the northern part of China'. The activity of this sect, and their great zeal for the promotion of christianity, deserve praise; and yet no one can suppose that the religion they instilled into the minds of these nations, was the pure Gospel of our Saviour. § 2. This Tartarian king, who was converted to christianity by the Nestorians, it is said, bore the name of John (after his baptism), and in token of his modesty, assumed the title of presbyter [or elder]. And hence, as learned men have conjectured, his successors all retained this title, down to the fourteenth century, or to the times of Gengis Kan, and were usually called each John Presbyter2. But all this is said, without adequate authority or proof: nor did that presbyter John, of whom there was so much said formerly, as also in modern times, begin to reign in this part of Asia, anterior to the close of the eleventh century. And yet it is placed beyond controversy, that the kings of the people called Carith, living on the borders of Cathaia, whom some denominate a tribe of Turks, and others of Tartars, constituting a considerable portion of the Moguls, did profess christianity from this time onward; and that no inconsiderable part of Tartary, or Asiatic 1 Jo. Sim. Asseman, Bibliotheca Oriental. Vaticana, tom. iii. pt. ii. p. 482, &c. Herbelot, Bibliothèque Orientale, p. 256, &c. [Mosheim, Historia Tartaror. Ecclesiast. p. 23, 24. It is there stated, that this Tartarian prince commanded more than 200,000 subjects; all of whom embraced christianity in the year A. D. 900. The authority for this account is, a letter of Ebed Jesu, archbishop of Meru, addressed to John, the Nestorian patriarch; and preserved by Abulpharajus, Chronic. Syr., and thence published by J. S. Asseman, Biblioth. Orient. Clem. Vat., tom. ii. p. 444, &c. The letter states, that this Tartarian king, while hunting, one day got lost in the wilderness, and was wholly unable to find his way out of it. A saint now appeared to him, and promised to show him the way, if he would become a christian. The king promised to do so. On returning to his camp, he called the christian merchants who were there to his presence, received instruction from them, and applied to the above-named Ebed Jesu for baptism. As his tribe fed only on flesh and milk, it became a question, how they were to keep the required fasts. This led Ebed Jesu to write to his patriarch, stating the case, and asking for instructions on the point. The patriarch directed the bishop to send two presbyters and two deacons among the tribe, to convert and baptize them, and to teach them to feed upon milk only, on fast days. Dr. Mosheim thinks the conversion of this tribe of Tartars is too well attested to be called in question; but the manner of it, he would divest somewhat of the marvellous. He suggests, that the saint, who appeared to the king in the wilderness, might be a Nestorian anchorite or hermit, residing there; who was able and willing to guide the king out of the wilderness, on the condition stated. Tr.] 2 See Asseman, Biblioth. Oriental. Vatic. tom. iii. pt. ii. p. 282. Scythia, lived under bishops sent among them by the pontiff of the Nestorians". § 3. In the West, Rollo, the son of a Norwegian count, and an arch-pirate, who was expelled his country', and who with his military followers took possession of a part of Gaul in the preceding century, embraced christianity, with his whole army, in the year 912. The French king, Charles the Simple, who was too weak to expel this warlike and intrepid stranger from his realm, offered him no inconsiderable portion of his territory, on condition of his desisting from war, marrying Gisela the daughter of Charles, and embracing the christian religion. Rollo embraced these terms without hesitation; and his soldiers, following the example of their general, yielded assent to a religion which they did not understand, and readily submitted to baptism'. These Norman pirates, as many facts demonstrate, were persons of no religion: and hence they were not restrained, by opinions embraced in early life, from embracing a religion which promised them great worldly advantages. From this Rollo, who assumed the name of Robert at his baptism, the celebrated dukes of Normandy in France, are descended; for a part of Neustria, with Bretagne, which Charles the Simple ceded to his son-in-law, was from this time called, after its new lords, Normandy". § 4. Micislaus, duke of Poland, was gradually wrought upon by his wife Dambrowka, daughter of Boleslaus, duke of Bohemia, till, in the year 965, he renounced the idolatry of his ancestors, and embraced christianity. When the news of this reached Rome, John XIII., the Roman pontiff, sent Egidius, bishop of Tusculum, accompanied by many Italian, French, and German priests, into Poland; that they might aid the duke and his wife, in their design of instructing the 3 The late Theoph. Sigef. Bayer purposed to write a history of the churches of China and northern Asia, in which he would treat particularly of these Nestorian churches in Tartary and China. See the Preface to his Museum Sinicum, p. 145. But a premature death prevented the execution of this and other contemplated works of this excellent man for the illustration of Asiatic christianity. 4 Holberg's Naval History of the Danes; inserted in the Scripta Societatis Scientiar. Hafniensis, pt. iii. p. 357, &c. 5 Boulay, Histor. Acad. Paris. tom. i. p. 296. Gabr. Daniel, Histoire de France, tom. ii. p. 587, &c. [It was Neustria properly, and not Bretagne, that received the name of Normandy from the Normans, who chose Rollo for their chief. Macl.] traced the origin of what is called the Sicilian monarchy, or the supreme power in matters of religion, which is claimed by the kings of Sicily: for Urban II. is said to have created this Roger and his successors, hereditary legates of the apostolic see, by a special diploma, dated A. D. 1097. The Romish court contend, that this diploma is a forgery: and hence, even in our times, those severe contests, between the Roman pontiffs and the kings of Sicily, respecting the Sicilian monarchy. The posterity of Roger governed Sicily down to the twelfth century; at first under the title of dukes, and then under that of kings'. For when he conquered Sicily, he allowed the Saracens, who chose to remain in the island, to live according to their own laws, and to follow their own religion, so long as they should continue obedient subjects. See Muratori, Annal. Ital. ad ann. 1090. Schl.] 9 See Cæs. Baronius, de Monarchia Sicilia Liber; in his Annales, tom. xi. and Lud. Ell. du Pin, Traité de la Monarchie Sicilienne. [The famous bull of the monarchy of Sicily is supposed to have been granted, at an interview of pope Urban II. with Roger duke of Sicily and Calabria, held at Salerno, A. D. 1098. The pope had appointed Robert, bishop of Frani, his legate à latere in Sicily. But the Duke, no stranger to the authority claimed by such legates, and to the disturbances they produced, entreated the pope to revoke the commission, plainly insinuating that he would suffer no legate in his dominions. As the duke had rendered signal services to the apostolic see, had driven the Saracens quite out of Sicily, and subjected all the churches of that island to the see of Rome, though claimed by the patriarch of Constantinople, the pope not only recalled the commission he had given to the bishop, but to engage the duke still more in his favour, he conferred upon him all the power he had granted to his legate, declaring him, his heirs, and his successors, hereditary legates, and vested with the legatine power, in its full extent. The bull is dated at Salerno, July, Indiction vii., Urban's reign xi. i. e. 1098. Here is some mistake, as the eleventh year of Urban coincided with the sixth year of the Indiction. And this error has been urged against the genuineness of the instrument, by Baronius, who inserts it, and endeavours to prove it a forgery, in the eleventh volume of his Annals. He also urges, that the buil if genuine, related only to Roger and his immediate descendants; that it was a family privilege, given to reward the personal services of Roger. Though many learned men regard the bull as of very questionable origin, and espe cially as the Sicilian monarchs, when challenged to do it, have not produced the original writings, yet the kings of Aragon, to whom Sicily was long subject, claimed and exercised the legatine power, as being the successors of duke Roger. And they would not suffer the eleventh volume of Baronius' Anais to circulate in their dominions, on account of its elaborate confutation of their claims. The same power has been likewise claimed, and sometimes exercised, by all the princes, who have been masters of that island, down to modern times. In the year 1715, Clement XI., having published two bulls, the one abolishing the monarchy, as it is called, and the other establishing a new plan of ecclesiastical government, the duke of Savoy, as sovereign of Sicily, banished all who received either of them out of the country. place, but the supreme ecclesiastical Some compromise has since taken power is still in the hands of the temporal sovereign of the country: that is, he is supreme head of the church there; has power to excommunicate § 4. From the times of Sylvester II., the Roman pontiffs had been meditating the extension of the limits of the church in Asia, and especially the expulsion of the Muhammedans from Palestine: but the troubles of Europe prevented the execution of their designs. Gregory VII., the most daring of all the pontiffs that ever sat in the chair of St. Peter, being excited by the perpetual complaints of the Asiatic christians respecting the cruelty of the Muhammedans, wished to engage personally in a holy war; and more than fifty thousand men prepared themselves for an expedition under him. But his controversy with the emperor Henry IV., of which we shall have occasion to speak hereafter, and other unexpected events, obliged him to abandon the design. But near the close of the century, a certain Frenchman of Amiens, Peter, surnamed the Hermit, was the occasion of the renewal of the design by Urban II. Peter visited Palestine in the year 1093, and there beheld, with great anguish of mind, the extreme oppressions and vexations, which the christians, residing at the holy places, suffered from the Muhammedans. Therefore, being wrought up to an enthusiasm, which he took to be a divine impulse, he first applied for aid to Simeon, the patriarch of Constantinople, [the Greek patriarch of Jerusalem,] and to Urban II., the Roman pontiff, without success; and then began to travel over Europe, calling on both princes and people to make war upon the tyrants of Palestine. He moreover carried with him an epistle on the subject, which came from heaven, was addressed to all christians, and was calculated to awaken the sensibilities of the ignorant 2. and absolve all persons whatever, ecclesiastics as well as laymen, and cardinals themselves, if resident in the island; he has a right to preside in all the provincial councils of the country, and to exercise all the jurisdiction of a legate à latere, vested with the fullest legatine power. And this power the sovereign may exercise, though a female; as in the instance of Jane of Aragon and Castile; and not only in his own person, but also by a commissioner of his appointment. For the more convenient exercise of this power, a commissioner, who is styled the Judge of the monarchy, is appointed by the king, whose tribunal is the supreme ecclesiastical court, for Sicily, Apulia, Calabria, Tarento, Malta, and the other Islands. Yet from him lies an appeal to the royal audience. See Bower's Lives of the Popes, vol. v. p. 340, and Stäudlin's Kirchl. Geographie, vol. i. p. 476, &c. Tr.] Gregory VII., Epistolarum lib. ii. ep. 31, and in Harduin's Concilia, tom. vi. pt. i. p. 1285. 2 This fact is mentioned by the abbot Dodechinus, in his Continuat. Chronici § 5. The public feelings being thus excited, Urban II., in the year 1095, assembled a very numerous council at Placentia, in which he first recommended this holy war'. dangerous enterprise was relished only by a few; although the ambassadors of the Greek emperor, Alexius Comnenus, were present, and in the name of their master represented the necessity of opposing the Turks, whose power was daily increasing. The business succeeded better in the council of Clermont, which was assembled soon after. For the French, being more enterprising and ready to face dangers, than the Italians, were so moved by the tumid eloquence of Urban. that a vast multitude, of all ranks and ages, were ready at once to engage in a military expedition to Palestine. This host seemed to be a very formidable army, and adequate to overcome almost any obstacles; but, in reality, it was very weak and pusillanimous for it was composed chiefly of monks, mechanics, farmers, persons averse from their regular occupations, spendthrifts, speculators, prostitutes, boys, girls, servants, malefactors, and the lowest dregs of the idle populace, who hoped to make their fortune. From such troops, what could be expected? Those attached to this camp were called Crusaders (cruciati); and the enterprise itself was called a Crusade (expeditio cruciata); not only, because they professedly were going to rescue the cross of our Lord from the hands of its enemies, but also, because they wore upon their right shoulders a white, red, or green cross made of woollen cloth, and solemnly consecrated'. Mariani Scoti; in the Scriptor. Ger- 3 [Berthold, a contemporary writer, says, there were present in this council about four thousand clergymen, and more than thirty thousand laymen, and that its sessions were held in the open air, because no church could contain the multitude. See Harduin's Concilia, tom. vi. pt. ii. p. 1711, &c. Tr.] Theod. Ruinart, Vita Urbani II. § cexxv. &c. p. 224. 229. 240. 272. 274. 282. 296, of the Opp. Posthum. of Jo. Mabillon, and Theodore Ruinart, tom. iii. Jo. Harduin's Concilia, tom. vi. pt. ii. p. 1726. Cæsar Baronius, Annal. Eccles. tom. xi. ad ann. 1095, No. xxxii. p. 648. [The number present at the council of Clermont is not definitely stated by the early writers, though they all agree that it was very great. There were thirteen archbishops, two hundred and fifty bishops, besides abbots and inferior clergy, with a multitude of laymen. The Acts of this council, with two speeches of Urban, are given by Harduin, Concilia, tom. vi. pt. ii. p. 1718, &e. Tr.] See Abrah. Bzovius, Continuat. Annal. Baronii, tom. xv. ad ann. 1410, § ix. p. 32, &c. ed. Colon, Jac. Lenfant, |