' THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA BEQUEST OF Alice R. Hilgard (L UL / THE LAST CRUSADER: OR, THE LIFE AND TIMES OF CARDINAL JULIAN, OF THE HOUSE OF CESARINI. A HISTORICAL SKETCH, BY ROBERT C. (JENKINS, M.A. TR1N. COLL. CAMB. RECTOR AND VICAR OF LYMINGE. "PRO FIDE CUPIO ET VOVI MORI." Ep. Juliani Card, ad Eii-geniiim IV. LONDON : RICHARD BENTLEY, NEW BURLINGTON STREET. $jttblis(pr ht dhbinarg ta p,er 1861. [The Right of Translation is reserved.'] LONDON : PRINTED BY R. CLAY, SON, AND TAYLOR, BREAD STREET HILL. GIFT -DA V 76 TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE STEPHEN LUSHINGTON, D.C.L. JUDGE OF THE HIGH COURT OF ADMIRALTY, DEAN OF THE COURT OF ARCHES, ETC. ETC. are g*bkat*b IN SINCERE ADMIRATION OF HIS PUBLIC AND PRIVATE LIFE, AND IN GRATEFUL RECOLLECTION OF THE KIND AND VALUED OFFICES OF A FRIENDSHIP OF MANY YEARS. April, 1861. CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. PACK ROME DURINQ THE SCHISM 1 CHAPTER II. CARDINAL BRANDA AND THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE .... 19 CHAPTER III. THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION 58 CHAPTER IV. ROME UNDER EUQENIUS IV 126 CHAPTER V. THE COUNCIL OF BASLE 181 CHAPTER VI. THE COUNCIL OF FLORENCE . 269 CHAPTER VK. THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION 313 APPENDICES . 383 LIST OF THE GENERAL AUTHORITIES EMPLOYED IN THE FOLLOWING PAGES. Sylvius Piccolomini (Pius II.) Opera Omnia. Ambrosii Camaldulensis Epistolse. Acta Concil. Basiliensis. Concilii Pisani et Senensis. (Par. 1612.) Grseca Concilii Florentini. (Rom. 1577.) Concil. General. Ed. Labbe, Mansi, &c. Andreas a Sancta Cruce (in Actis Concil. Florent. ab Horatio Justiniano edit.) Anonymi Vita Juliani, MS. in Bibliotheca Marucelliana. D'Attichy Flores Cardinalium, S.RE. Benedict XIV. de Synodo Dicecesana. Blondi Flavii Foroliviensis Decades. Bessarionis Epist. ad Joannem Lascharim, &c. Bonfinii Decades. Callimachi (Ph.) de Monte Wladislai et de Clade Varnensi, and de Vita Gregorii de Sanocenis. Cochlsei Historia Hussitarunx. Charlier (Gilles) ap. Baluzium (Miscellan. torn, iii.) Dlugoss Historia Polon. Du Chastenet, Histoire du Concile de Constance. Eugenii IV. Epistolae, &c. Eggs (G. von) Purpura docta. Fasciculus rerum Expetendarum. Garnefelt Vita. Nic. Albergati. Gobellini Commentaria, in vit. Pii II. Hussii (Johannis) de Ecclesia; Epistolse, &c. Juliani Cardinalis Epistola) ad Eugenium, Orationes, &c. xii LIST OF THE GENERAL AUTHORITIES. Lenfant Histoire du Concile de Basle. Maimbourg Histoire du Grand Schisme d'Occident. Nyder (Johan.) Formicarium. Niem (Theod.) de Schismate. Oswald de Job. Rokyczana, &c. Phranzse Chronicon. (Viennae 1796.) Poggii Vita Dominici Capranicse (ap. Baluzium.) Platinao Vitse Pontificum. Palatii Fasti Cardinalium Omnium. Procopowicz, de Processione Spiritus Sancti. Pray (Georg.) Annales Regum Hungarise. Panormitani Oratio ad Convent Francofurd. de Concil. Basil. &c. Raynaldi Cont. Annal. Baronii. Ricci (Vie de Scipio) par de Potter. Richerii Hist. Concil. Gen. Rosweydii de fide hsereticis servanda. Spondani Continuatio Annaliurn Baronii. Sylvestri Syropuli Historia Concilii Fiorerrtmi. Sansovino Historia di Casa Orsina. Seyfried Vita Hussi. Theobaldi (Z.) Bellum Hussiticiim. Tbwrocz Chronica Hungarorum. Ugbelli Italia Sacra (torn. iii. de Episcopis Grossetanis). Vertua di Soresina La Scienza Tbeologica, I'eminente Scienza di Gesu Cristo. Wilrdtwein Subsidia Diplomatica. Wessenberg. Die grossen Kirchenversammlungen des 15ten und 16ten Jahrhunderts. Von den Hardt Magnum Concilium Constantiense. PREFACE. THE public life of the subject of this narra- tive forms one of the most animated and exciting of the episodes in the great " History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire." The few masterly touches with which the features of the life of Cardinal Julian are there drawn, might constitute the attempt to produce a more finished portrait hazard- ous, were it not that the sketch of the great historian contains errors as well as imperfections errors which the impossibility of following up the separate lives of all the vi PREFACE. actors in a history of so vast a scope, made in a manner inevitable, and to which the ignorance of many of the documents relating to the fifteenth century, in the days of Gibbon, contributed not a little. It was to be expected that, instead of patiently dis- entangling the threads of this history, the great philosopher would merely cut the knot, and represent Julian as an interested convert, passing over from the Council to the Pope, from the selfish motives which were then too common. An early acquaintance with his letters to Eugenius from Basle, followed up by a careful comparison of the documents of that perplexing period, convinced the Author that the integrity and originality of this re- markable character had been altogether over- looked, and that both his friends and enemies had done it but scanty justice. This con- viction has led him to offer the following pages to the reader, written at different times during the intervals of parochial duty, and PREFACE. vii presenting to the eye the life of Julian in connexion with those great events in the Church and in the State in which he took so conspicuous a part. The key to that life is to be found in the great principle laid down at Constance "There can be no true union without reformation, nor true reforma- tion without union."* There remains to the Author only the task of making grateful mention of those who have assisted him during a work which, on account of frequent and long interruptions, has extended over many years. Among these he is able to number His Eminence Cardinal Wiseman, John Craufurd, Esq., the late Count Valerian Krasinski, Dr. Beolchi, J. B. Inglis, Esq., with others, to whom he desires to record his obligations. With this expression of them, he commends to the reader his attempt to fulfil (though in another language) the last wish of the cotemporary biographer * Petri de Alliaco, Sermo super verba " Laetare Hiermalem" viii PREFACE. and friend of the Cardinal, " Prego adunque chi si volesse affaticare di comporre la vita sua in Latino, lo facci, che maggiore opera di pieta e di buono exempio non potrebbo fare di quello, di scrivere uria vita di si degno huomo quanto fu Messer Giuliano, exempio a tutto il mondo di tutte degne conditioni possono essere in uno huomo."* * Vespasiano Florentine (ap. Ughelli Italia Sacra, de Ep. Gros- setanis, torn. iii. p. 775), April, 1861. THE LAST CRUSADER. CHAPTER I. ROME DURING THE SCHISM. THE family Cesarini, which already in the sixteenth century is ranked by Sansovino "fra le case antiche di Roma" and numbered with the Savelli, the Anni- baldi, the Conti, and even with the half-regal Orsini, derived its origin from a branch of the Montanari, which had flourished in Rome during the middle ages. In the beginning of the fifteenth century, it appears first to have assumed that patronymic, which, through the two succeeding ages, has been handed down as one of the most illustrious in the nobility of Rome, and which, with the vast inheritance which followed it, merged, at the close of the seventeenth century, in the great houses of Colonna and Sforza.* * See the pedigree of the Cesarini family, in the " Famiglie Celebri Italiani" of Count Litta, and Sansovino, "degli Uomini illustri della Casa Orsina," p. 2 (Ven. 1565). See also, for the early period of the life of Julian, the cotemporary biography of Vespasiano Fiorentino (Ap. Ughelli, Ital. Sacr. de Episcopis Grossetanis). 2 THE LAST CRUSADER Giovanni de Montanari, who lived in the beginning of the fourteenth century, was the father of Orso, and grandfather of Andreuzzo, who, by his marriage with Paolotia Rustici, had among other children a son Orso, who, by a fortunate alliance with the rich heiress Semidea Brancaleone, laid the foundations of the opulence of the Cesarini, and a younger son Giuliano, who, as the great Cardinal Julian of the fifteenth century, was*the first to establish, on a histo- rical basis, the name which had been then so recently assumed. Born in 1398, in the midst of that fatal schism which divided the Church first into two, and then into three obediences, and reduced Rome to a state of ruin and anarchy, which the wildest periods of the tumul- tuous history of the papacy had never yet witnessed, the early years of Julian, like that of his great cotem- poraries, were passed under a pressure of hardship and privation, which, while it prepared him for the labours of his after life, inspired his mind with the two great influences which animated it to the very last the longing for the outward unity of the Church as the first step to its reformation, and for the complete reformation of the Church, as the only means of its vital and permanent union. For more than seventy years, a season which the Romans might well deplore as their Babylonian cap- tivity, the popes, with their court, had resided at Avig- non, whither their political tendencies towards France HOME DURING THE SCHISM. 3 had first led them, and where the influence of Prance in the consistory, and in the conclave, had retained them, until the year 1374, in which, moved by the revelations of St. Catherine of Siena, though proba- bly more deeply influenced by ragioni di stato, to which the disclosures of the Saint gave a religious pretext, Gregory XI. re-entered Rome and re-estab- lished the supreme power in the ancient centre of the visible monarchy ; but Italy had too long been left a prey to the factions of its princes, and the tumults of its peoples, to settle down into order and tranquillity on the mere reappearance of the sovereign pontiffs. The policy of division of power which the courts of France and the empire had found to be so successful, and which gave to the one by the presence of the papal court in its own territory, and to the other by the absence of any rival power in Italy, so great advantages, was in no degree obviated by the return of the Roman court to its proper centre. The paramount influence of France remained still in the Sacred College, while the government of the popes was impotent even in the streets of Rome. When the extravagant joys of the Romans had passed away, the real desolation of the country and ruin of the Church became more apparent than ever, and the disheartened pontiff soon found that he had done little more than transfer from a scene of com- parative security to one of the most hopeless anarchy a house divided against itself a court in which the B2 4 THE LAST CEUSADER. French and Italian parties existed in all their old inveteracy, and were even subdivided into factions of greater virulence and animosity. For while in every part of the Roman States " the pontiffs, by governing by deputy (a terza mano), had lost much of their ancient estimation and grandeur, and mur- ders, rapine, and confusion, reigned everywhere, in Rome the confusion was still greater, arid the people brought to such a state of degradation, that they suffered themselves to be led and disturbed by every slightest movement giving occasion to one disorder after another."* The great pestilence of 1348, described with such eloquence by Boccaccio, was succeeded by years of tumult, opening the way to a dearth of provisions of all kinds, which almost amounted to a famine. And although the Caporioni (or Bannerets), who had, since the residence of the popes at Avignon, usurped the entire government of the city, pledged themselves to restore it to the returned pontiff, they failed to fulfil their promise ; and the tumults which filled the streets of Rome, and carried by means of violence and intimidation every measure which had the popular approval, made it even easier for Gregory to preserve the fiction of government at Avignon than in Rome itself. Wearied out with his efforts to appease the Romans, and to unite the members of the Sacred College, which numbered thirteen French to only * Sansovino, " Historia di Casa Orsina," p. 56. ROME DUKING THE SCHISM. 5 four Italian cardinals, the aged pontiff expired in the palace of the Vatican, on the 26th of March, 1378. The scene of discord and confusion that followed was indescribable; and though the invasion of the conclave by the Roman populace is softened down by the historians of that side into a mere deputation of entreaty and supplication, that the electors would choose a Roman, and thus secure the establishment of the papacy in Italy, the evidence on the other side greatly preponderates : and it is certain that the elec- tion which followed, though canonical and unanimous to all appearance, was in no respect free, even if it were not fictitious for it would appear, from cir- cumstances which followed, that the cardinals them- selves, in uniting their suffrages for one not of their own number Bartolomeo Prignano, Archbishop of Bari, a Neapolitan by birth, but connected through a long residence in France with the French party in the conclave merely designed to pacify the Romans until they could escape from their hands, and reckoned on the voluntary resignation of the subject of this forced election, who, as a strict observer of the canon laws, might be expected at once to acknowledge the irregu- larity of these proceedings.* He, however, not only accepted the dignity, but at once obliged them to confirm him in its possession by a due enthronization, making use, in this instance, of the very power which * Cod. MS. Bibl. Viet. ap. Spondan. 6 THE LAST CRUSADER. had forced on his election the Caporioni whose influence he from that moment conciliated. Of the new pontiff, who assumed the name of Urban VI., we may say (as has been said of the popes generally), "This is he of whom nothing not great, nothing not exceeding the ordinary state of mankind, on the one side or on the other, is thought or spoken." And difficult, indeed, it is to find the historical mean in such a case. But for the frightful cruelties of his after life, we should esteem him merely a severe Church reformer, an austere reviver of all the ancient canons against the countless abuses of manners and discipline which had grown up in the wildest luxuriance during the exile of the papacy^ a kind of anticipation in the fourteenth century of the morose, but elevated character of Pius V. Against the abuses which now reigned universally, he began at once to oppose himself with the greatest vehemence, but with a degree of indiscretion which is almost incredible. On Easter Monday, the day after his coronation, in the presence of his secretary, the celebrated historian, Theodoric a Niem, he pub- licly reproached the bishops who came thither, " for neglecting their churches, and breaking their oath of residence," upon which the Bishop of Pam- peluna, his own referendary, defended his order with great boldness, affirming that on public grounds alone he came to the court of Rome, which he was ready to leave at once. A few days after, in a public con- ROME DURING THE SCHISM. 7 sistory, which was attended by a large concourse of cardinals and bishops, he held a discourse on the words, " I am the good shepherd," in which he bitterly denounced the lives of the prelacy, and deepened the fatal impression of his first address. But his indiscretion became almost grotesque, when he received one of the collectors of the Apostolic Chamber, who was rendering him an account of his moneys, with the words, "Thy money perish with thee." This extraordinary conduct, repeated day after day, and extended to the highest of the laity as well as of the clergy, and to those best affected to his govern- ment, and crowned at last by the most marked insults to the Duke Otho, of Brunswick, and his wife, Joanna, Queen of Sicily, led the principal number of the cardinals, under the pretence of visiting their country-houses, to seek refuge in Anagni, from which place, for security, they removed to Fondi, in the kingdom of Naples, Prom thence they protested to the world that their previous election was void and uncanonical, and at once proceeded to the election of another pope, in the person of Robert, Count of Geneva and Cardinal, who assumed the name of Cle- ment VII. and was crowned before the cathedral of Fondi, in the presence of all the Neapolitan court, including Otho, Duke of Brunswick, whom the in^ fatuation of Urban had turned from a devoted friend into an irreconcilable enemy. Thus was opened that memorable division of the papacy which, under the 8 THE LAST CRUSADER. name of the Great Schism of the West, separated Europe first into two, and then three, obediences, un- til the Council of Constance, nearly forty years after, restored the unity of the papal throne, but which dis- tracted and corrupted the Western Church to a degree which admitted of no synodical remedy, and, by the accumulation of abuses, prepared the way for the Reformation of the sixteenth century. It may be questioned whether the immense collec- tion of treatises written on either side of this disastrous quarrel, and collected in thirty-two folio volumes in the library of the Vatican, can throw any clearer light upon the causes which led to so violent a division than that which the observation of the state and policy of the courts of Europe at this time supplies. Indeed, if the contradictory statements of the two secretaries of Urban VI., Niem and Gobelinus (who at least were eye-witnesses), are a fair specimen of the manner in which historical facts are treated on both sides, we may conclude that the multitude of these advocates rather confuse still further this perplexing history, than give any means of determining its true bearings. So confused it was, even to those who had the best opportunity of tracing its origin and course, that Niem entitles his collection of public documents and personal notes relating to it the "Nemus Unionis" dividing it into paths, by-ways, thickets, and hills which close in one great chaos or labyrinth. In a political aspect, the grounds of the great schism ROME DURING THE SCHISM. 9 are more distinct than they are from a religious or ecclesiastical point of view. The papal monarchy had attained its great elevation by two courses of policy, which it alternated during the middle ages with great success. The one was the union of the states of Europe in some great object of a religious character, by which their attention was drawn away from their own interests, and their strength from the protection of their own authority and the advancement of their political influence. This the crusades effected in the most remarkable degree ; and the history of the papacy from the period of the first crusade until the day when Pius II. sought, in the very close of his life, to rekindle the devotion of the faithful in the same cause, proves clearly that the fear of the Turkish power was far less real than the apprehension that, in the absence of such a ground of alarm, the countries of Europe would discover their true strength and solid interests, and become less and less dependent on Home. The second great principle of policy, which became more and more prominent as the former became ex- hausted in the history of Europe, was the policy of division, so successfully carried out down to the period of the Reformation, from which time the history of the papacy as a political power may be said to have ceased. Both these paths to political power were cut off by the schism which, while it suspended all the actual authority of the court of Rome, and threw the 10 THE LAST CRUSADER. government of the Church into interminable doubt, enabled the states of Europe, and specially the re- publics of Italy, to carry on their commerce, and increase their strength, to a degree unknown before. " See you not," writes Niem to a friend with whom he is sympathising on the ruin of the Church, " how the Venetians and Florentines have been lifted up during this schism, who, until it began, were in the most depressed state ? " * In proportion, moreover, as the see of Rome had lost its influence, the power of national Churches became increased. The final appeal, in the absence of any determination of the rightful possessor of the papacy, flowed back upon the metropolitans f the independent authority of synods revived, until the great principle of their supreme authority over the popes themselves, and their right to legislate freely for the whole Church, became established by the Council of Constance. The indifference of the princes of Europe to the papal authority was illustrated by the fact that, though every one of them assumed the side of one or other of the disputers for the papal throne, by none it was regarded as a subject of deep importance. A difference which two centuries before would have, * Niem (Nemus Unionis, c. xl.) Platina (in Vita Gregorii X.), and Johannes Marius Belga (de Schismat. et Concil. p. 1. c. i.), accuse the Venetians as being the authors of the schism, and of tin dissension between the Roman and Gallican Churches. t Wiirdtwein Subsidia Diplomatica. t. vii. p. 413. ROME DURING THE SCHISM. H beyond question, plunged Europe in a general war, left the relations of its several states unchanged. Notwithstanding the mutual citations and excom- munications of the anti-popes, the princes and nobles of Germany scrupled not to form alliances with those of Prance who lay under the interdict of schism ; and the prelates and clergy of both obediences lived in social intercourse and friendship, utterly regardless of the excommunications of their respective heads.* Urban VI. died in 1389, and was succeeded by Boniface IX., of the Neapolitan family of Tomacelli. His rival, Clement VII. (who, following the traditional feelings of his electors, fixed his seat at Avignor), survived till 1393, and had, as his successor, the Cardinal of Arragon (better known as Pierre de Lune), who assumed the title of Benedict XIII. Meantime, the Roman throne was filled by Innocent VII. (of the family Migliorati), Gregory XII. (Angelo Corario), Alexander V. and John XXIII. (Balthasar Cossa). Of these Gregory XII. had pledged himself to resign the papacy if Benedict XIII. would do so at the same time ; but the latter having fled into Spain, and there resumed his title, Gregory, who had taken refuge at Rimini, maintained his own : so that the fifteenth century dawned upon a threefold papacy, and witnessed the verenda et abominanda Trinitas paparum which Cardinal Pierre d'Ailly deplored at Constance. * Niem, Nemus Unionis, c. xliv. 12 THE LAST CRUSADER. Such was the state of Rome in the opening years of Cardinal Julian. He had experienced from his earliest years the afflictions of his native city, and from his earliest years he longed and laboured for their relief. His indignant question to Eugenius IV. in his after life, "Am not I a member of the Church and of the court of Rome?" had its first inspiration in the day when he saw the Church of Rome divided and its court deserted ; when, under the pressure of poverty and in the foresight of the ruin of the Church from its countless abuses and hopeless divisions, he en- rolled himself as a student in the University of Perugia. When we read of the city of Rome at this period, that " the houses and churches were in a state of ruin that even the monastery of St. James, that ancient and venerable asylum of the lords cardinals, and of poor and holy men, was unable to escape destruction"* we may picture the state of a provincial city of Italy at this time. It is difficult indeed to conceive how the Uni- versity of Perugia, founded less than a century before, could withstand the pressure of those calami- ties that had desolated the Roman States, for the poverty of its students was illustrated by the fact that Julian had not the means of procuring himself a full copy of the Pandects, the very text-book of his studies and subsequent lectures on jurisprudence, and was compelled to write out with his own hand the * Niem, Nemus Unionis, Tract, iii. ROME DURING THE SCHISM. 13 marginal glosses, a task for which he was well fitted, as (to use the words of his cotemporary biographer Vespasiano Fiorentino) " era gentilissimo scrittore" While at Perugia, he resided in the house of the Buontempi family, where, by his literary talents and early promise, he soon became known to the governor of the city, Bindaccio da Riccasoli, " a literary man, and a lover of men of letters/' At his house the young Cesarini had ever a ready welcome, and to this earliest patron he dedicated some poetical essays which he composed during his univer- sity career. But these gave no interruption to the study of the Roman law, which engrossed all his time and labour, and on which from a student he became in the ordinary course a lecturer, numbering among his auditory several of the most eminent of his cotem- poraries, of whom Dominico Capranica is specially mentioned, a man of stern and exalted character, the friend and companion of Julian in his after life, and elevated to the cardinalate in the same promotion. It is easy to trace from the writings and speeches of Julian in after life, whether we take up the synodical epistles which he indited at Basle, or the subtle disputations which he conducted at Florence, how much he was indebted to this early discipline for his subsequent controversial successes. The study of the Roman law, occasioned by the discovery of the Pandects of Justinian in the eleventh century in the city of Amalfi, had formed, from that period, the 14 THE LAST CUUSADER. foundation of the teaching of the universities of Italy, and was their only security against the progress of decretal ism and the false principles of the canon law, which in the end superseded it in all the schools of Europe. The freedom and success of the republics of Italy were chiefly maintained by the force of those solid principles which the Roman law so early engrafted upon the minds of their statesmen and even clergy,* and incorporated in the laws they established. Nor did anything tend more to promote the triumph of the civil over the pontifical law than the great schism, which, by dividing the headship and throwing it into inextricable confusion, had proved the principles and maxims of the decretalists to be as practically worthless as they were afterwards proved to be histori- cally false and groundless. The views of these absolutists of the Roman monarchy arose naturally out of that great phenomenon of the middle ages, which the period of Gregory VII. and Innocent III. exhibited in its fullest perfection. The Church of Rome, emerging from the darkness and confusion of the middle ages, had then arrived at the form of an absolute spiritual monarchy ; and a prac- tical expediency, if not a positive necessity, of government identified the unity of the whole Church with the unity of the presiding see. * Of this St. Bernard complains to Eugenius III., "Et quidem qtio- tidie perstrepunt in Palatio leges, sed Justiniani, non Domini." ( 1. i. de Consideratione, cap. iv.) ROME DURING THE SCHISM. 15 The great moral superiority which Rome still retained had given it a moderating influence between the conflicting powers of Europe, civil and religious, during the period in which the elements of nationality were forming, and the impressions of religious autho- rity were the deepest and most lasting. The spiritual passed imperceptibly into the temporal, the religious into the political bond. The chair of advice and consultation became, by degrees, a tribunal of authoritative appeal,* and this was hastened by the assumption of a legal form and system in briefs and synodical writings, f The foundation of its imperial rank, upon which the primacy of the Church of Rome had been left by the Council of Chalcedony became too weak to bear the vast superstructure of the ecclesiastical monarchy. The supposed donation of Constantine added but little strength to the old foundation; and in trans- ferring the fabric of power to the higher donation of Christ himself to St. Peter, a stability and perpetuity was given to its authority, enabling it to give sanction and solidity to every other tenure of power. The boldness of this theory, the simplicity of its plan, and, above all, the success of the forged decretal * See a memoir of Bishop Ricci on Reservations, and on the Origin of the Appellate Jurisdiction of Rome. (Memoires de Ricci, par de Potter, torn. iv. p. 222.) t Van Espen. Jus. Eccl. p. 3. t. vii. c. i. 13. J dia TO (3a(TlXfVlV TTJV TtoXlV Kftt>r)V. Condi. Chatc. Can. 28. 16 THE LAST CRUSADER epistles, and their triumph over the system of the ancient canon law, which established an aristocratic rather than a monarchical government in the Church, completed the building of this visible monarchy, and suggested to later ages a new argument, derived from the mere fact of an early acknowledged and universally recognised supremacy. The divines of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries were content to frame a theory in accordance with the facts before them ; and at a time when all ecclesiastical power flowed from Rome without dispute and without obstruction, they gladly escaped from the troubled waves of controversy, and cast anchor in the decision that Rome was the proper and only source of power. Hence arose the principles of decretalism, and the supposition of a jurisdiction " prevenient and concurrent " in every part of the Church, whereby the episcopal and every other authority were rather leased out to their occu- pants than held in their own right. Upon this supposition were based all the exactions of the court of Rome, its annates and other extortions, which were little else than fines paid to the supreme pontiff on the succession to any benefice, presupposing a kind of tenancy under the papal monarchy. To carry out this scheme more fully, the religious orders were gradually made independent of the ordi- nary jurisdiction, and peculiars .erected everywhere, giving the popes a direct, as well as an indirect, influence in every diocese. When, however, the ROME DURING THE SCHISM. 17 monarchy was divided by the great schism, and the headship fell into endless dispute, the minds of men were dislodged from their resting-place, and found the necessity of arriving at some more rational principle of ecclesiastical order and power. The great maxim of St. Augustine, that the keys were given " not to one, but to unity " (non uni, sed unitati), led them to look on towards sy nodical autho- rity and determination, and to maintain that the whole Church had the right of reforming every member of its body, even though that member were Rome itself; that the ruling see was within the body, though it presided over it ; and that the pope was less the "vicar of Christ " than the " vicar of the Church" of which he was only the " ministerial head."* And when the Council of Constance deposed the three anti-popes by a single act of power, the advocates of the independent supremacy of the see of Rome were left without any resting-place. " They have already " (wrote Huss, from Constance, in allusion to the epithets of Roman flattery) " cut off the head of the Church, they have torn out the heart of the Church ; the all-sufficient refuge of the Church, to which every Christian ought to flee, they have made utterly to fail/' It was under these altered circumstances of the Christian world, when men were preparing themselves for this great change in the relations of this Church, * Concil. Basil. Ep. Synodal. Cogitanti." Thorn, de Corsellis (ap. ^Enseam Sylvium. Hist. Basil. Concil. 1. i.). 18 THE LAST CRUSADER. and were looking anxiously for a new and firmer basis of ecclesiastical power, that Julian returned to Rome, where he was soon received into the family of a still more eminent patron, Branda di Castiglione, the Cardinal of Piacenza. The unity of the papacy had been secured by the Council of Constance by the election of Pope Martin V., one of the chiefs of the illustrious house of Colonna, whose devotion to the empire was a guarantee of the success of his mission as the uniter of the whole Church, the builder anew of the shattered monarchy. Of the two great objects of the council, the restora- tion of the unity of the Church, and the work of its reformation, the latter alone remained ; but it was infinitely the greater and harder : and the failure to accomplish it at Constance was the root of the Reform- ation of the following century. But, to understand clearly the position of the Roman Church and court at this time, we are led to fall back for a moment on the life of Cardinal Branda, whose part in these great events was somewhat earlier, and whose influence and experi- ence contributed so materially to form the public character of Julian. CHAPTER, II. CARDINAL BRANDA AND THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. BRANDA DI CASTIGLIONE, generally called by the historians of this period the Cardinal of Piacenza, to the bishopric of which city he was nominated by Boniface IX., was a noble Milanese, brought up under the patronage of the Grand Duke Galeazzo Yisconti, and was considered the most eminent jurisconsult of his age. He remained faithful in his obedience to the successors of Urban VI., until, on the failure of Gre- gory XII. to redeem the pledge solemnly made on his election, to hold his office only provisionally, and until a determination of the controversy should be made synodically, and in the meantime to elect no new cardinals, he renounced his allegiance to that pon- tiff, who at once deprived him of his bishopric and all his other honours. In 1408 he joined the council which had just assem- bled at Pisa to effect the reunion of the Church, and which Balthasar Cossa, afterwards Pope John XXIII., is alleged to have hastened in consequence of his per- c 2 20 THE LAST CRUSADER. sonal animosity to Gregory XII.,* and his ambitious desire to fill the throne so soon to become vacant. The near neighbourhood of Rome, or rather perhaps the paramount influence of the cardinals and members of the court of Rome in the Council of Pisa, rendered that assembly wholly abortive in the matter of the reform of the Church, while the absolute want of executive authority, occasioned by the divided state of the secular powers of Europe, which stood aloof from a council so purely Roman in its origin and structure, deprived its efforts after the union of the Church of all their effect. By the election of Alexander V. to the papacy, declared vacant by the deposition of Benedict XIII. and Gregory XIL, against whom the council pro- ceeded with all the formalities of the law, but who maintained their respective claims in defiance of all its acts, it left the Church in a worse condition than that in which it found it, and divided it into three, instead of two obediences. " Thus," as the writer of the time observes, " out of all the forethought and wisdom of the men of all parts of the world who wished to make one head, they contrived to make three popes instead ; truly," he adds, " there is too much reason to fear that if the Council of Constance takes place, a fourth will be made there/'f * Niem, de Vita et fatis Joan. XXII. c. xiii. (ap. Von der Hardt.) t Th'eodoric a Vrie, Hist. Concil. Constat. 1. v. ap. fin. THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 21 The prelates and ambassadors left in such haste at the close of the council, that the fathers found a ready excuse from entering upon the subject of reformation, which they remitted to the future council in the very cool terms : " Whereas, our Lord the Pope, with the advice of the council, intended to reform the Church in its head and members, to which end many things have been expedited by him, and many others concerning the state and favour of the prelates and inferior clergy remain, which, on account of the departure of the prelates and ambassadors, cannot be carried on : therefore our Lord, the holy synod requiring and approving, suspends and pro- rogues the said reformation to the ensuing council already convoked."* This last session was held on the 7th of August, 1408 ; and whether the new pontiff had the capacity or the will to enter upon the great work of reforma- tion, the opportunity at least failed him ; for in less than eleven months after his election, his death left a new vacancy in the papal throne, which was filled by the election of Balthasar Cossa, who assumed the name of John XXIII. Cardinal Branda had, as Bishop of Piacenza, taken an active part in the business (if such it could be called) of the Council of Pisa ; and his zeal in the cause of a body which (for his own advancement and for the abasement of Gregory XII.) the new pontiff * Acta Concil. Pisan. Soss. xxiii. 22 THE LAST CRUSADER. had so greatly hastened, marked him out for special favour. He was accordingly included in the first pro- motion of the new pontiff, being restored to his bishopric, and made cardinal in 1410. The Council of Pisa, unimportant as it was in itself, and without success in the main design of its assembly, yet was not altogether ineffectual in clearing the way for the great work of reform, which in its public sessions it passed by unnoticed. As the first occasion on which the heads of the Church were brought together, to discuss and deplore its state as a point of union and intercourse to those great minds which became developed in the Council of Constance, and have left in the records of its acts imperishable monuments of wisdom and maxims of ecclesiastical experience above all, as the scene in which that new theory of the Church was opened which the Councils of Constance and Basle matured, and to which alone whatever liberty remains in the Roman Church must trace its origin we may well view the Assembly of Pisa as a necessary prelude to the Council of Constance a fit introduction to its political and religious history. In its acts we find, for the first time, the contenders for the papacy dealt with as subjects of the Church, and not as its absolute monarchs. In the sermons preached before it, we find the first public recognition of those doctrines, which the learning and eloquence of Gerson, D'Ailly, Zabarella, and the great reformers of the fifteenth THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 23 century, commended to the Council of Constance. And though the acts of the council give but a passing notice of these discourses, we can well fill up in imagination the argument of the French divine, Pierre Plaoul, in the thirteenth session, who, from the words of Hosea (i. 11), " Then shall the children of Judah and the children of Israel be gathered together, and appoint themselves one head," beautifully deduced the exaltation of the Church and its superiority over the pope. It was in this manner that the members of the Council of Constance became prepared for their future station in that great assembly, and were stimulated to hasten its advent. The four years which intervened between the promotion of Cardinal Branda and the assembly of the Council of Constance, while they saw the abuses of the Church multiplied arid its confusions increased, witnessed also the multiplication of con- ferences and treatises on the reformation of the Church, and increasing efforts to clear the way for the great event of the age, a free and general council con- voked by an emperor, and held in one of the free cities of the West, as a guarantee of its liberty and authority. The fears of the new pontiff, in the meantime, lest the subject of reformation should be seriously taken up, and that by a body removed from his own in- fluence, led him to convoke a council in the Lateran a policy which has been steadily followed by the court 24 THE LAST CRUSADER. of Rome whenever the danger of an independent synod, held out of Italy, has threatened its security. The acts of this shadowy body were, however, rather ludicrous than formidable. In the first session, held in the Lateran church, a great screech owl, flying from the corner of the building, fixed its eyes with a frightful glare on the pope, and threw the assembly into confusion with its horrible cries. The session was prorogued, but the visit of the owl was prorogued also, for it reappeared in the following meeting, and though at last pursued and killed, the fatal omen remained ; and the council, after an ineffectual protest against the heresies of Wiclif and Huss, and the pretensions of the two other an ti- popes, was dis- solved almost immediately after its assembly. Of the strange incident which marked its opening, and which Nicolas de Clemangis had on the solemn testimony of one of its members, it has been pleasantly observed by an old writer, that " at length the holy dove being departed" from such assemblies, "an ominous owl overlooked the Lateran fathers, and though with much clamour they destroyed the appear- ing fowl, yet the foul spirit of darkness and error wrought as effectually in them as ever." * The pope, seeing that he could no longer put off the period of a general council, strove in vain to make Italy the scene of its assembly. In a conference with the Emperor Sigismund, at Lodi, he used every in- * Dr. Owen's Sermons, p. 227. THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 25 fluence to carry this great point, but the emperor was inflexible. To the difficulty of the cardinals crossing the Alps into Germany, he opposed the still greater difficulty of the spiritual electors crossing them to reach Italy.* With a heavy heart the pontiff yielded, and from the scene of this meeting there went forth from the emperor and from Pope John XXIII. the letters convoking the assembly of the council at Constance, on the 1st of November, 1414. The pope did not arrive at Constance until the 28th of October, having been delayed on his journey by the snow, in which, on his reaching the Adlerberg, he was completely fixed. According to Ulrich von Reichen- thal, a cotemporary historian, his exclamation on this emergency was not very canonical, " Here I lie ! " he cried out to his attendants, " in the name of the devil ; Why did I not remain at Bologna ?"f On his arriving at Feldkirch, which commands the view of Constance and the Bodensee, he somewhat facetiously prophesied his own fate. " It looks," he said, " just like a hole in which they catch foxes/'} To ascend to the more solemn view of another cotemporary, " It pleased the supreme pontiff to go to Constance, not to judge, but to be judged ;"$ but the multitude and splendour of his retinue, the amount of his largesses, and the companionship of Duke Frederic of Austria, * Von der Hardt, vi. p. 5 and vi. p. 3 . 9. f Ulric. Reichenthal. Chron. 14. J Reichenthal. 1. c. Trithem. Chron. Hirschaug. ii. 336. Theod. a Niem, Hist. Concil. Const. 1. vi. dist. 4. 26 THE LAST CRUSADER. indicated that the conviction of the certainty of his re-election was the sole motive of his appearing in Constance, though for a short period it was prudently dissembled. In a train consisting of nine cardinals, among whom was the Cardinal of Piacenza, and a vast number of archbishops, prelates, and doctors, he entered Con- stance in state, seated on a white horse, adorned with scarlet trappings, and preceded by another bearing the consecrated host. Six hundred persons were in his immediate suite, twelve hundred formed the retinue of the cardinals ; besides whom there were twelve secre- taries, two hundred and seventy-three notaries, and twelve hundred and seventy-two doctors. The Duke Frederic of Austria accompanied the pontiff, and increased the splendour ,of a procession which rather resembled a public triumph than an act of submission. Among the papal followers on this memorable occasion was the great financier and money-changer, Cosmo de Medici, the ancestor of that illustrious house, which reigned afterwards in Florence, whose rise from com- parative obscurity was attributed to his connexion with John XXIII., whose simoniacal exactions and pecuniary necessities became the foundation of the wealth of the great Florentine. Other cardinals and bishops followed soon after ; and by the time of the arrival of the Emperor Sigismund, on the evening of Christmas-day, with all the circumstances of pomp and majesty which belonged to the empire in the THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 27 days of its greatest glory, the council numbered 33 cardinals, 346 prelates, 2,148 abbots and doctors, both lay and clerical, 564 heads of religious houses, and 1,600 noblemen, bringing up the strangers assem- bled in Constance to the almost incredible number of 50,000. But a few days after the procession of Pope John XXIIL, the people of Constance witnessed an arrival, whose circumstances exhibited a strange and affecting contrast to that gaudy and unmeaning pageant. Attended by his constant friend the Baron de Chlurn, and a few devoted followers " faithful found amid the faithless " of that day of self-seeking and time-serving duplicity John Huss, whose name is too great for the epithets of earthly honour, entered the scene of his afflictions, of his condemnation, and of his cruel and glorious martyrdom. His simple and touching letters from Constance to his friends in Bohemia, and to the faithful congregation of the chapel of Bethlehem, never again destined to see his face, and to hear his words of solemn pleading and of deep though mystic piety, survive to this day, and throw a light upon the scene before us which it can receive from no other page of coteniporary history. A few years before this, and in the beginning of that great Bohemian movement which recognised Huss as its originator and martyr, two Englishmen, followers of Wiclif, are said to have painted on the walls of an inn at Prague a picture of significant con- 28 THE LAST CRUSADER. trast. On the one side Christ was entering Jeru- salem in the triumph of His great humility, surrounded by the apostles, and followed by the joyful multitude ; on the other, the pope was entering Rome, surrounded by his cardinals and with every emblem of earthly sovereignty and secular pride. On the memorable day which saw the reformer and his friends enter Con- stance, this contrast became realised in the disciple as well as in the Master ; and the thousands of strangers who thronged the gates of Constance asking " Who is this ? " might have well been carried back in lively retrospect to the day when the multitude uttered the same words in the crowded streets of Jerusalem. Soon after the arrival of the emperor, the ambassa- dors of the two anti-popes arrived, one or two of whom were cardinals of the hostile obediences ; and their assumption of the cardinalitial insignia created no little difficulty. The council which recognised that of Pisa as legitimate, and even regarded itself as the continuation of that assembly, could not reasonably acknowledge even the provisional claims of those who had been formally deprived of the papacy by the fathers of Pisa. The jealousies which this difficulty occasioned were increased by the mutilation of the arms of Gregory XII., which his ambassador had put over his house, an indignity which was believed to have been instigated by John XXIII. himself. The predominance of the secular power in the council began early to show itself; and the determi- THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 29 nation to reduce the influence of the court of Rome was evidenced by the manner in which the assembly was constituted and the power of the Italian bishops neutralized. The entire council upon its opening was divided into four nations the German, the Trench, the Italian, and the English to which (after the sub- traction of the kingdom of Arragon from the obedience of Benedict XIII.) the Spanish nation was added as a fifth. Every nation chose its own president, who was changed every month. All the subjects of discussion were treated upon in the first instance by each nation separately. Thence they were carried up to a general meeting of all the nations, the decision of the majority of which came before the council in its public and full sessions, in which the voting was repeated by nations, and published as a synodical decree. The pope in vain contended against a plan which virtually cut off all his power over the body, and against which he afterwards protested as an innovation unknown to the Christian world before.* He had reckoned on the paramount influence he possessed over the Italian bishops, whom he had increased by the nomination of titular bishops, and who all were de- voted to his cause from motives of self-interest or gratitude. f The constitution of the council he foresaw therefore as the death-blow of ah 1 his influence. * Ep. Joan. XXIII. ad Wladislaum. apud du Chastenet, " Preuves de la Nouvelle Histoire du Concile de Constance," p. 316. f Wessenberg, torn. ii. p. 117. 30 THE LAST CRUSADER. Nor were the cardinals less dissatisfied with an arrangement which denied them their accustomed influence as leaders and moderators, and merged them in their respective nations ; in whose congregations they not only found themselves standing on the same level as the bishops and doctors, but even treated by these with such distrust and reserve that they rarely became acquainted with the subjects to be legis- lated upon until the decision of the nations had nearly arrived at maturity.* It is this peculiarity in the structure of the council that gives to its acts so irregular and unsystematic a form, and makes even the admirable diary of its proceedings, drawn up by Von der Hardt, a very insufficient clue to the mass of documents relating to it, which he has collected with such judgment and assiduity. To follow its proceedings in chrono- logical order, would be to take up and to drop one thread after another of its actual history. Our object will be, therefore, to present an outline of those leading and characteristic features, which give to the great Council of Constance such a prominence in the history of the world, as no other assembly of the kind has ever yet attained to. Of these the first in order, as in importance, is the matter of Pope John XXIII. , whose cession of the papacy and flight from the council give almost a romantic * Von der Hardt, torn. iv. pars ii. p. 140, and torn. i. pars vi. p. 431. THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 31 interest to its earlier history. After the first session, which was merely formal, and held during the absence of the emperor, and until the second, which was held nearly four months afterwards, negotiations were carried on between the nations and the pope in order to bring about his voluntary abdication of the papal throne, while similar efforts were made to give effect to the deposition of the two other claimants, by inducing them to submit to the decree of the Council of Pisa. The fact that a proposition to open a criminal information against John XXIII. was only over- ruled on the ground of public scandal, so far alarmed the pope as to induce him to appear to enter with sincerity into these negotiations for his voluntary cession of the papacy. He even received their proposal of the nations with an affectation of pleasure, and replied with gravity that he was quite prepared to accept it if the other claimants would do the like,* a very safe condition, inasmuch as Benedict XIII. stoutly refused to resign either to the council or the emperor. f The only safety of the pontiff now lay in procrastination ; and to this end he en- deavoured in vain to bring on the trial of Huss in order to divert the attention of the council, and to give scope to his intrigues with the Duke of Austria. When, however, the will of the council * Theod. a Niem, cle Vita et fatis Joannis XXIII. 1. 2, cap. 3, 4. t Du Chastenet, " Preuves," &c. p. 312. 32 THE LAST CRUSADER. could be no longer evaded, he made a virtue of necessity, and in a general congregation held on the 1st of March, 1415, he solemnly abdicated the papacy. " How wondrous was then the joy of all present ! how sublime the voices of those who chanted the Te Deum Laudamus ! For not content with this, the pope solemnly convoked a session for the following day, which was held accordingly in the cathedral." "There having celebrated mass himself, with litanies, prayers, and all accustomed ceremonies, the Cardinal of Florence enjoined silence and proclaimed that the pontiff graciously decreed and accepted the form of cession which he had written. Then the pope read it, and when he came to the words 'juro et voveo,' descending from his throne, he bowed himself and knelt before the altar, and putting his hand to his breast said, 'This I do faithfully.' Then the emperor rose and blessed God, thanking the pope for his holy resolution, and that not only in word but in deed, for laying aside his imperial crown, he prostrated himself, and kissed the feet of his holiness." * This exciting scene led on to fresh negotiations, in which the insincerity of the pope, whose grand object in this simulated abdication was to influence the emperor in his behalf, and to gain time for intrigues, became speedily apparent. He felt the pulse of Sigisniund by offering him the consecrated * MS. Victorin. ap. du Chastenet. Append, p. 309. THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 33 rose a few days after iii the cathedral ; but the emperor, to his mortification, instead of retaining the gift, handed it over to the image of the Virgin, and presided the next day in a general assembly for electing a new pontiff. The pope's disappoint- ment was speedily turned into alarm when he found that the gates of the city had been closed, and from that day he meditated his escape. His constant friend, the Duke Frederic of Austria, contrived to get up horse-races and games in order to divert the minds of the strangers in Constance, and in the midst of the confusion thus occasioned, John XXIII. fled from the city by night, and arrived safely at Schaffhausen, then under the dominion of the Austrian duke. The sensation which this news occasioned in Con- stance may well be conceived from the knowledge that, on the following day, the emperor thought it necessary to proclaim in the public places of the city the security and immunity of the council, and this not merely by heralds and officers, but in his own person, riding about the city with the Elector of Bavaria, and reassuring the minds of the citizens and strangers who had already began to close their shops and prepare for the general break-up of this vast assembly. Many of the cardinals followed the pope to Schaffhausen under the pretext of prevailing upon him to return, and among these was Cardinal Branda, The council itself, driven to the support of D 34 THE LAST CRUSADER its own authority, and fearing that the pope would proceed to dissolve it in the plenitude of his power, entered at once upon the work of establishing its own independence and indefeasibility, in which the great Gerson, d'Ailly, Zabarella, and the English Bishop of Salisbury, who had maintained its supremacy before the pope himself with such energy, as to lead him to complain to Sigismund of his insulted majesty, took an active and successful part. Down to the twelfth session the council was chiefly engaged in rebuilding the fabric of synodical authority, and giving weight and vigour to those higher and more rational views of ecclesiastical polity, which formed the foundation of the liberties of the whole Western Church, until the days of the Reformation, and of the Gallican Church in particular, until the period of the Revolution, which in its natural reaction brought back the supremacy of Rome in its most unmitigated form, and made France a Roman mission rather than an independent branch of the Church.* In the twelfth session, the council not only deposed the pope, who had in the meantime, after a fruitless series of escapes from one city to another, been brought back as a pri- soner to Constance, but determined that none of the anti-popes should be elected to fill the vacant throne. Cardinal Branda, who had followed the pope to * Richer, "Histoire des Conciles," and "De Eccles. Libertate." Bishop Ricci expresses the dread lest France should, by becoming to the priests a "pays de conqutte" become ecclesiastically a "pays de Mission." (Memoires, torn. iii. p. 369.) THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 35 Schaffhausen, and was among the last to adhere to him in the day of adversity, at length accepted the safe conduct and invitation of the emperor, and returned to Constance on the 20th of April, just a month after the flight of his patron. From this time he took an active part in the council, and exerted con- siderable influence in the election of Cardinal Otto Co- lonna to the papal throne, which closed its labours. Of the three contenders for the papacy whose claims were thus finally set aside, John XXIII. died in captivity at Florence, Gregory XII. voluntarily ceded his claims, and was recognised by the council as a cardinal, and the rank of the cardinals of his promotion confirmed by its authority. Benedict XIII. (Pierre de Lune), continuing obstinate in his contumacy, notwith- standing his desertion by the court of Spain, was deposed and excommunicated ; but having sheltered himself in the fortress of Peniscola, he continued to fulminate counter-excommunications against the coun- cil and its adherents until his death. It was upon this accession of Spain to the obedience of the council, that that kingdom was admitted, as a fifth nation, to take part in its deliberations ; and this was solely brought about by the zeal and devotion of the emperor himself, who had undertaken a journey into Spain, to effect an alliance with the King of Arragon, for the completion of the unity of the Church, and had at considerable personal risk tra- velled into France and England, in order to bring D 2 36 THE LAST CKUSADER about a peace between those countries, then engaged in their long and disastrous wars, with a view to the same grand object. In the forty-first session of the council, the last stone was put to this great work by the election of Cardinal Otto Colonna, one of the chiefs of that illustrious house, which had for so many ages sustained the imperial against the pontifical power in Italy, and who assumed on his election the title of Martin V. The reformation of the Church in its head and in its members should properly have immediately suc- ceeded the deposition of the rival candidates, but the cardinals who dreaded the prospect of such a reform, when in the hands of a body of unlimited power, as well as enlightened knowledge a body in which all the abuses of the court of Rome had been exposed with so much sincerity, and denounced with such apostolic fearlessness used every art and every in- fluence to put off the evil day, and succeeded in effecting this delay by interposing the affairs of Huss and Jerome of Prague between the deposition of the anti-popes and the election of their successor a course which enables us to take up this most inte- resting and important of all the subjects of this nar- rative, as the next in order to that of the settlement of the papal line. For the origin of the doctrinal views which were advocated with such irresistible power and signal success by Huss and Jerome of Prague in the king- THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 37 doin of Bohemia, we must go far beyond the days of Wiclif and the early English reformers, between whom and the followers of Huss the connexion was much less real and influential than is generally supposed. The friends of the Church of Rome were eager and skilful in their endeavours to connect the rising rebel- lion against its authority with a heresy which had been already so frequently condemned ; and the writers on the other side have been equally anxious to establish this relationship in order to give to the Reformation the character of an unbroken protest against the Roman Church. The Council of Constance readily adopted this connexion of the two heresies, although Huss himself declared on his examination that he had not read any of the works of Wiclif until about twelve years previously (i.e. 1403), and these only his philosophical writings, his works on theology not having then found their way into Bohemia. Now, the public preaching of Huss in the chapel of Bethlehem began in 1400, and could not, there- fore, have received its inspiration from the writings of Wiclif. His preaching, conducted in the Bohemian language and adapted to the popular feeling, embodied and expressed that strong religious sentiment of the Slavonian nations which, from the day of their con- version in the ninth century, had separated them in their character and sympathies from the scholastic teaching of the Church of Rome. The theology of the Bohemian Church was connected as inseparably 38 THE LAST CRUSADER. with the philosophy of the realists as that of Rome was, at this period, with the philosophy of the nomi- nalists ; and the causes of the hostility of the leading members of the council to the unfortunate Huss are to be traced rather to the fact that he represented the realist views of the University of Prague in oppo- sition to the nominalism of Gerson, d'Ailly, and the University of Paris, than to the religious tenets which he had advanced, and which only, inasmuch as they were based on a heretical philosophy, became in their view heretical. " And you," (exclaimed Gerson to Jerome of Prague on his citation before the council), "when you were in Paris, disturbed the university, affirming many erroneous conclusions with their corol- laries, and especially on the matter of the universe, and on ideas, and many other scandalous points."' The manner in which Huss was roused to an open resistance of the corruptions and errors of the Church cannot be better described than in his own impressive words, which carry back this great resolution of his life to its earliest period, and prove the originality and individuality of his life and mission : "I. confess," he writes, "before God and Christ, that from my earliest age until now, I have halted between two what I ought to choose and what to hold; whether to seek after the benefits and honours of the world . . or rather to go forth out of the camp bearing the reproach of Christ ; whether to seek a quiet and * Von der Hardt, torn. iv. p. 217, and p. 506. THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 39 an easy life, living with the multitude in peace and equality, or rather to cling to the faithful and holy truth of the Gospel ; whether to commend what almost all commend, to advise as the multitude advises, to excuse and gloss over the Scriptures, as too many men, great, famous, and learned, and clothed with every appearance of wisdom and sanctity, excuse and gloss over them ; or rather to accuse and reprove the unfruitful works of darkness, and to hold the sincere truth of the Divine Word, which openly contradicts the present manners of men, and proves and makes manifest the false brethren. . . I prayed accordingly to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, in his own most faithful words, and lifting up my Bible before him, I cried with my heart and my voice, saying, c Lord and Father, Ruler of my life, leave me not in the imagination and counsel of these men, and give me not the desire of mine eyes, but turn me from all the devices of the evil one. Take from me all the lusts of the flesh, and deliver me not to the ungodly and lawless men/ " * The period for the formation of this great resolution seemed marked out by Providence in the day when the schism between the Roman pontiffs became inve- terate. While, on the one side, the kings and rulers of the earth took shelter in a prudent neutrality, the bolder minds of the reformers of the Church seized the * Hussii, " De Sacerdotum et Monachorum Carnalium Abomina- tione," cap. Ixxviii. (Opp. torn. i. p. 578. Ed. Norimb. 1715.) 40 THE LAST CRUSADER. opportunity of freely preaching that word of truth which declares, " He that is not with me is against me," and could fairly denounce all the anti-popes as anti-Christs, a title which they freely applied to one another, and perhaps equally deserved. In a remark- able sermon, preached by Huss, on the words, " Stablish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord draweth near," he gives an interesting picture of his predecessors in this arduous work, and leads to the belief that he was not the first, though undoubtedly the greatest, of those who had opened the truth in all its freedom before the people of Prague. In 1410, Sbiiico, Archbishop of Prague, cited Huss to appear before a synod to account for his doctrine ; but, failing to convince him of error, or to restrain the boldness of his preaching, he referred the matter suc- cessively to the Popes Alexander V. and John XXIII. The former, in order to strike at the root of Huss's popularity, prohibited all preaching in chapels, how- ever authorized and privileged ; but, on his refusal to submit to this prohibition, the Pope referred the case to Cardinal Colonna (afterwards Pope Martin V.), who cited Huss to Rome. But the Queen Sophia, of Bohemia, who had appointed him one of her con- fessors, interposed in his behalf, and with her husband, Wenceslaus, obtained leave for Huss to appear by deputy ; though his proctors were not listened to by the mortified cardinal, who, with a degree of rashness strangely opposed to the moderation of his after con- THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 41 duct, excommunicated not only the reformer himself, but the whole Bohemian nation. Against this the deputies appealed to the pope, who transferred the cognisance of the cause to a commission of four cardinals. Meantime Huss remained unmolested in his work of preaching and writing against the abuses of the Church, and, on the occasion of John XXIII. publish- ing throughout Bohemia a bull of indulgences for a crusade against Ladislaus, King of Naples, he put up a thesis upon all the churches of Prague, impugning the lawfulness of such a publication. The doctors of law, Wolff and Lewo, with the Canon Kbel, under- took the public defence of the bull, whose arguments, from the civil and canon law, were met by Huss with the clearest proofs of its illegality from Scripture. This led on to a serious controversy, during which three of the citizens, who had denounced the papal decree, were beheaded, and Huss himself, in conse- quence of the interdict laid by the pope upon the people of Prague as long as he remained therein, was induced to leave the city. He found a place of refuge in his native village of Hussinetz, whose feudal lord, Nicholas (of and in Hussinetz), gave him an asylum, and in which he continued boldly to preach as before. From this retreat he published an Appeal from the Pope to the Tribunal of Christ. The next stage of his history brings us on to the convocation of the Council of Constance, before which 42 THE LAST CRUSADER. Huss was cited to appear by the pope and the Em- peror Sigismund, a safe conduct to and from the council having been furnished him by the emperor himself. The journey of Huss from Prague to Con- stance was fraught with incidents of touching interest and significance. The poor and pious clergy of the villages and towns through which he passed received him as a messenger of God, but with the sad presenti- ment that, when once parted from him, they should see his face no more. Even before he left Prague, one of his most faithful friends addressed him, " Master, know for certain that you will be condemned." And a poorer, but not less devoted, member of the congregation of Bethlehem, took leave of him in the words, " God be with you 1 for it scarce seems possible that you will return safe, my dearest master, and most constant in the truth. May the King, not of Hungary, but of heaven itself, give thee every good thing for all the faithful and diligent teaching I have had from thee !" The same painful presentiment had occupied the mind of Huss himself, for he left in Bohemia, with a friend, in whose welfare he was deeply inter- ested, a sealed letter, with the charge that it should only be opened in the event of his death. The cardinals, on hearing of his arrival in Constance, invited him to appear before them, and after the con- ference, to the astonishment of Huss and of the Baron de Chlum, his companion, who had relied on the safe- conduct of the emperor, delivered them both into the THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 43 custody of the soldiery. The latter was presently released, and made public protest against this flagrant violation of faith, of which the emperor, who had not yet arrived at Constance, expressed his disapprobation in strong terms, by letter. The cardinals insisted that faith was not to be kept with heretics, and refused to release their captive, who was passed on from one prison to another until, from the horrible state of one of the dungeons in which he was confined, and the cruelty of his restraint, he was attacked with an illness which, but for timely medical care, would have re- moved him from the hands of his persecutors. His bitter enemies, Stephanus Paletz and Michael de Causis, the promoters of the suit against him, had, in the interval, made a number of false extracts from his writings, and especially from his work " On the Church," which were brought against him in the council, as he was led before it from time to time, and which formed the ground of the most subtle efforts to entangle him in some heretical formula, and, above all, to betray him into the admission of the already condemned positions of Wiclif. His violent adversa- ries, Gerson and D'Ailly, with great affectation of friendship and sympathy, entreated him to recant, and submit himself unreservedly to the will of the council. Unhappily, however, for the credit of that assembly, a provisional decree, which it drew up to meet this ex- pected contingency, exists still,* in which the unfor- * Von der Hardt, Concil. Const, torn. iv. pars ii. p. 432. 44 THE LAST CRUSADER tunate Huss was doomed, in the event of his entire recantation and submission, to degradation and per- petual imprisonment. In vain the accused insisted that all these extracts were false in vain he even dis- proved one of the charges against him so fully as to make its withdrawal a matter of necessity. The long days of his imprisonment were spent in prayer and meditation, and in writing devotional treatises, full of simple and earnest piety, which still survive de- fences of his doctrine and letters to his friends in Bohemia and in the council whose sublime sim- plicity, and almost inspired trust, must give them, to every really Christian heart, a rank next to that of the writings of the primitive age. Among the false witnesses who rose up on this memorable occasion, and the unjust judges who used their testimony only as the ostensible pretext for a condemnation already determined, the eye is enabled to rest with pleasure on one beautiful and noble excep- tion, in the Cardinal Bishop of Ostia, John de Bron- hiac, the oldest member of the Sacred College, and as such, the president of the council itself. This amiable and venerable prelate visited Huss frequently, and was regarded by him as a father. His affectionate entreaties to submit himself to the council, and to accept its decision, as they were dictated by a sincere friendship, and urged in a manner which touched the heart, were listened to by the afflicted Huss in a spirit of grateful sympathy, though they were rejected THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 45 on the ground of imperative but painful duty. The path of the great reformer was clear and cloudless ; the testimony of his whole life carried him on to that last and highest testimony, which should be taken up in glory, and carried on to eternity. The bitterest death was but a passing cloud over such a path as this ; his mind was calm and resolute ; he needed not the earnest words of the loved, the devoted John de Chlum, to remind him of that dreadful alternative, " Beloved master, if you have taught errors, revoke them ; but if not, look to it lest you lose your own soul, and the souls of many more. Do, then, that which your own conscience dictates." Of his support in these fearful moments he writes, " The merciful God whose laws I have magnified was with me, and is with me, and I trust will preserve me in His grace unto death/' Of his fixed resolve, he says further, " To-mor- row, as I believe, I shall be purged from my sins, in the hope of Jesus Christ, by a cruel death ; " and of his consolations he adds, " How mercifully the Lord my God hath dealt with me, and hath been with me in wonderful temptations, you shall know in that day when, through the help of Christ, we shall meet again in the joy of the life to come." Many visited him in his captivity, and urged him to submit to the council, one doctor even affirming that if the council said that he had only one eye when he knew that he had two, he ought nevertheless to admit with the council that it was so. Well might the poor 46 THE LAST CEUSADER. prisoner apply to himself the words of St. Paul to the Corinthians, and declare that " though he had many instructors, yet he had not many fathers." But if the visits of these false friends were tedious and wearisome, and those of his devoted followers in the same degree touching and consoling, most painful and harrowing of all were the visits of his bitter adversary Paletz, by whose unceasing persecution and cruel misrepresentation, the condemnation of Huss was brought about. In his last visit to the prison, a feeling of remorse like that of Judas came upon him, and to the simple appeal of his victim, " whether he would confess himself guilty if he knew in his conscience that he was innocent?" he replied, "It is a hard question" and wept " respondit, grave est et ccepitflere"* The letter which describes this interview to his faithful Bohemians closes with the prayer of inspired and inspiring faith, " O most holy Christ, draw our feeble steps after Thee; for unless Thou draw us we cannot follow Thee ! Grant us the spirit of Thy might, that we may be ready ; and though the flesh is weak, let Thy grace prevent, and guide, and follow ; for without Thee we can do nothing, far less go forth for Thy sake to a cruel death. Grant Thou a ready mind, a fearless heart, a right faith, a firm hope, a perfect charity, that for Thy sake we may lay down our life mightily, and to our eternal joy." * Ep. Huss. i. Opp. torn. i. THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 47 On the 6th of July, 1415, after the solemnization of mass before the whole council, Huss was confronted with it for the last time. Then, silence having been proclaimed by an aged bishop of Italy, and the slightest expression of sympathy or dissent prohibited under pain of excommunication, the preparations for the degradation of Huss from the priesthood were begun. But first the Bishop of Lodi, ascending the pulpit, preached a sanguinary discourse on the text, "Let the body of sin be destroyed " (Destruatur corpus peccati), which he applied to the destruction of the sinner instead of the sin, and brought to bear with an almost incredible perversity against the victim of the council's animosity, closing it with a fulsome address to the emperor, inviting him to " destroy errors and heresies, and especially this obstinate heretic' 9 who, in the meantime, was praying earnestly and instantly, and commending himself to God the righteous Judge. The sermon ended, and the allegation of the here- tical articles repeated (every effort of Huss to explain and to reply to which was at once repressed by the soldiery), the final sentence was pronounced, and the unfortunate Huss consigned to a commission of bishops, to whom the repulsive ceremonies of de- position and degradation were deputed. As these in all their stages most painfully resembled the indig- nities offered to Christ Himself, they suggested to the martyr words of touching significance in reply to the maledictions and reproaches which accompanied every 48 THE LAST CftUSADER. stage of this dreadful rite. The words of his perse- cutors were meetly concluded by the commendation of the soul of their victim to the devil, to which Huss rejoined, "But I commend my soul to my most gracious Lord Jesus Christ, my only Saviour." Upon this the bishops handed him over to the secular power ; and Sigismund, addressing the Duke of Ba- varia, exclaimed, "Since to us pertains the sword, take this accursed heretic and inflict upon him the deserved punishment of his heresy ! " while the duke, laying aside his crown, transferred his charge to the judges of the city in the words, " In the name of the emperor our Lord Sigismund, and by our own special com- mand, take John Huss, this great heretic, and destroy his body by fire ! " Attended by a vast concourse of members of the council, soldiers, and strangers, Huss was then led forth through the suburb of Gotleben, the scene of his long captivity, to the place of execution, which is now covered with the fortifications of the city ; and in the midst of prayers and litanies to Christ, was suffocated by the rising flames, at the moment when he was repeating for the third time, " O Jesus Christ, Son of the living God, who suffered for my sake, have mercy on me ! Jesus Christ, Saviour of the whole world, redeem me !" * * The Life of Huss, by Seyfried, with the Additions and Annota- tions of Mylius (published at Hildburghausen in 1743), has been principally used in the foregoing pages. It contains the most care- ful and accurate digest of all the authorities on the subject, every THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 49 Thus closed a testimony to the truth of God, and to the power of the gospel of Christ, of which we may say fearlessly that since the days of the first witnesses of our faith it has never been equalled a*life of severe self-restraint and consistent holiness, carried on in the midst of a corruption of doctrine arid discipline such as the Church had never seen, and it is devoutly to be trusted may never see again. The condemnation and execution of Jerome of Prague followed soon after, and presented the same features of injustice and cruelty on the one hand, and patient endurance, or rather, triumphant faith, on the other ; and this completed the case of the Church and kingdom of Bohemia against the court of Rome, and opened that terrible work of reprisal against the clergy and monastic orders, of which this fatal and impolitic act of the council was the signal. Not the most elo- quent of the pleadings of Huss and Jerome before the council, not the most vigorous of those discourses which the great reformer had delivered in his now silent chapel of Bethlehem, or the most impressive of those lectures which his more learned companion had read in the halls of the University of Prague, could have so indelibly traced their doctrines in the hearts of the Bohemian people as the sad and unexpected intelligence that they had sealed their testimony with their blood, and confirmed it by the evidence of so circumstance of the life and teaching of Huss being weighed with judgment and impartiality. 50 THE LAST CRUSADER. awful a martyrdom. In the election of an undisputed head for the Christian Church, the fathers at Constance had closed up a schism which existed rather in the eye than in the heart of Europe ; by the condemnation of Huss, it opened a schism in the very soul of the Christian world which the Reformation of the sixteenth century has kept open to this day. But if the sins of commission of the Council of Constance were thus pregnant with evils and perils to the Church, its sins of omission were not less fatal in their consequences. The cardinals, who had, by constant intrigues, put off the work of reformation and though they had dealt with the subject with great vigour and sincerity in the memoirs and pro- jects of reform which they had published from time to time in the council, had steadily resisted its synod- ical treatment made the election of Martin V. a successful pretext for getting rid of it altogether. Dangerous as it must have appeared to bequeathe the principal object of their present convocation to future councils, laden with new responsibilities and perplexed with increased difficulties, they feared still more its treatment by a body which had regarded their own privileges and influence so lightly. If their passion for reform was great, their devotion to their own order was paramount ; and even Cardinal Pierre d'Ailly, the most enlightened of their number, while content to reduce the papal authority to more reason- able dimensions, claimed the representation of the THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 51 apostolic order for the Sacred College, and admitted the episcopal only as a hierarchical degree a kind of culminating point of the priesthood. This esprit de corps of the Sacred College had even its martyr in the council ; for so vehement was the great Cardinal Zabarella in his advocacy of the claims of his order against the nations, that he died, a few days after, of a fever brought on by the excitement of this contro- versial heat. The utmost that could be gained by the nations in the matter of reform was the adoption by the council of five resolutions to be imposed on the future pope, of which the first and most important was, that general councils should be convoked at regular inter- vals, the next to be assembled after a period of five years, the succeeding one after seven years from that, and then at regular intervals of ten years. This, as it gave origin to the Council of Basle, and is cited continually by the fathers of that body under its title Frequens, was perhaps the most important in its results of any of the reformatory decrees of this otherwise fruitless assembly. Of its doctrinal features the most important is unquestionably the celebrated law of the thirteenth session, which has ever since deprived the recipients of the Eucharist in the Roman Church of the right they had enjoyed in common with every branch of the Church from the beginning, of partaking in that sacrament in the integrity of its first institution. By this decree, drawn up in pro- E 2 52 THE LAST CRUSADER. fessed defiance of the teaching of Christ and the practice of the Church in every age, the cup was denied to all but the celebrant, and a mutilation which, in the first instance, was a mere corruption of usage, became a positive and inviolable law. This was little less than a declaration of war against the Slavonian nations, whose very religion seemed embodied and symbolised in the undivided Eucharist, and who, in tradition and in practice, had clung to this as the very palladium of their Chris- tianity : and we can be little surprised to find that, while an avenger of the national cause appeared in the celebrated Zisska, an advocate of the mutilated sacrament rose up in the Church of Bohemia in the person of the equally distinguished Archbishop Rokyczana. Without entering upon the theological question in this place, it cannot but be observed that the Church of Rome has here discovered a total absence of that political foresight which is its most remarkable attri- bute. While even during the pontificate of Martin V. the Eucharist was openly administered in both kinds in Rome itself, notwithstanding the decree of the council* a circumstance which at least placed the new usage in the rank of things indifferent in * This is proved from the work of Petrus Amelius, Bishop of Sinigaglia, " On the Ceremonies of the Roman Church," in which he mentions that he had himself seen the Eucharist thus administered in Rome, under the pontificate of Martin V. (v. G. de Lith. de Inter- dictione Sacri Calicia, p. 262). THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 53 Bohemia the prohibition was exacted as inexorably as though the most vital doctrines of Christianity were involved in its observance. It was natural that where such a decree was enforced, in direct opposition to the institution of Christ himself, the resistance to it should be urged as a necessary and vital point on the ground of His express command. The prohibition of the council was in direct contravention of a com- mandment of the Great Institutor of the sacrament, and was issued with a non obstante to the injunction of Christ himself. The opposition to it seemed, therefore, not only a duty, but a necessity ; for what guarantee could any member of the Church of Rome possess that the entire sacrament would not be re- moved at last, when an integral portion of it had been taken away so lightly ? The ceremonial of the election of Pope Martin V. which closed the labours of the council, was worthy of the splendour of its inauguration. On the an- nouncement that the choice of the electors had fallen upon Cardinal Otto Colonna, a crowd of eighty thousand persons thronged the place of election, who, separating at mid- day, returned to the cathedral at an appointed time, to witness the arrival of the emperor, in this scene of unmingled rejoicing. " The sea of people," in the words of an astonished eyewitness, " was divided again into rivers, soon to flow back and inundate the cathedral." On its return the emperor, princes, and bishops, and all the council, were merged 54 THE LAST CRUSADER. in the vast multitude, which proceeded with them to the conclave to escort the newly-elected pope to the place of his public recognition. The pontiff, mounted on a white horse and surrounded by the cardinals, whom perplexing intrigues and disappointed ambition, not less than want of food and rest, had reduced to the most wretched and emaciated state, was conducted by them to the cathedral. On his way thither an interruption occurred which must have reminded him that Europe was not yet pacified, or the course of the pontificate clear and cloudless. The Duke of Bavaria, falling down before him, implored his aid against Henry of Landshut, by whom he had been wounded and despoiled. The pope could only reply with good wishes, while Sigismund rebuked the un- timely intrusion. After a succession of ceremonies and consecrations, the pope elect was fully inaugu- rated in his office in the great hall of the episcopal palace at Constance, an Englishman, the Prior of St. John, Clerkenwell, holding the diadem at his coro- nation. A few days after, another proof of the disorganised state even of the territory bordering on Constance was given in the assassination, in broad daylight, of the Provost of Lucerne, at the instigation of the dis- affected citizens. In the meantime, the grand object of the assembly of the synod the reformation of the Church in its head and in its members made but little progress. This great work was, in fact, handed over THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 55 to the new pontiff, who very doubtfully contributed to its progress by writing a memoir upon it, which he offered to the nations. The state of every inde- pendent kingdom requiring a distinct treatment in the matter of discipline and reform, the plan adopted by the pope was that of a system of concordats, which, inasmuch as they were destitute of synodical weight, were too capable of revocation to be of any permanent advantage. The decrees published in the forty-third session on the great abuses of the age, exemptions, dispensations, annates, simony, and the general discipline of the clergy, have rather the character of reprobations of the past and promises for the future than of positive and clear prohibitions; and how ineffectual they soon became is witnessed by the increase rather than the removal of all these cor- ruptions, which the history of the Council of Basle discloses. Besides the danger which threatened the Church through this delay of an active and searching reforma- tion, several lesser causes of alarm presented them- selves in the council before it closed. The sect of the Flagellants, ably resisted by Gerson, the doctrine of the lawfulness of tyrant murder advocated in France by Jean Petit and a large party of his fol- lowers, the libels and injurious publications of John Falckenberg against the King of Poland, ftnd other untoward subjects, threatened the peace of the council to the last, and gave to its closing scenes, notwith- 56 THE LAST CEUSADER. standing the moderation of the pope, an unseemly and even tumultuous character. It was not until they were menaced with excommunication that the Polish deputies desisted from their endeavour to compel the pontiff into a condemnation of the libellous work, and even then they publicly recorded an instrument of appeal to the future general council. On the 22nd of April, 1418, after an event- ful history extending over three years and a half, the great Council of Constance was formally closed. After a sermon on the words, "Ye now have sorrow, but I will see you again and your heart shall rejoice," a promise which seemed rather to look onward with hope to the future council, which was summoned to meet at Pavia, than to look back with satisfaction upon the work of the council now at an end the vast assembly was dissolved, the bishops returning to their dioceses, and the pope, with his court, to Geneva, whence they proceeded to Rome. Of the great reformers of the Church who had lived to see the grand object of their lives and labours frustrated, Zabarella had died in the council ; D'Ailly retired to Avignon, where he continued to assist with his writings the great cause which he had so ineffectually maintained in the council ; Gerson, the most illus- trious of all, disappointed but not disheartened at this failure of his dearest hopes, carried on his advocacy of reform to a degree which rendered it perilous to remain in his native country. He wandered as an THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 57 exile through Bavaria and Austria, returning to Lyons after the death of his enemy, the Duke of Burgundy. In the solitude of the Abbey of Molck he consoled himself with eloquently deploring the fruitless issue of the council of which he was one of the most illus- trious members, and hastened, by his writings in defence of ecclesiastical liberty and reformation, the advent of that day when the one should become a reality and the other a necessity to be evaded no longer. The suggestive words which formed a part of the ceremonial of the coronation of Martin V., when a cardinal, lighting a piece of tow on the end of a spear, exclaimed, " Sancte Pater, sic transit gloria mundi !" may well be written as the moral of the history of the Council of Constance, than which a spectacle more magnificent in all its circumstances, or more transient in all its results, has never been presented before the eye of the Christian world. CHAPTER III. THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. " WOULD that the age of Martin (not to say the age of Saturn) could return 1 " * were the words of ^Eneas Sylvius to Julian, in later years, when the reign of Martin V. was looked back upon as the Church's breathing time, and the success of the mission of the good pontiff, for the peace of Italy and the world, seemed no longer even doubtful. Nor can we wonder that this period of repose and recovery was rich in grateful memories to those who, like Julian at this time, were enjoying the society of the great men of the age in the centre of the Christian world. The palaces of the cardinals then formed the schools of advance- ment and improvement to the youth of Italy, and in them the characters of those statesmen and ecclesiastics who adorned Europe during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries received their formation and direction. The residence of Julian with Cardinal Branda was at a * Epp. 1. 1. Ep. Ixv. THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 59 period which was eminently calculated to enforce the traditions of his patron. Both in the Church and in the different states of Europe, events of the greatest importance, and of the most serious perplexity, were unfolding themselves with strange rapidity. Daily it must have appeared more strongly than before, that the golden opportunity of reformation and union which the Council of Constance had offered to the world had been lost for ever, and that the perils of this neglected work were becoming more inevitable. The vast and unexpected results of that great assembly, discovered in its deposition of rival pontiffs and elevation of its own authority on the basis of principles wholly new to the theories of pontifical law, must have rendered the synodical remedy in the eyes of the members of the court of Rome even worse than the diseases which so many of them had exposed with such eloquent sincerity. From the great reluctance of Julian to accept the presidency of the future council, it would appear that the experience of Cardinal Branda had rather awakened in his mind a fear of the synodical principle than a desire to maintain its exercise. From the con- flicts of the council the friends of the Church turned naturally to the new pontiff, who represented its unity, and who was pledged to its reformation of the abuses which had divided it. Unhappily, the most far-sighted of these was unable to see that the real unity of the Church was even more endangered by the progress of 60 THE LAST CRUSADER. the great Bohemian movement than by the divided headship, which had been made one at Constance. Tt was enough in their view to cauterise the wound, or even to cut off the offending member; and the advocates of the council stood committed to the adoption of those corrosive remedies of fire and sword which the council itself had already applied with as little wisdom as success. Among the older members of the Sacred College at this period was Cardinal Dominici, whose severe and uncompromising disposition represented the prevalent feeling in the strongest and most repulsive form. Under his roof, among many other illustrious men, the celebrated St. Antoninus, Archbishop of Florence, received his education. Elected to the cardinalate by Gregory XII., whose legate to the council he became, it was mainly through his influence that his patron was induced to resign the pontificate ; and the council having confirmed him in all his dignities, he was enabled to take a prominent part in the election of Martin V. To him the new pontiff naturally turned as the fittest representative of the Holy See in the now distracted Bohemia, and even before he left Constance he nominated him as his legate in Germany. Cardinal Dominici returned accordingly with the emperor to become the witness of that scene of rapine and con- fusion which was opening in the hereditary kingdoms of Bohemia and Hungary. To the former of these Wenceslaus, the brother of Sigisrnund, had succeeded THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 61 a prince who is represented by all the historians of the time as utterly deficient in every quality that could secure the respect or obedience of his people. Vacillation and cowardice marked his conduct in adversity, while his cruelties and excesses in prosperity were little calculated to conciliate the offended nation- ality of the Bohemians. During the period of the Council of Constance the people of Bohemia had maintained a sullen and ominous silence. The year 1417 was memorable for a tranquillity so deep and unnatural throughout the kingdom, that it could only be compared to the calm which precedes some great convulsion of nature. That close contact between the Hussites and Catholics, which was afterwards productive of such fearful conse- quences, was .at this time prevented by the separation of their churches and assemblies. The influential members of the Hussite faction waited for the issue of the council, and restrained by their example the more violent. After the death of Huss, the Emperor Sigis- mund had written to the Bohemians an apologetic letter, which, in some degree, softened the effects of the indiscreet though plausible letters of the council on the same subject ; but neither the dishonour of the emperor, who had suffered his safe conduct to be violated with impunity, nor the indignation of the Bohemians, whose confidence had been thus betrayed, could be in the least degree covered by these diplomatic explanations. It is evident, therefore, that the mission 62 THE LAST CRUSADER. of Cardinal Dominici was one of the greatest delicacy and difficulty, and that it required the wisdom of the wisest and most moderate of Roman statesmen even to delay the inevitable storm ; yet, with that absolute disregard of every political and religious danger, which has so often been imitated even at a period when the Roman See was rather militant than triumphant, Cardinal Dominici opened his campaign by an act of violence and cruelty against those who maintained the use of the cup in the Communion, which destroyed at once every chance of the success of his legation. Entering a church in the district of Slana, he threw to the ground a chest which was placed on the altar, and which probably contained the chalices used by the Hussite congregation, and caused an ecclesiastic and a layman who had opposed him to be burnt alive. The severities of the legate were the signal of an outbreak throughout the entire kingdom, which proved at once that the national feeling had been outraged beyond the possibility of restitution, and that the court of Rome was fatally ignorant of the extent of the danger it had invoked. The dread of assassination and the consciousness of his utter helplessness in the storm he had himself awakened, drove the legate to take refuge in Hungary, where public tranquillity had not been so deeply compromised, and there, we are assured by his biogra- phers, that, notwithstanding the advice he had be- queathed to the emperor to adopt the remedies of THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 63 fire and sword against the prevailing heresy, he had recourse to the more legitimate weapons of the Chris- tian warfare, for he was engaged in preaching to, and influencing the Hungarians in behalf of the Roman rites, when he died. On his death, which happened in 1419, scarcely a year after he had entered upon his unsuccessful legation, the mission into Ger- many and Bohemia was offered to Cardinal Branda. This new legation of his patron was an epoch of great importance in the life of Julian. The high and almost extreme opinions which the cardinal had formed of his young protege were now to be put to the severest practical test, in a mission in which the greatest Roman diplomatists had failed so remarkably. If Cardinal Branda had shown on several occasions that he was not possessed of that prudence which formed the highest qualification for so difficult a work as that which lay before him, the prudence and judg- ment of Julian on all ecclesiastical matters might yet preserve him from the errors of his predecessors; for to his advice he attached the most exalted opinion, and was after heard to say that, " if the whole Church were to fall into ruin, Julian would have been equal to the task of rebuilding it." On the arrival of Cardinal Branda in Bohemia, the insurrection had assumed a definite form, and an organised opposition to the imperial authority was to be seen everywhere. The success of this great national movement (and its very nationality was the secret of 64 THE LAST CRUSADER its success) was so rapid and signal, that nothing was left for the legate but to look on in hopeless dismay, and a diet held at Prague by the Emperor Sigismund opened the only scene in which the talents of the Roman diplomatist could have the slightest exercise. It would appear that, despairing of his mission to Bohemia, he retreated early into Hungary, into which the doctrines, rather than the arms, of the Hussites had penetrated. From this comparative tranquillity he was able to observe the progress of a civil war as barbarous in its general conduct, and as romantic in many of its subordinate features, as any which has ever convulsed a European kingdom. We may well, therefore, take up the opening history of the Hussite wars as its incidents of wonder and horror passed in succession before the eye of the legate. The gathering storm which the ominous stillness succeeding the martyrdom of Huss and Jerome, and the " angry silence" of the great nobility, had so clearly augured, burst out in the very centre of the kingdom. The followers of Huss had chosen as their general one of the chamberlains of King Wenceslaus, a mem- ber of the lesser nobility of Bohemia John Zisska de Trocznow while a champion of the ecclesiastical order appeared in the equally celebrated John de Rokyczana, afterwards Archbishop of Prague. The objects of these two great sections of the rebellion were different in the beginning, and grew more and more distinct as the movement advanced. The single point on which THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 65 the latter contended against the Church of Rome was the denial of the cup to the laity, and this sole con- cession would have at once preserved them in its unity. But the general body of the Hussites, to whom the teaching of the great reformer had given a deeper thirst for change, would accept nothing short of a free and full preaching of the word of God, a secularization of the monastic orders and property, and the public punishment of all open crimes and scandals, in addi- tion to the concession of the cup to the laity. Zisska, feeling insecure in the city of Prague, had, in 1418, built a new city and fortress at some distance from the capital, to which he gave the name of Tabor, and from which his followers received the distinctive title of Taborites. From this retreat he was able success- fully to attack the Bohemian metropolis, whose weak- ness was fatally shown in the course of the following year. The first news which must have reached the as- tonished legate on his arrival was the strange fact that, in the neighbourhood of this stronghold, an assembly of 40,000 persons of all ages had gathered together to receive the Communion in both kinds at the hands of the Taborite priests. They had thence marched to Prague by torchlight, and stood under the walls of the palace of Wissehrad, to which the wretched and helpless King Wenceslaus had retired for safety. Emboldened by the impunity of this step, and roused by the knowledge that the king, with the municipal 66 THE LAST CRUSADER. authorities of the city, were arranging measures of re- prisal, they re-entered the city soon after, under Zisska, and after destroying the convent of the Carmelites, whose members had been influential in the condemna- tion of Huss and Jerome, proceeded to pillage and destroy other religious houses, ending with an attack upon the town-hall, in which the judges and senators of Prague were consulting on the plans of opposing them. Eleven of the senators escaped by flight, but the rest, with a judge of the city, were cast down from the windows of the hall upon the spears and pitchforks of the infuriated mob below, and perished miserably. For several clays Prague was the scene of the most frightful disorder, and the most hideous cruel- ties were perpetrated against the monks and religious orders. The reign of terror had truly begun ; and the miserable king, who would otherwise un- doubtedly have been one of its earliest victims, was removed by a sudden and strange death from the scene of tumult and slaughter which his own cruelty and incapacity had so greatly contributed to open. When the massacre of the senators was related to him, on some one observing that he had long foreseen such an event, he flew into a violent passion, and would have murdered the person who made the remark but for the interposition of those present. His passion re- sulted in a stroke of apoplexy, which carried him off on the 16th of August, 1419. He died, as we are THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 67 told by a chronicler of the day, " with a fearful noise, as of the bellowing of a lion." * The succession to the kingdom fell to the Emperor Sigismund, the next brother of Wenceslaus, whose endeavours to take possession of this ruined inherit- ance added a new element to the troubles of Bohemia. The widowed Queen Sophia, left in a state of almost hopeless peril, endeavoured to fortify herself in the castle of Wissehrad from the attacks of the Hussites, who had already overrun Prague and threatened every hour to attack the last stronghold of royalty, the scene of its ancient glories, and the witness of its present afflictions. The palaces, churches, and monasteries of Bohemia were at this period unequalled in Europe. ./Eneas Sylvius who had seen the ecclesiastical glories of Italy, and even visited the then distant England, declares that no kingdom in Europe equalled this in the splendour of its monastic buildings, or in the priceless treasures of its altars and shrines. "Temples lifted up as it were to heaven, of mar- vellous length and amplitude, were covered with arched- work of stone. Altars placed on high were laden with the gold and silver, in which the relics of saints were enshrined. The robes of the priests were embroidered with pearls; every ornament was costly; the furniture of the very highest value; the windows, lofty and of the greatest width, gave * Byzinii Diarium Hussiticum. F 2 68 THE LAST CRUSADER. their light through glass of exquisite beauty and admirable workmanship. Nor were these features to be observed only in towns and cities, but even in villages."* In the monastery of Konigssaal he tells us that there was " a garden surrounded with walls, on which, upon beautiful plates, the whole of the Scrip- tures, from Genesis to the Revelations, was written in majuscule characters; the letters gradually in- creased in size as they were carried above the eye, so that the whole could be easily read from the top to the bottom," a memorable proof of the devotion of the Bohemians to the Scriptures-, but which was barbarously destroyed. When, however, we read that no less than five hundred and fifty of these splendid monuments of ancient piety were destroyed by the Hussites, we must bear in mind that a new element of destruction had been called into existence through the indolent incapacity of Wenceslaus, and the utter disorganization of the government. Brigandage had now assumed so great a boldness, and had secured so complete an impunity, that public security was entirely gone, and the defenceless monas- teries were no less the prey of successful brigands, whom their wealth and treasures had tempted, than the object of the revenge of the Hussites, on the ground that the religious orders had originated the troubles of the kingdom by procuring the con- * uEneas Sylvius, Histor. Bohem. c. xxxvi. THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 69 demnation of the national party. Thus, John Tysta and John Miesteczki, both members of the ancient gentry of the kingdom, pillaged and destroyed towns and villages, meeting with but little resistance from the government of Wenceslaus ; and the latter is celebrated as the plunderer of the great monastery of Opatovicz, which had the misfortune to be popu- larly believed the receptacle of a hidden treasure. One evening, the monks were surprised by the visit of a stranger with two attendants, coming, as they alleged, to visit the abbot. They were hospitably entertained, and were succeeded later in the evening by two others the second arrival was succeeded by another, and yet others again until the mysterious guests numbered thirty. With this accession of strength, they fell upon the unsuspecting monks, Miesteczki seizing the Abbot Peter Laczur, and cruelly torturing him in order to discover the place of the treasure. Unable to force from the abbot or the monks their secret, the brigands retired, carrying with them eight thousand florins in money, and sacred vessels to the value of two thou- sand more. Such was the impunity of crime at this period, that Miesteczki bought with his plunder the castle of Opoczno, contemptuously disobeyed a citation of the emperor, and finally became recon- ciled to him, without making the smallest restitution. In the meantime, the terrible Zisska was consoli- dating his reign, and extending his ravages. The 70 THE LAST CKUSADER. cloud of confusion and slaughter which covers this period of the history of Bohemia, is everywhere so regular and so invariable in depth and outline, that it is only occasionally that some new feature of peculiar interest tempts us to continue this digression. The work of destruction was reopened in 1420 by the demolition of the town of Aust, which so nearly adjoined Tabor as to render it an object of apprehension to Zisska, its feudal lord Ulrich de Rosenberg, of the Bohemian branch of the great Roman house of Orsini, being a zealous Catholic. This signal and terrible destruction of a town, with all its inhabitants, took place during the carnival, at a moment when every suspicion of danger was lulled to rest, and was instantly suc- ceeded by the attack on the fortress of Sedlitz, where Rosenberg himself had taken refuge, and in whose ruins he was destined to perish. The burning of the monastery of the Servites in the new city of Prague followed with fearful rapidity, and the deaths of the monks of this foundation, who be- longed to the noblest families of Florence and Siena, might well be crowned by all who witnessed them with the glories of martyrdom. Conscious of the im- pending danger, they proceeded, without the betrayal of a single fear, to hold a chapter of their order, in the midst of which the maddened Taborites burst in upon them, and demanded them to sign the four articles of their rebellion against the Church of Rome. THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 71 Firmly and fearlessly they protested that they would never sign, upon which their persecutors fired the building and lighted faggots to burn the monks, who died joyfully, chanting the Te Deum to the last, the Catholic historians affirming that their deaths were not unattended by that prodigy, so often asserted of this dreadful kind of martyrdom, and so naturally conceived by the bystanders in such a scene, the appearance of souls ascending in the flames to heaven. The destruction of the monasteries of Gratz and Konigssaal, whose treasures of art have been before spoken of, succeeded ; and the siege of Raby, at which Zisska, already blinded in one eye, lost his sight entirely, was added to the successes of the war, at the hazard of its future conduct. Our narrative of conventual destruction may here be suspended, in order that we may fall back upon the fortunes of the widowed Queen Sophia, little more than a prisoner of state in the fortress-palace of Wissehrad. From the windows of this vast and magni- ficent pile she was able to trace the dreadful contrast of desolation and misery which every success of the Hussite arms heightened and saddened. At the close of 1419, the divided forces of the Hussites proper (Taborites), Calixtines, and Orebites were united, at the instigation of Nicholas de Hussinetz, under the very walls of Wissehrad. Foreseeing the danger, Rosenberg had with difficulty conducted the queen to a place of safety before the attack began. The 72 THE LAST CRUSADER. united forces opened the assault with a frightful energy, but the strength of the garrison, and the adoption of instruments of warfare till then unknown in Bohemia, occasioned so great a carnage, that it was resolved to defer the attack until nightfall, when the darkness might favour the assailants. That was a fearful night in Prague, and was well described by one who witnessed it, as " a night of much tribula- tion and perplexity ; a night of sorrow and grief, and resembling the last day in fearfulness."* Victory, as far as the complete possession of the streets and avenues to the fortress, and the field of battle, if such it could be called, remained with the besiegers, and probably another attack might have carried the place; but a diversion against the fortress of St. Wenceslaus, in which the Queen Sophia was believed to be still concealed, put off for a short period the demolition of a palace which, then at least, had not its equal in Europe. A truce of four months, between the Hussites and the Imperialists, occasioned by a turn of fortune in favour of the latter, and the knowledge that the fortress had received an additional garrison since this attack, was agreed upon at this critical moment, the terms of it being that either party should remain unmolested in the exercise of their religion and in the possession of their rights Pilsen and some other places being restored to the emperor. Prague revived for a season under this respite ; the wild mob of Hussite strangers * Byzinii Diarium Hussiticum apud Ludewig " Reliq. MSS." THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 73 retired, the senate reassembled, but the chief of the Catholic party, who had fled from the city, still feared to return. An indiscreet letter from Sigismtind, in which he promised to govern on the principles of his father, the Emperor Charles IV., whose severe edicts against heresy were still too well remembered, destroyed in a moment the treacherous calm, and hostilities were renewed in the country, in which the Taborites were less successful than before. The miners of Cuttenberg hunted down vast numbers of them, and when they seized them, cast them into deep pits and wells, six hundred of them thus perishing miserably. Sigismund, however, made use of this short inter- val of comparative tranquillity, by convoking a diet at Brunn, in Moravia ; and to this the Cardinal of Piacen za, as legate of Martin V., was invited. It is probable that this ecclesiastic, attended by Julian, had remained with the emperor during this period, as he arrived with him and the Dowager Queen Sophia at the Diet. Except for the purpose of advising the emperor, and communicating with the court of Rome from this scene of tumult, whose real causes were far beyond the reach of Roman diplo- macy, the legation into Bohemia was utterly power- less ; and the only person who can be said to have profited by it was the young Cesarini, whose ardent mind seemed alone capable of grasping the meaning and fathoming the depths of this mysterious revo- 74 THE LAST CRUSADER. lution. An episode of some interest, and singularly illustrative of that spirit of bold inquiry which had opened the Hussite controversy, and of the cruel and impolitic means which had been throughout adopted in order to close it, occurred to the legate and his companion during their Hungarian sojourn. " While I was reading the Scriptures or the sen- tences in the University of Vienna," are the words of the quaint relater of this incident,* " there was just such a heretic as you speak of to be found not far off, in Hungary, a bachelor of arts, and a priest. He was, to my knowledge, so marvellously singular, and singularly marvellous a heretic, as to be second to none .... And, to cut the matter short, the wretched man came to this, absolutely to disbelieve all the articles of the Christian faith until they could be proved by a natural philosopher, by a due and effec- tual philosophical demonstration." After a repetition of various heretical and even blasphemous sentiments expressed against the rites of the Church, which led to his capture and imprisonment by the bishop, our informant continues : " There arrived, in the mean- time, the legate of all Germany, the Lord Cardinal of Piacenza, with three devout, prudent, and learned professors of divinity and canon law, who visited the guilty man in prison for his soul's health, and with pious entreaties laboured to bring back the wanderer to repentance. When examined upon the various sects * Nyder. Formicarium, 1. iii. c. x. THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 75 of Wicklifites and Bohemians, which were then run- ning their course, of Waldenses, Arians, Jews, Sara- cens, and every other perfidious sect, he uniformly derided them all, but persisted in his own error." His visitors, two of whom were Jacobus de Clavoro and Martinus de Hispania the third having been unquestionably Julian finding that to argue and philosophize was vain against one who exhibited the most exquisite subtlety in his replies, and even declared himself ready to die in his conviction, con- trived another plan, being more " affected towards the soul of the poor wretch than his body. ' Let him be bound, 3 they said secretly to the bishop's official, 'more, tightly; fastened to a stake, and tied with thongs, and spending a night in this state, he will find himself, perhaps, a little troubled in his intellect/ This having been duly performed, these faithful soul- surgeons * returned in the morning, wishing to see t their invalid, who cried out impatiently, ' Prithee, burn me, for I am ready ! Why do you vex my soul any longer?* They, however, applying sharper spiritual remedies out of the philosophical treasures of Egypt, showed the erring man how weak was the human understanding, how manifold its devices, how short its life, how false its judgment, how critical its time, and such-like. After this, they left him, bound as tightly as before, to meditate upon what they had * The word in the original is cyrulogi, which I conceive to be a misprint for chirurgi. 76 THE LAST CRUSADER. said. Returning on the next day, they found the good man inspired through the divine light." Here- upon follows a good Catholic confession, and a retire- ment to the convent of the Paulites, in order to carry it out without any new temptations from philosophy. An incident like this, trifling as it is, introduces us to the spirit of the age. The severe policy of the court of Rome in Bohemia, was, in fact, only an attempt to apply to a powerful nation, capable of the most successful resistance, an argument which could only answer when applied by a host of inquisitors to a single and powerless victim. The universal terror which the' progress of the rebellion awakened, far more than the influence of the legate, inspired the members of the diet of Brunn with the most earnest resolutions of devotion, and vows to sacrifice life, and family, and property, in the ^cause of the emperor. Communications were opened with Prague, and Sigismund was lavish in promises and assurances to all who would return to their allegiance. Deputies arrived at Brunn to conduct the negotiation, while the Hussites, alarmed at its progress, suddenly retired from Prague to confer with their leaders at Tabor and elsewhere. A succession of bar- barous executions at Breslau, by the order of Sigis- mund, again transferred the advantage to his enemies ; and the list of terrific successes of the Hussites was reopened by the destruction of the fortress of Wen- ceslaus, which is said to have been betrayed to them THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 77 by Czenko von Wartemberg. The exquisite chapel of St. Wenceslaus, encrusted with jasper and covered with chasings of gold, was demolished on this occa- sion. After this Zisska and his forces re-entered Prague, and occupied that city, whose inhabitants were now straining every nerve to defend themselves against Sigismund, who was approaching it at the head of a considerable army. On the 30th of June, 1420, the siege of the city began. The fortress of Wenceslaus and of Wis- sehrad, the one commanding the old and the other the new city, being still in the hands of the Imperialists, the chances of success of an army numbering more than 140,000 men were obviously very great. But the advantages of a popular and even national cause, and the wild inspiration of a religious enthusiasm, more than counterbalanced those of position and number. Zisska was again irresistible, and on the 30th of July the emperor raised the siege and retired into Moravia and Hungary. The victorious Hussites, whose confidence was daily increased by new successes, resolved now, with a junction of all their forces, to renew their attack on the citadel of Wissehrad. On this occasion they had recourse to the simple but infallible method of entirely cutting off the fortress from all around it, and starving out the garrison, who, after having killed horses, dogs, cats, and even rats, for food, were at last compelled to capitulate. 78 THE LAST CRUSADER On the 31st of October, a day memorable also for another defeat of the army of Sigismund, who had attempted to force the assailants to raise the siege, the fortress and palace of Wissehrad were sur- rendered to the enemy. A few days sufficed to destroy the treasured glories of ages ; and the abbey, fortress, and palace, which, since the year 683, had been the residence of the dukes and kings of Bohemia, was so utterly destroyed, that not one stone was left upon another. In the seventeenth century the site was covered by a garden of herbs " Et campos ubi Troja fuit." Thus fell the ancient palace of Wissehrad, which in its accumulated treasures and venerable relics of the past was so identified with the history of the people, as well as the rulers of this ancient kingdom, as to make it a subject of just surprise that, in a movement essentially national, it should not have found protection rather than destruction. It formed the culminating point of the ecclesiastical and palatial splendour of Bohemia. Its collegiate church, founded by the Duke Brzctislaus, in the eleventh century, and enriched by the Duke Sobieslaus with all that was most costly, had received from the popes unusual privileges. It was exempt from every jurisdiction but that of the pontiff himself. The Prince and Chancellor of Bo- hemia were its perpetual provosts, who, as well as the dean, the canons, and even the deacons of the church, THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. J9 had the right to wear the mitre when celebrating mass before the duke. The fall of Wissehrad was the bitterest humiliation and the heaviest blow that the Imperialists had yet sustained. Their last hold on the city of Prague was lost with it, while the most sacred memorials of the monarchy had perished under the very eye of the emperor, and at the very moment when he was at the head of an army more numerous, and to all appearance more devoted, than any which the energies of the whole empire had ever yet united in its defence. Sigismnnd in vain made wretched reprisals by ravaging the lands of the Hussites in his retreat, and laid waste among others the country of the lords of Podiebrad, an act whose only result was the exaspera- tion of a powerful family, one of whom afterwards became his rival and sate on the very throne of which he had been ignominiously deprived. All hopes of an accommodation with the emperor being now at an end, the people of Prague resolved upon electing another king, and directed their thoughts towards the King of Poland, a prince of the house of Jagellon. The proposition to elect a foreigner in the place of one whose foreign tendencies and character were the first causes of his rejection and final deposi- tion, displeased the Taborites in the highest degree. " We have hardly driven out a foreign king," ex- claimed Nicholas de Hussinetz, " when you would have us call in another!" 80 THE LAST CRUSADER. The Calixtines were equally energetic in defence of their plan, and the difference between the two parties became so irreconcilable, that the Taborites withdrew from the city. Doctrinal as well as political disagree- ments threatened to dissolve a union which a great national impulse had alone consolidated, and, but for the death of Nicholas de Hussinetz, and the succession of Zisska to the undivided command of the Taborites, Sigismund might have recovered his crown. Con- ferences of both the great parties of the Hussites were held to remove if possible the grounds of this serious difference, and articles of faith were declared on either side, so entirely discordant, as to prove that but one point of doctrine really connected the Calixtines of Prague and the lawless inhabitants of Tabor the right of the laity to the cup while even this was a very slender tie in comparison with that of a common hatred of Sigismund, as representing an anti-national league, and as inspired by the denationalizing influ- ences of the court of Rome. The doctrines of the Taborites, which carried out to the fullest extent the mystical theory of the Church, which Huss had propounded at Constance, were essentially opposed to those of Rokyczana and the Calixtines, whose system was formed on a more scho- lastic model, and had been, by the influence of the University of Prague, restrained within the limits of antiquity. With the one, the wildest propositions of Wicklif were readily admitted, while with the other THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 81 the concession of the cup formed the single ground of resistance to the Church of Rome and to the Council of Constance, which had for the first time authorita- tively mutilated the institution of Christ. It was the observation of this essential difference that led Julian in after life, and when it devolved upon him to conduct the negotiation with the Hussites in their united cha- racter as the representative of the court of Rome, to endeavour to draw out the extreme party into admis- sions . and declarations that might effectually separate them from the other. This skilful design, though, as we shall find hereafter, it was unsuccessful, was evidently formed on the personal knowledge he had acquired of the original differences between the mode- rate and extreme sections at this period. We may observe here, that that deep dread of the progress of Hussitism, which bore so many fruits in his later life, was here implanted. The obscurity which covers the three or four years of his residence in Hungary and Bohemia may be well explained by the fact that it was the single and fruitful opportunity of learning the lesson of his future life. Every feature of that life derives light and significance from the events of which he was at this time a silent but anxious witness. It was then that he recognised the necessity of that deep and searching reform which could alone bring back to the unity of the Church its distant and disaffected members. It was then that he first realized 82 THE LAST CRUSADER. the truth that the Turkish empire was working its way into Europe, not so much in its own strength as from the disunion and disorganization of the European states, and the gradual relaxation of that single bond which had, from the days of the Crusades, combined them against the enemies of the Christian name. The great Bohemian movement he naturally regarded as the most menacing of all the elements of confusion that were now threatening Europe. Its scene was the very nearest to the point of danger. Its successes were opening a path of conquest to the enemies of the Church, at a point where the Church of Rome had ever been weakest, the countries of the great Slavonian family, Eastern in their origin and sympathies, and wavering in their allegiance to the papacy since the day of their conversion by the Eastern missionaries, and their invitation, on the part of the great patriarch, Photius, to resist the tyrannical pretensions and novel doctrines of the bishops of Rome.* The importance of connecting the eastern countries of Europe by a stronger tie to the common centre must have assumed at this time the sterner form of a necessity. And it will not surprise any one who traces the varied fortunes of the Church of the fifteenth century to find that, of the co-ordinate works of union and reformation, the latter was entered upon only as the pathway to the former and the rule admitted and carried out, that the * Photii, Ep. Encycl. (Ep. Ed. Montacut. p. 59.) THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 83 unity of the Church could never be real until the reformation of the Church was complete. The year 1420 did not close before the negotiations of the people of Prague and the Grand Duke Sigis- mund of Poland had made considerable advancement ; and the following year carried on the frightful cata- logue of murder and rapine, opening with the utter destruction of the town of Coinmotau with upwards of two thousand of its inhabitants. Neither women nor children were spared in this barbarous massacre, which was succeeded by the destruction of the towns of Be- raune and Broda, and the voluntary submission of many other cities terror-stricken at the progress of Zisska. Meantime the scene of cruelty was reopened hi Prague. The convent of noble women dedicated to St. George, of which the illustrious sister of the Burggrave of Wartemberg was abbess, was invaded by the Hussites, and on the firm refusal of the abbess to renounce her faith, she was dragged with thirty of the nuns through the streets of Prague, exposed to the insults of the populace, and, but for a timely resistance on the part of the less violent, would have been thrown into the river Mulda. At this period the Hussites, whose arms had hitherto met with so strange a success, resolved to give it a practical direction by the assembly of a diet of the States of Bohemia and Moravia at Czas- law, which was presided over by the great Calixtine nobleman, Ulrich de Rosenberg. The emperor thought G2 84 THE LAST CRUSADER. it not beneath his dignity to consult his temporal interests by acknowledging the legitimacy of this assembly, though, after it had laid down the four great points of Hussitism, it proceeded to the solemn resolution to receive him no longer as king. Letters of mutual remonstrance and recrimination passed between the diet and Sigismund. The one charged upon the emperor all the evils that had befallen the kingdom, and which flowed, as they maintained, from the execution of Huss, and the adhesion of Sigismund to the decrees of the Council of Constance; the other heaping upon the Hussite faction the cruelties and desolations which had ruined and dishonoured the kingdom, bitterly allud- ing to the destruction of the glorious Wissehrad, with its abbey of St. Peter and St. Paul, and forty dependent churches. Neither the arguments nor the reproaches of Sigis- mund could delay the execution of the plan of his dethronement, and the following year witnessed the triumphant entry of Sigismund Coribut into Prague at the head of 5,000 horsemen. The nobility adhered still to the emperor, and the Taborites, with Zisska at their head, energetically opposed the election of a king. The new monarch was left accordingly to the narrow sympathies of the people of Prague the pure Calixtines who were unable to obtain for him the allegiance of the Bohemians generally. The difference between Zisska and the people THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 85 of Prague, indicated in the very determination with which they had carried out a project so opposed to the principles of the proper Hussites, assumed shortly after a very serious aspect. Everything tended to widen the breach, which in the following year (1423) broke out into open warfare. After a raid into Moravia, in which the warlike Bishop of Olrnutz more successful as a general than any who had preceded him in this strange succession of conflicts offered him an unusual degree of resist- ance, the terrible leader of the Hussites advanced upon Prague, but here he had to encounter a difficulty which no amount of military skill and daring could overcome. The national character of the movement departed from it when Prague became the object of attack, and Prague not any longer as the centre of the monarchy, but the centre of the revolution which had overthrown it. Confusion and dismay spread through the ranks of Zisska as he led them against so new an adversary. How could they carry fire and slaughter into the homes of those who had fought beside them as the joint defenders of the national honour, the joint avengers of the martyrs to the national faith ? Zisska, equal to the emergency, addressed this rude soldiery in words which appealed to their former recollections, and pointed to a future which should secure them from every danger of internal division. Mounted on a cask of beer, the blind leader of this wild host spoke to them in language of simple 86 THE LAST CRUSADER. eloquence, as one of themselves, rather obeying their own impulse than demanding obedience for himself. " Take counsel yourselves," were his closing words, " that none may accuse me. Do you wish for peace ? See only that no snare or treachery lie hid beneath it for war ? here am I with you. Choose which you will have in either Zisska will be your counsellor." The magic influence of the general returned as in a moment. The soldiery flew to arms. The attack was already begun when the people of Prague, under the advice of Coribut, sent a deputation to treat of peace. The chief leader of the Calixtines, Rokyczana, afterwards Archbishop of Prague, was sent to meet Zisska, and, after a long interview, the relations of peace were completed. On the feast of the Exaltation of the Cross a strange anniversary for a work of peace such as this the treaty was signed. A rude monument, in the form of a vast stone-heap, was piled up to comme- morate the new alliance, and the Taborites re-entered the city as friends, and were received with every mark of honour and exultation. Turning thence into Moravia, Zisska laid siege to the town of Przibislaw ; but, on the very eve of the final assault, the plague, which had broken out in his camp, attacked him with fatal virulence. " As the hand of man (writes ^Eneas Sylvius) had been unable to slay him, the finger of God destroyed him." The meeting between the leaders of the two THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 87 factions, and the immediate and sudden removal from the scene of the master-spirit of this convulsive movement, makes it not inopportune to say a few words in this place of John de Rokyczana, the Calix- tine Archbishop of Prague, and of John Zisska de Trocznow, the chief of the Taborite faction. There is in the district of Pilsen a village named Rokyczana, belonging to the Church of Prague a village which, in the Bohemian wars two centuries after, was cruelly ravaged by Count Zdenko Leo von Kolowrat, and its wretched inhabitants reproached for the only event which has given it a name in history the birth within its walls of John de Rokyczana, who united to the possession of a commanding intellect a singular capability of adapting himself to the circum- stances of his time. His life in all its history, from the days on which he is said to have even begged his daily food in the streets of Prague, has but one motive and one inspiration. The archbishopric of Prague, the headship of the national Church, was ever before his eye as the single object of his life. The schism between the national party and the court of Rome opened to the crafty ecclesiastic an opportunity of rushing at the prize, while the great nobility and the partisans of the court were for a while kept back from the race. Accordingly, he espoused the cause of the national party with all the energy of a vigorous and original mind ; and on the occasion of this meeting (in connexion with which his 88 THE LAST CRUSADER. name is mentioned for the first time) proved that he was fit to conduct the most difficult and delicate mission. The heads of the consistory of Prague who stood in the way of his ambition the equally celebrated John de Przibram, the physician Krzistan, and Peter de Mladonowicz were removed from the capital through his intrigues; and from that moment he governed the Church of Prague with almost an abso- lute power. His firm adherence to Coribut, and his employment in this negotiation, point him out as the chief adviser of the invitation to that prince to accept the vacant throne, as he undoubtedly was the cause of that reaction a few years later, which sent him back iguominiously to his own country. At a later period we shall find him one of the deputies of the Bohemians at the Council of Basle, confronted with Julian himself, and sustaining his old reputation as a controversialist and diplomatist. After the fruitless issue of this attempt at pacification, we find him next receiving at Prague the deputation sent thither by the council, headed by Philibert, Bishop of Coutances. The acts of this colloquy were transmitted to the council, and formed the basis of the compactata, to which we shall have to revert at a later period. This form of concord, in which the Hussites were overreached by the subtlety of the fathers of the council, was without doubt as much the work of Rokyczana as of those whom he had hitherto so con- sistently opposed. The archbishopric was the reward THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 89 of his duplicity; for, after bringing over the more obstinate of the Hussite party to the terras of the compactata, and obtaining from Sigismund the power of election of the archbishop and bishops for the clergy and nobility of Bohemia, his own election was immediately completed, and the end of his life seemed gained. Rokyczana himself, in the presence of the emperor, professed his renewed allegiance to the Roman See, and received absolution from the condemnation of 'the Church at the hands of the legates of the council. But the treachery of Sigismund, on his arrival at Prague, withdrew from the Calixtine leader the golden prize ; and on the pretext that he did not conform to the Roman Church in those very points in which the terms of the compactata admitted a diversity, the emperor handed over the administration of the arch- bishopric to Philibert, the legate of the council, until Rokyczana was duly reconciled to the Roman See. The restitution of the Roman rites and the return of the monks into Bohemia gave him an opportunity of appealing anew to those who still recognised him as their leader; and his discourses drawing from Sigis- mund threats of personal injury, he retired secretly from the city, and remained under the care of a powerful follower at Konigsgratz. The death of Sigis- mund enabled him soon after to carry on a new intrigue against the election of Albert of Austria, his son-in-law, to the Bohemian throne. But the efforts of Rokyczana were here again fruitless. 90 THE LAST CRUSADER. The death of Albert and the long minority of Wladislaus, his posthumous son, succeeded, and opened a new opportunity for the diplomacy of the indefatigable candidate for the archbishopric. On the election of George Podiebrad, the chief of that illus- trious family which had already borne a conspicuous part in the events of this exciting period, to the vice- royalty of the kingdom, Rokyczana was established in the archbishopric and entered upon its functions, but never received the confirmation of the Roman See. To the instigation of his restless and jealous ambition the popular belief of the day attributed the sudden and mysterious death of Wladislaus, which happened soon after ; and the rude rhymes of the multitude pointed against the king and the archbishop the charge of poisoning the young monarch, whose throne was pre- sently usurped by Podiebrad, who had been intrusted with the care of the future monarch.* But the cruelty and insincerity of Rokyczana were most clearly seen in his bitter persecutions of the Taborites, and of all who adhered to the simpler teaching of Huss. It is to this persecution, which compelled the purer Hussites to seek safety in exile, that the Church of the Bohemian and Moravian Brethren, the Unitas Fratrum, traces up its earlier * lf Auf die Erden haben sie ihn gestreckt,, Mit einem Kiiss haben sie ihn ersteckt, Sein Gemacht haben sie ihm durchbrochen, Das jammert Gott im Himmel hoch, Wird's nicht lassen ungerochen." THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 91 history ; and by this it connects itself with the apostles of the reformation in Bohemia. The year 1471 was fatal both to Rokyczana and to his patron, whose death, from the knowledge of his shattered constitution, he foretold as soon to follow his own. The one died on the 22d of February, the other on the 22d of March ; and their last meeting formed the closing scene of that long conflict, which must have filled the minds of* both with so many bitter memories. The dying archbishop admonished the failing king that he must soon follow him to the awful judgment- seat of God. Stung by the same remorse, and con- scious of kindred crimes to which the same insatiable and blinding ambition had hurried them both, we may well conceive how bitter a commentary upon the history which we have just opened must have been read in this momentous interview. The opinion which Rokyczana entertained of the religion of his country- men he was used to express in the words, "If we could see a Christian who was one not in name only, but in truth, the very sight would move as much astonishment as if a stag with golden horns should make its appearance on the bridge of Prague." * A character of greater levity, except in the single resolution which inspired his life, and of deeper dissi- * A short but valuable biographical sketch of the life of Kokyczana is given by Oswald ("De Joanne Eokyczana Calixtinorum in Bohemia Pontifice," Altdorf, None. 1718), which we have here followed. 92 THE LAST CRUSADER. mulation of all but the hatred he bore to Rome which had frustrated it so long, can hardly be conceived ; and in both these features it stood forth in remarkable contrast to that of the military leader of this great movement, John Zisska de Trocznow, whose religious convictions, though stern and wild, were sincere and inflexible, and whose very cruelties were carried on in submission to a severe and vindictive morality, as was proved in the case of T;he punishment of the Picards or Adamites, a sect which aimed at the overthrow of all the moral sanctions of society. While Rokyczana would have readily conceded the cup to the Church of Rome, on the condition of her confirmation of him in the archbishopric, Zisska, taught rather by the severe dogmatism of the Slavo- nian Church than by the more flexible system of the schoolmen, regarded the assertion of the integrity of the sacrament as a religious duty which admitted of no compromise, and the vindication of the cause of its martyrs at Constance as a righteous work whatever misery and suffering it involved. The words, " Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink His blood," imprudently applied to the Eucharist at the moment when the very possibility of fulfilling the second part of the condition was removed, or, at least, but questionably satisfied in the doctrine of con- comitancy, were dwelt upon by the Church of Prague, in their declaration of faith, in such a manner as to show the strength which a religious party, founded on THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 93 the resistance to the decree of Constance, might assume. That Zisska had not merely taken advantage of a popular sentiment to raise himself to his strange position, but deeply shared the feelings he understood so well, and could direct with so much energy, must be admitted by every unprejudiced observer; while none can deny him the possession of those military qualities which it is, perhaps, difficult for any but the eye of a soldier fully to measure. The foundation of Tabor as a centre from which his operations could be carried on in every direction, appears to have been less a concession to the feudal system of strongholds, which was now fast disap- pearing, than a means of withdrawing those on whose support he chiefly reckoned from the strong counter- acting influences of the city of Prague, which so fre- quently produced discord, and once serious collision, between the two great divisions of the national party. In this remarkable colony, which Pius II. (when ./Eneas Sylvius) visited, and describes in his " History of Europe/' the party of the stricter Hussites was so organized in its religious and military plans as to concentrate the power of its founder, and to enable him to carry out his terrible warfare with the greatest suddenness and success. The slow and -cumbrous means of the Royalists, like those of the empire of which they formed a part, were but ill adapted to resist the impetuous and rapid attacks of an enemy inspired with the double enthu- 94 THE LAST CRUSADER. siasm of a national cause and a religious conviction ; and the recent introduction of fire-arms gave an addi- tional superiority to the more prompt and vigorous party. The plans of Zisska, laid with such judgment and foresight at Tabor, were carried out so suddenly and energetically as never to fail, " for he died as the conqueror in many battles (writes Cochlseus), having never been conquered in any." Little is known of the earlier life of this remarkable man until he was appointed page in the court of the Emperor Charles IV. Probably in consequence of the brilliant opening of his military life in Poland, the period and circumstances of which his biographers are unable to determine, on the accession of Wences- laus, he was appointed chamberlain to that king, a post from which he was able to watch the storm gathering over his country, and to prepare himself to direct it. The death of Huss, and the acceptance by the Bohemian Church of the decree of Constance, called him forth into active life, and enabled him to draw before the world the lines of a character in which the barbarous and grotesque is so interwoven with the religious and military element as to make it stand alone in the history of generalship. The blind leader of the wildest and most undisciplined hosts, with every disadvantage of personal appearance possessing only a rude eloquence, whose chief power lay in its rough and homely appeal to the hearts of his followers his influence over them was yet so great that, on his THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 95 death, a considerable body of them refused to elect any one as his successor, and called themselves orphans, as having been deprived of a father whose loss they could never supply. The main body of the Hussites chose a successor to Zisska in Procopius (surnamed Rasus), a chief who appears to have inherited many of those military quali- fications which the first leader of the national cause had possessed in their fullest measure. The year which witnessed the death of Zisska wit- nessed also the closing act of the legation of Cardinal Bran da, which was the excommunication of Sigismund Coribut, who, breaking the engagement he had made at the Diet of Presburg, had entered Bohemia. His return to Rome took place soon after, and the elevation of Julian, who accompanied him to an auditorship of the Rota, opened to him that path of preferment which brought him so early to the cardinalate. The Council of Siena, convoked in obedience to the decree of the Council of Constance, which had enjoined the assembly of a general council at an interval of five years from its own dissolution, was feebly reopening the work of its great predecessor at the period of Julian's return. Translated from Pavia, the appointed scene of its assembly, on account of the appearance of the plague in that city, it entered upon the subjects that had been bequeathed it at Constance the reformation of the Church, and the 96 THE LAST CRUSADER, reunion with the Eastern Churches with so much disunion and imbecility, as to give an early pretext to the pope to dissolve it. Some of the sermons preached before it are still extant, and while they depict the Church as in the last stage of degeneracy and decay, they exhibit the state of preaching of the age as little suited to raise it to a higher standard. Ludicrous visions of St. Bridget and St. Catherine of Siena, and equally absurd grammatical and scrip- tural images, give a mournful picture of the ignorance of the first principles of theology which was then so prevalent, and of the degeneracy of the taste of the more educated classes before the revival of learning in the close of the fifteenth century. The council was dissolved in February, 1424, after a miserable and convulsive existence of a few months, Cardinal Capranica being the bearer of the bull of dissolution, which summoned a new council at an interval of seven years. But though the prospects of the reformation of the Church were still so unpro- mising, the temporal condition of the papacy was rapidly improving, under the peaceful policy of the new pontiff. Seven years of peace and restoration had done much towards removing the traces of that seventy years of anarchy and orphanage which Rome has ever regarded as her Babylonian captivity. But it was not less the moral than the material influence of the papacy which the wise moderation of the pontiff THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 97 rebuilt on so firm a foundation. The administrative talents which he possessed in his own person were well and ably represented by those whom he selected for offices of trust and responsibility, and the court of Rome was never more richly furnished with great and good men than at this moment, when, perhaps, it needed them more than ever. Besides the older members of the Sacred College who had taken part in the election at Constance, there were at this time in Rome Ludovicus Alemandus (afterwards President of the Council of Basle during its long contest with Eugenius IV.) ; the now sainted Albergati, whose success in carrying on the pacific labours of Martin V. had gained him the name of the Cardinal of Peace ; Capranica, whose severe integrity and devoted fidelity to the Colonna placed him so long under the unjust ban of Eugenius IV. ; and Prosper Colonna, the nephew of the pope, of whom it is said that no one could have failed to " love him, unless it were an ultra-Ghibelline." Among the older men was the venerable John de Bronhiac, the vice-chan- cellor, whose paternal kindness to the great Huss, at Constance, adds greatness to his own name, Car- dinal Branda, and Cardinal Condolmieri, afterwards Pope Eugenius IV. To these members of the college, one was soon to be added whose name is better known in England than any of his contemporaries, Cardinal Beaufort, or, as he was then generally called, the Cardinal of H 98 THE LAST CRUSADER. Winchester. To this prelate, who was included in the large promotion made by Martin V. in 1426, the legation into Bohemia, now rendered additionally dif- ficult by the failure of Cardinal Branda, was confided. The new legate, whose zeal to promote the interests of the court of Rome with his nephews, King Henry V. and the D tikes of Bedford and Gloucester, as well as the success with which he had carried on an ecclesiastical negotiation of another kind, had pointed him out as fitted for a mission of still greater difficulty, entered at once upon the command of the large forces which the empire had placed at his disposal for carrying on the Hussite war. The failure of the previous mission had left no other resource than an appeal to arms, in which the Bohemian cause, from its very nationality, was ever more fortunate than in diplomatic warfare. The terrors of the insurrection had now extended far beyond its first field, and the most flourishing towns of Saxony and Lusatia soon fell a prey to the ravages of the Hussite arms. The sad fate of the town of Lauban, in Lusatia, as it has been more cir- cumstantially described than many others, may enable the reader to estimate the misery and ruin which Mowed the successes of these desperate marauders through all their career. That town forms one of the six municipalities of the Margraviate of Upper Lusatia, and the Taborites having carried their work of plunder and massacre through the neighbouring country of Silesia, attacked it on the 15th of May, 1427, under THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 99 the command of Diedrich von Kliix, a Lusatian noble- man, a headship which shows that the Bohemian disaffection had spread among the higher classes of Lusatia also, and formed part of a general Slavonian movement against the German population. The inha- bitants of the neighbouring villages had taken refuge in the town, in order to escape the cruelties of the Hussite invaders ; but notwithstanding the courage and vigour with which, under the command of the Burgomaster Conrad Zeidler, they repelled the enemy, driven into confusion by the death of their leader, they fell back into the town, whither the infuriated Hussites pursued them. On the 16th of May, the place was taken by assault, and a frightful massacre, not only of its defenders, but of the helpless women and children, who had fled for refuge to the churches, succeeded. In the great church, whither the priests and scholars had betaken themselves for sanctuary, and which was crowded with miserable suppliants, singing the Salve Regina Miser icordia, in the vain hope, if not of a miraculous interposition for their rescue, yet of touching the hearts of their persecutors with pity for their utter helplessness, the murderous assailants hewed down all without mercy, till a stream of blood flowed through the building. A priest of the church, Jeremias Grolle, mounting the tower, addressed energetic words to the brave townsmen, who defended themselves so vigorously, that in every direction a H 2 100 THE LAST CRUSADER. Hussite and an inhabitant of the town were seen fallen together, or engaged in a hand to hand conflict. The unfortunate patriot was soon, however, dragged down from the place of his momentary security, and torn to pieces by horses in the market-place. So utter was the destruction of those who had taken refuge in the church, that the escape of a scholar who had concealed himself under the surplice of a murdered chorister is recorded as almost a miracle. After the Hussites had left, the survivor of the massacre found a piece of bread, on which for three days he contrived to sup- port himself, and having escaped this calamitous day, lived to become altarist at Lowenberg. The demoli- tion of the nunnery of Lauban, and the slaughter of the nuns and the women and children, who had taken refuge with them, followed, nor did the Hussites relinquish the place until the work of desolation was complete. Four years had scarcely passed away since this fatal attack, when the town again fell a prey to the Hussite marauders, who were vigorously, but in the end vainly, resisted by Bernhard von Uchtritz. On this occasion the church was again the scene of a frightful slaughter, the guardian Johann Crone and eight monks being slain before the high altar. These details of cruelty and rapine were repeated in every part of Bohemia and Germany, in which the successes of the Hussites enabled them to act out their sanguinary warfare, and make it easy to fill up the picture of anarchy and THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 101 confusion which the empire was now exhibiting, wherever the Slavonian element was to be found.* Cardinal Beaufort, to whom the legation into Bo- hemia and Germany was now confided, had learned from the failure of Cardinal Branda, a far more ex- perienced diplomatist, that the season of negotiation in that distracted country was at an end, and that nothing but the most prompt and vigorous military action could bring back the reign of law and order. The date of his appointment as legate was the 16th of February, 1427, and he lost no time in opening the crusade, which was first published in his own diocese of Winchester, from which he hastened to the seat of war. From Mechlin he communicated with the pope, and received an encouraging reply. The rapidity with which he raised a large army from every part of Ger- many gave the sure promise of ultimate success. The forces which were thus collected, were divided into three corps the Saxons and troops of the Han- seatic league formed the first ; the contingents from Franconia, Thiiringen, and Liineburg, under the Elector of Brandenburg, formed the second; while the third was supplied by the electorates of Bavaria, and the Palatinate, and the free cities of the bench of Swabia. Entering into Bohemia, they encamped respectively at Commotau, Egra, and Tausch. * These details are given by Carpzovius in his " Ehrien tempel der Ober-Lausitz," and were derived from the MS. annals compiled by the Burgomaster, Christopher Wiessner, in the seventeenth century, and preserved in the Town-hall of Lauban. 102 THE LAST CRUSADER. The Hussites in the meantime, foreseeing the danger, had prepared for it by a work of recon- ciliation between the two great factions of the Ta- borites and Calixtines, whose divisions had already been far more fatal to their arms than the greatest successes of their adversaries. Sigismund Coribut had been dismissed from Prague, deserted alike by all, and thus the chief element of discord was re- moved. The city of Meissen was the scene of the first encounter of the rebels and the imperialists, who were bent upon regaining this important posi- tion. The siege had already commenced, and the success of the legate, with the vast resources at his command, seemed to be inevitable, when, for some unexplained and even yet inexplicable cause, the army of the besiegers took to a sudden and shameful flight. Probably, the best and most reasonable solution of the sudden defection, that so frequently rendered abortive the energetic and for that period gigantic efforts of the imperialists, who had gathered the flower of the armies of Europe into this strange battle-field, may be found in the nationality of the Bohemian movement, and in the terror which its wild successes and savage features had inspired throughout Christendom. The spirit which had animated the crusades was now passed away, and the folly that sought to evoke that spirit against Christians, and had drawn forth the sublime denuri- THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 103 elation of Dante, had tended to hasten the day of its utter extinction. The publication of the crusade of Martin V., though it succeeded in enlisting one of the largest armies hitherto collected in Europe, could not keep it together in the face of a religious influence like that of Hussitism, which was rooted in national sympathies, such as Rome could never awaken in the day of her greatest power. The renewed success of the Hussites, whose cause seemed to be providentially sustained against that of united Europe, led the emperor again to have recourse to diets and diplomacy, and to strive to put in motion the cumbrous machinery of the empire, whose exe- cutive power had ever, from its very complication, been so weak and difficult to direct in the hour of danger. Again was a diet summoned at Nuremberg, to concert immediate and vigorous measures for crushing the hitherto successful rebellion. To this diet, Julian, now nominated a cardinal deacon, with the title of St. Angelo, was accredited by Martin V. as his representative, combining the offices of legate in Bohemia and president of the general council, which, in pursuance of the celebrated decree " Fre- guens" of the Council of Constance, was shortly to assemble at Basle. But scarcely had he arrived at Nuremberg, when the afflicting intelligence of the death of his patron reached Jiim. His twofold mission seemed abruptly closed. Upon one portion of it, that of legate into 104 THE LAST CRUSADER. Bohemia, he had entered with that eager zeal which his devotion to an active life, and his strange predilec- tion for a military activity above every other, made so natural to him. Upon the other he had entered not only with hesitation, but with actual repugnance. Even when he accepted it, and was congratulated by his friends upon his double appointment, before he left Rome, he loudly complained of this part of his office, and to none more loudly than to the successor of Martin V., Cardinal Condolmieri, and to the Car- dinal of the Holy Cross (Albergati), who both " con- doled with him," as he himself affirms, " with parental affection on the assignment of such a province to him." As some days had elapsed between the announce- ment of the election of Eugenius IV. (Gabriel Condol- mieri) to the papal throne, and the confirmation of him in his legations by the new pontiff, he began to indulge the hope, that at least the presidency of the council had been delegated to another member of the college. But it was not long before the dreaded appointment arrived, and Julian found himself con- firmed in both his offices, while Eugenius, as if to increase his embarrassment, urged upon him the necessity of the immediate assembly of the council, apparently viewing that as the most important part of his commission. All that the legate possessed at this moment was the discretion to give priority to the one subject or the other, as either appeared to him to be the more urgent. It was natural, therefore, that THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 105 notwithstanding the pressure from Rome, he should give priority to what was now of paramount importance, and should at once address himself to the reconciliation of Bohemia. Such a course was necessary even to enable the council to fulfil the most difficult part of its labours, and to make it an effective instrument in restoring the religious peace of Europe. Julian took advantage of this interval to press again on Eugenius his entreaties to be absolved from a charge which he so much dreaded, and prayed the pope to transfer to another the presidency of the future council. Meantime, he opened the diet of Nuremberg by the publication of the bull of Martin V., authorising a crusade against the Hussites, and pro- posed a large and judicious plan for the future cam- paign, which, after its adoption by the diet, he communicated by letter to John Hoffmann, the energetic Bishop of Meissen. The letter itself runs thus : " ' There must/ saith the Apostle, 'be heresies, that they which are approved may be made manifest : ' ' for gold is tried in the fire, and acceptable men in the furnace of adversity/ men who offer themselves as a wall for the house of the Lord. O grief 1 the abomi- nable heresy of the Wiclifites and Hussites of the kingdom of Bohemia, surpassing in cruelty the heresies of every former age, has prevailed in our day. Yea, it hath filled their hearts with such obstinacy and rage, that, even as the deaf adder that stoppeth her ears, 106 THE LAST CRUSADER. they hear not the words of the Church, their mother, and heed not her holy doctrine, insomuch that they seem to be inflexible to the labours, the arguments, the gentleness, the entreaties of those who would bring them back. And, besides their pestilent doctrines, which proclaim every kind of blasphemy, they have utterly put off the feelings and the nature of men, and, becoming as it were brute beasts, pant for the spoil and for the very blood of Catholics. Their crimes and sacrileges against God and man, against the sacraments and temples consecrated to God their murders, their rapines, their zeal for the destruction of every earthly institution are so notorious and conspicuous to all, that to recount them severally were indeed superfluous. In arms and in violence is their only trust by fire and sword alone do they seek to defend their errors. And, above all, thirsting for the blood of Catholics, they murder and burn all who will not assent to their errors with savage cruelty, hideously mutilating them, and afflicting them with manifold torments. How shameful and ignominiously they handle the divine sacrament of the Eucharist, which, with profane feet, they tread down into the blood of the slain how inhumanly they break and burn the images of our Lord Jesus Christ, and of the most glorious Virgin, His mother, and of all the saints how they destroy churches and oratories from their very foundation, it were too tearful to relate. "Against such an insane and armed heresy the THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 107 Catholic princes are most justly and meritoriously rising mightily in arms and warfare. For to them the power of the sword hath been granted by God for the punishment of evil-doers, and for the praise of them that do well. Wherefore the most Serene Prince, and illustrious Lord Sigismund, by the grace of God, King of the Romans, of Hungary, and Bohemia, etc., desiring, as the defender and advocate of the Church, utterly to root out this pestilent heresy, having assembled in this city of Nuremberg the reverend fathers and illustrious lords, the electors of the holy Roman empire, the archbishops, bishops, princes, dukes, counts, barons, and ambassadors of the cities, we ourselves being present, unanimously took counsel and resolved, for the defence of the faith, that on the feast of the nativity of St. John the Baptist next ensuing, a strong and powerful army gathered together from every part of Germany should assemble at Weyden, on the frontiers of Bohemia, to advance (with the favour of God) into Bohemia in due course for the extirpation of the heretics, if they should refuse to return into the bosom of the Church. "But since pious prayers and supplications were ever wont to prevail more than arms, we ought to imitate the holy Moses, who prayed for the people while they were fighting, and as long as he held up his hands to heaven caused them to prevail, and when he dropped them again to yield. Follow we also the example of the Levites, who, by the sound of the 108 THE LAST CRUSADER. trumpet, animated the people to battle. Let us pray, then, without intermission, suppliantly and devoutly, and, with tears and prayers, implore of God, through his grace, that our Catholic army about to contend for the house of the Lord, and for the salvation of his people, may obtain victory over the enemies of the faith. Let us, moreover, exhort these warriors of the faith, these wrestlers for Catholic truth, by sermons, by admonitions, and by the examples of their ancestors, not to suffer the sanctuary of the Lord to be polluted by wicked enemies. Let us arm ourselves, let us strengthen those whom we invite with the saving sign of the life-giving cross, and with spiritual graces and gifts, so that they may confidently and successfully defeat the enemies of God and man. " Wherefore we (as we are bound), wishing to fulfil with all diligence the commission laid upon us by the Apostolic See, and desiring that this holy work may be joyfully completed, by these presents, do exhort, advise, and charge you, and in virtue of your holy obedience lay the strict commandment upon you, that without delay in all cathedral and other collegiate and con- ventual churches, as well as in all parish churches of your city and diocese, you do solemnly pray, and set forth and proclaim the word of God, and the apostolic indulgences to the exhorting and awakening of the faithful on every Lord's day and festival during the approaching campaign ; and that you will ordain and depute discreet and fit priests with the power of signing THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. ]QC) with the cross, and absolving and doing all such other things as are contained in the apostolic letters, according to their form and tenor, whereof I send you an authentic transcript, under our seal and official signature. " Given at Nuremberg, in the diocese of Bamberg, A.D. 1431, ninth iudiction, 20th day of March, and in the first year of the Pontificate of the most holy Father and Lord in Christ, Eugenius IV." The diet of Nuremberg, whose resolution on the Hussite war was thus promulgated through the empire, carried on its discussions Bunder the pre- sidency of Sigismund himself for as many as eight months. The very prolongation of its sessions, and the fact that more than two months elapsed between its assembly and the publication of the letter of the legate, leads to the belief that the unanimity here alleged was not arrived at without much preliminary difference of sentiment. We are told on very good authority that the emperor was himself at the head of the dissentient party, and strongly urged upon the princes the im- policy of the expedition of which Julian was the energetic advocate. Sigismund wisely saw the danger and complications which even a successful campaign against his own subjects would bring with it to the empire, and that success in such a cause would not only make an irreparable breach between himself and his people, but tend to the exaltation of ] 10 THE LAST CRUSADER. the princes of the empire, and of the court of Rome at his expense. His natural policy, as well as his own feelings, urged him to resist the warlike counsels of Julian, and even when they prevailed, to make a pri- vate attempt to conciliate his Bohemian subjects. Passing to the frontier town of Egra, he sent on two of the gentlemen of his court to propose terms of accommodation. Their overtures were well received by the Calixtines and Taborites, and all except the Orphans, from whom, as the obstinate opponents of all reconciliation, they met with determined hostility. The other factions agreed to send deputies to the emperor, who gave them several interviews, but with- out arriving at any successful conclusion. At this critical moment, the discovery of the hostile plans that were now matured in the diet, and the news of the preaching of the crusade throughout the em- pire, awakened in the Hussite ambassadors a fear of treachery, too natural to those who remembered how easily the safe conduct of Huss had been cancelled, and the oath of the emperor broken. Abruptly leav- ing the scene of the diet, they returned to Prague, uttering only reproaches and accusations against Sigis- mund, asserting that upon the Catholics alone the blame of this furious warfare would rest, which they themselves had vainly endeavoured to terminate. The military predilections of the legate, supported in this instance by his experience of the fruitlessness of negotiation, even when entrusted to the most prudent THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 1 1 1 diplomatist, not only prevailed over the open "opposi- tion of Sigismund, but overruled the ill-concealed disinclination of the majority of the princes of the empire. With a selfishness more than ordinarily shortsighted, they refused to look upon the war in their federal character, and maintained that its expenses should fall upon those who were most immediately to profit by it, and especially upon the Elector of Saxony. On the part of these, however, it was properly rejoined that the war was for the defence of the empire and of religion itself. The closing scene of the diet of Nurem- berg completed the triumph of the warrior over the diplomatist. In a full assembly, and with every circum- stance of pomp and solemnity, Cardinal Julian de- livered into the hands of the Margrave of Brandenburg and his sons, the blessed banner of the crusade ; and the ancestor at once of the great Frederic, and of that not less glorious, though less warlike successor, who so lately filled his throne, received the symbol and accepted the mission of a crusader against the children of the same faith, and the confessors of the same Cross. In the meantime, Julian, who employed the inter- vening period in publishing the crusade in the district around Nuremberg, seems to have had at least a mis- giving that his warlike counsels had been premature, and that the duty of exhausting every peaceful means had not been fulfilled before the sword was drawn. The day of the appointed meeting of the allies had already passed away without finding them assembled, 112 THE LAST CRUSADER. and while he was awaiting the signal for the opening of the campaign with that impatience which was so natural to his ardent mind, he addressed to the Bohe- mians these last words of pathetic entreaty words whose tones of peace and love harmonized ill with the notes of warfare, and the noise of the instruments of death, out of the midst of which they were uttered : "Julian, by the grace of God, Cardinal Deacon of St. Angelo in the Holy Roman Church, and Legate of the Apostolic See throughout Germany. " Of all the things which we desire from our heart this is the highest and the chief, that the celebrated kingdom of Bohemia may return to the one faith and to its ancient obedience to the holy Roman Church. For if this were indeed to come about, not only the salvation and bliss of the soul, but peace, rest, and every other good, would doubtless flow back upon the kingdom in as large a measure as they did before this confusion and innovation began. But in order that this may be fruitfully accomplished, I am applying myself with all my strength and in virtue of my office to this one point for this alone I exercise my mind, and to this devote my life that the citizens of this kingdom may see with their own eyes the fervency of my anxiety for their salvation, the sincerity of my desire to deserve well at their hands ; yea, to that extent, that if need be I am ready to welcome death itself for the name of Christ. THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 113 " But since we have found that those who scatter evil seeds pretend (in order to detach the minds of the inhabitants from peace and concord) that our Christian forces are led by us into your kingdom to overturn it, to fill it with rapine, slaughter, and burnings, to its utter and irreparable destruction taking due consi- deration hereof, and willing to remove from you this groundless suspicion we thus make known to you that we have brought together our Christian forces only to appease your controversies and to conciliate peace among you, to restore sacred rites fallen into disuse, to confirm the relations of peace and quietness with you, to renew and upraise the name and glory of God, which this disorder has diminished, and finally to reduce everything into a certain order, if only the inhabitants agree to reject that confusion already alluded to, and their change of government, and join themselves to us as they did before by ties of social and political alliance. " We exhort, therefore, and with the deepest and most heartfelt love we implore, all Bohemians of either sex and of every age to return to the faith and con- versation of their ancestors, who agreed with us, and in no way whatever to depart therefrom. " We assure the Bohemians that they may all freely return to the holy Roman Church, and that they need entertain no fear whatever either for their persons or for their property. For these our Christian forces have never injured, either in life or in property, a single i 114 THE LAST CRUSADER. one of those who sought again the bosom of the Church their mother, and suffering from constraint or injury betook themselves thereunto ; and we solemnly promise you that you will be welcomed by them so tenderly and lovingly that not even the slightest point of enmity will be visible between you. " Let not, therefore, him who seeks to live in the fear of God, and to escape these troubles, fear to become reconciled to us ; for such as this may look for every office of Christian love from our forces. Nor do we doubt that the Bohemians, when they are reconciled to us, and see our benevolent feeling towards them, will return thanks to the great and good God for having put this grace into their hearts, and that the only ground of sorrow that will remain will be the thought that for so long a time and for so slight a cause they were separated from us. Return, then, to the breasts of your mother the Church of Christ. Do not bring her even a yet greater grief, who already groans and pours forth tears, and expects with ardent love the returning of her children, who, having asked for the portion of the inheritance which fell to them, have wasted it in riot in a far country, and whom hunger and every other ill has overtaken. " Return, dear pledges of love, return to us ; we will go forth to meet you ; we will embrace you ; we will put upon you the new garment ; we will slay for you the fatted calf; we will call together our friends and our neighbours, having found the sons we had lost, THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. H5 and make joyous festival with them. What is it that our fellow -citizens and brethren still fear? Were we not born of the same mother? were we not renewed at the same font of holy baptism ? Do we not partake the same Christianity ? do we not unite in acknow- ledging the same Mediator and Redeemer, Jesus Christ ? Have we not the same word and sacraments ? do we not embrace the same Scriptures ? What, then, hath alienated you from us ? Who hath been able to separate the children from their mother ? But a little while ago you exceeded all nations in faith and piety; now you are pursuing Christians themselves with fire and sword. The piety you showed erewhile you are now changing into cruelty. " Were it not better for us who are signed with the sign of the cross to fight against the Turks and Sara- cens, those most bitter of the enemies of the Christian name, than to attack our Christian brethren, to the inevitable destruction of our religion, and to the depopulation of your own territory? We do it un- willingly; we are compelled; unwillingly and with tears we advance in arms against you, But since necessity demands it, and the love of our neighbour, most inhumanly persecuted, spoiled, slain, by the Bohemians, requires it, we cannot sit silently with our hands closed, nor connive at the destruction of the temples and houses of prayer in which God is invoked and his worship celebrated, at the breaking and burning of the images of Jesus Christ, of the Blessed i2 116 THE LAST CRUSADER. Virgin, and of all the Saints, at the torturing with manifold torments of the Catholics, at the treading under foot of the venerable sacrament, and the plunder and ruin of all the countries around. ! with how great misery and destruction have they filled their own kingdom of Bohemia, Austria, Hungary, Silesia, Misnia, Bavaria, Franconia, and the adjacent countries, or, I should say, rather, continue to do to this day, so that it is grievous even to speak of? " By this iniquity and these crimes, strange to human nature, we are roused ; not that we seek war against you, but fight in defence of Christians, and of our neighbour, for our salvation. We are consoled at the number of those Bohemians who are displeased at this state of disorder, but, while they think with us, are so oppressed by tyrants as not to dare to remove it. It is to free all those who are thus piously disposed in the Bohemian kingdom, and to punish those who love and promote this state of confusion, that we have justly taken up our arms. "What then, knowing this our zealous affection towards you, can ye say? What can you fear for yourselves ? We bring you peace, we offer it to you, if there are any among you to accept it. And as we have offered you peace, the guilt of war cannot be laid to our charge, but to those who will not accept it, and would be wise above measure, all which errors arise from that evil spirit * the enemy of mankind, who is envious of this kingdom lest it increase in THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. H7 faith, and love, and righteousness. Yet you ought not to embrace a strange and foreign teaching, nor suffer yourselves to be borne to and fro by every wind- of doctrine a danger which you will easily escape if you embrace the immoveable column of the Christian Church and cling thereto. " And think not that these few among yourselves have a deeper knowledge than the whole world and the universal Church of Christ, both of the present day and in the ages that are past. What can soldiers, burghers, rustics, and other illiterate persons teach you? Can these excel in understanding the doctors who have gone before or who still remain, not to speak of universities and colleges in which the Holy Scrip- tures are assiduously treated upon ? Will you rather believe two or three men, I know not who or what, than so many doctors, masters, and learned persons, to whom, as they lived so many years before them, not even the suspicion of hatred or contention can attach itself ? Look at St. Augustine, who says that he would not believe the Holy Gospel itself if it were not accredited by the Christian Church. Many evangelists have written gospels, but because the Christian Church, which under the guidance of the Holy Spirit does not err, bids us read only four, we receive those only, and withhold our faith from the rest. The same is taught us by all the doctors of the Church with one consent, who will have us keep to the faith which the true Church teaches us. ] 18 THE LAST CRUSADER " To the same Church our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ hath promised His Holy Spirit to lead it into all truth, to preserve it, and to remain with it eternally. I could produce countless sayings of the Holy Fathers to the same effect, but these I omit lest I should be too prolix, and repeat in fine that all Bohemians who betake themselves into the bosom of the holy Roman Church may obtain, according to this our promise, a full and perfect remission of their sins, and pardon for this guilt in all clemency, tenderness, and love, yea, in all that a son can ask of a father, or certainly expect from him. " May our Lord Jesus Christ, who has redeemed and bought us for Himself with His most precious blood, vouchsafe to the Bohemians and endue them with such a mind that, believing with us, they may embrace one faith to the good of their own souls and the peace and glory of their most worthy kingdom. " Given at Nuremberg on the third of the nones of July, 1431." To a letter such as this, the very simplest of the Bohemian recusants might have given a very profound reply. A community in which, as Pope Pius II. him- self tells us, the very women knew far more of Scripture than the priests of Italy,* might well be expected to reply at least to the religious part of the cardinal's appeal with vigour and success. The answer which they transmitted to the legate is * MnG3d Sylvii, De Dictis Alfonsi Regis. THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. H9 one which indicates a masterly hand probably that of Rokyczana himself, if not of Peter Payne, the English Hussite. There is a vein of irony running through the opening passage in which the Bohemians suggest to the cardinal that he cannot but be aware that many salutary precepts were delivered by the Lord Jesus Christ while upon earth, and that the chiefest among them were these, that the sacrament should be distributed in both kinds, that the Word of God should be freely taught, that open and notorious sins, even when done under a pretext of religion, should be punished, and that the administration of public affairs should be taken out of the hands of the clergy. They charge the Roman Church with having deserted the principles of Christianity, and the clergy with having implicated themselves in secular matters and neglected their religious duties. They maintain that they have simply taken up the cause of Christ after vainly seeking for a hearing from a general council. They forcibly advert to the argument of necessity alleged by the legate, and urge the far greater necessity of teaching and observing the pre- cepts and institutions of Christ, than of obtaining the aid of armies gathered from every part of Europe to force back the Bohemian nation into the obedience of the Roman Church. They tben proceed with as much ease as freedom to deal with the petitio principii involved in the latter portion of the cardinal's appeal. They peremptorily 120 THE LAST CRUSADER. refuse to admit either the legate or the witnesses whom he cites as* the judges in a cause which the Eternal Word of Truth alone can determine, re- minding him of the words, "If an angel from heaven preach unto you another gospel than that which I have preached let him be accursed." Human opinions frequently err in such a case. They desire to reconcile themselves with the Roman Church by reconciling that Church with the Scriptures. They point to the obvious contrast between the methods of Scripture and the warlike measures with which they are now threatened, and they significantly remind the legate that if he had come to them as St. Peter to Cornelius, he would be received as he was; the ministers of Christ among them would have rejoiced greatly, and have killed not only the calf of the parable but the stalled ox, and have called together their friends and their neighbours to rejoice with them. "If you weigh these things well (they conclude), you will see the reason why we, baptized as we are with the same baptism as yourself, but exercising the faith of Christ not with the lips only, but in the life, are separated and drawn away from you. Wherefore we pray you to hear us as a brother, and as the world is near its destruction, to associate yourselves with us and tread with all your heart in the footsteps of our Lord Jesus Christ and his disciples. For by this means the Christian people shall live peaceably here in tabernacles of hope, and shall come to everlasting THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 121 bliss hereafter." Given at Prague in the mouth of July, 1431. The day for opening the campaign had now arrived, and Julian, at the head of probably the largest army which the empire had ever before collected, moved towards the border-town of Egra. A hundred and thirty thousand men, gathered from every part of Ger- many, might seem a force sufficient, at least in number, to crush the rebellion of Bohemia, wherever it might show its head. But it wanted the unity and the clear object, as well as the courage and discipline of its now experienced adversary. Its leaders were divided among themselves, and the soldiery looked with indifference upon a cause which could give no inspira- tion of ardour or courage even to those who were most interested in its success. The Bohemians, whom the presence of their great general, Procopius, inspired with the highest confi- dence, and who, by the fusion of the three parties which divided them, for the sake of their common de- fence, had proved the possession of a more solid unity than that of the hosts who were assembled for their destruction, were not slow in discovering their vantage ground. The Imperial Army, whose commissariat appears to have been as defective as its discipline, fell at once upon the prey before it ; and the villages and towns which lay in the course of its march were mercilessly plundered and burnt. So great was the eagerness 122 THE LAST CRUSADER. with which the soldiery entered upon their work of pillage that the consciousness of the presence of a powerful and dreaded enemy seemed lost altogether. While they were besieging the town of Tachow, Proco- pius approached the place with so great a stillness and secresy as to escape detection, and to cause such alarm, when his presence was known, that the besieg- ing army fell back on Tysta, which they ravaged with a barbarity worthy of the cowardice that had prompted their retreat. While they were encamped there, the news that the enemy had followed them, and was fast approaching, occasioned a panic so wild and universal that the en- tire camp seemed broken up in a moment. So sud- denly and completely did this vast armament melt away that it seemed rather a preconcerted plan than an unforeseen misfortune. The scene was strange and stirring. On the one side generals and princes de- serting their posts, and the soldiers dropping away from their ranks ; on the other, the energetic legate, " faithful found amid the faithless/' riding from rank to rank, and from man to man, encouraging, per- suading, reproaching, and even shaming them into fidelity to the cross they had taken ; appealing in one breath, and in every possible form, to their religious devotion, their patriotism, their fears of temporal loss, their peril of eternal salvation. Every motive was held up to them in vain their courage as Germans, their pride of a warlike ancestry, their zeal as Christians, THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 123 their faith as crusaders, their honour as men, all were gathered up in the few sentences of exhortation which were multiplied by Julian on this occasion.* Blending together in himself the characters of the priest and the soldier, between which his whole life was so strangely divided, he sought to kindle the hearts of his crusa5ers with the fires of religious zeal and of patriotic devotion; but the potency of a blessed banner and a consecrated sword had passed away with the age of the earlier crusades : and though the spec- tacle of an ecclesiastic urging on an army to a war of faith might excite wonder and admiration, it had ceased to awaken sympathy. The labour was a hope- less one, and the sagacity of the legate must have traced this bitter humiliation of the greatest Christian host that had ever assembled to those political divi- sions in the empire from which the Church of Rome had already suffered so much, and which, in the day of the Reformation, gave occasion to the greatest and most irreparable of her losses. This failure of the last attempt to reanimate the crusading army, which is described by ./Eneas Sylvius (probably on the authority of Julian himself) as so sudden and signal as to be wholly inexplicable, is qualified by Theobaldus, who derives his authority * The set speeches which are put into the mouth of Julian by Theobaldus exhibit too much of the elaborate skill of the historian to enable us to regard them as the exact report of what took place at emergencies so sudden and under circumstances so confused as these. I have therefore given rather the substance than the words of these addresses. 124 THE LAST CRUSADER. from the Bohemian chroniclers. For a brief space, according to his statement, they rallied; but the panic returned with the approach of the Bohemian army, and the slaughter was so great that eleven thousand of the crusaders perished on that fatal day, the legate escaping by flight, and leaving in the hands of the enemy the papal bull authorising the crusade, his cardinalitial hat and mantle, together with the cross and other insignia of his legatine office, which were kept and exhibited afterwards at Tysta, where they were to be seen as late as the seventeenth century. The Archduke of Austria, who had brought up his forces to support the army of Julian, when he heard of the flight of the cardinal, turned off his men into Moravia, which he so far reduced as to extort from the inhabitants the promise to submit without reserve to the decrees of the approaching council. Julian, returning to Nuremberg, where the Emperor Sigis- mund awaited the result of the campaign, loaded with the bitterest reproaches the princes of Germany, to whose cowardice and disunion he traced the dis- asters of the imperial force. The dreaded alternative of the council was the only resource which now remained to the baffled legate, and the success of ecclesiastical diplomacy had been made so doubtful by the premature appeal to the sword, that it became necessary for the emperor to assume the style of an apologist, and to disavow THE BOHEMIAN LEGATION. 125 that hostility which he had (perhaps unwillingly) sanctioned, while he invited to the council now assembled at Basle the irritated malcontents of Bohemia. " We exhort you/' are his words, " and advise you to appear in the council. There you will find the Reverend Father in God the Lord Cardinal Legate of the Apostolic See, and our Vicar, the most Illus- trious and Serene Margrave of Brandenburg, whom we have charged to protect all those who come to the council to explain their faith, and to aid and sustain them; to confirm, moreover, all that shall be agreed upon, and to take all pains to convince you how fully your hereditary King and Lord is disposed to gratify your wishes and to advance your interests." Before we accompany Julian to the Council of Basle, our attention is called back to Rome and to the political changes and altered influences which the accession of Eugenius IV. to the pontificate opened upon the Church and the world. CHAPTER IV. ROME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. NEVER had a more auspicious day dawned for the Roman pontificate than the llth of November, 1417, on which the controversies and conflicts of the Church were closed with the announcement which till then had but an uncertain sound, " Papam liabemus " no longer the pope of a schism or a faction no longer a mere pretender to a disputed throne, but the elect of all Europe, whose representatives, with a marvellous unanimity, concurred in the choice of Cardinal Otto Colonna. Centuries of party triumphs had not wit- nessed so great and unmixed a joy as that which hailed the conclusion of the great work of restoring the unity of the Church in the person of its head. So great was the wonder and delight of the multitude, that, for a long time, they could not even speak, while the joy of the emperor took a more loquacious and practical form. " Overflowing with delight, and re- gardless of his dignity, he entered the conclave, and ROME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. 127 gave thanks to all for having elected so great a man, and one so necessary to the all but perishing state."* It would appear as though Martin V. had been the elect of the emperor, even before he was that of the council, and that the concessions which were made by the co-electors, who had been appointed by the council to act with the cardinals, in order that an Italian car- dinal should be chosen, were not altogether uncon- ditional. From a state of almost hopeless disunion, they arrived at so sudden an unanimity in the choice of Cardinal Colonna, that the known predilection of the emperor can hardly have been without its in- fluence. For not only on the ground of his belonging to that illustrious family, which had ever maintained the cause of the empire in Italy, and had become as positively identified with it in interest as it was traditionally connected with it in origin,! but on the far higher ground of the prudence and moderation with which he had balanced the conflicting interests, and overruled the factious dispositions of the council, the desires and even the necessities of the emperor could not have been satisfied by the election of any other. Even the powerful cardinals of the contrary faction seem to have acquiesced in these feelings, and no member of the college was more influential on this * Von der Hardt, torn. iv. p. 1483. f The house of Colonna and that of Hohenzollern are believed to be of the same origin, while that of Orsini has its German repre- sentative in the Bohemian Counts of Rosenberg. 128 THE LAST CKUSADER. occasion than Cardinal Giordano Orsini, whose later conduct stood in singular contrast with his disinterested generosity as the elector of a Colonna. Faithful to the principles which had placed him on the throne, Martin V. maintained to the last the determination to keep aloof from every feud of party or family ; and his sudden departure from Constance before the arrival of his uncle, Count Frederic Colonna, and his refusal to remain in Germany after the disso- lution of the council, though greatly urged by Sigis- mund, may be traced to his anxiety to escape even the suspicion of a political leaning. When, from being pronounced " the poorest and the simplest of all the cardinals/'* he became to be considered " the richest and most tenacious of popes," he still received the same character of wisdom and moderation, even from those whose jealousy had been awakened by the unexpected change. And when, after thirteen years of an enlightened government, such as Rome had rarely witnessed in the most vigorous ages of the papacy, and certainly has never seen in the period of its decrepitude, the good pontiff was struck with apoplexy, the confusion and dismay which reigned in the city, and spread throughout the Church at the news of so irreparable a loss, may readily be conceived. To the one great work of building up a solid peace not only in Italy, but throughout Europe, the reign * " Der armate und einfaltigste Cardinal." (Windek, Vita Sigis xmmdi, c. Ixxvii.) EOME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. 129 of the pontiff had been dedicated, and if he failed to satisfy the expectations of those who looked at his hands for the Reformation of the Church, as well as its union, he had so strengthened the central power as to give it, at least, the means of entering successfully thereafter upon that great work which he had left unaccomplished. On the question of the priority of the reformation or the union of the Church the sentiments of the emperor had differed from those of the council from the first. Sigismund foresaw with that shrewdness which he was so little able to exercise in hi? relations with his own subjects, that when once the election had taken place the claims of the reformers of the Church would be set aside, or deferred to the more convenient season. With this conviction, he had urged the importance of the reformation of the Church as the only safe guide to its reunion. Against this the cardinals, who were the least interested in the work of reformation, and whose power and prosperity had grown up so rapidly in the anarchy of the schism, reclaimed with energy and success.* Having with them the French nation in the council, which was indebted to the schism and to the abuses of which Avignon had been the centre for * "Hse autem taxationes ecclesiarum. . . . reservationes ecclesi- arum, etc. in Avenionensi curia, ipsa illic remanente, pro majori parte initium habuerunt. Quia non poterat quilibet Cardinalium ittius tern- ports statnm tenere regalem nisi talibus Incris undecumque venirent, quo* de Reform. Eccl. cap. 17.) 130 THE LAST CRUSADER. its undue influence in the conclave, and over the papacy itself, they had carried the question of priority in favour of the election to the papacy ; and Sigismund, when urged to press upon the newly- elected pope the great work of reformation, retorted, with just severity,* "While we were insisting that the work of reformation should be done before you pro- ceeded to the election of the pope, you would not acquiesce, and would have a pope before the reforma- tion was accomplished. Lo, now you have a pope, and we have one also. If you want to expedite the work of reformation, go to him. For the question no longer interests us as it did then, while the see of Rome was vacant." f Thus the election of Martin V. sealed up the ques- tion of reformation, and the pontiff entered upon his work of restoring the papacy without finding it necessary to redeem the pledges upon which it had been obtained. The pacification of Italy, the restora- tion of peace between Prance and England, the rebuilding of the ruins of Rome, the union of the empire in the crusade of Bohemia, these, and many other features of his reign, have constituted him the greatest benefactor the Roman Church has ever had in the long line of her monarchy, while in the convoca- tion of the Council of Basle, to complete the great * Gobelinus Persona. (Ap. Von derHardt, torn. iv. p. 1503.) f To promote this feeling of contentment Martin V. had given to Sigismund a year's tenths of the whole empire, and concluded con- cordats with Germany and France. ROME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. 131 work which was left unfinished at Constance, he proved, at least the desire to reform that Church, whose unity and strength he had restored. Had he survived to fulfil this desire, the world might have never witnessed the renewal of that schism which his prudent policy had closed up, and his successor might have inherited the proud title which was inscribed on his cenotaph in the church of St. John Lateran, " Temporum suorum felicitas." Yet with all these qualifications Martin V. did not escape the charge of nepotism, and of enriching the great family of Colonna at the price of all his earlier pledges, and to the disappointment of the just ex- pectations of Europe. Not only had he erected principalities and obtained fortresses for his house, thus laying the seeds of its future troubles, and contributing fatally to the restoration of the anarchy of the schism, but had advanced his nephew Prosper Colonna to the cardinalate, which he had pledged himself to restore to its best estate, and even to foreign dignities and benefices which the weakness of the sovereigns of Europe had enabled him to grasp at anew. At the age of fourteen Prosper Colonna fulfilled the prophecy of his name, by obtaining the Arch- deaconry of Canterbury, and a permission to hold other benefices to a certain amount in Europe while he held also the dignities of cardinal and archdeacon of the Roman Church. The immense K 2 32 THE LAST CRUSADER. wealth which had flowed back upon the Roman chancery after the accession of Martin V., indicating the renewed prosperity which had been secured to Europe by the settlement of the papacy, taken together with the fact that all the strongholds of the Estates of the Church were in the hands of the Colonna, awakened in the cardinals of the Venetian and of the Orsini interests the utmost jealousy and alarm. The sudden death of the pontiff gave them an opportunity of checking the progress of a power which might otherwise have brought into complete subjection to itself all the minor factions of Italy. Of the Venetian members of the college, the youngest and most promising was Cardinal Gabriel Condol- mieri the nephew of Pope Gregory XII., who had filled several offices of trust under Martin V. He had inherited from his uncle that hatred of the Colonna and affection for the Orsini, to which the very choice of his name when elected to the Papacy significantly pointed. For as Eugenius III. had raised to the cardinalate the first of the Orsini family who attained that rank, so Gabriel Condolmieri, when through the influence of another Orsini, he took possession of the papal chair, assumed the name of Eugenius IV., and failed not to carry out all the traditions of the faction to which he had attached himself.* * V. Wessenberg's " Qrossen Kirchenversammlungen," &c. torn. ii. p. 340. ROME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. 133 The -cardinal electors did not, however, proceed to their work without a vigorous attempt to regain the power which they had lost during the reign of Martin V., who, as he owed his election less to the cardinals than to the deputies of the council, who had been in this instance associated with them, was enabled to enter upon the papacy unfettered by a single pledge. Before they proceeded to choose his successor, the fourteen electors pledged themselves mutually by oath, that whichever of them should be elected should for the future insert into the papal briefs the words "with the consent" instead of "with the advice" of the cardinals that no new cardinals should be elected but with the consent of the College; that the half of the patrimony of the Church should be assigned to their body; and that a general council should be held at the time and place fixed by the Council of Constance. The second of these conditions was probably the ground of the unjust treatment of Cardinal Capranica, to which we shall have occasion to advert presently, while the other three appear never to have bound the conduct, whatever claims they may have had upon the conscience, of Eugenius.* The family of Colonna had foreseen the difficulties that were likely to arise on the death of Martin V., * Eaynaldi Annal. ad. an. 1431. n. 5 and 6. A MS. of the original diploma is to be found at Vienna. Its opening words are, " In qualibet monarchia tarn ecclesiastica quam mundana." (See Wiirdt- wein Subaidia Dipl. torn. viii. prsef.) 134 THE LAST CRUSADER. in the separation of his personal accumulations from those which belonged properly to the pontifical treasury. As soon, therefore, as they heard the news of his death, they delivered up the castles and forts which they held in the name of the pontiff, and handed over to his successor a vast sum which, no doubt, faithfully represented those public funds of which they were the depositaries. But the jealousy of the Cardinals Orsini and Conti, who took advantage of the absence from Rome of some of the most eminent of the friends of the Colonna, and above all of the Cardinals Cesarini and Capranica, was dissatisfied with this reasonable sur- render of place and power. Eugenius, too short- sighted to perceive the dangers into which he was being led on, lent a ready ear to the tales of peculation and embezzlement of which the Colonna were accused, and with a rashness which is almost incredible, ordered into custody all the high officials of the court of his predecessor, on the mere suspicion of their concealment of a portion of that money upon which there was a public claim. In this insane course he was urged on, not only by Cardinals Orsini and Conti, but also by Stephen Colonna who, probably on account of some difference arising out of the division of the property of the late pope, had sided with the opposite faction. To him the imprudent Eugenius gave the not unwelcome but most dangerous office of seizing the vice-chamber- ROME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. 135 lain of Martin V., only enjoining him to take him into custody and bring him into his presence without tumult or indignity of any kind. This injunction was so wantonly and purposely broken that it is questionable whether the emissary of the Pope had not at heart rather the embroilment of Italy in a new civil war, than the advancement of the interests of his master. The unfortunate chamber- lain, Oddo Poccio, was dragged like a felon into the presence of Eugenius, and even maltreated and plun- dered by the soldiers who were sent to take him. In a moment the eyes of the pope were opened to see the dangers he had so recklessly invited. But nothing could repair the injury he had done to the family of his predecessor or to the security of his own succession. Remonstrances and even threats were vainly heaped upon the treacherous emissary, but these were even yet more fatal, as they drove him to the camp of his own family, and enabled him successfully to propagate the report that Eugenius had determined to extinguish the very name of the Colonna. Upon this strange announcement which, though it came from one so little to be trusted, gained ready belief from the experience of the earliest days of the new Pontificate, the Prince of Colonna and all the retainers of that almost regal family flew to arms, while Cardinal Prosper Colonna hastened from the city to join their ranks. At such a moment there was little chance that any 136 THE LAST CRUSADER. of the friends of Martin V., least of all those whom he had elevated to the cardinalate, would receive the merest justice, not to say mercy, at the hands of Eugenius. We have seen, indeed, that among the earliest acts of that pontiff was the confirmation of Cardinal Julian in his Legatine office, in Germany and at the Council of Basle, but the conduct of the pontiff to his friend and pupil, the good Cardinal Capranica, proved that it was rather with a view to keep him away from Rome than to give him any real authority elsewhere, that Cesarini received this apparent mark of confidence. Capranica, who had not only enjoyed the instruction, but had shared the friendship of Julian since the days when he was a reader of law at Padua, had been created a Cardinal by Martin V., in petto, on an understanding that he should not be so pronounced until the lapse of two years, except in the case of the death of the pope, on which event he should take his place with the other electors. This compact had been sanctioned by an oath to which Eugenius was himself a party. On the death of Martin V., Capranica hastened to Rome, but being dissuaded from asserting his claim to the conclave, waited until the election was over and preferred his claim to the new pontiff. When, how- ever, he found that Eugenius was putting him off from day to day, and was evidently listening to the sugges- tions of the Orsini faction, who proposed even to take him into custody, he hastily left the city and retired to Monfalcone, Thither the papal emissaries were ROME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. 137 sent to capture him, but he eluded them by flight. The pope, mortified at his escape, continued his vin- dictive course by depriving him of his benefices and estates, and planning even against his life. On this he appealed to the Council of Basle, which, after hearing from him an eloquent exposition of all the wrongs and cruelties which for three years he had endured from the implacable Eugenius, solemnly restored him to the cardinalate and reinstated him in all his rights.* In the meantime the party of the Colon na began to re-assert its influence in the college, and the ad- mitted merits of Martin V. and his house roused into action those who had derived their elevation from him. " The whole senate began to burn with envy and hatred."! Already the narrow 7 escape of the pope from an attempt upon his life by poison had warned him of the terrible elements of danger which were concealed under the peace which his predecessor had bequeathed him ; while a conspiracy, headed by the Archbishop of Benevento, a Colonna, and providentially discovered just in time to prevent its execution, proved that the hostility which the pope had so rashly invoked by his earlier acts was as powerful as it was implacable. In his misfortunes he looked towards the emperor, * Poggii Florent. Vita Card. Capranicee, Baluzii Miscell. 1. iii. p. 266. f Blondi Hist. Decad. iii. 1. 4. 138 THE LAST CRUSADER. whom he had urged to come into Italy for his corona- tion, and whom he sought to conciliate by hastening the assembly of the Council of Basle. For Sigis- mund, who had never forgiven the dissolution of the Council of Constance before it had fulfilled the pledges of reformation for which it was assembled, looked to the approaching council as the only available instru- ment for the pacification of Germany. From the affairs of Rome we return to the proper theatre of our history, the empire, whose relations with the Church were so naturally and unfavourably influenced by the fatal policy of the new pontiff. We left Julian at Nuremberg, engaged in laying before the emperor and the diet the humiliating history of the reverses of his last campaign. Among the most anxious and interested of his hearers were the depu- ties of the faithful from Bohemia, who could only look from so disastrous a past into a future of utter despair. The sanguine and undaunted legate, who had been the first to reckon on the military campaign as the only remedy for the spreading disease, was now the first to fall back upon the council from which he had hitherto augured so little good. " As I saw no other remedy left " (are his own words), " I animated and encouraged all to remain stedfast in the faith, and to fear nothing, since on this very account I was going to the council where the whole Church would assemble." The panic at the successes of the Hussites ROME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. 139 was so universal at this moment, that it needed all the resources of a mind as fertile in persuasion as Julian's to restore the slightest degree of confidence. The zeal of the legate was well responded to by the nobles of Germany, who felt themselves deeply dis- honoured by the late defeat, and attributed all to the princes of Germany, whose miserable divisions and signal cowardice had occasioned that great disaster. They were eager to go forth again, alone, and without any payment, as mere soldiers of the faith, if a sub- sidy could be raised for such a purpose. " I answered them," writes the legate to Eugenius, " by encou- raging them in this holy determination, telling them that I would write to your holiness about it, by whom I fully hoped this subsidy would be paid, but urged them at the same time to come to the council, for whether by your holiness, or by the council, such a subsidy should without doubt be raised. When I heard their words, I lifted up my hands to heaven, thanking God who, in so great an extremity, did not forsake his Church." It appears that no answer whatever was sent by Euge- nius to the letters which Julian " wrote again and again " on this important offer. The domestic troubles of Eugenius are the only apparent reason for this other- wise inexplicable silence ; and as for a subsidy, the state of the Roman treasury, from which the vast accumulations of Martin V. had in the first six months of the reign of Eugenius melted away, mira- 140 THE LAST CRUSADER. bili profluvio* was sufficient to render the appeal of Julian as unaccountable to Eugenius as the silence of the pope had been to the legate. As late as the 30th of June, the pope had been eager and urgent for the immediate departure of Julian to Basle ; but no sooner had he determined to proceed thither, than the desires of Eugenius cooled down ; and whether the change arose from that sus- picious habit of mind which is so conspicuous in all his conduct, or from the sinister influence of the Orsini party, to which Julian himself alludes so fre- quently in his first letter from Basle, it is clear, that from the first moment that the council became a reality, he had resolved on the perilous attempt to suspend its sessions, and to transfer it into Italy. To this end he used all his influence with Sigismund to persuade him that the pacification of Italy was the first and necessary step to the restoration of the peace of Europe,! and endeavoured to draw him into Italy under the pretext of his coronation. From the real necessity of uniting the conflicting members of the Western Church, he turned to the chimerical project of a reunion with the Eastern Churches. He persuaded himself that the Hussites, as already condemned, had no claim even to an * Blondi. Hist. Dec. iii. 1. 4. t Hence, among the instructions to the legates of the council is the following, " Item, si perdat vestra Majestas istud regnum Bohemiae. . . . non recuperabitis per istos et Ytaliam sed Ytaliam facilius per Alamamiiam et Bohemiam." (Wiirdtwein, torn. vii. p. 10.) ROME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. 141 audience from the council. He evaded the question of reform, denied its urgency, and pointed to other means as better adapted to the pacification of Europe. These grounds he alleged as moving him to issue a bull, empowering the legate to dissolve the council, and to summon another at Bologna, over which he would preside in person. This bull was dated the 12th of November, and was immediately transmitted to the emperor, and to the president at Basle. The emperor replied with energy and determination, inva- lidating, by the most solid arguments, the allegations of the pope, and demanding the immediate and unconditional suppression of the bull of dissolution. The reply of the cardinal-president is too valuable and important a document to be presented to the reader in any other words than those in which it is conceived. It would be difficult to find any writing which more completely represents the originality of the character of its author, and the military and eccle- siastical spirit which animated his public life, often in rapid alternation, and sometimes in ill-omened con- junction. "Many things (he writes) compel me to speak freely and fearlessly to your holiness ; the peril of our faith's overthrow as well as that of the ecclesiastical order, a withdrawal of obedience from the apostolic see in these parts, yea and the darkening the very name of your holiness itself. Nor less does the love which attaches me to your holiness and by which you 142 THE LAST CRUSADER. are animated towards me compel me to take this course. Wherefore I will speak with great confidence, following the words of St. Ambrose to the Emperor Theodosius, ' No one uses greater boldness than he who loves affectionately/ Nor will I spare, if need be, severe words, since (as says St. Bernard) 'true friendship sometimes reproaches but flatters ^ever/ And it is necessary to know the danger that we may consult afterwards what is to be done. Unless I acted thus I should seem guilty of sacrilege and unfaithfulness to God and man. "But before I approach the embassy of my reverent father Parentinus, I beseech your holiness to bear with me while I relate some of the events which have passed away, and which may have escaped your memory, lest it should be believed that I came here more eagerly than I did. The whole Roman court is, I think, aware how distressing to me was the legation to the council. No one visited me at that time to whom I did not very heavily complain of it, and above all to your holiness, then in the lesser orders, and to the most reverend the Cardinal of Bologna, who both sympathized with me that this province had been assigned me. For inasmuch as I went willingly on the mission into Bohemia I went unwillingly to this, on account of much which I then feared would happen and already begin to experience; yet I should not have feared if this duty had been enjoined me by your holiness. ROME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. 143 I arrive at Nuremberg; word is brought me of the departure from the world of my lord Martin, of blessed memory; and as no instrument had arrived confirming me in the presidency of the council, I deemed that this heavy yoke was removed from me. But God, for my many sins, suffered me not to be without affliction. "The emissary Cuntzo arrived soon after and presented to me that bull which had already reached the hands of many even out of the court of Rome. When I saw it I was distressed beyond measure, and although I was importuned by several to come hither, I wished first to know your holiness' desire in so great a matter, especially as you had been so recently elected. Twice or thrice, and by my own messengers I announced this, and entreated with many prayers that this cup might pass from rne; and because I thought myself much better fitted for the Bohemian expedition than for the council, I besought instantly that another might be deputed to preside here. And I remember to have written so strongly on this subject that I sometimes feared to give offence to your holiness, by seeming to refuse that labour after your pro- motion which I had undertaken in the pontificate of another. " When I had gone over Germany preaching the cross against the Bohemians, on returning to Nurem- berg I found Leonardus de Piscia with instructions 144 THE LAST CRUSADER. for me to come to the council if I could do so without prejudice to the Bohemian expedition. The same was enjoined me in the letter of the Bishop of Cervetere on the part of your holiness. But although I was earnestly requested by many to go to the council, thinking that I should act more usefully by entering Bohemia with the army, and especially as I had heard of but few arrivals at Basle, I determined to prepare myself for the ex- pedition; and lest any one should insinuate against your holiness that you wished to neglect the council of Basle, which was appointed by former councils and by your own predecessor, I sent as my deputies John de Polernar an auditor of the Rota, and John de Ragusio, telling all that when the business in Bohemia was settled, I would myself go to Basle in obedience to the commands of your holiness. This I immediately announced to you, and received in the letter of the Bishop of Cervetere your appro- bation and applause for what I had done. " The misfortunes which succeeded in Bohemia, fell out as it pleased God they should. And when, from the flight of the army, all the people were at the utmost pitch of terror and alarm, I (as I saw no other remedy left), animated and encouraged all to remain stedfast in the faith, and to fear nothing, since I was, on this very account, going to the council where the whole Church would assemble, and in which a remedy would be found against the heretics ROME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. 145 sufficient to resist and to extirpate them. I said the same at Nuremberg in the presence of my lord the emperor, and the greater part of the barons and nobles of Germany. With this too, I encouraged the ambassadors from the faithful at Pilsen and Egra, giving them the hope of assistance through the council. And, indeed, so great was the alarm of all the population, that it was necessary to do thus. Let no one, therefore, wonder that I exerted myself to make all either come or send to the council ; for it was necessary to obviate so many and so great dangers by finding some quick means of providing assistance. And, indeed, the mere report of the council retained many, and even now retains the states bordering on Bohemia, from joining the rebels. " The nobles and warriors of Germany who were in that unfortunate expedition, urged me at the same time, charging the flight to their princes alone, and offering again, with a much larger army, to return the ensuing summer into Bohemia, where they resolved to conquer or to die. They wished none of the princes of Germany to be present with them, but themselves alone to elect that commander, whom, by long experience, they might judge best qualified. Nor did they ask more of the Church than the payment of their common expenses alone, not ex- ceeding, I should think, 30,000 ducats. I answered them by encouraging them in this holy determination, telling them that I would write to your holiness L 146 THE LAST CRUSADER. about it, by whom I fully hoped this subsidy would be paid, but urged them at the same time to come to the council, for whether by your holiness or by the council, such a subsidy should without fail be raised. When I heard this, I lifted up my hands to heaven, thanking God, who in so great dangers did not forsake His Church. For this report and expectation was bringing to life again the hearts of the soldiery, already almost dead, and animating them to resist the heretics. I wrote directly to your holiness by the Abbot of Perugia, I wrote again and again. I thought that when so great an offering on the part of the army, and such a confederation of Christendom was made known, the Apostolic See ought to sell its crosses and chalices and instantly meet it. " But now almost five months are gone, and I have received no answer ; but a power is sent me to dissolve that council in which resides the only hope of defending the faith and the Church in these parts. Yet was it for this very reason that I was induced to come hither, that if perchance no assist- ance be provided by the court (of which I have now no slight fear), some might at least be provided here. " My lord the Archbishop of Cologne incited me besides, for in the retreat from Bohemia he per- suaded me that nothing could be of more service to the expedition than to engage the Duke of Bur- ROME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. 147 gundy, whom lie knew to be well affected towards it. On this account the archbishop said that a general subsidy should be imposed, which it appeared would be best levied in the council all present and consenting. And it might reasonably be expected if a great multitude of prelates had flowed together hither, on considering the dangers now impending, that no one would have opposed the grant not only of the subsidy of the tenth, but even of a greater tax, which might have been exacted without difficulty afterwards, since it would be imposed in so different a manner from that of Martin V., the payment of which, excepting in Italy, was resisted. A letter, moreover, which was sent by some Baron of Bohemia to Nuremberg after the retreat of the army, incited me to come hither, affirming that that kingdom could not be conquered by arms, but by concord and treaty. To whom I returned an answer that since a council of the whole Church was being now celebrated in Basle, the Bohemians should take care to send thither their plenipotentiaries, since nowhere better than here could such a treaty be entered upon. To this end they should have a safe-conduct, and whatever else was necessary. " Besides this, the corruption and derangement of the clergy of Germany induced me to come hither, for from this cause the laity are beyond measure indignant against the ecclesiastical order. Greatly is it to be feared lest on this account (if they reform L 2 148 THE LAST CRUSADER. not in the meantime) the laity may be excited to turn upon the whole clergy in the manner of the Hussites, as they openly threaten to do. And this corruption it is which produces so great a boldness in the Bohemians, and gives a colour of reason to the errors of those who specially inveigh against the immo- rality of the clergy. Wherefore, even if there had been no general council convened already, it would have been necessary to hold a provincial one, by means of the legation in Germany, for the reformation of the clergy. Tor it is really to be feared, that unless that body corrects itself, even after the extinction of the Bohemian heresy, others will rise up. "Your holiness' wish having been considered as well as the above named reasons, who will not con- sider me in a manner compelled to come hither? But, furthermore, there arrived a letter from your holiness, dated June 30th, in which I am expressly commanded to come hither, in these words : ' We will and command you, when you have fulfilled the Bohemian charge, whose termination is expected, to direct your steps presently to Basle, for the celebration of the council, and there make timely provision according to the injunctions and ordinance of the Council of Constance/ " But some one perchance will say, ' You have been too diligent in this matter/ A strange thing this ! to be accused of diligence when sovereign pontiffs are wont to say, ' We commend your diligence ROME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. 149 in the Lord/ But stranger far, for that diligence to be blamed, which is exerted in the extirpation of so pestilent a heresy. It was not my wish to deserve that malediction of Holy Scripture, ' Cursed is he that doeth the work of the Lord negligently/ And hence it did not appear to me that your holiness wished me to dissemble or to act negligently in so holy a work. Nay, I was bound to hold the contrary opinion, from having ever known you in all things pertaining to God's honour and the defence of the Church most ardently zealous. But if I be indeed commanded to act with dissimulation or insincerity, I should freely answer, ' Let this burden be laid upon another, for I have resolved never to act the part of a dissembler/ "Your holiness requires me -to make timely pro- vision according to what has been enjoined me, and I know of nothing enjoined me in the bull of Martin, except that I should act with diligence. This the necessities of the Church demanded, and still demand. And I thought that a diligence of this kind not only became so holy a labour, but even brought great honour and glory to your holiness, since as your messenger and minister, and in your name I did all these things. If, therefore, I have done anything, diligently as I was acting in behalf of Christ and for your holiness, I rejoice, yea, and regret. that I did it not yet more diligently. Let whoever will condemn me, I care not ; it is enough for me that neither God 150 THE LAST CRUSADER. nor your holiness condemn me. Nor yet let any one allege that this, my diligence in the matter of the council, was only of recent origin, for the whole world is witness how ardently, how almost beyond reason, I laboured for the extinction of this heresy. Let my reverend lord of Piacenza be asked with what ardour for three years I have pursued this work with him. " What I afterwards did at Rome is known to the whole court and to your holiness. This I have not related for my own praise, but lest any should imagine that this zeal had come upon me recently or for any other than the real cause. And if this diligence was displeasing to any of the heretics, the court of Rome ought most particularly to commend it, since the Hussites desire nothing more eagerly than utterly to wipe out and extinguish the name and authority of the Roman Court and of the Apostolic See. " Now I come to the embassy of Parentinus, con- cerning the prorogation and translation of the council. Oh, that I had been at court ; oh, that the dangers here existing were known there! then, without doubt, such an embassy had been never sent.* Its very rumour has already produced great scandal and disquiet ; how, then, will these be increased when its effects actually take place ? How far wiser would it * This is a plain allusion to the fatal influence of the Orsini, which has been mentioned before. ROME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. 151 have been to intimate these plans first to me who am here, that your holiness, well advised of all the circumstances, might afterwards weigh them more maturely ; for how can a plan be justly arranged when the case and all its circumstances are unknown ? Hear, then, patiently the scandals that must ensue, and how near the consequences of this step will bring us to a total ruin of the faith. "First, the Bohemians are called to this council. The letters summoning them I sent to your holiness on another occasion. Every one approved this measure as salutary and necessary ; for arms having been so long employed in vain, another way was to be tried. Our letter has already arrived at Prague, and the people of Prague reply to those of Egra as is contained in the inclosed letter. We hope that they will come. But if the council is dissolved, what will the heretics say ? Will they not turn upon us with insolence and increased effrontery ? Will not the Church confess herself conquered by not daring to wait for those whom she herself has summoned ? Oh, to how great confusion will the Christian religion be put hereby ! For by this flight we shall sanction their errors and condemn our own truth and justice. Will not the finger of God be seen in this? Lo ! a host of armed men has often fled before their face, and now the whole Church flies in like manner. Neither arms nor arguments can overthrow them. It will seem a manifest miracle of the Almighty, 152 THE LAST CRUSADER proving their opinions to be true, and ours to be false. Oh, ill-fated Christians ! oh, faith of Catholics deserted by all ! Soldiers and priests alike desert thee, none dares to stand up in thy behalf. But will not the sacrilege be laid to his charge who was the cause of this council's dissolution? There is none that will not revile and traduce the Roman Court, which produced so great a confusion of our faith. "In the second place, will not all the faithful, knowing that the said heretics have been summoned to the council remain thunderstruck, and thinking our faith false by reason of the flight whereby we prove that we dare not defend it, will they not follow the heresy of the Bohemians? especially as the latter have oftentimes already, and now very recently disseminated through Germany libellous documents, containing about thirty articles contrary to the faith, and particularly directed against the ecclesiastical order, fortified, moreover, by many authorities of Holy Scripture and the fathers of the Church, in which they expressly assert that our clergy not having the means of answering them, will escape the opportunity of doing so by not giving them audience. What then will the Catholics say, if, when that audience is arranged, we fly? And let your holiness advert to this fact, that the great majority of these articles are directed against the Apostolic See, and towards the depreciation of the ROME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. 153 Court of Rome. Furthermore, directions have been sent to all the universities to send the most reverend doctors and masters they have to this place for the purposes of the council. "Thirdly, since it has been everywhere published that this council is called together for the extir- pation of the Bohemian heresy ; how much confusion and ignominy must accrue to the Church if it leaves its chief purpose unaccomplished ? How great a danger of evident overthrow impends the Church, who will not naturally reflect ? Woe to its wretched ministers wherever they may be found ! "Fourthly, what will the whole world say when it perceives this? Will it not judge the clergy to be incorrigible and anxious to remain always grossly in their corruptions? So many councils have been celebrated in our time which no reformation has succeeded men were expecting some fruit, at least, to follow from this. But if it be thus dissolved, they will say that we only mock God and man. And when all hope of our amendment is taken away, the laity will deservedly rush upon us in the manner of the Hussites; and this public report actually warns us will be the case. Men's minds are now as it were pregnant already do they begin to cast forth that poison with which they will destroy us they think that those who murder and rob the clergy offer a sacrifice to God ; since they will be deemed plunged in the depths of evil, they will 154 THE LAST CKUSADER. seem to have become hateful to God and to the world. And as even now there is but a very slight reverence paid them, then it will be altogether withdrawn. " This council was a kind of link which attached the laity to us ; but when they find all hope failing them, they will relax all the reins of their conduct in the severity of their persecution of us. Ah ! what honour will it then be to the Court of Rome to have disturbed a council gathered together for the reformation of the clergy ? Assuredly all the odium, all the crime and the shame will be transferred to it as the cause and the author of so many evils. Ah ! reverend father, be it far from your holiness to enable any one to say hereafter that you were the author of so great a calamity of your hands will the blood of all who perish thereby be required. Of all, one by one, will you have to give account before the strict tribunal of God; what will you say then? what reason will you then be able to produce ? If against him who offends one of the Church's little ones so fearful a judgment is threatened by God, what will be the portion of him who offends the whole Church together? And to speak without reserve, so greatly have all been scandalised by the mere report that I know not what may happen if it be (as I trust it never will be) realised. Already they say, ' We trusted that this was he who should have redeemed Israel/ EOME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. 155 " For God's sake abstain from so great an offence ; even if you knew that this council will be your destruction. Suffer not yourself to be branded with so indelible a shame, suffer not so great a scandal to ensue. If in your youth, if at every period of your life, if both before and after the cardinalate you have ever shewn the signs of in- tegrity and holiness if you have ever been the nourisher of virtue and the enemy of vice, how much more ought you to be so now, when you are become God's vicegerent upon earth? But if this take place, even if your whole after-life were like St. Peter's, men would never believe it so to be, they would think it to be all hypocrisy. Henceforth no hope nor faith will be placed in any man, if your holiness permits so great a stain to remain upon yourself. "Fifthly, it is announced that this council is assembled to establish peace between the kings and princes of Christendom, because the bull of Martin, of which copies were spread everywhere, commands the convocation of the council for this object among others. Already kings and princes are invited, and especially those of France and England, who have been so long warring together. Some preparation towards this has been already made, concerning which I have on a former occasion written to your holiness, inasmuch as I have charged the Archbishop of Cologne to go into France to the assistance of 156 THE LAST CRUSADER. the most reverend lord of the Holy Cross (Albergati). I have written, also, to him in answer to an an- nouncement, that if any place were ehosen to which ambassadors might be sent on both sides, it would be very desirable to send thither a solemn embassy on the part of the council. " And let not any one ask why it was necessary that the council should intrude itself, since my lord the cardinal of the Holy Cross was sent for this very purpose; for this plan was held expedient by all and is commended even by himself, finally, whatever is done here is done in your holiness' name, and yours will be all the praise and merit. Again, did not my lord Martin first send the cardinal of the Holy Cross, and then give him a power to negotiate peace between the Christian princes? Whatever be the result it may be profitable, but cannot be injurious. " Sixthly, the King of Poland, the Duke of Lithuania, and the Prussians have been written to, in order that they may be induced, in the meantime, to suspend their wars; an embassy has been offered them to treat of peace, and a letter to this effect has been sent to the bishops of Poland ; will not they consider themselves deluded ? How many evils -may ensue from that war, I have on another occasion laid before your holiness. For it is even to be feared that the one may call in the Tartars and the other the Bohemians to the destruction of Christendom. ROME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. 157 " Seventhly, at this time the metropolitan city of Magdeburg has expelled its archbishop and clergy, and the citizens already are armed with chariots after the manner of the Bohemians, and it is said that they have sent for a Hussite captain ; and what is greatly to be feared, is, that that city is in league with many cities and communities of the same party. The city of Passau, which is under the government of the bishop, has, likewise, expelled its bishop and erected engines of war against his fortress. Both these cities are adjacent to the Bohemians, and if they unite themselves with these, as there is great reason to apprehend they will do, they will draw in their train many others. Both have been urged to suspend their warfare. And if any controversy remains be- tween the parties, the council offers its mediation to terminate it, and in- other respects so to provide that the citizens themselves may be in the fullest measure contented. An ambassador, moreover, has been sent to Magdeburg to bring about this plan of peace, by writing to the lords and communities adjoining, urging them to interpose their authority also. The same course will be pursued towards Passau when the ambassador has returned. Further- more, since there is great discord between the city of Bamberg and the bishop and chapter, a discord which is beyond measure perilous from the nearness of heretics, the council is exerting itself to interpose in behalf of peace, and summons both parties who 158 THE LAST CRUSADER have already come. If, however, the council be dissolved, these discords cannot be removed, but will be increased, and many other cities and towns will fall into the same state. "Eighthly, by the advice of the Archbishop of Cologne, the Duke of Burgundy has been solicited, and a letter has been sent to him to ask him whether he will accept the command of this expedition against the Bohemians, since he appeared to be very well fitted and disposed towards it ; and it is but a short time since he has made a truce for two years with king Charles, the tenor of which expressed his motive thereto to be, the desire to devote himself to the extirpation of the Bohemians, as he was solicited by me. Already he has replied to me, that he wishes to send hither ambassadors to bring about the matter. If the council be dissolved we shall lose this most useful means, and the prince himself will be exas- perated against the Church, by which he will say he has been twice deceived. See how wonderfully all things are arranged for the overthrow of the ecclesias- tical order. Therefore the most extreme and exact diligence has been, and is deservedly exhibited in order that all prelates should flow together, hither, to impose upon the whole Church, with unanimous consent, some considerable subsidy for this object, exceeding the tenth, if need be. This, if imposed in the council, would be raised without difficulty, which was not the case in the time of Martin. ROME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. 159. A copy of the letter of the Duke of Burgundy I send enclosed herewith. " Ninthly, the officers and nobles of Germany have offered to lead next summer into Bohemia a most powerful army, if only a subsidy be granted them to liquidate their general expenses, as aforesaid. And as four months have elapsed since I announced this to your holiness, first by the Abbot of Perugia, then by many letters, but have had no reply and they sent to intimate to me by the Master of the Teutonic Order that unless by the octave of St. Martin I could give them an assurance of such subsidy they would dismiss the project of their expedition I wrote to them, by order of the council, and sent an ambassador, promising them again the same subsidy. I wrote again yester- day, and solicited them, through the two ambassadors, to follow up so holy a work, again promising the same subsidy. Perhaps it may not be obtained from the court, therefore I hastened and hasten the assembly of the prelates, that if it be not obtained from the court, it may be obtained here. " But if the council be dissolved, in whose name this requisition and this promise also has been made, what will they say ? Will they not discontinue the work which they had begun? And this will be of the greatest injury to us by giving an excess of boldness to the heretics, while our own party, deprived of their last hope, will be inspired with fear and distrust, and will be compelled to conclude a peace with the here- 160 THE LAST CRUSADER. tics. The mere hope they now entertain is of the greatest benefit, even if nothing follow from it, since it keeps men from uniting with our adversaries. But what is, perchance, worse, will not the whole army and nobility of Germany, seeing themselves deluded and deceived by the Church, be exasperated against the clergy, and, as they are already prepared to do, spoil and persecute them everywhere ? How will they open their mouths to gainsay them ? ' We were willing/ they will exclaim, 'to expose our bodies and our property for their defence, but they, whose cause we undertook, refused even to give the smallest contribution towards it/ Truly, truly, this is to put a sword into their hands, and to give them an express license to attack the clergy even more violently than the heretics. "It was not enough, it seems, to have the Bohe- mians as our enemies, but we must gratuitously add to their ranks this vast multitude of secular nobles. When this is related through the world, will not others applaud whatever these military leaders may do against us? Will not others, also, be in the end inflamed and incensed against us ? " Behold in how great dangers we are, dangers which to say the truth, we have raised against ourselves. And I shall be everywhere denounced, whose letters, written with my own hand, conveying the promise of this subsidy, are in the possession of these very officers. Assuredly that I may obviate these dangers, ROME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. 161 that I may not be the cause of this overthrow of the whole estate of the clergy, but may altogether avoid it, I will labour with all my might to influence the prelates who are here to contribute to this subsidy, since, with their counsel, I essayed all this. And if I cannot bring it about, I have resolved to die rather than to live in dishonour. I will go, perchance, to Nuremberg, and put myself into the hands of the nobles there to do with my body as they like, even if it be to sell me to the heretics. My innocence, at least, shall be clear to every one. Behold the reward which awaits my zeal and ardour for the defence of the Catholic faith ! " Sure I am that when your holiness hears this you will determine otherwise ; you will even provide other- wise, since eventually all the responsibility, and every mark of infamy, will rest on the Apostolic See and your holiness. How unexpected was this event ! I deemed that your holiness would send me the required subsidy, and word is brought to me that I am to dis- solve the council. And if your holiness alleges the war we have had as a reason, I reply, that if wars were still raging even if you were certain to lose Rome, and all the patrimony of the Church we ought rather to come to the relief of the faith and of the souls of men, for whom our Lord Jesus Christ died, than to that of citadels and walls. Dearer to Christ is one soul, not only than the temporal patrimony of the Church, but even than heaven and earth; for M 162 THE LAST CRUSADER. neither heaven nor earth were made after His like- ness and image, nor was it for them He died. Your chiefest office, most holy father, is to save souls, follow- ing the steps of Him who said, ' I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel/ I say not that the temporality of the Church is to be neglected, but that the salvation of souls is to be valued far higher. " But some one, perhaps, may say, ' Who laid it upon you thus to bind yourself to these soldiers, or to enlist the Duke of Burgundy ? ' I answer, the evident danger of the subversion of the faith ; for unless some hope had been held out to them they would have withdrawn themselves altogether. Since I was appointed legate for the extirpation of this heresy, it seemed incumbent upon me to adopt every means whereby its extirpation might be effected. Furthermore, inasmuch as I am his messenger who is the vicar of that Great Shepherd who laid down his life for the sheep, I justly indulged and still indulge the hope that he will not refuse, at least, to lay down some money for so great an object. To this is added the consent of the fathers of the council. But if, perchance, your holiness cannot give the required assistance, suffer me, at least, with these of the council to find some method of providing it ; otherwise, I perceive that the faith and ecclesiastical estate will perish remedilessly. "Tenthly, since after the retreat from Bohemia ROME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. 163 many nobles and cities adjacent to Bohemia have entered upon truces with the heretics, to prevent others from doing so these of the council have sent two persons of consideration through Austria, Bavaria, Franconia, Misnia, and the states bordering upon Bohemia, to exhort the people and their rulers to remain firm in the faith, and since the council is convoked for this very reason to give them the hope that it will, at all events, apply some remedy for the extirpation of this heresy. And some who were already meditating the negotiation of truces with the heretics hearing the report of the council, in the hope that some conclusion might be arrived at against that heresy, have desisted therefrom. " If the council is now dissolved, will not the people of Germany, seeing themselves not only deserted but even deceived by the Church, make agreement with the heretics and become more hostile to us than they ? Alas, alas ! how great a confusion threatens us ! Our end is inevitable ! Already I per- ceive the axe is laid at the root ; the tree is bending to its fall ; it can stand no longer. And while it- might have stood by itself we are hurrying it down to the earth. At least, let him who will not grant assistance to the faith, abstain from offering it ob- struction. See how many evils, how many scandals, will follow from such a dissolution ? "And even granting that none of those benefits which are foreseen from the council follow from its M 2 164 THE LAST CRUSADER. continuance, yet if it be dissolved all will say, ' If it had not been dissolved so many and so great benefits would have ensued/ and all this will be imputed to your holiness, nor will you ever be able to wipe off this stain. Suffer it, then, to run that course which it has begun under the sanction of other former councils and of your predecessors, and which has been approved by your holiness' own letters. And although it be said that such prorogation and trans- lation of the place is for a good object, that elsewhere from your holiness' presence greater benefits may accrue, no one believes this, for they say, 'We were deluded in the Council of Siena, again we are deluded in this. A legate is sent, bulls are sent, and, never- theless, a change of place is demanded and a proro- gation.' What hope can then be entertained? " Moreover, holy father, the scandals which have been detailed cannot be removed by such a proro- gation as this. Ask the heretics whether they will postpone for a year and a half the dissemination of their poison. Ask those who are scandalized at the corruption of the clergy whether they will in the meantime let their object be superseded ? Lo ! this heresy is budding daily ; its followers daily seduce the Catholics or forcibly oppress them. They lose not the least moment of time. Daily new scandals arise from the disorganization of the clergy, and do we, notwithstanding all this, temporise in our plans of remedy ? Let us do what must be done, now and HOME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. 165 let what is more than that be left for a year and a half. I fear that in a year and a half's space, unless we provide otherwise, a great part of the clergy of Germany will be ruined. If this rumour that the council is dissolved be but spread throughout Germany, of a surety all the clergy will become a spoil. Is your holiness so changed ? You wrote to me to come hither and make opportune provision according to what was enjoined me in the Council of Constance. This I have taken care to do, but if your holiness had this intention of so soon dissolving, it had been better not to have begun. What can your holiness fear, seeing that you live so holily, that others ought rather to fear you than you them. Of a truth, great astonishment has seized all who have heard these things. "And that I may not suppress anything that is said hereupon, some fear that, perchance, severe and pro- tracted illness may not permit your holiness to consult as maturely as was requisite. Martin V. sate on the papal throne for fourteen years, and nevertheless com- manded a council to be held. And as I remember your holiness to have twice answered when asked at different times by me what you wished me to do, ' Do what is right,' I am thrown into a kind of stupor of mind when I hear such things as this. Your holiness was wont to be of a firm and consistent mind, and now you have made a sudden change without any extreme circumstances to account for it. Whatever may be the excuse offered for it, men will 166 THE LAST CRUSADER. not believe that the motive is good ; they say, ' If he cannot come himself by reason of his ., infirmity, let him send more and more cardinals ; let hini send other men of the highest eminence : this is npt the first council which has been celebrated in the absence of the supreme pontiff/ Of the security of the place they allege that there can be no doubt; for the citizens have pledged themselves to defend the council from every adversary and in plenary form as at Constance. " But I hear that some are alarmed lest the tempo- rality of the Church should be taken away in this council. A strange fear, and one which could only be entertained if this council were celebrated by those who are not ecclesiastics. But who is the ecclesiastic who would consent to such a resolution, inasmuch as it is not only against the faith but would redound to their own injury ? Who, moreover, of the laity would entertain it? None, or the very fewest possible. And if perchance there should be some princes to send representatives, they will send for the most part ecclesiastics who would in no wise give their consent to such a proposal. Nor will those few laymen who are to be in council have a deliberative voice when the affairs of the Church are under dis- cussion. And I think that hardly ten secular lords altogether will be present here in person, and possibly not even five. " Furthermore, I do not think that this council will be greater than those of Pisa and Constance, and ROME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. 167 yet not even in these was the question, whether the temporalities should be taken from the Church, agitated. From the Passion of our Lord to this day, I reckon that about a hundred councils have been held, but in not one of them was this question discussed. How can it be feared, then, that the temporality may be taken away in this? Nor yet was there ever any lawfully assembled council in which the Holy Spirit permitted anything opposed to the faith to be determined. Why is the contrary to be feared in this ? This is to distrust the Holy Spirit. I fear that what happened to the Jews will happen also to us. They said, ' If we let this man go, the Romans will come and take away our place and nation/ So also say we, ' If we let this council be celebrated, the laity will come and take away our temporality/ But as, by the just judgment of God, it fell out that the Jews lost their place because they would not dismiss Christ, so by the just judgment of God it will befall that, as we would not let this council take its course, we shall lose our tempo- rality. Would that we may not lose therewith our bodies and our souls ! When God wishes to bring any calamity upon a people, He first disposes them not to understand and not to consider their dangers. This seems now to be the case with ecclesiastics, whom I often maintain to be blind, for they see the fire and nevertheless run towards it. " This sound of the dissolution of the council has 168 THE LAST CRUSADER. an evil omen, engenders suspicion, irritates men's minds. Strange indeed ! I find that councils have ever strengthened, defended, increased the power and the liberties of the Church; and now we fear that they must needs take them away. But admit that a decree should pass taking away the temporality. The danger to the faith is at least greater if the council be dissolved as was more clearly shown above. But, perchance, the authority of the supreme pontiff will be prejudiced in some manner or other; I do not deem that any one will consent to what is against the canonical sanctions and the decrees of the holy fathers, nor would the Holy Ghost permit it. Never would any council have been celebrated if such a fear as this had invaded the minds of our fathers as it invades our own. But even if we retain this fear, why oppose no remedy to it ? Why, to avoid one evil do we seek to incur a greater ? Here is, then, the remedy. Let your holiness send some of the most reverend lord cardinals and other as notable prelates and as well affected to the Apostolic See as can be found, well affected moreover to the universal good. Let your holiness give all possible favour to this council and promote it as much as possible. Write to it kindly letters, exhorting the fathers to the holy works they propose, offering yourself, &c. All that the council asks of your holiness, courteously grant. Strive to procure money for the moderate subsidy of the soldiery of Germany. ROME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. 169 " Besides this, let your holiness reform whatever remains to be reformed in the court, as you have praiseworthily begun. Write also to these of the council, that if there is anything which they judge requisite to be done by you for the good of the Church Universal, you are ready to do it with all your power. When they see and hear this, sure I am that even if they had a bad disposition towards you they will change it, and will not only study to preserve the authority of the Apostolic See but to increase it : because the more powerful and vigorous the head is, the more will the members be advantaged, since greater will be the the energy that is diffused throughout them. But if they see the contrary, for instance, the dissolution of the council, then they will be offended, and the consequence will be that whereas they were before lukewarm, such an announcement will make them quick and fervent. "And in truth, when the day before, the citizens, of this place assembled in the public congregation in the presence of Parentinus, and complained of the suspicion which had arisen on the dissolution, and sought for the application of a remedy for- this scandal, all the members of the council turned in a manner furious and armed themselves to persevere more boldly; and as far as I can collect from their expressions, are prepared to endure anything rather than recede. They said much, not indeed against the reputation of your holiness, which from your 170 THE LAST CRUSADER. acts at every period of your life, they greatly com- mended, and for that very reason thought it unlikely that this should proceed from the mind of your holiness. " Added to this, let your holiness carefully reflect that besides the dangers which have been already enumerated, another danger greater than these hangs over us, that, namely, of a schism, of which I have exceeding fear, if your holiness perseveres in this plan of dissolving. Those here will never consent either to a prorogation or translation, for, as they said at the time, the decree of Constance expressly prohibits both. They seemed, moreover, expressly to protest that the procuring this is to obstruct the extirpation of heresy, the reformation of manners, and the peace of the Christian people, and hence is to foster heresies, sins, wars, and enmities. The deep significance of this I beg your holiness to consider, For God's sake, suffer not yourself to be thus persuaded, for I fear a discord in the Church of God. I fear that the time is approaching of which the apostle writes, that ' there must first be a falling away/ I plainly perceive that for me or for any other to attempt to dissolve the council, or to change its place without their consent, were but to invite them to seize and stone me as a heretic, yea, to tear me to pieces with their teeth. If any one desires my death let him send me to Prague, or to the Turks, where I shall die as a Catholic. In defence of the faith I desire, ROME UNDER EUQENIUS IV. \Jl and have resolved to die; but not in this manner, to the scandal of the universal Church. If your holiness is pleased that I should be no longer your legate, let this be intimated to me, and after this letter and an answer from your holiness, I will imme- diately resign the legation. Nay, it will even be more grateful to me for this province to be assigned to another, since I find myself here exposed to many labours, and cares, and difficulties, both of mind and body. I will return to Rome, if this is your pleasure, and remain with greater quiet ; and there I trust to be as acceptable to your holiness as any other. But, and in this I supplicate at the feet of your holiness with many tears, do not seek my ignominy and scandal, and not so much mine as that of the faith, and inasmuch as I am bound in behalf of the faith to these military leaders, find the means of fulfilling my obligation. Otherwise, even if I labour no longer as legate, at least I will labour in the council as a private person, that the fathers of the council may grant the aforesaid assistance; but if I cannot effect this, before I can be branded with such infamy, I will put myself into the hands of the soldiery at Nuremberg, as I said before. " i have now said enough. Let your holiness discuss everything in the best manner, consider my past life, and ask yourself whether you have found me a liar or faithless. God, who will be my Judge, is my witness, that if I had been begotten 172 THE LAST CRUSADER. from your own body, I could not more faithfully advise you. Whatever I have said springs without doubt from the fountain of that overflowing love which I have for God's honour and your holiness. If anything, perchance, has been expressed more keenly than becomes me, be it ascribed to that filial devotion and ardent charity which considers not the dignity of him who is addressed, but is borne along by the impulse of love beyond measure and degree. When the house is on fire the servants may be permitted to cry out and shriek, and if their lord is asleep to awaken him without reverence. Nevertheless, I most humbly ask pardon if in any- thing I have erred in this letter. " After what has been detailed above, Parentinus announced a message from the court, and handed me a certain bull giving a faculty of dissolving the council ; before which I was empowered to appoint a place with the advice of the council, for another to meet at an interval of ten years. He affirmed that he had nothing touching the council but this : but made some observations upon it to myself and others, which, for the honour of the episcopal rank, I would that he had left unsaid. And because at first many were offended at him, by his own advice I publicly excused him, saying that concerning the conduct of the council he had nothing, but that that rested with me, and that they ought by no means to fear since he would do nothing respecting it. Even he himself ROME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. 1J3 had said to persons of high authority, that he should deem that he was making a sacrifice to the devil if he did anything for the dissolution of this council. " And because all entertained evil suspicions of your holiness on account of this report of dissolution, lest they might think that your holiness was bringing it about for bad purposes and without some motive, by the advice of the aforesaid Parentinus, I read the bull in question to some of the principal members of the council. They answered and said that since your holiness was moved by reasons which were not true, and you were not truly informed of the fact, and were ignorant of the inconveniences and scandals which might accrue from such a dissolution, to the faith and the Church, they desired to send an am- bassador to your holiness, who might fully inform you of every tiling, persuading themselves that after hear- ing him you would determine otherwise; and that they would by no means assent to this dissolution before they had informed your holiness of that which was true in fact. " They said, first, that the cause which was expressed in the bull to wit, that some of the townspeople about Basle were infected with the Bohemian heresy, and were persecuting the clergy was untrue, for they are all faithful, and nothing of the kind is heard of in these parts. Nay, the citizens of Basle are all good Catholics, and defend and protect the clergy. The second cause, that there was not a safe access on 174 THE LAST CRUSADER. account of the war between the dukes of Burgundy and Austria, this is also untrue ; for a truce has been made and no one has ever been injured or spoiled when on his way to the council. Wherefore, as these are mainly the motives of your holiness, they pro- nounce the bull surreptitious. The approach of winter they do not admit to be a sufficient cause of dissolution, for those who wish to come do not on account of the season put off their journey. " They say further, that this council, so solemnly instituted, ought not to be omitted on account of the Greeks ; and count it absurd that for the sake of the doubtful reduction of the Greeks it should be per- mitted that Germany, which is now and always has been faithful, should fall away into the heresy of the Bohe- mians. And this they say is greatly to be feared unless a remedy is speedily applied ; and as to this song of the Greeks, its burden is now of three hundred years ago, and is renewed every year. They add that both objects, inasmuch as they are good, may be accom- plished, the one now at the appointed time and the other in a year and a half's time ; that all will gladly approach the latter subject, the former having been well completed by that time. " And much else they say on this matter. On the point of your holiness' presence, they say that if you cannot for the alleged reason be present, considering the danger of the faith and of the ecclesiastical order, this council, in which is your holiness' legate, and to ROME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. which more might be sent, ought not, therefore, to be neglected ; and that though Pope Martin asserts in his bull of convocation that he cannot come in person to the council by reason of his known infirmities, nevertheless he enjoined its celebration. Again, the same treaty of the Greeks was pending with the same pope, yet notwithstanding he commanded the council to be assembled. I have held frequent com- munications with Parentinus on all these points ; and though he seems altogether disposed towards the dissolution, nevertheless he said that he had not come but to confer with me on the subject, and that he would be guided by my advice and do according as I should write to your holiness. Nay, I should have even written much sooner to your holiness had not he induced me to wait. After this, early one morning, he precipitately departed without any mention of his purpose to me, and gave out that he was going to Strasburg to exact from a certain collector money due to the apostolic chamber. But now they say here that he was seen to go towards Constantinople. " I was greatly astounded to find myself treated herein with such dissimulation, considering all that he had said before. I had unsuspectingly trusted him in everything : I grieve that matters of faith are treated and confounded with such mockery. There remained here a young doctor who had accompanied him, who showed me a twofold document; one in which your holiness dissolves the council, another in 176 THE LAST CRUSADER. which you give Parentinus himself a power of dis- solving it. I asked him to show me the original letter, since I found him so often to change, and heard so many false and fictitious statements, that I was in a manner compelled not to believe him : up to this time he has not shown it me, but now says one thing and then another. I asked him to go to Parentinus, that if he had anything in his directions he might put it off for two months, until I had consulted your holiness upon it. Unless I see the original letter, I will not believe it; for it does not appear in any way consistent for the dissolution to be en- trusted to me, and a choice of a place for the future assembly of the council to be made by it before its dissolution, and at the same time for your holiness to have already dissolved it at Rome, especially when this is expressly opposed to the tenor of the decree of the Council of Constance, in which it is provided that during the month preceding the dissolution of the council, a place shall be fixed upon for the future council with its own consent and approbation. But what was the need of all this mystery ? Why were not these things clearly expressed to me? It is a token that confidence is not placed in me. But all this I patiently bear. " The fathers of the council, have altogether resolved to remain here and to continue the council, and to send a person of eminence to your holiness within two days. I see a door open to great scandal and ROME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. 177 confusion in the Church of God. I see Him already brandish his sword over us, the axe is laid at the root of the tree, the scourge is at hand. Sure I am that your holiness cannot see the extent of the offence, or you would rather have died than assented to it. For God's sake, then, oppose the only possible remedy which seems to me to be both easy and proper, and let your holiness write back that as you were not fully informed on these matters, therefore you had thought fit to prorogue the council for the general good for a year and a half s space. " But since you have heard these things you have resolved that the council should take its course and deign to command Parentinus, if he has any power of dissolving, not to put it forth. At least, holy father, let your holiness defer it till the month of July, because by that time the inconveniences and scandals which now obstruct us will have ceased; the invi- tation (namely) of the heretics and of the military leaders for all these arrangements will have been by that time completed. Some regulations, more- over, may have then been framed for the reformation of the clergy of Germany, and promulgated there; and thus something, at least, will seem done, nor can any blame be then laid upon your holiness, and this, indeed, which could not now be done without scandal and with effect, might then be done more honourably. " Holy father, all your holiness* faithful servants N 178 THE LAST CRUSADER. are grieved beyond measure at these things, especially the archbishops of Treves and of Ratisbon who are now here. It seems to them and to all that a perpetual brand will remain herefrom on your holi- ness and the court of Rome ; all will ever denounce it, the universal church will be publicly and seriously offended, and your holiness, in one moment, will lose that reputation of integrity and sanctity which you have acquired during so many years. " May I ask, holy father, what your holiness or the court of Rome apprehends? Am not I, also, a member of the Roman church and court? have I no interest therein ? wherefore then are these things concealed from me? I wither at the thought; con- fide in me, I pray you, if there is any cause of fear. Lo, I swear by Him who liveth for ever and ever, that as far as God permits, I am ready to die and to go to prison for your holiness. Put off your design for this short time ; there can be no excuse for refusing this, for a council to treat on the question of the Greeks cannot in anywise be impeded thereby ; and further, if you wish, your holiness can convoke one at Bologna, not only in a year and a half but in two years' time. " If, notwithstanding all this, your holiness will not be turned from your purpose, deign for the love of Christ to provide the means of freeing me from the obligation entered into with these generals. For if your holiness will not give the aforesaid ROME UNDER EUGENIUS IV. subsidy, nor these of the council give it either, I am bound, as I have said, to go to Nuremberg and put myself in the hands of these leaders. Rather will I die in their prisons than be the breaker of my promise. If the unbelieving Regulus, for his promise's sake, feared not to return to the Cartha- ginians, neither will I, who am a Christian and am bound to them for the faith's sake, fear to return to them. " I know not at this time what I can say more ; I have done and do as much as I am able ; I can do no more than weep and lament the scandal that I fear must follow from this dissolution. But it is not rny transgression, it is not my iniquity ; ' I am weary of my crying, my throat is dried/ Do thou, Jesus Christ, aid thy church which thou hast founded with thy most precious blood ! I advise your holi- ness that on my departure hence, or resignation of the presidency, the council will of its own authority create a president. To the instructions touching what has hitherto been done here, I answer fully in the inclosed paper; all that is done has been done in accordance with the dispositions of the com- mon law, the form of the councils of Pisa and Constance, and the bull of Pope Martin, with the consent, moreover, of those who are here." " Thus," to use the words of an eminent writer of the modern Roman Church, " spoke this great prelate, who had a single eye herein to the truth and to the N 2 180 THE LAST CRUSADER. interests of the Church."* Of the perfect authen- ticity of this letter, which Spondaims has sought to discredit, but with a criticism as impotent as his frequent appeals to the revelations of St. Bridget are infatuated, we need say no more than that it is found in all the earliest and most authentic manu- scripts of the acts of the council, including those at Basle, at Vienna, and in the Harleian collection,! and above all in that of the College of Navarre, written by the very hand of a person present in the council. While, as incorporated by Pius II. in his history of the later acts of the council, in justifi- cation of his continued adherence to that body, it stands upon a foundation of authority which the conjectures and assumptions of Spondanus can never in the slightest degree disturb. * Abate Vertua da Soresino " La scienza teologica," torn. xi. part p. 80. f No. 826. CHAPTER, V. THE COUNCIL OP BASLE. JOHANNES DE POLEMAR, an auditor of the Rota in Rome, and Johannes de Ragusio of the order of Friars Preachers, had arrived in Basle about the middle of July, 1431, as the deputies of Cardinal Julian.' Few of the prelates had then arrived, for the crusade in Germany as well as the hostilities between the Dukes of Austria and Burgundy, rendered the access to Basle difficult and even dangerous. The commissioners had nevertheless held several prelimi- nary congregations, in which they prepared the way for the public sessions of the council. About the middle of September, the arrival of the cardinal from Nuremberg gave a new impulse to its assembly,* and the gradual accessions to its ranks before the close of * His letter of invitation to the University of Cologne, beginning " Quum necessarium sit instant i tempore" is dated Sept. 17th. Julian took up his abode near the church of St. Leonard's, where he appears to have remained during his sojourn in Basle. A document signed by him in 1436 is dated, "Basilese, apud S. Leonardum in eedibus solitse residentise meinorati cardinalis." 182 THE LAST CRUSADER. the year enabled the president to inaugurate its public sessions in the December following. The interval was employed in renewed negotiations with the Bohemians, and in the endeavour to bring about a reconciliation between Burgundy and Austria, an object whose importance is urged upon Eugenius in the letter of Julian, which has already been laid before the reader. On the 15th of October, he addressed another letter to the Bohemians, inviting them to the council, and promising the freest and fullest consultation of their differences with the Roman Church, and of the means of their re-union. This letter he transmitted to the emperor by Hamman von OfFenburg, a senator of Basle, and Johannes Gelhusius, Abbot of Maul- brunn, who found Sigismund at Feldkirch in the Tyrol, upon the point of passing on to Rome, for the cere- mony of his coronation. The emperor forwarded this invitation together with an urgent letter of his own, disavowing the hostile sentiments which the popular belief attributed to him, to the chiefs of the Hussite party at Egra, who returned a dignified and vigorous answer. They defended their " honest disobedience" to himself and the see of Rome, on the high ground of their supreme allegiance to God, and declined an invitation which appeared to them only an insidious method of depriving them of that religious freedom which they had so successfully asserted against the united force of the whole empire. THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 183 The letter of Julian was, as ever, earnest, persuasive, and full of professions of the most exalted charity. " It will be permitted you," he writes, " to speak freely your religious opinions, to consult, and to pro- pose methods of union. We have heard that you have often complained that an audience such as you require has never been conceded to you. This subject of complaint will henceforth exist no more ; you shall be heard in future publicly, and as often as you desire. On this account we pray and entreat you with all our heart and with all our soul, in the name of the Holy Spirit, to delay not entering by the fair and great door which is now open to you, and to come in all confidence to the council. And though we have provided for the security and freedom of every one in the council, in case you should nevertheless be re- strained by any diffidence herein, we are ready to give you a safe conduct full and sufficient for your journey hither, your sojourn, and your return, and will grant you in the name of the universal church everything that can contribute to the safety and liberty of your deputies. We pray you to choose these wisely, and to send pious, mild, and conscien- tious men, humble in heart, peace-makers, and dis- interested, and such as ' seek not their own, but the glory of Jesus Christ/ ' The minds of the fathers, occupied as they were by the Bohemian negotiation, were soon distracted by the affairs of Rome, where the hitherto confused 184 THE LAST CRUSADER. conduct of Eugenius was assuming the definite policy of hostility to the council and a resolute determination to dissolve it before it could enter upon its reformatory labours. While the legate was anxiously expecting letters confirming all that had been done, and promising even pecuniary aid, an emissary of Eugenius brought with him, at the close of November, a bull, authorising, on various pretexts, the dissolution of the council, and the convocation of another for a future day at Bologna. The bearer of this fatal document was Fantino Valleresso, a Venetian, who had been recently trans- lated from the Bishopric of Parenzo to the titular Archbishopric of Crete, which he represented in the Council of Florence.* The reader will recall the bitter complaint made by Julian, of the duplicity and inconsistency with which this ecclesiastic carried out his mission. First, he assumed almost a legative character, then that of an ambassador, then reduced his pretension to that of a mere adviser and consulted with the legate and the council. He had in his possession other bulls and instructions, which came to the knowledge of Julian, and awakened in him the deepest alarm. The mystery and dissimulation which reigned in the Councils of Eugenius rendered it impossible to foresee the nature of his policy, or to guard against its dangers except by * He is called sometimes " Episcopus Venetus," at other times, " Parentinus." THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 185 the vigorous and independent action of the council. With these convictions he wrote the letter which, on account of its recapitulation of the events which hastened his progress to the council, has been already given, and while anxiously awaiting the result of the mission to Egra, entered energetically upon tne work of establishing the council upon a solid and in- destructible basis. The first public and general session was fixed to be held on the 14th of December, on which day, after mass of the Holy Ghost had been solemnized by Philibert, Bishop of Coutances, and the prayers and antiphonies proper to so great an occasion chanted with all the pomp of the Roman ritual, the Cardinal President, in full pontificals, delivered an eloquent and fruitful dis- course on the words of Isaiah (c. Hi. v. 11), "Be ye clean that bear the vessels of the Lord " " in which," say the acts of the council, " he exhorted all to purity, cleanness, and integrity of life, with much judgment and unfeigned charity/ 5 Then were recited that decree of the Council of Constance the celebrated decree Frequens under which this of Basle had been assembled, the bull of Martin V. convoking it, and appointing Julian to preside over it, and that of Eugenius confirming this convocation and appoint- ment. Upon the basis of these decrees the council passed several resolutions asserting its own authority and indefeasibility. In the meantime the news of the attempted disso- 18(5 THE LAST CRUSADER. lution had roused not only the indignation of the council, and of the senate, and people of Basle, but, passing rapidly on through France and Germany, had everywhere drawn forth bitter remonstrances against the party of Eugenius, and earnest addresses of encouragement to the body whose existence was so prematurely threatened. The University of Paris sent letters in January, 1432, urging the council to the most determined resistance, while the Cardinal of St. Eustachius complained of an appearance of too great leniency towards the pope. The possible necessity of suspending him from his office was openly canvassed, and an anonymous writer went so far as to prove that such a sentence need not be preceded by the usual proof of contumacy. At the same time came forth other writings proving the legitimacy of the position of Julian as president of the council, notwithstanding the attempted dissolution.* Nor did the cardinal himself act unworthily of the spirit of his memorable letter. He assumed the highest spiritual powers of his office, as appears from the licence he gave in the name of the council to the University of Cologne, to choose a confessor for giving absolution in the cases reserved by the pope to him- self alone.f Eugenius had, meanwhile, received from the Emperor a letter of remonstrance against his * All these are referred to by "Wurdtwein as extant in the Impe- rial Library at Vienna, (torn. viii. prsef.) t This concession, beginning, " Benigne sunt nobis ilia concedenda" is also at Vienna. (Wiirdtwein ut sup.) THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 187 intended coup d'etat, couched in language which, must have seriously alarmed, though it failed to deter, the venturesome pontiff from his dangerous project. After destroying with a few touches of his pen the web of pretexts with which Eugenius had concealed his real motive, the Emperor enjoins him to go in per- son to Basle, and at least to send an immediate revo- cation of his bull of dissolution. Eugenius, however, was inexorable, and the formal bull of dissolution was issued only four days after the first session of the council. All Europe reclaimed against the fatal act, which recalled the disappointment of the council of Siena, and threatened a renewal of the great schism, at a period when the dangers of Europe were so greatly increased. The kings of France and England had seconded the remonstrances of the Emperor, but the weight of opposition seemed only to increase the obstinacy of Eugenius. But the discouragements which the council had met with from the court of Rome, were greatly relieved by the prospects of success which were already opening upon their embassy to Bohemia. In consequence of the interviews of the emperor with the Hussites, it had been arranged that a con- gress of the deputies on the part of the council and on that of the Bohemians should be held at Egra, in order to promote the great object of an immediate negotiation with the council itself. On the side of the council the celebrated Dominican, Johannes Nyder, 188 THE LAST CRUSADER. and the abbot of Maulbrunn were associated in this embassy with Philibert, bishop of Coutances, Johannes de Polemar, and Henry de Toke, a canon of Magde- burg, who took a conspicuous part in it. On the 25th of April they arrived at Egra, and were joined on the 8th of May by the deputies from Bohemia, who were addressed at the residence of the elector of Brandenburg by Henry de Toke on the words, " Peace be unto you." After several confer- ences the following points were agreed upon as the conditions of their acceptance of the invitation of the council. First, they claimed an entire freedom in going, staying, and returning; next, the liberty and right of determining, on the ground of Scripture and antiquity, the controversies pending between themselves and the Church of Rome ; . thirdly, the right of celebrating divine service according to their own usages without hindrance or ridicule ; fourthly, they stipulated that until their arrival the council should not be continued ; fifthly, that it should be free and open to all ; and lastly, that its headship over the pope should be maintained. These preliminaries being admitted, the deputies of the Bohemians, after return- ing to Prague, proceeded to the council to obtain the confirmation of them, and to procure a safe conduct in a proper form. This first stage of success led the cardinal to address a second letter to Eugenius, even more vigorous and decisive than the former one, in which he continues THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 189 and enforces the arguments of that eloquent appeal with the skill of an accomplished canonist and the zeal of an enlightened churchman. " Now at least," he takes up abruptly the thread of his former letter, " the whole world will know whether your holiness hath the bowels of fraternal love and the zeal of the house of the Lord ; whether you are sent for peace or for discord, to gather or to disperse; whether you are that good shepherd who layeth down his life for the sheep. Behold, already the door is opening through which the lost sheep are to return to their own fold. Behold, already there is hope in the gate that the Bohemians may be reconciled. If your holiness even now assists and promotes this work as you are bound to do, you will obtain glory both in heaven and earth. But if (which can upon no ground be believed) you endeavour to obstruct it, all will accuse you of impiety; heaven and earth will unite against you ; there is none who will not forsake you. For how can they follow him who, when by a single word he could restore peace and tranquillity to the church, refused to speak it? But I begin to hope better things, and to believe that now your holiness without any excuse will favour this council with your whole mind, and give thanks to God that for so worthy a purpose this assembly has not departed hence. Behold the legates of this holy council, in replying to us from Egra, announce with joy and exultation how, through the grace of the Holy Spirit, 190 THE LAST CRUSADER. they have entered into a firm engagement with the ambassadors of the Bohemians, (those namely of Prague, of the Orphans, and of the Taborites ; among whom there were present the generals of this people, especially Procopius,) to this effect : that a solemn embassy of all the States of the kingdom should come to the Council of Basle upon a safe-conduct being transmitted to them according to a stipulated form, which shall be done without delay. With wondrous joy, and hands upraised to heaven, this holy assembly rejoiced thereat; for our ambassadors allege that this treaty was made with such exceeding charity, and that they saw and conjectured so much while with the Bohemians, that they justly conceived the greatest hope of their reduction, and at length departed from Egra after embracing them tenderly and with tears of joy, the Bohemians themselves urging them to hasten as much as possible this business. They related that many things occurred in this negociation of such a kind, that if any one wept not for joy when he heard them, he would show himself but coldly affected to Christ. On three out of the four articles they ap- peared to make no difficulty : on the fourth (the communion under both kinds), there is a hope that they will follow the judgment of the council. Who is there that can now dare to advise your holiness to persevere any more in your intention of dissolving the council ? Even if it had never been convoked, for so great a hope and so great a necessity it ought to be THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 191 convoked now and in this place. How praiseworthily would your holiness act were you to dismiss your care for Italy and everything else, and come hither in person even if it were necessary to travel in a carriage. The temporal care and defence of the patrimony of the Church may be provided for amply by legates and vicars. The true patrimony of the Church is to gain souls. For the Church is not a heap of stones or a pile of walls. Christ did not constitute you the guardian of castles and walls, but the shepherd of souls ; arid therefore that which is more necessary and dearer to Christ ought to be done in your own person, and the rest by deputy. It was thus the apostles did, who, that they might more freely addict themselves to the preaching of the word of God, appointed seven who should serve tables and minister in inferior matters. "I hear that, through the grace of God, your holiness improves in health from day to day. And if, as it is said, you now visit some churches on foot, perchance on horseback, you will be able to come hither. You could not come to a more useful business or one better becoming your office than to a place whence innumerable blessings are expected to proceed. Let your holiness reflect in what labours Christ, whose vicar you are, St. Peter whose suc- cessor you are, and the rest of the apostles and sainted pontiffs exercised themselves ; and as you have succeeded them in office, succeed them also in life. 192 THE LAST CKUSADER. " But if your holiness refuse to come hither, I advise you, for so great a good, to send the majority of the most reverend cardinals of the Roman court, and to charge all the prelates to come hither. With- draw not, obstruct not (as it is reported you do), those who desire to come, but rather encourage them so to do. Believe me that love alone impels me thus to advise you, separate not yourself from your members ; cherish your sons as a hen doth her chickens under her wings. If even you send no one for this purpose, at least say this one word I will that the Council of Basle be held. For at this time another piece of intelligence has reached us, on account of which your holiness ought altogether to desist from the dissolution. The reverend father, the archbishop of Lyons, has written to the council, and to me also, that the prelates of France have assembled in the city of Bourges, and there, after a long and accurate examination, they concluded that the council is lawfully assembled here, and that it is necessary that it should be celebrated here and now, and that the prelates of France ought to join it. " The motives and reasons by which they were led to this conclusion he has also forwarded ; I believe that a copy of them has been sent to your holiness by others. Wherefore, then, can you delay any longer ? You have endeavoured as far as you could by messengers, letters, and various means, to draw away the prelates ; you have laboured with all your might THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 193 for the dispersion of the council. Nevertheless, as it seems, it increases daily, arid as the prohibition becomes more absolute the opposition of every one becomes more vehemently inflamed. Is not this, I ask, to resist the will of God ? Why do you provoke the Church to indignation ? Why do you irritate the Christian world? Deign, I entreat you, so to act as to obtain the love and favour, not the hatred, of the world. Exceedingly must it be offended at hearing these things. Do not suffer yourself to be led away by any one who would insinuate into your mind a fear where there can exist none, or persuade you that this is not a legitimate council. I know that I shall offend your holiness by seeking to prove that it is. But it is better that I should offend a little in words and profit in deed. Thus the physician applies to the sick man the burning cautery, and heals his wound. Nor can the medicine profit unless its taste be bitter. " In this persuasion, I will not fear to lay open the truth, that knowing it, your holiness may more piously consult for the Church and for yourself. Whether this council be rightly constituted or not depends upon the Council of Constance. If that was a true council, so is this. Yet no one seems to doubt whether that was legitimate, or hesitates to receive what was there decreed. For if any one were to affirm the decrees of that council to be invalid, hu obliges himself to the conclusion that the privation of Pope John made upon the strength of its decrees is o 194 THE LAST CRUSADER. invalid also. But if this be invalid, neither does the election of Pope Martin hold good, made as it was while the former yet survived. If Martin was not pope, neither is your holiness, elected as you were by cardinals created by him. No one, therefore, is more deeply interested in upholding the decrees of that council than yourself. And if any one of its decrees be called in question, on the same grounds could all the rest of them. "For the same reason the decrees of all the other councils must fall, for if our faith in one council is shaken all the rest are shaken with it, as St. Augus- tine argues, and is contained in the ninth distinction, in the chapter Si ad Scripturas. Thus the faith and all the mysteries of the Church will give way if a doubt is entertained of one single council lawfully constituted. Now by the Council of Constance a decree was passed beginning Frequens, in which it is appointed, that the first succeeding council shall be at the expiration of five years from its dissolution, and the next in seven years' time from that. Accordingly, five years after the termination of the Council of Constance, that of Siena was celebrated, after whose termination, seven years having elapsed, the celebration of this council is begun. To what end, therefore, is this expressed in the bull of dissolution among other reasons, that the seven years is now passed? Seeing that it was requisite that it should elapse before the celebration of the council, these THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 195 words, in seven and in five years' time, meaning, in / O * legal acceptation, that all the divisions of time con- tained in them are completed and the term of them waited for. Hence it was necessary for seven full and entire years to pass before this Council of Basle could be opened, as a full period of five years had passed before the opening of that of Siena. But some one may say it ought to have been celebrated on the first day after the expiration of the seven years, else the council must expire too. " But it may be obviously replied that it is not con- tained in the chapter Frequens, that unless it is begun on the first day the power of celebration is at an end; nor can this be deduced either from the words or the intention of that law. It only provides that it should be celebrated after the seven years accordingly, whether it is celebrated on the second or third day on the first, second, third, or fourth month after the seven years, the chapter Frequens is satisfied. For when the first day arrives then the power of celebra- ting begins; but before that it does not Afterwards, however, it is not prohibited, nor is this opposed by the fact that in the chapter Frequens the expression is inserted e in the five years immediately ensuing/ which seems to be repeated in the case of the seven years' period also. Since it is not meant that the celebration is necessary punctually on the first day after the seven years, but the words immediately following are only placed there lest another seven years' period beyond o 2 196 THE LAST CRUSADER. this should be supposed, although that word from (de) was clear of itself for when we speak simply of seven years we understand those which are nearest to us this addition was made, then, for greater pre- cision. " Add to this, moreover, that even if, in the chapter Frequens, there had been inserted after the words ' immediately following ' any such words as these without delay, presently, continuously, or instantly, or words synonymous; still they ought to be inter- preted with some slowness and some interval of time, and as speedily as was practicable, as such words are expounded by lawyers and doctors, For they are extended and contracted according to the subject matter, and the various circumstances of things. It is in every way incredible that it could have been the intention of the legislation considering the length of the journey, the difficulty of preparing for a business of this kind, and the many obstacles that may occur in it, to limit the time so strictly to the first day as to make the legal existence of the council dependent upon this condition. For if we pursue these subtleties we must have it not only on the first day, but at the first moment, yea, the first second after the seven years' period. " But, since words are to be taken in their general meaning, such an interpretation is strange and un- wonted. And if any argues that in this case there would be a prorogation, which is prohibited in the THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 197 same law, I reply that he who thus affirms neither understands his own meaning, or the value of words. For that is not prorogued which is begun in the second or third month, but is rather a continuation or execu- tion of what there is already a power to do. For if it had been a prorogation, then, since a prorogation has the nature of a former delay, it could not begin before that period to which prorogation is made. But this is not true in the present case. For, although the council was not begun in the first month, but in the second or third, it is not to be concluded from this that it could not be begun in the first. But, if there had been a prorogation to the second month, then it could not have been begun in the first. For instance, I promise to give Titius a sum of money after Easter, he cannot exact it before Easter, but after Easter he can ; and, even if he does not, I do not cease to be bound ; and, although he does not exact it till the second or third month, it is not therefore understood to be postponed, nor does it follow that [ could not be compelled to pay in the beginning, which would not have been the case had there been any postponement. The nature of a prorogation is this, that it must be declared before the lapse of the first term ; after that it is not properly a proroga- tion, but a new convocation, a continuation. " And if it is said, 'Can it then be put off for a long time ? ' I answer that herein we must abide by the judgment of the Church, which, having considered 198 THE LAST CRUSADER. the different circumstances, will determine the due season ; for it is for her benefit and advantage that this power of celebrating councils was instituted. For how would it be if, in the place of its celebra- tion, when the period arrived, the plague were to supervene, or a siege, or anything of the same kind, which might continue for three or four months ? if, moreover, the pope had not, in the meantime, changed the place of assembly, according to the form of the chapter Frequens, and, on account of these obstacles, the prelates could not come on the first day to the appointed place ? or if any of the prelates, coming to the council, were taken prisoners by the way, who otherwise might have arrived there on the first day and earliest moment ? shall it be said that for this reason the power of holding the council has expired, and that when the obstacle was removed, and the prelates had arrived, the council could not be cele- brated ? This surely would be very absurd, and, too, injurious to the Church of God. In our case, how- ever, there was a sufficiently just reason for the delay of the prelates beyond the beginning of the term. For when it was approaching, on the 20th of Feb- ruary, Pope Martin died, on which account the pre- lates might reasonably doubt whether there was any impediment to the council. At the same time, they waited to see if any should come thither in the name of the pope, lest, without an apostolic president, they should remain in the place in vain. The legate, how- THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 199 ever, who was appointed to the council, and whose presence was expected before he prepared himself for his journey, did not arrive at the council at the appointed time, but went to Nuremberg to pursue the extirpation of the Bohemians, according to the injunction of Pope Martin, which charged him to go thither before he went to Basle. The same legate was oftentimes importuned by the emperor, when in Nuremberg, to go to Basle to celebrate the council, according to the power given him; but he replied that he was unwilling to go before he had the consent of the new pontiff. " This, therefore, was the cause of the delay of the prelates. Nor can these prelates be reprehended for suspecting that Pope Martin was not willing to hold the council ; for they feared to put themselves in a position of inconsistency and contradiction, and had reason to entertain such a fear from what had hap- pened in the Council of Siena; and much was said at the time which indicated suspicion. I remember it to have been told me that some had said that I was come into Germany to disturb the council. It 'was also the view of Pope Martin that, although the council was not opened in the beginning of March, the power of celebrating it had not expired; for when the period of the council was at hand, he wished me to go towards Bohemia, before I went to the council, of which wish the consistorial bull of dissolution makes mention. 200 THE LAST CEUSADER. " But why need I prove this from any other source than your holiness's own letters? In your letter, dated May 31, and therefore long after the appointed term, which letter was actually presented to me three months later, you command me to hasten the affair of Bohemia, whose close was shortly expected, and direct my steps towards Basle, to celebrate the council, and there to provide opportunely according to what was enjoined me, and ordained in the Council of Constance. You even repeat this in the bull of dissolution, brought me by Parentinus, whose words are these : ' We gave our instructions to your discreet excellency,* by reason of the non-assembly of the prelates at Basle for the celebration of the council at the period of your visit to the part of Germany, to direct your attention in the meantime to the expedition against the Bohemian heretics like- wise entrusted to your care, and thence to proceed to the city of Basle, the place of the said council, there to preside in our and the Church's name/ " What, I ask, is clearer than this ? If any doubt remains, by the tenor of this letter it is obviously removed. And if it is alleged that neither Pope Martin or Eugenius could give validity to the council by writing such letters, since that would be a pro- rogation, an act prohibited by the chapter Frequens, I answer, that it is not a prorogation, but the execu- tion of a legitimate power, or rather a declaration that * Circumspection! tuse . . . dedimus in mandatis. THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 201 it is not necessary to celebrate the council precisely in the beginning. Moreover, it is not a prorogation, because a prorogation must be before, and not after the period in question ; for if after it, it would be rather a new convocation, and a new question would arise; and if it be said it could not be convoked anew, then it may be objected, How then can the convocation of the Council of Bologna be legitimate ? And if it be affirmed that the new convocation of the Council of Bologna has force because that of Basle has been dissolved by your holiness, then I have this difficulty : if it was dissolved, then it must have existed as a council, for deprivation pre-supposes pos- session ; but if it was a council previously, then (as will be proved below) it could not be dissolved with- out the consent of the council. What can be said in reply to this? "To illustrate it still farther: On the very day of the appointed term, or before, the Abbot of Vezelai having assembled for this purpose the officials of the great church, and certain other prelates and men of consideration, made a solemn protestation to the effect that the time for celebrating the council had arrived, and that he was come to Basle to require all present, until the rest of the council arrived, to treat and confer together; and of this a public in- strument is in existence. Within a month's time came the ambassadors of the University of Paris, and began to treat of the things pertaining to the council, 202 THE LAST CRUSADER. even writing to the emperor, and to other princes of Germany, to send representatives to the council, which letters I then saw. Nor does the fewness of mem- bers signify, for where there is authority, a great number is not required, according to the words of Christ, " Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them ;" in virtue of which councils are held. Now, therefore, your holiness must see more clearly than light itself that the aforesaid objection is sufficiently frivolous. Again, why is the dissolution made if the council is not in being? Wherefore, on no ground can it be doubted that the council is legitimate, and canonically assembled ; and, perhaps, scarcely any council can be found sustained by so many authorities as this is, confirmed as it is by the two preceding Councils of Constance and Siena, and by two Roman pontiffs. I hear that, among other things said of me at Rome, it is alleged by some that I could not call the prelates to come to the council, because in the bull of Martin this clause was not added. I am exceedingly amazed at this objection. In the first place, I did not alone call them, but I and those who were here assembled in the council. A marvellous thing ! Pope Martin gave me a power of extirpating heresies with the advice of the council, of pacificating kingdoms, of reforming the manners of every order of the Christian community, and dare they say that I am not em- powered to cite? The power of judgment and of THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 203 condemnation is given to me, and have I no power of citation ? The jurisconsult would say, he to whom jurisdiction is entrusted, receives therewith a power to do all which the exercise of that jurisdiction requires. But how can the aforesaid things be done, unless the prelates and others come hither ? " Again, why is it said in the chapter Ego enim (de jurejurandoj ' being called to a council, I will come,' if there is no power of calling thereto ? By whom is the summons implied to be sent, unless by the council, or by him who presides therein ? The whole 18th distinction speaks of nothing else than this, that bishops summoned to a council and not coming are liable to excommunication and suspension. Let such read the book of the councils of St. Isidore, and they will find in many councils that the prelates were called by the council. It now remains for me to speak upon the point whether the dissolution is of force. Again I am afraid to speak, fearing to irritate your holiness, but love constrains me. For perhaps your holiness believes the dissolution to be of force, and, therefore, persists therein; wherefrom since many scandals must ensue, my conscience urges me to remain no longer silent. In the first place, the chapter Frequens appears to imply that it is not of force. For if a prorogation is prohibited, which is less, far more is a dissolution, which is greater, for it is a greater act to do away than to defer ; by 204 THE LAST CRUSADER. proroguing you defer, by dissolving you do away. Those here say, also, that the aforesaid constitution Frequens would be thus easily rendered abortive ; since immediately the council was begun it might be dissolved without accomplishing anything, as they say was done at Siena, and say farther, was done by your holiness on this occasion upon sinister and false information. They allege, moreover, that the aforesaid dissolution evidently tends to the overthrow of the faith, the ruin of the Church, and the confu- sion of Christian people, and that, therefore, it ought not to be done, and cannot be obeyed. They affirm further that the said dissolution could not be made, opposed as it is, by a decree of the Council of Constance, since in those things which pertain to the faith, to the extirpation of the schism, and to the reformation of the Church in its head and in its members, every one, of whatsoever rank he be, even the pope himself, is bound to obey the statutes and ordinances and precepts of every general council, and unless he obeys may be punished, &c. So, to be able to pass a law against any one, to be able to punish the disobedient, these are manifest tokens of a superior power in those in whom the law commands, ordains, or punishes. To be bound, moreover, to obey, to be subject, and to submit, are signs of inferiority in the aforesaid cases. Therefore in them, since the pope (as they say) is inferior to a council, which was, indeed, proved in fact (since for one of the three THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 205 cases the council deprived Pope John, and for another deprived Benedict) he cannot dissolve it; since an inferior, in that wherein he is inferior, cannot bind and loose, as appears from the chapter Cum inferior (de Ma. et Obe.), and other similar laws. Nor can he repeal the law of a superior, otherwise it would involve this contradiction, that he is bound to obey and yet not bound, since he can dissolve. But how could he obey any ordinance or statute of a council if he could take away and annul that very ordinance or statute ? This council, however, is assembled for the extirpation of heresies, for the negociation of peace, for the reformation of manners; and in its first session it ordained and resolved that it ought to devote itself to these objects, and that any one occasioning an impediment, dissolving, proroguing, or changing this council, ought to be severely punished, ami proceeded against as a disturber of the public peace, &c. If, however, it can be dissolved, it is evident that the said ordinance is infringed. Hence it must be admitted, as a neces- sary conclusion, that if it can be dissolved the said decree of the Council of Constance has no force. And this is proved by another argument. No one doubts that if an accusation of heresy were to be brought against any pontiff, he could not dissolve the council ; because if he could dissolve it, he could not be judged, which is contrary to the chapter Si Papa (40 dist.). And as it is in the case of 206 THE LAST CRUSADER. heresy, so must it be in the two remaining cases ; for these three are made equal by the Council of Constance. The council and the chapter /Si Papa speak the same doctrine on this single point. And (as I observed before) the council ap- proved this opinion in its acts ; for on account of the schism it deprived Pierre de Lune; and on account of his depravity of life, it deprived Pope John. " And if there be found any laws which say ' the chief See is not judged by any one/ and 'let no one judge the chief See/ they must be understood with these three qualifications ; first, in matters of faith, provision is made in the chapter Si Papa ; the other two are provided for by the Council of Constance. Otherwise, if that rule Prima Secies, &c., be understood without any exception, then the chapter Si Papa, and the decree of Constance, would be false. And if the former had added to the case of heresy these two others, no one would have doubted this view. Let no one, therefore, doubt the decree of the council, which was made with the papal authority, and represents the whole Church. And if it be said, ' In councils it is always under- stood " the papal authority excepted," I answer, that is true when the person of the pope is not specially included ; but if it be specially included, then it could not be excepted, as that would savour of contradiction. THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 207 " These things have I said, holy father (God is my witness), with disquietude of mind. But I am compelled thus to speak, that your holiness may desist from your dissolution, that I may prevent infinite evils from arising in the Church of God. If your holiness could see the pure mind and clean conscience, and integrity, with which I write this, you would embrace rne of your exceeding love, and regard me, without doubt, as a son. I have said often, and say now, and protest before God and man, that if you change not your designs, you will be the cause of schism and infinite calamities. May Almighty God preserve your holiness in the prosperity of a virtuous man ; at whose feet I humbly prostrate myself. Basle ; on the fifth of June." Among the distinguished members of the Roman Church, who had already arrived at Basle, was Cardinal Branda, the earliest patron, and now the most energetic supporter of Julian in his arduous work. His presence and authority contributed much to preserve the identity of the council in feeling and labour with the great assembly of Constance. During the earlier session, in which the controversy with Eugenius was opened, and the great principles laid down at Constance were re-established, the Cardinal of Piacenza took an active part ; while the influence of his name, not only in the council but at the court of Eugenius, is proved by the fact that five of the cardinals whom the authority of the pope 208 THE LAST CRUSADER. had retained in Rome* nominated him as their representative at Basle.f The bull of dissolution, which must have reached Basle at the end of December, had no other result than to animate the fathers with a still greater zeal in behalf of their own authority as the representatives of the Church universal. In the second session (February 15, 1432), they renewed the decrees of the fourth and fifth sessions of the Council of Constance, on the supremacy of a general council over the see of Rome, as a preliminary to the citation of Eugenius, to appear at Basle in person, or by deputy, to answer for his late proceedings. The third session was held on the 29th of April, and the fourth on the 20th of June, in which, as the time of Eugenius' citation had not expired, nothing further was done in regard to the pope than the decree (which his alleged infirm health rendered opportune, if not necessary), that in the event of a vacancy in the papacy, his successor should be chosen in the council, and that the election of new cardinals at the present moment should be prohibited, as well as the recall of any who were incorporated with the council. In the fifth session, held on the 9th of August, the council appointed proctors and judges to examine into * A paper entitled " Mandatuin factuin Romas Cardinalibus Cortesanis nomine Eugenii Papse de non exeundo urbem " (Feb- ruary 30th, 1432), is among the MSS. at Vienna. t " Procuratoriuin," &c. dated July 25th, 1432 (Wurdtwein, torn. viii. prsef.). THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 209 such matters of faith and doctrine as might be referred to it, and fixed a period of three months as the term of their office. Appeals to the court of Rome against any of the members of the council were prohibited in the same session. In the meantime there had arrived at Basle, from the court of Rome, Andrew, Archbishop of Colosse, the Bishop of Magelona, and Antonio Sanvitale, an auditor of the Rota, as the proctors of Eugenius, who were admitted to an audience with the council in two general congregations, held between the fifth and sixth sessions. Finding the spirit of the council to be so thoroughly roused that the attempt to defend the act of dissolution would be in the highest degree perilous to their cause, the prudent ambassadors confined themselves to general and trite propositions on the power and functions of the pope, on the dangers of the threatened schism, and on the necessary loss of the unity of the Church whenever the unity of the pre- siding see was disturbed or endangered. " Who could hope for the union of the Greeks when the unity of themselves was at an end ? or the admission of a head- ship which they would themselves have made im- possible ? And as for the Hussites, they were already condemned at Constance, and needed rather the execu- tion of the law than a new hearing." Thence they passed on to the old arguments of Roman absolutism, and finally offered, on the part of Eugenius, some place for the assembly of the council in Italy, where 210 THE LAST CRUSADER. the work of reformation, as well as union, could be entered upon under the direction of the pope himself. The scene which presented itself in the council at this moment cannot be better described than in the words of its reply to the Imperial Commissioners at Mentz, in 1439. "In this Council of Basle (they write), at the time of the first attempt to dissolve it, there were present seven of the most eminent of the cardinals of the Roman Church, manfully defending that doctrine of the authority of councils which was declared at Constance, and insisting that no dissolu- tion of this council can have any vigour either at the present or any future time without the consent of the council itself ; and, in conjunction with the rest of the fathers, they composed and published to the whole world many solemn decrees upon this subject. More- over, in a synodical reply, they replied with great authority to the orators of Eugenius, who desired to maintain his bull of dissolution, ' We had rather die than yield ignominiously to so great an error. This article, which is now in question, relates to faith, and cannot be neglected without peril of salvation. If Eugenius refuse to hear the Church, he must be unto us as a heathen and a publican." ' * The synodical reply of the council, addressed to the whole Church, so closely resembles in style and dic- tion the letters of Julian, as to point clearly to him as * Resp. Concil. ap. Wiirdtwein (torn. viii. p. 56.) Init. " Rem gravissimam." THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 211 its author. In it the great principles of Church authority opened out at Constance are re-affirmed and carried on to their legitimate conclusions. The extrava- gant demands of the advocates of Eugenius in defence of the papal claims are met with the assertion that, " though the pope is the ministerial head of the Church, he is not greater than the whole Church; otherwise, if the pontiff should err, as has often happened, and may yet happen, the whole Church would err, which is impossible. And though he be the head and chief prelate of this mystical body, he is, nevertheless, within the body, and would not, in such a case, remain the head of it. The body, therefore, contains the entirety, both him who is called the head, and all the other members." From this doctrine the council advanced yet another stage in its later sessions, in which the title of the popes as vicars of Christ is reduced to that of vicars of the Church, while on the ground of this delegated power is built the right of the Church to depose a pope on the charge of public scandal, as well as on that of heresy. There are many points in this remarkable state- paper, which must give it the highest interest to all who would place the Church on a sounder basis than that of an irresponsible autocracy. Opening, as it does, by disclosing the ruinous state of the Church before the time of the assembly of the council, from which alone it looks for a remedy, it upbraids Eugenius for cutting off by his pre- p 2 212 THE LAST CRUSADER. cipitate hostility the last hope of restoration. "If (are its words) against him who offends one of these little ones, God hath threatened so terrible a judgment, what, think you, shall be the case with him who has offended the universal Church ? ' : Then, touching the grievances which Eugenius retorted against itself, in rather a lighter vein, it asks, " Who would not be amazed if the one who strikes the blow should say to him who is so stricken, Why do you strike me ? when such language belongs rather to him who receives, than to him who gives the blow?" Then the delicate question of the un- changeableness of the papal decision is somewhat rudely approached in the words, "Nor ought the pope to be restrained from such a course by shame or any other human motive, since the Roman pontiff, when he sees the error of anything that may be suggested to him, or finds that he has done some- thing tending to evil, is accustomed immediately to revoke it, and even acquires the greater glory and honour from this very change." The idea of the dissolution being remedial instead of destructive, is met with another stroke of humour: "What should we say if when the sick man asked the physician to cure him, he should straightway kill him, in order to avoid the trouble of applying remedies?" The fears which kept Eugenius from Basle are met by simply reminding him of the hostile armies at his own door, and a rumour that THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 213 the principal work of the council, the pacification of Bohemia, had been delegated by Eugenius to a single individual (the Archbishop of Gnesen), and transferred from the representatives of the whole Catholic Church, is mentioned with indignant sur- prise. Finally, the determination is expressed in the most emphatic terms to resist the "pretended dissolution ;" and the charge of heresy on the ground of resisting the Roman pontiff, thrown back upon himself in the words, "If he be accounted a heretic who takes away the supremacy of the Roman Church, how much greater a heretic must he be who denies that that Church, in which the Church of Rome is contained and presides (continetur et prseest) hath jurisdiction over all Churches and all men?" Such were the noble sentiments of ecclesiastical wisdom and freedom, which the fathers put forth to the world in defence of their resistance to Eu- genius, and with which they ratified and in a measure authenticated the letters of their great president, and gave a synodical weight to the doctrines he had expressed as an individual. But while the contest was thus raging at Basle, a sympathetic movement of another kind had occurred at Avignon that city of ill omen to the court of Rome, recalling so many recollections of the schism and suggesting so many dangers of its renewal. The French and Spanish cardinals had still too many 214 THE LAST CRUSADER. thoughts of affection, too many lingering desires after the scene of their former reign, to enable the pope to look without the most lively apprehension to any sympathy between the council and the people of Avignon. The old proverb, "Ubi papa ibi Roma" might yet regain its former hold, and the presence of a pope elected by the whole Church restore the place of the former exile of the papacy to more than its ancient position, while it gave back to France that real supremacy of which the election of Martin V. had deprived it. Eugenius had ap- pointed his nephew Cardinal Francesco Condolmieri as his legate at Avignon, but the people of that city resolutely refused to admit him. This unpopular appointment having led to tumults and bloodshed, the council, at the prayer of the city of Avignon, appointed a legate of its own, the Spanish Cardinal Carillas, of which act, as of an unheard of usurpa- tion of the papal rights, Eugenius complained in a letter of bitter remonstrance. The appointment of the new legate, who belonged to the creation and obedience (as it was called) of Benedict XIII., recalled the memories of the great schism of the west, and was a bold defiance of Eugenius in a principality which had hitherto belonged as exclu- sively to the see of Rome as any of its Italian legations, and might well be regarded as the most ominous of the indications of an approaching con- vulsion. THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 215 The eighth session of the council was little calcu- lated to allay the apprehensions of the court of Rome, for the formal proceedings which had already been opened against Eugenius, began therein to assume a judicial aspect ; a term of sixty days being accorded him for withdrawing the bulls of dissolution which formed the ground of his citation. This delay was no less opportune to the council than to Eu- genius, as the time of the long expected visit of the Bohemians had now arrived. Those men, whose names had so long been the terror of the civilized world and the reproach of the armies of Europe, were now for the first time to enter peaceably into an imperial city, the guests of an assembly of ecclesiastics, whose warfare was of so different a nature. Crowds of wondering citizens, among whom were seen many of the members of the council, poured forth to meet them as they approached the city, and proved the intense interest and excitement which their arrival had awakened. Every one of them was the subject of some tradition of terror, but in Procopius, the great successor of Zisska, the interest of the multitude had its centre. Men, women, and children filled the doors and windows of the city as they entered the streets of Basle, one pointing out one, and one another of these terrible guests. The national dresses of Bohemia, so new to western Germany, the savage expression of countenance, the eye fierce and determined r 216 THE LAST CRUSADER. everything, in a word, that caught the attention of the bystanders gave freshness and reality to those scenes of horror of which they had heard so much, and in which few families of Germany had not taken part or suffered bereavement. Nor can we doubt that scarcely less interest was felt by the more intelligent, and above all by the members of the council, in the religious leaders of this great move- ment, and specially in the Archbishop Rokyczana, upon whose influence the results of the coming negociation so much depended. A few days after their arrival, they were admitted to an audience by the council, and the conference was opened by Cardinal Julian, who, in a graceful but ill-judged address, set forth the claims of the Church, and appealed to the affections rather than to the reason of the sturdy dissidents. Unhappily, they remembered too well how soon the " voice of the charmer " had been succeeded by the noise of the instruments of death how soon the invitation, " Re- turn, dear pledges of love," had been changed for the sword of the crusader to enable them to listen to the words of a welcome in which their cause was so evidently, though so insidiously, prejudged. Their reply was solid and consistent. They denied the charge of disobedience to the Church, which the president had unwisely insinuated ; they alleged that they had been condemned unheard at Constance ; they denied that they had taken away any part of THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 217 the faith of the Church, or dishonoured any of her doctors. All that they had done was based upon the Scriptures, and to these they feared not to appeal. On the 16th of January, 1433, they proposed to the council, in a public audience, the four articles which have already been exhibited to the reader, and selected four deputies to conduct the advocacy of them. First, the Archbishop Rokyczana was em- ployed in defending the communion of the laity under both kinds, which formed the distinctive controversy between the Calixtines of Prague, of whom he was the representative, and the modern Roman Church. Three days were occupied on this question alone; after which, Nicholas Pelzrimowski, a Taborite priest, contended for two days in behalf of the correction and suppression of public crimes and offences, the neglect of which had summoned the followers of Zisska to that terrible work of vengeance which neither the arms nor the diplomacy of Europe had been able hitherto to arrest. On the conclusion of this argu- ment, Ulrich, a priest of the Orphans, vindicated and demanded the free preaching of the Word of God. The case of the Bohemians was closed by Peter Payne, an English Hussite, who impugned the right of the clergy to the possession of secular property and power. These discourses have not reached our time, though the answers of the advocates of the council have been carefully recorded and appended to its public acts. The first of these opponents was Johannes de Ragusio, 218 THE LAST CRUSADER. Avho answered the arguments of Rokyczana during eight forenoons. Upon him followed Gilles Charlier, Dean of Cambray, who for four days replied to the second Hussite advocate, and was succeeded by Heinrich de Kalteisen and Johannes de Polemar, who each took up three days in impugning the positions of the third and fourth of the Bohemian deputies. Far, however, from being persuaded by these replies, the deputies returned with still greater zeal and prolixity to the defence of their cardinal points, Rokyczana again leading the way by refuting, for six days, the discourse of Johannes de Ragusio. But before the questions were thus re-opened, the cardinal-president, by a skilful, though unsuccessful stratagem, endeavoured to divide the forces of the adversary. Knowing that the Bohemian delegates represented, at the very least, three distinct parties, and that the only grounds of their union in a common hostility to the Church of Rome were the four points for which they were then contending; observing, moreover, that one of them cited Wiclif as an evan- gelical doctor, he called upon the deputies to say, whether they admitted the celebrated propositions of that reformer which had so often been condemned, and, finally, by the Council of Constance itself. He knew well that the Taborites, as the stricter fol- lowers of Huss, would readily assent to the heretical propositions, and thus compromise themselves with the Calixtines of Prague, by whom they were eagerly THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 219 repudiated. The deputies were, however, too clear- sighted not to discover the design of this transfer of the battle to a field in which they must so soon be divided and lost. They replied, therefore, that they had appeared at the council to propose and to defend, on behalf of the Bohemian nation, the four articles they had already propounded, and those only ; and resolutely declined to enter upon any other question. It had now become evident that their mission was fruitless, and that it had only opened another and a still more intricate chapter in the history of this long and eventful controversy. Private conferences succeeded public disputations, but the hope of a final settlement was as distant as ever. Eventually, it was determined that a commission should be sent into Bohemia, to return with the deputies, and there, in the centre of the scene of conflict, should feel about for some path of union which the collective wisdom and penetration of the council had been unable to discover at Basle. The absence of Sigismund from Basle at this criti- cal juncture, while it revived the worst suspicions of the council, deprived it of the best chance of removing those differences which had as deep a root in political animosities as they had in religious convictions. A remarkable paper of instructions to the ambassadors of the council at the court of the emperor is still extant, which opens to us very clearly the mind of the fathers at this moment. " You shall relate," are its 220 THE L^ST CRUSADER. words, " that if his majesty had been here, the Bohe- mians would have remained longer, and, perchance, some method of peace might have been discovered. It is believed, also, that if his serene highness would proceed quickly to the council, the Bohemians, hearing of his approach, would send another embassy hither, and might be more easily reduced, at the inter- vention of their lord, the king." From this expres- sion of hope, the ambassadors were at once to proceed to the disclosure of the fears of the council. " You shall then boldly explain how that the holy council has heard with the greatest wonder the intelligence which his serene highness has lately communicated to it, that he has come to an agreement with the pope on the ground of his approving of the council, whereas it is manifest to every one who has seen the bull of the pope that he has in nowise approved of it ; nay, as far as lies in him, has, by that very bull, endeavoured to destroy the foundation and authority of the council." The attempts of Eugenius to draw over the emperor to himself on the occasion of his coronation, are then exposed, his motive being alleged to be, simply to detain Sigismund in Rome in order to prevent the council from taking judicial proceedings against him- self, which, in the absence of the emperor, it would be less likely to initiate. The ambassadors are there- fore instructed to urge him to remain at Siena, if he is still there, or if he has arrived at Rome, to hasten his departure thence with all speed. THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 221 After reverting to the political importance of the Bohemian difficulty, and the necessity of making the reduction of that kingdom the ground-work of a general pacification of the empire, the council again presses upon the emperor the danger of any appear- ance of union with the pope, and the fatal injury which their own body must receive from the very rumour of such an agreement. Upon all these grounds they urge the necessity of the immediate presence of Sigismund in the council.* It would appear by these instructions that the pope had mis- represented to the emperor the relations between himself and the council at this period, with a view of drawing him to Rome, where through his personal influence he might induce him to consent to its trans- lation into Italy. Eugenius, though his own policy was always marked by the most fatal inconstancy and vacilla- tion -timid in the hour of danger, and vain-glorious in the day of relief was yet most skilful and most successful in turning to account the weaknesses or excesses of others. His early associations in the great mercantile community of Venice seem to have given to all his diplomacy , so to speak, a Venetian character and hence the fathers at Basle complain of his earliest communications to them, that they were " so full of safeguards and involutions, that they seemed rather to * Avisamenta ad Sigismundim ex parte Concil. Basil. (Wurdtwein, torn. vii. p. 1 17), 222 THE LAST CRUSADER. be the bargains of merchants on worldly goods, than the conventions of ecclesiastics on the things of the Church."* Sigismund had already promised the fathers by letter that he would never receive the crown at the " hands of the pope until he had given his sanction to the proceedings of the council that he would sooner return uncrowned to Basle, than prejudice its interests in any way."f But the desire to receive the crown of Lombardy at Milan, and that of the empire at Rome, to deck himself with the symbols of a power which in Italy, as well as in Germany, was fast falling into weakness and contempt, prevailed over the mind of the emperor, and was readily turned to advantage by Eugenius. In every respect, such a journey was a political failure. The Italian princes looked upon it with jealousy and suspicion, while Germany, upon whose free cities even more than its princes, he relied for sup- port, viewed the emperor's overtures to the pope as too likely to end in a general council in Italy, and a denial of those reforms for which, since the day of their neglect at Constance, the empire had become more than ever clamorous. It is possible that Sigis- mund might have set before him the pretext, though he could have hardly entertained the opinion, that his presence in Rome would be as beneficial to the * k Concil. Basil. Congreg. June 16th, 1433. f Mansi Concil. torn. xxx. pp. 103 4. "Avisamenta Concil." (ap. Wtlrdtwein, torn. vii. p. 4). THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 223 interests of the council as the fathers themselves believed it to be detrimental. If, however, he had ever entertained such a thought, it was soon lost in the cold reception and the ill-concealed triumph of Eugenius. The ceremonies of the coronation were no sooner over than the emperor discovered his error, and the pope his miscalculation of its results. His recantation followed close on his frailty, and in a letter to the council from Rome he renewed his allegiance to it in stronger terms than ever, vowing to remain faithful to it until death. The fathers replied in becoming terms of gratitude, and in their ninth session reciprocated the imperial devotion, by taking the emperor and all his estates and interests under their special protection, annulling and abrogating every act which the pope or his partisans might institute against him. Sigismund had contrived to extort from the pope, before his coronation, the promise to send legates to the council, and this promise Eugenius fulfilled, but not in the sense in which the emperor had received it. Instead of having full powers to authorize the proceedings of the fathers hitherto, the legates were simply empowered to ratify the selection of some place for a future council. In the ninth session, held on the twenty-second of January, 1433, the citations against Eugenius began, which were renewed in the tenth session, held on the nineteenth of February. 224 THE LAST CRUSADER The resolution of the fathers to proceed to the last extremities became now more and more apparent in every stage of their progress. Already it had been openly maintained that a sentence of contumacy was not necessary before the work of deposition was proceeded with,* and the " auferibility of the Pope/' which was justified by Gerson at Constance, had become an admitted doctrine at Basle. In the eleventh session the fathers entered again upon the defence and explanation of the great synodical provisions of the council of Constance, a subject which the second letter of the president to Eugenius had so ably cleared from the sinister interpretations of the court of Rome. They construed the words nullatenm prorogetur of the thirty-ninth session of Constance, as a prohibition so absolute as to leave the pope no ground of defence for his illegal dissolution, and determined that the council could not be dissolved or translated but by the express consent of two out of the three divisions of classes and deputies of which it was constituted. The twelfth session of the council was held on the four- teenth of July, and after a recapitulation of the injuries which Eugenius had inflicted on the Church, granted him at the earnest interposition of Sigismund a further term of sixty days to withdraw his obnoxious bulls, and to reconcile himself to the council ; other- wise the sentence of suspension and deposition from * An anonymous tract to this'effect is'in the^MSS. of the library at Vienna (v. Wtlrdtwein, torn. viii. prsef.). THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 225 the papacy must proceed. A copy of this decree was forwarded by Sigismund to Rome by a confi- dential messenger, and affixed to the very gates of St. Peter's * But the greatest, though the least conspicuous, of the acts of this memorable session, was the re-institution of the fourth and fifth canons of the Council of Nice on the freedom of the election of bishops, a remarkable proof of the zeal of the fathers for the restitution of the primitive laws of the Church. Eugenius, intrenching himself behind " the plenitude of his power," satisfied himself by simply annulling the decrees of the twelfth session, and making public the former of those bulls of dissolution which had hitherto been merely placed in the hands of the legates, and promulged the second of them in the following month. Sigismund in the meantime had recourse to every art of deprecation both with the pope and with the council, putting forth to the one every plea for delay- ing its extreme measures, and to the other the most urgent entreaties to withdraw the decrees of disso- lution. He beseeches the pope by letter to "come with all speed to the aid of the Church, already in the struggle of death, and only waiting for extreme unction ; " while to the other he assumes in person the character of a mediator. On the llth of October he arrived at Basle, and was received with due pomp and solemnity by the * Mansi Concil. xxx. 46, 47. Q 226 THE LAST CRUSADER. fathers, who went to meet him on his approach to the city. On the 16th he took his place in a general congregation, at which a lively and energetic argument was conducted between the Archbishop of Spalatro, the envoy of Eugenius, and Cardinal Julian. The presi- dent dwelt with his usual point and felicity upon the absolute necessity of a reform in the Church, and upon a general council as alone able to enter upon the task. The dangers which would follow the submission to the papal decree are pointed out no less clearly; while the charge that the council had hitherto acted prejudicially to the holy see is met by the assertion that every one of its steps had been taken with a view to the elevation of the spiritual interests of Rome and of Christendom. On the 7th of November the council met again, and the controversy with Eugenius was re-opened. The patience of the fathers hardly survived the expiration of the term they had already allotted to the pope for his entire submission. At the intercession of Sigis- mund it was, however, prolonged to another period of sixty days ; after which the sentence of suspension was to go forth. In the meantime three formularies of adhesion to the council were offered to the pontiff, one of which he afterwards embraced. The state of de- sertion in which his impolitic course in Italy had now left him, the open support which was given to the council by the Grand Duke of Milan, and the threaten- ing attitude assumed by the republic of Venice while the presence of Sigismund at Basle shut out the last THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 227 hope of imperial support all these had left Eugenius in a state of such utter helplessness that an uncondi- tional submission became a necessity. But ere we turn to the act of pontifical submission which made the opening of the year 1434 so memorable in the annals of the council, we are led to dwell for a moment on that important restoration of diocesan synods in the same session, which is at once the greatest monument of the wisdom of the fathers, and the greatest proof of the weakness of that Church for which they so wisely though ineffectually legislated. Falling back upon those earliest precedents, the fifth canon of Nice and the second of Constantinople, the Council of Basle enjoined in this decree the regular assembly of provincial and diocesan synods at least once a year. We can bestow no greater praise upon this important act of the council than to affirm that it is in every respect worthy of that better period whose traditions it embodied anew. Had such a law been faithfully obeyed, any reformation from without the Church, like that which the sixteenth century witnessed, would have been rendered unnecessary by the gradual renovation of the whole body from within. In vain did the Council of Trent, whose reformatory labours have been very ill appreciated or even under- stood by those who have rejected its doctrinal defi- nitions, re-enact this important law. " This pearl of its reformatory decrees (as a great writer of the 228 THE LAST CRUSADER. Roman Church has said in our own day) lies in the dust/'* It is memorable that the decree on diocesan synods was carried by those of the inferior orders in the council, and that to Cardinal Julian, as their head, supported in this instance by only five of the epi- scopal order, the Church was indebted for this signal victory over the prejudices of the hierarchy.! A similar opposition was given by the bishops to all those decrees which tended to curb the pride or ambition of the episcopal order. The confirma- tion by the court of Rome of a law thus carried, gives an implied sanction to the right of presbyters to a decisive vote even in general councils a right which is based on the fact that in the apostolic and primitive councils, the three orders of the Church had a full and free representation. This appears by the signatures attached to the earlier synods, as those of Aries and Rome (under Symmachus) in which priests and deacons, without any mention or indi- cation of a mere delegated authority, attach their names as present and consenting parties. The right survived in the middle ages in the cardinals and mitred abbots, who exercised not only a de- liberative but a definitive power even in general * Wessenberg (Bishop of Constance), "Die Grossen Kirchen- versaiamlungen des 15ten und 16ten Jahrhunderts," torn. iii. p. 472. f See the speech of Johannes de Segovia, in the History of the later Sessions of the Council, by ^Eneas Sylvius (Pope Pius II.) . THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 229 councils ; and though the extreme advocates of the episcopate have endeavoured to explain this on the ground that jurisdiction was transferred from the episcopal order in these special cases, this shifting of the qualification from order to jurisdiction is not only contrary to every principle of ancient ecclesias- tical jurisprudence, but fatal to the very cause for which they contend. While the year 1433 was thus crowned with a w r k of reformation worthy of the best ages of the Church, the dawn of 1434 was made no less memorable by the submission of Eugenius, and the revocation of his bulls of dissolution. "Hereby (exclaims Bossuet) he renders honour to the Council of Basle, and to the universal Church which that council represented. Hereby he places it above himself, since, in deference to its commands, he revoked the decrees which he himself had pub- lished with all the authority of his see." But it was not without strange misgivings and even deep suspicion that the fathers of the council accepted this reluctant surrender. The insincerity of Eugenius had been too often experienced to enable them to disband their fears or suspicions as long as the slightest doubt or ambiguity remained. When the admission of the legates of Eugenius, and their in- corporation into the council, came under discussion, it was observed that there was a discrepancy between the date of the bull of adhesion to the council as 230 THE LAST CRUSADER. given in their instructions, and the date of the original bull, " whereupon some of the fathers began to suggest that the adhesion of the pope was rather verbal than real." On this Sigismund (who appeared, nevertheless, to share their suspicions) observed pleasantly that " the council ought to act like a good physician, who even out of what was poisonous could make a sweet potion by mixing wholesome herbs therewith."* The bull of reconciliation (in which the name of Cardinal Giordano Orsini has so prominent a place as to lead to the belief that he was in this instance the special adviser of Eugenius) declares that " the general Council of Basle from the time of its commencement has been, and is still, legitimately continued, and ought to have always the same continuation and prosecution as though no dissolution had ever been made." It pronounces the said dissolution to be null and void, and proclaims the intention of the pontiff to give full effect to the synod in its progress with all devotion and affection. In proof of this good-will two out of the three briefs which had been published in Eugenius' name are formally withdrawn, and the third (beginning Dem novit) which was disavowed by him, is annulled with them, to satisfy the desire and for the greater security of the council. The bull bears date on the 17th of January, 1434. * Responsio per unum ex Oratoribus Concilii in Diseta Nurem- berg. (Concepta sed non exbibita), Wiirdtwein, torn. vii. p. 220. THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 231 Four legates had been commissioned by Eugenius to associate themselves with the president on this act of reconciliation by the council, Cardinal Alber- gati, the Archbishop of Taranto, the Bishop of Padua, and the Abbot of St. Giustina, who were formally received in the sixteenth session held on the 5th of February. Before, however, they were incorporated with the council, it was resolved that a solemn oath of fidelity and devotion should be exacted from them according to the terms of the fourth and fifth sessions of the Council of Constance. This condition, after much hesitation and discussion on the part of the legates, was at length acceded to, and in the seven- teenth session (April 26th) they were admitted to their precedence in the council, but not until the fathers had still further protected themselves against any inteiruption or delay of their reformatory labours, by a resolution that the new legates should not have any coactive jurisdiction over their synod. In this session the emperor again took part in state, and the reconciliation between the pope and the council was inaugurated with all the pomp that imperial cere- monial could give. On the 19th of May Sigismund retired from Basle. After the departure of the emperor the great ques- tion of the Reformation of the Church was entered upon with a boldness and energy which indicated the consciousness of the support of the secular power, if it did not even point to its instigation. For in the 232 THE LAST CRUSADER. twentieth session the long-disputed question of annates received its synodical settlement, and that greatest of the abuses of the court of Rome was encountered, not with the delicacy and reserve with which it was approached at the Council of Constance, but by an absolute decree of prohibition. At a single blow one of the principal resources, not only of the Roman see, but of several of the great electoral bishoprics of the empire, was cut off. The remarkable exaction which was thus summarily extin- guished was no less than the payment of a year or a year and a half's income of every ecclesiastical benefice, from a bishopric to a simple parochial cure, to the Roman chancery. It is believed to have originated in the fees which it was customary to pay to the see of Rome on the institution to any benefice or dignity,* and especially on that for the pallium, which had accrued to the papacy as early as the pontificate of St. Gregory the Great, but which that eminent man had abolished in a synod held at Rome, by which all such payments were pronounced to be simoniacal.f Pope Urban continued this prohibition, but permitted the voluntary oblations of those who received institution or investiture, a practice which remained until the voluntary offering grew up into a customary fee, and in the time of Clement V. the translator of the ponti- * De Marca de Coucordia Sacerdot. et Imperil, 1. vi. c. 10, Wiirdt- wein, Subsidia Diplor&atica, toni. vi. praef. t Regist. 1. iv. ep. 55. THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 233 ficate to Avignon, this charge reached such extrava- gant proportions, that the Council of Constance was compelled to reduce them by ordering a reassessment of every benefice in order to relieve the Church in some degree of so intolerable a burden, or, at least, to adjust it more evenly. This recognition of the principle of the tax naturally failed to satisfy those who regarded it as a simoniacal abuse. It was a poor expedient to make a new rating for the purposes of such a tax, when the legality of the tax itself was disputed. The Council of Basle, less tender in the treatment of these venerable corruptions, swept away in a single decree every fine, fee, and im- post of the Roman chancery, leaving only the regular legal expenses of writers, abbreviators, registrars, and the other officials of the court. We should commit an injustice were we to fix this great abuse on the court of Home exclusively, though the example of the reigning see originated and contributed so much towards retaining it. The great primates of France and Germany derived a considerable income from the same exaction, and the Archbishop of Mentz was not less vigorous than Eugenius himself in his remon- strances with the Council of Basle on this sudden exhaustion of one of the chief sources of his income. His appeal was so successful, on account of the modera- tion with which his taxation of benefices was drawn up, that up to the close of the last century, the diocese of Mentz retained this relic of the abuses of an earlier age. 234 THE LAST CRUSADER. Reservations, another of the great abuses which the council undertook to deal with, were properly prohibi- tions addressed to ordinaries forbidding them to fill up an actual or expected vacancy, and retaining it for the pope himself. To the person pre-elected to fill the vacancy, this reservation became a grace expecta- tive, a term which expresses, in another form, the same singular usurpation. The commission of cardinals appointed by Pope Paul III. in 1538, and which included the honoured names of Contarini, Sadolet, and Pole, proposed the extinction of all these abuses, and their report still re- mains as a monument of their own wisdom and zeal, and a proof of the feeble and paralysed state of that Church, which was incapable of acting upon the advice it so eagerly sought. The golden maxim there laid down, " Eedditus sunt annexi beneficio ut corpus anirna" strikes at the root of that corrupt system which, by the subtlest inventions, had drawn away to the Boman chancery so rich a portion of the endow- ment of the churches of Europe. A valuable memoir of the deputation, Ad pias causas, presented to the senate of Venice as late as 1769, describes these abuses as then in the fullest vigour. " There still re- mains a large field (are the words which close this im- portant paper) for the existence of all that disfigures the patrimony of Christ and of the poor, and which has given so many grounds of complaint in the last general councils. The rules of the chancery, plurality THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 235 of benefices, frequent translations, resignations in favour of particular persons, coadjutorships with pro- mise of future succession, commendams, resignations in curia, annates, canonical dispensations, and manifold abuses deplored by the piety of the faithful, and pro- hibited by the ecclesiastical laws, flourish still."* Eugenius no sooner heard of the resolution of the council against annates, than he dismissed an envoy thither, to protest against it, and at all events to demand some compensation to the see of Rome for the threatened loss of one of the chief means of its support. This request drew from Julian an eloquent and me- morable address, in which he defended the conduct of the council in this matter, and refused in its name to rescind the decree protested against ; promising at the same time to consider the claim for compensation put forth by the papal deputies. " What have we done ?" he exclaimed ; " hear, I pray you, and consider with me. We have decreed that benefices and holy orders should be conferred without money. Is this, I ask, a crime and a sacrilege ? Did not our Saviour lay upon us this necessity, when he said, ' Freely ye have received, freely give ? ' What have we done further ? We have decreed that spiritual things should not be dispensed by any pecuniary compact, agreement, contract, or negotiation. For even Christ himself, seeing this done in the house of God, having * Vic de Scipion de Ricci (par do Potter), torn. iv. p. 283. 236 THE LAST CRUSADER. made a scourge of small cords, fired with a holy zeal, drove thence all buyers and sellers, and overturned the tables of the money-changers. And while He declared His hatred against other sins in word only, this sin He severely chastised with his own hand. What have we done? We have determined that spiritual things shall be dispensed without the inter- vention of money. And St. Peter, the first Vicar of Christ, who understood the mind of the Lord by daily converse, when Simon Magus offered money for a spiritual grace, abhorred, cursed, and repelled him, saying, ' Thy money perish with thee.' ' But while the work of the reformation of the Church in its head and in its members, was thus proceeding at Basle, the affairs of Eugenius and the state of Rome had assumed a new and most serious aspect. The policy of the pope towards the states of Italy had been like that towards the council, of the weakest and most irritating nature. The details of his quarrels with the Grand Duke of Milan and the republics of Venice and Florence, as they are given us by one of the most devoted of his advocates and nego- tiators,* show that the meanest intrigues and endea- vours to sow discord among the many enemies he was creating for himself, were Eugenius' sole reliance at this period. But it was in vain that he sought * Blondus, the historian, gives the fullest particulars of the Italian events of this period, in many of which he took part. (" Pon- tifex Episcopum Recanatensem Florentiam, nosque Venetias simul mittit," etc.) THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 237 money from the great mercantile communities of Venice and Florence, to carry on this difficult policy, for even Bologna, from which he might more reason- ably have expected the needed assistance, had been lost by a successful revolt. While he was thus wasting time at a distance, he overlooked the dangers which surrounded him in Rome itself, which were daily becoming more im- minent. In the very heart of the capital the Grand Duke .of Milan found his strongest allies in the injured Colonna, while the fear lest the pontiff, by being drawn away to Basle, would disappoint the hope of a council at Rome, had excited the minds of the multi- tude. The burden of constant warfare, the want which was felt everywhere, and the prospect of utter ruin unless the government were wrested from the hands of Eugenius, had been aggravated by the reck- less conduct of Cardinal Francesco Condolmieri, the nephew and chamberlain of the pope, whose unfeeling reception of the grievances of the people of Rome drove them into an open revolt. The multitude rushed to the palace of the pope, demanding a change of government, and claiming the favoured nephew as a hostage until their demands were fulfilled. The earnest remonstrances of Eugenius and his pathetic depreca- tions were alike fruitless in this moment of resolute action, and Francesco Condolmieri was snatched from the arms of his uncle, who himself became a state prisoner in his own palace. Cardinals Orsini and 238 THE LAST CRUSADER. Conti, who had all along been the ministers and advisers of the pope in his infatuated course of mis- government, were only just able to shelter themselves from the storm they had raised. Conti, in disguise, " entered a boat, near the Flaminian gate, and escaped along the river to the mole of Hadrian," while Orsini betook himself to one of the strong fortresses of his family, under the protection of his brother.* The pope had recourse to the same ignominious flight, but not before it had become much more difficult and dangerous. In the disguise of a monk, and accom- panied by a single attendant, he ventured in a boat in the direction of Ostia, but had hardly got beyond the city, when a volley of arrows and stones announced the discovery of his flight, and disclosed the extent of the danger from which he had had so narrow an escape. About ten days after this event, the Council of Basle held its eighteenth session. This was entirely occu- pied with what might seem at the present moment the superfluous work of re-enacting the great laws of the Council of Constance, which had already been insisted upon and re-enforced in the earlier sessions. The occasion of this return to a subject so completely wornout as this, appears to have been the suspicion which the forced reconciliation of Eugenius had still left in the minds of the fathers, and the doubt they had, whether these earlier sessions were adopted in good faith, and not with some secret reservation or * BJondi Hist. Decad. iii. 1. 4. THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 239 plan of future disavowal. To this end it was im- portant that the newly incorporated legates should be committed to their ratification, and that no element of synodical or papal authority should be wanting to the consolidation of those principles upon which the whole of the previous acts of the council were based. The affairs of Bohemia having been brought as near to a settlement as the influence of the council could bring them, by being entrusted to a com- mission having the fullest powers to conclude a final arrangement of them, while the conflict with Eugenius had been closed by his unqualified sub- mission, the fathers entered upon the third of those great works which they had undertaken to accomplish the union of the Eastern and the Western Churches, at once the hardest and the most fruitless of all. But before we enter upon this third act of the council, it is necessary to fall back upon the previous pontificate, during which the negotiation originated. The idea of the re-union of the Churches at the moment of the redintegration of the papacy in the person of Martin V., appears first to have presented itself to Eugenius himself, then Cardinal Gabriel Condolmieri, one of the ministers and most influential friends of the pope.* His knowledge of the East in early life, and the proximity in which the * " Summa dictorum Nicolai de Cusa " (Wiirdtwein, torn. ix. p. 6.) 240 THE LAST CRUSADER. Churches stood in the Venetian republic, which formed, as far as was possible, a neutral ground in the long controversy between the East and West, had naturally led him to contemplate this union at an early period, and to view it as a means of giving new life and energy to the papal power, weakened as it was by so long and fatal a schism. The attention which had already been awakened in the West to the literary riches of Greece, and the thirst which had been excited among the higher ecclesiastics by the public teaching of men like Chrysoloras, who numbered among his pupils at the Council of Constance, Cardinal Zabarella and Ambrosius Traversari, afterwards the most influential friend and confidential adviser of Eugenius, tended to familiarise the public mind with what might then be termed the great Eastern question, and on the ground of a political necessity to introduce the project of an ecclesiastical union. The Council of Basle, which, as it had a single eye to the reform of the Church, regarded with suspicion every object which stood in the way of, or might distract the attention of Churchmen from that single aim, had looked upon this plan of re-union with suspicion and secret disaffection from the beginning. They regarded it as a mere shadow, in the pursuit of which they would lose the great substance of reform, while to Eugenius it would THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 241 prove a cover and a pretext for the intrigues he was carrying on against themselves.* The view which was taken of the union of the Churches by the Eastern court, greatly resembled that in which the fathers of the council regarded it, though it was prudently dissembled by the emperor and his ecclesiastics. No one believed in the possibility of a council in which both Churches should deliberate freely, or conclude fairly on the serious points of difference which had separated them for so many centuries. The fact that recourse was never had to this project of re-union, until some necessity on the side of the Eastern court or reason of state on that of the court of Rome, rendered the introduction of it useful to both, marked it out clearly as the suggestion of political expediency rather than the obedience to a religious duty. The historian Phranza, the near connexion of the imperial family, overheard a very significant con- versation on this subject between the emperor Manuel Palaeologus and his son John. The question of a council having incidentally occurred " My son," said the venerable monarch, " I know firmly and truly from the very midst of their hearts, that these infidels are in great perplexity, from the fear lest we may come to an understanding and union with * " Deus novit . . . quantis modis laboravit (Papa) ut ipsos (Grsecos) ad se traheret ut sub umbra Grsecorum sua compleret desideria." (Resp. Synodal, ad invectivam Gabrielis quondam P. Eugen. Oct. 1439). R, 242 THE LAST CRUSADER. the Western Christians. For it seems to them that in such a case, some great evil will befal them from the Western powers through us. Exercise, therefore, great care and watchfulness in the matter of a synod, and above all, whenever it is necessary to alarm the infidels, but never attempt to carry out the plan itself. For as far as I can read our own people, they are not sufficiently agreed among themselves to find out a scheme and method of reunion, or of peace and concord, unless, indeed, they contemplate the conversion of the Western Churches to the faith which they held with us at first; but this being impossible, I almost fear that a worse schism may ensue, and thus we shall only expose ourselves to the infidels." To this wise advice, almost prophetic of the future of the Council of Florence, John Palseologus gave little heed, and as he left without caring to reply, the king, turning to Phranza himself, continued "My son thinks that he is very well adapted for the govern- ment, but not, as I think, for such a time as this. For he has in view and imagines grand schemes, such as are fitted to the prosperous days of our ancestors ; but in the present day, as things press upon us, the empire needs rather a steward than a king. I fear that, through his proceedings and plans, our house will decline." * The occasion of this remarkable conversation (which * Phranza, 1. ii. c. 13. THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 243 Phranza passes over in silence) appears, from the minute historian of the Florentine union, Syropulus, to have been the overture made by Martin V., at the instigation of Cardinal Condolrnieri, to Manuel Palaeologus and to his son, to carry out the project of a synod of the East and West. Eudaemon Joannes, an ardent promoter of this policy, had been sent to Rome to congratulate the pope on his coronation, and had entered into a close intimacy with Andreas, Bishop of Rhodes, a Greek ecclesiastic, who had been tempted to go over into the camp of the Latins, from whom he received his titular bishopric as the reward of his con- version. The readiness with which Martin V. listened to their arguments, and entertained their plans, was manifested by the letters which he immediately addressed to Manuel and John Palaeologus, and to the Patriarch Joseph, who had just been preferred from the see of Ephesus to the patriarchate of Constanti- nople. The reply of the two kings and of the patriarch, after indicating the assembly of a free and universal council as the only method of effecting the reunion of the Churches, alleged the necessity of its assembly in Constantinople, and the right of the Eastern emperor to convoke it. At this period, however, the convocation of the Council of Siena, which the decree of the Council of Constance had rendered imperative, led to the re- mission of the whole subject from the pope to the council, while the dangerous state of Manuel Palaeo- R 2 244 THE LAST CRUSADER. logus, who was seized with paralysis, at the same time, interposed a corresponding difficulty and delay on the side of the Greeks. The pope had entrusted this delicate negotiation to Antonio Massa, a Franciscan monk, who, in an inflated address to the emperor and patriarch, and the great officers of the Eastern court, had prejudged the entire controversy between the Churches, by claiming for his master the titles of " Lord upon earth, successor of Peter, the anointed of the Lord, the lord of the universe, the father of kings, the light of the world." The reply of the emperor and the patriarch to this oration was of a very moderate and practical nature. Constantinople was still urged as the place of meeting ; the presence of all the Eastern prelates was not held to be essential in order that the decrees of the future synod might have force and legitimacy, while the poverty of the imperial treasury appealed to the generosity of the pope to provide the requisite means for the sustenance of this great assembly. The Latins endeavoured in the meantime to draw over the miuds of the Greeks to their favourite scheme of a council in Italy, the pope pointing to his own advanced age as the reason for immediate action in a matter in which his suc- cessors might be so differently affected from himself. Notwithstanding the misunderstandings that arose between the emperor and the legates of the pope, and the far more ominous difficulties which the disaffection of the patriarch to the project of a council in Italy THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 245 occasioned, the negotiation was proceeding with a rapidity which few Roman questions have ever exhibited, until the death of Martin gave it a serious interruption. The imperial legates, who had only just started when the news arrived, returned home and were ill received by the emperor, who hurried them back to carry on their work with the newly elected pontiff. But Eugenius, with the pontificate, had assumed a new nature as well as a new office. He was no longer the conciliator of Churches and kingdoms, but a fierce absolutist both in religion and politics. He received the ambassadors with the angry inquiry, " Why Patras had not been restored to its bishop ? " and ' ' How they could ask a synod of him until it had been thus restored?" The legates, after vainly explaining and remonstrating, left the pope impressed with the con- viction " that he touched the matter of the synod carelessly, and as it were with the tips of his fingers/' He wrote, however, by them to the emperor, promis- ing that a synod should be convoked in Italy. It is difficult to account for this very impolitic dis- courtesy of Eugenius except on the ground that the interested motives of the Eastern court had now be- come transparent, and that the opportunity for claiming an equivalent in favour of Rome had accordingly arrived. It is highly probable, moreover, that the fact that the emperor had sent ambassadors to the Council of Basle to open a negotiation there, even before the 246 THE LAST CRUSADER. deputation to Eugenius had returned to Constantinople, had mortified the new pontiff, and led to this unex- pected reception. However this might have been, the news of the assembly of the Council of Basle, and of the adhesion to it, not only of Sigisinund, but of all the Western powers, created a profound sensation at the Eastern court, and awakened an immediate desire to enter upon so new and promising a field. An embassy to the council was at once despatched, consisting of Demetrius Palseologus, the Abbot (after- wards Cardinal) Isidore, and John (called Dissypatus or Bisconsul, from his having twice filled a consular office), who was a son-in-law of the emperor. These were authorised on the part of the emperor and the patriarch to promise that the entire strength of the Eastern Church and court would be ready to join itself to the council, in order to form an oecumenical synod in whatever place might be selected by that body. Eugenius, whose conflict with the council had now begun, sent off an emissary in all haste to the emperor, to avert, if possible, this threatened defection to the ranks of his opponents; and the diplomatic warfare which had so long been carried on between Rome and Basle was transferred, with increased bitterness and subtlety, to the neutral ground of Constantinople. The emperor, who had received from the ambassa- dors to the council a description of their reception, which surpassed all his expectations, and had found that it represented all the political strength of Western THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 247 Europe, gave his entire support to the plan of a junc- tion with the fathers of Basle ; while the patriarch, with a natural leaning to the ecclesiastical element, and as natural a dread that he might be carried to the very end of the world at which his geographical ignorance had fixed the scene of the council's labours and that in the pursuit of a very doubtful object, clung to the pope and the promise of a synod in Italy.* The council lost no time in following up the depu- tation of the Eastern court by an embassy to Constan- tinople, of which John de Ragusio and Simon de Fiero were the leading members. While at Constantinople, where they assisted in certain religious processions, connected probably with the projected union, the report that Eugenius had again dissolved the council led them to write to the president to ask for informa- tion on the subject. f Their letter is dated on the 10th of March, 1436 ; and this enables us to form some chronological connexion between the documents of the council and Eugenius, and the narrative of Syropulus, which during the controversy become more than usually complicated, and often contradictory. In the meantime the success of the deputies of the council with the emperor was so complete that the * Syropul. sect. ii. c. 25. t MS. Viudobon. Cod. Can. 69. f. 11. "Joannis de Kagusio et Simonis Fierum legatorum Concil. Bas. Literse ad Julianum Cardinal. Csesarinura (ut videtur) petunt sibi certa remmtiari de concilio quod dissolutum fuisse fama attulerat ; et late describunt piissimain quandam supplicationem Cpoli habitam." (Wiirdtwein, torn. viii. preef.). 248 THE LAST CKUSADEE. patriarch was filled with despair. Gathering together his cross -bearers, of whom the historian Syropulus was one, he complained that the monarch had alto- gether gone with the fathers at Basle, and that they should be led thither at last. At this critical moment the indiscretion of the council in its preliminary decree again turned the balance in favour of Eugenius. " The fathers/' it alleged, " having hastened to reform the new heresy of the Bohemians, were now about to obviate the old heresy of the Greeks." In the face of such a document as this, where was the promised freedom of the projected synod ? What justice or equality could the Greeks expect from those who had already judged and condemned them with the revolted Bohemians ? Well might the representa- tives of the council have said of their own proposals of peace what they said so happily of Eugenius "Would that his benign answer had been less like that of Joab, who, taking the beard of his companion Amasa, and giving him the kiss of peace, stuck his sword into his bowels and killed him.* In vain the delegates of the council were called upon to alter the offensive proeme. Though they professed to treat it as a mistake of the copyists an interpolation which they could not account for, alike without authority and without meaning they dis- claimed the power and declined the responsibility of * " Responsio per Unum ex Oratoribus (C. Bas.) coucepta sed nou exhibita." (Wtlrdtwein, torn. vii. p. 197). THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 249 altering a single word.* After many fruitless con- ferences, they proposed at last to draw up a new preamble to the decree, and to obtain for this the sanction of the council. In the meantime, and in order to quiet the appre- hensions of the Eastern bishops, the emperor sug- gested the composition, on their part, of a new introduction, and the eventual selection between the two forms of that which was most agreeable to the feelings of all. The new introduction of the Latins, however, so fully satisfied the Easteni court, that it was at once adopted, though another question of still greater importance appeared in the distance. What if the projected union should turn out a failure ? and how, in this case, would the stipulations of the decree be affected? The representatives of the council re- plied to this, that whether the union were effected or not, the return of the Eastern court should be equally secure and honourable. Upon this assurance, the decree was formally drawn up and transmitted to the council by Henry Mancer, one of the deputies. The legates of the council took advantage of this delay to effect the conversion of the patriarch to their views, who, from the beginning, had been most eager to accept the papal overtures, and looked with natural suspicion upon a body whose relations with the papacy had become so anomalous, and whose deri- vation from the pope-deposing Council of Constance * Syropul. Sect. ii. c. 29. 250 THE LAST CRUSADER. awakened a natural alarm in one of the same order. And here the emissaries of the council succeeded so well in misrepresenting the true relation between Eugenius and the fathers at Basle, as to bring over the patriarch to their side, and to induce him for the first time to enter heartily into the projected union.* The ambassadors of the council were not, however, alone in this field of subtle diplomacy, for Eugenius was represented in it by Christopher, Bishop of Corone, who studiously propagated among the Greeks the news of the dissensions which were reigning at Basle, and of the schism which was openmg between the council and Eugenius. Not only had he suc- ceeded hitherto in detaching the mind of the patriarch from the synod, but had been apparently equally suc- cessful in influencing the mind of Joannes Dissypatus, whom the emperor was about to send, as his plenipo- tentiary, to the council. The ambassadors of that body, who were not unaware of the intrigues of the papal emissary, endeavoured to extort from him the concurrence of his master in their negotiations with the Eastern court, which, after some tergiversation, he was compelled to promise. f On the arrival of Dissypatus at Basle, in the begin- ning of February,! he had an audience with the council, and, after delivering his credentials and * Syropul. sect. ii. c. 38. t Ibid. sect. iii. c. 36. | Panormitani Oratio in Conveutu Francoford, (Wtlrdtweiu, torn. viii. p. 128). THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 251 describing the good-will of the Eastern court towards the projected meeting of the Churches, opened the question of the place in which this great work of union was to be accomplished, and of the means that had been prepared for the conveyance of the Eastern court. To this, Cardinal Julian made answer, that the naval preparations were already completed, and that the cities of Basle or Avignon, or some place in Savoy, had been chosen as the scene of the future council. On this, the ambassador protested strongly that the Greeks would, on no account, undertake so long and, to the aged prelates who were to take part in the council, so perilous a journey ; that they had believed the Savoy mentioned originally, to include only the Italian dominions of the duke, although, as it was enumerated among the places agreed upon out of Italy, it was difficult to maintain this ground. The representative of the Eastern court insisted further on the absolute necessity of the pope's personal presence in the council, from all which it was evident that he was seeking occasion, " or had been suborned by some other influence, to find for the Greeks an opportunity of receding from their agreement with the council/'* The fathers, who suspected the source from which these unexpected protests and reclamations had arisen, met them with a determined resistance, until, on the 15th of February, Dissypatus read and * Panormitan. p. 130. 252 THE LAST CRUSADER. delivered a formal protest, drawn up in Latin, which was introduced by Eugenius into the bull which he put forth soon after, confirming the acts of the re- cusant minority at Basle. The language of this protest is so singular, as to prove that it was the composition of the ambassador himself, though there cannot be the shadow of a doubt that its inspiration was from Eugenius,* and possibly also from the patriarch, whose special dele- gate he is said by the pope to have been.f He begins with saying that he has been sent by the emperor " ex multis respectibus et specialiter propter quatuor" the first being to announce the readiness of the Eastern court and prelates to fulfil their engage- ments ; secondly, to entreat the fathers to fulfil their own in their full integrity and with due punctuality ; thirdly, to see whether the place selected were among those named in the preliminaries, etnd convenient both to the Greeks and to the pope, the necessity of whose presence and concurrence he so dwells upon, as to make it appear that he represented the interests of Eugenius not less than those of his proper consti- * Panormitanus mentions, with just suspicion, the fact that the protest was written " not in Greek, but merely in Latin," and notes the significant circumstance, that the Eastern delegate insisted on the presence of the pope in person^ whereas the original compact added the alternative, or by his representatives, as a proof that he had received his instructions from Eugenius. (Wllrdtwein, torn. viii. p. 129). f Eugenii Bulla " Sahatoris et Dei nostri" ap. Justiniani Acta Con- cil. Florent. p. 7. THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 253 tuents ; fourthly , he is commissioned to examine the vessels procured for the use of the emperor and prelates. He then protests that they have chosen a place " to which the pope will never come, nor send his legates " a clear indication that he was receiving instructions from Eugenius, whose change of mind with regard to Avignon, which was actually his own suggestion, he could not otherwise have known.* The pope had generally expressed himself to the council as " very little solicitous about the place of union, so that the union were only effected;"! and Avignon, as immediately subject to his jurisdiction, would have naturally been the best substitute for Rome or Bologna. But whether the resistance of that city to his authority, and the refusal to receive his legates, still rankled in the memory of the pontiff, or the fear that its selection was the prelude to a new schism, and threatened a new headship of the Church, as well as a new scene for the council, Eugenius soon disavowed his fatal suggestion, and nothing but a council held in Italy could now satisfy his desires. The zeal with which the citizens of Avignon had come forward with the funds to meet the engage- ments of the council, and the fact that they alone had * Panormitan. p. 126. f See the reply of the legates at the Diet of Nuremberg, " Con- cepta sed non exhibita " (Wurdtwein, torn. vii. p. 192). This is a very important document, as the fact of its non-publication in the diet sufficiently indicates. It is conceived with much more truthfulness and candour than is generally exhibited by such diplomatic pro- ductions. 254 THE LAST CRUSADER. responded to this urgent invitation of the Church out of all the cities of Europe, must have awakened in the suspicious mind of Eugenius the fear of ulterior designs, and of the interested motive of making Avignon again the centre of the papacy. This fear he betrayed in the inhibition which he laid presently on the people of Avignon from raising money, in order to fulfil their contract with the council;* and having thus disabled them from completing their arrangements within the thirty-two days appointed, he has the modesty to make this failure the ground of setting aside the choice of the council, and pro- ceeding to a new election.! Dissypatus, instead of returning at once to Con- stantinople, proceeded to Bologna, to Eugenius, and having given him his protest as the groundwork of his bull of translation of the council, induced him to send vessels to bring the Eastern emperor and prelates to Italy, so as to anticipate the designs of the council. J It chanced that the papal triremes arrived first at Constantinople, and the emissaries of Eugenius represented themselves as bearing the credentials of the council as well as of the pope, by which successful falsehood they brought upon * "Difficultates per Ambasiatores motse " (Wtirdtwein, torn. vii. p. 269). Nationis Germanicse Responsum ad Literas Stephani Palatini Eheni. (id. torn. vii. p. 299). 1* Justiniani Acta Cone. Florent. p. .10 | Syropul. sect. iii. c. 5. Theophanis Procopowicz Archiep. Novogrod. Historia Controversies de Processione Sp. Sancti. p. 94 (Goth, 1772). THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 255 Eugenius and his party the bitterest reproaches of the fathers at Basle, who recognised in this master- piece of duplicity the crown and completion of the Eugenian policy.* The return of Dissypatus and his colleague at this critical moment contributed not a little to this unexpected triumph. For they brought the readily credited news that the pope and the council were reconciled, that the sessions at Basle were at an end, and every obstacle to a synod under the papal presidency and in Italy removed. Dissypatus was extravagant in his zeal to propagate this strange intelligence, and the arrival of Cardinal Albergati as legate from the pope, contributed to the success of these misrepresentations. The address of the German nation to the Palatine of the Rhine affirms boldly, not only that the am- bassadors of the pope assumed to represent the council, but that they were actually fortified with letters to which the seal of the council had been surreptitiously affixed. f The history of the sub- sequent rifling of the chest in which this seal was deposited, in order to attach it to the act of the minority, in which Cardinal Julian was himself implicated, indicates the too great probability of this dishonest proceeding. The successive stages * Panormitan. Propositio ad Electores facta (Wiirdtwein, torn, vii. p. 103). f Wttrdtwein (torn. vii. p. 300). 256 THE LAST CEUSADER, of the diplomacy of Eugeiiius, which was crowned at this point with so complete a success, may be thus briefly recapitulated. By his attempted dis- solutions and transfers of the council to Italy, he had compelled it to regard its very existence as identified with its permanence at Basle, or at the very least with its continuance in some city out of Italy. He had himself accepted and sanctioned the resolution of the council to remain firmly at Basle, until the Eastern court should arrive at the port which might be selected for their landing, and thus contrived to paralyse the action of the fathers until that period when the success of his own diplomacy should render it utterly fruitless. He had by " glosses " and misrepresentations, of which Dissypatus was a most convenient channel, led the Greeks to raise difficulties on every one of the cities out of Italy, which had been included in the first schedule of their agreement with the council, suggesting that Savoy only referred to the possessions of the Duke of Savoy in Italy, whereas it was enumerated in the decree as one of the places that might be chosen out of Italy.* Finally, when the last stage of the negotiation had been arrived at by the guarantee of the requisite funds by the citizens of Avignon, the pope interposed to prevent * Difficultates per Ambas. motse (Wurdtwein, p. 263). In this important paper the course of Eugenius' policy, and his plans of dividing the council against itself, as well as detaching it from the Greeks, are well discussed. THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 257 the fulfilment of the terms of the promised loan, although the suggestion of Avignon as the place for the future council had come originally from himself,* and by anticipating the council at the court of the emperor, completed his great political work by an act of duplicity which has probably but few parallels in history. On the faith of this " false legation " the emperor and the patriarch prepared for their anxious journey.f At this point our attention is recalled to Basle, and to the solution of the interesting but difficult question, how far the immediate subject of our narrative was implicated in these transactions. The only clear and consistent narrative of the proceedings which led to the final schism at Basle, and the retirement of the legates, is the address of Panor- mitanus at the diet of Frankfort, which was replied to by Nicolas de Cusa in a counterstatement, or rather argument, which took three days to deliver. The " sum of his discourse " has alone reached us, and though it contains nothing to invalidate the historical statements of Panormitanus, it may be re- garded as a faithful representation of the causes and motives which led Julian to that apparently sudden change of purpose which, with some writers is the greatest reproach, with all, is the deepest mystery of his life. It may, indeed, be reasonably * Oratio Panormitani (Wtirdtwein, torn. viii. p. 126). f Syropul. sec. iii. cap. x. S 258 THE LAST CRUSADER. believed, that at least the facts of this statement were derived from the president himself. Up to the arrival of Dissypatus, and his protest in the general congregation, held on the 15th of February, his loyalty to the council remained un- shaken. For, notwithstanding all the denunciations of the orator against the choice of Avignon, and his allegations that the path of union would be irremedi- ably cut off by its adoption, Cardinal Julian ad- ministered the oath to the deputies of the council, who were about to proceed to that city to receive the first instalment of the loan.* Between this and the general congregation of the 23d of February, in which the final arrangements were made for the payment of it, the relation between the council arid the president had become materially changed. He had been invited to take part in this congregation an invitation which itself indicated a difference of opinion already springing up on the subject of the present discussion but excused himself on the ground that he could not concur in the schedule of places "in so far as it related to Avignon. "f The arrangements with the representatives of that city were made accordingly in the absence of both the legates, though the assertion of the advocate of Eugenius that they were made " unknown to them " J * Wtirdtwein, torn. viii. p. 130. f Panormitan. ap. "Wtirdtwein (torn. viii. p. 134). $ Summa dictorum Nicolai de Cusa (Wtirdtwein, torn. ix. p. 8). THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 259 is refuted by the clear and full statement of Panor- nritanus. The negotiations opened at Avignon assumed, how- ever, so suspicious a complexion as to lead at once to the belief that the final nomination of that city would reopen the warfare with Eugenius, and perhaps inau- gurate a new schism at a moment in which the great object of the reunion of the Christian Church seemed to be so near its accomplishment. The very eagerness which the people of Avignon the city of the exiled papacy had shown on this occasion, the ominous absence of its principal citizens at the court of the king of France at the very moment of the arrival of the ambassadors,* the inflexible resolution of Eugenius and of the Eastern court, and the increasing exaspera- tion of the council, must have awakened in the minds of all its more moderate members the gloomiest appre- hensions for the future. The colleague of Julian, Juan de Cervantes, the cardinal of St. Peter, maintained at this critical moment a perfect neutrality" Neque hos neque illos laudare solebat" f He was able to retire into a more private life from a conflict in which Julian was com- pelled to take an active and decisive part. For "it was evident to all the world/' as his ancient biographer affirms, "that he wjould have been himself chosen to fill the throne which by the deposition of Eugenius * Panormit. (1. c.). t ^Ensese Sylvii Ep. xxv. 260 THE LAST CRUSADER would so soon become vacant.* For him, therefore, no place of neutrality could remain ; nor can we won- der that he looked anxiously for a pretext for setting aside the election of Avignon, and closing with Eugenius on some place in Italy in which the disunion of the Western Churches might be concealed from the eyes of the Eastern world. The inability of the citizens of Avignon to complete the payment of the loan within the time prescribed, and the acceptance by the ambassadors of a moiety only, with a security for the payment of the rest, suggested to the Archbishop of Tarentum, the devoted adherent of Eugenius, the idea of breaking the com- pact on the ground of the non-fulfilment of its main condition. This suggestion was eagerly adopted by the legates, and the question was mooted hereupon, whether the council should proceed to a new election, or should confirm the choice of Avignon. The subject was remitted by the council to the committee on the reunion of the Churches; but before it was decided therein the legates resolved at once to offer a new schedule, naming Florence or Lyons as the place of the future council. Accordingly, in the twenty-fifth session, after the confirmation of the decree offering Basle, Avignon, and Savoy as the future meeting-place of the council, an official authorized by the legates ascended the pulpit, and read a counter-decree, in which Florence, Udino, or any other suitable place * Vespasiano Florentin. (ap. Ughelli Italia Sacra). THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 261 in Italy, were substituted for the places nominated by the majority. A scene of strange and hopeless confusion ensued. The majority, including the Cardinal of Aries, and all the prelates of inferior rank, together with the lay- members of the council, inflexibly adhered to their resolution, while not less pertinacious, though standing almost alone, were the two cardinals, who, in the end, seceded from the body of the council, and carried on the negotiation with the Greeks as though its repre- sentation had been centred in themselves alone. Julian continued, however, still to carry on his office as president, and to take his place in the general congregations, anxious, if possible, to obey the solemn resolution of the council by remaining in Basle until the arrival of the Eastern Court in Italy, and, during this critical interval, to promote the work of union, or at least, prevent an open rupture with Eugenius. This retention of his presidential office secured to him the custody of the official seal of the council, which he re- fused to attach to the decree of the majority without sealing also the counter-decree of the minority. In consequence of this refusal the acts and proceedings of the council remained for some time without official sanction. Yielding at length to the solicitations of its mem- bers, the seal was, by common consent, confided to the care of a commission, consisting of Cardinal Cer- vantes, Alphonso Bishop of Burgos, and Nicholas, 262 THE LAST CRUSADER. Bishop of Palermo, better known as the great Canonist Panormitanus. The two former were Spaniards by birth ; the last, as representing the King of Arragon, was connected officially with the same country, and all of them well qualified to mediate between the French and Roman parties which divided the synod. To them Julian appealed in order to obtain the seal of the council to the decree of the minority, but his application was at once rejected. This led to an outrage, which forms a strange and painful contrast to the legal and dignified conduct which the legate had hitherto maintained. His secre- tary, Bartolomeo de Battifero, with others of his domestics, succeeded in breaking open the chest in which the seal had been deposited, and attached it to the schedule of the minority.* How far Julian was implicated in this transaction it is difficult to deter- mine ; but the Archbishop of Tarentum was found to be so deeply involved that he was immediately placed under arrest, but soon effected his escape to the court of Eugenius. A correspondence he was holding with the pope was intercepted by the council, in which the state of affairs at Basle is thus significantly sketched : " Your holiness may believe me that even when the * These facts, asserted by Panormitanus, and not in any particular denied by Nicolaus de Cusa in his reply, are further confirmed by a MS. in the Imperial Library at Vienna, described as a fragment of the Acts of the Council, containing " testimonies to prove the sur- reptitious sealing of the decree concerning Florence and Udino " (Wiirdtwein, vol. 8). THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 263 Greeks arrive, it will be difficult for us to depart hence without a schism (scissura). I perceive my lord the legate to be most firmly resolved at the time of their arrival, to transfer the council, and to fulminate cen- sures against the rebellious, who will be twice the number of the other party."* The treacherous pre- late must have already reached the Roman court when Eugemus received the official notification of the act of the minority, which he eagerly ratified, accepting the selection of Florence or Udino, and confirming it in a public consistory. The rupture between Julian and the council was now irremediable ; and yet he never appears to have surrendered to any other his presidential authority, employing it in order to carry on his unsuccessful work of mediating between the parties in the council to the very last. As far back as the 20th of December, 1437, he had eloquently appealed to the wisdom and moderation of the fathers, in order that they might rescind their monitory against the pope on his en- gaging to revoke his bull of translation of the council. He pointed out, with his accustomed force and per- suasiveness, the necessity of showing to the Greeks that they were not making the union of the whole Church the pretext of a still more hopeless schism in their own body. He proffered the mediation of Sigismund, the great defender of the council, as at * " Difficultates per Ambasiatores motco" (Wftrdtwein, torn. vii. p. 269). 264 THE LAST CRUSADER. once acceptable to Eugenius and to themselves. He exhorted them not to exhibit to the Greeks the humiliating spectacle of men who were seeking union with strangers, while they were falling into disunion among themselves. Finally, he implored them " in all humility, and adjured them by the terrible tribunal of Christ, and that dreadful day of judgment in which, willing or unwilling, they must give an account of all their thoughts and deeds, and in the name of the Redeemer, the Lord Jesus Christ, who, coming into the world, proclaimed peace, conversing in the world, preached peace, rising from the world, spake peace to his disciples." From the first he had rested in the conviction that the influence of Sigisrnund was alone able to prevent the threatened schism, and that some plan of reunion might be effected, either by a mutual compromise, like that entered into between the emperor and the electors, or by a direct mediation on the part of the emperor himself.* Great, then, must have been his con- sternation to find that, at the very moment he had urged the acceptance of this mediation on every ground of political necessity, and even religious duty, Sigis- mund had been summoned away from the long and weary conflict, having expired at Znaym, in Moravia, on the 9th of December. This intelligence, succeeded as it was by the arrival * Responsio ad Oratores Regis Roman! (Concepta sed non exhi- bita, Wftrtitwein, torn. vii. p. 216). THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 265 and representations of Dissypatus, must have strength- ened, if it did not even originate, the determination to throw himself and the moderate party in the council into the balance against the majority. As soon as the news of the embarkation of the Eastern court arrived at Basle, Julian, accompanied by only four prelates and his own attendants, set forth towards Venice, the place of their expected landing, resting at Mantua on his way. To the latter place he would naturally be led, in order to consult at this critical moment the head of the Gonzaga family, the near relative of the late emperor. From Mantua he proceeded to Venice, in a mixed public and private character, which a contemporary historian describes in the words, " He went to visit the emperor and the patriarch, and went as the legate of the Council of Basle/'* In this light he was received at Venice, both by the Greeks and by the Venetian government, which accorded him the same honours which had been bestowed upon Cardinal Albergati as the representative of Eugenius. The controversy on the place of the future council was here renewed in another form ; the Doge Fran- cesco Foscari urging the claims of Venice, the papal party contending for Ferrara, while Julian would appear, from his sudden return to Mantua, to have suggested that city as the safest scene of the future synod. The eloquence of the Eugenian advocates, and especially of the celebrated prior of the Camaldules, * Sanuto. 266 THE LAST CRUSADER. Ambrosius Traversari, had been hitherto vainly spent in the effort to bring him round to their views. The latter seems to have been specially commissioned by the pope for such a purpose, his letters to Eugenius making frequent mention of his labours for the car- dinal's conversion.* On one occasion he writes, " Sometimes I entertain a hope, sometimes I despair of his conversion." On another he says, " We cannot be sanguine, and yet cannot despair of it." The return of Julian to Mantua f must have frus- trated these hopes ; as it proved that whatever might be his ultimate decision, it would not be on the ground of any change of purpose or conversion, but from those free and independent convictions which had been growing up in his mind since the time when the reconciliation between the pope and the council had become impossible. It was not till the llth of March, 1438, that he formed the determination to join the Greeks and Eugenius at Ferrara ; and the surprise and delight of the papal court at the accession of so great a man to their ranks proved that it was an unexpected not less than a welcome event. J The egotism of the Eugenian party eagerly claimed as a conversion what was really the natural develop- * Ambrosii Traversarii Ep. p. 400. f " Cardinalis Sanctse Sabinae Mantuam reversus est " (Justinian! Acta Concil. Florent. pars ii. coll. i.). See also Sanuto (ap. Raynald ad ann. 1438). J " Atque ut magis exultet S. V. adplicuit Cardinalis S. Sabinao paratus et promptus pro tua sanctitate, si ita sit, opus iutendere" (Auibrosii Traversarii Ep. p. 58). THE COUNCIL OF BASLE. 267 raent of those great principles of ecclesiastical policy upon which Julian had acted from the beginning ; and this claim has been too readily admitted by historians of every creed. While, however, the advocates of the pope were thus rejoicing over the immediate fruits of a successful duplicity, that vigorous and impulsive mind, which had guided the intellectual strength of Christendom in the freest and most enlightened council that had assembled since the apostolic age, was preparing itself for a future of more enduring triumph. The long and dreary night of schisms and controversies seemed now far spent, and the day of strength and reunion was at hand. How sublime was the prospect now opening upon an earnest and sanguine mind ! The restoration of the Church to its first beauty and integrity its refor- mation by the recovery of its first estate, and of that spirit which made it one in Christ the overthrow of the infidel and the enemy of the Church by a warfare of whose glories the earlier crusades would become but a faint prophecy the extension of the power of the papacy over all Christendom, and the restoration of the episcopacy to its pristine beauty under the one universal patriarch these were the most prominent features of this vision of things to come. We cannot wonder that, with such a view before him, the great reformer of the Church at Basle laid down the work of reformation to take up that of union ; 268 THE LAST CRUSADER. and while keeping still, as the rule of all his labours, the truth proclaimed at Constance, " There can be no real union without reformation, nor true reformation without union," fell back upon the work of union when that of reformation became impossible. To one who regards his course from this point, every stage of his transition from Basle to Florence will become clear and consistent. Everywhere we shall recognise a careful provision for the exigences of the Church, formed from the matured experience of its past dangers, and a disinterested zeal which, in an age of selfish intrigue, was as naturally misrepresented as it was wilfully misunderstood. The insinuation of Gibbon is at once confronted by the fact that if Julian had not sought the peace of the Church rather than his own aggrandisement, he might have grasped at this moment the papacy itself, and wrested from Eugenius that authority under which he was content to close a life of brilliant but unrequited service. CHAPTER VI. THE COUNCIL OP FLORENCE. THE Greeks, who had embarked amid conflicting rumours of the reconciliation and renewed hostility between the pope and the council, arrived at Venice in a state of indescribable division and perplexity. All that they believed in common seems to have been that whatever party they attached themselves to would be immediately and necessarily joined by the other. It was difficult for them to conceive the possibility of a continuance of the prolonged hostility between Eugenius and the fathers at Basle after they had added themselves to the ranks of either. Those who clung to the promises of the council looked eagerly for the arrival of Julian, of whose independent position at this moment they knew nothing, and whom they believed to be still the zealous advocate who had opened the negotiation with them at first. They accordingly urged the emperor to withhold his ac- ceptance of the invitation of Cardinal Albergati, who had arrived at Venice as the legate of Eugenius, until 270 THE LAST CEUSADER. the return of Cesarini. The prepossessed monarch replied with impatience, " Come at once to the point, and trouble not yourselves about the cardinal."' The arrival of the Marquis of Ferrara in Venice and that of Cardinal Albergati were hailed by the Venetian court with great joy. The venerable Doge Francesco Foscari, whose name has descended in poetry as well as history, received the papal ambassador with the greatest devotion, even condescending to bear his train in public. The scene which this city of waters pre- sented at this memorable period was in the highest de- gree picturesque and exciting. Moving amidst an asto- nished multitude eager to witness the arrival of the illustrious strangers the canals and the surrounding sea covered with boats and gondolas, through which the state-barge of the doge slowly made its way to the vessels which conveyed the emperor and his train, one of which was laden with the sacred vessels and chalices of the great church of St. Sophia, without which it was deemed that the magnificence of the Eastern ritual could not be worthily represented before the Western Church the procession exhibited a stateliness and solemnity which reminded the bystander that it was not a mere secular pageant that he was witnessing, and that something more than a worldly triumph was ex- pected as the result of this day of joyful meeting. In the contemplation of this scene, in which the setting glories of the Eastern empire, surviving its power, * Syropul: sec. iv. cap. 17. THE COUNCIL OF FLORENCE. 271 were poured for the last time upon the Western world, the historians of the day are lost in wonder and admiration ; the despot Demetrius gravely exclaiming, " Methinks it was of this place that the prophet wrote, ' God hath founded it upon the seas, and pre- pared it upon the floods ! ' As soon as the imperial train arrived near enough to the city to recognise the palace of the doge, the cathedral of St. Mark, and the stately palaces and churches that surround them, appearing one after another to fill up the glorious prospect, their enthusiasm began. Passing up the grand canal, they beheld the Rialto crowded with an eager multitude, whose acclamations burst over them as they recognised the banners of the Republic and of the Eastern empire floating in the breeze together, perhaps for the first time in so close and propitious a union. At this moment the admira- tion of the Eastern court reached its highest point, and found vent in the exclamation that "the earth and the sea had become a heaven."* The pageant of the day of arrival being over, and the members of the Eastern court suitably lodged, the more tranquil and diplomatic part of the cere- monial began, which was brought to a speedy close by the determination of the emperor to adopt the place and plans proposed by Eugenius. He reached * The account of the despot Demetrius is given by Phranza, and is repeated almost verbatim, but without his name, in the introduc- tion to the Greek acts of the council. 272 THE LAST CRUSADER. Ferrara, where the pope, with his court, was awaiting him, on the 4th of March, the patriarch, who travelled by water, not arriving there until the 8th. At about the same interval, after the arrival of the latter, Cardinal Julian entered Ferrara, and was received by Eugenins with the liveliest emotions of joy. The public reception of the Eastern court at Ferrara was not inferior in magnificence to that which it had experienced at Venice. But so extra- ordinary an event as the meeting together of the heads of the Eastern and Western Churches had been, unfortunately, but ill provided for in the ceremonial books of either; and the claims of reverence which were advanced by the pope so startled the patriarch that the very opening of the congress was prophetic of a disastrous termination. It was announced to the Eastern primate, at the preliminary communication, that he was expected to kiss the foot of the pope. At this demand the aged prelate, in the words of the Eastern historian, " was horrified." In vain had Traversari, the tried friend of Eugenius, endeavoured to avert this danger : " Let it not move you" (he had written to him) "to be called by the patriarch, 'Brother/ for the Church of Constantinople is second to Rome, and an inveterate and not newly assumed habit may be readily pardoned." It was a pity that Eugenius needed, and a still greater pity that he neglected, such advice. He continued, however, to press his foolish demand, until his pertinacity and THE COUNCIL OF FLORENCE. 273 resistance of the Eastern prelates gave it a formidable importance. "And on what grounds," exclaimed at length the indignant patriarch, " does the pope make this demand ? or which of the councils has sanctioned it? Show me whence he derives it, and where it is recorded. Albeit he is the alleged successor of St. Peter, we are not less the . successors of the other apostles. Did those apostles kiss the feet of St. Peter ? who ever heard of such a thing ? " His final determination not to leave the vessel by which he had reached Ferrara until the offensive claim was withdrawn, compelled Eugenius to give way. A reception in the pope's private chamber, in the presence of the cardinals only, and the sub- stitution of the cheek and hand for the foot were at length agreed upon, and Eugenius was prevented from repeating in public a scene which Home had too often witnessed, and which Bishop Cuthbert Tonstall so quaintly describes when (in 1505) he beheld Pope Julius "standing on his feet whyles a noble manne of great age dyd prostrate hymselfe uppon the grounde and kyssed his shoo, whyche he stately suffered to be doone as of duetie," adding : " where me thynke I sawe Cornelius the century on capytayne of the Italyon's bende, spoken of in the tenth chapiter of the Actes, submyttynge hym selfe to Peter and moche honourynge hym ; but I sawe not Peter there to take hym up and to byd hym ryse, sayenge, ' I am a man as thou arte,' as saynte Peter dyd T 274 THE LAST CRUSADER. saye to Cornelius ; so that the byshoppes of Rome do clymme above the hevenlye clowdes, that is to saye, above the apostels sente into the worlde by Chryste."* A still more difficult question, involving in a deeper degree the controverted question of the papal su- premacy, succeeded this. How were the seats of the prelates in the council to be satisfactorily arranged ? How, without pre- determining this controversy, which was one of the subjects of discussion, could the pope and the patriarch, as well as the emperor, be satisfied with the seats assigned them? The event proved how difficult was the solution of these ques- tions. And though the prudence and eloquence of Julian were now bestowed upon the cause of Eugenius, the relative position of the seats was a subject of eager altercation, which greatly delayed the session of the council. The synod was opened on the 9th of April, 1438, when the instruments of its convocation were pub- lished and ratified in full session. The Greeks, though pressed by the Latins to enter immediately upon the regular labours of the council, resolutely urged the propriety of waiting for the arrival of the fathers from Basle, who, they imagined, upon the knowledge of their arrival and of the opening of the synod, would hasten to take part in its debates. All that the Latins could prevail upon them to do was . * Sermon preached before Henry VIII. on Palm Sunday, 1539. THE COUNCIL OF FLORENCE. 2J5 to meet them in preliminary conferences, in which the subjects of difference were privately discussed, and plans of reconciliation suggested. This period of suspense was, however, not un- favourable to the cause of the Latins ; for not only was the strength of the adverse party worn away by the long delay, and their dependence upon the papal court made more complete, but an opportunity was gained for sowing dissension among the principal advocates of the Eastern Church, which facilitated more than any other cause the success of the Roman diplomacy. Of the leading prelates on the side of the Greeks, Bessarion, Archbishop of Nice, and Marcus Eugenius, the Archbishop of Ephesus, were the most conspicuous in rank and talent. Regarding one another, it is probable, from the very first, as rivals, the seeds of jealousy were very easily sown in their minds, and Julian, who, in this interval, entertained both of them at his table with much hospitality and cordiality, was not a little instrumental in dividing these champions of the adverse party. The patriarch, justly suspecting that too intimate a social intercourse with the chief advocates of the Latin cause might lay the foundation of a deeper union, and must in any case endanger his own position as the spiritual head of the Eastern Church, forbade the acceptance of the cardinal's invitations by his bishops and officials. On this ground the grand chartophylax, and the historian Syropulus, his principal cross-bearer, T 2 276 THE LAST CRUSADER. were compelled to decline the invitations of Julian. The learned and philosophic Bessarion had been, however, unable to resist the friendly importunities of one in whom he found so kindred a spirit, and such congenial tastes ; and the intimacy which began on the ground of philosophy, soon found a firmer basis on that of religious inquiry. The great Platonist, accompanied by the profound Gemistius, the Nestor of the Greeks in the council of Florence, whose name is hardly ever mentioned but with the epithet " the wise," was engaged in solving questions of moral philosophy at the table of the car- dinal, while the severe and dogmatic Ephesius had hitherto resisted this dangerous hospitality. At length he also was prevailed upon to overcome his scruples, though his conversation, unlike Bessarion's, who ap- pears to have been acquainted with Latin, if not also with Italian, even at this early period, was conducted through an interpreter. The object of Julian in these pressing invitations appears at once in the fact that he took the earliest opportunity of urging Ephesius so far to commit himself to the project of union, as to address a panegyrical letter to the pope, applauding his design, and encouraging him to carry it on to a successful issue. Ephesius, who suspected that the real object of this suggestion was rather to commit him to a policy which he had so energetically opposed, than to strengthen the inclinations of the pope, which needed THE COUNCIL OF FLORENCE. 277 no such stimulus from without, hesitated before he could be prevailed upon to entertain it. But when the persuasions of the Bishop of Mitylene were added to those of his host, he consented to draw up a paper which should be presented to the pope, after having been first transmitted to Julian. Julian, with a breach of confidence which throws a just suspicion upon his previous conduct in the matter, showed this writing to the emperor, whose indignation was at once awakened against Ephesius, as having ventured to write on subjects upon which he had not as yet even spoken. In the first excess of his anger, he brought the matter before the patriarch and the assembled bishops, and proposed that condign punishment should be inflicted on Ephesius by the judgment of the whole synod. Bessarion here interposed, and urging the scandal that such an exposure of one of their brethren would occasion before the Western Church, prevailed upon the emperor to pass over an offence, which it is too probable he might himself have originated. It is easy to trace in this incident the source of that severe hostility to the future union, and utter distrust of Julian and of Bessarion himself, which animated the future conduct of the indomitable Mark of Ephesus. Nor can we fail to observe this at the same time as one of the earliest stages of that moral declen- sion in the course of Julian, which was at once closed and expiated in the dark page of the Hungarian legation. 278 THE LAST CRUSADER. The business of the council was now opened in pre- liminary conferences, in which it was proposed to lay out a scheme for the public sessions, and to come to a kind of non-official understanding on the subjects of controversy, and the methods by which they were to be treated. These conferences were prefaced by Julian himself, who after many encomiums on the design of the union of the Churches, and the zeal of those who had come so far to effect it, inquired whether some plan had not been already proposed in a synod at Constantinople, and earnestly desired that, if so, it might be communi- cated to the Western Church. Ephesius, in reply, denied that any scheme of the kind had been adopted, and invited rather the propositions of the other side. The Greeks had come ready for the fullest discussion of every difference, but not committed to any project of union beforehand. Julian replied to this at some length, urging the view that the present conferences were the proper opportunity of discovering a medium of union dwelling on that word with a peculiar emphasis and unction.* The eloquence and persua- siveness of Julian is confessed by the Eastern historian to have had so unpleasing a contrast in the ruder sentences of Ephesius, that it was found desirable to entrust the second reply to Bessarion, whose eloquence surpassed in this instance that of the Western advo- cate, and who met his importunate inquiries for some ni had succeeded Sigismund in the empire. But in the interval between the death of Albert and the birth of Wladislas the nobles urged upon the queen the importance of contracting another marriage, pointing out Wladislas, King of Poland, as worthy of her choice. The queen permitted them to send an em- bassy to the Polish prince to open this delicate negotiation, but stipulated that if in the meantime she should give birth to a prince this permission was to be considered withdrawn. Before the am- bassadors reached Poland the news of the birth of 316 THE LAST CHUSADER. Wladislas was brought them, but they failed to fulfil the promise they had given in such a case, and proceeded with their negotiation. Nay, they even went so far as to offer the crown of Hungary to the Polish prince, and invited him to take im- mediate possession of it. He accompanied them accordingly without hesitation to Buda, where he was solemnly crowned by the same archbishop who had officiated but a little while before at the coro- nation of his more legitimate namesake. The emperor, who adhered firmly to the cause of legitimacy, which was ably sustained by the partisans of the queen and her infant son, strongly resisted the new claim to the throne of Hungary, while the court of Rome, viewing a long minority in that kingdom as perilous to the whole of Europe, of which it formed the key, advocated the cause of the elder Wladfelas as one of necessity. A civil war was thus begun in which both the imperial court and that of Rome were too deeply interested to be qualified to become mediators, and which threatened to divide and dissipate the forces of Europe on that very battle-field upon which they should have united to check the alarming progress of the Turkish power.* The legation into Hungary was at such a moment of primary importance as well as of the most per- plexing difficulty; and to this Cardinal Julian was * JSnese Sylvii Europa, c. i. Epist. 81, ad Leonardum Episc. Patavin. &c. THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 317 without delay appointed. In the year 1443 he entered upon this new scene of exertion and danger ; but before his departure he received from Eugenius the bishopric of Frascati, a preferment which seemed rather given in acknowledgment of his services in defence of the Roman court than as their peaceful and final reward. The addition of this new pastoral care could but remind him with renewed force of the contrast in which his sacred office already stood with that upon which he was now preparing to enter; and while he laid aside the spiritual weapons he had wielded at Florence to resume in Hungary the tem- poral sword he had so unsuccessfully drawn in Bohemia, his fatal predilection for the camp was again conspicuous. We have to lament, moreover, that there was not merely a change in the manner and weapons of his warfare, but even in the prin- ciples for which he fought; while we approach a period of his history so fatal to his reputation and to his life as that to which we have now to lead on our reader " Dishonorably obscuring hereby his later days," observes Count Litta, in his animated sketch of the life of Cesarini,* " he provoked his fatal destiny." As the objects of his policy became more extensive and difficult, his mind became more sanguine and unscrupulous in their pursuit; and at the present moment, the great work of uniting Christendom * Famiglie Celebri Italiane (Fam. Cesarini), Fasc. v. 318 THE LAST CRUSADER. against the Turks, which, till the close of this century, was the very soul and secret of the policy of the court of Rome, and that chiefly through his own ardent inspiration, had thrown all the objects and principles of his former life into the background. The vastness of his plans and the conviction of the necessity of carrying them out seem to have entirely absorbed his mind. That conduct alone seemed good which was favourable to the leading policy and ruling idea of his life that alone evil which obstructed or opposed it. When he left the clearer atmosphere of Basle, and the influence of that great republic of free and vigorous minds had ceased to exercise itself upon his own, he entered upon a scene of intrigue and casuistry at Florence which at once unfitted him to resume the station he had left, and prepared him for a still more fatal degeneracy. His noble and apostolic conduct in resisting the encroachments of the papal power was first gradually relinquished, then looked upon with a suspicious dread, and finally openly repudiated. " I admit," were his words at Vienna, when this now distasteful subject was pressed upon him, "that I have said and written what you allege; but departing from the truth I erred. . . You followed me when I erred, follow me then when I advise well."* This advice the rising courtier to whom it was addressed (and who was none other than Pius II. himself) was * Pii II. Bulk Retractationis. THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 319 led to adopt ; and the same advice he offered at a later period to the University of Basle, in the memor- able words " jffineam rejicite, Plum recipite" It is seldom, however, that such a recommendation has been followed in the case of any great man who, having invited to a new and untrodden path, at- tempts to call back his followers into the beaten track. Even those who are unfit to lead acknowledge, in their very imitation, the truth that " that is most valuable which is individual, which is marked by that which is peculiar, and characteristic in him who accomplishes it."* The bull of Pius and the advice of Cesarini follow their earlier writings with so halting a pace, that they seem but the apologies of age and decrepitude for the sincere zeal and intrepid activity of manhood. The first object of Julian on his arrival in Hun- gary was to settle the minds of the people in their adhesion to Eugenius, the schism occasioned by the election of Felix V. having given a dangerous pretext for disaffection to those who, from political causes, were alienated from the court of Rome. Then, finding that the only method of pacificating the kingdom was to effect a matrimonial alliance between the widowed queen and the usurping Wladislas, he addressed himself with his usual diplomatic zeal and skill to this difficult task. Frequent were the inter- views he had with the queen on this subject; and the * Dr. Charming " On Associations." 320 THE LAST CRUSADER. motives he urged for such a union were such as, had not her maternal feelings been dignified by the sense of her duty towards her people and in a con- fidence in their zeal for her person, would have speedily commanded her acquiescence. The pro- tection of her son (which Julian urged, as making this alliance a duty and a necessity) she confided to the justice of God and the loyalty of the Hun- garians. She yielded, however, at length, rather to the importunity than to the arguments of her advisers, and assented to the marriage on these conditions : that Wladislas was to abdicate the throne he had usurped, and to become the regent of the kingdom during her son's minority, or until he should die; that an ample dowry should be secured her; the claims of Hungary to Podolia and Wallachia relin- quished ; and certain lands belonging to Hungary transferred to the kingdom of Poland for defraying the expenses of the projected war. These conditions were readily accepted by Wladislas, but the Hun- garians and their great general Hunyiades demanded terms which should be less injurious to the interests of their country. Julian modified them, but without success. He then proposed a conference between the queen and the Polish prince, but this was equally unsuccessful in accomplishing the much-desired object. An amnesty was the only result of this singular interview, but the terms on which it was accepted did not transpire. THE HUNGAKIAN LEGATION. 321 Almost immediately afterwards the queen was seized with an acute internal disorder which closed her life so strangely and suddenly, that the suspicion that she was poisoned rooted itself deeply in the minds of all her subjects,* But the cause of her son did not materially suffer by this calamity; for Giskra, her faithful and active general, still vindicated it with the same zeal as before, and the Emperor Frederic was uncompromising in his resolution to maintain the cause of his helpless ward. In the meantime the zeal of the cardinal legate was absorbed in the endeavour to avert the possi- bility of a treaty or even suspension of hostilities with the enemies of the Christian name. Wladislas, devoted as he was to war, and knowing that the field of battle was the proper theatre of his skill, had, notwithstanding, at the present moment, a just apprehension of the value and importance of main- taining peace until the troubles and distractions of Europe should be tranquillized. On the side of the Turks the desire for peace was no less deeply felt; and the successes of Hunyiades, and the ardour of the young king to continue and complete them, induced them to hasten the negotiation of a peace with Wladislas. Julian, whose arguments and en- treaties derived an irresistible force from the warlike * Vitus Arnpeck, a cotemporary writer, attributes her death but without sufficient reason to Wladislas, whose whole life is far above the imputation. (See Hieron. Fez. Scriptores rerum Austriac. torn. i. p. 1,254.) Y 322 THE LAST CRUSADER. propensities of the young king, failed not to urge upon him the vital importance of an immediate and uncompromising resistance of the Turkish power, painting in vivid colours the perils of Europe, especially his own kingdoms, and the hopes it en- tertained of him at this critical juncture. To his fervid eloquence was added the subdued, though deeper appeal of the despot of Servia, who, as a despoiled prince and bereaved father, called upon Wladislas to assert and avenge his cause against those who had deprived him of his country and of his children. The success of these urgent entreaties was com- plete; and animated with the thought that the dangers of Turkish diplomacy were now removed, the cardinal undertook a mission to the emperor at Vienna, accompanied by the orators of the king, the Dean of Cracow, and Laurentius de Hedervara, palatine of the kingdom. Frederic, who had just returned from a progress through the Rhenish provinces, received them coldly, and with marked aversion to the object of their embassy, which was to arrange conditions of peace between himself and Wladislas. The two orators were such violent partisans of the Polish monarch, that it was with great difficulty that Julian made them agree on any terms of peace with the emperor. A truce of two years' duration was finally determined upon, in which it was stipu- lated that the two monarchs should refrain from THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 323 every act of hostility against Hungary and Austria respectively. This temporary agreement is mainly to be attributed to the prudent chancellor of the empire, Caspar Schlick, who anticipated from it the most beneficial results. " For," he writes to Julian at this time, " as from a little war a great one arises, so from a short peace there may spring a more enduring one. In this two years' time we may hope that men's minds will be softened, a forgetfulness of injuries will supervene, commerce and communion will produce intimacies from which, please God, an universal concord may be found to arise."* On the return of the cardinal from Vienna, the king determined to open the campaign without delay. f After several days spent in public prayers and religious solemnities, the army left Buda, and marching on slowly, in order to give the inhabitants of the districts which it traversed an opportunity of joining its ranks, arrived at the confines of Wal- lachia and Bulgaria. Here the king received an accession of troops, headed by one of the Bulgarian chieftains, with whose assistance he succeeded in capturing several towns; and finding that parties of the Turks were lying in ambuscade in the neigh- * Epist. ^Eneee Sylvii. ed. Nuremberg. 1496, Ep. 169. f The authority for this part of our history is the work of Philip Callimachus, " De Rege Wladislai seu de clade Varnensi" (Aug. Vin- del. 1519.) He was nearly a cotemporary of those who took part in these transactions. Y2 324 THE LAST CRUSADER. bouring woods, he encamped on the farther side of the river Morave. From this encampment, Hunyiades, with a chosen body of men, made an effectual inroad into the interior of Bulgaria, and took the town of Sophia. After frequent successful enagagements with the enemy, he returned to the camp to Wladislas, who resolved to lead forth the entire army. Being advised that Carambus, the Turkish prefect of Asia Minor, was coming to the defence of the Sultan Amurath, he depopulated and laid waste the southern country of Bulgaria through which the Turkish general must pass. As the allies advanced, animated with their uninterrupted success, it was rumoured that the Turks were lying in ambush in a strong force near the town of Nissa. Hunyiades undertook to fall upon their ambuscade by night, but they antici- pating this movement retired to some distance from the town, of which Hunyiades took immediate pos- session; gaining intelligence that the enemy were returning and had encamped at no great distance, the indefatigable Hungarian again planned a noc- turnal surprise. The light of the moon enabled him to draw up his men in perfect order before the enemy was aware of his approach, and the attack was contrived with so much energy and decision that flight was almost as impossible as defence. The victory of Hunyiades was as easy as it was signal, and the number of the slain very considerable. To the success of this vigorous movement a very THE HUNGAEIAN LEGATION. 325 remarkable personage contributed not a little, whose name has descended to posterity in close connexion with that of the great Hungarian. George Castriot (better known under the name of Scanderbeg) was the son of a prince of Epirus, who had been deprived of his country by the Turks, and kept with his father at the court of Amurath as a hostage. His two brothers had been despatched by the tyrant, and his own great courage and promise, from which Amurath expected much future benefit, was the sole cause of his preservation from the same fate. On his father's death, finding that he was still kept in the same ignoble thraldom, he secretly resolved to free himself from so intolerable a yoke. By a skilful stratagem he recovered his liberty and that of his Epirots, and, taking advantage of the successes of the Christian arms, assisted them in effecting the humilia- tion of that power from which his family and country had suffered such cruel injury. The army of the allies now passed onward into Thrace, but the prospect of the journey over Mount Haemus, which was now before them, and the entire failure of their provisions and other resources, com- pelled them seriously to meditate breaking up the campaign and returning homewards. The voices of Julian and the despot of Servia were loudly raised against this submission to the pressure of circum- stances, but the time of deliberation was unexpectedly shortened by the enemy, who, from maintaining a 326 THE LAST CRUSADER. defensive system of warfare, entered upon active hostilities and attacked the allied armies with vigour and decision. The battle was long and well sustained, but terminated in favour of the Christian forces, who among their prisoners numbered the Turkish general Carambus, whose name has been already mentioned. Thirty thousand, according to the despatch forwarded by Wladislas to the Emperor Frederic, fell on the side of the enemy in this encounter a computation which ^Eneas Sylvius justly suspects as exaggerated " in the fashion of the Poles, who of great things talk still greater."* But although the confidence of the allies was increased by this victory, their hunger was unappeased, and their threatening necessities had no better prospect of relief than before. The king reluctantly submitting to an influence which was beyond his control, began his return from the scene of his successful crusade. After painful and tedious marches, which were continually inter- rupted by parties of the enemy, the victorious army reached Belgrade, and thence proceeded to Buda, where it was received with great pomp and rejoicing. The public entrance of the allies into the Hungarian capital had almost every feature of an ancient triumph ; the captives and the spoil went before them, the soldiers of the crusade commanded by Cardinal Julian being ranged between these and the rest of the army. Wladislas did not re-enter his palace * Epist. 81. THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 32J before he had offered public thanksgivings for the success which had attended his arms, in a cause which was looked upon so eminently as the cause of the religion of Christ. In the beginning of the following year embassies and deputations from all the powers of Christendom arrived at Buda, to offer congratulatory addresses to the king on his late achievements. Not the least zealous of these in the demonstrations of their joy, and in urging the necessity of continuing the war, were the representatives of Eugenius. They were ably seconded by the legate and the despot of Servia, who brought forward all the motives that could influence a prince whose warlike propensities received so high a sanction from his religious zeal. But a powerful counteracting motive presented itself in the wasted and disturbed condition of his two kingdoms, Poland having been devastated by the Tartars, and Hungary divided with factions and menaced by an invasion from Giskra and the untiring partisans of the young prince on its Bohemian frontier. The last danger rendered it necessary to negotiate a peace with the legitimatist general for two years ; but the claims of Poland were not so easily dealt with, the public voice demanding the return of the king with even greater importunity than Julian and the Hungarian nobility urged the prosecution of the war. The latter, however, again prevailed, and after a diet held at Buda, it was resolved to invite the co-operation of 328 THE LAST CRUSADER. all the allies, and to enter immediately upon a new campaign. When intelligence of this determination reached the Turkish court, Amurath, seized with consternation, hastened to open a negotiation with his warlike adversary.* After some delay his ambassadors ob- tained an audience of Wladislas, who, yielding rather to the necessities of his own kingdom than to their arguments, agreed upon conditions of peace of which the fundamental stipulations were the cession by the Turks of all their European conquests except Bulgaria, and the release of captives on both sides, especially the sons of the despot of Servia. A day having been fixed upon for the surrender of the cities and countries to be ceded by the Turks, a peace was finally con- cluded between Wladislas and the sultan, which was to last for ten years. The oath by which this treaty was ratified was taken by the Christians on the Gospels, and by the Turks on the Koran, constituting it on either side a convention of the most solemn and paramount obligation. And as if this were not enough to complete its sanctions, the Eucharist itself was added, and, in spite of the warnings and protests of Gregory de Sanocenis and other bishops, the very ark of the Christian faith was, for the first time in the history of the world, offered as a pledge for the security of the infidel, f * jEnese Sylvii. Europa, cap. v. f See Callimachus, 1. 2, and JSneas Sylvius (Europa andEp. 81). THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 329 Scarcely were the ratifications completed, when letters arrived from the Cardinal Admiral Condolmieri, from Hunyiades, and from the Emperor John Palseo- logus, of a character tending most fatally to unsettle the mind of the king. His destiny pointed him out as the champion of the Christian cause, and his successes hitherto seemed to give a divine sanction to the mission which he had so enthusiastically entered upon. To the fulfilment of this high destiny his friends and allies urged him on, and before them all, and while they were watching with admiration and cheering with their applause his victorious progress, he had suddenly withdrawn from the conflict and deserted those whom he was leading on to a new harvest of glory. Every eager response to his invita- tion to the war seemed now to reproach his incon- stancy, and to cover with shame his retreat from the exalted position in which this hitherto successful crusade had placed him. Instead of the tranquillity which follows the honourable settlement of an anxious warfare, he experienced the chilling remorse of one who has made a fatal and perhaps irretrievable con- cession. The reaction of the ardent mind of the king was too violent to need any impulse from those around him. His repentance was as sudden and complete as it was deep and bitter ; and Julian, who had watched its course with a keen discernment, until it reached that point at which it most needed the direction and most easily admitted the influence of 330 THE LAST CRUSADER. another, at last opened his mind to the king, after vainly endeavouring to associate in his counsels the high and upright bishop Gregory de Sanocenis, who with Hunyiades had insisted that though faith was not rashly to be reposed in such an enemy, when once given it ought on no account to be broken. Turning to the king and to his counsellors, who were in a state of doubt and desire which too well prepared them for his fatal casuistry, he spoke as follows : * " I would that we had altogether abstained from entering upon that treaty which seems to have been concluded with the Turks, though I hope it will prove to be void and of no effect. Not that we need admit that any right or religious compact would be broken if we should still prosecute the war, but be- cause in giving and accepting these conditions we have wasted a good deal of the season best fitted for its prosecution. I should have opposed it in the beginning but I saw that your minds were too bent * Bonfinius (Rer. Ungar dec. iii. 1. 5) gives a different version of this address to that of Callimachus, but on many grounds we may regard the latter as the more accurate version. The Jesuit Rosweyd, on the strength of Bonfinius's narrative, endeavours to exculpate Julian altogether from the breach of faith which has so darkly clouded the reputation of his later years, but with so little satisfac- tion even to himself that he is obliged to add, " Age vero, sint e nos tris qui opinati fiierint censuisse unum Julianum perfidis Turcis non servandam fidem, quid hoc ad causam de qua agimus ? An privati hominis error constantem ecclesiae labefactabit fidem?" (De fide hareticis servanda, p. 152.) Unfortunately the "privatus homo" was here the papal legate, and the confirmation of the act, probably even the origin of it, is to be traced to Eugenius himself. THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 331 upon peace to give me the least hope of raising them to energetic action by my influence. " Besides this, I knew that all which has been this day announced on the facilities of carrying on the war in Europe, while the Turks are implicated and detained by a war in Asia, would very soon transpire, and I rather chose to wait until you could believe it on the authority of others, than by un- timely declaring it to risk the suspicion that I had feigned the intelligence and was boasting only of my own vain desire. Now, however, since the confirma- tion of your victory has come to you from another quarter than mine, and your regret at your under- taking shows that you .rather believe that the event has fulfilled my wishes than that my wishes have anticipated the event, I feel called upon to maintain not the expediency of carrying on the war which all admit to be necessary, if with your safety and liberty you would also retain your former glory, but the lawfulness of carrying it on after the ratifi- cation of this treaty (such as it is) on both sides. For I see many perplexed about the empty names of faith and treaty, and deliberating not so much what they desire to do as what they ought to do as though some unadvised words mutually banded in hope and fear could have the name and sanctity of a treaty; when that alone is rightfully a treaty which is entered upon by those who have a right to treat, and is ratified, not by a mere pledge of 332 THE LAST CRUSADER words, but by a fulfilment of its stipulations. This, however, has neither authority in the consenting par- ties nor the subsequent execution of the articles agreed on, but merely boasts the name and ceremonies of a treaty which do not become holy and binding until they are loyally carried out on both sides. " To begin, then, with what seems to be the origin of this agreement. It was competent to the king to negotiate for truces and for peace with the Turks so long as he carried on the war with the strength and success of this illustrious kingdom ; so long as, with- out external aid, and at the risk of his own kingdom, and with his own resources alone, he preserved the safety and dignity of Christendom. But when he was pleased to communicate with other Christian princes the plans and object of his warfare, he ought to sus- pend it only with the consent of those with whose resources and under whose auspices it is undertaken and carried on. But supposing that the whole affair had been the king's alone, as it was before his alliance with the other princes, even then it was not compe- tent to him to have any correspondence with such a race of men, far less to conclude a treaty with them ; nay, such a treaty is not itself binding without the consent of the pope. Add to this, that the conditions stipulated by the enemy have not been in any way fulfilled, for which reason, even if there were no other, all which is alleged to have been said or done is made void. Furthermore, since the faith of the stipulation, THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 333 nullified, as it is, by themselves, has not established the sanctity and obligation of the treaty, we must conclude not only that the king is released from his bond (if there were ever any), but that all the proposi- tions and acts of the orators who came to us to ask for peace were deceitful and fictitious. " If the enemy had desired to conclude a treaty which should be firm and solid, if his desire and pledge had been altogether free from deceit had he no other man to send than one foreign to him in language, race, habits, and (except his pretended reli- gion) in the whole object of his life ? one who, on the behalf of the Turks, could promise nothing, nor, on the other hand, could stipulate anything for them truly, honestly, religiously, but every one of whose promises and agreements it would be free for them to reject or to disavow without dishonour, if it should be expedient to them to do so. For it would be dis- honourable even to them to simulate such an act of submission as this in the person of one of their own nation. And they would guard, for very shame, against any act of submission of their own people, any act which should fall below the popular estimate of their magnanimity and prowess ; they would not that the king should be able to boast that a Turk had ever been a suppliant to him. " Besides, as the whole action required much dupli- city, it was thought that no one could better succeed in deceiving us than one who, but a little before, had 334 THE LAST CRUSADER. been our co-religionist ; that what could not of itself command our belief might, under the veil of religion, find an easy access to our minds. If he could obtain such stipulations as pleased him, the enemy would stand by his agreement ; if not, he would by the pre- tence of a treaty obtain at least the advantage of being able in the meantime to plan the course of a future campaign. That this is indeed the case, the fruitless issue of all the stipulations which he ought to have fulfilled plainly indicates. I know that the despot and Hunyiades in a special degree have so much knowledge, and have had so great experience in matters of warfare, that it were a sin to deny that everything is as they have persuaded themselves. "But the ardent desire of regaining his children, and of receiving again his lost honours and fortune, have, as I believe, constrained the one while the distrust in the immediate assistance of the allies has induced the other to apply their minds but lightly to the subject, and not at once to discover the insincerity which is hidden under these gracious assurances. Yet, surely, neither the fear nor the authority of any man ought to influence your minds more than truth, seeing as you do that no one can be bound by such a treaty, whether regarded as concluded without competent authority, or as dissolved through the fraud of the ^nerny, which has left its conditions unfulfilled. " But supposing that all has been lawfully done by the king, and nothing insidiously by the enemy, even THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 335 then you are bound to remember that your fidelity to the Christians, whom you invited and admitted to a participation in the war, has a prior obligation to that which you pledged to the Turks. And since your decision is reduced to such narrow limits, that you cannot keep faith with both, and one or the other must be relinquished, no one can doubt for a moment that you ought to select that one who is bound to you by the stronger tie. What then, I ask further, have you in common with an enemy like this, from whom you are separated by your profession, habits, and whole course and principle of life? What, on the other hand, have you with Christians, which is not of the highest obligation ? For to pass by the beginnings of an eternal life, which you had in common temples, sacrifices, sepulchres, ceremonies, and holy rites, by which your minds are bound together by a far closer tie than that of nature and of a common parentage is it not these, I ask, who but a short while ago sent their fleet into the Hellespont for your safety, for your glory, adding their strength to yours, and taking up with you the prosecution of the war, and thus laying you under such an indissoluble bond of obligation as cannot be broken without the eternal stain and infamy of ingratitude ? " Since, therefore, on the one hand, you have men who, besides having everything human and divine in common with you, have added the benefit of an assistance so lately rendered, and who touch you so 336 THE LAST CRUSADER closely in every human and divine relation, as to pre- clude every other alliance ; while on the other hand you have an enemy cruel, perfidious opposed to you not only in war, but in faith and worship ; despising as profane all that you hold sacred, and violating it when he is able ; one to whom faith can- not be given without grave criminality, and with whom even when given it cannot be kept without still graver error ; there can hardly be much hesitation in deciding with whom our stipulations ought to be carried out. If you persevere in the peace you have taken up, not only will you have been deluded by the frustration of the conditions on the other side, but stained with inexpiable guilt, and with the loss of the glory you acquired in the former war ; you will drag on an infamous life under the daily execration of all good men. But if, repudiating that impious alli- ance which even in itself is vain and null, you enter true to yourselves into that danger into which you have yourselves led the way, not only will you possess your own thenceforth in safety, but will regain with everlasting glory not only those places of which men- tion is made in the treaty, but everything else which that dreadful race possesses in Europe. " Of the ease with which this may be done I might proceed to speak, were it not for the conside- ration that the Greek emperor and the Cardinal Francis (Condolmieri) have sufficiently convinced you of this by their letters. And their authority ought to THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 337 have the greater weight inasmuch as they are nearer to the enemy, and judge from what is immediately before them. The fear of the enemy, moreover, greater than his orator could well dissemble, ought far more than any address of mine to stimulate you to seize the present opportunity as your own ; which if you pass by, you will be compelled hereafter, despised and deserted by all, and with as much disgrace as dan- ger, to accept a contest within your own boundaries, to which, by your very appeal for foreign aid, you have professed yourself unequal." To these arguments the cardinal added many others from the pontifical law, which he prefaced with asser- tions of the power and strength of the papacy ; and concluded by rescinding and abrogating in the name of the pope the treaty, such as it was, and absolving from the oath and pledge they had given to the Turks, the king, and all who were involved in it. It is difficult to detect, under this strange disguise, the features of that enlightened mind which inspired the decrees and directed the correspondence of the Council of .Basle. And yet there are subordinate points of resemblance in the course and manner of the argument to those of the celebrated letters of a better period, while there are as striking points of contrast in the nature of the reasons themselves. The same tendency to accumulate arguments with such profuseness as to weaken the separate force of each of them is as apparent in this address as in z 338 THE LAST CRUSADER, the appeals to Eugenius. The same invocations of Catholic feeling and sympathy which meet us in the addresses to the Bohemians, meet us also here; the same sophistical method of explaining away the terms of a positive ; and Inflexible law which cha- racterises the speeches of Julian in the Council of Florence, reappears in his endeavour to escape the obligations of the most solemnly ratified treaty which the Christian world has ever witnessed. Yet the very versatility of the legate in his arguments for resuming the war, not only proves that he had but little confidence in any of them, but that they are simply introduced to hide the deformity of that single argument which underlies them all, the anticipated prohibition of the papacy in every case of a compact with heretics, and the dispensing power as the sole remedy for its infraction. It is hard to suppose that Julian could have attached any weight to the argument that the non-delivery of the fortresses by the day appointed was a sufficient ground to overthrow the treaty when he had con- tended with energy and even indignation against Eugenius' advisers, who had attempted to invalidate the Council of Basle on the ground of a similar delay in its inauguration. The specious argument, that " to whom faith cannot be given without criminality, to him it cannot be kept without still heavier guilt," is the only one on which the cardinal really relied, and it was one that his great patron, Martin V., had too well THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 339 taught him, in his letter to the Duke of Lithuania, where he writes : " Know that you cannot give faith to heretics, and that you sin mortally if you keep it to them."* The true position, which (however repulsive it must be in any form) has never been fairly put by the adversaries of the Church of Rome, is not " that faith is not to be kept with heretics," but that " it is not to be given to them." Every member of that Church is supposed to be in the position of a precontracted person, whose paramount obligation to the Church can never yield to any subsequent compact, however sacred it may appear to be. "Juramentum non tottit oUigationem priorem" is the rule of one of our own casuists ;f and the Court of Rome having unhappily undertaken to make the ecclesiastica utilitas\ the measure of this obligation, has found it easy to annul the most sacred engagements if they interfered with her temporal policy. It is refreshing to be able to fall back upon one great and bright example even in this day of con- secrated faithlessness and treachery. Gregory de Sanocenis, Bishop of Leopolis, stood alone at this fatal juncture as the representative of the unchanged fidelity of the Polish clergy and people, and raised his voice in loud and energetic protest against a breach of faith which has few parallels in history. The sanguine * Cochlsei Hist. Hussit.p. 212. f Sanderson ' De Juramenti Obligations,' p. 32. j Decret. Gregor. de Jurejurando, 1. 2, tit. 24. z 2 340 THE LAST CRUSADER. temper of the legate, irritated by this unforeseen resistance, knew no control, and even burst forth in expressions unworthy of his station and character, and singularly contrasted with the habits of his earlier and better days. He scrupled not to call his enlightened opponent a rustic, a fanatic, ignorant of divine and human laws, an enemy of religion, and an obstacle to the extermination of infidels even venturing to add menaces to insult. The sturdy Pole, undaunted by the onslaught of the cardinal, maintained that even if it were wrong to conclude treaties with infidels, it was a duty to observe them when made, declaring that GOD would never sanction an act of treachery nor suffer it to prosper. With this noble reclamation, worthy to stand beside the silent protest of the Chan- cellor Caspar Schlick when he withdrew from the Council of Constance in the day of the condemnation of Jerome of Prague, the illustrious representative of the clergy of Poland left the assembly.* The address of the legate met, however, with an eager response from all the other leaders of the crusade. Even Hunyiades and the Despot of Servia withdrew their resistance : the one too easily con- verted by his military ardour, the other bribed, as it * The life of Gregory de Sanocenis, written by the same Calli- mactms who is the historian of the battle of Varna, is extant in MS. in the library of the University of Cracow. It is cited in the " His- tory of Polish Literature " of "Wiszniewski, published at Cracow, in the Polish language. I am indebted to my late friend, the lamented Count Valerian Krasinski, for this important incident in the last scene of the life of Julian. THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 341 is affirmed, by the promise of the crown of Bulgaria, in the event of the expected victory. With a fatal unanimity, the peace which had been accepted was declared void, and the renewal of the war determined on. Emissaries were sent with the news of this sudden change of counsel to Cardinal Condolmieri, who commanded the fleet in the Hellespont, to the Eastern Emperor, and to all the princes who, as they had been made parties to an inglorious peace without their knowledge, were now involved in a far more inglorious warfare, without their consent being even asked. The more distant allies appear to have viewed the alternative with very little interest or anxiety; but to the Poles, harassed by a civil war, which the presence of their king could alone terminate, it was one of life and death. As soon as the news of the determination of the allies reached them, they assembled the States of the kingdom at Piotrkow, and resolved to send their representatives to Wladislas to entreat him to remain faithful to the treaty, and to hasten without delay in order to save the country from utter anarchy. But the too eager prince had anticipated the messengers of peace by sending deputies to Piotrkow to explain his reasons for reopening the war, and to prove that he could not recede from his position without the sacrifice of his own honour. In the meantime the proceedings of the fatal day of the renunciation of the treaty had been closed by a 342 THE LAST CRUSADER. solemn absolution of the Polish king from its obli- gations, and the publication of an instrument in which he bound himself to the legate and to the allies to reopen the war with the Turks without delay. This document was signed at Szegedin, on the fourth of August, 1444. Among the witnesses to this paper are to be found the names of Robert de Thur, Bani of Macedonia, and Sylvester de Thruina, count of the same: titles, observes a Hungarian writer, which, as they occur nowhere else, must have been bestowed by Wladislas, in the sanguine hope of reconquering from the infidel the country from which they were assumed.* Before his departure with the army, Cardinal Julian took a final and affecting leave of all his household, in sad presentiment that they should meet no more, and commended himself to the for- giveness and to the prayers of all around him. The discordant features of his character seem grouped in stronger and wilder contrast as he drew near to the closing scene of his life the attributes of the warrior and the ecclesiastic exhibiting themselves in strange and unexampled combinations. In his twofold character of priest and general, the legate celebrated mass daily before his crusaders. The labours of the day of warfare were opened with prayer and suppli- cation as regularly as in the more spiritual, though perhaps scarcely more peaceful, labours of the * Georgii Pray Annales Regum Hungarise (Vienna, 1766). THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 343 Councils of Basle or Florence. Well might he have said in his last hours with one who was nearly his cotemporary, " O Lord, Thou knowest that my times have been rather a confusion than a life."* He had, from the first, endeavoured to reconcile in his own person the conflicting characters of the divine, the pastor, the legislator, the negotiator, and the warrior, and now they stood forth altogether, in their closest and last combination. Breaking up their encampment at Szegedin, the allies moved on to Orschowa, on the banks of the Danube, which they crossed at that place and ad- vanced to Widin. In the meantime, the surrender by the Turks of the places they had agreed to restore came like a last warning and reproach upon the Christian camp : a surrender made the more complete by the restitution of all the captives, including the sons of the Despot of Servia. The mind of the king seems at this moment to have again faltered; but the sanguine eloquence of Julian soon restored it to its former resoluteness. The plan of the campaign was to effect a junction with the naval forces under Cardinal Condolmieri, the Pope's nephew, at Gallipoli ; and in order to succeed in this, it was found necessary to take the longer of the two routes which presented themselves, and to pass through the plain country of Bulgaria, along which the war-chariots could be most easily conveyed. Arrived at the suburbs of Nicopolis, * S. Laureutii Justinian! (Vita). 344 THE LAST CRUSADER. the soldiers could no longer be restrained from the work of rapine and plunder. After robbing and destroying the dwellings in the environs they attacked the town itself, which was so strenuously defended by the inhabitants, that they were compelled to relinquish their expected prey, and to content themselves with spending two or three fruitless days in a neighbour- hood whose opulence had so fatally tempted their rapacity. Here, as the king was marshalling his troops, and preparing them for the more formidable conflict which awaited them, he was met by the Walachian Prince, Wladislas Dracula, a man who is described as " never to be named without the title of a great and most gallant commander." The ruler of a thinly peopled and mountainous district, he had already decided that the attempt to cope with the vast power of the Turks must end in the extermination of his people. He had accepted therefore such terms of peace as, while they left him in possession of his religious and civil rights, enabled him to reserve his strength for that more critical moment, whose approach he foresaw, when not only his liberty, but his honour, and even his faith itself might be endangered. When he saw how unequal the forces of the king were to the great enterprise he had in view, he entreated him in the most energetic terms to change his fatal resolve, assuring him from his own know- ledge that the Turks were able to bring into the THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 345 hunting-field a stronger force than he was leading into the field of battle. He conjured him to refrain from so rash and even insane an attack, and to reserve it for a better day. Even if the chances had been more equal in the battle-field, the near approach of winter must soon render warfare impracticable. To this faithful monitor, the majority listened as though he were uttering not his own sentiments, but those which his compact with the enemy had forced upon him. Not a few, however, acknowledged the wisdom and prudence of the advice, as well as the sincerity of the adviser. Again, however, the influence of the legate rose above every other, and his sanguine mind once more conjured up before the king the image of the former campaign, and from every feature of the highly coloured picture drew promises and pledges of a higher and a final success. " The surprise would come upon the enemy before he could draw the sword ; every place would be undefended. Amurath, on the other side of the Hellespont, could hardly sustain the attack of his adversaries there ; and even if his hands were free, would be precluded by the Venetians and Burgundians, and by the pontifical fleet, from succouring those on this side. Moreover the Greeks, in no inconsiderable force, would meet them at the foot of the mountains. The friendly offices of Dracula might well be accepted by all as a proof of his affection to the cause ; but no marvel that 346 THE LAST CRUSADER. he should despair of its success, unaware as he was of the preparations and supports on which they relied. Never could he have said to the king what he did had he known how great and how well equipped a fleet how many thousands of allies, Italians, Bur- gundians, Greeks, both horse and foot, were now awaiting them. Neither the king, nor those with him, were so wildly rash as to provoke a battle they were unable to engage in. Let the king then be of good courage. As far as regarded strength, all had been sufficiently foreseen and provided for ; and as to their success, GOD whose cause it was, and who had already given it them, would Himself secure it to them again." Addressing himself to the king once more : " Since fortune," said the Walachian chief, " which has never forsaken your highest daring, or the hope of foreign aid which I trust may indeed be fulfilled or the secret influence of fate carries you to another con- clusion than mine ; I will at least assist your plan, which my advice cannot alter, as far as the suddenness of the opportunity permits." He added, accordingly, four thousand cavalry, under the command of his own son, to the forces of the king, and enhanced this wel- come gift by assigning two young men as his guides through the country, whose knowledge of its roads and paths was unsurpassed ; presenting him at the same time with two horses of the greatest courage and fleetness, if (as he earnestly deprecated) misfortune THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 347 in battle should compel him to fall back upon this last resource. Whether inspired by the military ardour of the king, or fascinated by the treacherous eloquence of Julian, the brave Walachian was on the eve of him- self joining the crusading hosts, and the religious motive would soon have overborne the moral restraints which his treaty with the Turks had laid upon him, had not the deeper influence of superstition held him back. An old Bulgarian fortune-teller, of whom he had inquired the day before his arrival in the camp, had prophesied the defeat of the Christian army in this campaign, and that the scattered hosts of the king after their defeat would obtain a better success, and a more hopeful future, than a victory at the present time could secure them. In this instance at least, the superstition which dissuaded a breach of faith stood on a higher ground than the religious sentiment which enjoined it. Passing on through the country parts of Thrace, the Christian army arrived at the river Pamisus, where they destroyed a number of small craft, suspecting them to have been built by the Turks, in order to harass the river districts of Hungary. At this point the king began his preparations for crossing the moun- tain chain of Haemus, by sending on Hunyiades with the Walachian auxiliaries, and three thousand Hunga- rians; the main body of the army following at a considerable interval, and the war-chariots being 348 THE LAST CRUSADER. placed in the midst. As they advanced, they destroyed all the towns which lay along their route, in order to prevent their being fortified, so as to endanger them from behind. Their progress thus became one of desolation and plunder, carried to so barbarous an excess that neither the churches nor homes of the unfortunate Bulgarians and Greeks, through whose country they were passing, escaped profanation or destruction. Wladislas in vain attempted to restrain the marauders, whom he had gathered together for this unholy war, though he gave some restitution in the case of those whose religion had been so wantonly outraged. In order to hold out an inducement to the Turks to surrender whatever fortresses they still held, they were offered freedom to go wherever they liked, or to enlist in the army of the king. By this offer immediate possession was obtained of many places which before had been strenuously defended. The fastnesses of Sumi and Pesech, whose natural position rendered them almost inaccessible, formed the only exceptions to this ready surrender. These, as they covered the path of his return, the king determined to invest with all his force. The undaunted courage of the assailants soon carried both places, at a loss to the enemy of nearly five thousand men. At this juncture, when the prospect of success seemed opening out in all its brilliancy, the fatal intelligence arrived from the Cardinal Admiral Con- THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 349 dolmieri, that Amurath, eluding the blockade of the Asiatic coast by the Christian fleet, had conveyed a vast army into Europe, which had already effected a junction with that assembled in the Thracian Cher- sonesus. The Genoese, more mercantile than patriotic, were believed to have assisted in this masterly move- ment ; but the culpable negligence of Condolmieri could alone have made their work of treachery success- ful. From letters of Julian himself, referred to by JEneas Sylvius,* it appears that the fleet was badly provisioned ; and hence the probability arises that Amurath seized the moment when the Cardinal Admiral had put in for provisions to effect a landing in Europe. In one important point the cotemporary historians are at variance, ^Eneas Sylvius charging Condolmieri with neglecting to announce this fatal passage of the Turkish army to the leaders of the Christian hosts, f while Callimachus affirms that the news came immediately from him to the king and his allies. J It is certainly hardly credible, that the nephew of the Pope could have been guilty of positive conni- vance in an act so suicidal as this. His previous history rather indicates his neglect to have proceeded from that reckless folly and incapacity of which he gave such early and convincing proofs. The crisis was now desperate. Some counselled a retreat, others were for holding to the mountain passes * JEnese Sylvii Europa, c. v. f Id. Ep. lii. | Callimach. de Morte Vladislai, &c. 1. 3. 350 THE LAST CRUSADER. and fortified places ; but the king, blinded by an in- fatuation which seemed rapidly forming itself into a destiny, descended from the fastnesses into the plain. Here town after town surrendered to the Christian forces without a struggle; Macropolis, Callacrium, Galata, and Varna, the closing scene of this disastrous expedition. At this place the mountain chain of Hsemus, approaching the coast, loses its former elevation, and sinks gradually into gentle hills and slopes, inclosing valleys of a fertile and picturesque appearance. Two promontories extend into the sea on either side of the town, the land on the south being hilly and cultivated, and that on the north opening into an extensive marsh, which renders the access to the town difficult on this side. The advantages which Varna presented to an army fatigued with so long a march were doubly wel- come at this critical moment, as the king was suffering from a tumour which required medical treatment and a rest of at least some days. In the meantime, the Turkish army had reached Adrianople, and by the seventh day the watchfires behind the nearest chain of hills announced the ap- proach of the enemy to within a few miles of the Christian camp. Presently, as the moon rose, the outline of the vast hosts which were arrayed against them revealed itself to the eyes of the crusaders. No time was now to be lost; and doubling the watches, and ordering all to be under arms, the THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 351 generals hastily assembled together in the quarters of the king, and consulted on a plan of defence. Julian was for putting off any offensive operation until the strength of the Turkish force was fully known, and til] then fortifying the camp with chariots and other munitions. He still clung to the hope of support from the fleet, which already must have entered the Black Sea, and, as the blockade was now useless, might with its whole force co-operate with the Chris- tian army. The same view was urged by the Bishop of Agria, the Bani of Slavonia, and other of the generals ; the king maintaining rather an attitude of acquiescence than of approval. But Hunyiades and the Despot of Servia denounced the proposition of the legate in the strongest terms " To be shut up in their own camp was rather the last refuge of the conquered than the honourable posi- tion of the invaders. In everything, and in war above all, success depended on the first step. The first en- counter would be the measure of the whole war as the one was vigorous or feeble on either side, so would the other be no sign of fear ought therefore to be given either to their own men or to the enemy. All their safety lay in rapidity of action. By doing and daring, and not by scheming, such an adversary as this was to be kept in awe. What was to become of them if the Turks surrounded them while inclosed in their munitions of war, and gave them no opportunity to fight ? For they were wholly unprepared for such 352 THE LAST CRUSADER. a siege as this. And as to the naval forces, what had been said was utterly absurd. For where, in all the world, was such a thing seen or heard of as a land fight carried on with soldiers from a fleet, who could be of no more use on land than cavalry on the sea ? " After enlarging on the folly of this hope of naval co- operation, " Let us dismiss," he continued, " so vain an expectation, and go forth in battle array against an enemy whom we have over and over again routed and destroyed this last year whose timidity and confusion makes him break off every undertaking he begins ; now betaking himself to Asia, and now to Europe, rashly hastening hither and thither, anxious and alarmed at the sound of the lightest rumour. " Let us not ask how many are coming against us, but with what spirit and boldness they come. How- ever countless they may be, they will bring nothing but the memories and the fears of the conquered. Soldiers should never be accustomed to defend them- selves in intrenchments, which are the defences of those who distrust their arms, and who ought to obviate the necessity of such defences by attacking the enemy without delay instead of shutting themselves up, like the unwarlike multitude, in fortified places and intrenchments. Base it were, indeed, for brave men to believe that they could find a better protection in chariots and trenches than in their arms." The words of Hunyiades, spoken in the full con- sciousness that he was standing in the presence of an THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 353 inevitable and overwhelming danger, and yet with the resolution to perish rather than to shrink from the perils he had himself invoked, found an echo in the heart of the courageous king, and an eager response from all but the legate and those who had seconded his more prudent but less spirited counsels. The enemy was already preparing for the attack, and an hour's delay might be fatal. The arrangement of the defence was at once entrusted to the great Hungarian. The other generals rushed to their posts. Every one pre- pared for a conflict of life and death. After an anxious survey of every point which was open either to a direct attack or a subtle approach, Hunyiades brought together the chariots in the gorge between the valley and the marshes, so that he might with the least possible danger fall back upon them in case of a repulse, while, with the other munitions of war, they might form a protection against any attack from behind. The defence of the middle of the valley he assigned to the king and the royal troops of Poland and Hungary. Towards the marsh, where the natural defence was greatest, he placed only five regiments of Hungarians, concentrating his greatest strength on that side of the valley which skirted the town of Varna. The fortunes of the day would be plainly determined at this point; and here, accordingly, he fixed the great standard of Hungary, defended by the Bani of Slavonia and the Bishop of Agria, to whose forces he added those of the Despot of Servia, and the A A 354 THE LAST CRUSADER. crusaders under Cardinal Julian. In the rear, and under cover of the chariots and instruments of war, he stationed the Bishop of Waradin, to whom was confided the Standard of St. Wladislas, with an ad- ditional guard of Poles, under the command of Lesco Bobricius, a leader whose reputation of vigour and boldness made him a fit protector of so sacred a trophy. To himself and the Walachians the great Hungarian assigned no special place, holding himself ready to rush to the critical point wherever assistance was most needed, or danger was most imminent. Arnurath, in the meantime, had sent forth six thou- sand cavalry rather to take a complete view of the position of the Christian host than to precipitate an attack. But, either from the irresistible desire to open the battle with their old adversary, or from the conviction that the Christian forces were this time, at least, unequal to the conflict they had provoked, the Turkish horsemen harrassed the enemy with their darts, and it was with difficulty that the Ban and the Bishop of Agria restrained their men from rushing on to the charge. Their prudent forbearance, however, was mistaken for fear, and the Turks at once began the attack. After a vigorous repulse they were pursued by the troops under the Bishop of Waradin, who, "more skilled in sacred than in warlike arts," believed that the victory was already won. The Despot and the Bishop of Agria followed the perilous example of their THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 355 clerical colleague, and presently found themselves con- fronting the close ranks of the enemy in the further part of the valley. From this extremity of danger the Despot found a path of escape, while the Bishop of Waradin, thinking to escape towards the mountains, perished in the treacherous swamp between. The Bishop of Agria, after a desperate effort to make for Galata, returned to the attack, and was never heard of more. The tide of victory now carried on the Turks as far as the standard of St. Wladislas, for the Despot, the Bani, and Julian, were already driven back by an overwhelming force. There the fight was close, and with varied success, until the death of the brave Lesco, who had hitherto been the very soul of the battle, gave the decided preponderance to the Turks, who rushed against the chariots, as well as the sol- diery, and by the violence of their charge overthrew several of them. The king and Hunyiades hastened to save from destruction their last means of refuge in case of a defeat, and their appearance again turned the stream of battle. The Turks took to flight, and were pursued to some distance by the ardent king, who was eagerly recalled by Hunyiades to the more important task of supporting the Bani and Julian, who were now hard pressed by the enemy. Here the energy of the battle revived, and the Christian host rang with shouts of encouragement and earnest mutual appeals. Nor were the Turks wanting in the A A 2 356 THE LAST CRUSADER. most vigorous efforts to animate and inspire one another against those who had shown that nothing would satisfy them but the utter destruction of their faith and race. The carnage was frightful on both sides, and the places of the slain were filled and filled again with unyielding obstinacy. At length the Turks gave way ; but the temptation to fall upon the prey ren- dered their flight more perilous to the Christian host than their most resolute attack. Hunyiades, whose mission had carried him from one point to the other of this battle-field, was now compelled to fly to the succour of the king, who was engaged in a hand-to- hand fight with the Janisaries, who surrounded him. Cut off by a too rash advance from his own people, they had already believed him to be slain, and scarcely had the Turks taken to flight, when the troops of the king fell into a confusion no less fatal. Before the great Hungarian could rescue the young prince, the horse upon which he was mounted was pierced with a spear, and fell, and Wladislas in an instant was added to the heap of the slain. Hunyiades rushed into the midst of the enemy with his faithful Wala- chians to snatch from the hands of the Infidels the body 'of a prince now become no less the martyr of the Christian cause, than the model of the Christian warrior. But even the last energies of despair were fruitless \ and the flight of all around him com- pelled the brave Hungarian to save the remnant of THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 357 his men by flight. Already the Despot of Servia and Julian had retreated towards the dense forests which lay beyond the hills, and which they reached at nightfall, followed by hundreds of fugitives, all alike ignorant of the extent of their defeat, or of the calamity which had deprived them of their chivalrous but too daring leader. The closing scenes of this day of confusion and dismay have never been cleared up, and the fate of Julian is among its last and most affecting mysteries. Between the hour of his retreat from the field of battle, and that in which he was found lying naked and wounded in the wild mountain pass, which he had entered on that fatal night, there is a void which only the conjectures of his cotemporaries can fill up. " There is a report," writes ^Eneas Sylvius to the Grand Duke of Milan, " that the most eloquent and most prudent man of our age, Julian, the Cardinal of St. Angelo, has fallen in this battle, and has given forth in death that noble spirit which was so divinely fitted for every work he undertook to fulfil. Some allege that he fled with John the Vaivode of Tran- sylvania .... which I should have rather hoped, but his death is more probable, for he was never fortunate in war/' * A little later, the rumour passes on into an admitted fact: "Wounded in the battle, and fainting in his flight through loss of blood, he was slain near a marsh by the impious hands of the * ^neas Sylv. Ep. 52. 358 THE LAST CRUSADER. Hungarians, not at the instigation of the nobility, but through the rage of the populace; and thus breathed forth that glorious spirit which once with its sweet discourse swayed at will the assembled fathers at Basle." * These words were written in the very year of this fatal conflict. In his history of Europe, written some time after, the cardinal is said to have perished through the perfidy of the Hun- garians, who slew him while watering his horse, for the sake of plunder, rather than for revenge, f But though the conjecture here assumes the bold front of a historical fact, the cloud must still remain. Pew had escaped to tell the tale of that dreadful night, and who of that few could authenticate it ? We can but faintly track the path of Julian through the wood into which he escaped, to the verge of the fatal marsh where, plundered and wounded, the victim rather of avarice than of revenge, he sank down alone and friendless to die. It is impossible for those who have followed him through a life so marked by the strange rapidity of its vicissitudes to pass hastily over a scene like this. The hero of Bohemia, the moderator of divines at Basle, the religious diplomatist at Florence, the coun- sellor of princes and diets, the negotiator of the peace of Europe, was now lying naked and wounded in a wild and desolate mountain-pass of Thrace ; the pillar of the Roman Church in the court and in the camp, * JEneas Sylv. Ep. 81. f Europa, cap. v. THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 359 the undoubted successor to the papal throne, had he survived Eugenius, whose rival he had so nobly refused to become, was left to perish without a mourner, and without a friend; leaving the history of his fate to the conflicting rumours of the battle- day, and commending his soul to God, amid a tumult of wild recollections, a death-dream of wars and fears confused and fitful, yet not undisturbed from without, or freed from the terrible realities of which it was the lingering shadow ; for there rode up one to his side in this moment of agonising conflict, whom, if the power of recognition was not entirely lost, he might have dis- cerned to be Gregory de Sanocenis, the only protest- ing member of the council-chamber of the fallen prince. The cruel reproaches of this relentless eccle- siastic sank deep into the ears of the dying man. He reviled him for his breach of faith to God and man, and charged him with all the slaughter and misery of that fatal day. " 'Tis just," he exclaimed over the all but lifeless body which was stretched at his feet, " 'tis just that you should perish thus you, who made the apostolic see perjure itself, and taught mankind that God sanctions treachery and infidelity ; to him you shall now answer for your motives, as for your words." Thus cruelly avenging himself for the insults which he had received in the council, and the losses he had experienced on the battle-field, he left him to die.* * See the MS. life of Gregory de Sanocenis, by his cotemporary 360 THE LAST CRUSADER. Strangely was the almost prophetic wish which Julian uttered from Basle fulfilled in this eventful hour in both alternatives " If any one seek my death let him send me to Prague or to the Saracens, where I shall die as a Catholic ; " for it was in warfare with the Saracens that he fell, while from the hands of his own followers, if not of Prague, at least of Christian Europe, he received the fatal blow. Nay, a doubt might even arise whether the immediate cause of his death be not still balanced between the crusaders of his own ranks and the infidels who were his proper adversaries ; for the accounts even of cotemporary historians are too confused and conjectural to enable us to determine with certainty on which side the fatal scale pre- ponderates. But the eventful history of the defeat of Varna, so abruptly succeeding the account of the victories and triumphs of the Christian confederates, and resting upon the rumours of a battle-field deserted under circumstances of such strange perplexity, received at first but little credit in Europe. Hopes and conjec- tures, the most wild and groundless, were every- where entertained, and the unquenchable valour of Waldislas and Julian seemed to give them in the imagination of the eager multitude a kind of immor- tality.* Callimachus, preserved in the library of the University of Cracow, and referred to by Wiszniewski, whose work was cited above, and also the close of the narrative of Callimachus, " De Clade Varnensi." * "Din post mors Vladislai et Juliani incredita fuerat, quidam THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 361 The suspense which they encouraged and prolonged prepared them for the reception, or rather gave occa- sion for the fabrication of a story which is too singular to be passed over in silence, and which was related by a person professing himself to have been an attendant of Cardinal Julian, to Gilles Charlier, Dean of Cam- bray.* " Concerning this most reverend father," are the words of the Dean, " one of his household related to me in the French language the triumph of his most glorious martyrdom, in the month of February, 1447. When, for the punishment of our sins, the Turks had gained a victory over the Christians, many of the faithful being slain, and others betaking themselves to flight, this most reverend Father was taken and placed before the Turkish Emperor. The doctors of his execrable law are produced, who contend with him on the faith, seeking to subvert him, and turn him to their impious sect. But when they are by no means able to do this, they ply his holy mind alternately with promises and threats of punishment to turn him from his good resolve. For the tyrant promises him, if he consent, to make him high-priest of his law, but if he consent not, to try him with sundry tortures; but when this most reverend Father acquiesced not for a moment, but professed with constancy the Lord Jesus Christ, there approached torturers and physicians. In namque ut invictse virtutis illos sciebant, sic et immortales esse re- bantur " (^Enese Sylvii, Ep. 81). * V. Baluzii Miscellaueorum. 1. 3, vol. iii. (Ed. 1680, p. 301.) 362 THE LAST CRUSADER. the middle street of the city, in the presence of the tyrant, a venerable bishop and many Christian captives standing near, he is placed upon a ladder and flayed by the torturers, the flesh being lanced with iron spikes. When he had been wearied out with this martyrdom he was again asked to give up the Christian law, and come over to their sect. If he will do this the physicians promise to heal his wounds. But neither ambition of their honours, nor the promised blessing of health, could injure the holy man, but, persevering in the faith of Christ, he is again tormented as before. His end now approaching, turning to the bishop who was present, he says, ' Behold, venerable Father, I go to Christ ; to thee I commend my flock, that is, the Christian people ; be a brave warrior of Christ, and confirm it in the faith ; ' and thus trium- phant he migrated to the Lord. " This," proceeds the Dean of Cambray, " the afore- said domestic related to me in Cambray, having been, as he affirmed, himself present at the time, and seen him alive and dead. He added that the tyrant ordered the body to be burnt, and the ashes placed in a gold or silver case> in token of the victory he had gained over the Christians. Whether this be true (he concludes) or not, I know not." We, however, can have no doubt on the matter, the evident and glaring absurdities of the whole narrative being more than enough to condemn it if it were even reconcilable with more authentic facts. THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 363 The circumstances which it alleges were not only utterly unknown to ^Eneas Sylvius, Calliniachus, Cochlaeus, Michovius, Bonfinius, and all the earlier historians of this period, but are incompatible with the facts which they relate. The cruelties imputed to Amurath are equally inconsistent with his historical character; and were they not so, the folly of aggravating the Christian world by a display of them when he might have gained so much by the ransom of the Christian prisoners, would render them incredible. Nor is it very likely that Amurath would have believed in the sincerity of the conversion of one who claimed the power of absolving a whole nation even from the most solemn and voluntary obligation. The ignorance of the narrator in supposing that there was a high-priest of Mahomedanism corre- sponding to the Roman pontiffs in the Christian hierarchy, the absurdity of the cardinal commending to one under the same condemnation as himself the care of the Christian people, and so far recovering from the deadly wounds he had received in the battle (and which Gregory de Sanocenis himself witnessed) as to be capable of being made the subject of the tortures here detailed all this, and much more that will occur to the most casual observer, compels us to reject the state- ment recorded by the Dean of Cambray as altogether absurd and fictitious. And when it is further con- sidered, that the relation was made to a stranger by an anonymous person at a great distance of place and 364 THE LAST CRUSADER time, and probably to obtain sympathy and assistance for himself by ministering to the known passion of the ecclesiastics of the Roman Church to make martyrs of their eminent men, we cannot fail to transfer it from the severer page of history to that of fiction and romance. We hold it, therefore, to be indisputable that the fatal day which witnessed the defeat and dis- persion of the Christian host at Varna was the last which dawned upon Cardinal Julian, and that he died as a soldier rather than as a martyr, the victim either of the avarice of his own followers, or of those who pursued him from the field of battle. His life belonged to the close of that chivalrous age in which the characters of the warrior and of the priest were too strangely mixed up and confounded together to enable us in every case to separate the self-devotion of the one from the martyrdom of the other ; but his un- disguised predilection for the camp leads us to expect that the sacerdotal character would be found to the very last subordinate to that of the warrior, in which, though never fortunate, he was ever most distin- guished. " In this place/' (we may continue in the words of his cotemporary Vespasiano Fiorentino) " before we go further it appears right to say somewhat of those of his virtues which were known to me out of that infinite number which he possessed. " In the first place, it was the firm opinion at the Court of Rome, and wherever else he was, that he THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 365 was of perfect chastity. He slept always wrapped in a woollen shirt ; he fasted every Friday on bread and water ; he fasted, as was the custom, on all the vigils, and the forty days of Advent as well as in Lent ; he said the matin service regularly : rising at night, and calling his chaplain to say it with him ; often by night he said it in the Church de Servi, near which he lived ; and had had a staircase made which went into that part of the Church where the body of Christ is now kept. He went forth from his chamber and along the passage above the cloister, and entered the Church by the stairs already mentioned, where he said matins, and prime and terce. He had in his house a most pious priest and attendant, old and tried, a German by birth ; to him he confessed every morning, and said mass every morning, nor did they neglect to confess every day. He had by nature an unheard of liberality, in giving all that he had to God, and more than he was able ; no one ever went to him without bringing away what he desired, and going away from him contented. One day, when certain brothers of a religious order, having obtained the alms they sought, were departing, I happening to be there with a chamberlain of his, who was like his patron, he said to me, " If you were to see my lord some day go to the palace without a cloak, do not be astonished at it, for he gives to God what he has, and what he has not;" and in this manner he assisted all the necessitous. 366 THE LAST CRUSADER. Having been a student himself and experienced the need mentioned previously, he had pity for poor scholars, and used to inquire whether in the Court of Rome or at Florence, where there was an excellent seminary, there were any poor youth and of good ability, who could not pursue his studies from poverty, and having sent for him, kept him in his house for two or three months, to see if he was apt in learning, and to watch his life and habits. Having done this, if he discovered him to be good and of good habits, he procured him the body of the civil law, and then sent him to the college, either of Perugia, or Bologna, or Siena, whichever the student preferred, for seven years, giving him the text of the civil or canon law, whichever course he chose, and a sufficient sum of money for his maintenance; finally, he clothed him suitably to the college which he was to enter, and having done this, would call him and say : " Come hither, my son, I have done for you what was not done for me, only in order that you may become a good man. Above all, love God and fear him, and doing thus all will be well with you. While I live, trust me, nothing shall be wanting to you that you may stand in need of." These are the truest and best alms, and this every good man who has the means should do; he who reads this life bearing in mind that the Cardinal had no other income than that of his hat and of the bishopric of Grosseto, and sought for no other. THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 367 He lived at home very sparingly, without any display, and was naturally a stranger to every kind of pomp. He did not cause the dishes to be fore- tasted when he dined; he used to have but one dish; sometimes he dined alone in his chamber. As soon as that which he had to eat was brought he washed his hands without wishing that anyone should kneel to him; only two held the towel and one simply held the bason in his hands ; as soon as he had taken his seat at table, he desired every one, except two or three attendants who remained to wait upon him, to go to have their dinner. When he took wine he put only enough into his glass to cover the bottom of it, and filled it up with water, so that the water was merely coloured, and such as it astonishes me to reflect on. It happened the first summer that he spent in Flo- rence,* that all or the greater part of his family were taken ill, to whom he exhibited this unheard-of charity. First, he arranged that every one in his service should be visited by the physician twice daily, in the evening and in the morning, and ordered him to give them all that they required. He desired them to have a care also of their souls, and to confess immediately they fell sick. I will mention here his amazing humility, and exceeding charity ; every day he went twice to visit all these sick persons in the morning * Probably we should read Ferrara instead of Florence, as it seems to have been the plague which raged at the former place that attacked the cardinal's household. 368 THE LAST CEUSADER. and in the evening, to see that nothing was wanting to them ; nay even, when the servant of his groom fell sick, the humblest of all the servants of his house- hold, he visited him like the rest. Oh ! unspeakable love, Oh 1 immense charity ! I am struck with amaze- ment at that which his lordship bestowed, and at that which he bestows on most people. Let us come now to those who were at the point of death, and who needed spiritual assistance in the extremity of their life. I saw in the Cardinal's house his secretary, a Lombard, by name Messer Bartolomeo Battiferro,* at the very point of death. The cardi- nal stood over beside him, and in the very hour of his departure I saw him sitting at the bedside with his face on the pillow, close to that of his secretary, com- forting him without ceasing in his parting moments, and anxious that he should expire in his arms ; he never left his side, and desired to remain alone with him. Let every one mark the ardent charity of this lord cardinal how wondrous and worthy of imitation. I will say thus much in this place : I have known many saintly men, but of all these admirable characters I never knew the like of the Cardinal of St. Angelo. ***** The alms which he gave and the succour which he afforded to the poor were derived, when his means were not sufficient to supply them, from the sale of * This Bartolomeo the reader will remember as the successful purloiner of the seal of the Council of Basle. THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 369 books which he possessed : often have I seen him sell books, duplicates, and those which he did not require, entirely to make up these alms. He ordered his household in the most admirable manner, and there were in it many worthy persons and of good and laudable habits. It consisted of thirty persons, of whom fifteen were servants, the rest being chaplains and other persons of consideration. Pomp, as I have already said, was foreign to him, for he had so many virtues that they were his orna- ments. He kept eighteen or twenty mules, and when he went to the palace, as is customary with the cardinals, his attendants, when the pope had entered, went to take a walk ; and, because the cardinal set so much value on time, when he alighted, if he saw that there was nothing to do, or that the pope was engaged, he returned home. And it happened many times that wishing to go home, there were only his chaplains to be found, yet he did not care to be without his train, but mounted with his chaplains and went in that manner from Santa Maria Novella to the Servi where he lived. He was of a most patient disposition, and a great lover of good men, nor did he cease to strengthen and exhort every one to do rightly, or to urge the Jews to come to the Christian religion. There was living in Florence in his time a Hebrew physician, learned in the Jewish law, named Maestro Giovanni Angelo, a Spaniard by birth. It displeased the cardinal that he was a Jew, and every day he ceased not to urge him B B 370 THE LAST CRUSADER. to become a Christian, and he succeeded so completely as to prevail upon him to be baptized. Messer Gianozzo Manetti, who had great skill in the Hebrew language, co-operated with the cardinal to bring about this agreement. He wished the baptism to take place on a feast day in the church of San Giovanni, and desired Messer Agnolo Acciaiolo, and Messer Gianozzo Manetti, together with his lordship, to be his sponsors ; and they made in the church of San Giovanni, over the great font, a fair preparation of coverings of cloth, and there the cardinal baptized him with his own hand, and performed all the ceremonies of baptism. When he was baptized, the cardinal had him clothed anew in a garment of rose-coloured stuff, and leaving with the above named citizens, and with the baptized Jew, returned to the Servi, and there held a fair enter- tainment to celebrate his success in conducting him to the true light of our faith. He desired him to remain in his house and always to eat at his table, and paid him an extreme honour. He gave up to him one of his principal chambers, and assigned him a servant and two horses, and wished him from thenceforth to dwell in his house, and treated him no otherwise than if he had been his own son. These are the fruits which prelates ought to produce in the Church of God. There was, and is still, a society in the hospital of (nello Spedale di Lemmo), called that of San Girolamo, which met, and still meet, every Saturday evening, THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 37 1 and say a certain office, after which they discipline themselves, which was a devout object, and specially at a time when there were so many men of exalted character and admirable habits. Having heard of its fame, the cardinal used to go most Saturdays accom- panied by two or three of his household, and after he had entered he permitted those who had accompanied him to leave him and to return at an appointed time. When he had entered the chapel and offered his de- votions, he placed himself beside the head of the company and desired the others to stand at his side, while he stood during the whole service and disciplined himself like the rest. There were, at the time that they arrived at this discipline, so many tears and groans, and such astonishing devotion, that no heart could be so hard as to remain unmoved, and chiefly when Bartolomeo di Ser Benedetto was speaking, at whose words, as he was a man most excellent and most devout, and had an omnipotent tongue, no one could be hard enough to resist the deepest emotion. The cardinal exhibited the greatest devotion in this society, as we have said before. When I was young, and went one day to his lordship, he asked me if I belonged to any company of young men. I answered that I did not. See the unheard of charity of my lord, who said to me, I wish you to enter that of Ser Antonio di Mariano, I will go to him myself upon it. And thus he did, for he was careful not only of the greatest but the least B B 2 372 THE LAST CRUSADER. things that affected the salvation of his neighbour. He asked me further if I wished to be a priest, adding that if I did, he would assist me in pursuing my studies and in obtaining a benefice afterwards. He told me to take fifteen days to consider it, and at the end of that time asked me what I wished to do ? I answered that I did not desire to be a priest. He rejoined that he could not do better for me than he had done ; there was in him nothing but charity and love. He wished his family to be most well-conducted, and that at the Ave Maria every one should be in the house ; at that time he used to go in person to lock the gate, and had the key deposited in his chamber. It happened one day, that one of his servants, having occasionally passed by the door of a citizen on the other side of the Arno, that citizen came to complain of it to the cardinal, who, as soon as he heard it, caused the servant to be called into his presence, and ordered him not only not to pass before that door, but not to go to the other side of the Arno where that citizen's house was, and whenever he did so to be ready to quit his service. It happened that that servant did not pass over the Arno, but he used to go to a place which was opposite the citizen's house, but at a great distance, and this he did more out of spite than anything else. The citizen came again and told the cardinal what the servant had done. As soon as he heard it he caused the servant to be THE HUNGAKIAN LEGATION. 373 called into his presence, and said to him, " My son, depart from my service, for I require you no longer in the house ; since you wish to live in your own way and as it seems fit to you, and I wish you to live in such a manner as is without offence both to God and men," and immediately he desired him to quit. His lordship ever busied himself in ordering things that required arrangements, and chiefly those things which involved the honour of God. It appearing to him that in the Servi they did not live with that honour of God which he desired, and wishing that all religious fraternities should be bound to the observation of their rule, as he was often with Pope Eugenius, he arranged with his holiness to re- form this order and make it one of observance. He dismissed accordingly all the brothers that were there, so that not one remained, and introduced a becoming observation into the same order, and formed the house anew into a house of religion ; and all the time he was in Florence he preserved it thus, so that at that period there were two well-conducted monasteries there, the one in question and that of Saint Mark. The cardinal endeavoured to do all that he could for the salvation of those souls whom he could prevail upon by his authority to be diligent in good works. He used often to go to the chambers of his servants, and chiefly at hours in which they did not expect him, and ask them familiarly what they were doing. One day he entered the chamber of one of his secretaries, 374 THE LAST CRUSADER. who had in his hand a book called the Hermaphrodite, written by Panormita. Immediately he saw the cardinal he threw the book which he had in his hand behind a chest, but not so cunningly as to escape his observation. The cardinal having entered the chamber of this secretary asked him what he was reading. He blushed and was unable to answer. The cardinal smiling, for he was of a cheerful nature, said, " You have cast the book behind that chest," and he con- fessed that it was true. Then he took it, and over- whelmed with shame showed it to the cardinal, who gently received it, telling him that it was not well to read it, seeing that there was a papal excommunication against those who read it published by Pope Eugenius. Then he bade him take it and destroy it, and when he had done so, and it was destroyed, he smiled and said, " If you had known how to answer me, perad- venture you would not have destroyed it ; the reply you should have made me is, that you were hunting for a precious stone in a dunghill." He adopted this mildness that the young man might not be alarmed, or think that the cardinal had accused him from having a bad opinion of him. Of such gentleness he gave frequent instances. It happened one day, that as he was going to the palace, one of his servants through carelessness or neglect lost a mule which he valued ; when it was lost and the cardinal had returned home, he called the servant and asked him how the loss had occurred. When he THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 3J5 heard it, he remained some time silent before he re- plied ; then he turned to him and merely desired him to use all diligence to find it if it was to be found, if not, he added, we must have patience ; then he dis- missed him. There were in the room some who wondered at so great patience. The cardinal, to clear up the minds of all, said, " You are surprised at my having abstained from replying, but I did so for this reason ; I wished, before I replied, for my reason to return to its place ; when it was returned I made my answer." After this manner did the sages of old who did not suffer themselves to be ruffled for any cause whatever. The cardinal was of a sanguine temperament, which was readily excited to anger, but which he moderated in the manner described above ; in all his conduct he manifested his virtue." From the private habits of the cardinal we are led to take a last survey of his public life, the more promi- nent parts of which have formed the subject of our narrative. The great objects which engaged his attention throughout, and in the pursuit of which he manifested a boldness and decision which amounted almost to recklessness, were the reformation and the union of the Church. These co-ordinate objects, whose necessity was the theme of the discourses of all the great ecclesiastics of the age, and the means of effecting which were so anxiously devised but so feebly executed, maintain, in the life of Julian, an unceasing conflict for priority. 376 THE LAST CRUSADER. His ardent mind, which at Basle had so boldly endeavoured to effect the union of the Church by means of its reformation, and had forced Eugenius into union that he might not arrest the progress of reform, speedily discovered that it was attempting an impossibility. A divided body has not the power over its own members, even if it has the desire, to effect those reformations whose tendency is to reunite it ; while a body which is only externally and super- ficially united shrinks from that work of reformation which would betray its real and deep divisions. The one of these truths was proved at Basle, while the experience of the council of Constance had firmly established the other. In the former the Church, weakened and divided between the Eugenian and the synodical factions, not less than by the Hussites, and other open adversaries, vainly attempted to reform its distracted body. However admirable its canons and plans of reformation, they were utterly ineffective; and that council, whose laws we admire as a perfect model of ecclesiastical wisdom, was unable to enforce the very least of them unable even to reform a single convent of nuns within the city of Basle itself.* In the council of Constance, on the other hand, an artificial and political union had been effected, which its constructors were too well aware could not endure the work of reformation, which was the second great task assigned them. Unwilling, therefore, to discover * Joannis Nyder Formicarius, lib. i. c. viii. THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 377 the weakness of their structure, they transferred their office to a future council, and separated as soon as they had completed the settlement of the papal monarchy. Julian, taught by a long and trying experience the impossibility of carrying on the work of reformation with so shattered and strained an instru- ment as the council of Basle, through its many factions, had become, and finding that its remaining powers were ready to be exercised for the destruction of all that the preceding council had effected, was in a manner compelled to make the union of the Church the means of its reformation rather than its reforma- tion the means of its union. The opportunity of the reunion of the Eastern with the Western Church was singularly adapted for this change of plan, the execution of which was hastened by the circumstances of danger and of difficulty which multiplied around him. The sudden and pre- mature termination of his eventful life prevents us from deciding whether he abandoned altogether his former position as a Church reformer, when he en- tered upon the labour of reuniting the divided body in which he held so exalted a station. Perhaps he might have returned to the task which was yet little more than begun ; perhaps he might have been too utterly disheartened by the practical rejection of all that had been done to enter upon the reformation of the Church anew, or at least to enter upon it in a synodical manner. A successful effort, which he made 378 THE LAST CRUSADER. while at Florence, to reform, with the authority of Eugenius, a monastery there, gives some indication that he would have returned to the work of reforma- tion, though along a more quiet and private path than that which he had trodden before ; but the growing fear of reopening, by the attempt to reform, those schisms in the Church which the prudent policy of his first patron had so recently healed, renders it very improbable that he would have taken part in any pub- lic deliberations on this subject. The greatest and the best minds in every branch of the Christian Church have been unable to overcome the obstacles which everywhere present themselves to its real reformation. The bishops Alamanni and Ippoliti, the predecessors of the celebrated Scipio de Ricci, Bishop of Pistoja and Prato, who had entered with an apostolic zeal upon this gigantic work, sank under it, and left it to their great successor fraught with increased dangers, and complicated with new difficulties. His long and useful life was spent in the fruitless endeavour to reform the religious orders, and to restore a simpler and more practicable form of government to the Roman body. There is, however, an undercurrent of influences flowing on steadily against the executive power in that Church, which has hitherto rendered the noblest efforts of the supreme government ineffectual ; and these influences derive from the religious orders their chief strength and direction. THE HUNGAKIAN LEGATION. 379 Even the council of Trent itself, whose labours for the reformation of the Church have been very insuffi- ciently recognised by the adversaries of the See of Rome, found its efforts opposed in this direction by practical difficulties which rendered them inoperative, or at least, but partially effectual. The obstacles which present themselves to every church which addresses itself zealously to the work of its own reformation, and which even in our own Church has left disfigurements and abuses which equal those developed during the great schism itself, lead us to look with charity, and even sympathy on the diffi- culties that increased around the path of the reformer of the Church in that earlier day, and to be very jea- lous of neglecting that work of personal reformation which may be the means of ministering to the health and vitality of the Church to which we belong. Many of the best regulations of the council of Trent were obsolete even in Italy in the days of Ricci ; many of the laws of our own Church have become a dead letter in our own day from the same spirit of laxity and negligence ; and until we carry out, as far as we are able, our whole ecclesiastical plan, adjusting it, as far as possible, in all its distinctive features, to our own state and to the present necessities of the Church, we can have little hope to see its primitive vigour renewed, or its full design accomplished. The fear of disturbing a settled order of things will ever make men look with suspicion, if not with abhorrence, on any plan of 380 THE LAST CRUSADER. reformation which acts upon the body from without, and is formed upon new principles, or, at least, new habits of thought from those which appear in the first design. A strict adherence to the organic laws of the Church is the best means of securing reformation, and at the same time, of preventing innovation. "'All great mutations," in the words of Lord Faulkland, " are dangerous even when what is introduced by that mutation is such as would have been very profitable upon a primary foundation." We must study well the design and foundation of the building which we propose to alter and to reform, or plans, however per- fect in themselves, will be vain and impracticable. The life of Cardinal Julian may supply the Church reformer with many lessons and many warnings. His prophecy of a violent reformation from without, if a constitutional reformation should be delayed too long from within, had not its last fulfilment in the Reforma- tion of the sixteenth century, nor was the temporising diplomacy of the empire at that great epoch the last imitation of the Eugenian policy that the Church is destined to witness. The worldly, but profitable, "neutrality" which followed the dissolution of the council of Basle has still too many advocates, and the distraction of the Church itself in deciding between the claims of reformation and of unity, of truth and of peace, remains still. May the Spirit of truth and peace suffer not His Church, while settling the prece- dency of these great labours, to forget that the THE HUNGARIAN LEGATION. 381 night is at hand, in which no work may be done ; that a conflict may be yet nearer, in which the powers which we are now permitted to exercise for our reformation, may be taken away from us to our destruction ! APPENDICES APPENDIX A. On the Theory of the Church, as propounded at Constance and Basle. THE confusion into which the great schism had thrown the entire Church had not only opened many invincible arguments against the theory of the decretalists on the universal monarchy of Rome, but proved the necessity of arriving at some more fixed principles on the derivation of ecclesiastical power, and the mutual relations of the several members of the ecclesiastical body. The greatest divines and jurisconsults of the age had been assembled in the Council of Constance to judge the claims of rival pontiffs, and to determine the great question whether and how they might be altogether deprived of their hitherto supreme office. The precepts of the decretal epistles were accordingly unceremoniously set aside even before their spuri- ousness had been discovered ; and though it was reserved for the age of the Reformation to explode the entire system of the pontifical law by discovering it to be but a pious fraud, or rather a successful forgery, the Council of Constance, less critical, though not less enlightened, claimed the honour of first repudiating and overruling the antiquated maxims of decretalism. The great question discussed in the council, and by the cele- brated Gerson, de auferibilitate Papce db Ecdesia, drew after it the whole theory of the Papacy, and disclosed its unsoundness. This illustrious doctor and Cardinal Pierre d'Ailly have left us c c 386 THE LAST CRUSADER. most valuable treatises on the theory of ecclesiastical power as expounded at Constance ; and as these were written in the Council, and read publicly in its open sessions, we may conclude that they fairly represent the sentiments of the entire body on this important subject. We shall endeavour therefore to point out some of their principal features to the reader in this place. " Ecclesiastical power (writes Gerson) is that power which Christ supernaturally and specially conferred upon His apostles and disciples, and their legitimate successors unto the end of time, for the edification of the militant Church, according to the laws of the Gospel, for the attainment of everlasting bliss." (Von der Hardt, torn. vi. p. 79.) In which definition he observes that Christ is the causa efficiens, the apostles the causa, subjectiva, the Gospel the causa formalis, and the edification of the Church the causa finalis. He uses the word specially to separate those who are set apart for spiritual rule from the other members of the Church (omnis viator), to whom faith, hope, charity, prophecy, fear, piety, &c. are equally given. He then separates the potestas ordinis from the potestas jurisdictionis, both of which he makes twofold ; the one being a power over Christ's real body (in the Eucharist), and over his mystical body, the other a power inforo exteriori and inforo conscientice. From the fact that Judas received with the rest of the apo- stles the power of consecrating the body of Christ, he draws an argument that " ecclesiastical power is not necessarily founded in faith or grace, but in the baptismal character." This is aimed against the doctrine of Hus, who maintained the founda- tion of such power to be in the predestination to faith and good works, and who held that wicked bishops and priests were not properly bishops or priests. With respect to the power of order, he grants that there is none higher than the priesthood either in pope or bishop ; but that the same power exists in all in different manners; and gives this rather ingenious illustration of his meaning : " Sicut exemplificant quod eadem est humanitas in APPENDICES. 387 homine dum est puer et eadem dum factus est vir : vir nihilo- minus generare potest sibi simile, puer nequaquam." (P. 85.) He then passes from the distinction of the power of order in bishops and priests to the power of a general council, which he makes supreme in all acts of legislation, and which acts as the whole Church in everything. The power of the keys he maintains with St. Augustine to be given to the whole Church (claves ecclesise datse sunt universitati). The power of inflict- ing punishment he asserts to belong to the Church only by the permission and concession of the civil authority. Proceeding to examine the foundations of ecclesiastical power, he shows first the necessity of all its several parts, and yet the possibility of the removal of any one of their representatives (even if it be the pope for the time being), if it be by the authority of a general council, which includes in it the papal power as well as every other. The fact of Peter's bishopric at Antioch, and perhaps also the recollection that so many of his alleged successors lived out of Rome, leads him to assert the truth of the popular maxim at that period, ubi Papa ibi Roma. But as it is manifest even upon the most orthodox Roman view that the localising of the papal power in Rome fixed its succession in the Roman bishopric ; it cannot but appear that the dislodgment of the papacy for so long a period, and its residence in Avignon, broke up the suc- cession, or transferred it to Avignon, as St. Peter had transferred it, according to the Roman legend, from Antioch. As the fact of St. Peter's death in Rome is the principal argument for this transfer of his authority, the deaths of so many pontiffs at Avignon might give the inhabitants of that city as reasonable a claim for the possession of the papal throne. The necessity of Reformation constitutes in the eye of Gerson a sufficient cause for the " auferibilitas Papce ab Ecclesia." The papal power is then more fully discussed, and is shown to consist of a plenitudo ecclesiasticce potestatis given by Christ to Peter C C 2 388 THE LAST CKUSADER. and his successors. The origin of this monarchy he traces to the greater convenience of consulting a single person than a general council, refuting those who alleged the supreme power to be derived " by an immutable divine right, and a primary institution of Christ." The supremacy of a general council is then laid down in the emphatic form so well known to those who are conversant with the decrees of this council and of that of Basle, and the assertion made that a general council can be assembled without the pope, and to judge the pope, and that it can decree laws to moderate and rule the plenitudo potestatis of the papacy. (P. 107.) After expressing an opinion that the council would exert this controlling power as regarded the interpretation of its laws, he lays down certain general maxims to this end. He then shows the right of the council in electing a future pope, and passes thence to the demolition of the decretalist theory of the domi- nion of the popes in the temporal affairs of the clergy and laity. These are the principal points of interest in a work which, when we consider the period of its composition, must be deemed one of singular enlightenment ; and when we consider the authority which it possessed, must be regarded as one of the very last importance in determining the ecclesiastical opinions of this remarkable period. Of no less importance is the cotemporary work of Pierre D'Ailly, de Ecclesiasticd Potestate, written in and read publicly before the Council of Constance, in 1416. He professes, in his preface, to set it forth as the Catholic via media, avoiding at once the doctrines of the Waldenses and of the Ultramontanists of that day. The treatise begins by a definition of ecclesiastical power similar to that of Gerson, and which he divides into the power of ordaining, that of dispensing the sacraments, of preach- ing, of judicial sentence, of ecclesiastical arrangement (i.e. the disposition of ecclesiastical persons and places), and of receiving sustentation. The power of working miracles he holds to have APPENDICES. 389 belonged only to the primitive Church, and not to be inherited by bishops and priests, "quid jam non indiget fides miraculis confirmari ;" a notable passage from such a writer in the day when the visions and miracles of St. Catherine of Siena, St. Bridget, and so many modern claimants of supernatural power, were the deepest part of the popular belief. All the six powers, he enumerates, he pronounces to have been equal in all the apostles, except the fifth (the potestas dispositionis ministrorum), which he holds to have been specially given to Peter ; although even this he maintains to have been originally bestowed equally on all the apostles, and only centred in Peter from a foresight of the necessity of order that would arise subsequently. As the cardinal makes the potestas ordinis to be equal in every bishop, whether pope, cardinal, or simple prelate, and the potestas juris- dictionis to be alone unequal, the diametrical opposition in which he stands to the advocates of the papacy of a later age is con- spicuously seen ; for these make the papacy the fountain of all power, and while to the pope as patriarch they consign a universal jurisdiction, from the pope as successor of St. Peter derive all spiritual power whatever. The sense in which St. Peter, and any of his successors, may be called the head of the Church, is thus declared : potuit did caput Ecclesice in quantum principalis est inter ministros. The writer then goes into a long and elaborate examination of the steps by which the doctrine of the papal supremacy is reached, and enables us to discover that he is much better acquainted with the difficulties which beset the argument at every step than the advocates of the doctrine at the present day are, or profess to be. First, he alleges the election of the apostle to this universal jurisdiction ; then, that a power was given him of selecting a particular see as the centre of it. Next, he admits that the apostle exercised this power by choosing as his see, Antioch, over which he presided seven years. After this period, Christ, it is asserted, appeared to him and 390 THE LAST CRUSADER. revealed to him his will that he should transfer it to Rome ; whence he affirms that there is in the Roman See the concur- rence of a universal and a particular bishopric. Now, weak as this argument is in the facts which are brought forward to sus- tain it, it indicates how many are the desiderata of this com- plicated argument ; how many points of attack it opens to its adversaries, how many points of danger it requires its defenders successfully to hold out, by the loss of any one of which all the rest must be surrendered. First, it must be proved that the power was originally granted ; then that it was localised ; then that it was transferred, and became what Milton would call a " dividual moveable -" then that it was made hereditary j then that the inheritance has been fairly transmitted to the present time, and according to the terms of the original grant. We may say of the papacy as of the Roman empire " Tantae molis erat Romanam condere gentem." Cardinal Pierre d'Ailly is not, however, without some of fhat esprit de corps which Cesarini claimed even in his letters from Basle, in the words, " Numquid non ego sum membrum Eccle- sise et curise Romanae ?" For he maintains the college of car- dinals to represent the other apostles, as the pope represents St. Peter, and traces their office and dignity even into the pages of prophecy, and indicates (p. 26) that efforts were made in the Council of Constance to depress the power of this venerable body, and even to prove the possibility and lawfulness of its extinction. The different forms of election which have obtained in the papacy are then described, and the suggestion put forth that the election which was then coming on should Le made, not by the college alone, or by the council alone, but by both united. It would appear from this, that the object of those who depressed the cardinalitial dignity in the council was to confer the right of election on the council alone. He then passes on to the con- sideration of the temporalities of the clergy, and their right in APPENDICES. 391 them ; and after a defence of annates against the attacks of the representatives of the French nation in the council, proceeds to establish the supremacy of a general council, and the subjection of the papal authority thereto. Such are the principal features of this remarkable treatise, and if the account here given of it lead the reader to examine it more closely, he will easily forgive the length of these observations which have introduced him to it. One passage, among many others which deserve a separate notice, may be here produced before we turn from the subject before us, inasmuch as it vindicates the doctrine of our own Church, which requires even a general council to found its laws in and to govern its decisions according to the Scriptures; and does not hesitate to aver that some councils, when too regardless of this principle, have erred both in ancient and modern times : "Ex quibus patet quod judicium concilii praBferendum est judicio Papae cum ipse in his quse fidei sunt possit errare, sicut et Petrus, de quo dicit Paulus (Galat. ii. cap.) quod ei restitit in faciem quia reprehensibilis erat non recte ambulans ad veritatem evangelii, &c. Tamen secundum aliquos hoc est speciale privi- legium universalis Ecclesise, quod non possit errare in fide. Licet hoc idem pie credatur de concilio generali, scilicet quando innititur divince^ sct~ipturce vel auctoritati quse a Spiritu Sancto conspirata est. Alias ssepe errasse legitur." (Von der Hardt, torn. vi. pp. 72, 73.) The theory of ecclesiastical unity of the age of the Councils of Pisa, Constance, and Basle, is so clearly laid down in the four following propositions, which were written at the time of the first of these bodies, and are given at the end of the " Acts of the Councils of Pisa and Siena," printed at Paris in 1612, that no apology is needed for introducing them here : " I. Prima : in unitate capitis Christi plena ac perfecta con- sistit unitas corporis mystici totius Ecclesise Christianse, juxta illud apostoli Christus est caput Ecclesias, et illud omnes unum corpus sumus in Christo. 392 THE LAST CRUSADER " II. Secunda : licet Papa in quantum Christi Vicarius quodam- modo possit dici caput Ecclesise, tamen Ecclesise unitas non necessarie dependet aut originatur ab unitate Papse, patet ex prima parte : et etiam quia nullo existente Papa semper Eccle- sia remanet una, juxta illud in Canticis Una est columba mea, et illud Symboli Unam Sanctam et Apostolicam Ecclesiam. " III. Tertia : a Christo capite ejus, corpus mysticum quod est Ecclesia, originaliter et immediate potestatem habet et auctori- tatem, ut ad suam unitatem conservandam rite valeat seipsum ad generale concilium ipsam representans, congregare, patet ex illo verbo Christi, Ubi duo vel tres, &c. Ubi animadverten- dum est quod non dicit in nomine Petri vel in nomine Papce sed in nomine Meo, dans intelligere quod ubicumque et a quo- cumque congregentur fideles, dum tamen hoc fiat in nomine suo, hoc est in Christi fide et pro Ecclesise suse salute, ipse assistit eis tanquam ductor et infallibilis rector. " IV. Non solum auctoritate Christi sed etiam communi jure naturali praemissam auctoritatem habet corpus mysticum Eccle- sis9 Dei, patet, quia quodlibet corpus naturale naturaliter resistit suse division! et detractioni, et si sit corpus animatum natura- liter congregat omnia membra, omnesque vires suas ad conser- vandam suam unitatem et repellendam suam divisionem : simili quoque modo est, quodlibet corpus civile seu civilis communitas vel politia rite ordinata j ideoque corpus spirituale seu mysticum Ecclesise Christiana quod ordinatissime compositum est, propter quod ecclesiastica politia in Canticis describitur velut Castrorum acies ordinata, simili jure uti poterit ad suam unitatem conser- vandam et quamlibet schismaticam divisionem repellendam, tanquam suse ordinatse compositionis destructivam." APPENDICES. 393 APPENDIX B. On the Former Letter of Julian from Basle. I HAD prepared a very long defence of the authenticity of the former letter of Julian to Eugenius, against the groundless attack of Spondanus, but found the whole of the historians of this period of every party so perfectly decided on this subject that it would be needless to lay before the reader a tedious or elaborate examination of it. Even Spondanus, when it suits his purpose (as at an. 1431, sec. 8), refers to it as a genuine document, and is irresistibly compelled to own the authenticity of the second letter, which is found in most of the MSS. of the Council of Basle, including that of the College of Navarre, written by the very hand of a person there present, and that in the Harleian collection, numbered 826. I will, therefore, merely recapitulate here the grounds of the argument which I intended to offer in vindication of this remarkable letter. I. Its existence in MS. in the public libraries of Basle and Vienna, and incorporation from the beginning into the works of ^Eneas Sylvius, as appended by him to his history of the council. His object in this was to justify himself in the eye of the world, as appears from his words to Eugenius when recanting his former opinions, " Erravi, quis neget ? sed neque cum paucis neque cum parvis hominibus. Julianum SanctiAngeli Cardinalem, Nicolaum Archiepiscopum Panormitanum, Ludovicum Pon- tanum tuse sedis notarium sum secutus."* Now, the opinions of the two latter are given by ./Eneas, embodied in their own * Vide Gobellin. Vit. Pii II. 394 THE LAST CRUSADER. speeches. But, as his history begins after Julian's secession from the council, he could avail himself of the cardinal's autho- rity only by appending to his work these celebrated letters, which accordingly he did. And with these he intimates, in his Bull of Eetractations, that he pressed the cardinal so hard in argument as nearly to overcome him. II. The second argument for the former letter was derived from the admitted authenticity of the latter one. The parallelism between the two is so close, and sometimes even verbal, as to convince an unprejudiced mind that they proceeded from the same pen. III. Another argument was founded upon the parallelism, also often verbal, between the disputed letter and the synodical epistle which Julian dictated in the council, dated September, 1432, and beginning, " Cogitanti huic Sanctce Synodo" This is even a more remarkable coincidence than the former, but it is difficult in either case, from the singular resemblance of style and idea in all these documents throughout, to select separate proofs and instances of it. IV. The fourth argument sprang from the comparison of the statements of ^Eneas Sylvius (in his letters and Bohemian history) with the facts contained in the letter in question. So exact is the identity between them that it plainly indicates this letter to be the source of the historian's information, while it proves at the same time the credit and authority he attached to this source. V. A very strong argument (and one to which the reader needs only to be referred to be immediately put in possession of) is, that both in style and historical fact the latter letter implies the former. So much is this the case that the one would be imperfect without the other, and almost unintelligible. Even if the former epistle were not extant, we might discover from the second that it must have existed. The abruptness with which it opens, the manner in which it takes for granted Eugenius' know- APPENDICES. 395 led e of the events detailed in the "preceding letter these, and a multitude of similar circumstances, indicate that a letter had been sent before, and that the document we possess is a faithful copy of that letter. VI. Another argument may be derived from the fact that these letters were indispensably called forth by the request of Eugenius, in a letter to Julian, in which he writes : " Circa vero negotium concilii generalis, quia in pluribus mutationem esse factam sentimus omnia quce emerserint vel ad notitiam tuam pervenerint celeriter nobis scribas, cum consilio tuo qualiter in talibus providendum et agendum esse videatur." (Concil. t. xii. p. 934, ed. Labbe.) Both the letters were published from authentic MSS. existing at Basle, not a century after they were written, and from that ori- ginal and extremely rare edition (a copy of which is in my posses- sion) they were transferred by Ortuinus Gratius to his Fasciculus rerum expetendarum et fugiendarum ; which, after several editions, was finally re-edited in London by Brown. All the historians and divines of the Roman communion admit them without hesi- tation, with the exception of Spondanus, who, when it suits his purpose, does so also. The learned Abate Vertua di Soresina, in his recent work, " La scienza teologica, V eminente scienza di Gesfo Cristo" after quoting copiously from Julian's former letter, con- cludes " Cosi parlava quel grande prelato che non avea in vista che la verita e gl' interessi della chiesa." (Tom. xi. part ii. p. 80.) Some apology is due to the reader for appearing to balance the unsupported assertion of a single writer against the testimony of the learned of every subsequent age; but the extreme importance of the letter I have endeavoured to establish urged me to vindi- cate it even from the suspicion of inauthenticity. 396 THE LAST CRUSADER. APPENDIX C. On the Addition of the " Filioque" THE period and the occasion of this addition to the creed on the part of the Western Church are involved in much obscurity. It appears, however, admitted by both parties in the controversy that Spain was the place of its origin, and its object the desire to fence the creed from the dangers of Arianism, which there maintained a long conflict with the doctrines of orthodoxy. It is not improbable that the attempt to revive a species of Nesto- rianism in Spain and the south of France, by Felix Urgelitanus and Elipandus of Toledo, promoted, if it did not even occasion, the adoption of this change. The earliest writer who countenances and even prepares the way for the doctrine of the double procession, is St. Cyril of Alexandria, in the ninth of his cele- brated anathematismi, or doctrinal canons, drawn up against Nestorius. The doctrine of all the rest of the early fathers, without exception, had been that the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father alone, which is the clear statement of the Scriptures on this mysterious subject. Indeed, the pertinacity with which the Provincial, in the Council of Florence, clung to a single passage of St. Basil, proves how very limited was the ground of the Latins on this subject in the field of antiquity. The addition which was introduced in Spain was so openly discountenanced by the Roman Church that Pope Leo III., to whom it was referred, not only prohibited it, but caused the creed, without the addition, to be engraved on two silver plates, that they might be preserved in the Church of Rome for ever, " amore et cautela orthodoxse religionis," These were seen in APPENDICES. 397 the eleventh century by Petrus Damiani, Cardinal Bishop of Ostia.* The addition thus repudiated was readily entertained by Nicholas, the successor of Leo, and a controversy between the missionaries sent by that Pope to convert the Bulgarians, and those sent by the Eastern Church, carried the dispute from the centre of the West into the daily increasing debateable ground which lay between the Eastern and Western Churches. For the papal missionaries, like Anastasius and Photius of old, had introduced to their converts the interpolated creed, but were furiously and successfully encountered by another and afar greater Photius, the celebrated Patriarch of Constantinople, in learning and vigour of mind the prodigy of his age. In an encyclical letter to the patriarchs of the West, as well as in a letter to the Prince of Bulgaria, he challenged the orthodoxy of the Roman Church, and exposed the innovating spirit which has from the beginning so fatally characterised her rulers. The schism grew more inveterate and irremediable as the con- troversy advanced, and every effort to unite increased, by the violence of the reaction it produced, the distance of the severed members of the Church. And, as some of these efforts were forcibly and others surreptitiously made (those of Innocent III. being of the former, and that of the Council of Lyons of the latter kind), they not only left the former causes of disunion unremoved, but added others. Neither the domination of the Latins at Constantinople, nor the zeal for union which Michael Palseologus displayed when the seat of the Eastern Empire was recovered by its ancient possessors, effected anything towards this great object. The Council of Lyons, the result of this prince's zeal and bad faith for the signatures to its decrees on the part of the Greeks were forged throughout with the most unblushing effrontery f * P. Damiani in Opuscule xxxviii. de Processione Sp. S. c. 2. + Pachymeris, 1. vi. cc. 17, 18, &c. 398 THE LAST CRUSADER. was never even acknowledged by the Eastern Church, and the Latins ventured not to found upon it any of their Florentine decrees, far less to assume that it had settled any of the contro- versies which it proposed and professed to resolve. Though boasted of at the time as a Roman triumph, it soon fell into such oblivion as to be unable to retain its place even among the advocates of the Roman See as an (Ecumenical Council. The authentic acts of the Council of Florence,* Car- dinal Bessarion,f Cardinal Pole,J and all the Eastern authorities, by giving to the Florentine Council the title of the eighth general council, disallow the claim of that of Lyons most effec- tually. Between these two councils the controversy, though occasionally awakened by the zealots of either Church, sank slowly to rest, and the natural and political separation of the Eastern and Western world tended to produce an ignorance of the grounds on which the doctrine was received on the one side, and rejected on the other. So 'complete was this in the time of Aquinas that in his writings on the errors of the Greeks he does not touch the real root of the controversy, the prohibition of the Council of Ephesus ; and, when that argument came upon the Latins at Florence, the students of Aquinas, and such writers, were as confounded as their master would have been had he been sud- denly met in his metaphysical speculations on the doctrine itself, by the stern and unbending decree of the Ephesian fathers. In the corrupted pages of the canon law the only two proofs of this doctrine adduced from antiquity are an alleged extract from ohe decrees of the Council of Ephesus, which is properly, however, a fragment from the synodical letter of St. Cyril of * In the preface, in which it is plainly stated that there were only seven general councils before that of Florence, f Concil. Florent. ed. Justiniani, p. 425. $ Reginald! Poli, De Reform. Angliso Decret. II. APPENDICES. 399 Alexandria, and a passage of Didymus on the Holy Ghost, a writer who flourished more than four centuries before the con- troversy began. This latter passage is so corrupted and muti- lated, that Didymus, who makes mention of the procession as from the Father only, is made to propound a doctrine which nearly approaches the Roman standard. The corrupted and genuine text of Didymus runs thus : GEATIAN. 1. iv. dist. v. c. 40. DIDTMI DE SP. S. 1. ii. Dehinc in consequentibus de Spi- ritu veritatis qui a Patre mittatwr et fit paracletus, " Salvator qui est veritas, ait [non salvator qui est veritas ait, nou enim loquetur a semetipso : hoc est enim loquatur a semetipso, &c. non sine me, et sine meo et patris arbitrio, quia inseparabilis a mea et patris est voluntate, &c.] " Where the reader will observe the suppression of the most important part of the words of Didymus, words which qualify all that follows. Of the controversy itself we may observe further, that had the word procession been taken in that plain and simple sense, which the original eKTropewte alone can bear had it been taken in the sense of a temporal mission for the sanctification of the creature, and not as an eternal procession implying origin, this fatal controversy would have never arisen. The former was the meaning which the Fathers of the Latin Church, down to the very time of the opening of this contro- versy, uniformly gave it. Isidore of Seville,* in the seventh, and Anastasius Bibliothecarius in the ninth century, thus under- stood it, the words of the latter being these, " Sicut procedit ex Patre ita cum procedere fateamur ex Filio, missionem nimirum processionem intelligentes." t Jansenius, Michaelis, and almost * Isidor. Hispalensis Epistola. t Anastas. Biblioth. Ep. ad Joannem Diaconum, torn. v. Concil. (Labbe) p. 1,771. 400 THE LAST CRUSADER all modern critics, have held the word eo-opfvo-ie (John xv. 26) to relate thus to a temporary mission only.* Peter Lombard appears to be the first who discovered that this procession was of a twofold kind, eternal and temporary, t Of the former he asserts that " between the generation of the Son and the pro- cession of the Holy Ghost, we are unable while we live here to distinguish." % The latter he defines to be " that whereby the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father and the Son to sanc- tify the creature." The scholastic divines, when they had so fertile a field open to their speculations as that of the eternal procession, failed not to cultivate it with diligence ; and Aquinas, outrunning his fellow-labourers in the boldness of his conclusions, presents us in his work " Against the Errors of the Greeks," with some of the most startling and perilous deductions that can be con- ceived to be derivable from it. Let the reader take these as an example : 1. That the Son originates (deoriginat) the Holy Ghost. 2. That the Son is the Author of the Holy Ghost. 3. That the Son is the principle of the Holy Ghost. 4. That the Son is the fount of the Holy Ghost. || And after all these theses, he betrays his own mis-apprehension of the original term eWo'joevo-tc, by saying that the word processio is of all words which relate to origin the most general, and the least determining the manner of that origin. IT Had the Roman Church never insisted on the doctrine of the procession in a sense so fraught with danger, the Eastern Church would have * V. Theophan. Procopowicz de Processione Sp. S. p. 25. f Sentent. 1. i. dist. 14, A. J Id. ibid. dist. 13, C. L. i. dist. 14, A. || Aquinas, " Contra errores Grsecorum," Opusc. I. (Opuscula Insigniora Aquinatis. Duaci, 1609.) IT u Verbum enim processionis inter omnia quse ad originem pertinent magis invenitur esse commune et minus modum originis determinare." Opusc. torn. i. p. 45. APPENDICES. 401 never been aroused to that strong and just resistance to it which has severed these Churches so fatally and effectually. In the other meaning, the strongest advocates of the latter communion do not hesitate to admit the double procession ; even Phranza himself, who clung to the old paths with the strictest orthodoxy and most determined zeal, recognising the Procession from the Father and the Son in this sense, while he summarily rejects the doctrine for which the Roman Church contends. In a declaration of his faith, at the close of his history, he affirms : 'O/ioXoyw /3e/3a/we TO Trvevpia. TO aytov OVK IK TOV HarpOQ KOI EK TOV Ytou tKiropeveffdat w