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HISTORICAL ESSAYS
^0?m.
HISTORICAL ESSAYS
BY THE LATE
EDWARD /^EEEiMAN, M.A., Hon. D.C.L. & LL.D.
REGIUS PROFESSOR OP MODERN HISTORY IN THE UNIVERSITY
OF OXFORD
" Gallorum levitas Germanos justijieahit ;
Italics gravitas Gallos confusa necahit ;
Succumbet Gallus, aquil(S victricia regna
Mundus adorabit, erit urbs vix prcBsule digna.
% * Sf it^ if * *
Papa cito moritur, Ccssar regnabit ubique.
Sub quo tunc vana cessabit gloria cleri."
Peter Langtoft, ii. 450
FIRST SERIES. -FIFTH EDITION
LONDON
MACMILLAX AND CO.
AND NEW YORK
1896
[The Right of Translation and Beproduction is reserved']
First Edition, 1871 ; Second, 187a;
Third, 1875 ; Fourth, 1886 ;
Fifth. i8q6.
OXKOKI) : HORACE HART
PIMNIKK 10 rilU UNIVES.SITV
CONTENTS.
PACK
The Mythical and Eomantic Elements in Eably English
History [Fortnightly Review, May 1866) ... 1
The Continuity or English History' {Edinburgh Eevieiv,
July i860) ........ 40
The Relations between the Crowns oi'' England and
Scotland {Fortnightly Pceview, June 1867) . . . 53
Saint Thomas of Canterhukt and his Biographers
{Xational Review, April i860) ..... 80
The Reign of Edward the Third {Fortnightly Review,
:\Iay 1869) 116
The Holy Roman Empire {yorth British Review, jMarcb
1865) 128
The Franks and the Gauls {National Review, October
i860) 164
The Early Sieges of Paris {British Quarterly Reviev.\
January 1871) . . . . . . . .212
Frederick the First, King of Italy {National Review,
January 1861) ........ 257
The Emperor Frederick the Second {North British Review,
December 1866) ....... 290
Charles the Bold {National Review, April 1864, and
Fortnightly Revieiv, October 1868) . . . . 323
Presidential Government {National Revieiv, November
1864) 384
PREFACE TO THE FODETH EDITION,
I FIND, a little to my surprise, that a fourth edition of
this first series of essays is needed, while the second series
still remains in the second edition and the third remains in
the first. I should have thought that the last, containing
writings at once more mature and on the whole on fresher
subjects, would have been the favourite of the three. But
I must take facts as I find them.
In looking again through these papers, written mostly
from twenty to thirty years back, and of which the last
edition is dated eleven years back, what chiefly comes
home to me is how things have changed since they were
first written. I believe I may take for granted that both
myself and my readers have advanced ; if I were to make
fresh discourses on the same subject now, I might assume
many things which I had then to insist on. We have now
to deal with another map of Europe from that of i860 or
even that of 1866. I had then to speak of wrongs which
have since been redressed, while I was but little called on
to speak of wrongs which have since come to the front.
To me at least it seems that whatever value the essays
have is chiefly as a record of progress. I have therefore,
in revising writings which have already become somewhat
antiquated, dealt with them as in some sort things of the
past. I have corrected some things, but I have improved
viii PREFACE TO THE FOURTH EDITION.
nothing. I have struck out or changed a few lines here
and there, which I thought actually wrong or likely to
mislead ; I have not struck out or changed anything
merely because I could now put it better or because it
referred to a state of things which has now passed away.
On one point at least the essays have become historical.
In 1 860 I had still to speak of the Austrian power as the
enemy of Italy, the oppressor of Venetia. In 1871 I had
been led into hopes which have certainly not been fulfilled,
but the fulfilment of which was possible as late as 1875.
I have left what I wrote at both times. But I may still
be allowed to wonder why it is that a reference to the
bondage of Milan and Venice stirred every heart in those
days, while a reference to the bondage of Ragusa and
the betrayal of Cattaro and Crivoscia stirs so few hearts
now.
On the subject of one piece, that on " Saint Thomas of
Canterbury and his Biographers," I have had, since 1875,
to wage another controversy on behalf of truth and historic
justice. But I have let the old essay still stand just
as it was first written. In the essay on Presidential
Government there is comparatively little in the main
subject which would call for any change now, though at
every step there is much to remind one of the time which
has passed, and of the change in the world during the last
three-and-twenty years. Everything brings home to us that
we live in a time of the world's history which yields to
few in the number and importance of the events which have
happened within the memory of men who are yet hardly
old. If I had the same call to revise my third series of
Essays, though it deals largely with later events, I should
PREFACE TO THE FOURTH EDITION. ix
doubtless find that much has changed even since 1878.
The intermediate volume stands on a different ground,
except so far as even that might suggest new parallels in
later times, which might throw light on the facts, though
themselves unchangeable, which are dealt with in it.
16 St. Giles', Oxford,
March IZrd, 1886.
PEEFACE TO THE FIEST EDITION.
The following essays have been chosen out of a much
larger number which have appeared in various periodical
works. The principle on which they were chosen was
that of selecting papers which referred to comparatively
modern times, or, at least, to the existing states and nations
of Europe. It is by a sort of accident that a large number
of the pieces chosen have thrown themselves into something
like a continuous series bearing on the historical causes
of the great events of the last and the present year. In
revising the essays, I have commonly let passages referring
to the state of European politics ten or fifteen years back
stand as they were written at first, merely adding a note
whenever a note seemed to be called for. I have done the
same whenever change of circumstances or increase of
knowledge on my own part has led me to change my
views on any point. But whenever I could gain in accuracy
of statement or in force or clearness of expression, I
have freely changed, added to, or left out, what I wrote
in the first instance. To many of the essays I have added
a short notice of the circumstances under which they were
written.
I have to thank Messrs. Longman for allowing me to
reprint the essay which stands second in the series, the
only one among several contributions of mine to the
PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. xi
Edinburgh Review which seemed to come within the scope
of the present volume, I have also to thank the pub-
lishers and editors of the Fortnightly, British Quarterly,
North British, and National Reviews for leave to reprint
the articles which appeared in their pages. It is much
to be regretted that two of the Reviews which I have
just mentioned have now to be reckoned among things of
the past.
If the present venture should prove successful, I hope that
it may be followed by a further selection from among my
smaller writings, whether from among essays of the same
class as those now reprinted, but bearing on earlier periods
of history, or from among smaller pieces on various subjects
not always strictly historical.
SOMEKLEAZE, WeLLS,
August 9th, 1871-
HISTORICAL ESSAYS.
THE MYTHICAL AND ROMANTIC ELEMENTS
IN EARLY ENGLISH HISTORY.
I DO not intend in the present Essay to enter into any-
full examination of the nature of mythical narratives, or
systematically to compare those which we meet with in early
English history with those which we meet with in the early
history of other nations. The origin of mythical narratives
in general, and the relation of the myths of one nation to
those of others, is an important and fascinating subject,
and one which has lately been zealously taken up by a
special school of inquirers. The doctrine of the compara-
tive mythologists traces the myths of at least all Aryan
nations to a certain common stock of sayings, expressive of
the chief phaenomena of nature. These sayings, set forth in
the simple poetical language of an early age, have gra-
dually grown into narratives of the adventures of personal
beings. Zeus, for instance, is the Sky, Apollo the Sun, and
the legends of Zeus and Apollo resolve themselves into
poetical descriptions of those processes of nature in which
the sky and the sun are concerned. This view must not
be confounded with that of an earlier school of mytholo-
gists, who saw in the Grecian legends a system of physical
truths set forth under the veil of allegory. The compara-
tive school admits of nothing like conscious allegory. In
the view of its followers the physical truth grows into the
mythical story by a process perfectly gradual and uncon-
scious. The doctrine is new and fascinating, and, as put
2 THE MYTHICAL AND ROMANTIC ELEMENTS [Essay
forth by Professor Max Muller and by Mr. G. W. Cox, it is
in the highest degree capable of poetical treatment. But
I must confess that I can as yet accept it only in a modified
form. I must make a distinction between legends of the
Gods and legends of the Heroes — between myths which are
qitasi-i\\.Qo\ogicQ\ and myths which are quasi-hi^ioYicdl.
I can fully believe that Zeus is the Sky and that Demeter
is the Earth, and that the legends of Zeus and Demeter
arose from poetical statements of physical phsenomena re-
lating to the sky and the earth. But I confess that I have
some difficulty in accepting the doctrine that the mythical
histories of Herakles, of Meleagros, of Paris, of Achilleus, and
of Odysseus, are all of them mythical ways of describing
the daily course of the sun. The idea is most ingenious,
and the way in which it is carried out is, in many of its
details, not only ingenious, but highly beautiful. But I
confess that I am as yet only half a believer. Perhaps
I am under the influence of a dread that, if Achilleus and
Odysseus are ruled to be the sun, later heroes of mythology
and romance, Arthur and Hengest and Cerdic and the
Great Karl himself, may some day be found out to be the
sun also. The fear is natural on the part of one who does
not scruple to confess that he sees a certain historical
element alike in Hellenic and in Teutonic legend. Yet I am
told that the fear is an unreasonable one, inasmuch as the
two views are really not inconsistent. I am given to
understand that Achilleus may be the sun, and yet that
I may see, if I please, in Achilleus' conquest of Lesbos
a fragment, however exaggerated and distorted, of the real
primitive tradition of the Hellenic conquest of the land
which that conquest turned into Aiolis. Nay, I believe
it is allowed that, if the Charlemagne of romance should
also turn out to be the sun, the position of the his-
torical Emperor Karl will be in no way damaged by the
discovery.
I mention all this only to show why I do not feel called
on to enter into any scientific explanation of such mythical
I.] IN EARLY ENGLISH HISTORY. 3
stories as I have here to deal with. I leave them to in-
quirers of another class, and I shall be well pleased if I find
that my line of inquiry, though wholly different, is held by
them not to be necessarily inconsistent with their own.
But when I say that I recognize a certain historical ele-
ment in the myths, I wish especially to guard against
a probable misconception. I have as little sympathy with
the old pragmatizing or Euhemeristic school of mytholo-
gical interpretation as the comparative mythologists have
with the old physical school. The pragmatizers take a
mythical story; they strip it by an arbitrary process of
whatever seems impossible ; they explain or allegorize
miraculous details; and, having thus obtained something
which possibly may have happened, they give it out as
something which actually did happen. This system has
been thoroughly rooted up by Mr, Grote. It will never do
to take the tale of Troy, to leave out all intervention of the
Gods, and to give out the remnant as a piece of real
Grecian history. It will never do, as Thucydides did, to
piece out whatever seems unlikely by possible, but perfectly
arbitrary, conjectures of our own. And yet I cannot but
think that Mr. Grote goes too far in censuring all attempts
to extract a certain amount of historical truth from the
Trojan legend, or from any other legend. I will explain
my notions on this head a little more fully. But to do so,
I must first explain the nature of what I understand by
romantic as distinguished from mijthkal narratives.
I divide then the statements contained in our early
EngKsh history, or in any other history which may be
chosen for our illustrations, into four classes — historical,
romantic, traditional, and mythical. Of these I look on the
mythical statements as standing to the traditional in the
same relation in which the romantic statements stand to
the historical. I shall therefore first inquire into the
relation of these last two classes to one another, and then,
arguing from the known to the unknown, attempt to
point out more briefly the light which these relations cast
B 3
4 THE MYTHICAL AND ROMANTIC ELEMENTS [Essay
on the obscurer relation between traditional and mythical
statements.
By historical statements I mean those which we accept
as undoubtedly true, as resting on contemporary or other
sufficient evidence : say, that Eadward the Elder died in
the year 925, and that iEthelstan his son was chosen King
in his stead. Or perhaps the words " undoubtedly true "
may be too strong ; for we often meet with statements
which we must set down as historical, which we nevertheless
receive with a certain hesitation, as resting on a mere
balance of evidence. Owing to the natural imperfection of
all human testimony, owing to unavoidable errors, to men's
different ways of looking at things, to the way in which
statements are, sometimes wilfully, sometimes unconsciously,
coloured by party spirit or other interested feelings — owing
to all these causes, we often find contradictory statements
of facts, between which we have to judge as we best can,
but where there is nothing mythical or romantic about
either version. Thus, in the whole career of Godwine and
Harold, we have to pick our way between the opposite
statements of friends and enemies. Both versions cannot
be true ; but the version which we reject is not myth or
romance, but mistake or calumny, as may happen. The
true statement is historical — the false one we may call
psevdo-Iiislorical ; it assumes the form of history, and it is
put forth in the hope and belief that it will be accepted
as true. Such misstatements are, in a later stage, often
adorned with romantic details— such, for instance, as we
shall presently find in the legend of the death of Godwine — •
but in their original state they arc not romance, but history
misconceived or misrepresented.
By romanlic statements I understand stories about his-
torical persons, which we set aside, sometimes as merely
doubtful, sometimes as positively untrue, by other tests
than those by which we distinguish historical from pseudo-
historical statements. Around many famous men there
gathers a mass of tales and anecdotes, the evidence for
I.] IN EARLY ENGLISH HISTORY. 5
which is insufficient. Sometimes all that we can say is that
the evidence is insufficient. The story may be neither im-
probable in itself, nor inconsistent with the recorded actions
and character of the person spoken of. Of this kind is
a large proportion of the personal anecdotes handed down
to us by Plutarch. They may have happened, but we
cannot feel certain that they did happen. We know that
anecdotes are often invented, and that they are often im-
proved in the telling. We know that the fact of an
anecdote being probable and characteristic is no proof of
its historical truth. For clever anecdote-mongers always
take care that their anecdotes shall be probable and charac-
teristic. Many a living man has heard stories about him-
self, some of which are pure invention, some of which
contain a kernel of truth, but which in both cases illustrate,
if only by caricature, some real feature in his character.
Stories of this sort, where a distinct play of fancy is at
work, set us down within the borders of the land of
romance. In j)S€udo-h\^tor\c,&\ statements, the narrator is
either himself deceived, or he intentionally seeks to deceive
others ; in purely romantic statements deception hardly
comes in either way. The teller and the heai'er have no
set purpose to contradict historical truth ; they are simply
careless about historical truth. They tell an attractive
story, heedless whether it be true or false ; the tale may be
coloured by the narrator's passions or opinions, but it is
not a direct pleading on the side of those passions or
opinions, as are the statements which I have caXle^ j^iseudo-
historical. If the teller and the hearer have knowledge
and tact enough, they will take care that the story, if not
true, shall be at least characteristic. But in more careless
hands no such propriety is aimed at. The tale may, in
such a case, be utterly improbable from the beginning, or,
though it may have been characteristic at starting, it may,
in process of telling, get incrusted with circumstances
which make it no longer even characteristic. Every detail
is exaggerated, improved, or corrupted ; and circumstances
6 THE MYTHICAL AND ROMANTIC ELEMENTS [Essay
are brought in from other stories about other people. In
this last process we come across one of the most fertile
sources of legendary matter.
There is a class of stories which seem to be the common
property of mankind, and which may be said to go about the
world with blanks for the names, dates, and places, ready to
be filled up as occasion may serve. We meet with abundance
of these stories both in undoubted mythology and in what
professes to be history. Stories, for instance, of women
falsely accusing men who have refused their favours, stories
of kings' daughters betraying their country for love of in-
vaders who in the end punish their treachery, turn up, with
little more than the change of name, in all times and in all
places. Now stories of this sort we instinctively doubt,
even in their earliest form, and in every later form we
unhesitatingly reject them. It comes indeed within the
compass of belief, and even of probability, that such a story
may have happened once. In some cases indeed we may be
sure that one form of the story is historical, the later repe-
titions only being legendary ; nay, it is within the compass
of physical possibility that such a story may have happened
several times. It is even possible, especially when a story
occurs both in legend and in history, that the later story
may be a conscious repetition of the earlier. Alexander
maj/, as Mr. Grote believes, have dragged Eatis at his
chariot- wheels, in conscious imitation of the treatment of
the body of Hektor by Achilleus. But the chances are
always strongly against any tale of the kind. Knowing,
as we do, the way in which stories grow and wander
about, we need the strongest contemporary evidence to
make us believe any of them. Take, for instance, one of
the best known of the class. There is nothing actually
impossible in the story of a father being set to shoot an
apple off his son's head. We should have no difficulty in
believing the fact on sufficient evidence. But when we see
the story turning up in various forms in various places,
when in some instances it is evidently a mere tale, when in
I.] IN EARLY ENGLISH HISTORY. 7
no instance does it rest upon any convincing testimony, we
set it down as simply one of the stories which make the
round of the world. Another point must be mentioned,
namely that, when we have two or more stories of this sort,
there is no need to suppose that any one of them is borrowed
from any other. So to argue is like deriving Greek from
Sanscrit, or French from Italian. Those who told the story
of Palnatoki could not have heard the story of William Tell,
and it is not likely that those who told the story of William
Tell had heard the story of Palnatoki. It is far more prob-
able that both are portions of that general stock of romantic
narrative which is the common property of mankind.
By romantic narratives then I understand stories about
historical persons, which are neither historical nor psendo-
historical, neither real truth nor invention with a purpose,
but mere plays of fancy, in which historical truth is simply
disregarded. In most of them there is probably a kernel of
truth ; in some of them we can see what the kernel of truth
is ; but aU the colouring, all the circumstances, everything
which gives life to the story, are, at the best, doubtful, and
are in many cases clearly fictitious. The story, at its best,
cannot be proved to be true, and in many cases it can be
proved to be false. Such a story may be laudatory, or it
may be calumnious. In such a case we may feel sure that,
in its first form, it was put forth by the friends or by the
enemies of the person spoken of ; but as the story grows,
virtues are heightened, vices are blackened, new good
actions and new crimes are attributed to the hero, by the
mere process of mythopoeic growth, without any regard to
truth, but without any intentional departure from it.
Truth and falsehood, as I have before said, are matters
foreign to the state of mind both of the teller and of his
hearers. Of this state of mind Mr. Grote gives a lucid
explanation in the chapter on mythical narratives to which
I have already referred. Stories of this sort, as long as
they are acknowledged to be mere stories, may often be
told and heard with real pleasure. The evil begins when
8 THE MYTHICAL AND ROMANTIC ELEMENTS [Essay
they are mistaken for history, as they constantly are, and
that sometimes at a time surprisingly near to the period
at which they are said to have happened. Our early
English history, and all early history, is full of them. To
show their true character is one of the highest duties of the
historian ; but none of his duties runs more distinctly
counter to popular prejudice^ there is none in the discharge
of which the results of his labour are more distasteful to
large classes of his readers. With most people our early
history is a mere collection of legends. Alfred is simply
the King who forgot to turn the cakes, or, in another form,
the King who invented trial by jury. Eadgar is the King
who imposed a tribute of wolves' heads upon the Welsh, or
the King who slew ^thelwald and married his widow.
Dunstan is the monk who took the devil by the nose, or
possibly the Archbishop who caused .^Ifgifu to be put to a
horrible death. In all these cases history is simply sacri-
ficed to silly stories. The real actions of very remarkable
men are utterly forgotten, because their names have got
inseparably attached to legends which at best are doubtful,
and which in most cases can be shown to be untrue. Yet
many people cry out as if some wrong were done to them,
as if the grounds of all human belief were shaken, when
they are simply asked to accept history and to reject fable,
to see which statements rest on evidence and which do not,
and to believe or disbelieve according as such a test requires.
People deliberately set themselves against the truth ; some-
times because truth contradicts some prejudice, sometimes
merely to escape the trouble of inquiry. But the case
becomes worse when the prejudice to be fought against
takes the form of some political or provincial point of
honour. For instance, the character of the greatest of
England's later Kings is blackened in popular estimation,
because people will accept late legends and ballads rather
than the undoubted history written down at the time.
History sets before us William Wallace as quldam latro
piihUms, the savage devastator of England ; it sets before us
L] IN EARLY ENGLISH HISTORY. 9
Kobert Bruce as a traitor in turn to every cause, as a par-
doned rebel, who at last took to patriotism as his only-
chance to escape the punishment of a treacherous private
murder. It sets before us the great Edward as simply
asserting: the acknowledo-ed rig-hts of more than three hun-
dred years — rights as fully acknowledged by his Scottish
vassals as by his English subjects * It sets him before us
as acting throughout with a justice and a disinterestedness
to which his age, or any age, affords few parallels — as acting
throughout in strict adherence to law and right, and, after
repeated provocations, staining his conquest with the
smallest amount of bloodshed on record. But it makes a
prettier story to tell of the hairbreadth scapes of hunted
patriots tnan to record the real actions of a wise and
righteous King. The legend therefore turns out the his-
tory. Scotch people make it a point of provincial honour
to reject the truth, and English people — more unpardonably
still — reject it simply because the legend is thought to be
prettier. To crown the whole thing, novelists not only
substitute the legend for the history, but alter the history
itself to make the tale more convenient still. I believe
there is a Scotch story-book which makes the great
Edward, and not his wretched son, fight the losing fight of
Bannockburn, and I dare say there are people, both Scotch
and English, who believe that it really was so.
This is the sort of difficulty against which simple historic
truth has to struggle. In many cases it illustrates the pro-
verb that there are none so deaf as those who will not hear.
* Nothing could be more strictly just than Edward's whole dealing in the
affair of the disputed fief. His singular disinterestedness stands out most
clearly in the refusal of the proposal to divide the kingdom made by Hastings
and the elder Bruce. Nothing could have been more tempting than such
a proposal to a suzerain whose clear interest it was to have three weak vassals
rather than one powerful one. But Edward, as ever, stuck to his motto —
pactum servn ; he scorned all such considerations, and adjudged the whole fief
to the lawful heir. If any one wishes to see the difference between an honest
man and a rascal, let him compare the dealings of Edward with John of Balliol
in the matter of Scotland, and the dealings of PhiUp of France with Edward iu
the matter of Aquitaine.
10 THE MYTHICAL AND ROMANTIC ELEMENTS [Essay
To those who are accustomed to look facts in the face, it is
hard to understand the clinging to a story as a truth
simply because the story is pretty. As an avowed fable,
as a mere novel, it would bo just as pretty to hear. A
romance without a shadow of truth may be exquisitely
beautiful as a story, and the most severe historian has
no wish to interfere with any one enjoying his favourite
legend on those terms. All that he asks is that truth
should never be tampered with, when truth, and not
artistic beauty, is the question at issue. Belief is purely
a matter of evidence, not a matter of taste or of preju-
dice. But disbelief of a story as a matter of historic
reality is consistent with the fullest appreciation of the
artistic beauties of the tale which is pronounced to be histo-
rically false. The historic mind is never offended by either
myth or romance as such, but only when people obstinately
cling to them to the rejection of historic truth. Thus the
legends of iElfred are singularly beautiful ; the legends of
Dunstan are disgustingly absurd. We can, as a matter of
taste, enjoy the one and despise the other, while, as a
matter of historic truth, we hold both to be equally
worthless. The legend of William Tell throws a halo over
the marketplace of Altdorf, and the legend of Achilleua
throws a halo over the plains of Ilios, which can be as fully
entered into by those who distinguish between history and
legend, as by those who make their prejudices the measure
of their belief. In fact, the lovers of legendary lore lose
nothing by accepting the historic standard. A new source
of enjoyment is opened to them, and the old one is not
taken away.
I will now take two well-known legends in early English
history, and attempt to dissect them, and to trace their
several elements to their respective sources. In both cases
we shall find a certain kernel of truth round which a whole
tissue of romance has been woven.
In the year 933 the .ZEtheling Eadwine, son of King
Eadward the ]<vlder, and brother of the reigning King
I.] IN EARLY ENGLISH HISTORY. 11
-^thelstan, was drowned at sea. This simple entry is all
that we find in the English Chronicles, and there is nothing
about the entry to make us suspect any sort of foul play.
We are at once reminded of the similar fate of a later
^theling, William the son of Henry the First ; and there
is nothing to make us think that the prince who was
drowned in 933 came to his end in any other way than the
prince who was drowned in 11 20. Among later writers,
Henry of Huntingdon, who so often preserves fragments of
early tradition, records the drowning of Eadwine as a mis-
fortune clouding the otherwise successful career of ^thel-
stan : " Adversa percussus fortuna fratrem suum Edwinum,
magni vigoris juvenem et bonje indolis, maris fluctibus
flebiliter amisit." Not a hint is here given that .^thelstan
had any hand in his death, but quite the contrary. But
on turning to Simeon of Durham, who wrote in the twelfth
century, but who copied a much earlier Northumbrian
Chronicle, we are amazed to find a direct assertion that
Eadwine was drowned by order of his brother : " Rex
iEthelstanus jussit Eadwinum fratrem suum submergi in
mare." We are amazed at such a charge brought against
one of our noblest Kings, a prince with whose whole cha-
racter such a crime seems specially inconsistent. Nothing
stands out more conspicuously in the reign of " glorious
iEthelstan " than the care which, himself childless and pro-
bably unmarried, he took of his numerous brothers and
sisters, and the harmony in which he always appears to act
with them. On the field of Brunanburh the royal brothers,
^thelstan and Eadmund, appear side by side, almost like
the Kastor and Polydeukes of Grecian legend. Can we
believe such a tale of such a man 1 We might look at the
story as a mere piece of slander, invented by the Northum-
brian enemies of the West-Saxon conqueror. But it is far
more hkely that the story is a mere bit of romance, which
the Northumbrian chronicler inserted in his annals — a very
likely bit of romance to be preserved in a dry pragmatized
form, but for the genuine romantic shape of which we must
12 THE MYTHICAL AND ROMANTIC ELEMENTS [Essay
look elsewhere. The garrulous pages of William of Malmes-
bury help us to the key. I will translate the tale as
William gives it: —
" When King Eadward was dead, his son ^Ifward, born of his lawful wife,*
followed his fiithei" by a speedy death. Then, when the hopes of all were fixed
upon ^'Ethelstan, Alfred alone, a man of great insolence, with his party, resisted
secretly as much as he could, disdaining to be subject to a lord whom he had
not chosen of his own will. But when he, as the King told the tale above,i'
was discovered, and had ended his life, there were some who accused Eadwine,
the King's brother, of treachery — a horrid and foul crime to disturb brotherly
affection by hostile suggestions. Eadwine, though calling on his brother's faith,
both in person and by messengers, and even denying the charge on oath, was
driven into banishment. The insinuations of some men had so far prevailed
over a mind occupied by many cares, that, forgetting the ties of kindred, he
di'ove out a youth whom even strangers might have pitied, and that with an
unheard-of kind of cruelty, for he was compelled, alone with his armour-bearer,
to embark in a boat, without oars or rowers, and moreover rotten with age.
Fortune laboured for a long while to bring back the guiltless to the shore. But
when at last, in the midst of the sea, the sails could not abide the fury of the
wind, he, as a delicate youth, and weary of life in such a case, sought death by
a sudden plunge into ths water. His armour-bearer, with wiser mind, endur-
ing to prolong his life, now evading the adverse waves, now rowing with his
feet, brought the body of Ids master to land, namely, over the narrow sea from
Dover to Witsand. ^thelstan, when his anger had cooled, was shocked at the
deed in his calmer mood, and having undertaken a seven years' penance,
avenged himself wrathfully on the accuser of his brother. He was the King's
cupbearer, and had therefore opportunities of effectually pressing any of his
schemes. Therefore, once, wlien on a solemn day he was handing wine to the
King, slipping with one foot, he recovered himself with the other; then, seizing
the occasion, he uttered a word fatal to himself — ' So brother helps brother.'
When the King heard that, he commanded the traitor to be beheaded, often-
times speaking aloud of the help which he should have had from his brother,
if he had lived, and bitterly lamenting his death."
Such is William of Malmesbury's tale, on which he him-
self thus comments : —
" TJiis story of the death of his brother, although it seems probable, I afiBrm
* Tliis qualification alludes to the legend, which Williani had just before
told, which represents .(Ethelstan as the natural sou of Eadward by a shepherd's
daughter. This again is a mere legend, which, with its accompaniment of
dreams and marvels, doubtless made a very pretty story in some ballad.
t Namely, in a real or spurious charter of JEthelstan which William had
quoted a little time before, and in which ^thelstan tells tlio tale in his own
person. According to this story, .zElfred was sent to Rome to deny his con-
spiracy on oath before the Pope. He swore, of course falsely, fell down before
the altar of Saint Peter's, and died on the third day.
L] IN EARLY ENGLISH HISTORY. 13
witiL less confidence, because he showed a wonderful and affectionate care
towards his other brothers, whom, when their father had left them as mere
children, he brought up while young with every kindness, and when grown-up
made them partners in his kingdom. Of his sisters, I have already said to
what greatness he promoted those among them whom his father had left
unmarried and untochered."
The readers of Livy will remember the story of the
stratagems of Sextus Tarquinius at Gabii, a tale made out
of two stories which are also found in Herodotus. The trick
by which Sextus gains admission into Gabii comes from the
same source as the trick by which Zopyros gains admission
into Babylon. The policy recommended to Sextus by his
father's symbolical action is the same as the policy recom-
mended to Periandros of Corinth by the like symbolical
action of Thrasyboulos of Miletos. Our present story of
Eadwine is a compound story of the same class. It is made
up of several current tales, which have had their blanks
filled up with the names of .^thelstan, Eadwine, and the
cupbearer, while any other names would have done just as
well. A number of floating tales have gathered themselves,
like barnacles on a plank, round the simple fact that Ead-
wine was drowned. The treacherous servant who falsely
accuses his lord's wife, or son, or brother, is one of the
stock characters of story-tellers in all time and places. He
is always found out and punished when too late.
" Likewise he made the master-cook
In boiling lead to stand,
And made the simple scullion-boy
The heir of all his land."
This was the ending of a nursery-tale'^ which delighted
and horrified my own childhood, and the master-cook and
iEthelstan's cupbearer are only different forms of a single
legendary sinner. But we may get more into detail than
this. Stories of people exposed in boats, and being carried
safely to some shore or other, are exceedingly common.
To speak of no others, one is introduced into legendary
English history in the century before J^thelstan. Lothe-
* It may be found in Percy's Reliques.
14 THE MYTHICAL AND ROMANTIC ELEMENTS [Essay
brok, a Dane of roj'al descent, is driven by a storm to the
coast of East-Anglia with only his hawk on his wrist. He
is there murdered by Biorn, the huntsman of Saint Ead-
mund, King of the East- Angles. Eadmund exposes the
murderer in an open boat like his victim. Biorn is carried
to Denmark, as Lothebrok was to England, and there, of
course telling the story his own way, he excites the sons
of Lothebrok to vengeance against his own master. He thus
leads to the Danish conquest of East-Anglia, and to the
martyrdom of Eadmund. It required a little invention to
piece this story on to the fact that Eadwine was drowned ;
but this difficulty was got over by the introduction of the
armour-bearer. The latter part of the tale comes over
ao-ain in the Norman legend of Earl Godwine, which also
contains details somewhat similar to those of the death of
Alfred. I will translate the tale as it is told in its fulness
by Roger of Wendover, or those whom he copied : —
" In the year of grace 1054, Eadward, King of the English, kept the Paschal
festival at Winchester, where, as the said King was sitting at the table, as his
cupbearer was carrying to the table a royal beaker full of wine, he struck one
foot against the floor of the house, but recovering himself with the other foot,
he escaped falling. When Earl Godwine saw this as he was sitting, according
to custom, by the King at dinner, he said, ' This brother brought help to his
brother.' On this the King ironically answered him, ' My brother might now
help me, if it had not been for the treachery of Godwine.' Then Godwine,
who had betrayed the King's brother, being much distressed at the King's
answer, replied : ' I know, King,' said he — ' I know that you suspect me of
the death of your brother Alfred; but may God, who is true and righteous,
not let this morsel of bread which 1 hold pass my throat without choking me, if
your brother ever underwent death or hurt of his body through me or by my
device !' When he had said this, tlie King blessed the morsel, which Godwine
put in his mouth, and, conscious of his guilt, was choked and died. When the
King saw him de;id and pale, ' Drag out,' said he, ' this dog, and bury him in
the highway, for he is unworthy to have Christian burial !' When his sons,
who were present, saw that, they dragged out their father from the table, and
buried him in the Old Minster of that city, the King knowing nothing at all
about it."
Now the whole Norman account of Godwine is in itself
one of the best specimens of the growth of legend, the par-
ticular course taken by invention being in this case dictated
by political enmity. This whole romance of the death of
I.] IN EARLY ENGLISH HISTORY. 15
Godwine, which William of Malmesbury gives in an inter-
mediate shape, has gathered round the simple fact that the
Earl fell down in a fit while at dinner with the King, and
died four days after. But I am now concerned with it only
as showing that the story of " brother helps brother " was a
current one, ready to be fitted into any place which it would
at all suit. Roger, who gives it in the legend of Godwine,
does not bring it into the legend of -^thelstan, and William,
who gives it in the legend of -^thelstan, does not give
it in the legend of Godwine. The seven years' penance
of ^thelstan also seems borrowed from the seven years'
penance said, with better likelihood of truth, to have been
imposed by Dunstan on Eadgar for the seduction of Wulf-
thryth.
We thus see what the elements of romance really are
which have gathered round a very simple historical fact.
I may add that chronology alone upsets the legend. The
legend connects Eadwine's death with an opposition to
-^thelstan's election to the crown. But ^thelstan was
chosen King in 925, while Eadwine was not drowned till
933. A seven years' penance again, dating from this last
year, would reach to the end of ^thelstan's reign, and
would take in his most important actions.
For ni}^ own part I hold, not only that the details of the
exposure of Eadwine and of the punishment of the cupbearer
are altogether unhistorical — which I suppose few people will
deny — but that there is no evidence at all to connect -^thel-
stan in any way with the death of his brother. But if any one
chooses to accept the Northumbrian statement as historical,
all that I have said will equally apply. The legendary
details will have grown in exactly the same way round an
historical kernel, j ust like the legendary details of the death
of Godwine.
The second story which I have chosen as an illustration of
the romantic element in what passes for our early history is
one which I imagine to be more commonly known than that
16 THE MYTHICAL AND ROMANTIC ELEMENTS [Essay
of the death of Eadwine, namely the legend of Eadgar and
his wife ^Ifthryth, commonly Latinized into iElfrida. This
I cannot do better than introduce with the comments made
on it by Lord Macaulay in the preface to the "Lays of
Ancient Rome : " —
"'History,' says Hume, with the utmost gravity, 'has preserved some
instances of Edgar's amours, from which, as from a specimen, we may form
a conjecture of the rest.' He then tells very agreeal)ly the stories of Elfieda
and Elfrida — two stories which have a most suspicious air of romance, and
which greatly resemble, in their general character, some of the It- gends of early
Home. He cites, as his authority for these two tales, the Clu-onicle of William
of Malmesbury, who lived in the time of King Stephen. Tlie great majority of
readers suppose that the device by which Elfleda was substituted for her young
mistress, the artifice by which Athelwold obtained the hand of Elfrida, the
detection of that artiiice, the hunting-paity, and the vengeance of the amorous
King, are things about which there is no more doubt than about the execution
of Anne Boleyn, or the slitting of Sir John Coventry's nose. But when we
turn to William of Malmesbury, we find that Hume, in his eagerness to relate
these pleasant fables, has overlooked one very important circumstance. William
does indeed tell both the stories ; but he gives distinct notice that he does not
warrant their truth, and that they rest on no better authority than that of
ballads. Such is the way in which these two well-known tales have been
handed down. They originally appeared in a poetical form. They found their
way from ballads into an old chronicle. The ballads perished, the chronicle
remained. A great historian, some centuries after the ballads had been
altogether forgotten, consulted the chronicle. He was struck by the lively
colouring of these ancient fictions ; he transferred them to his pages ; and thus
we find inserted, as imquestionable facts, in a narrative which is likely to last
as long as the English tongue, the inventions of some minstrel whose works
were probably never committed to writing, whose name is buried in oblivion,
and whose dialect has become obsolete."
A professed student of early English history may be a
little amused at finding the work of William of Malmesbury
called a "chronicle," and at finding David Hume spoken of
as " a great historian." But, low as I rate the confused and
rambling narrative of William, he at least stands out here in
honourable contrast to Hume.* The monk of Malmesbury
had some notion of the difference between truth and false-
* [I now rank William of Malmesbury higher than I did. His narrative is
" confused and rambling ; " his neglect of chronoloi,'y makes him most provt)king
to one who consults him ; but no one more commonly gives us two sides of a
story, and no contemporary writer makes, as may be seen iu the extract already
given, a nearer approach to historical criticism.]
I.] IN EARLY ENGLISH HISTORY. 17
hood, between history and legend ; the Scotch philosopher,
it seems, had absolutely none. But the process by which
legend gets transmuted into apparent history could not have
been better described than it is by Lord Macaulay, and he
could not have found better instances to illustrate his posi-
tion. But it is needful to go a little further into the matter
than Lord Macaulay has done. The story, as told by William
of Malmesbury, is not the only form of the legend, and I do
not think that it is the oldest form. It bears signs of being
improved from another still extant version. It is improved
at once by the doing-away of one or two manifest contradic-
tions, and by the introduction of one or two incidents which
are not found in the earlier version, and which, if they
increase the criminal horrors of the story, certainly add to its
poetical effect. But let us first see what the history is. In
the English Chronicles we read, under the year 965 : ^ —
" This year Eadgar King took yElfthryth to him to Queen, She was
Ordgar Ealdorman's daughter."
Florence of Worcester, the best of our Latin writers, the
discreet and careful translator and harmonist of the English
Chronicles, tells us one more circumstance about yElfthryth.
She was the widow of -lEthelwald, Ealdorman of the East-
Angles : —
" Rex Anglorum pacificus Eadgarus Ordgari Ducis Domnaniae filiam, ^If-
thrytham nomine, post mortem viri sui ^thelwaldi, gloriosi Ducis Orien-
talium Anglorum, in matrimonium aecepit."
Henry of Huntingdon, who so often preserves older tradi-
tions, is silent.
Thus far, and it is as far as certain history goes, there is
not the slightest shadow of crime or scandal thrown upon the
matter. The King, himself a widower, marries the daughter
of one of his chief nobles, the widow of another. We know
indeed that the character of neither husband nor wife was
altogether spotless. Eadgar, the lover of the nun f Wulf-
* Florence makes it 964. This difference of a year, owing to imperfect
calculations, is very common.
f It is not perfectly clear whether Wulfthryth was a professed nun, but, at
any rate, the sanctity of the cloister was invaded.
C
18 THE MYTHICAL AND BOJ/A.XTIC ELEMENTS [Essay
thrjd-h, was not absolutely perfect in his relations with
women; and iElfthryth afterwards incurred a suspicion,
amounting almost to certainty, of being concerned in the
death of her stepson Eadward,"^ But, as far as her marriage
goes, there is nothing at all in the recorded history to make
us look on the transaction as being otherwise than regular
and honourable. Yet the mere fact of scandalous stories
arising, if it does not exactly prove anything, at least
awakens our suspicions. And in this case, there is some-
thing like internal evidence for some small part of the
legend. Let us then examine its different versions in detail,
beginning with the familiar story as told by William of
Malmesbury.
Eadgar, according to this legend, hears of the beauty of
Ordgar's daughter, and thinks of marrying her. But he
first sends his confidential favourite ^thelwald to see
whether report spoke truly of her. -i^llthelwald goes to her
father's house, falls in love himself, and marries her, per-
suading the King that she is unworthy of a royal alliance.
After a while Eadgar hears of the deception, and proposes
a visit to ^thelwald. ^thelwald, in his alarm, tells his
wife how he obtained her, and begs her to disguise her
beauty from the King. Instead of so doing she adorns
herself to the utmost of her power. Eadgar becomes en-
amoured, and kills -^thelwald at a hunting-party. He
turns round to -^thelwald's natural son, who happens to
be present, and asks how he likes such a quarry. The
youth answers that whatever pleases the King pleases him.
Eadgar takes him into his special favour, and marries the
widow iElfthryth.
* " Give a dog a bad name and hang him." When ^Ifthryth's character
was damaged in one way, it was easy to make stories to her discredit in
other ways. There is a wild fable in the Ilistor'm JSUensis, about her and
lirihtnoth, Abbot of Ely, in which she is first described as a witch, and then
made to play the part of Zuleikha to the Abbot's Joseph. Of course such
changes are made as were needed to adapt the story to the case of a widow —
for the tale is placed after the death of Eadgar — instead of that of a married
woman.
L] IN EARLY ENGLISH HISTORY. 19
But the story, as told by Geoffrey Gaimar, and in the
Chronicle known as that of Bromton, is widely different.
It is not only told with much greater detail, but it contra-
dicts the other version in some of the essential parts of the
story. Down to the marriage of -^thelwald and iElfthryth
there is no substantial difference. But at that point the
stories part company. Eadgar's visit to ^Ethelwald does
not take place till after ^Elfthryth has borne a son, whom
the King holds at the font, and to whom he gives his own
name, but without having seen his mother, ^thelwald
purposely asks the King to become godfather to the child,
in order that he might thereby contract a spiritual affinity
with the mother. yEthelwald is thus put more at his ease
as to any possible designs on the part of the King, either
on the vii'tue of ^Elfthryth or on his own life. Then comes
the story of the visit, essentially the same as in William's
version, only it is told, by Bromton at least, with much
greater detail, and with a fervid description of the growth
of Eadgar's passion. Eadgar then considers how he may
get rid of iEthelwald by craft. He holds a meeting of his
" parliament " at Salisbury, and, as the Danes had lately
invaded Yorkshire, it is determined to send .^thelwald to
the defence of that country. He is met on the road in
Wherwell Forest by armed men — whether sent by Eadgar
or not, neither Geoffrey nor Bromton ventures to decide —
who kill him. Eadgar marries the widow, contrary to the
canon law, which forbade marriage with the parent of a
godchild. For this he is rebuked by Saint Dunstan,
who pronounces the marriage to be mere adultery, and
requires Eadgar to separate from his wife. So great how-
ever is his love for her that he can never bring himself to
do so.
Let us compare these two stories. The latter, I may re-
mark, though improbable, is just possible, and I suspect that
it contains one little germ of truth which explains how the
whole story arose. The main improbability lies in the
utter misconception of ^thelwald's position, which however
20 THE MYTHICAL AND ROMANTIC ELEMENTS [Essay
would not necessarily involve the falsehood of the rest of
the story, -^thelwald was the son of ^thelstan, the reign-
ing Ealdorman of the East-Angles, and he was associated
with his father in that dignity, one short only of royalty.
In the story he is represented as a needy adventurer, glad
to marry the daughter of the rich Ordgar, and when married,
he lives in Devonshire, with or near his father-in-law."^
The deception and the visit are of course just possible,
though we may safely set them aside as mere romance.
But the birth of the child to whom the King is godfather,
the essential point of difference between this version and
the other, is much more likely to contain a germ of truth.
That the marriage of Eadgar and ^Elfthryth was in some
way uncanonical, and brought husband and wife under
Dunstan's rebuke, is perfectly probable, and it is not the
Bort of thing which a mere minstrel would invent. On the
other hand, it might be thought that we have here some
confusion between ^Elfthryth and Wulfthryth, and that
the legend-maker was thinking of the penance imposed
on Eadgar by Dunstan for the sacrilegious abduction of
a consecrated virgin. But I think that in this breach of
canonical rule we shall find the real germ of truth in the
story. The way in which the tale goes on is very remark-
able. The narrator clearly has the story of David and
Uriah in his head, and to make the parallel complete, he
ought to kill -^thelwald by the sword of the Danes. But
he stops short in a most lame and impotent way, killing
him on the road to his new government, and not venturing
to say whether those who killed him were the King's agents
or not. It strikes me that a piece of genuine history or
tradition stood in the way of the original romance. Let
us suppose that ^thclwald really was murdered by some
* Neither Geoffrey Gaimar nor William of Malmesbury makes any allusion
to ^thelwald being Ealdorman of the Eaat- Angles. Bromton makes him at
once the King's secretary and Ealdorman of the East-Angles, and makes him
talk of himself as a poor man to whom a rich marriage was desirable. Of
course the oris^inal legend knew nothing of his dignity, but Bromton put in the
title of Ealdorman without thinking of the contradiction.
1.] Us' EARLY ENGLISH HISTORY. 21
unknown persons, and that Eadgar married the widow in
breach of some canonical restriction,"^ and we have the germ
round which the whole story grew. By a supposition of this
kind we get at the origin of the legend, which otherwise is
puzzling. If there were nothing remarkable about the
marriage, whence all this talk about it 1 If ^thelwald
died a violent death, and if the marriage of his widow was
uncanonical, though there would be no proof at all of any
criminality on the part of Eadgar and Jj^lfthryth beyond the
mere breach of the canon law, there would be quite enough
to set slanderous tongues on imagining moral aggravations
of their formal offence.
If this be so, we have, just as in the case of Eadwine, a
germ of truth round which a certain portion of fabulous
matter has gathered. It is almost necessary to suppose
something of the kind to account for the existence of the
legend at all. In the case of Eadwine, the manner of his
death, as recorded in the Chronicles, suggested the tale of
his exposure ; but in the simple record of the marriage of
Eadgar and ^Ifthryth there is nothing to suggest any one
feature of the tale. I think then that we may assume a
violent death of -^thelwald and an uncanonical remarriage
of his widow as almost certain. To this germ of truth the
fii-st romantic nari-ative added the story of the deception of
Eadgar by iEthelwald and the visit of the King to ^If-
thryth. The next stage took a much gi-eater liberty with
the facts. The story now probably got into other hands.
The tale in Bromton has an ecclesiastical tone about it : it
turns on a breach of canonical rule, and one object of it is
to set forth the holy courage of Dunstan in rebuking a royal
offender. As a mere story, it is but a lame one : iEthelwald
* It would be simpler and more natural to suppose a marriage entered into
■with indecent haste after the death of the first husband. But there is reason
to believe that two or three years passed between the death of ^thelwald and
the marriage of his widow. Up to 962 ^thelwald signs charters in company
with his father yEthelstan ; in that year he ceases to do so, and his brother
^thelwine takes his place. It is therefore almost certain that .<3Ethelwald
died in 962.
22 THE MYTHICAL AND ROMANTIC ELEMENTS [Essay
is killed somehow, but the tale-teller does not know exactly
how : he suspects the King, but he does not venture directly
to accuse him. This is a state of mind which in an historian
is often highly praiseworthy, but« it is not one suited to
produce any very effective romantic narrative. The tale
next fell into the hands of some one who did not care about
the credit of Saint Dunstan, and who was not thinking of
David and Uriah. It manifestly was far more effective to
make Eadgar kill iEthelwald with his own hand. There
are many stories of people being killed at hunting-parties,
and indeed a hunting-party is brought in among the details
given by Bromton, though nobody is killed at it. The
murder at the hunting-party was thus suggested. But this
was not all. The story of Kambyses and Praixaspes in
Herodotus stood ready to be worked in. I do not mean
either that the English minstrel had read Herodotus, or
that ho knew anything about Praixaspes from any other
source. I only mean that a tale, forming part of the com-
mon fund of romantic tales, which the informants of Hero-
dotus had ages before shaped into one form, was now shaped
into one slightly different. In Herodotus the tyrant shoots
the son, and calls on the father to admire his archery. In
the legend of Eadgar father and son necessarily change
places. Now that the tale had reached the dignity of an
unmistakable murder, the mere breach of canonical order
was left out, or became quite secondary. But the new ver-
sion borrowed one important feature from the old. The son
of iEthelwald, whom Eadgar afterwards loved so dearly,
was surely, in the first form of this second version, the
young Eadgar, the son of iElfthryth, the King's own godson
and stepson. Lastly, William of Malmesbury, or those
whom he immediately followed, saw the absurdity of
bringing in a son of ^Ifthiyth's of an age to speak and
act. They therefore made the youth, not a son of M\i-
thryth, but a bastard of ^thclwald by some unknown
mother. The stoiy of the birth of young Eadgar, and of
the spiritual affinity between his mother and the King, was
I.] IX EARLY ENGLISH HISTORY. 23
now simply in the way, and, not being very capable of
poetical treatment, it was left out altogether. In short,
while the first version of the legend still retains a certain
kernel of truth, the second is simply fabulous throughout.
New imaginary incidents have been introduced, and the
little truth which remained has been turned out to make
way for them.
One or two features may be noticed in both versions which
illustrate the feelings of the time, or possibly point to a
traditional conception of the personal character of Eadgar.
^thelwald's delight in his fancied security, when he has
succeeded in placing the bar of spiritual affinity between the
King and his wife, points to an age, or to a character, which
looked on the breach of a petty canonical restriction as a
greater crime than adultery or murder. Till that point is
made safe, ^thelwald feels no security that Eadgar will not
seduce his wife or murder him for her sake. But he thinks
that he will most likely have a scruple about either seducing
or marrying the mother of his godson. On the other hand,
in neither version does Eadgar, enamoured as he is — and
Bromton's version helps us to all the details of an ex-
travagant passion — make any attempt to corrupt the virtue
of -^Ifthryth while she is the wife of ^Ethelwald. His first
thought seems to be, not to make iElfthryth his mistress,
but to get rid of iEthelwald and marry his widow. Eadgar
is, in short, set before us as a character something like
Henry the Eighth, as one who feels more scruple at adultery
than he feels at murder, and who is expected to feel more
scruple at an uncanonical marriage than he feels at adultery.
That is to say, a breach of Divine law is more serious in his
eyes than a breach of natural justice, and a breach of human
law is more serious than a breach of Divine law. We have
no reason to say that such was the real character of Eadgar,
but it was a caricature very hkely to be drawn by the enemies
of a prince who was so zealous in enforcing the observance
of canonical restrictions. It would have been a triumph
indeed to represent the great champion of clerical celibacy
24 THE MYTHICAL AND ROMANTIC ELEMENTS [Essay
as a murderer and adulterer, after the pattern of David.
But it was a still greater triumph to describe him, either in
fiction or in real history, as himself breaking a canonical
restriction of the same class as that which he was foremost
in imposing on others.
Such are the two legends which I have chosen out of
many others to illustrate the nature, origin, and growth of
romantic fiction. Each of them has its special value for my
purpose. In the story of Eadwine we see how the fiction
was suggested by the real history as we find it recorded.
In the story of iElfthryth, we see how the germ of truth,
which the recorded history has failed to preserve, is to be
found by internal evidence in the details of the legend itself.
The story of iElfthryth also, being happily preserved in two
quite distinct versions, helps us to trace out in a more dis-
tinct way how tales of this sort grew, how each stage
brought in fresh imaginary details, and still further con-
cealed the truth which lay at the kernel. It is also a good
illustration of the great rule for testing two contradictory
stories. If, supposing A to be true, we cannot account for
the origin of B, while, supposing B to be true, we cannot ac-
count for the origin of A, we have found an argument almost
approaching to certainty in favour of the truth of A. This
rule applies equally to real and to fictitious narratives.
When it is applied to two statements, each claiming to be
historical, it determines A to be the true account, and B to
be pseudo-\i\QioviQ.3i\. When it is applied to two romantic
statements, it does not indeed prove that A is historically
true, but it proves that it possesses a kind of relative truth.
It shows that it is an older form of the fiction than B, and
one therefore likely to depart less widely from historical
truth.-^
Having thus, as I hope, done enough to set forth and
illustrate the nature of what I call the romantic element in
• [I have struck out a paragraph here in which I found that it was my own
geography that was in fault. i8S6.]
I.] IX EARLY ENGLISH HISTORY. 25
our early history, I will now argue backward from the better
known to the less known, and endeavour to set forth the
nature of what I distinguish from it as the vii/thical Qlevaeni.
In a mythical narrative, as it appears to me, we may fairly
expect to find the same sort of elements of truth which we
find in the romantic narrative, though we are not able to test
the mythical narratives in the same convincing way. A
mythical narrative, as I hold, stands to genuine tradition in
the same relation in which a romantic narrative stands to
recorded history. If out of such a mythical narrative we
succeed in disentangling the element of genuine tradition,
we reach something which I hold to be essentially of the
same nature as recorded history, though infinitely inferior
in degree.
By mythical stories then, as distinguished from romantic
stories, I understand tales in which, as being placed before
the beginnings of recorded history, we cannot fix the re-
spective amounts of truth and falsehood from direct evidence.
In examining such stories as those with which we have just
been dealing, we are in a position to affirm some facts, and
to deny others, with as full confidence as we can affirm and
deny anything which does not come within the range of our
own personal knowledge. Much may be left doubtful, which
we do not venture positively either to assert or to deny ;
but the state of historical certainty, the possibility of con-
fident assertion and confident denial, is matter of constant
occurrence. That Eadgar married ^Ethelwald's widow we
may positively assert ; that Eadgar slew ^thelwald with
his own hand we may positively deny. That iEthelwald
met with a violent death, that Eadgar was godfather to a
son of JEthelwald and -^Ifthryth, are assertions which are
highly probable, aU but certain, but still assertions which
we do not make with perfect confidence. We know the
value of the evidence, internal and external, for every part
of the story. But when we come to a mythical tale, a tale
whose scene is laid in a time of which we have no recorded
history, we cannot test its component elements in the same
26 THE MYTHICAL AND ROMANTIC ELEMENTS [Essay
way. On the mere strength of the tale itself, we may often
positively deny, but we can never positively affirm. The
furthest point that we can reach is that the internal evi-
dence for some statements renders them highly probable ;
but we cannot get beyond such probability, unless the
mythical statement is confirmed by external evidence of
some sort or other. For it must be remembered that ex-
ternal evidence is often to be had, even for times before
wiitten history ; I mean evidence of the antiquarian class
in its various forms, buildings, barrows, sepulchral remains,
philological evidence derived from language and local no-
menclature. All this is just as much direct evidence as
the statements of chronicles and charters,'^ and, compared
with evidence of that class, it has some advantages and
some disadvantages. Written evidence may, after all, not
be trustworthy; the author may have been misinformed,
or he may have wilfully perverted the truth ; or again, he
may be both honest and well-informed, but we may misin-
terpret his testimony. In the case of antiquarian evidence
this latter source of error is greatly increased, while the
former source is altogether taken away. We are more
liable to misunderstand the evidence supplied by a sepul-
chral barrow than we are to misunderstand the evidence
supplied by a written document ; but then the written
document may err or may lie, the sepulchral barrow can
neither err nor lie. In inquiries of this kind we must be
constantly on our guard against our own misinterpretations,
but we need stand in no fear of error or deception on the
part of our informants. Or again, what is an age of re-
corded history for one nation is an age before recorded
history for another, so that casual allusions in writers of
other nations may also be taken as conclusive external
evidence. The two or three references in Greek writers to
the mythical period of Roman history, the two or three
* Coins and inscriptions are strictly written documents, differing from
clironinles and charters only in their material. In fact, they go some way to
combine the advantages of both species of evidence.
L] IN EAELY ENGLISH HISTORY. 27
references in Byzantine writers to the mythical period of
English history, so far as they fall in with the mythical
tales, form corroborative evidence for those tales. But,
without corroborative evidence of one or other of these
kinds, no statement during mythical times can get beyond
probability. The distinct, probable, and uncontradicted
statement of a contemporary chronicle we accept as certain
truth ; but a statement, however distinct, probable and un-
contradicted, relating to times before recorded history, we
do not accept as more than probable, unless it be confirmed
by some evidence of another kind.
The point then at which I part company with Mr. Grote
is this. Mr. Grote has done excellent service by utterly
upsetting the old pragmatizing way of dealing with my-
thical stories. No one can any longer venture, as so many
have done from Thucydides onwards, to take a poetical
tale, to strip it of its impossible elements, to turn it by an
arbitrary process into something which may have happened,
and then, without any further evidence, to give it out as
something which did happen. That Achilleus killed Hektor
by the personal help of Athene we all agree in disbe-
lieving; but to leave Athene out, and to give it forth as an
historical fact that Achilleus killed Hektor without the
help of Athene, is utterly unphilosophical. One statement
is impossible ; the other is perfectly possible ; but there is
no more evidence for one than for the other. Thus far I
heartily go along with Mr. Grote ; but I cannot go on with
him to say that every attempt to extract truth, or even
probability, from mythical stories is only time thrown
away. I believe that by other processes, by the processes
at which I have already hinted, a good deal may be re-
covered which is highly probable, something which is all
but certain. I am led to this belief by an argument from
analogy. I argue from the known to the unknown ; I
employ pur knowledge of the way in which we know
that romantic stories were formed, to help us to the way in
which it is probable that the mythical stories were formed.
28 THE MYTHICAL AND BOMANTIC ELEMENTS [Essay
We have seen then that the makers of romantic lesjends
did not purely and wholly invent. There is a kernel of
truth at the bottom of their stories. A real action of a real
person is distorted, exaggerated, incrusted with all kinds of
fictitious details, details sometimes transferred to a wrong
person, or to a wrong time or place ; but we see that a real
action of a real person did form the groundwork, after all.
The Charlemagne of romance departs so utterly from the
Karl of history that we seem to be dealing with two different
persons. The actions of Charlemagne are, for the most part,
purely imaginary, and, when they are grounded on any real
actions of Karl, those actions are so perverted as to seem
hardly the same. The character of Charlemagne is not the
character of the historical Karl ; the person of Charlemagne
is made up by taking Karl as the groundwork, and throw-
ing in all kinds of elements, earlier and later. His very
nationality is mistaken ; the greatest of Germans has be-
come the national hero of a people who in his age had no
national speech or national being, and whose land he knew
only as a province of his German kingdom. Still even in
the legend of Charlemagne there is a groundwork of real
history. It preserves a memory of the time when a single
Emperor reigned over all Western Europe. Here is a fact
which we should hardly have guessed from later history,
but which the legend of Charlemagne preserves no less than
the history of Karl. Again, some of the utterly fabulous
exploits of Charlemagne, though they have no groundwork
in the history of Karl, have a groundwork in the history of
other people. The ally of Haroun, the political lover of
Eirene, never. led armies against Jerusalem or Constanti-
nople. But later heroes did ; and the fact that the legends
carry Charlemagne to Constantinople and Jerusalem would,
of itself, almost be enough to prove the reality of some ex-
peditions to those cities. When a crusade was the type of
heroism, when Charlemagne was the type of a hero, it was
assumed that so great a hero must have gone on a crusade,
and a crusade was accordingly invented for him. But such
I.] IN EARLY ENGLISH HISTORY. 29
an invention could have been made only in an age to which
real crusades were familiar ; it is therefore in itself a wit-
ness to the historical truth of some crusades, though not of
the particular crusade spoken of. Again, though doubtless
many of the minor actors in the legend are purely fictitious,
some are not. Eoland is such a pure hero of romance that
we might easily fancy that he never existed. But two
lines of Eginhard preserve to us the fact that Roland was
a real man, and that his famous legendary death is a very
easy perversion of his historical death. He did die in
Pyrensean warfare, though in warfare waged not against
Saracens, but against Gascons."^ Now it seems to me that
legends of this sort, which we can test by real history, give
us a key to the amount of truth likely to be found in those
legends which we cannot test in the same way. Arguing
from the known to the unknown, I should expect to find
about the same amount of truth in the legend of the Trojan
war which I find in the legend of Charlemagne. The legend
of Charlemagne, amidst infinite perversions, preserves a
certain groundwork of real history. I should expect to
find in the legend of Agamemnon a similar groundwork of
real history. There is of course the all-important difier-
ence, that we can test the one story, and that we cannot
test the other, by the certain evidence of contemporary
documents. This gives us certainty in one case, while we
cannot get beyond high probability in the other. But,
pursuing the analogy, let us see what amount of probability
there is in the Trojan story. Later Grecian history would
never lead us to believe that there had once been a single
dynasty reigning, if not as sovereigns, at least as suzerains,
over a large portion of insular and peninsular Greece. So
later mediseval history would never lead us to believe that
there had once been a Latin or Teutonic Emperor whose
* Eginhard, Vita Karoli. c. 9 : " In quo prcelio Eggihardus regise menste
prsepositus, Anselmus comes palatii, et Sruodlamlus Brittannici limitis prce-
fedus, cum aliis compluribus interficiuntur." This is, I believe, the whole of
the authentic history of Roland.
30 THE MYTHICAL AND ROMANTIC ELEMENTS [Essay
dominions stretched from the Eider to the Ebro. But we
know that the Carolingian legend is thus far confirmed by
history; there is therefore no a priori objection to the ana-
logous features of the Pelopid legend. The truth is that the
idea of such an extensive dominion would not have occurred
to a later romancer, unless some real history or tradition
had suggested it to him. So again, without some such
groundwork of history or tradition, no one would have
fixed upon Mykene, a place utterly insignificant in later
history, as the capital of this extensive empire. The
romances have transferred the capital of Karl from Aachen
to Paris ; had it really been Paris, no one would have trans-
ferred it to Aachen. To have quartered the Bretwalda of
Hellas at Argos or Sparta would have been the natural
course of perversion ; to quarter him at Mykene could have
been done only under the influence of a genuine tradition.
And that tradition again is confirmed by those striking an-
tiquarian remains which show by indisputable evidence that
Mykene really was in early times a far more important city
than it appears in later history. Whether Agamemnon be
a real man or not, the combination of intei-nal and external
evidence leads us to set down the Pelopid dynasty at Mykene
as an established fact. Again, one can hardly doubt that
the war of Troy is a mythical version of some part or other
of the warfare which gradually Hellcnizcd the north-west
coast of Asia. The warfare of Agamemnon in the Troad
may be as imaginary as the warfare of Karl at Jerusalem,
because, if Agamemnon was a great traditional name,
legend -makers would, at a time when Grecian imagination
was filled by schemes of conquest in Asia, be as sure to
carry him thither as Karl was sure to be carried to Jeru-
salem. But a false crusade implies a real crusade, and
mythical warfare in the Troad points to that real warfare
there which we know, from the results of the case, must
have taken place. The Greek chief who conquered Lesbos
may, or may not, have been named Achilleus ; but some
Greek chief must have conquered Lesbos ; and, with the
I.] IN EARLY ENGLISH HISTORY. 31
example of a real Roland before our eyes, we may be in-
clined to say that the chances are stronger that he was
named Achilleus than that he was not. I could mention
many other portions of the Trojan story which seem to me
to have such a measure of evidence, internal or external, as
to enable us to set them down as, if not certain, at least
probable in a very high degree. But I hope to discuss the
matter more at length in another work ; at present I have
only referred to the main outline of one of the most familiar
of mythical narratives in order to show the sort of amount
and kind of truth which we are likely to find in any
mythical narrative.
The truth, as it appears to me, is that the difference
between romantic and mythical narratives, as I defined
them at starting, is simply a difference in the degree of our
knowledge of them, not a difference in the nature of the
tales themselves. We can test the one class in detail, and
we cannot so test the other ; but each class seems really to
consist of exactly the same elements. In both alike there
is an element of truth and an element of imagination. A
romantic narrative we can commonly compare with an
historical narrative of the same event, and we can thereby
disentangle the several elements of which it is made up.
So, in dealing with a mythical narrative, if we can, by any
sort of evidence, external or internal, distinguish the ele-
ment of genuine tradition from the poetical or imaginative
element, we are doing what is virtually the same thing.
We are too often apt to confound these two elements in a
mythical story, and to forget that tradition is really a means
of information essentially of the same kind as history.
Each alike intends or professes to hand down a true state-
ment of facts ; only one works with a very imperfect in-
strument, the other with a much more perfect one. History,
in short, is written tradition, and tradition is oral history.
History and tradition, as having the same object, the pre-
servation of a true account of past times, form one class, as
opposed to mere poetical or romantic tales to which the
32 THE MYTHICAL AND ROMANTIC ELEMENTS [Essay
truth or falsehood of statements is indifferent. The differ-
ence between such tales and either history or tradition is a
difference of kind, while the difference between history and
tradition themselves is only a difference of degree. Tradi-
tion has the same objects as history, but it is a much ruder
instrument for attaining those objects. It is far more open
to corruption, both accidental and wilful ; it is far more
liable to be mixed up with mythical or romantic additions.
In many cases it exists only in combination with such ad-
ditions, and it has to be disentangled from them how it can,
while history commonly exists in an independent and
parallel shape. It is therefore by no means so easy to
get at genuine tradition as to get at genuine history, and,
when we have got at it, it is by no means worthy of the
same undoubting acceptance. In short, its inferiority in
degree as compared with history is almost infinite ; all that
I assert is the absolute identity in kind of the two sources
of information. The oral statement of an eyewitness is as
trustworthy as his written statement ; the only difference
is that the oral statement is much more likely to be cor-
rupted by the various mouths through which it afterwards
passes. But such a statement, however much corrupted,
still differs in kind from the mere romantic tale. The dis-
tinction was observed long ago by Herodotus, who remarks
on the widely different versions as to certain points in the
half-mythical history of Peloponnesos, as they were told in
the songs of the poets and as they were told in the native
traditions of Sparta.^
To get then at genuine tradition is a difficult matter;
and the genuine tradition, when it is got at, is only a very
imperfect form of history. Still I maintain that it is an
imperfect form of history, and that, as such, it is entitled to
a certain measure of respect. But to entitle it to such
respect it must be genuine tradition. It must not be a
romantic legend cut down into prose. It must not be
* Herod, vi. 52 : Kaict^aifjLuvioi yap, u/xoKoyfouTfs ovBfyl iroitjTfi, Ktyovat.
ic. T. A.
I.] 7.y EARLY ENGLISH HISTORY. 33
later inference or invention or imitation. For instance, I
look on the War of Thebes, the War of Troy, the Dorian
Migration, as all pieces of genuine tradition, as far as
concerns the essence of the story, however mythical every
detail may be. The first of the three is cast so far back
into mythical darkness that we cannot accept a single
detail, so far back that even for the main story there is only
the faintest shadow of probability. In the War of Troy we
can discern the historical event of which the story is a
legendary representation ; and we here and there meet with
details which are capable of such an amount of corrobora-
tion of one kind or another as to clothe them with the
highest degree of probability. The Dorian Migration is all
but historical, and the most sceptical historians admit the
main story as true. Doubtless in all three the mythical or
romantic element is very strong ; but then that element
lives on to a much later stage of Grecian history, and is by
no means wanting even in the narrative of the Persian
War.'^ On the other hand, tales about Keki-ops coming
from Egypt are not traditions, or even myths, but inferences
from a theory. The legend of Aineias coming into Italy is,
as far as we can see, a bit of genuine tradition ; that is,
there seems no ground for supposing it to be mere inference
or invention. But it must be an inaccurate tradition,
because it contradicts another tradition which has strong
corroborative evidence.f But the catalogue of Alban kings
in Livy is pure invention. It is made up to cover over
a chronological difficulty which showed itself when men
began to affix dates to the legends. The elder story made
Aineias the father or grandfather of Romulus. Put when
the fall of Troy got a date, and when the foundation
* See Cox's Tale of the Great Persian War, p. 112.
•f- I refer to the passages in Homer which distinctly speak of an Aineiad
dynasty as reining in the Troad, and which have been often quoted to show
that a dynasty descended, or claiming to be descended, from Aineias, was
actually reit;ning there in the time of the poet. To me this inference seems as
certain as any mere inference can be. See Iliad, xx. 307. Cf. Hymn to
Aphrodite, 197, 198.
D
31 rilE MYTHICAL AXD ROMANTIC ELEMENTS [Essay
of Rome got a date, it was seen that the founder of Rome
could not, according to the received chronology, be the son
or grandson of a fugitive from Troy. A series of names
was therefore invented to fill up the gap. So the whole
series of Attic legends is full of mere invention of this kind.
So again, while the Trojan origin of Rome is apparently a
genuine tradition, the Trojan origin of Briton and Frank is
mere imitative invention. A Trojan descent was the right
thing for a distinguished nation, and it was invented accord-
ingly, just as pedigree-mongers nowadays invent pedigrees,
Norman,Welsh,or Scotch, according to taste. Human nature
and human vanity are the same in all times and places, and
rubbish of this sort, however ancient, must be carefully
distinguished from those orenuine traditions which are an
inferior form of history.
Again, I must here repeat a remark with which I started,
namely, that I draw a much wider distinction than the
Comparative Mythologists seem disposed to allow between
theological and historical myths. Legends of the gods and
legends of the heroes undoubtedly run into one another in
such a way that it is not always easy to draw an accurate
line between them. Still the two things are essentially
distinct. Tales about Zeus and Woden, and tales about
Achilleus and Hengest, seem to me to be altogether different
in kind. The former class are theological, physical, what
we please, anything but historical. The latter have at least
the form of history, and it is worth inquiring in each case
whether they contain any measure of its substance. The
doctrines of all religions must largely take the form of
facts ; but purely theological facts, true or false, do not
come within the range of history, and they are seldom
capable of historical proof or disproof That Zeus deposed
his father Kronos, that Loki brought about the death of
Balder, arc propositions altogether beyond the range of
history ; their examination belongs to another science.
But that Achilleus conquered Lesbos and Hypoplakian
Thebes, that Hengest and Horsa founded the first Euglish
I.] IN EARLY ENGLISH HISTORY. 35
kingdom in Britain, are propositions essentially of the same
class as the propositions that Henry the Fifth conquered at
Agincourt and that Edward the First massacred the Welsh
bards. Of these last propositions we know one to be true
and the other to be false. The propositions about Achil-
leus and Hengest we cannot so undoubtingly accept or
reject ; but the difference is not in the nature of the propo-
sitions themselves, but in the difference of our means of
testing them. But the strictly theological propositions of
either a true or a false religion we deal with in a dif-
ferent way. In the words of Scripture, we walk in the
one case by faith (or its opposite), in the other case by
sight.
I have but little space left to illustrate, in the purely
mythical history of England, the principles of mythical
interpretation which I have been trying to lay down. But
take, for instance, the story of Hengest. As there is an
historical Eadgar and a romantic Eadgar, so is there a
traditional Hengest and a mythical Hengest. The personal
existence of Hengest is doubtful ; that is to say, it is
doubtful whether the founder of the Kentish kingdom bore
the name of Hengest.* The name has a mythical air ; but
as men have been called Wolf and Bear and Lion, a man
may also have been called Horse. The name may be
merely a mythical expression of the national standard, or
a chieftain may really have been called after the national
standard. Hengest again is undoubtedly a mythical hero,
and the different versions of his origin and exploits cannot
be made to agree. But it is possible, on the one hand, that
a real conqueror of Kent may have become a hero of
Teutonic minstrelsy, and may thus have gathered a mythical
reputation round him ; it is possible, on the other hand,
that the conquest of Kent may have been mythically
attributed to a favourite hero of legend. All this is utterly
doubtful. But beyond this we get matter which we can
much more positively accept and much more positively
[* I now see no reason to doubt the real existence of Hengest.]
D 2
36 THE MYTHICAL AND ROMANTIC ELEMENTS [Essay
deny. That about the time when Hengest is said to have
lived, certain Teutonic conquerors began — most undoubt-
edly not the first Teutonic incursion into Britain, possibly
not the first Teutonic settlement in Britain — but the first
pure and self-existent Teutonic kingdom, the first Teutonic
settlement after the Roman power was withdrawn, the first
Teutonic settlement which involved, whether by extirpation
or assimilation, the utter driving out of the earlier British
and Roman elements — all this is not indeed directly proved
by contemporary evidence, but it is asserted by an evidently
genuine tradition, and it is borne out by all the later
phaenomena of English history. The Chronicles give us a
narrative which is, in the main, perfectly credible, and most
of which is evidently genuine tradition — tradition, it may
be, assisted by some rude artificial helps to memory, such
as have existed among many nations. The invitation of
Vortigern looks as if it had come in from a Welsh source ;
but even here there is nothinsf incredible in the main tale
itself; it only wants evidence. A British prince, like a
Roman Emperor or an Abbasside Caliph, may have taken
barbarian mercenaries into his pay ; they may have turned
against him, and may have invited fresh hordes of their
brethren. But the details of this story, as given in one
version of the Chronicles, are certainly mythical, and though
the main story itself is possible, yet I suspect that the whole
tale is a bit of Welsh romance which has found its way into
the English Chronicles. But what follows, namely the
meagre details of the conquest of Kent, is surely genuine
tradition, and it is, allowing perhaps for an artificial com-
putation of years, as trustworthy as any tradition can be.
The Chronicles confine the conquest of Hengest to Kent,
and they give us nothing but what is credible and probable.
But in Nennius we begin to get mythical details which are
unknown in the earlier version ; Hengest's daughter,* for
* Is it possible, however, that even in this wihl story an element of truth
may lurk ? In most tales the stranger marries the daughter of the native
prince; here the native prince mairies the daughter of the stranger. Does
I.J IN EARLY ENGLISH HISTORY. 37
instance, is now introduced, though her name of Rowena"^
is as yet unheard of. When we come to Geoffrey of Mon-
mouth we get a whole tissue of pure myth, working in all
kinds of wonders and stereotyped fables, till there arises a
mythical Hengest as different from the traditional Hengest
as the romantic Charlemagne is from the historical Karl.
Yet it is worth notice that, even among these tales, a bit
of probable history peeps out. Nennius, like our own
Chronicles, confines Hengest himself to Kent ; but he makes
two chieftains of his house, Octha and Ebissa, conquer and
settle far to the north, on the confines of the Picts. We find
nothing of this in the Chronicles, nor is there any entry at
all about the North of England till, in 547, the accession of
Ida the Angle to the Northumbrian crown is recorded. It
is the first recorded Northumbrian event, but it is recorded
in a way which shows that Ida, though the founder of the
subsequent Northumbrian kingdom, was not the first Teutonic
settler in that part of Britain. This earlier settlement of
Octha and Ebissa just fills up the gap, and fills it up in the
most unsuspicious way. It appears again in a somewhat
different, but perfectly probable, form in William of Malmes-
bury and Henry of Huntingdon. They make Ida the first
King of the Northumbrians, the settlement having been
originally made by chiefs who took no higher title than
that of Ealdormen. And if we can suppose a distinctively
Saxon settlement in the north, before the establishment of
Ida and his Angles, one or two points in the later history of
Northumberland would be cleared up. Hengest indeed and
his followers are not called Saxons, but Jutes : but I suspect
that the ethnical connexion between Jutes and Saxons was
closer than that between either and the Angles.
not this typify the probable fact that the English settlers, to a great extent at
least, bfought their women with them, in short, that our settlement in Britain
was a strictly national migration ? [The researches of Dr. Eolleston have set
this matter beyond doubt. He has seen our Teutonic grandmothers.] [1872]
* It is amusing to find this purely fictitious name, which is nowhere found
in real history, assumed by novelists and newspaper-writers as the typical name
of an Englishwoman before the Norman Conquest.
38 TUE MYTHICAL AND ROMANTIC ELEMENTS [Essay
The mythical history of England, that namely which we
have no direct means of testing, lasts down to the conversion
of the English to Christianity, about one hundred and fifty
years after the time assigned to Hengest. But I can call it
mythical only in the sense that it does not, as far as we
know, rest on contemporary written evidence. Some names
and dates may be doubtful, but I have no doubt that the
main story represents a genuine and trustworthy tradi-
tion, perhaps, as I before hinted, assisted by some means of
artificial memory. The more the details of the story are
examined by antiquarian and philological tests, the more
clearly does the general truth of the narrative come out.
No doubt we have here the great advantage that we are
dealing with the very last stage of a mythical period, when
the first twilight of proper history is beginning to dawn.
We are dealing with a period analogous, not to the War
of Thebes, or even to the War of Troy, but to the Dorian
Migration and the Wars of Messene. When I find that the
boundary of my own parish and my own property coin-
cides, after thirteen hundred years, with the boundary
assigned by two independent inquirers,^ following two
distinct lines of investigation, to the conquests of the
West-Saxon Ceawlin in 577, I cannot say that I find
myself inclined to the over-sceptical way of judging of
these matters.
Once more, in all these inquiries our one object is truth —
truth to be sought after at all hazards, at whatever sacrifice
of preconceived opinions, whether they take the form of per-
sonal theories or of national prejudices. Historical criticism
requires us to give up many^ beliefs to which we are naturally
attached, but it in no way interferes with our artistic enjoy-
ment of romantic stories, and it gives us, above all things,
the one jewel — truth. And happily, in early English history
at least, the substitution of history for legend almost always
tends to exalt instead of to depreciate the ancient heroes of
our land. It is something to find in real history that iElfred
* Dr. Guest and the late Rev. Francis Warre.
I.] IS EARLY ENGLISH HISTORY. 39
was as great and good, and that most of his successors were
greater and better than they appear in legend. It is some-
thing to find, as we do iSnd, in the pages of real history,
that ^thelstan was not a fratricide ; that Eadgar was not
one of the basest of murderers ; that God wine was a patriot
and not a traitor; that Harold was no usurper, but the
noblest of Englishmen, the true choice of every English
heart ; it is something to find elements of greatness and
even of goodness in the awful portrait of his mighty rival ;
to see in Henry of Anjou and in Thomas of Canterbury
men both of whom had a zeal for God, though it was for
God alone to say whose zeal was according to knowledge ; ^
to see in Simon of Montfort no selfish and crafty rebel, but
the combined saint and hero and statesman to whom we
owe our freedom ; to see in the great Edward no reckJess
invader of other men's rights, but the wise and just and
merciful assertor of his own. For truths like these it is
worth while to surrender a few pleasant fables ; but on the
other hand, we must beware lest sound criticism degenerate
into indiscriminate scepticism. We have seen, I think, that
the probability is in favour of any mythical narrative being
founded on a groundwork of truth. To distinguish truth
and falsehood amid such darkness needs great caution, and
a constant check upon the temptation of fancy. But I
believe that the task is not impossible, and that antiquarian
and philological research opens to us the means of testing
many a tale which at first sight appears to be hopelessly
beyond our power of examining, and of showing that much
which appears to be the merest fiction, may really contain
no small element of genuine truth.
* I borrow the expression of Thomas's friend and biographer, Herbert of
Eosham : "Certo enim certiiis quod uterque Dei habuerit semulationem, unus
pro populo, alter vero pro clero; utrius tainen eorum fuerit cum scientia zelus,
non hominis qui cito fallitur, sed scientiarum Domini qui in fine declarabit
judicium." Vita S. Thoma9, iii. 18 (p. 109, Giles). The whole passage, from
which I have made only a short extract, is very remarkable.
40 THE CONTINUITY OF ENGLISH HISTORY. [Essay
II.
THE CONTINUITY OF ENGLISH HISTORY *
A COMPARISON between the histories of England, France,
and Germany, as regards their political developement.
would be a subject well worth working out in detail.
Each country started with much that was common to all
three, while the separate course of each has been wholly
different. The distinctive character of English history is
its continuity. No broad gap separates the present from
the past. If there is any point at which a line between
the present and the past is to be drawn, it is at all events
not to be drawn at the point where a superficial glance
might perhaps induce us to draw it, at the Norman in-
vasion in 1066. At first sight that event might seem to
separate us from all before it in a way to which there is
no analogy in the history either of our own or of kindred
lands. Neither France nor Germany ever saw any event
to be compared to the Norman Conquest. Neither of them
has ever received a permanent dynasty of foreign kings ;
neither has seen its lands divided among the soldiers of
a foreign army, and its native sons shut out from every
position of wealth or dignity. England, alone of the three,
has undergone a real and permanent foreign conquest.
One might have expected that the greatest of all possible
historical chasms would have divided the ages before and
the ages after such an event. Yet in truth modern England
has practically far more to do with the England of the
* [This was originally a review of Dr. Vanghan's work called Revolutions
in English History, and the former part of the article consisted mainly of minute
criticism on the book. I'.ut the latter part was of more general interest, and
Beemed worth j)reserving. ]
II.] THE CONTINUITY OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 41
West-Saxon kings than modern France or Germany has to
do with the Gaul and Germany of Charles the Great, or
even of much more recent times. The England of the age
before the Norman Conquest is indeed, in all external
respects, widely removed from us. But the England of
the age immediately succeeding the Norman Conquest is
something more widely removed still. The age when
Englishmen dwelt in their own land as a conquered race,
when England was counted for little more than an acces-
sion of power to the Duke of Rouen in his struggle with
the Kinof of Paris, is an age than which we can conceive
none more alien to every feeling and circumstance of our
own. When then did the England in which we still live
and move have its beginning"? Where are we to draw
the broad line, if any line is to be drawn, between the
present and the past? We answer in the great creative
and destructive age of Europe and of civilized Asia — the
thirteenth century. The England of Richard Cceur-de-
Lion is an England which is past for ever ; but the England
of Edward the First is essentially the still living England
in which we have our own being. Up to the thirteenth
century our history is the domain of antiquaries ; from
that point it becomes the domain of lawyers. A law of
King j3£lfred's Witenagemot is a valuable link in the chain
of our political progress, but it could not have been alleged
as any legal authority by the accusers of Strafford or the
defenders of the Seven Bishops. A statute of Edward the
First is quite another matter. Unless it can be shown to
have been repealed by some later statute, it is just as good
to this day as a statute of Queen Victoria. In the earlier
period we may indeed trace the rudiments of our laws, our
language, our political institutions ; but from the thirteenth
century onwards we see the things themselves, in that very
essence which we all agree in wishing to retain, though
successive generations have wrought improvement in many
points of detail and may have left many others capable of
further improvement still. Let us illustrate our meaning
42 THE CONTINUITY OF ENGLISH HISTORY. [Essay
by the greatest of all examples. Since the first Teutonic
settlers landed on her shores, England has never known
full and complete submission to the will of a single man.
Some assembly, Witenagem6t, Great Council, or Parliament,
there has always been, capable of checking the caprices of
tyrants and of speaking, with more or less of right, in
the name of the nation. From Heufvest to Victoria Eno--
land has always had what we may fairly call a parliament-
ary constitution. Normans, Tudors, and Stewarts might
suspend or weaken it, but they could not wholly sweep
it away. Our Old-English Witenagemdts, our Norman
Great Councils, are matters of antiquarian research, whose
exact constitution it puzzles our best antiquaries fully to
explain. But from the thirteenth century onwards we
have a veritable Parliament, essentially as we see it before
our own eyes. In the course of the fourteenth century
every fundamental constitutional principle became fully
recognized. The best worthies of the seventeenth century
struggled, not for the establishment of anything new, but
for the preservation of what even then was already old.
It is on the Great Charter that we still rest the foundation
of all our rights. And no later parliamentary reformer has
ever wrought or proposed so vast a change as when Simon
of Montfort, by a single writ, conferred their parliamentary
being upon the cities and boroughs of England.
This continuity of English history from the very beginning
is a point which cannot be too strongly insisted on, but it
is its special continuity from the thirteenth century onwards
which forms the most instructive part of the comparison
between English history and the history of Germany and
France. At the time of the Norman Conquest, the many
small Teutonic kingdoms in Britain had grown into the
one Teutonic kingdom of England, rich in her barbaric
greatness and barbaric freedom, with the germs, but as yet
only the germs, of every institution which we most dearly
prize. At the close of the thirteenth century we see the
England with which we are still familiar, young indeed
IL] THE CONTINUITY OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 43
and tender, but still possessing more than the germs, the
very things themselves. She has already King, Lords, and
Commons ; she has a King, mighty indeed and honoured,
but who may neither ordain laws nor impose taxes against
the will of his people. She has Lords with high hereditary
powers, but Lords who are still only the foremost rank of
the people, whose children sink into the general mass of
Englishmen, and into whose order any Englishman may
be raised. She has a Commons still diffident in the exer-
cise of new-born rights : but a Commons whose constitution
and whose powers we have altered only by gradual changes
of detail ; a Commons which, if they sometimes shrank
from hard questions of state, were at least resolved that
no man should take their money without their leave.
The courts of justice, the great offices of state, the chief
features of local administration, have assumed, or are
rapidly assuming, the form whose essential character they
still retain. The struggle with Papal Rome has already
begun ; doctrines and ceremonies indeed remain as yet
unchallenged, but statute after statute is passed to restrain
the abuses and exactions of the ever hateful Roman court.
The great middle class of England is rapidly forming ;
a middle class not, as elsewhere, confined to a few great
cities, but spread, in the form of a lesser gentry and a
wealthy yeomanry, over the whole face of the land.
Villainage still exists, but both law and custom are paving
the way for that gradual and silent extinction of it, which,
without any formal abolition of the legal stains, left, three
centuries later, not a legal villain among us. With this
exception, there was in theory equal law for all classes,
and imperfectly as the theoiy may have been carried out,
it was at least far less imperfectly than in any other king-
dom. Our language was fast taking its present shape ;
English, in the main intelligible at the present day, was
the speech of the mass of the people, and it was soon to
drive out French from the halls of princes and nobles.
England, at the end of the century, is, for the first time
44 THE CONTINUITY OF ENGLISH HISTORY. [Essay
since the Conquest, ruled by a prince bearing a purely
Euglish name, and following a purely English policy.
Edward the First was no doubt as despotic as he could be
or dared to be ; so was every prince of those days who
could not practise the superhuman righteousness of Saint
Lewis. But he ruled over a people who knew how to
keep even his despotism within bounds. The legislator
of England, the conqueror of Wales and Scotland, seems
truly like an old Bretwalda or West-Saxon Basileus sitting
once more on the throne of Cerdic and of iElfred. The
modern English nation is now fully formed ; it stands
ready for those struggles for French dominion in the two
following centuries, which, utterly unjust and fruitless as
they W'Cre, still proved indirectly the confirmation of our
liberties at home, and which for ever fixed the national
character for good and for evil.
Let us here sketch out a comparison between the history
and institutions of England and those of France and Ger-
many. As we before said, our modern Parliament is traced
up in an unbroken lino to the early Great Council, and
to the still earlier Witenagemot. The later institution?
widely different as it is from the earlier, has not been
substituted for the earlier, but has grown out of it. It
would be ludicrous to look for any such continuity be-
tween the Diet of ambassadors which meets at Frankfurt *
and the assemblies which met to obey Henry the Third
and to depose Henry the Fourth. And how stands the
case in France 1 France has tidied cojistitutional govern-
ment in all its shapes ; in its old Teutonic, in its mediaeval,
and in all its modern forms — Kings with one Chamber
and Kings with two. Republics without Presidents and
Republics with. Conventions, Directories, Consulates, and
Empires. All of these have been separate experiments ;
all have failed ; there is no historical continuity between
any of them. Charles the Great gathered his Great Council
* [That this Diet has since given way to Komething wliolly different is only
a further instance of the distinction.] [1872]
II.] THE CONTINUITY OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 45
around him year by year ; his successors in the Eastern
Francia, the Kings of the Teutonic Kingdom, went on
doinsf so long: afterwards. But in Gaul, in Western Francia,
after it fell away from the common centre, no such as-
sembly could be gathered together. The kingdom split
into fragments ; every province did what was right in its
own eyes ; Aquitaine and Toulouse had neither fear nor
love enough for their nominal King to contribute any
members to a council of his summoning. Philip the Fair,
for his own convenience, summoned the States-General.
But the States-General were no historical continuation
of the old Frankish assemblies ; they were a new institu-
tion of his own, devised, it may be, in imitation of the
English Parliament or of the Spanish Cortes. From that
time the French States -General ran a brilliant and a fitful
course. Very different indeed were they from the homely
Parliaments of England. Our stout knights and citizens
were altogether guiltless of political theories. They had
no longing after great and comprehensive measures. But
if they saw any practical abuses in the land, the King
could get no money out of them till he set matters right
again. If they saw a bad law, they demanded its altera-
tion: if they saw a wicked minister, they demanded his
dismissal. It is this sort of bit-by-bit reform, going on
for six hundred years, which has saved us alike from
magnificent theories and from massacres in the cause of
humanity. Both were as familiar in France in the four-
teenth and fifteenth centuries as ever they were in the
last years of the eighteenth. The demands of the States-
General, and of what we may call the liberal party in
France generally, throughout those two centuries, are as
wide in their extent, and as neatly expressed, as any
modern constitution from 1791 to 1848. But while the
English Parliament, meeting year after year, made almost
every year some small addition or other to the mass of
our liberties, the States-General, meeting only now and
then, effected nothing lasting, and gradually sank into as
46 THE COyriXriTY OF EXGLISH HISTORY. [Essay
complete disuse as the old Frankish Assemblies. By the
time of the revolution of 17H9, their constitution and
mode of proceeding had become matters of antiquarian
curiosity. Of later attempts, National Assemblies, Na-
tional Conventions, Chambers of Deputies,* we need not
speak. They have risen and they have fallen, while the
House of Lords and the House of Commons have gone on
undisturbed.
And as with the parliamentary constitution, so it is
with all our lesser institutions. There is hardly a title or
ofhce, from a Lord-Chancellor to a Head-borough, which
does not reach back at least to Edward the First, while
not a few reach back to Alfred and Hengest. What
would Pliilip the Fair have understood by a Prefect of
a Department or by a Minister of Public Instruction?
But Edward the First corresponded with the Sheriffs of
his counties, with the Mayor and Aldermen of his capital,
exactly like our present Sovereign. Elsewhere the ad-
visers of the Crown bear some title which at once bespeaks
their modern origin. Here in England they are some-
times the shadows, sometimes the realities, of some great
medipeval office. On the other side of the Channel, the
Minister bears his portfolio, here the Secretary bears his
seal. Look again at our local divisions. Save for the
formation of the Welsh counties, the map of England
under Victoria differs but little from the map of England
under William the Conqueror, we might almost say from
the map of England under Eadward the Elder. Of the
Old-English kingdoms, several still survive as counties,
some of them with their boundaries absolutely unchanged.
Nearly all our shires date at least from the tenth century,
many of them date from the very beginning of the English
Conquest. t But a map of France or Germany sixty or
* [Here again events which have happened since the essay wus written
supply further inwtances of this position.] [1872]
•|- [I have exjilained tlie distinction in this respect between the shires of
Mercia and of Wessex, in the History of the Norman Conquest, vol. i. p. 561,
ed. 2.] [1872]
II.] THE CONTINUITY OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 47
seventy* years old is already well nigh useless ; one show-
ing those countries as they stood under Frederick Bar-
barossa or Lewis the Seventh looks like the map of
another region. Normandy, Burgundy, Guienne, are gone
— cut up into departments which we suppose only their
own Prefects can undertake to remember. In the other
of the two old Frankish realms, where are the old Five
Nations ? where are the comparatively modern Seven
Electors? Franconia, Saxony, Lorraine, Bavaria, and
Swabia, have either vauished from the map, or they have
so changed their shapes and boundaries that no man would
know them for the same. In everything, in laws, in
institutions, in local divisions, France and Germany have
been alike lands of change, England is pre-eminently the
land of permanence.
But, though the characteristics of English History are
thus throughout combined permanence and progress, yet
we cannot deny that there are occasional periods of at
least apparent falling back. We say apparent, because
it may be doubted whether there has been any period
which has proved to be such in the long run. One such
period we have already seen ; the period of Norman
oppression comes between the days of England's earlier
and later freedom. Yet even during that gloomy twelfth
century that silent union of the two nations was going
on without which Enoiand could never have beheld the
glorious events of the thirteenth. At a later period, the
fifteenth century is a time of distinct degeneracy. Some
good laws were made, some good precedents were estab-
lished ; but on the whole, the Parliaments of the fifteenth
century were less liberal and independent bodies than
those of the fourteenth. One of them formally legalized
religious persecution ; another stands alone in English
history in passing a counter-reform bill. The county
franchise was restricted to those freeholders whose pos-
sessions reached the amount of forty shillings yearly.
* [One is now tempted to say " six or seven."] [1872J
48 THE CONTINUITY OF ENGLISH HISTORY. [Essay
Considering the value of money at the time, this must have
been a measure of extraordinary exclusiveness, such as
the most conservative of statesmen would not have dreamed
of for some generations past. The later Parliaments of
this century exhibit the most utter subserviency to the
powers which are uppermost for the moment; we feel
that we are fast drawing near to the Elysian epoch of
Mr. Froude. Again, the war with France has sunk into
a mere struggle for an unjust dominion, and is succeeded
by fierce and purposeless civil wars at home. The personal
and dynastic struggles of the fifteenth century excite
a sort of feeling of disgust when compared with the great
struggles of principle either of the thirteenth century or
of the seventeenth. Yet there is a bright side even to the
fifteenth century. That age, looked at alone, may be
thought to have gone back, but in the long run, it has,
like other ages, contributed to our general progress. The
developement of the popular power in the seventeenth
century required the previous breaking-down of the old
feudal nobility. The general harmony between the two
Houses of Parliament, from their very beginning, has been
something wonderful ; but it is evident that, till the old
nobles were got out of the way, the House of Commons
could never become the real ruling body. And the par-
ticular way in which they were got rid of hindered any
open breach between the mass of the people and a peerage
which was really the first rank among themselves. The
Norman nobility were not overthrown by any popular
movement ; they were cut down by each other's swords
at Towton and Barnet, or were reserved to fall beneath
the axe of Henry. The Tudor despotism, like the Norman
despotism, served to shelter and preserve the elements of
liberty through a period of transition. And, if the Par-
liaments of the later Plantagenet a^ra were less independent
than their predecessors, we see, both then and in the Tudor
age, abundant evidence that the importance of Parliament
was becoming more and more fully recognized. The very
II.] THE CONTINUITY OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 49
act which narrowed the elective franchise shows that the
elective franchise was a thing valued and sought after,
that it was no longer felt as a burthen, as it often was
in earlier times. Late in the fifteenth century, as the
Paston Letters show, the position of a borough member
had risen sufficiently to be an object of ambition to men
of birth and landed property. In the Tudor age, we come
to direct government interference at elections, and to the
creation of insignificant boroughs on purpose to secure
members in the interest of the Crown. Violent and cor-
rupt as were these stretches of power, they still show
the advancing importance of the body about whose com-
position so much care was taken. And palpably unjust
as were the French wars of this age, they were more dis-
tinctly national wars, waged for the national glory. Edward
the Third, as a French prince, claimed the crown of France ;
his son reigned at Bordeaux as Prince of Aquitaine. But
Henry the Fifth, as a King of England, obtained a treaty
which made the crown of France an appendage to the
crown of England. Doubtless England, by grasping at
the French crown, lost her own Aquitanian coronet, but
that very loss rendered her still more insular and national,
and it is clear that all traces of the old Norman feeling
must have utterly died out in the breasts of the men who
strove to make France a province of England.
In the ecclesiastical aspect of the fifteenth century we see
the same mixture of advance and retrogression. The Church
of the fifteenth century was scandalously corrupt; both doc-
trinal and practical abuses had reached their highest pitch.
The prelates of that day were, at all events in their pro-
fessional aspect, men very inferior to their predecessors.
They had sunk into mere secular statesmen, members of
noble families who preferred the crosier to the sword, and
whose ecclesiastical advancement was owing to their birth
or their worldly services. The fifteenth century supplies
us with none of the saints, heroes, and patriots of the
Church, none of the Anselms and Beckets, the Langtons and
E
50 THE CON TIN U IT Y OF EXGLISII HISTORY. [Essay
Grossetestes. of former times. Chichele was one of the best
prelates of that day, and he certainly owed his promotion
to merit in his own calling. But even Chichele was not
ashamed to promote an unjust war, in order to draw off the
attention of the King and the nation from the overgrown
wealth of the Church. But, on the other hand, even this
degradation of the Church is not without its good side also.
The Church is no longer antagonistic to the State; the
clergy have become citizens like other men.
We have thus tried to trace the outward sequence of
cause and effect through a considerable portion of history.
This outward sequence is all that we can profess to trace
out. We cannot submit the pluenomena of English history,
its course at home or its points of difference from that of
other nations, to any grand scientific law. If we are asked
for the causes of the contrast between the steady course of
freedom in England and its fitful rises and falls in France,
we have no universal formula of explanation. We can only
say that the causes are many and various ; and some of
those which we should assign are perhaps rather of an old-
fashioned kind. We confess that we are not up to the last
lights of the age ; we have not graduated in the school of
Mr. Buckle. We still retain our faith in the existence and
the free-will both of God and of man. National character,
geographical position, earlier historical events, have had
much to do with the difference ; but we believe that the
personal character of individual men, and the happy
thought, or happy accident, of some particular enactment
has often had quite as much to do with it as any of them.
No one single cause has more effectually and more bene-
ficially influenced our whole political developement than
the law or custom which gives to the children of a peer no
higher legal dattis than that of simple commoners. This
alone has allowed us to retain the institution of a hereditary
peerage, while it has delivered us from the curse of a
nobility of the continental sort, forming a distinct caste
from the rest of the people. Yet no one can tell the date,
II] THE CONTINUITY OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 51
the author, or the cause, of this all- important rule. Again,
we do not believe that men like William the Conqueror
and Edward the First were mere walking automata. Their
personal will, their personal genius, did influence men and
things, let philosophers say what they please. Of these
several classes of causes we have only space to point out
a few of the most important. None, we think, has had
greater influence than the fact that we Englishmen live in
an island, and have always moved in a sort of world of our
own. This, combined with the exterminating character of
the first Teutonic settlements, made England, in the days
of its earliest independence, a more purely Teutonic country
than even Germany itself. And even the Norman Con-
quest, which seemed to destroy the old Teutonic life of the
nation, in truth only strengthened it. To the Norman
Conquest, more than to any other event, we owe the new
biith of freedom two centuries later. It gave the finishing
stroke to that process of union which had been going on
ever since the days of Ecgberht. England now for ever
became one kingdom. For a moment she became the prey
of strangers ; bat a variety of happy circumstances soon
tended to change her conquerors into her children. The
gigantic genius and iron will of the Conqueror himself
enabled him to establish a power in the Crown which had
no parallel in Europe save at Constantinople and at Cor-
dova. Then came the accession of the Angevins, which
was almost equivalent to a second Conquest. The French
domains of Henry the Second were so vast that he was
essentially a French sovereign. William was a Norm?n
reigning in England ; Englishmen were conquered, but
England was great. Henry was a Duke of Normandy and
Aquitaine, perhaps a would-be King of France, who ruled
England as a dependency beyond the sea. Posts of honour
were so far from being held by men of Old-English blood,
that they were but sparingly held even by the descendants
of the first Norman settlers ; men utter strangers to the land
held sway over both. In the reign of John, Normandy and
E 2
52 THE CONTINUITY OF ENGLISH HISTORY.
the strictly French provinces were lost ; Aquitaine alone
was retained, a country as foreign to France as to England,
and which found her account in loyalty to the more distant
ma^^ter. Then came fresh swarms of foreigners under Henry
the Third, when at last the nation was ready for resistance.
All these causes had combined to draw all the natives of the
soil together. The heavy hand of despotism pressed alike
upon the conquerors and the conquered. Men who were
wholly alien to the realm were enriched and exalted at the
expense of both. The Norman meanwhile had drunk in
the air of the free island, and had learned that the laws of
good King Edward were as good for him as for his English
neighbour. He soon found that his true place was among
the English people, not beside the foreign King. Speedily
did the Norman lords and gentlemen adopt the name,
the feelings, and at last the tongue of Englishmen. The
bloody baptism of Lewes and of Evesham made the two
races brethren in war and in peace for ever. In short, the
true effect of the Norman Conquest was, not to crush or
extinguish the Old-English spirit, but to call it out in
a more definite and antagonistic form, and to give it a
band of worthy proselytes in the conquering Normans
themselves.
Thus did an event which seemed to be the very death of
English freedom, prove in the end to be to it, above all
others, a savour of life unto life. We will not speculate as
to what might have been had William, instead of Harold,
fallen upon the hill of Senlac. It is enough to see what
has been. It is through the very event which might
have seemed to cut off England for ever from her ancient
being that she has — more than through any other cause
— been enabled to preserve an uninterrupted historical
continuity with her earliest days which has been denied
to kindred nations which never went through her fiery
trial.
( 53)
III.
THE RELATIONS BETWEEN THE CROWNS
OF ENGLAND AND SCOTLAND.
There is something very remarkable in the way in which
the popular mind, both in England and Scotland, looks at
the whole history of the two countries, and especially at the
question of the ancient relations between the two Crowns.
It is not very wonderful that it is a point of honour with
most Scotchmen to defend the Scottish side of a controversy
between England and Scotland. The wonderful thing is
that many Englishmen, and we suspect most Englishwomen,
take the Scottish side against their own country. And it is
more wonderful still that they do this, not from any calm
conviction that England was wrong in the controversy, but
from the same sort of unreasoning impulse which would
more naturally have led them to take the other side. An
Englishman, or a native of any other country, if he looks
through the past history of his own land, will find plenty
of occasions on which he must allow that his own nation
and its sovereigns were utterly in the wrong. Still he feels
a certain sympathy with his own people, even when they
are in the wrong. His judgement draws him one way, and
his feelings draw him another way. That the wars of
Edward the Third in France were wars of purely unjust
aggression it is impossible to deny."^ The only conceivable
palliation for them is that even virtuous men seem at the
time to have persuaded themselves that those wars were
just; and we must not forget that war in general, just or
unjust, was not looked on then in the same light in which
* [This is rather too strong. See the Essay on Edward the Third.] [1872]
54 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN THE CROWNS [Essay
it is looked on now. Still Edward the Third and his son
are popular heroes of English fancy. Reason may condemn
the aggression, but the glory of Crecy and Poitiers is too
dazzling to be withstood. The Black Prince is looked upon
so exclusively as the model of chivalrous courage and
chivalrous generosity that his real crimes and his real
merits are alike forgotten. The cruel massacre of Limoges,
an act condemned even in his own age, is forgotten. The
real services which he rendered to his country in the Good
Parliament are forgotten also. No ordinary English reader,
even if he consents to the abstract proposition that the wars
of Edward the Third and Henry the Fifth were unjust,
ever sympathizes with the French who fought against
them.
But from France turn to Scotland, and the scene is com-
pletely changed. In dealing with Scottish matters the
popular and romantic English mind not only condemns its
own countrymen, but throws itself, as a matter of feeling,
aga:nst its own countrymen. Under the convenient name
of Scots, a variety of persons, from William Wallace,
perhaps from Malcolm Canmore, down to Charles Edward
Stewart, are jumbled together. All alike are popular
heroes, though their only common merit seems to be that
they were all, in one way or another, enemies of England.
Edward the First is distinctly unpopular, not because he
seized the wool or because he was not eager to confirm the
Great Charter, but because, with the full approbation of all
England, he asserted his right to the ancient overlordship
of Scotland, and Ijecause in the end he put William Wallace
to death as a traitor. Even Elizabeth, the great Protestant
Queen who defietl Parma and Spain, comes off with a very
doubtful reputation, because she cut off the head of a
Scotchwoman whose crimes had aroused the righteous
instincts of the Scottisli people to depose her from their
throne. Oddly enough, the greatest English sinners against
Scotland, Henry the Eighth and Protector Somerset, are let
off. It' people think of Scotland in connexion with King
III.] OF ENGLAND AND SCOTLAND. 55
Henry, it is because Flodden was fought in his reign, and
a King of Scots invading England is of course an object of
romantic English sympathy. The brutal and causeless
devastations of Scotland under Henry and Edward the
Sixth, the utterly useless slaughter of Pinkie, seem to be
wholly forgotten.
The cause of this strange, and probably unparalleled,
direction of popular feeling is to be found in a sort of
generous revulsion of sentiment, strengthened by the in-
fluence of a few great Scottish writers. A foolish and
unworthy prejudice against Scotland and Scotsmen made
way, under the charms of romance and poetry, for an
equally unreasonable feeling of admiration for everything
beyond the Tweed, The Scots, in the widest sense of the
word, the inhabitants of modern Scotland of all tongues
and races, first made Tip their own differences, and then
made a sort of common conquest of English opinion. Lord
Macaulay has forcibly shown how every fight in which
the Gael overcame the Saxon, and every fight in which
the Saxon overcame the Gael, has been thrown into a
common stock of Scottish glory. Respectable citizens
of Edinburgh, bearing, it may be, such Teutonic names
as Smith, Brown, or Wilson, probably believe to this day
that the grand charge of Celtic claymores at Killiecrankie
somehow reflects honour on themselves. Mary Stewart,
whose rejection by the Scottish people is one of the most
honourable facts in Scottish history, has become a sacred
possession of the Scottish nation, on whom Englishmen at
least may not lay their unha.llowed hands. And English-
men, at all events Englishwomen, believe all this. They
get their notions of English history from the romance of
Hume, and they follow them up with the certainly not
more unhistorical romances of Sir Walter Scott. Every-
thing Scotch becomes invested with a sort of poetical and
romantic halo. Wallace and Bruce are heroes, full of
exploits and hairbreadth scapes. King Edward may pos-
sibly have been a general, a statesman, and a lawgiver, but
56 THE RELATIOXS BETWEEN THE CROWNS [Essay
what ai"e such prosaic merits when set against the charms
of a hero of romance 1
The fashion in these matters sets so strongly for the
Scottish and against the English side, that it is very
difficult to preserve strict impartiality in the matter. A
revulsion against utter misrepresentation of truth may
easily drive us too violently to the other side. When
Englishmen condemn, almost without a hearing, the part
taken by the whole English nation under the greatest and
noblest King that England has seen for eight hundred
years, one is perhaps tempted to do less than justice to his
enemies. Trying to look at the matter as fairly as possible,
it seems to me that, while the conduct of King Edward
can be justified and more than justified, it does not at all
follow that there is not a good deal to be said on the other
side. The claim of Edward was quite clear enough to
justify an honest man in asserting it. It was not so clear
but that an honest man might also be justified in resisting
it. Crimes were committed on both sides which fully
account for bitter national animosity on both sides. In
the end, the justice of the case, originally on the side of
England, turned to the side of Scotland. I am not con-
cerned to defend the way in which Scotland was dealt
with either by Edward the Third or by any English king
later than Edward the Third. I only ask for justice for
his incomparably nobler grandfather. I only ask that
our groat king be not hastily condemned for the asser-
tion of rights which were not, as I believe people generally
fancy, some invention of his own, but which had been an
inheritance of his predecessors on the English throne for
more than three hundred and sixty years.
On the subject of the relations between the English and
Scottish Ci'ovvns in early times, I have had occasion to
say somewhat in the first volume of my History of the
Norman Conquest, and especially in the Appendix. I there
entered into some controversy with an able writer on
the Scottish side, Mr. E. W. Eobertson. I there expressed
III.] OF ENGLAND AND SCOTLAND. 57
a hope that I might, at some future time, be able to go
into the matter more fully, as in that Appendix I could
deal only with points belonging to the very earliest stagts
of the dispute. I mention this lest any one should
mistake the present paper for the fulfilment of the promise
which I then held forth. I mean it for nothing of the
kind. To go fully into the matter from the beginning to
the end, arguing, as I should have to do, against Mr.
Robertson at almost every step, would require much more
time and space than can be given to it in a single essay.
But where the case on one side is generally misunderstood,
a mere statement of the case, even Avithout a minute dis-
cussion of the evidence, is worth something. I thought
therefore that I might be doing service to historical truth
by calling attention to the subject, by clearly showing the
line which I trust some day to lind an opportunity for de-
fending in a more complete manner, and by getting rid of
some mere popular misconceptions, which can never, unless
quite unconsciously, affect the minds of real scholars on
either side, but which form the whole belief on the subject
in the minds of a great many people, Scottish and English
alike.
First, then, I would venture to ask. What is Scotland,
and who are the Scots 1 I must here say once more what,
I have no doubt, I have said over and over again in one
shape or another, but which must be said over and over
again till people thoroughly take it in. No one can
understand this question, or any other question in early
mediaeval history, unless he sets himself altogether free
from the bondage of the modern map and of modern
national nomenclature. When the disputed relations be-
tween the English and Scottish Crowns began, the names
of England and Scotland seem not to have been in use at
all. And if we choose to use them as convenient ways
of expressing the English and Scottish territories as they
then stood, we must still remember that the limits of those
territories in no way answered to the modern limits of
58 THE RELATIOSS BET WEE X THE CROWDS [Essay
England and Scotland. Part of modern England was not
yet English, and a very large part of modern Scotland
was not yet Scottish. The growth of the Scottish nation
and kingdom is one of the most remarkable facts in
history. It was formed by the fusing together of certain
portions of all the three races which in the tenth century,
as now, inhabited the Isle of Britain. Those three races
may be most conveniently spoken of as English, Welsh,
and Irish. A portion of each of these three races was,
through a variety of political circumstances, detached from
the main stock of its own nation, and all were brought
into close connexion with one another. At the beginning
of the tenth century the three were still distinct. The
original Scots, a colony from Ireland, the original Scotia,
had, centuries before, established themselves on the north-
western coast of Britain, and, not very long before the
period with which I am concerned, they had conquered or
fraternized with or exterminated or assimilated the Picts,
the people of the north-eastern part of modern Scotland.
The relations between the Picts and the Scots I leave in
intentional vagueness ; they form a very difficult question,
and one whose solution or exposition is in no way essen-
tial to my object. It is enough that at tlie beginning of
the tenth century an independent Celtic potentate, the
King of Scots, reigned over all modern Scotland north of
the two great firths of Forth and Clyde, except so far as
Scandinavian adventurers had already begun to occupy
the islands and the extreme north of the mainland. Here
then were the Scots, a Celtic people, whose dominant
tongue was Irish, a tongue still represented by the modern
Gaelic. These Scots then, a branch of the Irish nation,
have given to the modern Scottish kingdom its name and
its royal dynasty. But all that gave Scotland its his-
torical importance came from other quarters. The applica-
tion of the Scottish name to the wliole people of modern
Scotland was soinothing like the application, so common
before the restoration of the Kingdom of Italy, of the
III.] OF ENGLAND AND SCOTLAND. 59
Sardinian name to the people of Savoy, Piedmont, and
Genoa. As far as ethnical connexion is concerned, this
analogy will hold good. The great mass of the so-called
Scots were Scots only by virtue of being subjects of the
Kins: of Scots. The great mass of the so-called Sardinians
were Sardinians only by virtue of being subjects of the
King of Sardinia. But there is this difference, that the
King of Scots was really a King of Scots ; the roj'al
dynasty of Scotland was Scottish, while the royal dynasty
of Sardinia was not Sardinian. But the position of that
dynasty as Dukes of Savoy answered exactly to the posi-
tion of the Kings of Scots. In both cases the cradle of
the dynasty was one of the least valuable possessions of
the reigning sovereign.
The King of Scots then, at the beginning of the tenth
century, reigned north of the firths, over an independent
Celtic people. The Scots seem to have submitted more
than once to a certain superiority on the part of the
Northumbrian kings ; perhaps both they and the North-
humbrians submitted to the Imperial superiority of Charles
the Great. But any submission of this sort was quite
transient, and did not affect the later historj'. At the be-
ginning of the tenth century the Scots were, as is allowed
on all hands, perfectly independent.
But at that time the southern part of what is now
Scotland had nothing to do with the Scots, and it had to
do with the King of Scots only inasmuch as an inde-
pendent branch of the Scottish royal family reigned in
one part of it. All south-western Scotland, with much of
what is now north-western England, formed the Kingdom
of the Strathclyde Welsh. Over this kingdom, from an
early date in the tenth century. Kings of the Scottish
family reigned, but it formed a purely distinct state, in-
dependent equally of the King of Scots and of the King
of the West-Saxons. The south-eastern part of modern
Scotland, Lothian in the wide sense of the word, was
simply part of Northumberland, that great region which,
60 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN THE CROWNS [Essay
sometimes under one king, sometimes under two or more,
stretched from the Humber to the Forth. Lothian was
therefore, then as now, a strictly Teutonic country, in-
habited by a population mainly Anglian, and speaking,
then as now, the Northumbrian dialect of English. In
the language of the Scots, the land was Saxony and its
people Saxons. An inroad into Saxony was a favourite
exploit of the Scottish kings, and they had already begun
to look with wistful eyes on the northern bulwark of
Saxony, the border- fortress raised by the great Northum-
brian Bretwalda, the castle of Eadwinesburh or Edinburgh.
Here then are the three elements of the modern Scottish
nation: the true Scots, the Irish population north of the
Forth ; the Welsh of Strathclyde or Cumberland ; the
English of Lothian. Of these, the first and the third still
survive and still retain their several languages, though,
ever since they have been brought into connexion with
each other, the English element has advanced and the
Irish element has fallen back. The Welsh element has
long since been absorbed by the English. The old Welsh
kingdom no longer exists as a distinct division ; it is di-
vided between modern England and modern Scotland, and
its language survives only in some points of local nomen-
clature to be traced out by inquiring antiquaries and
philologers.
It was out of the fusion of these three elements that the
modern Scottish nation arose, and their fusion arose wholly
out of the relations into which they all of them entered
with the dominant English power to the south. In 924
the kingdom of Eadward the Elder reached to the Humber.
Beyond that river the Scots and the Strathclyde Welsh
had never owned any superiority in any West-Saxon
king. Northumberland, including of course Lothian,
might be considered as owing some sort of vassalage, for
the whole land had owned the supremacy of Ecgberht,
and had even lenewed its submission to iElfred. In 924,
according to our national Chronicles, the submission of
III.] OF ENGLAND AND SCOTLAND 61
Noi-thumberland was again renewed in a more solemn
way ; and with the renewal of the submission of Northum-
berland, Eadward also received — what no West-Saxon king-
had ever before received — the submission of the Scots and
the Strathclyde Welsh. All the kings and princes north
of the Humber, with the assent of their subjects, " chose
Eadward to father and to lord." In the latin phrase they
commended themselves to him ; they promised him fidelity
and put themselves under his protection. This is the
origin of the English claim to superiority over Scotland.
It is also the origin of the close connexion between the
three countries which united to form modern Scotland.
All three — Scotland proper, Strathclyde, and Lothian (as
a part of Northumberland) — became dependencies of the
King of the English. Other changes speedily followed,
all of which had a tendency to bring the three countries
more closely together. The first change may for a moment
have had an opposite effect, ^thelstan was the first to
incorporate Northumberland, and Lothian as a part of it,
with the English kingdom. That kingdom thus stretched
to the Forth. After several revolts of the Danes, this
incorporation was finally accomplished by Eadred. Mean-
while Eadmund, on a revolt of Strathclyde, conquered the
country, and granted it to Malcolm of Scotland, to be held
on tenure of military service. From that time it became
the appanage of the eldest son of the Scottish King. In
Eadred's time Edinburgh came into the possession of the
Scots, by what means does not appear. At some later
time, either under Eadgar or under Cnut — I have gone
fully into that controversy elsewhere — all Lothian was
ceded to the Scottish King ; when and on what terms forms
one of the points of dispute.
We thus find, early in the eleventh century, the three
countries — Scotland proper, Strathclyde, and Lothian — all
united under one sovereign, Strathclyde being usually
granted out again to that sovereign's heir-appai ent. A great
step had thus been taken towards the formation of the
62 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN THE CROWNS [Essay
modern Scottish kingdom and nation. But all three formed
part of the English Empire, and were subject to the Impe-
rial authority of the West-Saxon or English King, The
three countries however stood in three different relations to
their overlord ; and the different relations of Scotland and
Strathclyde supply some of the best illustrations of those
various kinds of relations, both between sovereigns and
between private men, out of which the latter and more
finished feudalism gradually grew.
What lies at the bottom of the whole thing is the personal
relation between a man and his lord. The weaker party
commends himself to the stronger ; the man promises faithful
service, the lord promises faithful protection. The holding
of land by military or other service is not an essential or
original part of the relation, but it gradually and easily came
to be ingrafted upon it. Such land might be an original
grant from the lord, held by his man on such terms as they
might agree upon ; or it might be the man's own allodial
holdinff, which he surrendered to the lord, and received back
to be held by him with fief. Out of these simple elements
gradually grew up that elaborate feudal jurisprudence which
had reached its perfection in the thirteenth century, but
which was certainly not known in the tenth. But, even
within the tenth century, the different relations of Scotland
proper and Strathclyde mark the advance in the strictly
feudal direction. The King of Scots, and all the people of
Scots, chose Eadward the Elder to father and to lord. The
motive was obvious : Eadward was powerful, and was clearly
aiming at the conquest of the whole island. It was good
policy to meet him half-way ; it was also good policy, and
something more, for all the Christian states of the island to
unite au'ainst their heathen invaders. Such an union could
not be effectually made except under West-Saxon leader-
ship. The position of Wessex in Britain then was really
not unlike that of Prussia in Germany just now.* By a
* [The events of 1S70-1871, especially the assiiiiiption of the Imperal title
by the Prussian King — the Bietwalda of Germany — have made the likeness
etill closer.] [1872]
III.] OF ENGLAND AND SCOTLAND. 63
great national act the King and the people of the Scots
commended themselves to the West-Saxon King, exactly as
numberless states on the continent found it expedient to
commend themselves to the Emperor, or as the Duke of the
Normans commended himself to the Duke of the French.
There was nothing strange or degrading in the relation ; it
was the relation in which, in theory, all other princes stood to
the Emperor. But the commendation of the Scottish King
and people certainly did not make Scotland a territorial
fief ; still less did it bring with it any of the feudal in-
cidents which were invented long after. In the course of
the controversy it was argued that the English King could
have no superior rights over Scotland, because Scotland
was confessedly not liable to certain feudal incidents. The
true answer would have been that the superiority dated
from a time older than the feudal jurisprudence, from a
time when any incidents of the kind were as yet un-
known.
Scotland proper then — the Irish land north of the firths —
was connected with the English King (or, in this relation
we should rather say the English Emperor) by a tie of
purely personal commendation. Strathclyde, on the other
hand, was an early case of a real territorial fief. Eadmund
conquered Strathclyde ; he might of course have incor-
poi'ated it with his own kingdom. Instead of so doing, he
granted the land to Malcolm on condition of military
service by sea and by land. Here we have a real fief,
though of course all the niceties and intricacies of feudal
law are not to be applied to the case. The vassalage of
part of Strathclyde, namely of modern Cumberland, is not
denied by any Scottish writer. Indeed, Scottish writers
eeem rather inclined to exaggerate the feudal position of
Cumberland, as affording a means of escape from the fact
of any superiority over Scotland itself. Every instance of
homage is thus conveniently represented as being done for
lands within the modern limits of England.
Strathclyde then was a torritcrial fief, but not a territorial
64 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN THE CROWNS [E??ay
fief within the kingdom of England. But Lothian was
an integral part of England. Jedburgh was as much a
Northumbrian town as York. Unluckily the cession of
Lothian is, as to its date and circumstances, a difficult and
disputed point ; there is no contemporary account of this
transaction, such as there is of the other two. But it is
hardly possible to doubt that the King of Scots must have
been intended to be, with regard to Lothian, strictly an
English earl, just as he was in later times for other lands
within the later English frontier.
The three countries which make up modern Scotland
were thus brought into a close political connexion with one
another, while at the same time they stood in three distinct
relations to the Liiperial Crown of England. It followed
naturally that the three should draw closer together, and
that the original difference in the three tenures should
come to be foro^otten on both sides. The Scottish kings
soon learned that English Lothian was by far the most
valuable part of their dominions. They gradual!}' identified
themselves with their English territories, and they en-
deavoured to spread English culture over the rest of their
possessions. As early as the reign of Macbeth they
welcomed settlers from England and exiles from England,
of whatever kind ; native Englishmen dispossessed by
the Conqueror, Norman settlers in England dissatisfied
with him or his successors, all found a munificent welcome
beyond the Tweed. The marriage of Malcolm and Mar-
garet was the great turning-point. The Kings of Scots,
from that time, became essentially English princes, and
that just at the very moment when French princes were
beginning to reign in England itself. English Lothian,
and 80 much of their other territories as they succeeded
in Anglicizing, became the real Kingdom of Scotland. The
true Scots were in a manner forsaken by their own
princes ; they gradually came to be looked on simply as
troublesome savages, whom the new English Kings of
Scots had much ado to keep in any sort of submission.
III.] OF ENGLAND AND SCOTLAND. 65
Thus the English subjects of the King of Scots gradually
came to be called Scots, and their land Scotland. A part
of England, in short, got detached from the rest under the
name of Scotland, and held the true Scotland beyond it in
a somewhat unwilling connexion. And so long as the
Kings of southern England were French, so long as the
court laneruasfe of England was French while that of Scot-
land was English, the King of Scotland's dominions were
in very truth far more English than England itself.
Thus the Scottish kingdom gradually formed itself.
Under such circumstances it was impossible that the
different tenures by which the three parts of the dominions
of the King of Scots were held should long be remembered.
As the feudal jurisprudence developed, all of them became
obsolete and almost unintelligible. That Scotland was held
by personal commendation — that Strathclyde was a terri-
torial fief, but a fief too old to be burthened with aids or
wardship or marriage — that Lothian was in strictness
an English earldom — were distinctions which naturally
passed out of mind. Gradually there came to be no ap-
parent alternatives except strict feudal tenure, as feudal
tenure came to be understood, and the entire absence
of subjection of any sort. The subjection of Scotland
to the Imperial Crown of Britain was an historical
fact ; there was therefore a temptation on the English
side to argue that Scotland was an ordinary fief, differ-
ing only in extent and dignity from any English earl-
dom. On the other hand, it was equally an historical
fact that Scotland had never been subject to the burthens
incident to an ordinary fief ; there was therefore a tempta-
tion on the Scottish side to deny that Scotland owed
any kind of subjection whatever. In an age when the
developed feudal jurisprudence was familiar to both sides, it
was almost impossible that either side should cleave to
the ancient precedents of the tenth century. It was in
the nature of things that the lord should claim more, that
the " man " should offer less, than those ancient precedents
F
66 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN THE CROWNS [-Essay
dictated. More and less, that is, as regards Scotland and
Strathclyde ; as regards Lothian, an integral part of Eng-
land, it is clear that the English Kings claimed less than
their ancient right. Add to this that, except under some
special circumstances, the fear of Danish invasion or the
like, any sort of subjection would, from the days of the
first commendation onwards, be galling to the Scottish
King and his people. The homage due to the Emperor of
Britain would never be very willingly paid. It would be
paid when England was strong and Scotland weak ; when
England was weak it would be refused, perhaps not
demanded. Homage for Scotland proper was paid to
Eadgar, to Cnut, to Eadward, to William ; it does not
appear that it was ever paid to the feeble ^thelred.
Then, in later times, the homage due for the different
parts of what had become the Kingdom of Scotland got
mixed up with various other questions. The Kings of
Scots undoubtedly held territories within the later borders
of England, both royalties and private estates, for which
nobody doubted that homage was as fully due from them
as from any English noble. Whenever a King of Scots
did homage, it was always possible to raise the question
whether the homage was done for the Kingdom of Scot-
land, or only for lands held in England. In many cases it
might be convenient alike to lord and vassal to allow so
delicate a question to remain unsettled either way. Then
Hemy the Second imposed conditions on his captive
William the Lion which undoubtedly went far beyond
all earlier precedent. Richard the First released Scotland
from these special and novel burthens ; did he or did
he not also release her from all subjection of every
kind ? Here then were abundant materials for a never-
ending controversy, a controversy in which, if right con-
sisted in adherence to precedents which were no longer
understood, it is quite certain that neither side could ever
be exactly in the right. Here were questions perpetually
arising which did not admit of any satisfactory settlement,
III.] OF ENGLAND AND SCOTLAND. 67
questions which at different times were sure to be
answered in different ways and under different circum-
stances. When a weak King of England was troubled
with every sort of domestic difficulties at home, while a,
national and popular dynasty filled the throne of Scot-
land, it was not likely that the English claim could be
very effectually pressed. Things changed when England
was ruled by the greatest King of his age, by well nigh
the greatest English King of any age, and when a crowd
of competitors for the Scottish crown were eager to lay
their contending claims at his feet.
The claim which was then put forward by Edward the
First was, as I before said, a claim which he had fair
grounds for putting forward, but which the other side had
fair grounds for contesting. It was easy to prove that
Scotland owed some subjection to England ; it was equally
easy to prove that Scotland did not owe the subjection of
an ordinar}^ English fief. Vulgar and ill-informed Scottish
writers always seize the opportunity for hurling every sort
of abuse at Edward, seemingly for bringing forward his
claims at all. Better-informed and more candid writers
on the same side, who know the facts and who make no
attempt to disguise them, are satisfied with charging him
with ungenerous and unchivalrous conduct. This lack of
generosity and chivalry on Edward's part seems to have
consisted in his being statesman enough to see an advantage
and to make use of it. But I would ask whether Kings
and Governments even now commonly show much of
chivalry or generosity to one another, or whether it is to
be reasonably expected that they should show much of
such feelings 1 An angel on earth, like Saint Lewis, may
act otherwise ; from ordinary human Kings, Presidents, or
Prime Ministers it is enough to expect that they do not,
in any time or place, put forth claims which are palpably
dishonest. If a claim has any fair ground to go upon, to
put it forth in the form, the time, the place, in which it can
be pressed with most effect, is generally held to be a mere
F 2
68 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN THE CROWNS [Essay
question of policy. He who chooses the worst time for such
a purpose, instead of the best, may possibly show chivalry
or generosity ; but no statesman, whether of the thirteenth
or of the nineteenth century, will speak highly of his wisdom.
Edward then, I hold, had a fair case — such a case, I mean,
as would justify an honest man in putting forth an ordinary
claim in an ordinary court of law. He claimed an ancient
right of his crown, which his predecessors had exercised
whenever they could : he claimed it in the only shape which
the claim was likely to take in his days. If in some points
he claimed more, in other points he claimed less, than an-
cient precedents would have given him. In reading the
lengthy pleadings in the great suit before the Lord Superior
two things constantly strike us. As a rule, the whole
matter had reduced itself to a question whether the land
north of the Tweed, looked at as a whole, was or was not
a fief of England. But ever and anon we are struck with
various signs which show a vague feeling, a sort of lurking
memory, that the real historical issue was not quite so
simple as this. Here and there an expression is found
implying some sort of distinction between Scotland, Lo-
thian, and Galloway — the representative of ancient Strath-
clyde. More commonly we find a very distinct feeling on
all sides that a kingdom, even if held in fief, difiered in
some way or other from an ordinary feudal holding. More
remarkable than all are two passages in which the Lord
Superior receives the ancient and now well nigh forgotten
title of Emperor. In one of the earliest documents belong-
ing to the question, one earlier than the great conference at
Norham, Robert Bruce asks for the kingdom of Scotland
of Edward as "his sovereign Lord and Emperor T* So,
when the question is raised whether the controversy be-
tween the candidates should be judged by the Imperial law
or by any other, one of the prelates consulted answers that
the King of England must follow the law of his own realm,
* Palsrave, Documents, p. 29. "Sire Robert de Brus .... prie a nostra
seigneur le rey come son sovereign seigneur et son Empreur."
III.] OF ENGLAND AND SCOTLAND. 69
because he is himself Emperor in his own dominions."^
And passages are rather numerous in which freedom from
all subjection to the Empire and to the laws of the Empire
is spoken of as a sort of privilege of the Crown of England,
and of Scotland as a member thereof. This was of course
the old notion. The King of the English was, within his
own island, what the Emperor was in the rest of the world.
He owed no submission to Csesar, and he himself stood
in the place of C?esar to all the other princes of Britain.
The Imperial position of the Old-English kings must be
thoroughly grasped before the real nature of Scottish sub-
jection can be understood. In the full Imperial theory, all
kingdoms, Scotland of course included, owed submission to
the Roman Emperor. But our West- Saxon kings put in an
exception for Britain, as being in some sort another world,
and they claimed to be themselves Emperors within its
borders. This ancient position, by that time well nigh
forgotten, is invoked both by the elder Bruce and by the
Bishop. But commonly the matter becomes a mere ques-
tion of fief or no fief, allowing for any special privileges
belonging to a fief which was also a kingdom.
It must be borne in mind that Edward was invited to
decide the disputed succession to the Scottish crown. He
was invited to do so by Robert Bruce, by the Seven Earls,t
and by the Scots generally. The Seven Earls appealed to
him as their natural protector against the wrongs inflicted
by the Regents ; Robert Bruce, as we have seen, appealed
to him in the ancient character of Emperor of Britain.
Now can any reasonable man blame Edward for demanding
that those who thus invoked his interference should make
a full acknowledgement of his claims ? In the judge-
ment of any statesman, the moment was now come to make
* Rishanger, ed. Riley, p. 255. " Episcopus Bibliensis requisitus dixit quod
dominus rex secundum leges per quas judicat subjectos suos debet procedere in
casu isto, quia hie censetur Imperator." I confess that I do not know who
"Episcopus Bibliensis" was. I can only guess that he was some Bishop in
pariibus, perhaps of Byblos in Syria.
f See Palgrave, Documents, ]>. 14.
70 THE BELATIONS BETWEEN THE CROWNS [Essat
certain what was before uncertain. Edward pnt forth his
claim, a good and honest claim, urged in good faith. No
doubt an equally honest answer might on some points have
been made to the claim ; but no answer was made. After
a little hesitation, all the competitors for the crown ad-
mitted Edward's claims to the superiority in the fullest
extent, and they gave him, as surely was reasonable, the
temporary possession of the kingdom in dispute. And, if
any man's conduct ever was marked by thorough justice
and disinterestedness, that of King Edward was so marked
throughout the whole business. Every claimant was fully
and fairly heard ; judgement was given in favour of the
claimant who clearly had the best right ; the new King
was at once put into full possession of his kingdom and all
its appurtenances. Most princes of that age, and of many
other ages, would have devised some excuse for detaining
the kingdom itself, or some castle in it, or some other
material hold over it. That is to say, most princes would
have acted in the matter of Scotland as Philip the Fair
did act to Edward himself in the matter of Aquitaine.
Edward's conduct was throughout honest and aboveboard.
He required the acknowledgement of his claims ; he re-
ceived it ; he then acted justly and honourably according
to the theory of his own position which he had put forth,
and which all the competitors had acknowledged. And,
more than all, he rejected the tempting proposal of Hastings
and Bruce to divide the kingdom. Had Edward wished to
take any unfair advantage, here was his chance. Two of
the competitors, when their claim to the whole kingdom
was rejected, demanded a share, according to the English
usage in the case of female fiefs. No proposal could have
been more tempting, had Edward sought anything but
what he honestly held to be his due. It was clearly his
interest to liave three weak vassals rather than one power-
ful one. But Edward, as he did throughout the case, calmly
inquired into law and precedent, and ruled, in conformity
with at least later law and precedent, that the Kingdom of
in.] OF ENGLAND AND SCOTLAND. 71
Scotland could not be divided. Edward may have taken
a wrong view of his own rights ; but of anything like un-
fair or underhand dealing no man stands more thoroughly
acquitted.
The competitors then, the new King, the great men of the
realm generally, accepted Edward's claims. But it may be,
and it has been, doubted how far they really spoke the voice
of the Scottish nation. We must never forget who these
competitors and other great men really were. None of the
competitors, and comparatively few of the great men of the
realm, were genuine Scots in either the older or the later
sense. Setting aside foreign princes like Eric of Norway
and Florence of Holland, the competitors, Bruce, Balliol,
Comyn, Hastings, and the rest, were neither Dah'iadic
Scots, nor Welshmen of Strathclyde, nor Englishmen of
Lothian. They were Norman nobles, holding lands both
in England and in Scotland, who might throw in their lot
with England or Scotland at pleasure, but who did much
more commonly throw in their lot with England. Balliol
and the elder Bruce were essentially Englishmen — Eng-
lishmen, that is, in the sense in which any other English
noble of Norman descent was an Englishman. John Comyn
of Buchan was throughout a faithful adherent of Edward ;
John Comyn of Badenoch and the younger Bruce identified
themselves more freely with Scotland. But none of them
were Scots in the ethnological sense ; none of them were
Scots even in the sense of being natives and inhabitants of
Scotland, with no interests beyond its borders. John Balliol
had lands alike in Scotland, England, and France. After
being a king in Scotland and a prisoner in England, he
retired to live as a private French noble on his French
property. Such men did not, and could not, really repre-
sent the feelings of any part of the Scottish people. The
event proved that in the heart of the nation there was a
feehng against English dominion in any shape which the
great nobles did not share. But the apparent consent was
universal. Edward might boast, like his great namesake
72 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN THE CROWNS [Essay
and ancestor, that the King of Scots, and all the people of
Scots, chose him to father and to lord. And again we may
ask, Who were the Scottish people 1 It is plain that the
whole affair was one in which the original Scots took no
share, or a share hostile to what is commonly looked on as
the Scottish cause. The Scots who resisted Edward were
the English of Lothian, The true Scots, out of hatred to
the " Saxons" nearest to them, leagued with the "Saxons"
further off. Candid Scottish writers allow that the true
Scots of the Highlands were bitterly hostile to the younger
Bruce, and strongly favourable to Edward. No doubt, had
Edward kept possession, he would soon have become the
object of their hostility. As it was, the true Scots were the
faithful allies of Edward against the English of Lothian.
We thus see Edward the acknowledged Lord Superior,
and John of Balliol, undoubtedly the lawful heir, reigning
as his vassal. Then comes the question of the appeals. It
does not appear that any appeal had ever before been carried
from the court of the King of Scots to the court of the King
of England. We may be quite sure that no such subtleties
were ever di-eamed of in the tenth century. But the idea of
an appeal to the court of the overlord naturally grew out
of the principles of the new feudal jurisprudence. Edward
himself, as Duke of Aquitaine, was often summoned to the
courts of the King of France, and he does not seem to have
disputed the right of the King of France so to summon him.
But we may be quite sure that Edward's predecessors in
Aquitaine in the tenth century as little thought of paying
any such sign of submission to then- lord at Laon or Paris
as his predecessors in Wessex at the same time thought of
requiring any such sign of submission from their vassal
beyond the Forth. The whole notion of an elaborate system
of courts, such as could allow of such appeals, is later than
the earliest homage paid either foi" Aquitaine or for Scotland.
It could not be part of the original bargain in either case,
but in both cases the claim grow up with the gradual
developement of feudal ideas. And, after all, it was the
III.] OF ENGLAND AND SCOTLAND. 73
Scots themselves who, from the fact of Edward's superiority
over the kingdom, drew the inference that they might
appeal to his courts. Two Scottish subjects in very different
positions, Roger Bartholomew, burgess of Berwick, and
Macduff, a near kinsman of the Earl of Fife — surely a
genuine Scot, if there ever was one — dissatisfied with the
justice to be had in the courts of the King of Scots,
appealed to the courts of his acknowledged feudal superior.
The thing was a novelty; but it was an obvious conse-
quence from a state of things which was now universally
admitted, and it was not a novelty of Edward's devising.
Ordinary human nature on Edward's part was not likely to
refuse what would seem to be so fair and honourable a way
of increasing his power. But ordinary human nature on the
Scottish part could hardly fail to be offended with what
would seem to be a further humiliation of Scotland.
Next came the Scottish alliance with France, then at war
with England, an alliance which gradually led to a series of
mutual hostilities, which I need not recount at length, as
they do not immediately bear on the relations between the
two crowns. The important points are, that the first hostili-
ties were the act of the Scots, and that the King of Scots, as
soon as the war had actually begun, renounced his homage.
The assertion of national independence might be just and
expedient ; but the attempt to assert it by a process of feudal
law was simply absurd. Then Edward, in i 296, conquered
Scotland, and received the abdication of the King and the
general submission of the country. The kingdom was his by
conquest in a lawful war not of his seeking. I am not
saying that the Scots might not be fully justified in revolting
against him. All I say is that Edward was fully justified
in occupying Scotland, and in putting down such revolts.
With the conquest in 1296 the history of the old relations
between the Crowns comes to an end. From 1296 to 1328
the question was, not whether Scotland should be held by
its own King in feudal dependence on England, but whether
Scotland should become, as Northumberland and Wales had
74 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN THE CROWNS [Essay
in different ages become, an integral portion of the English
kingdom. Meanwhile a new dynasty, that of Bruce, had
arisen in Scotland. In 1328 the legitimacy of the new
dynasty and the independence of the Scottish kingdom were
fully acknowledged by England. From that day forth,
wars between England and Scotland must be judged by the
same principles as wars between any other two independent
nations. The renunciation of 1328 wiped out the fii'st
commendation of 924 ; it wiped out what we may call the
second commendation of 1292; it wiped out the conquest
of 1296. The attempts made by the English Kings to fall
back on the earlier state of things, to claim again a homage
which they had expressly surrendered, to set up pretenders
' against a dynasty whose rights they had expressly acknow-
ledged, were all simply dishonest. The charges of craft,
bad faith, and the like, which Scottish writers most un-
justly bring against Edward the First, may all be brought
with perfect justice against Edward the Third.
The little space I have left I will give to point out one
or two popular misconceptions. I fancy that people in
general quite mistake the chronology of the case. They
fancy that the whole of Edward's reign was taken up in an
attempt to conquer Scotland. Instead of this, it was only
the latter part of his reign which was occupied by Scottish
matters at all. Edward began to reign in 1272. In the
nineteenth year of his reign, 1291, the conference at Nor-
ham began. In 1296 came the first hostilities and the first
conquest. In 1297 came the revolt of William Wallace and
his victory at Stirling. In 129H the battle of Falkirk
crushed the revolt, but the war lingered till the surrender
of Stirling in 1304. In that year Edward was again un-
disputed lord of all Scotland. Scotland was annexed to
England as an integral part of the kingdom, and was to be
represented in the English Parliament. In 1306, the year
before Edward's death, came the murder of Comyn, the
revolt and coronation of the younger Bruce. At Edward's
death, in 1307, the new King was again a fugitive.
III.] OF EIs^GLAND AND SCOTLAND. 75
I speak of the wars of Wallace and Bruce as revolts.
Their revolts may, like many other revolts, have been
justifiable, but they were revolts. Neither of them, Bruce
far less than Wallace, was resisting an invader. As for
William Wallace, we need not look upon him either as the
faultless hero which he appears in Scottish romance, nor
yet as the vulgar rufiian which he appears in English
history. His tenure of power in Scotland was very short,
but for a man who started, as he did, from nothing, to rise,
even for a moment, to the command of armies, and even to
the government of the kingdom, shows that he must have
possessed some very great qualities. That the great nobles
mostly shrank from him, or supported him very faintly, is
rather to his ci'edit ; it sets him forth more distinctly as a
national champion. On the other hand, it is impossible to
deny the fiendish brutalities practised by him in England,
brutalities which fully explain the intense hatred with
which every English writer speaks of him, and which were
certainly not retaliation for any cruelties on the part of
Edward. Candid Scottish writers allow that no useless
slaughter or ravages can be laid to Edward's charge. In
the whole course of his warfare he stands chargeable with
nothing which even our age would call cruelty, unless it be
in the storming of Berwick, where the personal insults of
the besieged seem to have stirred him up to fury. At
other times we find nothing of the kind, but we do find him
checking and reproving the cruelties of others, including
his own unworthy son. As for the execution of William
Wallace, it should be remembered that his was the only
Scottish blood shed by an English executioner before the
murder of Comyn, and that he brought his fate upon
himself. Every other man in Scotland had submitted.
Wallace was invited to surrender to the King's mercy.
That mercy had been extended to every man who had
sought it, including many who had broken their oaths to
Edward over and over again. Wallace refused, and refused
with insult. He was seized by Sir John Menteith,
76 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN THE CROWNS [Essay
Edward's commander at Dumbarton, an act of official
duty which has been strangely turned into a betrayal.''^
He could now hardly look for the mercy which he had
scorned. In the eyes of Edward and of every Englishman
he was simply a traitor, robber, murderer, of the blackest
dye. On such men the law took its course in 1305 just as
it did in 1745.
The revolt of Robert Bruce was, in every way, far less
justifiable than that of William Wallace. Wallace was
certainly a native Scotsman in the wider sense of the
word. His name seems to imply that he was a Welsh-
man of Strathclyde. By his own account he had never
sworn fealty to Edward. The position of Eobert Bruce
was very different. He has become so thoroughly mythical
a being that it may be necessary to explain to many people
who he was. One Scottish romance goes so far as to make
him defeat Edward the First at Bannockburn ! Another,
of older date, identifies him with his own grandfather,
makes him the competitor for the crown, but makes him
also proudly refuse to do homage for it. We have seen
that Robert Bruce the grandfather was an Englishman, a
faithful subject of Edward, eager to admit Edward's su-
premacy, ready to have the kingdom divided. His son
was an utterly obscure person, who plays no part in the
politics of the time. His grandson, the future King, pos-
sessor of great Scottish estates through his mother, seems
always to have inclined to Scotland rather than to Eng-
land. Still he was Edward's subject ; he had sworn to
him and served under him over and over again. At last,
when the country was at peace, when Edward's govern-
ment was universally submitted to, Robert Bruce treacher-
ously and sacrilegiously murdered John Comyn, the man,
be it remembered, who, after the male line of Balliol, was
midoubtodly the heir of the Scottish crown. After such
* Wallace was "betrayeil," not hy Meiiteith, but to Menteith, by liis own
servant Jack Short. From this the English chronicler Peter Langtoft drawd
the moral that there ih no honour among thieves.
III.] OF EXGLASD AND SCOTLAND. 77
a crime there could be no hope of pardon. Bruce then
threw a desperate stake ; he assumed kingship ; while the
great Edward lived he lived the life of an outlaw and a
vagabond; over Edward's wretched son he won an easy
triumph. Robert Bruce undoubtedly proved himself in
the end a great captain and a great king ; but that fact
should bhnd no one to the infamous beginning of his
career. That all who were concerned in the murder of
Comyn met with their merited punishment, who can
wonder 1 Who can wonder that lesser degrees of punish-
ment fell on the other ringleaders of the revolt ? The
nature of punishments, the form of death, the degree of
the severity of imprisonment, are questions between the
habits of one age and those of another ; but it is quite
certain that Edward punished no man or woman who
would not be held liable to punishment at the present
moment. Indeed, when we look at the atrocities which
living Englishmen have committed and justified in India
and in Jamaica, King Edward need not blush for the com-
parison. The man who pardoned his enemies over and
over again, who checked the cruelties of his own son, who,
in the suppression of three rebellions, put no man to death
who had not added murder to treason, who, save in one
case of a stormed town, everywhere carried on war with
unparalleled clemency, would hardly have worshipped at
the shrine of a Hodson or joined in the festive reception of
an Eyre.
One word more. I do not regret that Scotland won her
independence. I cannot regret the formation of a nation,
a nation essentially of English blood and speech, a nation
which soon developed many noble qualities, and showed
itself fully worthy of the independence which it won. On
the field of Bannockburn I can almost bring myself to
sympathize with the great and wise King of Scots against
the foolish and cowardly heir of the greatest of later
Englishmen. But these things do not touch the character
of the great Edward. The real honour of Scotland in no
78 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN THE CROWNS [Essay
way requires the perversion of historical truth, or the
depreciation of a King whose object was to unite our
island as we see it united now. The vassalage of Scotland
to England ought by this time to be looked on as calmly
as the vassalage of Northumberland and Mercia to Wessex.
An Englishman born north of the Tweed should deem
himself as little bound to malign Edward as an English-
man born north of the Thames deems himself bound to
malign Ecgberht. Or, if a southern victim must be had,
let Scottish indignation spend itself on brutal devastators
of Scotland like Henry the Eighth and Protector Somerset,
not on the noble prince of whom the contemporary^ poet so
truly sang: —
" Totus Christo traditiu- rex noster Eilwardus ;
Velox est ad veniam, ad vindictam tardus."
I have now merely sketched out my line of argument
both as to the general constitutional question, and as to
the personal character of the great Edward. I trust some
day or other to work out the whole matter more fully, as
fully as I have worked out the two or three points on
which I have entered into direct controversy with Mr.
Robertson. In the meanwhile, I would recommend to all
who are interested in the matter a careful study of the
original chronicles and documents, and a comparison of
these with the later romances which have supplanted them.
As a guide in such a task, I will not venture to recommend
a book for which I must nevertheless confess a certain
liking, the anonymous volume called " The Greatest of
the Plantagenets." The book has much in it that is good
and useful ; but it is too much of a mere panegyric ; the
writer tliroughout holds, what I certainly do not hold, that
the honour of Edward requires the sacrifice of every one
who, either in England or Scotland, in any way withstood
him. I will rather choose my expositor in the ranks of
the enemy. I will send students of the original authorities
to a really learned and candid Scottish historian as their
III.] OF ENGLAND AND SCOTLAND. 79
harmonist. In Mr. Burton's lately published History of
Scotland the matter is treated in a way which does honour
to the writer. Mr. Burton has not wholly triumphed over
national prejudices, though in many passages he does
justice to Edward on particular points in a way in which
I suspect that no Scottish writer has forestalled him. In
many cases the inferences which I draw from the facts are
very different from those which Mr. Burton draws. But
his facts and my facts are the same throughout. Mr.
Burton's learning hinders him from neglecting any fact ;
his candour hinders him from concealing or misrepre-
senting any fact. How far such a book may be accept-
able to the less informed and more deeply prejudiced
classes of Mr. Burton's own countrymen, I do not profess
to know. I hail it as a great step towards the fair examina-
tion of a great historical question, which should now be
looked on purely as an historical question, not as involving
the honour of either of two portions of one happily united
realm.
80 SAINT THOMAS OF CANTERBURY [Essay
IV.
SAINT THOMAS OF CANTERBURY AND HIS
BIOGRAPHERS.-^
Vita S. Thomce Cantnanensis Archiejnscopi et Marty ris. Ejri-
sfolfB Sa7icti Thomce Cantuariensis et aliorum. GUtjerti
Ejnscopi Lonchniensis Epistola. Herherti de Boseham Opera
qufs extant omnia. Edidit J. A. Giles, LL.D. 8 volumes.
Oxford, 1845.
Joannis Sarishvriensis Opera omnia. Collegit J. A. Giles,
J. CD. 5 volumes. Oxford, 1848.
The History of Latin Christianity. By Henry Hart Milman,
D.D. Vol. III. London, 1854.
The Life and Martyrdom, of Saint Thomas Becket, ArMishop of
Canterbury and Legate of the Holy See. By John Morris,
Canon of Northampton. London, 1859.
Becket, Archliishop of Canterbury. A Biography. By James
Craigie Robertson, M.A., Canon of Canterbury. London,
1859.
A FULL catalogue of the materials for the history of the
wonderful man whose name heads this article, a complete
list of all the books, old and new, of which he has been
the subject, would take up a space rather suited for an
article itself than for the mere heading of one. We have
selected a few only of the most recent and important. We
have original materials of every sort, — chronicles, biogra-
phies, private letters, state-papers ; we have the panegyrics
of friends, the invectives of enemies, the correspondence
* [As this article gave rise to some controversy at the time, I reprint it
exactly as it originally appeared.] [1872]
IV.] AND HIS BIOGRAPHERS. 81
of the man himself. And as his own age was divided
in its opinion of him, ours seems to be divided no less.
He has still enemies who pursue him with the fierceness
of a Gilbert Foliot, and idolaters who worship him with
the devotion of a Herbert of Bosham. There is hardly any
man of past times for estimating whose life and character
we have such ample means. Every action of his own,
every action of others with regard to him, has been
chronicled and commented on by men who were both
eyewitnesses and actors. And there are few men about
the main features of whose history there is so little doubt.
Here and there, among the multitude of witnesses, we find
unimportant contradictions ; here and there we may have
our doubts as to the accuracy of a date or the genuineness
of a letter ; but the main events of his life, from his birth
in London to his murder at Canterbury, are known to us
as clearly and vividly as the transactions of our own time.
Our materials are not confined either to the land of his
birth or to the land of his exile. The vast Thomaic cor-
respondence spreads over the whole Latin world. The
terms of peace between a King of England and an Ai-ch-
bishop of Canterbury fluctuated according to the triumphs
and the failures of a German Emperor in Italy. Our
materials, in short, are infinite ; indeed, until somebody
shall kindly put them in order for us, they are over-
whelming. We know, or by the help of a decent editor we
might know, all about everybody and everything. As to
mere matters of fact, the points of controversy, for so vast
a field, are exceedingly few. The peculiarity of the history
is, that, with the same facts before them, no two people
seem to be content to draw the same inferences.
The cause of all this diversity and controversy — a diver-
sity and controversy most fatal to historic truth — is to be
traced to the unhappy mistake of looking at the men of
the twelfth century with the eyes of the nineteenth ; and
still worse, of hoping to extract something from the events
of the twelfth century to do service in the controversies of
G
82 SATXT THOMAS OF CAXTEUnrRY [Essay
the nineteenth. Thomas of Canterbury has become sur-
rounded by a mist of theological and qua si -theological
disputation ; it is impossible even to name him without
raising a storm of controversy. For how is the man to be
spoken of? " Thomas a Becket," on the one hand, and
"Saint Thomas of Canterbury" both have their dangers,
while ever}' intermediate form expresses some intermediate
shade of estimation. " Becket " is perhaps neutral ; " Arch-
bishop Becket " carries with it a degree of reverence for
the oflice, if not for the man. And ajjain, it is doubtful
whether his own ago even called him Thomas Becket,
much less Thomas a Becket, or Becket alone.* King
Henry the Eighth's proclamation has converted his his-
torical title of '■ Saint Thomas of Canterbury " into a badge
of party. Otherwise we might probably have called him
Saint Thomas with no more offence than is incurred by
speaking historically of Saint Dominic or Saint Dunstan.
By way of being safe, we mean to call him, as his con-
temporaries called him, Thomas, which we hope will not
commit us to anything either way. Thomas of London,
Thomas of Canterbury, Thomas the Archdeacon, the Chan-
cellor, the Archbishop, and finally the Martyr, are the only
descriptions by which he was commonly known in his
own day.
But when we have settled his name, we come to the
more important question of his character. Was he a good
or a bad man? Is he worthy of honour or of dishonour?
* His father was undoubtedly called Gilbert Becket ; but in the twelfth
century surnames were very fluctuating, and a son, especially if a churchman,
did not at all iiec ssarily bear his fathei's n.inie. The most natural way of
calling him would be Thonius of London, inntWke .Tohn of Oxford and Herbert
of Eoshani, and we find him actually so called by Gervase (col. 1377). ^®
iind the Archbishop himself only once called "'J'homas I'ecket," namely, by the
knights at his death, according to Edward Grim (ap. Giles, i. 75), where it
II ay be very likely an unusual expression of contempt. This remark, as far as
we know, has been made by no English writer ; but we find from M. Buss's
work (p. 150) that German industry has forestalled us: M. Buss has found
one more instance of the use of the name " Becket," which (perhaps through
Dr. Giles's fault) we cannot verify.
IV.] AND HIS BIOGRAPHERS. 83
To two classes of inquirers no question can be more easy
to settle. It is a very simple business to rule either that
an archbishop must be right who opposes a king, or that
a king must be right who opposes an archbishop. But
at the tribunal of historical criticism no such sweeping
general principles are admitted. Nor does it at all decide
the question to say which side we should take if the same
controversy were to arise now. What would be very
unreasonable and inexpedient now may have been exactly
the opposite seven hundred years back. If we Avish fairly
to judge of the right and the wrong between Henry and
Thomas, we must first of all shut our eyes to all modern
controversies whatever. We must not carry into that
region any modern theories about Church and State, about
Catholicism and Protestantism. We must not think
whether the events of those times can be made to help
High Church, Low Church, or Broad Church. Even
whether we are right or wrong in having no spiritual
dealings with the Bishop of Rome, is a question which
has just nothing to do with the matter. Yet it has been
with at least a side-glance to questions of this sort that
the history of Henry and Thomas has been for the most
part recently written. If we want to read or write it
as it should be read or written, we must forget everything
of the kind. We have before us two of the foremost men
of the twelfth century ; it is only by the customs, the
principles, the light and knowledge, of the twelfth century
that we can ever fairly judge them.
Cautions of this kind are more necessary with regard
to the dispute between Henry and Thomas than with
regard to almost any other portion of history. With
regard to many other controversies of past times, it is
almost impossible to avoid looking at them with the eyes
of our own day. In many cases, within proper limits,
it is even right that we should do so. The controversies
of remote ages and countries may be closely analogous
to controversies of our own day. The controversies of
G 2
84 SAINT THOMAS OF CANTERBURY [Essay
our own country in past times may be but the beginning
of controversies still going on among ourselves. In such
cases the side taken in present politics will always decide
the general estimate of past politics. We only ask for
the men and measures of the past, what we should ask
for the men and measures of the present, that opposition
and criticism be fair and honest, that particular men and
particular actions be not misrepresented, and that it be
never forgotten that, both then and now, wise and good
men may be found on both sides. But the twelfth century
stands in a peculiar position. It was a highly important
period, fruitful in great men and great events ; but its
work was a silent one, and its controversies have, less
than those of most ages either before or after, any direct
bearing upon present affairs. The events of the age which
came before, and those of the age which followed it, speak
at once to our hearts. The spectacle of a nation, and
that the English nation, overcome by foreign enemies,
made bondmen and strangers in their own land, is one
which re(}uires no explanation. The struggle of English-
man and Norman is one which awakens sympathies com-
mon to all time and places :
(is olwvus apiaroi, dfivvtaOai -nepl Trdrprjs,
is a sentiment which speaks equally to the heart, whether
it bo put into the mouth of Hector, of Hereward, or of
Garibaldi. The thirteenth century again has for every
Englishman an interest of another kind. Wo have now
entered on the England of our own time ; the great
struggle has begun which still continues ; we have begun
to walk among that goodly company of statesmen, heroes,
and patriots which leads us from Langton and Grosseteste
and Winchelsea, from Fitzwalter and De Montfort and
Koger Bigod, on to the Peel, the Russell, and the Glad-
stone of our own day. Compared with the eleventh
century and with the thirteenth, the age of Henry and
Thomas seems like something with which we have nothing
IV.] AND HIS BIOGRAPHERS. 85
to do, and which we can hardly understand. The political
position of England was like nothing before it or after
it. In the eleventh century and in the thirteenth, there
was an English king and an English people ; but in the
twelfth such objects are hardly discernible. There is
indeed a King of England, the mightiest and richest
prince of Europe ; but he is a mere foreigner, a French-
man living in France, devoting his energies to French
objects, and holding England almost as a province of
Anjou. And as with the position of the island, so with
its internal controversies. We imagine that no Roman
Catholic or High Churchman would claim for the clergy
a freedom from secular jurisdiction in criminal cases, or
would think the exclusive right of the Archbishop of
Canterbury to crown the King of England a matter for
which it was worth while to resist even unto death. In
the twelfth century the case was much less clear. Thomas
and Henry, in short, were two very remarkable men in
a very remarkable age, who engaged in a controversy
about which there could not be two opinions now, but
about which opposite sides were then taken by the best
and wisest men of the age. If a man will study the
matejials before him fully and fairly, he will probably
rise up with very considerable respect for both disputants
on the whole, mingled with strong condemnation of par-
ticular actions of both. Thomas often disgraced a sfood
cause by violence and obstinacy ; Henry disgraced a cause
equally good by mean cruelty and petty personal perse-
cution, and sometimes, which Thomas never did. he allowed
momentary passion to hurry him into practically giving up
his cause altogether.
On the modern writers on the subject we do not intend
to enlarge at length. Though the history has been touched
on incidentally by some very distinguished men, it has
never been made the subject of any separate work of first-
rate merit. We will therefore touch briefly on the most
important modern writers on the subject, and then proceed
86 SAINT THOMAS OF CANTERBURY [Essay
to give our own estimate of Thomas himself and his con-
temporary biographers.
Lord Lyttelton and Mr. Berington were probably the
first, among the modern " amici " and " inimici Thomi^e," *
who could give any reason for their friendship or enmity.
Their histories of Henry the Second were both of them
highly creditable to their authors at a time when his-
torical learning was at its lowest ebb. In an age of
second-hand knowledge they had really read the contem-
porary writers. Each maintains his own position well,
and each may be still turned to w^ith profit, even after
the accumulation of so much recent literature on the
subject. Mr. Berington, we may add, though an apologist
of Thomas, is by no means a blind admirer ; he is not a
Herbert of Bosham, but claims the higher character of
a John of Salisbury.
Among more general historians, in whose pages Thomas
and Henry necessarily play a considerable part, Dr. Lin-
gard at once occurs as a Roman Catholic writer of much
the same school as Mr. Berington. Both of them have
the wisdom to write, not as Roman Catholics, but as
ordinary men ; they at all events affect impartiality, and
of course are much more likely to influence Protestant
judgements than if they checked them at the beginning
by any ostentatious display of their peculiar dogmas. On
the other hand, Southey's agreeable, but very superficial,
Book of the Church contains one of the very best of what
we may call the incidental biographies of Thomas. It
is full, vivid, and sympathizing. It is clear that the
heroic grandeur of the Catholic saint appealed irresistibly
to the heart of the poet, even while invested Avith the
character of a Protestant controversialist.
Thoinas also figures very promincntlj'' in Thierry's well-
known History of the Norman Con((uest, where he is
pressed into the service of that writer's peculiar theories.
* Aiiioiii,' tlie Letters is one (Giles, iv. 256) headed "ALiXfuidn) papm et
Dimiiljiis curdiiialil us Inimici Thomce Cautuurieiibis arcliiepi.scopi. '
lY.] AND HIS BIOGRAPHERS. 87
He is made to figure as an English patriot contending
against Norman oppressors. Of this utterly untenable
notion, and of the small nucleus of truth around which
M. Thierry has gathered a mass of very attractive romance,
we shall have again to speak.
The more recent literature on the subject begins with
the Remains of the late Mr. R. H. Froude. Strangely
enough, the first recent apologist of Saint Thomas of
Canterbury was brother of the apologist of King Henry
the Eighth. The elder Froude, one of the original leaders
of the Oxford Tract movement, was a man of ability and
independent thought, but, as one might expect, he ap-
proached the subject from a wholly false point of view.
His case was one of the most conspicuous of misconceiving
history, in consequence of seeing it through an atmosphere
of modern controversy. The .subject attracted him from
some fancied analogies between the position of the Church
in the twelfth century and the nineteenth. The career of
Thomas occupies the whole of the third volume of Mr.
Froude's Remains, but a large portion of the narrative
part is from another hand, no less an one, we believe,
than Dr. Newman's. Mr. Froude's own labours were
chiefly given to translating and partially arranging the
Epistles, a task before which any amount of energy might
excusably have broken down.
After Mr. Froude came Dr. Giles. We suppose we must
allow the praises of zeal and research to a man who has
edited, translated, and written more books than any other
living English scholar. But really we can give him no
other praise. The Epistles, as edited in his Sauclu-s Thomas
Cantuarieiuns, are, as most later writers have complained,
a heap of confusion, made far worse confounded by Dr.
Giles himself. The principle of arrangement is an elabo-
rate puzzle which renders it almost hopeless to find any
particular letter ; the indexes are very meagre, and the
mere editing is exceedingly bad.*
* We thoroughly agree with Mi\ Robertsou's wish, that a really good editioQ
88 SAINT THOMAS OF CANTERBURY [Essay
Dr. Giles has indeed also given us the Life and Letters
in two volumes of English, in which there is an attempt
to arrange some of the letters in the order of time. But
scholars do not want a ti anslation — and a very bad trans-
lation too — of some of the letters, but an intelligible edition
of the original text of all. Dr. Giles's attempt at original
biograph}' amounts to little more than a filling-up of inter-
stices, and is moreover as poor and superficial as may be.
Nearly everything that is good in it is copied from Mr.
Froude.
The life and death of Thomas have also been taken up
by two writers of a widely different stamp from either
Mr. Froude or Dr. Giles. Professor Stanley, in his His-
torical Memorials of Canterbury, has given us a harmonized
narrative of the martyrdom, written with such minuteness,
life, and truth, that we deeply regret that it extends to
the martyrdom alone, and does not take in the whole
history. No less admirable is his treatment of what we
may call the posthumous history of Thomas in the chapter
on the Shrine of Becket. The Thomaic controversy again
occupies a large portion of the third volume of Dean
Milman"s Latin Christianity. With some drawbacks, this
is the best English Life of Thomas we know, though the
narrative perhaps suffers a little from over-compression ;
and though we think that the Dean passes on the whole
too harsh a judgement on Thomas, it is only fair to add
that he sometimes bears rather hard upon Henry also.
Still his narrative, allowing for some of those little slips
in names and details into which it is strange to find
so really learned a man as Dr. Milman so constantly
falling, is the very best history of Thomas we know ; far
better, considering its scale, than the more special ones
which we have now to mention.
The year 1H59 produced two rival biographies of our
hero ; the works of the Roman Catholic Canon of North-
of tlie whole literature on the suhject slioiikl f'urui part of the Series now publish-
ing by authority of the Master of the Kolls.
IV.] AND HIS BIOGRAPHERS. 89
hampton, and of the Protestant Canon of Canterbury. On
these we might be tempted to dilate at some length, as the
contrast between them is very curious and amusing. Each
of the rival canons has read his books well and accurately ;
each brings local inspiration to the task ; each does his best,
such as it is, to be fair ; but each is disqualified by
invincible prejudices, and the work of each alike labours
under incurable objections in point of form. Canon Morris
writes in a spirit of undiscriminating admiration ; Canon
Robertson writes in a spirit of carping and fault-finding,
with which we have still less sympathy. Canon Morris
might have written a purely devotional life of Saint
Thomas of Canterbury for members of his own communion,
and no fair person would have objected ; or he might have
written a historical life in the same spirit of prudence as
Mr. Berington and Dr. Lingard ; but he has confounded the
two ideas together, and has produced something far too
historical for purely devotional use, while, as a history, it
is sure to oflend every Protestant reader. Canon Robertson
has worked up into a book two old articles from the defunct
English Review, written, it would seem, against Mr. Froude
and Dr. Giles. The book retains far too palpable traces of
its origin in its somewhat poor and heavy attempts at wit,
in its constant sarcasms on the writers reviewed, and its
occasional allusions to things quite unintelligible to those
who have not all the numbers of the English Review by
heart. Nothing for instance can be truer, but nothing can
be more out of place, than the elaborate criticism on Dr.
Giles's editing which is thrust into the middle of the bio-
graphy. For the matter of the book, it is what might be
expected from a man who understands his subject without
loving it, and whose chief object is to upset Mr. Froude.
The narrative is accurate ; the references are highly valu-
able. The author does his best to be fair, and rejects all
the more vulgar calumnies against his victim ; — for, unlike
most biographies, this of Mr. Robertson has no liero. But
Mr. Robertson sees everything through the coloured glass
90 SAIXT THOMAS OF CANTERBURY [Essay
of the English Review. He is utterly incapable of entering
into the position of either a king or an archbishop of the
twelfth century. Above all, Thomas of Canterbury, whether
saint or not, was emphatically a hero, and a hero is just the
sort of person whom Canon Robertson cannot possibly
understand.
Of the foreign writers on the subject, we must confess
with shame that we know less than we ou^ht. Reuters
History of Alexander the Third is frequently quoted by
Deau jNIilman and Mr. Robertson ; and, as it seems to be
highly favourable to that Pontiff, we suppose we ought in
fairness to have mastered it, for certainly our own. study of
the Thomaic correspondence does not lead us to a conclusion
at all like what we take M. Renter's to be. M. Ozanam's
De7ix Chancellery iV Avgleferre (Paris, 1H36), and M. Buss's I)er
HeUige Thomas und se'm Kaiiipf fur die Freiheii der Kirche
(Mainz, 1856), we only heard of through Mr. Robertson's
references. M. Ozanam's book we have not seen ; M. Buss's
has reached us since we began to write this article, and we
have had time only to glance at it. It is easy to see that
M. Buss is a strong Catholic and partisan of Thomas, but
we do not see anything of the offensive ostentation of
Catholicism of which we complain in Mr. Morris. His
research and labour are unwearied, and, as far as we have
seen, his work seems to be the best suited of all to serve
as a guide to the original writers. But there are some
tasks before which even German industry breaks down, or
at least which it cannot go through without complaining.
M. Buss complains, not indeed with the sarcastic rhetoric of
Ml'. Robertson, but with a simple pathos which is quite as
effective, of the superhuman difficulty of finding anything
he wants in a book edited by Dr. Giles.
We will now turn from modern writers on the subject to
the original authorities for the Life of Thomas. These are
of throe kinds, — the biographers, the contemporary chro-
niclers, and the correspondence of Thomas, Gilbert, and the
rest. All our authorities arc in Latin, except a single very
IV.] AXD HIS BIOGRAPHERS. 91
important biography in French verse. English records we
unluckily have none. The Saxon Chronicle breaks off at
the accession of Henry the Second. What would one not
have given to have seen this stin-ing period described, with
the same life as the days of the Conqueror and of Stephen,
by a real native Englishman, in the old Teutonic mother-
tongue ?
The French Life of Garnier of Pont Sainte-Maxence
must be the earliest of all, as the author tells us it was
written between 1172 and 11 74, being completed within
four years after the martyrdom. The author had himself
seen the saint in the flesh, but before he assumed his saintly
character :
"En Gascuingne fu-il lung tens ]jnr guerreier.
As G;iscuns i kovint de lur chastens lesser.
En Normendie r'out sun seinur grant mester,
Ei jo Vvi sor Franceis plusur feiz ckevaucher."*
He visited Canterbury, and also conversed with Thomas's
sister, Mary, Abbess of Barking, so that he had good sources
of knowledge ; and he tells us that, in the course of writing
his book, he often altered what he had written, as he
obtained better information. Besides direct narrative, the
book contains many digressions or versified sermons ; he
has also taken the trouble to translate several of the more
important letters into his French verse, and a very odd
effect they have in their new shape. This biography is
very important from its early date, and to the philologer it
is highly valuable as a specimen of the French language in
the twelfth century.
Of the Latin Lives the most important are those of
Edward Grim, Roger of Pontigny, William Fitz-Stephen,
Alan of Tewkesbury, and Herbert of Bosham, together with
the short Life by John of Salisbury prefixed to that of Alan.
All these writers were contemporary, and were intimate
with the Archbishop at some portion or other of his career.
Each therefore tells part at least of his story from his own
* Garnier, p. 14, ed. Hippeau.
92 SAIXT THOMAS OF CANTERBURY [Essay
personal knowledge. Each, to a great extent, fills up the
deficiencies of the others. Thus Edward Grim only entered
the service of Thomas a few days before his death ; his
earlier narrative is therefore written from heai'say; but, in
his new-born zeal for his master, he gives a full and vivid
account of his martyrdom : of that martyrdom indeed
he was more than a spectator; he was actually a fellow-
sufferer, having his arm broken in a vain attempt to defend
the Archbishop. Roger was the attendant of Thomas during
his sojourn at Pontigny. We might have expected him to
be very full on that part of his history; but, writing doubt-
less mainly for the monks of Pontigny, he says that he will
not enlarge upon what every one knows, and cuts that part
very short. He therefore writes mainly from hearsay, but
it is from the hearsay of Thomas himself ; so that we may
look upon Roger's work as being more nearly an auto-
biography than any of the others. William Fitz-Stephen
seems to have been attached to Thomas earlier than any of
the rest. He was his clerk when Chancellor, and conse-
quently gives us many details of that time of his life
which are not to be found elsewhere. He did not follow
the Archbishop into exile, though he had one interview
with him in the course of a journey through France ; but
he was present at the martyrdom. Hence he can tell us
little from his own knowledge of his master's doings in
banishment, but he supplies many valuable particulars of
what was going on in England meanwhile. Herbert of
Bosbam, on the other hand, followed Thomas through his
whole career both in England and France, but he was not
present at the martyrdom, and he seems to have known
very little of his early life. He is therefore the fullest
of all in his biography of the Archbishop, but tells us
very little of the Chancellor. Alan, and the fragmentary
Life by William of Canterbury in Dr. Giles's second
volume, also contain occasional particulars not to be found
elsewhere.
The comparison of these biographies with one another is
IV.] AND HIS BIOGRAPHERS. 93
exceedingly cuiious and interesting. "We fully agree with
Mr. Robertson that they need to be more closely analyzed
and compared than they have ever yet been, " with a view
of ascertaining their correspondences and divergences, and
the sources from which each writer derived his materials."
Mr. Robertson goes on to say, rather darkly, " Perhaps the
result of such an inquiry might be found to throw some
light on questions connected with a Hidoria QvadnpartUa
far more important than that which is devoted to the Life
of Thomas of Canterbury." This we take to be Canon
Robertson^s roundabout way of describing the Four Gospels.
The hint is an excellent one, especially as coming from
so orthodox a source, though it is very likely that some
inquirers might push it to results at which Mr. Robertson
might be rather alarmed. The general character of the
narratives is that of close agreement in the main story,
combined with constant contradiction in minute particulars.
This is just what might be expected from narratives written
from memory some years after the event. Herbert, for
instance, did not write till fourteen years after the martyr-
dom. He speaks rather pathetically of himself as the last
survivor of the whole band of faithful disciples.* On the
other hand, there is not uncommonly a minute, sometimes
even a verbal, agreement between two or more narrators, as
if they had copied from one another, or from some common
source. Take, for instance, one grand scene in Thomas's
life, his "fighting with beasts" at Northampton. Two at
least of our authorities, Herbert and William Fitz-Stephen,
were there. Yet if a man were to try to force even their
narratives into exact conformity, as commentators do with
Mr. Robertson's other lUdoria Qtiadriparfifa, he would
utterly break down in tlie attempt. Comparing all the
narratives, there is a good deal of difference in the order of
events, and even as to the mouth into which particular
speeches are put. But in the whole history we only
remember one contradiction of any real moment. William
* Giles, vii. 335.
94 SATXT THOMAS OF CANTERBURY [Essay
Fitz-Steplien saj'S that Thomas did affix his seal to the
Constitutions of Clarendon, which is stated by no one else,
and which the rest implicitly deny. Here we confess is a
difficulty. William was something of a lawyer, and seems
always careful about legal technicalities, so his testimony
is especially valuable. But it has to be set against a
consensus of the other writers and the general tenour of the
story. Whether Thomas did or did not seal the Constitu-
tions is of real importance to the history, and it is strange
that any of his followers should be careless or misinformed
about it ; but the slighter diversities which elsewhere lie
thick upon the narrative are just what always happen to
several unassisted human narrators telling the same story.
No reader of the Life of Thomas is likely to be troubled at
discrepancies of this sort ; but exactly similar ones in the
other Hisforia Qiiadriparlila have given no small trouble to
tender consciences. Each biographer of Thomas, like each
of the Evangelists, has a character of his own. Edward
Grim has the greatest tendency to the marvellous ; Eoger,
as a Frenchman, is far more bitter against Henry than any
of the rest, and he makes just those little mistakes about
English matters which a Frenchman would make in any age.
William Fitz-Stephen is lively and amusing ; Herbert is
given to sermonizing and twaddling, and to putting long
speeches, not only into his own mouth (which is his own
affiiir), but into the mouths of Thomas and others, which we
trust and believe are Master Herbert's own composition.
But even this is no more than every historian gave himself
the license of doing till very recent times. Herbert is
moreover the Boanerges of our story. He seems to have
been the double of Thomas in mind and body, and probably
did Thomas very little good by his constant company. As
if the Primate were not of himself daring and unyielding
enough in all conscience, Herbert was always stii-ring him
up to the strongest measures. Like Thomas, he did not fear
the face of man, and spoke as boldly to King Henry on his
throne as to his own master in his chamber. Like Thomas
IV.] AXD HIS BIOGRAPHERS. 95
too he was tall of stature and goodly of countenance ; and
like Thomas in his unregenerate state, he did not object
to set off his bodily perfections to the best advantage."^
These two faithful followers appear in their several
characters in that most striking scene at Northampton. f
Thomas sits with his cross in his hand, defying the King of
earth in the name of the King of Heaven. Herbert, the true
Boanerges, would fain have him excommunicate every man
present on the spot. William counsels meekness and
patience. Forbidden to speak to his master, he points in
silence to the figure of the crucified Saviour. Even the
cold heart of Mr. Robertson forbears to sneer at this most
touching incident.
Besides these biographies by wmters whose names and
actions we know, there is a very remarkable one printed
in Dr. Gileses second volume, from an anonymous manu-
script in the Library at Lambeth Palace. The author
aifirms that he was present at the martyrdom ; still his
contemporary character is doubted by some modern
writers. If it were fully ascertained, the work would be
most valuable ; for, though it does not contain many new
facts, it is written in a tone of unusually independent
criticism, and has fewer coincidences with other Lives than
any one in the series. It states the case for Henry and
against Thomas with great fulness and fairness, and enters
into arguments at some length against those who denied
the Archbishop's claims to the title of martyr.
As for contemporary chroniclers, who wrote, not special
Lives of Saint Thomas, but general annals of their own
times, several of the best of the class have recorded the
reign of Henry the Second. These of course are highly
valuable, as giving us the view of affairs taken by those
who were not Thomas's immediate followers, and also as
helping us to the more exact chronology of the period.
The biographers are commonly rather careless as to the
order of time. Each, as we have seen, recorded what
* William Fitz-Stephen, Giles, i. 265. t lb. i. 226.
96 SAIXT THOMAS OF CANTERBURY [Essay
struck him most or what he best knew ; one set down
one event and another another ; and none of them paid
much regard to the order of details. The chroniclers step
in to correct their errors and supply their deficiencies.
Ealph de Diceto, Dean of Saint Paul's, a moderate partisan
of the King's, supplies in his Tinaginen Hhioriarnm several
important facts not in the biographies, together with the
chronological arrangement of all. Gervase and Roger of
Hoveden were also contemporaries : but they were younger
men, who wrote after the biographers, whom they con-
tinually copy. But it is always curious to see which Life
they follow for any particular fact, and they also often add
touches and details of their own. Gervase especially, as a
Canterbury monk admitted by Thomas himself, had good
means of information. William of Newbui-gh is chiefly
remarkable for the manly and independent tone with which
he treats the whole controversy, doing full justice to the
originally honest motives of both the King and the Primate,
but not scrupling to deal severe censure on particular
actions of both.
The Letters of course are invaluable ; at least they will
be when any one shall be found to edit them decently. For
the whole of Thomas's sojourn in France, they, much more
than the biographers, are really the history. Many of the
letters are strictly public documents, and many others,
though private in form, were meant at least for the eyes of
all the writer's own party. Mr. Robertson thinks the corre-
spondence does not give a favourable idea of the time, and
that it is on the whole discreditable to the mediaeval Church.
That the letters are full of stronof lanijuaofe is no more than
was to be expected ; but we do not know that Saint
Thomas and his contemporaries use any stronger language
than those worthies of the sixteenth century whom doubtless
Mr. Robertson, as a sound Protestant, duly reverences.
If Thomas is rather fond of calling Geoffrey Riddell Archi-
(liaholvs instead of Arcfiidiaconvs, was it not the established
joke of the Reformation to call a Bishop a BUesIieejp, and to
IV.] AND HIS BIOGRAPHERS. 97
turn Cardinal Poole into Carnal Fooll In short, in ages
when decorum was not very stringent, all men who have
been in earnest, from the Prophets and Apostles down-
wards, have used very strong language upon occasion.
But Mr. Robertson's taste is so delicate that he is actually
offended by Thomas's hearty, honest, and thoroughly
English denunciations of the iniquities of the Roman
Court. These we suspect, in anybody but Saint Thomas
of Canterbury, he would have hailed as an instance of
Protestantism before its time. But he has weightier accu-
sations still against the unfortunate Letters. They are he
thinks full of " cant," and of " stranQ^e tossino- to and fro of
Scripture, perverted by allegory and misapplication."* In
a certain sense this is true ; but talk of this sort always
reminds us very strongly of the doctrine taught us by
Mr. Grote, that all religions seem absurd to those who do
not believe them. Most undoubtedly a calm and critical
reader of those Hebrew and Greek writings which we call
Scripture will find constant '• misapplications " and strange
'• tossings to and fro " in the writings of Thomas, his friends,
and his enemies. But he will find misapplications and
tossings equally strange in any sermon, any religious tract,
any religious biography, of our own times. In their belief,
as in that of the Protestant enthusiasts of the seventeenth
century, every word of the Old and New Testament was
written for the direct example and instruction of every
man of every age. Believing this, they did not shrink
from carrying it out in detail. If God spake unto Moses,
why should He not speak also to Anselm or Bernard ? If
He bade Joshua lead His people against the Canaanite, did
He not also bid Peter the Hermit to preach the crusade
against the Saracen "? If the destroying angel smote the
host of Sennacherib before Jerusalem, was the arm of the
Lord to be shortened when the schismatic Frederick threw
up his banks and shot his arrows against the tomb and
temple of the Prince of the Apostles ? The faith of those
* P. 173.
H
98 SAIXT THOMAS OF CAXTERBURY [Essay
times was at least a real, living, practical, faith ; professiDg
to telieve certain books as their rule of faith and their
personal guide of life, they did believe them as such.
Consistently, at all events, they shrank from no " misappli-
cation," no " strange tossing to and fro," of what they held
to be real lively oracles, speaking direct comfort and
counsel in every circumstance of the life of every man.
We however fully agree with Mr. Robertson in placing
the letters of John of Salisbury far higher than any others
in the collection. John was a thoroughly good and pious
man, and withal learned, thoughtful, moderate, and prudent.
A firm friend and faithful follower of Thomas, he rebukes
him, whenever he thinks him in the wrong, with apostolic
boldness ; down to the very day of his death,* he with-
stands him to the face as often as he is to be blamed. We
have no hesitation in setting down John as a wiser and
better man than Thomas himself But does not Mr.
Robertson see that it speaks very much in Thomas's favour
to have attracted and retained the devoted attachment of
such a man ? A really candid writer would have pointed
out that if John's bold and faithful rebukes tell greatly to
his honour, they tell almost equally to the honour of Thomas,
who invariably took them in good part.
In a similar spirit elsewhere Mr. Robertson exhibits an
amount of delight and triumph altogether childish, in
pointing out the error of "certain writers" who had not
put the events connected with the excommunication at
Vezelay and the removal from Pontigny in their right
order. The " certain writers " seem to be Dr. Lingard,
and perhaps Dr. Giles and Mr. Froude. We are not greatly
concerned for them ; but when Mr. Robertson ventures to
say f that the original biographers " wished to falsify the
history," that is quite another matter. The case is this.
In 1 1 66 Thomas went from Pontigny to Vezelay, and
there, in discharge of legatine powers with which he had
been lately invested by the Pope, he excommunicated,
* IJog. Pont., ap. Giles, i. 164 ; P.en. retr., ibid. ii. 62. f P. 193.
IV.] AND HIS BIOGRAPHERS. 99
with especial solemnity, several of the King's friends,
both clerical and lay, for various offences, and uttered a
solemn warning against Henry himself. Him also he had
intended to excommunicate, but forebore doing so on
hearing that he was dangerously ill. On hearing of this
proceeding, Henry, by violent threats against the whole
Cistercian order, procured the removal of Thomas from the
Cistercian abbey of Pontigny, where he had hitherto been
sheltered. The comment of an impartial historian would be,
that the Archbishop's conduct was violent and imprudent,
the King's revenge mean and cowardly. Unfortunately
it happens that not one of the biographers, except the
anonymous Lambeth writer, describes this scene in all its
fulness. The complete account of the matter has to be
made out from the chroniclers and the Letters. That most
of the biographers do not mention it is really not very
wonderful. Edward Grim was not there, and his whole
narrative of this part of Thomas's life is utterly meagre.
Roger of Pontigny cuts his almost as short, because his
brethren knew all about it. William Fitz-Stephen was not
there; he tells us chiefly what happened in Henry's domi-
nions. Herbert was there, and records the scene ; he does
not indeed directly mention the excommunication ; but
this is clearly because the warning against the King was
the most striking point, that which he found most vividly
impressed on his mind eighteen years after. For an Arch-
bishop of Canterbury to suspend a disobedient bishop, and
excommunicate a schismatic dean and a sacrilegious lay-
man, was no very wonderful occurrence. The awful and
unexpected part of the proceedings was, when Thomas
arose, with a voice broken with tears,^ to warn the King of
England that, if he did not repent, excommunication should
fall upon him as well as upon inferior sinners. That
* " Confestim, omnibus audientibus et stiipentibus, miro motu compunctus
voce quidem flebili et intentissimo conipassionis afiectu in ipsuin Anglorum
regem Henricum nominative coniminatorium emisit edictuni." Herb., ap. Giles,
vii. 230.
H 3
100 SAIXT THOMAS OF CANTERBURY [Essay
Herbert had no intention of concealing the far less
important fact of the excommunication and suspension
appears from his speaking directly of them in the very-
next page.* So equally does William Fitz-Stephen f
though without strict regard to chronology, he being more
intent on the reception of the excommunications in Eng-
land than on their first denunciation in Burgundy. In
short, if Mr. Robertson enjoys crowing over Dr. Liugard,
we have not the least wish to interfere with his enjoyment;
but he has not the slightest right to repeat the note of
triumph over any one of Thomas's original biographers.
We must now turn from the ancient and modern bio-
graphers of Thomas to the estimate which we have our-
selves foi'med of Thomas himself. If we can trust ourselves,
that estimate is not swayed by party considerations of any
kind. We do not feel ourselves bound to indiscriminate
worship because of a papal canonization ; but we do not
look on such papal canonization as at all taking away a
claim to honour when honour is due. And be it remem-
bered that it was not only the Eoman Chancery, but the
spontaneous voice of the English nation which raised
Thomas to the honours of saintship. Through his whole
archiepiscopal career, alike in England and in Franco,
Thomas was the darling of the people. One of his
biographers is almost content to rest his claims to rever-
ence on the adage, familiar then as now, that the voice of
the people is the voice of God. J When he " fought with
beasts " at Northampton, when his king accused him, when
barons condemned him and bishops deserted him, an
admiring multitude followed him in triumph from the
castle-gate to his lodo;ini>:s at Saint Andrew's. W^hen he
turned away from the conference at Montmirail, when
every earthly power seemed to have forsaken him, every
eye as he passed was fixed in admiration on the Primate
who " would not deny the honour of God for the face of
two kings." His return from banishment, his reception
* Giles, vii. 231. f lb. i. 258. J Lamb., ap. Giles, ii. 136.
IV.J AXD HIS BIOGRAPHERS. 101
at Sandwich, at Canterbury, and at London, was a nobler
triumph than ever awaited returning conqueror. The bells,
the organs, the processions of monks and clergy, might
have expressed a mere constrained or official homage ; but
there could have been nothing of such compulsion in the
voice with which, in defiance of hostile nobles and officials,
all Kent and all London poured forth to bless him who
came back to them in the name of the Lord, the father of
the orphans and the judge of the widows."^ Such popular
reverence does not prove that the cause which he defended
was one which the sober voice of history will permanently
approve. It does not prove that his own character may
not have been disfigured by many and grievous faults. But
it is a homage which assuredly was never paid to a mere
proud and ambitious hypocrite, or to the assertor of a cause
which was at the time palpably that of unrighteousness or
oppression.
Nor must we suppose that the popularity of Thomas in
his own day was at all the popularity of an assertor of the
cause of the " Saxon " against the Norman, This is a mere
dream, to which an unlucky currency has been given by
the eloquent writing of Thierry. There is no trace in the
history of the period of any such strongly marked antago-
nism as Thierry supposes still to have existed ; still less is
there any trace of Thomas of London being its impersona-
tion, if it did exist. Thomas, in reality, was himself of
Norman descent. His family was settled in London at the
time of his birth ; but his father was originally from Rouen,
while his mother seems actually to have been born at Caen.f
It is evident however that at the time of his birth his
family was thoroughly established in England, and that
they had the feelings, not of strangers, but of Englishmen
and Londoners. The truth is that there is not a word
about " Saxons and Normans," or any controversies be-
tween them, in any one contemporary biographer, chronicler,
* " Pater orplianorum et judex viduarum." Herb., ap. Giles, vii. 315.
t Lamb., ap. Giles, i'. 73.
102 SAIXT THOMAS OF CANTERBURY [Essay
or letter-writer. The whole evidence seems to us to show
that the wide distinction and hostility between the two
races, supposed by Thierry and his school to have re-
mained so late as the reign of Henry the Second, is a mere
imagination. The probability is that, tliough the upper
classes were mainly of Norman, the lower of Old-English
descent, the distinction had then become one merely of
class, and not of nation. In the middle class, Thomas's
own class, the two races must have been much mixed up
together. Indeed the Conquest itself must have had the
highly beneficial effect of at once forming a middle class
out of the higher ranks of the conquered people. The
Norman gentleman, born in England, often of an English
mother, w(<uld soon feel himself much more English than
Norman. The Norman citizen, Gilbert Becket or his father,
would do so still sooner. In truth, mankind are every-
where far more sensible of birth than of descent, and they
identify themselves with the country where they were born,
rather than with the country of their fathers. We are
sometimes led to suppose that the feeling of race lasted
longer than it did because the kings remained foreign so
long. Henry the Second was not an Englishman, he was
not even a Norman ; he was a great French prince, who
reigned in France, and treated England as a dependency.
To his English subjects he was the rex transmaruuis,^^ the
king beyond the sea, who sometimes visited them, but who
commonly dwelt in more favoured parts of his dominions.
Twice in his reign he seems to have wished to confine his
own immediate government to his French territories, and
to convert England into the formal state of a viceroyalty.
Such, if we may believe the Lambeth biographor,f was
actually his object in pressing the election of Thomas to
the archbishopric. Henry was to reign in France and
Thomas in England. And afterwards it was clearly with
the same object that he procured the coronation of his son
* William Fitz-Stephen, ap. Giles, i. 284, 2S9, 294.
"i" Ap. Giles, ii. 86: cf. Gamier (et Fruteval), 152.
IV.] AND HIS BIOGRAPHERS. 103
as a rex cumarinns during his lifetime. Those whom he,
and the kings before and after him, advanced by preference
to high office were neither " Anglo-Saxons " nor " Anglo-
Normans," but absolute foreigners, natives of the continent.
This is especially to be seen in ecclesiastical promotions.
Thomas is always said to have been the first Englishman
who became Archbishop of Canterbury since the Conquest ;
it might have been added that he was nearly the first
Englishman who became bishop of any see. This is per-
fectly true. He was the first native of England, of either
race, who rose to the metropolitan throne ; while his pre-
decessors, and the greater number of the contemporary
bishops, were natives of the continent. It is probably
this ambiguous expression of " Englishman " which led
M. Thierry into the mistake of looking on Thomas as an
" Anglo-Saxon " patriot. The real ph?enomenon of the age
is not the struggle between the two races in England, but
the fusing together of the two races preparatory to the
struggle with a royal line foreign to both. This silent,
gradual, fusing of " Saxons and Normans," is recorded by
no chronicler, just because it was so silent and gradual.
But we see it plainly enough in its results. It was the
great work of the twelfth century. It is this work which
gives that century that peculiar character of- which we
have already spoken. No process could be more important,
more necessary to all that was to come after. But its
silent, hidden, nature is alone enough to give a sort of
isolated and unintelligible character to the outward aspect
of the age.
Of this fusion Thomas, the son of Gilbert Becket of
London, may be taken as the type. Though of Norman
blood, his whole feeling, his whole character, is English ;
and it is clear that no man in England looked upon him
as a stranger. His general character in mind and in body
stands vividly forth in his own letters and in the descrip-
tions of his biographers. The man of majestic presence
and of unyielding soul at once rises up before us. Saint
104 SAINT THOMAS OF CANTERBURY [Essay
Thomas of Canterbury was indeed a " muscular Christian "
■with a vengeance. Of strength and stature beyond the
common lot of men ; with a quick ear, a keen eye, a fluent
speech ; cheerful in discourse and ready in debate ; foremost
in the mimic warfare of the chase and on the actual fleld
of battle, — such was Thomas the Chancellor. And scourge
and fast and sackcloth did but little to change the essential
character of Thomas the Archbishop. The weapons of his
warfare alone are changed. Of old he stormed the strongest
castles, and unhorsed the stoutest knights in single combat.
He laughed at the scruples of his sovereign which kept him
back from assailing his liege lord King Lewis within the
walls of Toulouse. The saint clearly took exactly the
same delight in wielding his spiritual arms. He writhed
under the timid and time-serving counsels of Pope and
Cardinals, who kept back the sword of Peter from the
slaughter. And yet this man, so ardent and headstrong,
must have been, at both times of his life, amongst the most
amiable and delightful of companions. The intense love
with which he inspired his immediate followers breathes
in every page of their writings. It is alike in the neophyte
Edward Grim, in the fellow-exile Herbert, and in his
earlier follower William Fitz-Stephen, who seems hardly to
know which most to admire, the magnificent Chancellor or
the martyred Archbishop. Nor did he awaken less attach-
ment among men of other ways and callings. All their dis-
putes could never quite efface the old friendship from the
heart either of Henry or of Thomas. At every personal
meeting the unextinguished love breaks out again, if only
for one brief moment. Henry, there can be little doubt,
was kept up to his opposition by men who hated Thomas
far more than he did. The bishops, even the better ones,
for the most part disliked him from their natural repug-
nance to see a man of his early life and conversation so
strangely exalted over their heads. Ruffians like the De
Brocs were actuated by the motives common to men of their
stamp in all ages. The higher and better class of the laity,
IV.] AXD HIS BIOGRAPHERS. 105
men like the Earls of Arundel and Leicester, oppose Thomas
with deep sorrow, and in every respect exhibit a favourable
contrast to the bishops on the Kings side. The love and
the hatred of Thomas were passions of intense depth, and he
could call out both feelings in others in as great intensity as
he felt them himself.
The intellect of Thomas was clearly one ranking very
high in the second order of genius. He was not a creator.
We should look in vain to him for anything original or
comprehensive. He could never have left any such impress
upon his age as did Hildebrand among popes, or Charles
the Great among kings. His great qualities were an ardent
and impetuous spirit, a practical energy which carried
everything before him, an admirable versatility which could
adapt itself to all circumstances and all people, and a lofty
sense of duty which could support him under any amount
of adversity and disappointment. His faults were chiefly
the exaggeration of his virtues. His impetuosity often
grew into needless and injudicious violence ; his strong
will continually degenerated into obstinacy. His biogra-
phers praise him for uniting the wisdom of the serpent with
the harmlessness of the dove. We must confess that we
can see in him very little of either dove or serpent ; their
other favourite quotation of " the righteous man bold as a
lion," is very much more to the purpose. His enemies
have accused him of pride and of duplicity. Doubtless
he magnified his office to the extremest point ; his long
brooding over his wrongs at Sens and Pontigny imbued
him with a fanatical spirit, and an overdone, almost frantic,
longing for martyrdom. Yet how far the personal exalta-
tion of Thomas of London was still thought of in procuring
the triumph of the Archbishop of Canterbury and Legate
of the Holy See, it is not for mortals to presume to judge.
The charge of duplicity, which we are sorry to see brought
on one occasion by so weighty a writer as Dean Milman, is,
we think, without foundation. The faults of Thomas were
the natural faults of his lofty and impetuous character, the
106 SAIXT THOMAS OF CANTERBURY [Essay
faults of obstinacy and violence. But duplicity, conscious
bad faith, was utterly alien to his nature. Once, possibly
twice, in his life — certainly at Clarendon, perhaps also
at Montmirail — he allowed himself to be talked over
into conduct which he did not thoroughly approve. He
repented ; he drew back ; in a certain sense he violated his
promise ; but he was not guilty of any deliberate deception.
His conduct may be called either vacillating or obstinate,
two qualities quite consistent with one another ; it may be
called over- scrupulous ; it certainly was provoking and
otFensive ; but we do not think it fairly deserves the name
of double-dealing.
The whole character of Thomas strikes us as essentiall}'
secular. He was made for the court and the camp, not for the
cathedral or the cloister. His episcopacy and his saintship
strike us as mistakes. There was not a particle of hypocrisy
in him ; but the whole of his saintly career was artificial,
unnatural, and overdone. His misfortune was to be born
in an age, and in a class, to which the Church alone offered
means of advancement. His first great advancement was
indeed secular; he was a statesman and a soldier, not a
priest ; but, strangely enough, it was only his ecclesiastical
character which allowed him to become a statesman and
a soldier. His parentage was respectable, but no more ; he
was himself in no way ashamed of his descent, but it is clear
that it was humble enough to be used as a means of dis-
paragement by his enemies. The son of Gilbert Becket of
London would, as a mere layman, have had little chance of
presiding in the King's Chancery or of commanding the
King's armies. Once tonsured, secular as well as ecclesias-
tical greatness was open to him. As Chancellor he nearly
cast off his clerical character. Strict men condemned the
secular pomp of the great courtier and captain who was
also Archdeacon of Canterbury and Provost of Beverley.
But two things are to be remembered : first of all, ho was
not a priest. Loaded with preferment which now no deacon
could hold, the terror of Kinjj: Lewis and counsellor of King
IV.] AND HIS BIOGRAPHERS. 107
Henry remained ecclesiastically in that lowly order. A
fighting archdeacon was a scandal, though Edward Grim
seems to have thought otherwise ; but the conduct of
Thomas did not present the far greater scandal of a priest,
one invested with the mysterious powers of sacrifice and
absolution, casting off his spiritual character like Caesar
Borgia or Talleyrand. In modern estimation the diflEerence
between a priest and a deacon seems very slight ; but, when
once the full sacerdotal ideal is realized, it becomes some-
thing infinite. Secondly, though Thomas as Chancellor
led a thoroughly secular life, he did not lead either an ir-
religious or an immoral one. Looked on as a layman, he
might almost, even then, have passed for a saint. That he
already bared his back to the discipline does not prove very
much, as Henry himself now and then did the same. But
it is no small credit that a man, whose order debarred him
from marriage, should, in a profligate court, have strictly
preserved his personal chastity. How far he rebuked the
King's vices we know not, but he resisted many strong
tem^Dtations to share in them, and he was a severe censor
of inferior offenders in the same line. At last came the
moment of the great change. Thomas the Chancellor-
Archdeacon is converted into Thomas the Archbishop.
We have every reason to believe that the appointment
was against his own wishes. He was as great as he could
be in the line which best suited his powers, and he felt no
desire to adventure himself in a line for which he must then
at least have felt himself less fitted. He warned his master
that, once Archbishop, he should be sure to lose his favour.*
But Henry insisted on the appointment, and Thomas was
ordained priest, and elected and consecrated Primate of all
England.
And now came that great change by which, in the
language of his biogi-aphers, he became another man.
Was the change miraculous ? Was it hypocritical ? Or
shall we say with Mr. Froude that there was no sudden
* Herb. vii. 26: cf. Rog. i. 108; Will. Fitz-Stepli. i. 193; Alan, i. 322.
108 SAT XT THOMAS OF CANTERBURY [Essay
change at all 1 To us it seems merely the natural result
of change of circumstances in a man of Thomas's char-
acter. He was not a man to do any thing by halves ;
whatever master he served he served to the uttermost.
As the servant of the King he was the most faithful of
Chancellors; as the servant of the Church he would be
the most faithful of Bishops, One at least of his bio-
graphers seems to have quite understood^ what is really
no very wonderful phsenomenon. Thomas was in all
things a man of his own age ; we never find him rising
above it or sinking below it. He accepted without hesi-
tation the current notion of a saintly prelate, and en-
deavoured to carry it out in his own person. The ideal
ecclesiastic of his times was one who united the loftiest
hierarchical pretensions with the most unbounded liberality
and the severest personal mortifications. Into this ideal
Thomas threw himself with characteristic fervour. His
perfect sincerity no man can doubt who has studied at
once human nature and the records of the time. But the
change, though perfectly sincere, was still artificial ; his
saintship never sat quite easily upon him ; with the zeal
of a new convert he overdid matters. We at once see the
difference between him and those holy personages whose
sanctity has been the sanctity of a whole life, or those
again who have been suddenly turned from notorious
sinners into contrite-hearted penitents. Nor was he one
of the class of great ecclesiastical statesmen to whom the
Church has been through life as a fatherland or a political
party. Had Thomas belonged to any one of those classes,
he would have been somewhat more chary of his spiritual
thunders. But his artificial frame of mind allowed no
scope either for the long-suffering of Anselm or for the
policy of Hildebrand. His fiery soul would have revolted
* " Siqiiulein qiinm ante proiiuitionein suam tanqnam unus excellentiam
enituisset scculo, non minus etiain postmodum inter prtecipuos ortiiodoxoriuu
eminere studiiit niilitans C^hristo. Nesciebat eiiiiii nisi inaximorum unus esse
quemcunique sortitua esset ordinem vitse." Will. Cant., ap. Giles, ii. 130.
IV.] AND HIS BIOGRAPHERS. 109
against either as remissness in the cause of God. Thomas
could be meek and gentle after a sort, yet always only by
an effort ; himself personally he could humble, as he did
to his censor John of Salisbury ; but the rights of his
office, the cause of the Church, were never to be humbled
by him. Throughout his life the garb of saintship never
fitted him. Through his whole career the old Adam is
perpetually peeping out : we see the spirit of former days
when he tells his slanderer at Northampton that, were he
a knight, his sword should assert his righteousness ; when
he is detected on the Flemish coast by his eye fixed on
the hawk on the young noble's wrist ; when, even in his
last hour, after years of scourging and penance, the strong
arm which had unhorsed Engelram de Trie threw Reginald
Fitz-Urse prostrate upon the pavement of the cathedral.
It peeps out in less excusable form in those words of
reviling, rather than rebuke, from which he could not
restrain himself even in the hour of confessorship and of
martyrdom.* Had his early life been one of deeper sinful-
ness, his conversion might have brought a more chastened
and truly mortified spirit to the service of his Maker.
But a saintship artificial, though thoroughly sincere, had
always something awkward and incongrous about it.
If the Church really needed a champion, the lion-heart of
Thomas was certainly less fitted for the office than the
true union of dove and serpent to be found in his friend
and monitor John of Salisbury.
Our estimate of Thomas's personal character ought not
to be at all affected by modern notions, however well
founded, as to the abstract justice of the cause which he
maintained. The immunity of clerks from the jurisdic-
tion of the civil power would now be justly considered
monstrous in every well-governed country. All that is
wanted is to show that it was a cause which might be
honestly maintained in the twelfth century. And that it
* " Garcionem et spiiriiim" (Will. Cant., ap. Giles, ii. 13) at Northampton.
"Lenonem appellans" at Canterbury (E. Grim, ap. Giles, i. 76).
110 SAIXr THOMAS OF CANTERBURY [Essay
surely was. Thomas did not invent the ecclesiastical
claims ; he merely defended them as he found them. Even
if the " Customs " were, which seems very doubtful, the
established laws of the land, they were laws which a
churchman of those days could at most submit to in
patience, and could not be expected to approve or sub-
scribe to. None of his fellow-bishops loved the Con-
stitutions of Clarendon any better than Thomas did ; they
simply submitted through fear, some of them at least
clearly against their own judgement. The most violent
attack on Thomas ever penned, the famous letter of Gilbert
Foliot,* does not blame the Archbishop for resisting the
King, but for not resisting him more strenuously. And
we must remember that, if the so-called liberties of the
Church were utterly repugnant to our notions of settled
government, they did not appear equally so in those times.
The modern idea of government is an equal system of law
for every part of the territory and for every class of the
nation. In the middle ages every class of men, every
district, every city, tried to isolate itself within a juris-
prudence of its own. Nobles, burghers, knights of orders,
wherever either class was strong enough, refused the
jurisdiction of any but their own peers. Every town tried
to approach as nearly as it could to the condition of a
separate republic. A province thought itself privileged if
it could obtain a judiciiil system separate from the rest of
the kingdom. Even within the ecclesiastical pale we find
peculiar jurisdictions: orders, monasteries, chapters, col-
leges, shake off the authority of the regular ordinaries,
and substitute some exceptional tribunal of their own.
For the clergy to be amenable only to a clerical judica-
ture was really nothing very monstrous in such a state of
things. It was of course defended on totally different
grounds from any other exemption ; but it could hardly
have arisen except in a state of things when exemptions
of all kinds were familiar. And we must also remember
* Ep. Gilb. Fol., ap. Giles, V. 272.
IV.] AXD IITS BTOGRAPIlEnS. Ill
that ecclesiastical privileges were not so exclusively priestly
privileges as we sometimes fancy. They sheltered not
only ordained ministers, but all ecclesiastical officers of
every kind ; the Church courts also claimed jurisdiction in
the causes of widows and orphans.* In short, the privi-
leges for which Thomas contended transferred a large part of
the people, and that the most helpless part, from the bloody
grasp of the King's courts to the milder jurisdiction of the
Bishop. The ecclesiastical judicature was clearly inade-
quate to deal with the most serious class of offences ; but,
on the other hand, it did not, like that of the royal courts,
visit petty thefts or assaults with such monstrous penalties
as blinding and castration f One of the Constitutions of
Clarendon, that which forbade the ordination of villains
•without the consent of their lords, w^as directly aimed at
the only means by w^hich the lowest class in the state
could rise. And this constitution did not, as Dean Milman
saySjJ pass unheeded ; on the contrary, it called forth an
indignant burst of almost democratic sentiment from the
French biographer of Thomas. §
But while we do justice to Thomas, we must also do
justice to Henry. Foreigner as he was, careless of special
English interests, and stained as his life w^as by vices and
faults of various kinds, Henry had still man^^ of the
qualities of a great ruler, and we have no reason to doubt
that he was sincerely desirous for the good government of
his kingdom. The civil wars of Stephen's reign had left
England in a state of utter anarchy. This state of things
King Henry and Chancellor Thomas set themselves to work
in good earnest to undo. Their government did much to
* See the letter of .John of Poitiers, Giles, Ep. Gilb. Fol. vi. 23S.
■\ See a most curious story in Benedict's Miracles of Saint Thomas, pp. 1.S4-
193. On the cruelty of the royal jurisprudence, see Herb. vii. 105.
X Lat. Christ, iii. 465.
§ " ' Fils a vilains ne fust en nul liu ordenez
Sanz I'otrei sur seignur de cui terre il fu nez.'
Et Deus a sun servise nus a tuz apelez !
Mielz valt tls a vilain qui est preuz et senez,
Que ne feit gentilz hum failliz et debutez." Gamier, p. 89.
112 SATXT THOMAS OF CANTERBURY [Essay
restore order and peace ; but it is easy to see that, to
restore perfect order and peace, no class of men must be
allowed to break the law with the certainty of an inade-
quate punishment. Thomas's own admirers state Henry's
case very fairly, and do full justice to his motives."^
Herbert himself goes so far as to say that King and
Archbishop alike had a zeal for God, and leaves it to God
Himself to judge which zeal was according to knowledge. f
No doubt both Henry and Thomas saw the evil, and each
set himself vigorously to correct it in his own way. The
number of clerical offenders was large, and some of their
offences were very serious. Thomas, during the short
time that he lived in England as Archbishop, certainly did
his best to strike at the root of the evil by unusual care as
to those whom he ordained ; and he also passed severe
sentences, though of course not of life or limb, upon the
offenders whom he sheltered from the royal vengeance.
Still there can be no doubt that there were a good many
churchmen in the kingdom for whom the gallows was the
only appropriate remedy. Henry had a noble career before
him, had he but adhered steadily to his own principles.
The only danger was, that the full carrying out of those
principles would have led to ' consequences which in the
twelfth century would have been altogether premature.
They involved, not only the subjection of the clergy to the
ordinary jurisdiction, but the throwing off of all dependence
upon the see of Rome. This noble, but perhaps impractic-
able, cause Henry wilfully threw away. He let the contest
degenerate from a strife of principles into a petty personal
persecution of the Archbishop. In the scene at Clarendon
we see the clashing of two causes, both of which contained
elements of right. In the scene at Northampton we see
only a series of mean and malignant attempts to crush
a man who had become offensive and dangerous. Henry
was now the tyrant and Thomas the hero. By allowing his
* See Herb., ap. Giles, vii. 102, 122 ; Ann. Lamb. ii. 85, 86.
•^ Herb. vii. loS, loy.
TV.] A ND HIS BIOQRA PHERS. 1 1 3
Bishops to appeal to the Pope, by appealing to the Pope
himself, Henry gave up his own cause. Nor did he mend
it when he recognized the Pope as arbiter whenever he
thought him favourable, but, whenever he turned against
him, denounced savage penalties on all who should intro-
duce any papal letters into the kingdom, Henry, at the
beginning at least, appears as the statesman of wider and
clearer vision ; but Thomas deserves the higher moral praise
of sticking firmly and manfully to the principles which he
conscientiously believed to be right.
And now for a few words on the closing scene. As usual,
we find a heroic firmness, a lofty sense of right, mixed
up with circumstances detracting from the purely saintly
ideal. We admire rather than approve. We hold Thomas
to have been highly blameworthy in returning to England
amidst a storm of censures and excommunications ; so did
many of his wisest contemporaries. An amnesty on such
a triumphal return would have been naturally expected
from a secular conqueror ; much more would it have
become a minister of peace victorious in a bloodless struggle.
But in the state of fanatic exaltation into which Thomas
had now wrought himself, lenity would have seemed a
crime which would incur the curse of Meroz ; to have failed
to smite the contumacious prelates would have been failing
to come to the help of the Lord against the mighty. The
quarrel in itself was not so frivolous an one as it seems in
these days. The ancient right of the Primate of Canterbury
to crown the English King seems to us a mere honorary
privilege ; it was a very different matter when a king was
no king till he was crowned and anointed. And in the
actual choice put before him, no one can wish that Thomas
had chosen otherwise than he did. "Absolve the prelates;
fly, or die." He would not fly; he had fled once ; he would
not again desert his church. As for the absolution, he w^as
probably canonically right in saying that the Pope alone
could pronounce it ; but a conditional absolution he did
oSer. Now, whether the sentence was just or unjust, w^ise
I
114 SAIXT T/IOMAS OF CAXTFA'Bri?}" [Essay
or foolish, no public officer, Bishop, Judge, or any other,
could be justified in withdrawing a solemn and regular
judgement in answer to the bidding and threats of four
ruffians armed with no sort of legal authority. To have
absolved the bishops through fear of the words of Tracy
and Fitz-Urse would have been unworthy cowardice indeed.
That Thomas showed a most unhealthy craving after
martj^rdom cannot be denied ; but a martyr he clearly was,
not merely to the privileges of the church or to the rights
of the see of Canterbury, but to the general cause of law and
order as opposed to violence and murder.
We have thus tried to deal, by the clear light of impartial
historical criticism, with a man whose history has been
disfigured by three centuries and a half of adoration,
followed by three more centuries of obloquy. The almost
deified Saint Thomas, the despised Thomas a Becket,
appears by that light as a man of great gifts, of high and
honest purpose, but whose virtues were disfigured by great
defects, and who was placed in a position for which his
character was unsuited. Indiscriminate adoration and
indiscriminate reviling are alike out of place with so mixed
a character; petty carping and sneers are yet more out of
place than either. Thomas and his age are gone. He has
perhaps no direct claims upon our gratitude * as English-
men ; none certainly for those acts which most won him the
admiration of his own day. He M'on the martyr's crown
in contending for principles which we must all rejoice did
not ultimately prevail. The Constitutions of Clarendon
are now, with the good will of all, part and parcel of our
law. We do not claim a place for Thomas of Canterbury
beside iElfred and iEthelstan, beside Stephen Langton and
Simon de Montfort ; yet, as a great and heroic Englishman,
he is fully entitled to a respect more disinterested than that
* We speak dotihtingly, l)ecause the account of one exaction of Henry's
resisted by Thomas (Edw. Grim, ap. Gile.'-, i. 21 ; Rog. Pont. i. ii.^ ; Gamier,
p. 30) reads very much as if it were resisted tm general and not on purely
ecclesiastical grounds. lOven Mr. I'oLertson allows (p. 74), in his half-sneering
way, that " tho primate appeared as a sort of Hampden."
IV.] AND HIS BIOGRAPHERS. 115
which we show to benefactors whose gifts we are still
enjoying. Of no man of such wide-spread fame have we
so few visible memorials ; Northampton castle has van-
ished, Canterbury cathedral is rebuilt ; a few fragments
alone remain on which the eyes of Thomas can have rested.
No great foundation, no splendid minster or castle, survives
to bear witness to his bounty or to his skill in the arts.
He lived in and for his own age. To understand him
thoroughly, one must first thoroughly know what that age
was. And no fair-minded man who has at once mastered
the history and literature of the twelfth century, and has
attained the faculty of throwing himself with a lively
interest into times so alien to our own, can rise from his
studies without the conviction that Thomas of Canterbury,
with all his faults, is fairly entitled to a place among the
worthies of whom England is proud.
I a
116 THE REIGN OF EDWARD THE THIRD. [Essay
V.
THE KEIGN OF EDWARD THE THIRD.*
To lovers of chivalrous adventure I presume that no part
of English history is more attractive than the reign of
Edward the Third. Edward himself is to some extent a
popular hero, and his son the Black Prince is so to a
much greater extent. But in Edward himself, when we
come fairly to examine him, there is not very much to
admire ; and as to his son, the provoking thing is that
people admire him for the wrong things. Throwing aside
all the fopperies and fripperies of chivalry, we have to
balance how we can the good and the evil points of the man
who was at once the savage conqueror of Limoges and the
patriotic statesman of the Good Parliament.
To the political student the reign of Edward is rather
repulsive at first sight, but a closer examination soon
shows that there is a great deal of important matter below
the surface. The primary and popular notion of Edward
the Third and his son is that they were two great
conquerors, who won brilliant victories, which victories
abundantly showed how few Englishmen could beat a
vast number of Frenchmen. And no one will deny that
Cr^cy, Poitiers, even Navarete, were wonderful victories
indeed, victories of which it is impossible even now to
read the account without a thrill of national pride. The
pity is that they were victories which served absolutely
no purpose — Crecy and Navarete absolutely no purpose,
Poitiers only a very temporary purpose. England was
successful in battles, but she was thoroughly beaten in war.
Edward the Third succeeded by lawful inheritance to a
* This was a review of Mr. Longman's Life and Times of Edward the Third.
I have dealt with it in the same way as I dealt with the article on Dr.
Vaaghau'd Itevolutiuna in English History.
v.] THE REIGN OF EDWARD THE THIRD. 117
large part of southern Gaul. He left to his successor the
mere shadow of that ancient inheritance, together with a
still more shadowy title to the kingdom of France itself.
His only conquest, in the strict sense of the word, was
Calais. One may conceive a point of view in which the
gain of Calais might counterbalance the loss of nearly all
Aquitaine, but this is a very philosophical point of view,
and one from which we may be quite sure that no one
looked at things in the time of Ed\^'ard the Third. The
broad and plain fact of Edward's reign is that it was a
time of great territorial losses. As far as glory consists
in winning wonderful battles and leading foreign kings
captive, no other age in English history was equally
glorious. But at no time, save that of Heniy the Sixth,
was England ever so thoroughly stripped of possessions
which had once been hers.
The comparison which I have just made suggests
another. One can hardly help contrasting the two great
periods of English warfare and English victory in France.
Edward the Third and Henry the Fifth almost necessarily
suggest one another ; but the difference between the two
men is infinite. There is indeed a striking superficial
likeness between those among the exploits of the two
princes which have found for themselves the most abiding
resting-place in popular memory. The story of Azincourt
is almost a literal repetition of the story of Cr^cy, and the
victory of Azincourt was hardly richer in immediate results
than the victory of Cr^cy. But Edward was simply victor
in a battle ; Henry was victor in war, in diplomacy, in all
that he attempted. In reading the reign of Edward, the
years seem to pass away we know not how. Every ten
years there is a great battle, a glorious victory, but the
intermediate periods slip by like a dream. The}^ are full
of purposeless, unconnected, events, which fall into no
certain order, and which it is almost impossible to keep in
the memory. The time is stirring enough ; there is always
something going on ; the difficulty is to understand or to
118 THE REIGX OF EDWARD THE THIRD. [Essay
remember what it is that is going on. We move back-
wards and forwards from Britanny to Gascony, from
Flanders to Germany, from Scotland to Castile, without
any very clear notion why we are thus flitting backwards
and forwards. In the reign of Henry, on the other hand,
the wonder is how so many great events, pressing close
upon the heels of one another, could be crowded into the
few years of his warfare. Edward, in short, made w^ar
like a knight-errant ; war was a noble pastime for princes
and nobles ; the whole thing, from beginning to end, reads
like a long tournament, a tournament carried on for
the amusement and glor}^ of a few, at the expense of
suffering millions. Henry cared as little for human suffer-
ing as Edward did, perhaps even less. The besieger of
Rouen was at least as stern as the besieger of Calais. But
the warfare of Henry was no purposeless tournament ; not
a 1)1 ow was dealt by him, whether on the field or in the
council-chamber, which was not dealt in deep and deadly
earnest. It was not as a knight-errant that he made war,
but as a general and a statesman of the highest order, as a
king worthy to wear the crown of the great William and
the great Edward. No doubt Henry w^as favoured by
fortune as few men ever have been favoured. France lay
before him in a state which seemed almost to invite his
invasion. The murder of John of Burgundy, and the
position assumed by his son, served the purposes of Henry
as directly as if he had himself planned them beforehand.
Edward certainly had no such manifest advantages. But
after all, what does statesmanship consist in except in
makins: the most of such advautaijes as a man has? The
position of Henry was undoubtedly far more favourable
than the position of Edward ; but then Hemy made the
most of his position, while the Edwards, father and son,
failed to make the most of theirs. Henry knew his purposes,
and he fulfilled them. Edward failed to fulfil his pur-
poses, or rather it is hard to say whether he had any
purposes to fulfil.
v.] THE REIGX OF EDWAIW THE THIRD. 119
Looking at the morality of the two great enterpiises
against France, a modern writer is perhaps tempted to
judge both Edward and Henry with undue harshness.
Lord Brougham, for instance, brings Heniy up before the
tribunal of abstract right, and before the tribunal of ab-
stract right it must be allowed that Henry cuts but a
poor figure. But it is seldom fair to judge any historical
character by so unswerving a standard ; we must make
allowance for the circumstances, the habits, the beliefs, the
prejudices, of each man's time. As a lesson in moral phi-
losophy, as a comment on the doctrine that man is very
far gone from original righteousness. Lord Brougham's
estimate of Henry the Fil'tli is highly instructive; but as
a portrait of Henry the Fifth it is unfair. The biographer
of Edward, Mr. Longman, cannot wield the trenchant
weapons of Lord Brougham, but he is really fairer in his
estimate of Edward than Lord Brougham is in his estimate
of Henry. He is not dazzled with Edward's somewhat
tinsel glories, but he equally avoids the other extreme of
unreasonable harshness. He strongly brings out the fact
that Edward was really forced into the war by Philip.
Philip, in truth, had a policy, while Edward had none.
Philip's policy was the obvious, the traditional, French
policy, the policy of consolidating his kingdom by con-
venient annexations. He clearly aimed at the annexation
of Edward's duchy of Aquitaine, and he sought for a war
which would give him a chance of annexing it. A per-
fectly calm and passionless English statesman might have
doubted whether Aquitaine was worth the keeping. Aqui-
taine, we must remember, was now strictly an English
dependency. When England and Aquitaine fii'st became
possessions of the same sovereign, it was not so. Henry
of Anjou, King of England, Duke of Normandy, Duke of
Aquitaine, count and lord of a crowd of smaller states,
was no more a national prince in any of them than Charles
of Ghent was a national prince in Castile or Germany or
Sicily. But Henry's various continental dominions, widely
120 THE EEIGX OF EDWARD THE THIRD. [Essay
as they differed from one another in speech and feeling,
might still be looked on as forming one whole, in opposi-
tion to his insukr kingdom. And in his eyes, and in
those of his immediate successors, they certainly out-
weighed his insular kingdom. Henry was primarily a
great continental sovereign, the rival of his less powerful
lord at Paris. That he was also Kino: of Enjjland was a
very important accession to his power and position ; still
it was an accession and little more. But things changed
when John lost all his possessions in Northern Gaul, with
the solitary exception of that insular Normandy which his
successors have kept to this day. Aquitaine, or what was
left of it, was now a mere accession to England, an out-
lying and distant possession of the English crown. And
as the relation of Aquitaine to England changed, its rela-
tion to France changed also. We must not forget that
Aquitaine, though a fief of the French crown, was in no
sense a French province. Unless we except the short time
during which Lewis the Seventh ruled there in right of
Eleanor, Aquitaine had never been a possession of the
Parisian kings, and its people had, in speech and origin,
no kindred with the people of France beyond that general
kindred which they shared equally with the people of
Spain and Italy. When Henry was lord of Rouen, of
Tours, and of Bordeaux, none of those cities seemed at all
called upon to bow to Paris. But when Paris had
swallowed up Rouen and Tours, the position of Bordeaux
was sensibly changed. It was changed both politically
and geographically. Aquitaine was now no longer a part
of the great continental monarchy of Henry. It was a
dependency of the island kingdom, which the French con-
quest of Toulouse had caused to be surrounded by French
territory on every side, except those occupied by the sea
and the mountains. The Parisian King, instead of being
a mere nominal suzerain, was now the immediate master
of the larger part of Gaul. Aquitaine now looked like a
natural portion of his kingdom, unnaturally detained from
v.] THE REIGN OF EDWARD THE THIRD. 121
him by a distant potentate. Within the duchy itself the
feelings of the inhabitants presented great differences and
fluctuations. There was always an English and a French
party ; of a Spanish party, of which we see signs in the
thirteenth century, we see none in the fourteenth. And
men's minds might well be divided on the question whether
it were better for their country to remain a dependency of
England or to become an integral part of France. There
can be no doubt that the English rule was the better of
the two, as was soon found out when Aquitaine was finally
conquered. The nearer master was far more dangerous to
local liberties and customs than the more distant one.
Bordeaux, while it was a distant dependency of England,
came much nearer to the position of a free city than when
it had sunk into a provincial town of France. But
Englishmen failed then, as they fail now, to adapt them-
selves to subjects of another race and speech. Their rule
was essentially better than that of France, but it was less
attractive. France was already beginning to exercise that
strange fascination which she goes on exercising still, and
which enables her to incorporate and assimilate her con-
quests in a way in which no other conquering power has
succeeded in rivallins: her. And, marked as was the
ethnical distinction between France and Aquitaine, it was
slight compared to the ethnical distinction between Aqui-
taine and England. All these causes contributed to pro-
duce a very divided state of feeling in the duchy. The
strength of England lay mainly in the cities ; that of
France lay mainly among the nobles of the country. But
it is easy to see throughout Edward's wars that the English
party w^as decaying, and that the French party was grow-
ing. To annex then this great province, which lay so
temptingly open to him, a corner which seemed so needful
to round off* his dominions, was the main object of the
policy of Philip of Valois. We are commonly inclined to
blame Edward for setting up a claim of his own on the
French crown, after he had done homage to Philip, and
122 THE REIGX OF EDWARD THE THIRD. [Essay
had thereby recognized him as lawful King of France.
But Edward was fairly goaded into the war by Philip,
and he seems to have assumed the title of King of France
as much to satisfy the scruples of the Flemings as for any
other reason. It was fairly a case of drifting into war —
a war which, notwithstanding the two gi'eat battles and
many other gallant exploits, was begun, continued, and
ended in a way which is throughout purposeless and
perplexing.
The lirst war, the war of Crecy and Poitiers, was ended
by the Peace of Bretigny. People often fail to understand
how important a bearing that peace had upon the wars of
the next century. The French are perfectly right in
speaking of the whole time from Edward the Third to
Henry the Sixth as the Hundred Years' War. Tlie Peace
of Bretigny was the formal justification of Henry the Fifth.
On no tlieory could Henry have any hereditary right to
the crown of France. The principle on which Edward the
Third had claimed that crown was the principle of female
succession, and the principle of female succession would
have ffiven the rii^hts of Edward the Third to the house
of Mortimer. But Henry the Fifth succeeded to the crown
of England at a time when England was at war with
France. The Peace of Eretigny was undoubtedly broken
on the French side. From Bretigny to Troyes no other
peace was concluded ; there were only truces, and at the
end of any truce the King of England had a perfect formal
right to begin the war again. That the Peace of Bretigny
did not last is a sign of the cliange of feeling which was
gradually coming over southern Gaul. Two hundred
years earlier we may be sure that Aquitanian patriotism
would have rejoiced in an arrangement which made the
lands south of the Loire free from all superiority on the
part of the Parisian crown. But a large part of the
former dominions of Hemy the Second submitted with
the utmost ivluctanco to those terms of the treaty which
restored them to the rule of the descendant of their ancient
v.] THE REIGN OF EDWARD THE THIRD. 123
dukes. Even within the lands which bad never been
separated from England the rule of the Black Prince seems
not to have thoroughly taken root. In fact an independent
principality of Aquitaine was fast becoming, in French
phrase, an anachronism. And an independent principality
of Aquitaine in the hands of an English prince was some-
what of a pretence into the bargain. At an earlier time
independent commonwealths of Bordeaux and La Rochelle
mijjht have been something more than a dream. But in
Aquitaine, as throughout the fiefs of the Parisian crown,
with the single half exception of Flanders, the princely
power, royal or ducal, was always too strong to allow of
the growth of a system of free cities, such as arose within
the bounds of each of the three Imperial kingdoms.
The reign of Edward the Third is also of great importance
in a constitutional point of view; it is equally so in a social,
a literary, and a religious point of view. But in these
points also the reign of Edward has something of the same
character that it has in military affairs. Changes take
place in a sort of invisible, incidental way ; we cannot lay
our hands on any marked revolutions, like those of the
reign of Henry the Third, nor on many great and lasting
enactments, like those of the reign of Edward the First,
The fourteenth century is indeed more fertile than any
other in one most important class of political precedents.
It is the only century since the eleventh* which saw two
kings deposed by authority of Parliament. Yet even
the depositions of Edward the Second and Richard the
Second do not stand out in the same way as the events of
the thirteenth century or of the seventeenth. The reign of
Edward the Third was a reign of frequent Parliaments and
of much legislation, but Edward could no more be com-
pared to his grandfather as a legislator than he could as
a statesman and a warrior. Even his commercial legislation
* Charles the Fu'st was not deposed, but was executed being King. This
leaves the seventeeuth century with only one case of deposition su-ictly so
called.
124 THE REIGN OF EDWARD THE THIRD. [Essay
was done, as it were, by haphazard. So indeed was every-
thing that he did. He constantly wanted money, and
his constant want of money was a great constitutional
advantage. He was driven to summon Parliaments, com-
monly yearly, sometimes oftener ; and those Parliaments
gradually learned their strength. How important these
silent influences were is shown when we reach the last two
years of Edward's life. In the Good Parliament we see
how the Commons had been gradually gaining more and
more of power and enlightenment, till they were able to
carry some of the most thorough measures of reform, and
to make one of the most successful attacks on the execu-
tive government, that any legislative body ever made. No
doubt it was a great help for the popular party to have the
Prince of Wales on their side, and, when he was gone, his
loss was sadly felt in the reaction of the next year. But
it was a great thing to see a Prince of Wales put himself
at the head of a real popular movement of reform, a
very different process from a Prince of Wales getting
up a factious personal opposition against his father. It is
his conduct in this Parliament, far more than any of his
doings beyond the sea, which gives the Black Prince his
real claim to rank among the worthies of England. The
acts of the Good Parliament and their unhappy reversal in
the next year, the good intlueiice of Prince Edward and the
evil influence of John of Gaunt, are points which stand out
conspicuously in the legislative histoiy of this reign. On
the legislation of this time there is one dark blot, which
even touches the Good Parliament itself: I mean the con-
stant attempt to control matters which are beyond the
proper province of legislation, and, worse still, the constant
attempt to control them in a way contrary to the interests
of the most numerous and the most helpless class of the
people. The depopulation caused by the Black Death
made labour scarce ; wages of course rose, and successive
Parliaments, the Good Parliament among them, undertook
the cruel and impossible task of keeping wages down by
v.] THE REIGN OF EDWARD THE THIRD. 125
law. At the same time, and very much by reason of the
same causes, the emancipation of the villains was largely
going on. Thus the class of free labourers was being
enlarged and strengthened : the payment of wages for
work done was constantly becoming more habitual, while
the class of people who could be set to work without wages
was constantly diminishing. One might almost have ex-
pected that the emancipation of villains would have been
forbidden by law, just as in old Rome restrictions were put
on the emancipation of slaves. But happily the Church
taught that to set a bondman free was a pious and
charitable deed, and men could hardly be ordered by Act
of Parliament to abstain from adding to the number of
their good works.
The mention of the religious and the literary condition
of England during this reign at once suggests that we are
dealing with the age of Wyclif and the age of Chaucer.
I am not going to discuss either of them at the end of an
article. But those names stamp the age of Edward the
Third as the beginning of the theological reformation in
England and as the beginning of modern English literature.
I confess that the purely theological aspect of the time
interests me less than the part played by this age, as by
other ages, in the long struggle between England and Rome.
The English spirit which, three centuries before, had,
through the mouth of Tostig, defied Pope Nicolas on his
throne, came out in the Parliaments of Edward the Third
as it came out in other Parliaments before and after him.
And it was a sound and happy line of argument, a true
English love of precedent, which led the Good Parliament
to appeal to the practice of the sainted Edward himself as
unanswerable evidence of the true and ancient supremacy
of the crown in matters ecclesiastical. Oddly enough, this
was the very moment when the old ground on which that
supremacy was based was beginning to give way. Up to
this time, ever since the last Englishman ceased to worship
Thunder and Woden, Englishmen had been united in reli-
126 THE BEIGN OF EDWARD THE THIRD. [Essay
gion ; the Church and the nation had been two aspects of
the same body. But the teaching of Wyclif gave birth in
the next generation to our earliest Nonconformists ; when
we ought to have had our first toleration, we did have our
first persecution. With the appearance of the Lollards,
the Church and the nation ceased to be fully one, and
the puzzles and controversies of modern times had their
beginning.
Anotlier &\<m. of the times in relio-ious matters is the turn
which the bounty of pious founders and benefactors was
now taking. The day of the monks was over. The great
struggle which had been going on ever since the days of
Dunstan was at last decided in favour of the seculars.
Monasteries were still founded now and then, but there is
nothing like the zeal for them which followed on the
Benedictine movement in the tenth and eleventh centuries,
on the Cistercian movement in the twelfth, on the Francis-
can and Dominican movement in the thirteenth. Colleges
in the Universities, chantries for the repose of their
founders' souls, colleges for the more splendid performance
of divine service in this or that parish church, hospitals for
the poor, schools for the young, are now the objects of
pious benefactions far more largely than the monastic
orders. On the other hand, the constant wars with France
led, on an obvious principle of policy, to temporary seizures
of the property of the Alien Priories. These temporary
seizures again suggested the complete suppression of those
priories in the next century, and this formed a precedent
for the general suppression of all monasteries in the century
after that.
On the whole then the fourteenth century, the age of
Edward the Third, is an age whose importance lies below
the surface. It sets before us nothing like the great
tragedy of the eleventh century or the mighty new birth
of the thirteenth. It has more in common with the silent
working of the twelfth. But the visible actors are on
a smaller scale. The tinsel frippery of chivalry hangs
v.] THE REIGX OF EDWARD THE THIRD. 127
around the names of Edward and bis son, but, when
stripped of these factitious attractions, they seem small
indeed beside the two great Henries. Edward seems great
between his father and his grandson, but the real personal
greatness of our kings leaps from Edward the First to
Henry the Fifth. But there is this difference between
them. The work of Edward the First, like the work of
the Conqueror, still abides. Each of thorn has left his
direct impress on English history for all time. Henry,
hardly their inferior in natural gifts, has had only an
indirect influence upon after events. The war wdiich he
waged, the war in which France was so nearly conquered,
showed in the end that France could not really be con-
quered. His son, the only English King who was ever
crowned King of France, was the king who lost the last
relics of that continental dominion which England beiifan
to lose under the king who first took up the vain title of
French royalty. As long as Calais was kept, men ever
and anon dreamed that those who still held the key of
France, might one day enter on the possession of France
itself. But such thoughts were mere momentary dreams,
and never continuous!}^ influenced our policy. The victories
of Edward the Third began the chain of events which in
the end made England a strictly insular power. As such
we may be thankful for them.
128 THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. [Essay
VI.
THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE.
Tfie Eoly Boman Empire. By James Bryce, B.A.^
Oxford, 1864.
It may seem a hard saying, but it is one which the facts
fully bear out, that hardly one student in ten of mediaeval
history really grasps that one key to the whole subject
without which media?val history is simply an unintelligible
chaos. That key is no other than the continued existence
of the Roman Empire. As long as people are taught to
believe that the Empire came to an end in the year 476,
a true understanding of the next thousand years becomes
utterly impossible. No man can understand either the
politics or the literature of that whole period, unless he
constantly bears in mind that, in the ideas of the men of
those days, the Roman Empire, the Empire of Augustus,
Constantino, and Justinian, was not a thing of the past but
a thing of the present. Without grasping the mediaeval
theory of the Empire, it is impossible fully to grasp the
theory and to follow the career of the Papacy. Without
understanding the position of the Empire, it is impossible
rightly to understand the origin and developement of the
various European states. Without such an understanding,
the history of the nations which clave to the Empire, and
the history of the nations which fell away from it, are
alike certain to be misconceived. Unless viewed in the
light of the Imperial theory, the whole history of Germany,
Italy, and Burgundy becomes an inexplicable riddle. The
* [Now D.C.L. and llegius Professor of Civil Law. The article was founded
on the first edition. The third edition (1871), to which I have brought in
several references, is greatly enlarged and improved.] [1872.]
YL] THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. 129
struggle of Hildebrand and Henry loses half its meaning,
the whole position of the Swabian Emperors becomes an
insoluble puzzle, the most elaborate prose and the most
impassioned verse of Dante sink into purposeless gibberish,
if we do not fully grasp the fact that in the mind of all
contemporary Europe, the Hohenstaufen were the direct and
lawful successors of the Julii. How Germany, once the
most united state of Western Europe, gradually changed
from a compact and vigorous kingdom into one of the
laxest of confederations, can never be understood unless we
trace how the German kingdom was crushed and broken
to pieces beneath the weight of the loftier diadem which
rested on the brow of its kings. Those misrepresentations
of all European history with which French historians and
French politicians are apt to deceive the unwary can never
be fully exposed, except by a thorough acquaintance with
the true position and true nationality of those Teutonic
kings and Caesars whom the Gaul is so apt to look upon as
his countrymen and not as his masters. The relations
between Eastern and Western Europe can never be taken
in, unless we fully understand the true nature of those rival
Empires, each of which asserted and believed itself to be
the one true and lawful possessor of the heritage of ancient
Rome. We see our way but feebly thi-ough the long
struggle between the East and the West, between Christen-
dom and Islam, unless we fully grasp the position of the
Caesar, the chief of Christendom, and the Caliph, the chief
of Islam ; unless we see, in the complex interpenetration
of the divided Empire and the divided Caliphate, at once
what the theory of Christian and of Moslem was, and how
utterly either theories failed to be carried out in all its full-
ness. In a word, as we began by saying, the history of the
Empire is the key to the whole history of mediaeval Europe,
and it is a key which as yet is found in far fewer hands
than it ought to be.
The immediate cause of the failure of most historical
students to grasp the paramount importance of the Imperial
K
130 THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. [Essay
history is of course to be found in the fact that hardly any
of the books from which students draw their knowledge
give its proper prominence to the history of the Empire.
This is indeed little more than a truism. The question is,
how it comes to pass that even able and well-informed
writers have failed to bring forward this most important
portion of history as it should be brought forward. The
causes, w^e think, are tolerably obvious.
First. Our own national history has been less affected by
the history of the Empire than that of any other European
country. Britain, Spain, and Sweden, in their insular and
peninsular positions, were the parts of Europe over which
the Imperial influence was slightest, and of the three, that
influence was slighter over Britain than it was over Spain,
and not much greater than it was over Sweden. Of direct
connexion with the Empire, England had very little, and
Scotland still less. The external history of England does
indeed ever and anon touch the history of the Empire, in
the way in wdiich the history of each European state must
ever and anon touch the history of every other European
state. Once or twice in a century we come across an
Emperor as a friend or as an enemy, in one case as a
possible suzerain. As England supplied the spiritual Rome
with a single pope, so she supplied the temporal Rome with
a single king, a king who never visited his capital or
received the crown and title of Augustus. But the whole
internal history of England, and the greater part of its
external history, went on pretty much as if there had been
no Holy Roman Empire at all. Our one moment of most
intimate connexion with the Empire brings out most fully
how slight, compared with that of other nations, our usual
connexion with the Empire was. Every reader of English
history knows the name of Richard, Earl of Cornwall and
King of the Romans, and knows the part which he played
in the internal politics of England. But very few readers,
and we suspect by no means all writers, of English his-
tory seem to have any clear notion what a King of the
VI.] THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. 131
Romans was. On Scotland indeed the Eoman Empire has
had, in one way, a most important internal influence,
through the authority which Scottish lawyers, in such
marked contrast to those of England, have for so long a
time attached to the Roman law. Eut this is simply because
Scottish lawgivers or lawyers chose that it should be so ;
on the actual events of Scottish history, external and
internal, the Empire and its rulers have had even less
influence than they have had on those of England. As
then our own national history can be written and under-
stood with very little reference to the Holy Roman Empire,
Eritish readers lie under a strong temptation to undervalue
the importance of the Holy Roman Empire in the general
history of the world.
Secondly. When British readers get beyond the limits of
their own island, not only is their attention not com-
monly drawn to the history of the Empire, but it is
commonly drawn to a history which is actually antagon-
istic to the history of the Empire. France, so long the
rival of England, and for that cause so long the ally of
Scotland, is the country with which, next to their own,
most British readers are most familiar. Now it is certain
that no one who learns French history at the hands of
Frenchmen can ever rightly understand the history of the
Empire. The whole history of France, strictly so called,
the history of the Earisian kings, has been for six hundred
years one long tale of aggrandizement at the expense of
the Empire. From the annexation of Lyons to the an-
nexation of Savoy, all have been acts of one great drama,
a drama of which the devastation of the Ealatinate, the
seizure of Strassburg in time of peace, the tyranny of the
first Buonaparte over the whole German nation, are
familiar and characteristic incidents. French history con-
sists mainly of a record of wrongs inflicted on the later
and feebler Empire, prefaced by a cool appropriation of
the glories of the Empire in the days of its early great-
ness. In official and popular French belief, two great
K a
132 THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. [Espay
German dynasties, who held modern France as a subject
province, are conveniently turned into national French-
men. The greatest of German kings, the first of German
Cgesars, Charles, the lord of Rome and Aachen, is strangely
turned about into a French Emperor of the West, the pre-
cursor of either Buonaparte. The ancient landmarks of
European geography are wiped out, the names of the most
famous European cities are mutilated or barbarized, in
order to throw some colour of right and antiquity over the
results of six hundred years of intrigue and violence.
French history, as it is commonl}^ presented to English-
men, exists only through a systematic misrepresentation
of Imperial history. Till all French influences are wholly
cast aside and trampled under foot, the true history of the
Holy Roman Empire can never be understood.
Thircl/i/. It seems not unlikely that the righteous and
generous sympathy which we all feel towards regenerate
Italy has tended somewhat to obscure the true character
of the Empire. So many Austrian archdukes were elected
Kings of Germany and Emperors of the Romans that
people have gradually come to identify the House of
Austria and the Roman Empire. Nothing is more com-
mon than to see the title of " Emperor of Austria," the
most monstrous invention of modern diplomac}^ carried
back into the last century, and even earlier. Even Sir
Walter Scott, in some of his novels, Anne of Geierstein
for instance, seems to have had great difficulty in triumph-
ing over a notion that every Emperor must have been
Duke of Austria, and that every Duke of Austria must
have been Emperor. We have seen Frederick Barbarossa
set down as an Austrian because he was an Emperor ;
we have seen the Leopold of Morgarten and the Leopold
of Sempach exalted into Emperors because they were
Austrians. People thus learn to identify two things than
which no two can be more unlike, and to look on the
ancient reality with the eyes with which they rightly look
on the modern counterfeit. The dislike whicli every
VI.] THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. 133
generous mind feels towards the oppressors of modern
Italy is thus transferred to that earlier Empire which,
always in theory and often in practice, was as much
Italian as German. As Charles the Great becomes the
forerunner of Buonaparte, so Frederick the beloved of
Lodi, and Frederick the national king of Palermo, and
Otto, the dream of whose short life was to reign as a true
Roman Cjesar in the Eternal City, all are popularly looked
upon as forerunners of Francis Joseph, perhaps of Philip
the Second.* The Austrian delusion, no less than the
French delusion, must be utterly cast aside by every one
who would understand what Charles and Otto and Henry
and Frederick really were.
LaMij. Even among those who better know the facts of
the case, and who better understand the leading idea of
the mediaeval Empire, there is a certain tendency to under-
rate the importance of the Imperial history, on the ground
that the mediaeval Empire was throughout an unreality,
if not an imposture. We fully admit the utter unreality
of the position of Francis the Second, Emperor-elect of
the Romans, King of Germany and Jerusalem ; we fully
admit that Charles the Great himself was not a Roman
Emperor in exactly the same sense as Vespasian or Trajan.
We may freely grant that the Imperial idea was never
fully carried out, and that it was by no means for the
interest of the world that it should be carried out. We
may wonder at the belief of the ages which held, as un-
doubted and eternal truths, jirst, that it was a matter of
right that there should be an universal monarch of the
world ; secoudli/, that that universal monarchy belonged, no
less of eternal right, to the Roman Emperor, the successor
of Augustus ; and, thirdli/, that the German King, the
choice of the German Electors, was the undoubted Roman
Emperor, and therefore, of eternal right. Lord of the
* We have seen in a popular work the words " The Emperor Philip the
Second." The reasoning is irresistible: Philip's father was an Emperor; how
could Philip himself fail to be an Emperor too ]
]34 THE HOLY BO MAN EMPIRE. [Essay
World. This belief seems to us very strange, but it was
the belief of Dante. We rejoice that this scheme of uni-
versal dominion was never practically carried out; we
pride ourselves that our own island at least was always
exempted from the sway of the universal sovereign. But all
this should not lead us at all to underrate the paramount
importance of the Imperial idea. A belief may be false,
absurd, unreal, mischievous, as we please ; but this in no
way touches the historical importance of such belief.
Christians believe that the leading idea of Mahometanism
is a grievous error ; Protestants believe that the leadinor
idea of the Papacy is a grievous error ; but no one argues
that either Mahometanism or the Papacy has therefore
been without influence on the fate of the world, or that
any historical student can safely neglect the history of
one or the other, merely because he looks on them as
erroneous beliefs. In fact, the deadlier the error the more
important are the results of an error which is accepted by
large masses of men. It may be very wrong to believe
that Mahomet was the prophet of God ; but the fact that
millions of men have so believed has changed the destinies
of a large portion of the world. It may be very wrong
to believe that Saint Peter was the Prince of the Apostles
and that the Bishop of Rome is Saint Peter's successor;
but the fact that millions of men have so believed and do
so believe has affected the course of all European history
and politics down to this day. In these cases no one
attempts to deny the importance of the facts ; no one holds
that either Mahometan or Papal history can safely be
neglected. So it should be with the history of the medi-
suval Empire. The Imperial idea may have been unreal,
absurd, mischievous ; but it is not therefore the less im-
portant. Men did believe in it ; perhaps they were wrong
to believe in it ; but the fact that they did believe in it
affected the whole history of the world for many ages. It
may have been foolish to believe that the German king
was necessarily Roman En)peror, and that the Roman
VI.] THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. 135
Emperor was necessarily Lord of the World. But men
did believe it ; and the fact of their believing it changed
the whole face of Europe. It might have been much
wiser if the German kings had been content to be real
German kings, and had not striven after the shadowy
majesty of Roman Emperors. But, as a matter of fact,
they did so strive ; it was not in human nature for men in
their position to do otherwise ; and the fact that they did
so strive entailed the most important consequences upon
their own and upon every neighbouring realm. If the
history of the Empire were to be set down purely as the
history of error and folly, it should still be remembered
that the history of error and folly forms by far the largest
part of the history of mankind.
But we are far from admitting that the history of the
Empire is purely a part of the history of human folly,
though we may be obliged to admit that it is a part of the
history of human error. The idea of the Empire, the idea
of an universal Christian monarchy, not interferhig with
the local independence of particular kingdoms and com-
monwealths, but placing Cfesar Augustus, the chosen and
anointed chief of Christendom, as the common guide and
father of all — such an idea is as noble and captivating as
it is impracticable. It is an idea which has commended
itself to some of the noblest spirits that the world has
seen. It was the idea for which the first Frederick
struggled with a far from merely selfish aim. It was the
idea to which the early revivers of scientific jurisprudence
clung as to the one foundation of order and legal government
throughout the world. It was the great principle which
acted as the guiding spirit of the prose, the verse, and the
life of Dante. To men of that time, living amid the per-
petual strife of small principalities and commonwealths,
the vision of an universal Empire of law and right shone
with an alluring brightness, which we, accustomed to a
system of national governments and international rela-
tions, can hardly understand. But be the worth of the
136 THE HOLY EOMAN EMPIRE. [Essay
idea what it may, its practical influence on the history of
Christendom can hardly be overrated. The Empire may
have been a shadow, but it was a shadow to which men
were for ages ready to devote their thoughts, their pens,
and their swords. The results were none the less practical
because the object was unattainable. We repeat that,
without a full understanding of the mediasval conception
of the Empire, without a full grasp of the way in which
that conception influenced men's minds and actions from
the eighth century to the fourteenth, the greater and more
important part of medifEval history remains an insoluble
riddle.
Knowing then, as we do, the unspeakable importance
of right views of the Empire to a true understanding of
mediaival history, and being unable, as we are, to lay our
hand upon any other book in the English tongue which
gives so clear and thorough an account of the whole
matter, it is with no common delight that we welcome the
appearance of the small but remarkable volume whose
name we have placed at the head of this article. It is the
first complete and connected view of the mediaeval Empire
which has ever been given to British readers. Mr. Bryce's
book is of course not a history, but an essay ; he has not
attempted so hopeless a task as to narrate the fates of the
Empire and its attendant kingdoms within the space of a
single thin volume. But no one must confound Mr. Bryce's
Arnold essay with the common run of prize compositions.
Mr. Bryce's book, if it be not a bull to say so, has been
written since it gained the historical prize at Oxford. "It
is right," he tells us, " to state that this Essay has been
greatly changed and enlarged since it was composed for
the Arnold Prize." Any one who knows anything of prize
essays could have told as much by the light of nature. It
is hardly possible that any mere academic exercise could
have displayed the depth of thought, the thoroughness of
research, the familiarity with a whole learning of a very
recondite kind, which stand revealed in every page of this
VI. J THE HOLY ROM AX EMPIRE. 137
volume. The merits of the book are so palpably due in
the main to this later revision, that we could almost wish
that the words Arnold Prize Essay were removed from the
titlepage.
Of the Essay itself, in its present form, we can hardly
trust ourselves to speak all our thoughts. Men naturally
and rightly look with some suspicion on criticism which
speaks of a novice in language which is seldom deserved
even by a veteran. But it is only in such language that
we can utter our honest conviction with regard to the
merits of the volume before us. Mr. Bryce's Essay may
seem ephemeral in form, but it is not ephemeral in sub-
stance. He has, in truth, by a single youthful effort,
placed himself on a level with men who have given their
lives to historical study. Like the young Opuntian in
Pindar —
oiov iv MapaOwvi, av-
\a9its dyfvtiaiv,
Mr. Bryce's Essay must be placed in the same rank, and
must be judged by the same standard, as the most volu-
minous works of professed historians. He has done for
historic literature a service as great as any of theirs.
Mr. Bryce's great merit is the clear and thorough way in
which he sets forth what the mediaeval conception of the
Empire really was, and especially that religious sentiment
which so strangely came to attach itself to the power which
had once been the special representative of heathen pride
and persecution. This is a part of the subject which we
have never before seen set forth with the same power and
fullness. For, of course, in combating the vulgar error that
the Roman Empire came historically to an end in 476,
though Mr. Bryce is doing excellent service to the cause
of truth, he is not putting forth any new discovery. Thus
much Sir Francis Palgrave has already established for the
West, and Mr. Finlay for the East. The Eastern side of
the subject is, we cannot but think, somewhat neglected
138 THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. [Essay
by Mr. Bryce, as perhaps, ou the other hand, the Western,
side is by Mr. Finlay. Sir Francis Palgrave and Mr. Bryce
have to deal with the same side of the subject, but they
look at it with somewhat different eyes. With Mr. Bryce
indeed the Empire is his main, or rather sole, subject, while
the contributions of Sir Francis to Imperial history, valu-
able as they are, have come out incidentally in dealing with
matters not immediately connected with the Empire. Sir
Francis again concerns himself mainly with those outward
forms and institutions which show that the Empire did not
formally die. Mr. Bryce has more to do with the theory
of the Empire itself, and with the various shapes through
which it passed from Caius Julius Cresar Octavianus to
Francis the Second of Lorraine. This he has done in so
complete and admirable a manner that we trust that the
essay is only the precursor of a narrative. We trust that
Mr. Bryce may one day give us a history of the mediaeval
Roman Empire worthy to be placed by the side of Dean
Milman's history of the mediaeval Roman Church,
The theory of the mediaeval Empire is that of an universal
Christian Monarchy. The Roman Empire and the Catholic
Church are two aspects of one society, a society ordained
by the divine will to spread itself over the whole world.
Of this society Rome is marked out by divine decree as the
predestined capital, the chief seat alike of spiritual and of
temporal rule. At the head of this society, in its temporal
character as an Empire, stands the temporal chief of Chris-
tendom, the Roman Cresar. At its head, in its spiritual
character as a Church, stands the spiritual chief of Chris-
tendom, the Roman Pontiff. Csesar and Pontiff alike rule
by divine right, each as God's immediate Vicar within his
own sphere. Each ruler is bound to the other by the
closest ties. The Ca'sar is the Advocate of the Roman
Church, bound to defend her by the temporal arm against
all temporal enemies. The Pontiff, on the other hand,
though the Cyesar holds his rank, not of him, but by an
VI.] THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. 139
independent divine commission, has the lofty privilege of
personally admitting the Lord of the World to his high
office, of hallowing the Lord's Anointed, and of making him
in some sort a partaker in the mysterious privileges of the
priesthood. The sway alike of Csesar and of Pontiff is ab-
solutely universal ; it is local, in so far as Rome is its chosen
seat ; but it is in no way national : it is not confined to
Italy, or Germany, or Europe ; to each alike, in his own
sphere, God has given the heathen for his inheritance, and
the utmost parts of the earth for his possession. And each
of these lofty offices is open to every baptized man ; each
alike is purely elective ; each may be the reward of merit
in any rank of life cr in any corner of Christendom. While
smaller offices were closely confined by local or aristocratic
restrictions, the throne of Augustus and the chair of Peter
were, in theory at least, open to the ambition of every man
of orthodox belief. Even in the darkest times of aristocratic
exclusiveness, no one dared to lay down as a principle that
the Roman Emperor, any more than the Roman Bishop,
need be of princely or noble ancestry. Freedom of birth —
Roman citizenship, in short, to clothe mediaeval ideas in
classical words — was all that was needed. Each power
alike, as the power of a Vicar of God upon earth, rises far
above all petty considerations of race or birthplace. The
Lord of the World has all mankind alike for the objects of
his paternal rule ; the successor of Saint Peter welcomes all
alike, from the east and from the west, from the north and
from the south, within the one universal fold over which
he has the commission to bind and to loose, to remit and to
retain.
Here is a conception as magnificent as it was impractic-
able. No wonder indeed that such a theory fascinated
men's minds for ages, and that in such a cause they were
willing to spend and to be spent. That it never was carried
out history tells us at the first glance. It is evident that
neither the Roman Pontifi" nor the Roman Csesar ever ex-
tended their common sway over the whole of the world, or
140 THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. [Essay
even over the whole of Christendom. And the two powers,
which were in theory designed to work in harmony, appear,
for the most part, in real history as the bitterest of rivals.
Still no theory, as a theory, can be more magnificent. But
how did such a theory arise 1 What is the Roman Empire
and the Roman Emperor 1 At the two ends of their exist-
ence those words express ideas as unlike one another as
either of them is unlike the theory which Otto the Third
and Gregory the Fifth did for a moment carry out in
practice. At the one end of the chain we see the heathen
magistrate of a heathen commonwealth, carefully avoiding
all royal titles and royal insignia, associating on terms of
equality with other distinguished citizens, but carefully
grasping the reality of absolute power by the stealthy pro-
cess of uniting in his own person a crowd of offices which
had hitherto been deemed inconsistent with one another.
Such was the first Roman Emperor, and in his days the
Roman Pontiff as yet was not. The last Roman Emperor
was a German king, whose German kingdom was almost
as imaginary as his Roman Empire. He was a mighty
potentate indeed, but mighty only through the possession
of hereditary or conquered realms, which mostly lay beyond
the limits of either Roman or German dominion. He was
adorned with all the titles, and surrounded with all the
external homage, which could befit either German king or
Roman Emperor. But as regards the local Rome he had no
further connexion, no further authority or influence, than
might belong to any other Catholic prince of equal power.
The Roman Emperor no longer claimed any shadow of
jurisdiction in his ancient capital; even in his German
realm, his position had sunk to that of the president of
one of the laxest of federal bodies. The Lord of the World,
the temporal head of Christendom, retained nothing but a
barren precedence over other princes, which other princes
were not always ready to admit. His position, Roman,
German, and (ecumenical, was, as the event proved, utterly
unreal and precarious, ready to fall in pieces at the first
VI.] THE HOLY ROMAN EMTIRE. 141
touch of a vigorous assailant. Such were Caius Julius
Csesar Octavianus, the first, and Francis the Second, the
last, of the Roman Emperors. Each is equally unlike the
Roman Emperor of the true mediaeval theory. How then
did the same title, in theory denoting one unchanged office
through the whole period, come to be attached at different
times to personages so widely unlike each other ? We will,
under Mr. Bryce's guidance, run briefly through the various
stages through which the gi-and theory of the Christian
Empire arose and fell.
Mr. Bryce properly begins at the beginning. He starts
with a sketch of the state of things under the old Roman
Empire, the old dominion of the Roman Commonwealth
under her nominal magistrates and practical sovereigns,
the Emperors of the Julian, Claudian, and other Imperial
houses, down to the changes introduced, first by Diocletian,
and then by Constantine. The chief jjoint here to be
noticed is the absolute want of nationality in the Empire.
But, in this lack of nationality, the Roman Empire does
but continue the Roman Republic. The Roman Republic
was intensely local ; every association gathered round the
one centre, the city of Rome ; but it was less national than
any other commonwealth in all history. It grew, in fact,
by gradually extending its franchise over Latium, Italy,
and the whole Mediterranean world. The edict of Cara-
calla, whatever were its motives, did but put the finishing
touch to the work begun by the mythical Romulus in his
league with the Sabine Tatius. From the Ocean to the
Euphrates the civilized world was now Roman in name,
and from the Ocean to Mount Taurus it was Roman in
feeling. Mr. Bryce, we think, overrates the distinct na-
tionality of the Greeks of this age, and underrates that of
Syria and Egypt, provinces which never really became
either Roman or Greek. Then came, under Diocletian and
Constantine, the transformation of the Empire into some-
thing like an avowed royalty — we can hardly say an avowed
monarchy, seeing that the system of Diocletian involved the
142 THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. [Essay
simultaneous reign of more than one Emperor. Under this
system too the Old Rome ceased to be the seat of govern-
ment. Milan and Nikomedeia became Imperial cities, till
Constantine made a better and more permanent choice than
all in his New Rome by the Bosporos.
With Constantine too comes in a new element more
important than all. Hitherto we have indeed had a
Roman Empire, but it has as yet had no claim whatever,
in a Christian sense, to the epithet of Holy. Hitherto
Rome and her princes have been the enemies of the Faith,
drunken with the blood of the saints. But from the
conversion of Constantine onAvards, the epithet, though
not yet formally given, was in truth practically deserved.
Rome and Christianity formed so close an alliance that,
in at least one portion of the Empire, the names Roman
and Christian became synonymous.* Emperors presided
in the councils of the Church ; Christian ecclesiastics
obtained the rank of high temporal dignitaries ; orthodoxy
and loyalty, heresy and treason, became almost convertible
terms. Christianity, in fact, became the religion of the
Roman Empire, universal within its limits, but making
hardly any progress beyond them. And so it is to this
day. Christianity still remains all but exclusively the
religion of Europe and of European colonies, that is, of
those nations which either formed part of the Roman
Empire, or came within the range of Rome's civilizing
influence. Thus the Empire, which once had been the
bitterest foe of the Gospel, now became inseparably con-
nected with its profession. The heathen sanctity which
had once hedged in the Emperor was now exchanged for
a sanctity of another kind. The High Pontiff of Pagan
Rome passed by easy steps into the Anointed of the Lord,
the temporal chief of Christendom.
The Empire then and the Emperor thus became Holy ;
* Tlie (Jrcek, mediteval and modern, down to tliu late classical revival, was
indifferently c;illed 'Poj/^afos and Xpianavus. "EWrjv, as in the New Testament,
expressed only the Paganiam of a past age.
VL] THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. 143
but yet the Empire, even in the East, was not a Caliphate.
The successor of Mahomet inlierited alike the temporal and
the spiritual functions of the Prophet. In the Mahometan
system, Church and State needed not to be united, because
they had never been distinct. But closely as the Roman
Empire and the Christian Church became united, one might
almost say identified, traces still remained of the days when
they had been distinct and hostile bodies. The internal
organization of the Church, the gradations of its hierarchy,
the rights of Bishops and of Councils, had grown up nearly
to perfection before the Empire became Christian. The
constitution of the Church was a kind of theocratic demo-
cracy. The Bishop's commission was divine, proceeding
neither from the prince nor from the people ; but it was the
popular voice, and not the voice of the priesthood alone,
which marked out the person on whom that divine com-
mission should be bestowed. Of such an organization the
Emperor might become the patron, the piotector, the
external ruler, but he could not strictly become the head.
The spiritual power thus remained something in close
alliance with the temporal, but still something distinct.
The two were never so completely fused together in the
Imperial idea as they were in the idea of the Caliphate.
In the East the priesthood became subservient ; in the West
it became independent, and at last hostile. But in either
case it was distinct. Whether Emperors deposed Patriarchs
or Popes excommunicated Emperors, the Pontiff and the
Emperor were two distinct persons. In the Mahometan
system the Caliph is Pontiff and Emperor in one.
From the time of Constantine, Constantinople, the New
Rome, became the chief seat of Empire ; towards the end of
the fifth century it became the only seat. It should never
be forgotten, and Mr. Bryce calls all due attention to the
fact, that the event of the year 476, so often mistaken for a
fall of the Roman Empire, was, in its form, a reunion of the
Western Empire to the Eastern. Here again, nothing is
easier than to say that this is an unreal, unpractical, view.
144 THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. [Essay
It is an obvious thing to argue that Italy was not reunited
to the East, but that the Roman dominion was destroyed
altogether ; that the supremacy of the Eastern Emperors in
Italy was merely nominal, and the pretended reunion of the
Empii'e merely an excuse to save their foolish pride. Be it
so ; but, as we said before on the general subject, when
words and forms, however unreal in themselves, exercise a
practical influence on men's actions, they cease to be unreal.
The majesty of Rome still lived in men's minds ; the Roman
Emperor, the Roman Consuls, the Roman Senate and
People, still went on. Odoacer and Theodoric might reign
as national kings over their own people;* but the Roman
population of Italy cheated themselves into the belief that
the barbarian king was merely a lieutenant of the absent
Emperor. Such a belief might be a delusion, but it was a
living belief, and it did not always remain a delusion.
When Belisarius, in the year of his consulship, landed in
Italy, he appeared to the Roman population, not as a
foreign conquerer, but as a deliverer come to restore them
to their natural relation to their lawful sovereign. And
as Mr. Bryce truly observes, unless we remember that
the line of Emperors never ceased, that from 476 to
800 the Byzantine Caesar was always in theory, often
in practice, recognized as the lawful Lord of Rome and
Italy, it is impossible rightly to understand the true
significance of the assumption of the Empire by Charles
the Great, t
Almost the only defect of any consequence in Mr. Bryce' s
* Mr. Eryce, otherwise most accurate in his account of these events, repeats
the common statement that Odoacer assumed the title of " King of Italy." We
know of no ancient authority for this statement, and it is most unlikely in
itself. Territorial titles were not iti use till some ages later, and no one would
be so unlikely to assume a style of this kind as one who professed himself to be
an Imperial lieutenant. [This slip has been corrected by Mr. Bryce in his
third edition, p. 26.]
•\ Mr. Bryce remarks that, in the Middle Ages, the Western Emperors of
the fifth century seem to have been quite forgotten. The lists of Emperors
from Augustus to Maximilian or Rudolf or Ferdinand, alwa\s go on uninter-
ruptedly in the Eastern line from Theodosius to Constautine the Sixth.
/
VI.] THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. 145
work is that he seems hardly to realize the importance, in
any theory of the Empire, alike of the Eastern Empire and
of the Eastern Church. He shows neither ignorance, nor
concealment, nor even misconception of the facts. But he
hardly gives the facts their full prominence. The truth is
that the existence of Eastern Christendom, as it is the great
stumbling-block of the Papal theory, is also the great stum-
bling-block of the Imperial theory. Ingenious men might
theorize about the two lights and the two swords, and
argue whether of the twain were the brighter and the
stronger. They might debate whether the Pope held of the
Emperor, or the Emperor of the Pope ; but it was agreed
on both sides that there could be only one Pope and one
Emperor. These magnificent theories of the Church and
the Empire were in truth set aside by the fact that a large
portion of Christendom, that portion too which could most
truly claim to represent unchanged the earliest traditions
both of the Church and of the Empire, acknowledged no
Pope at all, and acknowledged a rival Emperor. It is
impossible to deny that, as far as uninterrupted political
succession went, it was the Eastern and not the Western
Emperor who was the lineal heir of the old Csesars. The
act which placed Charles the Great on the Imperial throne
was strictly a revolt, a justifiable revolt, it might be, but
still a revolt. It was in the East, and in the East alone,
that the Imperial titles and Imperial traditions — in a
word, the whole political heritage of Rome — continued
absolutely unbroken down to the days of the Frank
Conquest. The Greek prince whom the Crusaders hurled
from the Theodosian Column was, as Mr. Finlay saj^s,
a truer successor of Augustus than was Frederick Bar-
barossa. The Eastern Church too presented even a more
practical answer to the claims of the Western Pontiff than
the Eastern Empire did to the claims of the Western
Caesar. The universal dominion of either was a theory,
and only a theory, as long as their dominion reached, not
to the world's end, not even to the Euphrates, but only
L
146 THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. [Essay
to the Hadriatic. Alike in the days of Otto and in the
days of Dante, the most unchanged portion of the Roman
world still refused to acknowledge the sway of either the
Western C?esar or the Western Pontiff. In truth, the
elaborate theories of the mediaeval Empire were not pro-
pounded, and could not with any decency have been
propounded, as long as the Eastern Church and Empire
retained their old position. When Dante wrote, an Emperor
of the Romans still reigned at Constantinople, but he had
sunk to be simply one amidst a crowd of Eastern princes,
Greek and Frank."^ By that time too there had begun
to be some ground for bringing the charge of schism
against the ancient Churches of the East. There was at
least a pretext for saying that the Church of Constantinople
had been reconciled to the Church of Rome, and had again
fallen away. Such a theory could hardly have been put
forth in the days of the great Macedonian Emperors, when
the New Rome, and not the Old, was still mistress of the
Mediterranean, and when a large portion of the Italian
peninsula still owed allegiance to the Eastern and not
to the Western Csesar. Mr. Bryce does not forget these
things ; but we cannot think that he gives them all the
prominence which they certainly deserve. f
From the accession of Charles the Great onwards, Mr.
Bryce is thoroughly at home. During the whole of the
eighth century, the Imperial power in Italy had been
gradually waning. Lombard invasions had narrowed the
boundary of the Imperial province, and the Iconoclast
controversy had shaken the loyalty of the subjects of the
Empire. The Bishop of Rome had stood forth as the
champion alike of orthodoxy and of nationality, and the
practical rule of the city had been transferred to the
Frankish King. Still the tie was not formally severed ;
the image and superscription of Caesar still appeared on
* Dante, J)e Monarcldd, iii. lo: " Sciiidere imperium esset destiuere ipsinn,
consislente iuijjerio in unitate monarchi;« universalis."
f [This uniission is largely supplied in Mr. Bryce's tliird edition, p. 1S9.]
VL] THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. 147
the coin of his Western capital, and Pippin and Charles
ruled, like Odoacer, by no higher title than that of Patri-
cian. At last the accession of Eirene filled up the measure
of Western indignation. The thi-one of Augustus could
not be lawfully filled by a woman, least of all by a woman
who raised herself to power by the deposition and blinding
of her own child. The throne was vacant ; the Christian
world could not remain without an Emperor : * the Senate
and People of the Old Rome had too long submitted to
the dictation of the New; they asserted their dormant
rights, and chose their Patrician Charles, not as the founder
of a new Empire, not as the restorer of a fallen Empire,
but as the lawful successor of their last lawful sovereign,
the injured Constantine the Sixth. This belief in the
absolute continuity of the Empire is the key to the whole
theory; but it is just the point by which so many readers
and writers break down, and fail to take in the true
character of the election of Charles as it seemed to the
men of his own time. Never was the true aspect of the
case more thoroughly understood and more vigorously set
forth than it has been by Mr. Bryce. And few descriptions
in the English language surpass his brilUant picture of
the election and coronation of the first Teutonic Csesar.
Thus was accomplished that revolution of which, in the
West at least, no man had hitherto dared to dream. As
yet no man of avowed barbarian blood had dared to
assume the Imperial rank. Alaric, Ricimer, Chlodwig,
Theodoric, Pippin himself, had never dared to call them-
* Chron. Moissiac, A. 8oi (Pertz, Mon. Hist. Germ. i. 505) : " Quum enim
apud Romam nunc prsefatus imperator moraretur, delati quidam sunt ad eunij
dicentes quod apud Graecos nomen imperatoris cestasset, et femina apud eo3
nomen imperii teneret, Herena nomine, quae filium suum iniperatorem fraude
captum, oculos eruit, et sibi nomen imperii usurpavit, ut Atalia in libro Regum
legitur fecisse. Audito, Leo papa et omnis conventus episcoporum et sacerdo-
tum seu abbatum, et senatus Francorum et omnes majores natu Romanorum,
cnm reliquo Christiano populo consilium habuerunt, ut ipsum Caiolum, regem
Francorum, imperatorem nominare deberent, qui Romam matrem Imperii
tenebat, ubi semper Csesares et Imperatores sedere soliti fuerunt ; et ne pagan i
iniiultarent Christianis, si imperatoris nomea apud Christianos cessasset."
L %
148 THE HOLY ROM AX EMPIRE. [Essay
selves Emperors of the Romans. They might be Kings
of their own people and Roman Consuls or Patricians,
they might create or depose Emperors, but the Empire
itself was beyond them. But now a man of Teutonic
blood and speech was, by the election of the Old Rome,
placed on her Imperial throne. The Frankish King be-
came a Roman Csesar. And, what should never be for-
gotten, he claimed, after his Imperial coronation, to reign
not only as King but as Cipsar over the whole of his
dominions. Those who had already sworn allegiance to
the King were now called on afresh to swear allegiance
to the Emperor. Thus was the dominion of Rome and
her Emperor again formally extended, alike over large
provinces which had been wrested from the Empire and
over vast regions which the older Csesars had never held.
The Roman eagle was planted again on the banks of the
Ebro, and planted for the first time on the banks of the
Eider. When Germany swore allegiance to the new Au-
gustus, the defeat of Varus might be thought to be avenged
at the hands of one who, in blood and speech and manners,
was the true successor of Arminius. If Greece led captive
her Roman conqueror, Rome now still more truly led
captive the barbarian who strove to hide, even from him-
self, the fact that he had conquered her.
All this, it is easy to say, was mere unreality and delu-
sion. It is easy to argue that Charles was not a Roman
Emperor in the same sense as Augustus, or even as Augus-
tulus. With what right could he be called the successor
of Constantine the Sixth, when the dominions of the two
princes had hardly a square mile of ground in common,
while the succession of Byzantine Emperors continued
undisturbed, and while they bore sway even over some
portions of Italy itself? Charles, it may be argued, was
simply a Teutonic king, who satisfied a mere prejudice
on the part of a portion of his subjects by assuming an
empty title, a title which neither extended his rule over
new dominions nor increased his prerogative within the old.
VI.] THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. 149
All this, no doubt, is true ; it is obvious enough to us
at the distance of a thousand years. But it was not
obvious to men at the time. And, as men's actions in
all ages have been governed, not by what, with further
knowledge, they might have thought, but by what they
actually did know and think, the assumption of the Im-
perial rank by Charles was neither unreal nor illusory,
because it led to important practical results. In the eyes
of all Charles's Italian subjects, probably in the eyes of
many of his Gaulish subjects, the assumption of the Roman
title made all the difference between lawful and unlawful
dominion. The King of the Franks was a barbarian
conqueror, or at best a barbarian deliverer ; in the Em-
peror of the Romans men beheld the restorer of lawful
and orderly government, after a long and violent inter-
ruption. Even in the eyes of his own Germans, Charles
Augustus became, in some vague way, greater and holier
than Charles the mere Frankish King. And in their
exaltation of its prince the nation felt itself exalted also.
The form of words did not as yet exist, but the West
now saw again a Holy Roman Empire, and it was now
a " Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation."
This truth however was not as yet legally acknow-
ledged ; indeed it did not as yet exist in all its practical
fulness. Charles was indeed a German king ; but the
possession of the Imperial crown by a German king did
not identify the Imperial crown with the German nation
in the same way that it did from the time of Otto the
Great onward. The difference between the position of
Charles and that of Otto is this. Otto was indeed the
most powerful king of the West, but he was not the only
king. The Imperial crown was annexed to the distinct
local kingdom of the Eastern Franks, when it might
conceivably have been annexed to the kingdom of the
Burgundians, or even to the kingdom of the Western
Franks. There thus arose, from Otto onwards, a direct
connexion between the Roman Empire and Germany as
150 THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. [Essay
a distinct country and nation, one country and nation out
of several possible competitors. But Charles had been far
more than all this : he was not only the most powerful
king, but he was in some sense the only king. He might
claim to be Lord of the World in a truer sense than any
Emperor after his son, in as true a sense as any Emperor
since Theodosius. Setting aside our own island, which
passed in some sort for another world, Charles was actually
either the immediate sovereign or the suzerain lord of all
Western Christendom. The East was indeed ruled by a
second Csesar, who might, according to circumstances, be
looked on either as an Imperial rival, a Tetricus or a
Carausius, or as an Imperial colleague, a Valens or an
Arcadius. But the West was all his own. He ruled,
and, after his Imperial coronation, he ruled distinctly as
Roman Augustus, over all the lands from the Ocean and
the Ebro to the Elbe and the Theiss. His frontiers were
surrounded, as the frontiers of Rome were in ancient
times, by a string of allied and tributary rulers, the
antitypes of the Massinissas and the Herods. In such
a dominion as this the mere Frankish nationality might
well seem to be lost: Frank, Gaul, Burgundian, Italian,
might seem to be alike subjects of Csesar, or, if they
better liked the title, citizens of Rome. Of course this
appearance of universal dominion was delusive ; but it
was only in human nature that men should at the time
be deluded by it.
But such an Empire as this needed the arm of Charles
the Great himself to support it. One hardly knows
whether it was in folly or in wisdom, because he saw not
the consequences or because he saw that the consequences
were unavoidable, that Charles laid down the principle of
a division of his dominions among his sons. The Empire
was still to be one and indivisible, but the Emperor was
to reign only as the superior lord over several kings of his
own house. Under Charles himself, his sons had reigned
as kings over Italy and Aquitaine, and he had ever found
YL] THE HOLY ROMAK EMPIRE. 151
them his loyal vicegerents. Perhaps he hardly foresaw
that the submission which was willingly yielded to a
father, and such a father, would not be so willingly yielded
to a brother, an uncle, or perhaps a distant cousin. Per-
haps he saw that no hand but his own could keep his
dominions together ; that it was better to make the best
of a sad necessity; that it was something to secure a
nominal and theoretical unity through the vassalage of
all the kings to the Imperial head of the family. Anyhow
he had precedents enough, Roman and Prankish. He was
only treading in the steps of Chlodwig and of Pippin, and
he may well have thought that he was treading in the
steps of Diocletian, Constantino, and Theodosius. At all
events, from the death of Lewis the Pious, or rather from
the death of Charles himself, a state of division begins ;
kings and Emperors rise and fall ; the Empire is some-
times nominally, always practically, in abeyance. For one
moment, under Charles the Fat, nearly the whole Empire
is reunited; but, with his deposition in 888, the Eastern
and the Western Franks, Francia Teutonica and Francia
Latina — in modern language, Germany and France — are
parted asunder for ever. Germany, West-France, Bur-
gundy, Italy, become distinct kingdoms, ruled for the
most part by kings who are not of the blood of the Great
Charles. Through the first half of the ninth century,
whenever there was an Emperor at all, instead of being
Lord of the World, he was at most a King of Italy, with
a very feeble hold indeed even on his peninsular kingdom.
Then came the revival under Otto the Great, the founda-
tion of the Roman Empire under its latest form. The
kingdoms of Germany and Italy were now united, and
their common king, though he did not as yet assume the
title, was, from the moment of his coronation at Aachen,
Roman Emperor-elect, " Rex Romanorum in Csesarem pro-
movendus." Once only, on the extinction of the direct
line of the Ottos, did Italy again strive to establish a real
national king. Though Kings of Italy were once or twice
152 THE HOLY JiOMAN EMPIRE. [Essay
elected in later times in opposition to the reigning King
or Emperor, they were discontented or rebellious princes
of the Imperial house, who certainly had no mind to
confine their rule to Italy, if they could extend it over
Germany and Burgundy also. From the days of Otto the
principle was gradually established that the chosen King
of Germany acquired, as such, a right to the royal crowns
of Italy and Burgundy* and to the Imperial crown of
Rome. He was not Emperor till he had been crowned at
Rome by the Roman Pontiff; but he, and no other, had a
right to become Emperor. This was a state of things very
different from the Empire of the first Caesars, very different
from the Empire of Charles, but it was still more widely
different from the "phantom Empire," to use Mr. Bryce's
words, of Guy and Berengar, The union of three out of
the four Kingdoms into which the dominions of Charles
had split, made the Empire, if not an universal monarchy,
yet a power which had as yet no rival in Western Europe.
France — modern, Celtic, Capetian, Parisian, France — looked
exceedingly like a revolted province, a limb wrongfully cut
off from the body of the Empire and from the sway of the
successor of Charles. States of which the old Csesars had
never heard — Denmark, Bohemia, Poland, Hungary, owed
a homage, more or less practical, to the Saxon, Frankish,
or Swabian Augustus. The Holy Roman Empire had now
assumed essentially the same form which it retained down
to 1 806 ; another distinct step had been taken towards
making it the special heritage of the German nation.
It is at this point, the beginning of the Empire in its
last shape, that Mr. Bryce stops to review the Imperial
theory as it was understood in the Middle Ages. What
that theory was we have already tried to set forth ; but it
should be borne in mind that the theory grew in clearness
and fulness, and moreover that the more clearly men saw
* After the acquisition of the Kingdom of Burgundy in 1032. Mr. Bryce
has an important note on the various uses of the word Burgundy, the most
fluctuating and perplexing name in history.
VI.] THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. 153
that the existing Empire failed to answer their ideal con-
ception, the more they went on to theorize about the ideal
Empire. We may be sure that neither Otto the Great nor
any man of his time could have set forth the Imperial creed
in the distinct and elaborate shape into which it was thrown
by Dante. Still the essential elements of the theory existed
from the beginning. It was held, from the days of Otto,
that the eternal fitness of things required an universal
temporal and an universal spiritual chief of Christendom ;
it was held that those chiefs were to be looked for in the
Roman Emperor and the Roman Pontiff; and lastly, it was
held that the true Roman Emperor was to be looked for in
the German King. No Emperor was ever so thoroughly
imbued with these notions as Otto the Third, who seems
to have seriously intended to make Rome, in fact as well
as in name, the seat of his Empire, and thence to rule the
world by the help of a Pontiff like-minded with himself.
Of the schemes, or rather the visions, of this wonderful
young prince, so sadly cut off in the days of his brightest
promise, Mr. Bryce gives us an eloquent picture, which
forms one of the gems of his book.
The union in one person of the incongruous functions of
German King and Roman Emperor is a fact which Mr.
Bryce sets forth witli much power and clearness. He
contrasts the two offices, " the one centralized, the other
local ; the one resting on a sublime theory, the other the
rude offspring of anarchy ; the one gathering all power
into the hands of an irrespouBible monarch, the other limit-
ing his rights, and authorizing resistance to his commands ;
the one demanding the equality of all citizens as creatures
equal before heaven, the other bound up with an aristocracy
the proudest, and in its gradations of rank the most exact,
that Europe had ever seen." He then goes on to show how
these two conceptions were fused into a third different from
either ; how the Emperor- King strove to merge his king-
ship in his Empire ; how the titles of German royalty were
dropped for ages, so that Csesar was held to rule as Csesar
154 THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. [Essay
no less in Germany than in Italy ; how again, by a natural
interchange of thought, the idea of the Empire became
mingled with feudal notions ; how the Emperor became a
Lord of the World, not as a direct ruler, like the old
Casars, but as an universal suzerain, of whom local kings
and dukes and commonwealths might hold as his vassals,
while he himself held his Empire immediately of God
alone. There can be no doubt that, in Germany itself, the
effect of the union of the Kingdom with the Empire was
the weakening and the final destruction of the royal power.
The Germany of the Ottos and the Henries, divided and
turbulent as it seems when compared with modern cen-
tralized states, was actually the most united power in
Western Europe, incomparably more united than con-
temporary England or France. The whole later history
of Germany is simply a history of the steps by which this
once united realm fell to pieces. The King gradually lost
all real power, and yet he remained to the last surrounded
by a halo of outward reverence beyond all other kings.
The full examination of the causes of these phacnomena
belongs to German history. But it cannot be doubted that
the chief cause of all was the fact that the German King
was also Roman Emperor. It was not only that their
Italian claims and titles led the German Kings into never-
ending Italian wars, to the neglect of true German in-
terests. This outward and palpable cause had doubtless
a good deal to do with the matter ; but this was by no
means aU. The true causes lie deeper. The Emperor,
Lord of the World, became, like the supreme deities of
some mythologies, too great to act with effect as the local
king of a national kingdom. His local kingship was for-
gotten. The Emperors strove to merge their kingship in
the Empire, and they did merge it in the Empire, though
in an opposite way from that which they had intended.
They would reign as Emperors and not as Kings, meaning
to reign as Emperors with more absolute and undisputed
power. They did reign as Emperors and not as Kings.
TL] THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. 155
because the Imperial power was found to be practically far
less effective than the royal power. The Emperor, Lord of
the World, exercised only a most vague and nominal
supremacy beyond the limits of his own kingdoms ; why,
now that he reigned as Caesar rather than as King, should
Cjesar claim any more effective authority over Germany,
Bui'gundy, and Italy, than he held over Gaul or Spain or
Britain ? He was Emperor alike in all lands ; why should
his jurisdiction, nominal in one land, be any more practical
in another? Thus, because their suzerain was of greater
dignity than all other suzerains, did the vassal princes of
Germany obtain a more complete independence than the
vassal princes of any other realm. Again, the Empire was
in its own nature elective. Mere kingdoms or duchies,
mere local sovereignties, might pass from father to son
like private estates ; but the Empire, the chieftainship of
Christendom, the temporal vicarship of God upon earth,
could not be exposed to the chances of hereditary succes-
sion ; it must remain as the loftiest of prizes, the fitting
object of ambition for the worthiest of Roman citizens, that
is, now, for all baptized men above the rank of a serf. The
practical effect of this splendid theory was that, while the
crowns of England and France became hereditary, the
crown of Germany, as inseparable from the Empire, became
purely elective.'^ Then followed the consequences which,
in any but a very early state of society, are sure to follow
on the establishment of a purely elective kingship. Each
Emperor, uncertain whether he would be able to transmit
his dignity to his son, thought more of the aggrandizement
of his family than of maintaining the dignity of his crown.
Escheated or forfeited fiefs, which in France would have
gone to swell the royal domain, were employed in Germany
to provide principalities for children whose succession
* Of course the old Teutonic law, in Germany and everywhere else, was
election out of one royal family, but in England and France the hereditary
element in this system grew at the expense of the elective, while in Germany
the process was reversed.
156 THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. [Essay
to anything higher was uncertain. The election of each
Emperor was commonly purchased by concessions to the
Electors, and if an Emperor was so lucky as to procure
the election of his son as King of the Romans during his
lifetime, that special favour was purchased by further con-
cessions still. The Empire sank to such a degree of poverty
that it became absolutely necessary to elect a prince whose
hereditary dominions were large enough to enable him to
maintain his Imperial rank. Such princes made their
hereditary dominions their fu'st object, and retreated alto-
gether to their hereditary capitals, sometimes beyond the
limits of Roman or German dominion. Italy fell away;
Burgundy was gradually swallowed up by France. The
Holy Roman Empire was cut down to a German Kingdom,
whose very royalty was little moi^e than a pageant. As if
in some desperate hope of reviving the royal authority,
Maximilian revived the royal title,"^ almost forgotten since
the days of Otto. And by a strange but inevitable re-
action, the crown which had become purely elective became
from this time practically hereditary. The form of election
was never dropped, but chief after chief of the Austrian
house was chosen, because national feeling revolted from
choosing a stranger, while no other German prince could
be found equal to bearing the burthen. Thus both the
Roman Empire and the German Kingdom came to be
looked on as part of the heritage of the House of Austria.f
From Charles the Fifth onwards, the Roman Emperor was
again a mighty prince, but his might was neither as Roman
Emperor nor as German King. The Emperor-King, with
his Kingdom and his Empire, sank, as we have already
* The old titles, " Eex Orientalium Francoruni," etc., were gradually
dropped under the Ottos. Hcncefoith the Emperor, though crowned at
Aachen and sometimes at Arle.s, took no title but "Imperator" or "Rex
Roinanoruiii." Maximilian restored the ancient style under the foim of" Rex
GermaniBe," " Kiinig in Germanien." This description was common in the
ninth century, thougli it was not used as a formal title.
■\ The election of Charles the Seventh of Bavaria was no exception. He
claimed the Austrian succession.
VI.] THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. 157
said, to be the president of one of the laxest of federal
bodies.
Thus it was that the acquisition of the Imperial dignity
crushed and broke up the ancient kingdom of the Eastern
Franks, Yet the influence of that splendid possession was
not wholly destructive. It preserved in the very act of
weakening. The Imperial idea was like the ivy which
first makes a wall ruinous, and then keeps it from falling.
The possession of Empire in every way lessened the real
power and influence of the Kingdom, but it insured its
existence. We may be sure that any other kingdom whose
king retained so little real authority as the King of Ger-
many would have fallen asunder far sooner than Germany
did. But the King of Germany was also the Roman
Emperor ; as such he was surrounded by an atmosphere of
vague majesty beyond all other kings ; he was the object
of a mysterious reverence, which did not hinder his vassals
from robbing him of all effectual prerogatives, but which
kept them back from the very thought of formally abolish-
ing his office. The Koman Empire, as far as any real
power or dignity was concerned, was buried in the grave
of Frederick the Wonder of the World, But its ghost
lingered on for five hundred and fifty years. Csesar sur-
vived the Interregnum ; he survived the Golden Bull ; he
survived the Reformation ; he survived the Peace of West-
phalia. The Roman Emperors, powerful as heads of the
Austrian House, became, as Kings and Csesars, almost as
vain a pageant as a Merowingian King or an Abbasside
Caliph of Egypt. The temporal head of Christendom saw
half of his own kingdom fall away into heresy. He saw
his vassals, great and small, assume all the rights of inde-
pendent sovereigns. He saw cities and provinces fall away
one by one, some assuming perfect republican inde-
pendence,"^ some swallowed up by royal or revolutionary
* The Confederations of Switzerland and the United Provinces, whose
independence of the Empire, practically established long before, was not
formally recognized till 1648.
158 THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. [Essay
France. But the frail bark which carried C?esar and his
fortunes still kept on its course amid so many contending
blasts. It was only when the magic spell of the name of
Empire was dissolved by the rise of upstart and rival
Emperors, that the fabric at last gave way. The as-
sumption of the Imperial title by the Muscovite was the
first step, but this alone did but little. The Russian Em-
pire might be looked upon as in some vague way repre-
senting the Empire of Byzantium, or its sovereign might be
spoken of as Emperor according to that rough analogy
which confers the Imperial title on the barbaric princes of
China and Morocco. It was not till a rival appeared close
on its own ground that the Holy Roman Empire of the
German Nation fell utterly asunder. Side by side with
the Emperor of the Romans suddenly arose an " Emperor
of the French," giving himself out, with consummate but
plausible impudence, as the true successor of the Great
Charles. The kingdom of Italy, almost forgotten since the
days of the Hohenstaufen, arose again to place a new
diadem on the same presumptuous brow. A King of
Rome, a title unheard of since the days of Tarquin, next
appeared, as if to mock the long line of German "Reges
Romanorum." The assumption of the Imperial title by
Buonaparte was met by Francis the Second in a way
which showed that he must almost have forgotten his own
existence. He, the King of Germany and Roman Emperor-
elect, could find no better means to put himself on a level
with the Corsican usurper than to add to his style the
monstrous, ludicrous, and meaningless addition of " Heredi-
tary Emperor of Austria.""^ An hereditary Emperor of
* " iJrfckaiser von Oesterreich," as distinguished from " erwuhllervom.isch&v
Kaiser." This, as Mr. Bryce remarks, besides its absurdity in other ways,
implies a complete forgetfnlness of the meaning of the word " erwcihlter." The
title of " erwaftlter romischer Kaiser," " Eonianorum iiiiperator clecfm,'" was
introduced l)y Maximilian, under papal sanction, to express what hitherto had
been expressed by " Rex Romanorum in Caesarem promovcndus," that is, a
prince elected at Frankfurt and crowned at Aachen (latterly crowned at
Frankfurt also), but not yet Emj)eror, because not yet crowned at Rome by the
VI.] THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. 159
Lichtenstein would have seemed no greater absurdity in
the eyes of Charles or Otto or Frederick. When it had
come to this, it was time that the old titles of Rome and
Germany should pass away. As the elective King had
made himself an hereditary Emperor, Dukes and Electors
thought they had an equal right to make themselves
hereditary Kings. Their new-fangled Majesties and High-
nesses revolted against their renegade overlord, and found
a willing protector west of the Rhine. The Roman Empire
and the German Kingdom were now no more; the foreign
Emperor declared that he did not recognize their existence,^
and its own Imperial chief proclaimed the final dissolution
of the creation of Augustus, Charles, and Otto, in a docu-
ment in which, after the formal enumeration of his own
now degraded titles, the name of Rome does not occur. f
We have thus hurried through a period of more than
eight hundred years, the revolutions of which are set forth
by Mr. Bryce with singular clearness and power. He
brings forth in its due prominence the great reign of
Henry the Third, the moment when the Empire reached
its highest pitch of real power. This was followed by the
Pope. This was the condition of all the Emperors since Charles the Fifth,
none of whom were crowned by the Pope. They were therefore only
"Emperors-elect," just like a Bishop-elect, one, that is, chosen, but not yet
consecrated. But when " j?r6kaiser " could be opposed to " erwdhlter Kaiser,"
it was clear that people fancied that erivdhlter meant, not " elect," but elective
as opposed to hereditary. In short, Francis the Second seems to have altogether
forgotten who and what he was.
In the Peace of Pressburg, in 1805, the Emperor is called throughout
" Empereur d'Allemagne et d'Autriche ; " in the heading he is " Kaiser von
Oesterreich " only.
* See the addition made bj' Buonaparte to the Act of Confederation of the
Rhine : " Sa Majesty . . . ne recimndit plus I'existence de la constitution
germanique."
f The fonn used throughout is "deutsches Reich." But the titles run as of
old, " erwiihlter romischer Kaiser," " Konig in Germanien," etc. ; oidy the
new-fashioned " Erbkaiser von Oesterreich " is thrust in between them. Even
tlie " zu alien Zeiten Mehrer des Reichs," the old ludicrous mistranslation of
"semper Augustus," is not left out in the document which proclaims the
Empire to have come to an end.
160 THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. [Essay
struggles between the spiritual and temporal powers under
his son and grandson, which showed how vain was the
theory which expected the Roman Ca?sar and the Roman
Pontiff to pull together in harmony. But Mr. Bryce's
highest enthusiasm centres round the great House of
Swabia. He gives us a brilliant picture of the reign
of Frederick Barbarossa, into whose real character and
position we need hardly say that he fully enters. On the
reign of his grandson, "Fridericus stupor mundi et inno-
vator mirabilis," Mr. Bryce is less full and less eloquent
than we should have expected; but he clearly points out
the importance of his reign as an epoch in Imperial history,
and marks out boldly the fact that "with Frederick fell
the Empire." The Empire, in short, from Rudolf onwards,
is a revival, something analogous to the Empire of the
Palaiologoi at Constantinople. Internal disorganization
had done in the Western Empire what foreign conquest
had done in the Eastern. Rudolf, Adolf, Albert, were
mere German kings ; they never crossed the Alps to
assume either the golden crown of Rome or the iron crown
of Monza. With Henry the Seventh we reach a new
period, or rather his reign seems like a few years trans-
ported onwards from an earlier time. The revival of
classical learning had given a revived impulse to the
Imperial idea, just as the revival of the Civil Law had
done at an earlier time. Of the ideas with which men
then looked upon the Empire, Dante, in his work Be
Monarchia, is the great exponent. It must not be thought
for a moment that Dante's subject is monarchy, in the
common sense of the word, royal government as opposed to
aristocracy or democracy. With him Monarcliia is synony-
mous with Jmper'invi. There may be many kings and princes,
but there is only one Monarch., one universal chief, the
Roman Emperor. He proves elaborately, in the peculiar
style of reasoning current in that ago, that an universal
monarch is necessary, that the Roman Emperor is of right
the universal monarch, that the Emperor docs not hold his
VI.] THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. 161
crown of the Pope, but immediately of God alone. But he
has not a word of argument to show that the German King
is really the Roman Emperor ; that is assumed as a matter
of course ; there was no need to prove, because nobody
doubted, that whatever belonged of right to Augustus
Caesar belonged of right to his lawful successor, Henry of
Llitzelburg. On this branch of the argument— one which,
to our notions, stood quite as much in need of proof as any
of the others — Dante does not vouchsafe a single line. The
illusion survived untouched.
We have not room to follow Mr. Bryce through all the
stages of the later German history, when the Empire had
lost all Roman and Imperial character, when the Emperor
was again a mere German King, or rather a mere President
of a German Confederation. The steps by which Germany
sank from a kingdom into a confederation have an interest
of their own, but it is one which more closely touches
federal than Imperial history. Germany is, as far as we
know, the only example of a confederation which arose,
not out of the union of elements before distinct, but out of
the dissolution of a formerly existing kingdom. From the
Peace of Westphalia — we might almost say from the Inter-
regnum onwards — the Imperial historian has little more to
do than to watch the strange and blind affection with which
men clave to the mere name of what had once been great
and glorious. And yet we have seen that even that name
was not without its practical effect. If, in Mr. Bryce's
emphatic w^ords, "the German Kingdom broke down be-
neath the weight of the Roman Empire," it was certainly
the name of the Roman Empire which hindered the severed
pieces from altogether flying asunder. And the recollection
of the Empire works still in modern politics, though we
fear more for evil than for good. Patriotic Germans indeed
look back with a sigh to the days when Germany was great
and united under her Ottos and her Henries, but these
are remembrances of the Kingdom rather than of the Em-
pire. The memory of the Empire is mainly used in modern
M
162 THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. [Essay
times to prop up the position of the two upstart powers
which now venture to profane the Imperial title. Because
Gaul was once a German province, the Lord of Paris* would
have us believe that the successor of Charles is to be found
among a people who in the daj^s of the great Emperor had
no national beinof. Because certain Austrian dukes were
chosen Roman Emperors, we are called upon, sometimes to
condemn the great Frederick as a forerunner of Francis
Joseph, sometimes to justify Francis Joseph as a successor
of the great Frederick. We will wind up with the fervid
and eloquent comments of Mr. Bryce on this latter head.
A more vigorous denunciation of the great Austrian im-
posture we have seldom come across : —
"Austria has indeed, in some things, but too faithfully reproduced the policy
of the Saxon and Swabian Caesars. Like her, they oppressed and insulted the
Italian people ; but it was in the defence of rights which the Italians them-
selves admitted. Like her, they lusted after a dominion over the races on
their borders, but that dominion was to them a means of spreading civilization
and religion in savage countries, not of pampering upon their revenues .1 hated
court and aristocracy. Like her, they slrove to maintain a strong government
at home, but they did it when a strong government was the first of ])olitical bless-
ings. Like her, they gathered and maintained vast armies ; but those armies were
composed of knights and barons who lived for war alone, not of peasants torn
away from useful labour, and condemned to the cruel task of perpetuating their
own bondage by crushing the aspirations of another nationality. They sinned
grievously, no doubt, but they sinned in the dim twilight of a half-barbarous
age, not in the noonday blaze of modern civilization. The enthusiasm for
mediseval faith and simplicity wliich was ao fervid some years ago, has run its
course, and is not likely soon to revive. He who reads the history of the
Middle Ages will not deny that its heroes, even the best of them, were in
some respects little better than savages. But when lie approaches more recent
times, and sees how, during the last three hundred years, kings have dealt
with their subjects, and with each other, he will forget the ferocity of the
Middle Ages, in horror at the heartlessness, the treachery, the injustice, all the
more odious because it sometimes wears the mask of legality, which disgraces
the .innals of the military monarchies of Europe. With regard, however, to
the pretensions of modern Austria, the truth is that this dispute about the
worth of the old system has no bearing upon them at all. The day of Imperial
greatness was already past when Kudolf the first Hapsburg reached the throne;
while during what may be called the Austrian i)eriod, from Maximilian to
Francis II., the Holy Empire was to Germany a mere clog and encumbrance,
which the unhappy nation bore because she knew not how to rid herself of it.
* [1865.]
VI.] THE HOLT ROMAN EMPIRE. 163
The Germans are welcome to appeal to the old Empire to prove that they were
once a united people. Nor is there any harm in their comparing the politics
of the twelfth century with those of tlie nineteenth, although to argue from
the one to the other seems to betray a wank of historical judgment. But the
one thing which is wholly absurd is to make Francis Joseph of Austria the
successor of Frederick of Hohenstaufen, and justify the most sordid and un-
genial of modern despotisms by the example of the mirror of mediaeval chivalry,
the noblest creation of mediaeval thought." *
* [I let Mr. Bryce's words and my own stand as they were first written.
Since then we have seen the "sordid and ungenial despotism" scourged by a
wholesome defeat into an honourable place in Europe. We have seen the
tyrant of Hungary changed into her lawful king. We have seen Italy en-
larged and strengthened by the deliverance of Venice and of Rome. We have
seen the lod of the oppressor broken ; the power which has been so long the
disturbing element in Europe has at last been crushed, and instead of the
frontier of France being extended to the Rhine, the frontier of Germany has
been again extended to the Mosel. The unity of the greater part of Germany
has been secured, and, by a pardonable confusion of ideas, the Imperial title has
been assumed by the chief of the united naticm. I need not show that such a
title i3 in strictness inaccurate, but it would be hard to find a title more appro-
priate than that of Emperor for the head of a Confederation of kings and other
princes. The new German Empire is a fair revival of the old German
Kingdom, but it must be borne in mind that it is in no sense a revival of the
Holy Roman Empire. That has passed away for ever.] [1871.]
M 2
1G4 THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. [Essay
VII.
THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS.
We think it right, at the beginning of this Article, to tell
our readers exactly what we are going to talk about, and
what we are not. We are not going to plunge into any
antiquarian minutise about the settlement of the Franks in
Gaul, or to perplex ourselves and our readers with any
questions as to Leudes, Antrustions, and Scabini. Still less
are we about to enter on the disputed ground of Gaulish
or British ethnology, to trace out the exact line of demar-
cation between the Gael and the Cymry, or to decide the
exact relations of the Belgse either to them or to their
Teutonic neighbours. What we wish to do is to pass
rapidly through the whole history of Gaul and France,
from the earliest times down to our own day. We wish
to take a general survey of Gaulish and Frankish history
from a point of view which is not commonly understood,
but which is well suited to throw an important light alike
upon the history of remote ages and. upon the latest events
of our own day. The past and the present are for ever
connected ; but the kind of connexion which exists be-
tween them differs widely in different cases. Past history
and modern politics are always influencing one another;
but the forms which their mutual influence takes are in-
finitely varied. Sometimes the business of the historian
is to point out real connexions and real analogies which
the world at large does not perceive. This is most con-
spicuously his duty in dealing with what is called the "an-
cient" history of Greece and Italy, and, to a large extent
also, in dealing with the early and. mediaeval history of our
own island. Sometimes, on the other hand, it is his duty
VII.] THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. 165
to upset false connexions and false analogies, which have
not only misled historical students, but have often exercised
a most baneful influence upon public affairs. This is his
primary duty when dealing with the history of Gaul and
France. It is something to show that the old history of
Athens and Rome is no assemblage of lifeless chronicles,
but the truest textbook for the real statesman of every age.
It is something to show that the England of our own times
is in every important respect one and the same with the
England of our earliest being. But it is something no less
valuable to break down false assumptions which pervert
the truth of history, and which enable designing men to
throw a false colour over unprincipled aggressions. If it
is worth our while to show that Queen Victoria is in every
sense the true successor of Cerdic and ^Elfred and Edward
the First, it is no less worth our while to show that Louis
Napoleon Buonaparte is in no conceivable sense the successor
of Clovis* and of Charles the Great.
There is perhaps nothing which people in general find
more difficult to master than the science of historical geo-
graphy. Few men indeed there are who fully take in
the way in which nations have changed their places, and
countries have changed their boundaries. We say " fully
take in " because the facts are continually known in a
kind of way, when there is no sort of living grasp of them.
People know things and, so to speak, do not act upon their
knowledge. Almost everybody has heard, for instance, of
the succession of " the Britons" and "the Saxons" in this
island. A man knows in a kind of way that " the Saxons"
are his own forefathers, and that they drove "the Britons"
into a corner ; but he does not fully take in the fact that
these ''Britons" and " Saxons" are simply Welshmen and
Englishmen. When Dr. Guest, like a good and accurate
* [I seem, eleven years back, to have kept this absurd form of the name.
The two names being exactly the same, if we do not write lllodwig or
something like it, it would be better to write Lewis from the very beginning.]
[1871.]
166 THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. [Essay
scholar, talks of " the English " in the fifth and sixth cen-
turies, to most ears it sounds like a paradox.* In the
meanwhile, the most unmistakeable Teutons will talk
glibly about " our British ancestors," and see no absur-
dity in the title of Haydon's picture of " Alfred and the
fii'st British Jury." In the same way men have a sort of
notion that Gaul is the " ancient name " of France, and
France the "modern name" of Gaul. A man sees " Charle-
magne " called " King of France," and he thinks that the
France of Charlemagne is the same as the France of Lewis
the Fourteenth or of either Buonaparte. One cause of the
evil is doubtless the want of proper historical maps. Every
household does not boast a copy of Spruner's Hand- Atlas.
People are set to read the history of the world with two
sets of maps. One is to serve from Adam to Theodoric or
to Charles the Fifth — we are not quite sure which ; the
other, from Theodoric or Charles the Fifth to the year 1 860.
They sit down to read about John and Philip Augustus
either with a map of Roman Gaul or with a map of Napo-
leonic France. Now, if you want to find the homes of the
Twelve Peers of France, it is no light matter to do so when
you have to choose between a map showing you only
Lugdunensis and Germania Prima and a map showing you
only the departments of Gironde and of Ille and Vilaine.
People read of the return of Richard Coeur-de-Lion from
the East, how he falls into the hands of the Duke of Aus-
tria, and is presently passed over into those of the "Emperor
of Germany." This Duke and this Emperor are persons
not a httle mysterious to those whose only idea of " Aus-
tria " is something which takes in Venetia at the one end
and Transsilvania at the other. If a man in this state of
mind came across a copy of Eginhard, and found Mainz,
Kbln, and Trier spoken of as cities of Francia, he would
think that he had hit upon an irrefragable argument in
favour of the claims of Paris to the frontier of the Rhine.
A " King of France " once reigned upon the Elbe, the
* [1 trust that it ia not so great a paradox in 1871 as it was in i860.]
VII.] THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. 167
Danube, the Tiber, and the Ebro ! A patriotic Frenchman
would trumpet the discovery abroad as the greatest of
triumphs ; a patriotic Englishman might perhaps be in-
clined to hide so dangerous a light under the nearest
bushel. Our business just now is to show that the fact
tells quite the other way, so far as it tells any way at all.
If any inference in modern politics is to be drawn from the
pha?nomena of mediaeval geography, they would certainly
rather prove the right of Maximilian of Bavaria to the
frontier of the Atlantic than the right of Napoleon of Paris
to the frontier of the Rhine.
We will begin by admitting, if it is needful for anybody
either to assert or to deny the fact, that modern France is,
beyond all doubt, connected with ancient Gaul in a way in
which modern England is not connected with ancient Britain.
There can be no question that the predominant blood in
modern France is not that of the invading Franks, but that
of the conquered Gallo-Romans ; while in England the pre-
dominant blood is not that of the conquered Britons, but
that of the invading Angles and Saxons. The truth is that
the Frankish conquest of Gaul must, of the two, have been
more analogous to the Norman than to the English conquest
of our own country. The Frank in Gaul and the Norman
in England were predominant for a season ; but in the end
the smaller and foreign element died out, and left Gaul once
more Gaul and England once more England. In fact,
England still retains more traces of the Norman than France
does of the Frank. The Romance infusion into our Teutonic
speech is far more extensive than the Teutonic infusion into
the Romance speech of Gaul. The main difference is that
Gaul or part of it has changed its name to France, while
England has not changed its name to Normandy. This was
doubtless, among other causes, owing to the more settled
condition of states and nations in the eleventh century as
compared with the sixth, and to the fact that William of
Normandy claimed to be, not the unprovoked invader of
England, but the lawful inheritor of her crown. But, on
168 THE FEAXKS AND THE GAULS. [Essay
the other hand, Gaul has never, even in name, so thoroughly
become France as Britain has become England. This may
sound strange at first hearing, because " Briton " and
" British '' are now such household words to express our-
selves ; but their use in that sense is extremely modern ; it
has simply come in from the necessity, constant in political
language and frequent elsewhere, of having some name to
take in alike England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland. So
lately as James the Second's time, a Briton still meant a
Welshman ; * and we believe that exactly a century back,
the famous declaration of George the Third that he " gloried
in the name," not of Englishman, but "of Briton," was
looked upon by many of his subjects as a wicked device of
the Scotchman Bute. To this day " England " and " English-
man " are the words which always first occur to us in the
language either of every-day discourse or of the rhetoric of
the heart. The word " Britain," in the mouth of an English-
man, is reserved either for artificial poetry, for the dialect
of foreign politics, or for the conciliation of Scottish hearers.
Before England and Scotland were united, the name " Briton,"
as including Englishmen, was altogether unheard of; but
the name " Gaul " has never fully died out as the designa-
tion of France. How does the case stand in the tongue
which was so long the common speech of Europe? The
most pedantic Ciceronian never scrupled to talk familiarly
about Ang/ns and AiigUa ; but Francxs and Francia are hardly
known except in language more or less formal. Gallns,
(iallia, Gallmruw. liix, are constantly used by writers who
would never think of an analogous use of Brifaiinns and
Ihiianma. In ecclesiastical matters, Gaul has always re-
mained even the formal designation. The Galilean Church
answers to the Anglican, the Primate of all the Gauls to the
Primate of all England. And if it be said that the reason
* As in the ballad quoted by Lord Macaulay :
"Both onr Britons are fooled,
Who the laws overruled.
And next Parliament both shall be plaguily schooled."
The " Britons" are tiio Welshmen .JeHreys and Williams.
VII.] THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. 169
is that England is not coextensive with Britain, neither, we
are happy to say, is France even yet coextensive with Gaul.
If Britain includes Scotland as w^ell as England, Gaul
includes Belgium and Switzerland as well as France. The
difference of expression merely sets forth the truth of the
case. France is still really Gaulish ; England is in no sense
British, except in a sense lately introduced for political
convenience.
If we turn to a map of the Roman Empire, we shall find
in the West of Euroj)e the great province of Gaul, whose
extent, as we have hinted in the last paragraph, was far
larger than that of modern France. Its boundaries are the
Ocean, the Pyrenees, the Alps, and the Rhine. It includes
the modern states of France, Switzerland, and Belgium, the
lately plundered Duchy of Savoy, and portions of the King-
dom of the Netherlands and of the German states of Prussia,
Bavaria, and Hessen. And then, as now, the division was
geographical, and not national. As France now forms the
greatest part, but far from the whole, of the ancient
province, so in those days men of Celtic blood occupied the
greater part, but not the whole, of geographical Gaul. The
German dwelled then, as now, on both sides of the Rhine.
The Basque dwelled then, as now, in Aquitaine, though his
tongue has now shrunk up into a much narrower corner of
the land than it then occupied. Now the only claim of
modern France to the Rhine frontier is that the Rhine w^as
the frontier of ancient Gaul. But why should one of the
states into which ancient Gaul is divided thus claim to be
the representative of the whole 1 There is no reason, save
that of their relative strength, why France should, on geo-
graphical principles, annex Belgium or Switzerland, rather
than Belo-ium or Switzerland annex France. If the Parisii
claim to reach to the Rhine as the eastern frontier of Gaul,
the Helvetii may just as well claim to reach to the Atlantic,
as being no less undoubtedly its western frontier. And, on
this sort of reasoning, why stop at the Alps ? why be
satisfied with Savoy and Nizza? What are Lombardy and
170 THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. [Essay
Romagna but fragments feloniously cut off from the great
Gallic whole ? They came as much within the limits of the
Gaul of Cfesar as Paris itself. Csesar spent his winters at
Lucca without leaving his province. He had got some way
into the present Papal territory before he violated the sacred
limits of Roman Italy.* Geographical necessities and
natural boundaries may, in the mouth of a despot, mean
whatever he pleases ; but we really do not see why every
argument in favour of the French claim to the frontier
of the Rhine would not tell just as strongly in favour of a
French claim to the frontier of the Rubico.
The truth is, that, though modern France does represent
ancient Gaul, so far as that the old Gaulish blood is
predominant in the veins of the modern Frenchman, still
the connexion is purely geographical and ethnological ;
modern France is in no political or historical sense the
representative of ancient Gaul. France, in short, in the
modern sense of the word, the monarchy of Paris, has no
continuous existence earlier than the tenth century ; it has
no existence at all earlier than the ninth. Parisian France
has been in Gaul what Wessex has been in England, what
England has been in Britain, what Castile has been in
Spain, what Sweden has been in Scandinavia, what Prussia
has been in Germany and Sardinia in Italy; that is, it is
one state among several, which has risen to greater im-
portance than any of its fellows, and which has gradually
swallowed up many of them into its own substance. The
Kings of Paris gradually united to their domain nearly all
the territories of their nominal vassals, and a vast territory
besides which never owed them so much as a formal
homage. So have the Kings of Castile done in the Spanish
peninsula ; so is the Sardinian monarchy doing before our
* [It IK half a privilege, lialf a penalty, to live in an age when states and
nations are making themselves new boundaries. When 1 wrote this article,
the Bisliop of Rome was a temporal prince reigning on both coasts of the now
liberated peninsula. Piedmont was just beginning to grow into Italy. I leave
every word relating to Italy as it was first written.] [1871.]
VII.] THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. 171
own eyes in Italy. There is of course one wide difference
between the cases : Italy is being annexed to Sardinia by
its own free will, while, in the Spanish peninsula, Portugal
has not the least wish to be again incorporated with Castile
and Aragon, and, in Gaul, the free states of Belgium and
Switzerland have still less longing to be swallowed up by
the despotism of Paris. Otherwise, for Sardinia to annex
any Italian state by fraud or conquest or the mere award of
foreign powers would be as much opposed to justice as the
annexation of Portugal by Spain, or of Belgium by France.
The thing which men have so much difficulty in under-
standing is that modern France is a power which really has
risen in this w^ay. The existence of France in its modern
extent, or nearly so, is assumed as something almost
existing in the eternal fitness of things. The name of
France, a mere fluctuating political expression for a terri-
tory which has grown and which may again diminish,* is
used as if it had a permanent physical meaning, like the
names Spain or Italy, To speak of a time when Lyons and
Marseilles were no parts of France would seem to many
people as great a paradox as to speak of a time when
Rome was no part of the Italian peninsula. People know
in a way, but they do not fully take in, that Rouen,
Poitiers, and Toulouse were once the seats of sovereigns
whose allegiance to the Parisian King was at least as loose
as that of Frederick of Prussia to the Austrian Emperor ;
still less do they take in that Provence, Dauphiny, Franche
Comte, Lorraine, and Elsass were all — some of them till
very lately — as absolutely independent of the crown of
France as they were of the crown of Russia. There was no
reason in the nature of things why, not France, but
Aquitaine, or Toulouse, or Burgundy, might not have risen
to the supremacy in Gaul, any more than there was w^hy
Saxony or Bavaria might not have risen to the place in
Germany now held by Prussia.
* [I had but faint hopes then of seeing Elsass and Lothringen won back
again.] [1871.]
172 THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. [Essay
This sort of geographical and historical confusion is very
much aided by one or two peculiarities in modern diplo-
matic language. When Louis Napoleon Buonaparte first
expressed his wish to become master of Savoy, the word
selected for the occasion was the verb " revendiquer," and
the actual process of annexation was expressed by the noun
"reunion," and the verb "rdunir." At first sight this
seems very much as if a burglar who asked for your money
or your life should be said to " revendiquer " the contents of
your purse, and afterwards to efiect a "reunion" between
them and the contents of his own. Accordinof to all
etymology, '' y-d/vendiquer " must mean to claim back again
something which you have lost, and " reMnion" must mean the
joining together of things which have been separated after
being originally one. Now undoubtedly, in modern French
usage, the particle " re " has lost its natural force, and " re-
union " has come simply to mean " union." But, first of all,
foreigners may indeed get to knoiv, but they can hardly get to
realize ihx^ ; you may know the construing in the dictionary,
but you cannot get rid of the instinctive impression that "re-
vendiquer" and "y'd/union" imply the recovery of something
lost, most probably of something unjustly lost. " La reunion
de Savoie" will always seem to an Englishman to mean that
Savoy was a natural part of France unjustly dissevered
from it. If Savoy remains annexed to France for the next
hundred years, people will begin to look on it as they have
already learned to look upon the " reunion " of Lorraine
in the last century and upon the earlier "reunions" of
Provence and Lyons. And one can hardly doubt that the
twofold meaning of the word, its etymological sense and
its modern Parisian sense, has been purposely made use of
as a })lind by French diplomatists. They tell us that they
use the word merely in its modern Parisian sense ; but they
know very well that many people now, and still more
hereafter, will instinctively interpret it in its natural
meaning. And secondly, it is a most speaking fact that
" reunion " should in any language have come to mean the
Yir.] THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. 173
same as " union." It could only have come to do so in
the language of a country where a long series of fraudulent
or violent " unions " had been ingeniously passed off as
lawful "reunions."
The truth is that, while all nations have a tendency to
annexation, France stands alone in the art of veiling the
ugly features of annexation by various ingenious devices.
Fiance is not more guilty in this matter than Russia,
Prussia, Austria, Turkey, or Spain ; indeed we cannot
venture to profess that our own English hands are alto-
gether clean. But France stands distinguished from them
all by her power of putting a good name on a bad business.
A Russian or Austrian aggression is simply an aggression
of brute force ; it is defended by the aggressor, if he con-
descends to defend it at all, simply on grounds of political
expediency. Austria does not retain Venetia for the good
of the Venetians, or because the hand of nature has marked
out Venetia as a necessary portion of her dominions. She
has simply got it, and means, if she can, to keep what she
has got. But a French aggression is quite another business.
There is always some elaborate reason for it. French
ingenuity never lacks a theory for anything. A country is
annexed in the interests of French versions of physical
geography, of French notions of what has been, or French
notions of what ought to be. France "wars for an idea;"
an idea, it may be, either of past history or of anticipated
futurity. Treaties are broken, legal rights are ti-ampled
under foot, natural justice is cast to the winds ; but there
is a good reason for every step. French cleverness is
alike apt at proving the doctrine that the annexed people
ought to desire annexation, and the fact that they actually
do desire it. In short, while Austria acts as a mere vulgar
and brutal highwayman, France better likes the character
of an elegant, plausible, and ingenious swindler. The
tendency is not new. Lewis the Eleventh had much to
say for himself when he seized on Provence and the Duchy
of Burgundy, and Philip Augustus extemporized a tribunal
174 THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. [Essay
and a jurisprudence in order to put himself into lawful
possession of Normandy and Anjou.
Another means by which a false light is thrown upon
the successive aggressions of France arises out of the
familiar and ahnost universal use of the French language.
We are so much more familiar with French than with any
other tongue, French has become to so great an extent our
medium of communication with other nations, that we have
got into a way of speaking of half the cities of Europe, not
by their own names, but by Fi-ench corruptions. The
custom is quite recent ; in the sixteenth century English-
men spoke of a German, Flemish, or Italian town either by
its real German, Flemish, or Italian name, or else by some
corruption of their own making. Now our habit of calling
all places by French names greatly softens the ugliness of
French aggression. Alsace sounds as if it had been a
French province from all eternity ; the Teutonic Elsass
suggests ideas altogether different. The "reunion" oi Nice
may a generation or two hence sound quite natural, but
that of Nizza would retain its native ugliness to all time.
Cologne, Mayence, and Treves sound as if they positively
invited annexation : so do Li^ge, Malines, and Louvain ;
and it is no wonder that people think that Charles the
Great was a Frenchman when they find his tomb at such
a French- sounding place as Aix-la-Chapelle. But Koln,
Mainz, Trier, and Aachen would, by their very names,
stand up as so many bulwarks against Parisian aggression.
For at least eight hundred years past Frenchmen have
been incapable of spelling rightly any single name in any
foreign language ; but it is not at all unlikely that the in-
capacity may now and then have not been without a sound
political motive.
We will now return to our geographical survey, which
we have perhaps somewhat irregularly interrupted. Some
time back we drew a map of ancient Gaul as a province of
the Roman Empire. In the days of the great Teutonic
migration, when East-Goths poured into Italy, West-Goths
VII.] THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. 175
into Spain, Vandals into Africa, Angles and Saxons into
Britain, the kindred nation of the Franks appeared in
Gaul. Everybody knows that France is so called from the
Franks ; but people are apt to forget that France is not the
only country which is called from them. France and
Fraticonia are etymologically the same word ; the difference
in their modern forms simply comes from a wish to avoid
confusion, a confusion which was avoided in early mediaeval
Latin by speaking oiFrancia occid entalis a,nd Francia orie^ifalls,
Francia Latina and Francia Teiitonica. The difference between
the two is that the Frank of France was a settler in a
strange land, while the Frank of Franconia remained in the
land of his fathers, that the Frank of France ere long
degenerated into something half Roman, half Celtic, while
the Frank of Franconia has ever remained an uncontamin-
ated Teuton. In short, the Franks conquered Gaul, but
without forsaking Germany ; and they conquered different
parts of Gaul in widely different senses and degrees. In
Northern Gaul, to a certain extent, they settled. Orleans,
Paris, Soissons, and Metz became the seats of Frankish
kingdoms ; but in the southern provinces of Aquitaine and
Burgundy they hardly settled at all. There other Teutonic
conquerors had been before them. The Goth reigned at
Toulouse, and the Burgundian had given his name to the
land between the Rhone and the Alps. Both were in a
certain sense conquered. The orthodox zeal of the newly-
converted Merwing formed a good pretext for driving the
Arian out of Gaul. The Gothic monarchy had to retire
beyond the Pyrenees, and the Burgundian kingdom for a
while " ceased to exist." But the conquest was at most a
political one. Southern Gaul was brought into a more or
less complete subjection to the Frankish kings, but it never
really became part of the true Frankish territory. There
was no permanent Frankish population south of the Loire,
and, as the Merowingian dynasty declined, Aquitaine again
became to all intents and purposes an independent state.
Under Pippin we find a Duke of Aquitaine who has to
176 THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. [Essay
be conquered just as much as any prince of Lombardy or
Saxony. In truth, to this day Aquitaine and France proper
have absolutely nothing in common, except the old Roman
element and the results of their political union during the
last four hundred years. The Teutonic element is different
in the two lands, and, in a large district at least, the abori-
ginal element is different also. The Frenchman is formed
by the infusion of the Frank upon the Celt, the Gascon is
formed by the infusion of the Goth upon the Basque. Both
speak tongues derived from that of Rome, but the differ-
ence passes the limits of mere difference of dialect. The
arrogance of modern Paris talks indeed of the " bad
French " of Aquitaine and Provence. In its ignorant pride,
it can see only a patois of itself in a tongue which is as
distinct as that of Spain or Italy, and which was a formed
and polished speech, the speech of the refined courts of
Poitiers and Toulouse, while northern France had still only
an unformed and unwritten jargon.
We thus see that the dominions of the Kinsrs of the
Franks of the house of Clovis in no way answered either to
ancient Gaul or to the modern French Empire. The Mero-
wingian realm consisted of central Germany and Northern
Gaul. Southern Gaul was overrun rather than really
conquered, and northern Italy was overrun also. For a
short time, during the wars of the sixth century, Prankish
conquerors appeared south of the Alps on an errand which,
for aught we know, may afford a full precedent for the
Italian campaigns of Francis the First, or for those of
either Buonaparte. But the real Prankish territory of this
period does not reach southward of the Loire. North of
that river we find the Frank of Neustria, perhaps by this
time in some degree Romanized, and to the east of him
comes the true German Frank of Austrasia. How far the
Franks of Gaul had yielded to Roman influences during
the Merowingian period it is impossible to say ; but every-
thing leads us to believe that before the time of Pippin they
must have begun to differ widely from their uncorrupted
VII.] THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. 177
Austrasian brethren. We shall see presently that, by the
middle of the ninth century, a Roman speech, no longer
Latin, but as yet hardly to be called French, had grown up
in Frankish Gaul. Now the influences of the previous cen-
tury and a half were altogether in a Teutonic direction : a
Romance dialect could hardly have lived on through the
domination of the Austrasian Mayors and Kings, unless it
had been pretty firmly established before the end of the
Merowingian rule.
The Carolingian dynasty dates its formal beginning
from the election of Pippin as King of the Franks in
752. Eut practically it may be carried back to the be-
ginning of the series of Austrasian Mayors in 681. The
first Pippin and the first Charles were really sovereigns
of the Franks, no less than the Pippin and the Charles
who were invested with the royal title. And this transfer
of power to the house of Pippin was nearly equivalent
to a second Teutonic conquest. Whatever the Merwings
and their Gaulish subjects may have been, there is no
doubt as to the true Teutonic character of the whole
dj'nasty of the Karlings. They were raised to power by
the swords of the Teutonic Austrasians ; the cradle of
their race was the Teutonic Heerstall ; their favourite seats
of royalty were the Teutonic Engelheim and Aachen ; as
Mayors of the Palace, as Kings of the Franks, as Roman
Csesars, nay even when they had shrunk up into the
petty kings of the rock of Laon, they clave firmly, down
to their latest dajs, to the dress, the manners, and the
tongue of their Teutonic fathers. Under the " kings of
the second race," Aquitaine and even Neustria were little
more than subject provinces of a German monarch.
The zenith of the Frankish power was attained in the
reign of Charles the Great. Charles, Kiug of the Franks,
King of the Lombards, Patrician of the Romans, was
something far more than a king either of Gaul or of
Germany ; he was the lord of Western Christendom. All
Gaul, all that was then Germany, were his ; Aquitaine,
N
178 THE F/LiXKS AND THE GAULS. [E.say
Saxony, Bavaria, Lombardy, were gathered in as con-
quered provinces ; the Slave, the Avar, the Northman,
became subjects or tributaries; the Commander of the
Faithful himself corresponded on equal and friendly terms
with the mightiest of the followers of the Cross. At last
a dignity fell to the lot of the triumphant Frank to which
no barbarian of the West had as yet ventured to aspire.
Goths and Herulans had long before made and unmade
the Western Caesars ; Gothic chiefs had reigned in Italy
with the royal title ; but the diadem and the sceptre
of Augustus had as yet been worn by no Teutonic brow
and grasped by no Teutonic hand. The Old Rome had
stooped to become a provincial dependency of the New ;
but it had never submitted to the permanent sway of
a barbarian. Theodoric had reigned, a Gothic king indeed
in fact, but an Imperial lieutenant in theory ; Alboin and
Liudprand had appeared as open enemies, but they had
never passed the gates of the Eternal City ; Charles him-
self, his father, and his grandfather, had exercised the full
Imperial power under humbler names ; but the Patrician
was only the republican magistrate of the Roman com-
monwealth or the vicegerent of the Eastern Csesar. By
that Csesar's regnal years charters still were dated, and
his image and superscription were still impressed on a
coinage from which no tax or tribute ever reached him.
At last the moment came when the Old Rome was again
to assert her coequality with her younger sister, and to
affirm that she had never forfeited her right to nominate
one at least of the masters of the world. Rome once more
chose her own Ciesar, but that Cfesar was not of Roman
or Italian blood : the golden crown at last rested on the
open brow of the lordly German, and the Pontiff and
People of Rome proclaimed the Imperial style of " Charles
Augustus, crowned by God, the great and pacific Emperor
of the Romans." Not that the Roman Augustus gained
thereby an inch or particle of territory or power which
had not already belonged to the simple Frankish king.
VIL] THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. 179
But in the eyes of a large portion of his subjects his
rule was thereby at once changed from a dominion of
force into a dominion of law ; the elected and consecrated
Emperor became, in the eyes of all southern Europe, a
different being from the mere barbarian conqueror ; we
might almost say that the world recognized the Teuton
as its chosen and natural ruler, when for the first time
a man of Teutonic blood was raised to the highest pin-
nacle of earthly greatness. It shows the true greatness of
Charles's mind that his head was not in the least turned
by a splendour which might have dazzled the imagination
of any mortal. Crowned in the Eternal City by the
common father of Christendom, he still remained, Im-
perator and Augustus as he was^ the same simple hearty
German as of old. Even Alexander, on the throne of
the Great King, could not wholly endure the trial ; he
went far to exchange the spirit of the chosen King of
Macedon and chief of Greece for the arbitrary rule of a
Persian despot. Eut Charles was in no way spoiled or
changed by the almost superhuman glory from which he
seems himself to have shrunk. He still retained his
German dress, his German speech, his German habits ;
nor did he ever transfer the pomp, the slavery, the
almost idolatrous incense of the court of his Byzantine
colleague into the free Teutonic air of Aachen and of
Engelheim.
Those were indeed days of glory for the ancient Frank ;
but it is a glory in which the modern Frenchman can
claim no share. Celtic, Parisian, France had as yet no
being. Its language was as yet the unformed patois of a
conquered province. Paris was a provincial town which
the lord of Rome and Aachen once visited in the course
of a long progress amongst a string of its lowly fellows.
Gaul, at least its Celtic portions, was seldom honoured
by the presence of its German master, and it added but
little to the strength of his German armies. The native
speech of Charles was the old Teutonic ; Latin, the literary
N 3
180 THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. [Essay
tongue of the whole West, and still the native speech of
many provinces, he spoke fluently as an acquired lan-
guage ; Greek, the other universal and Imperial tongue,
he understood when spoken, but could not himself speak
it with ease. French he could neither sp3ak nor under-
stand ; for, alas, as yet no French language could be said
to exist ; a King of the Franks was about as likely to
express himself in the dialect of a Neustrian Celt as an
Emperor of the French is now to indite his pamphlets
in Basque, Walloon, or Bas-Breton. The valley of the
Loire, the chosen home of the Valois, the valley of the
Seine, the chosen home of the Bourbon, had little charms
for the Austrasian Frank, whose heart, amid Roman pomps
and Aquitanian and Hunnish victories ever yearned for
the banks of his own Teutonic Rhine. Under Charles
that elder Francia which was the native land of the Frank
was at the summit of its greatness ; but there was no
period, before oi- after, at which that younger Francia of
which Paris is the centre was so utterly insignificant in
the eyes of men.
Another of the many mistakes with which this period
of history is overshadowed is the common belief that the
long reign of Charles, his wars, his treaties, his legislation,
left hardly any lasting fruit behind them. We are too
apt to suppose that his great work was almost imme-
diately undone amidst the dissensions of his grandsons.
This again arises from looking at him and his Empire
from a French instead of a German point of view. Looked
at from Aquitaine or Neustria, the work of Charles the
Great was altogether ephemeral ; but it bears quite another
hue if we once step on the other side of the Rhine. Charles
found a large part of Germany a mere wilderness of
heathendom ; the Christian Frank found the bitterest and
most stubborn enemy of his creed and empire in the
kindred Saxon. Charles converted Saxony by the sword ;
but, however the work was done, it was done effectually.
He welded Saxony and the Teutonic Francia together into
VIL] THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. 181
that great German kingdom which so long held the first
rank in Europe, and which, strange as it seems to us,
was really, when we compare it with Gaul, Italy, or
Spain, the most united of Western realms. He opened
a path in which a long line of illustrious German kings
and Emperors, from Arnulf to Frederick the Second,
worked with no small success after him. That he be-
queathed to them a claim to his Imperial style, and a
vague pretension to his Imperial power, was an inheritance
of but doubtful advantage. The Kingdom of Germany
was in truth crushed and broken to pieces beneath the
weight of the Holy Roman Empire ; but of the united
and glorious Germany of Henry the Fowler and Otto
the Great, of Henry the Frank and of Frederick the
Swabian, Charles the Great was the father and the
founder. If Gaul and Italy fell awayj the llegnum Teu-
tonicum survived for four hundred years, and it still sur-
vives in the hearts of a people longing to be one as they
were beneath his sceptre.* Only remember what the
Francia and the Franci of Charles really were, and the
dismemberment of the Carolingian Empire amounts to
little more than the lopping-ofF of some outlying foreign
provinces from the body of the great Teutonic realm.
We have now reached the ninth century. Charles was
crowned at Rome in the last year of the eighth century,
and fourteen years later he was borne to his Imperial
tomb at Aachen. He had founded the German kingrdom
and won the Roman diadem for its kings. But before
the new century had passed, another nation, another lan-
guage, was beginning to appear. During the century
which followed the death of Charles, we get our first
glimpses of the existence of modern, Celtic, Parisian,
France. Eefore the close of the second century from his
* [The Ee(jnam Teutonicuiii has now come to life again, but its chief bears
the Imperial title. Still the inaccuracy may be forgiven. Now that dukes
and electors have grown into kings, it is hard to see what a Basileus, a King
of Kings, could be called except Emperor.] [1871.]
182 THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. [Essay
coronation, modern, Celtic, Parisian, France, the kingdom
of Odo and Hugh Capet, is fully established, high in rank,
but as yet small in power, among the recognized divisions
of Western Christendom.
The Western or Frankish Empire, as it stood under
Charles the Great, was undoubtedly far too vast, and in-
cluded nations far too incongruous, to remain permanently
united under a single head. Charles himself, it is evident,
perceived this. The division of a kingdom among the sons
of a deceased king was indeed nothing new ; it was a device
which had been constantly tried in Merowingian Gaul.
But we cannot believe that Charles would have given the
sanction of his master genius to such a plan, had it not
been really adapted to the circumstances of the time. His
schemes were very elaborate. The mode of succession
chalked out by him included a mixture of popular elec-
tion and hereditary right, and all the minor kings were to
be united in a sort of federal bond by the recognition of a
common superior in the Emperor. Whether such a system
could have worked may be doubted. It had worked under
himself ; he had made his sons kings in Italy and Aquitaine
without any prejudice to his own rights as supreme Em-
peror. But submission to a father, and that father Charles
the Great, was quite another thing from submission to a
brother, an uncle, or, as it might soon be, a distant cousin.
Charles's own scheme of division came to nothing, because
of the death of two out of his three sons. Lewis the Pious
succeeded him in the possession of the whole Empire, with
only one subordinate king in the person of the unfortunate
Bernhard of Italy. But it is well worth while to mark the
geographical limits of the several kingdoms as traced out
by the hand of Charles himself. Most likely he had no
thouff-ht of forminjj national kingdoms at all.* There was
still to be one kingdom of the Franks, though it was divided
* This seems to be shown by the titles wliich Eginhard gives to tlie subordi-
nate kings. Lewis, fur instance, is not "rex Aquitanise," or "rex Aquitano-
rurn," but merely " rex super Aquitaniam."
VI r.] THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. 183
among several kings ; just as in the early days of the divi-
sion of the Roman Empire, the Empire was still held to be
one, though its administration was portioned out between
two or more Imperial colleagues. Certainly the three
kingdoms traced out for Charles, Pippin, and Lewis co-
incide with no national divisions either of earlier or of
later times. Roughly speaking, Charles seems to have
meant to keep the old Frankish kingdom for his eldest
son Charles, and to divide his conquests between Pippin
and Lewis. But, besides that the frontier is not very ac-
curately followed, one most important exception is to be
made. The wholly new acquisitions of Italy and the Spanish
March, together with Aquitaine and Bavaria, which had
been reduced from nominal vassalage to real obedience,
wt-re divided between the two younger sons. Charles took
the old Francia ; but he also, by the necessity of the case,
took the great conquest of Saxony. Of the three divisions,
Aquitaine, the kingdom of Lewis, came nearest to being a
national kingdom. Southern Gaul and the Spanish March
answer pretty nearly to what were afterwards the countries
of the Lingua d'Oc. But the Italian kingdom, cut short at
one end by the Byzantine province, was lengthened at the
other by the addition of all Germany south of the Danube.
Did the theory of " natural boundaries " flash across the
mind of the great Charles when he made that great river a
political limit ? Certainly no such idea presented itself to
him with reg^ard to the Rhine. Not the slio^htest reofard
was paid either to the past boundaries of Roman Gaul or
to the future boundaries of modern France. Aquitaine was
to have something like a national sovereign ; but no such
boon was conferred on Neustria. The German king was
to reign, as of old, on both sides of the German river. The
kingdom of the younger Charles was to consist of what is
now Northern France and Northern Germany ; while what
is now Southern France formed the great bulk of the king-
dom of Lewis. Modern, Parisian, France was so far from
answerinfj to the Francia of Charles the Great, that it did
184 THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. [Essay
not even occur to him as a convenient division when he
was portioning out the vast monarchy of which it formed a
part.
The division made by Charles had, as we said, no lasting
effect. It is valuable only as showing what were the ideas
of a convenient partition entertained in the year 806 by the
greatest of living men. Charles was succeeded by Lewis.
His reign was a mere series of ever-fluctuating partitions
of the Empire among his sons. Sir Francis Palgrave, in the
first volume of his History of England and Normandy, has
taken the trouble to reckon up no less than ten successive
schemes of division. In tlie last of these we beoin to dis-
cern, for the first time, something like the modern kinofdom
of France. Then, in 839, Northern and Southern Gaul,
Neustria and Aquitaine, were for the first time united as
the kingdom of Charles the Bald. The kingdom thus
formed was far smaller than modern France, but it lay
almost wholly within it. It took in Flanders at the one
end and the Spanish March at the other ; but both of these
provinces remained French, in a vague sense, far down into
the middle ages. The suzerainty over the county of Bar-
celona was only given up by Saint Lewis, and that over the
county of Flanders lingered on to be one of the main sub-
jects of dispute between Francis the First and Charles the
Fifth. The kingdom of Charles the Bald was undoubtedly
the first germ of modern France. It was, if we except the
Flemings, the Bretons, and the Basques at its several corners,
a kingdom wholly of the Roman speech. This fact comes
prominently forth in the famous oath of Strassburg, pre-
served by Nithard.* That precious document has been
commented upon over and over again as a matter of philo-
logy ; it is no less valuable as a matter of history. It shows
that in 841 the distinctions of race and language were be-
ginning to make themselves felt. The Austrasian soldiers
of King Lewis swear in the Old-German tongue, of which
the oath is an early monument ; but of the language in
* Nith.ird, iii. 6, ap. Pertz, ii. 666.
VII.] THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. 185
which the oath is taken by the Neustrian soldiers of King
Charles "^ the oath itself is, as far as our knowledge goes,
absolutely the oldest monument. In the lingua Iio)iiana, as
Nithard calls it, we see for the first time a tongue essen-
tially of Roman origin, and yet a tongue which has departed
too far from the Roman model to be any longer called Latin.
It has ceased to be Latin, but we cannot yet call it French,
even Old-French. How far it is the mother of French, and
how far rather the mother of Provencal, we must leave those
to decide whose special business lies with the history of
language. For our purpose it is enough that it reveals to
us the existence of a Gaul speakmg neither Celtic, nor
Teutonic, nor Latin, but Romance : that iS; it shows that
one most important step had been taken towards the crea-
tion of modern France. As yet the new speech was known
only as lingua Romana ; in the course of the next century
it became nationalized as lingua Gallica.^ One might be
curious to know how far men had begun really to feel that
a new language had been formed ; but we can say nothing,
except what we may infer fiom the fact that Count Nithard,
a man of high rank and high ability, and, by an illegitimate
female descent, the actual grandson of the great Charles,
was struck by the phenomenon of the diversity of speech,
and thought the formula worth preserving in the very
words of the vulsjar tongue. This is in itself remarkable
enough, and at all events it proves the observant and in-
quiring spirit of Nithard himself. We wish that he had
had more followers. There is nothing which we more
commonly lack in the Latin chroniclers of the middle ages
than notices of the tongue of the people, and even of the
tongue of the actors in the story.
* [It is worth notice that Charles the Bald, as well as his soldiers, could
speak the "lingua Romara" or Romance tongue. See the Capitularies put
forth by the kings Lewis, Charles, and Lothar at Coblenz in 860. Lewis
speaks "liiii.'ua Theothisca," and Charles "lingua Romana" (Pertz, Leges, i.
472). Yet Charles, in his own Capitularies, speaks of "lingua Tiieodisc;ie "
as the language of the country, exactly as Lewis does (i. 4S2, 497).] [1871.]
f See Richer, i. 20, iii. 85, iv. ico, ap. Pertz, vol. v.
isr, THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. [Essay
The wars between the sons of the Emperor Lewis, and
the final settlement at Verdun in 843, did but confirm the
existence of the new kingdom. The connexion between
the two parts of ancient Francia was now severed for ever ;
Neustria and Austrasia were never, except during the
ephemeral Empire of Charles the Fat, again united under
a single ruler. On the other hand, a connexion was formed
between Neuslria and Aquitaine, a connexion which was of
little moment, but which was destined to bear at the time
no small fruit in future ages. Ey the treaty of Verdun the
Empire was divided into three parts. Charles took, as we
have seen, the purely Romance lands of Neustria and Aqui-
taine ; Lewis took the pureJy German lands far to the east.
Lothar, their eldest brother, the Roman Cajsar, of course
took Frankish Italy; but he took also that long strip of
debateable land from the Mediterranean to the Ocean,
which took his name, and part of which still keeps it.
Lofliariw/ia, Lot/iringen, Lorraine^ lay between the Germanic
realm of Lewis and the Romance realm of Charles, taking
in doubtless then, as now, lands both of Romance and of
Germanic speech. But it was a kingdom which had no
principle of unity of any kind ; no kind of tie of language,
of history, or of " natural boundaries," united Provence and
Holland and the intermediate countries. The kingdom,
therefore, had no lasting being. Sometimes we find it cut
up into several separate kingdoms ; sometimes, as in our
own day, it was divided between the two more compact
realms on each side of it. Those two realms remained,
grew, and flourished, while Lotharingia fell to pieces.
Those realms need names from the beginning, and it is
hard to avoid giving them, though it is still too soon to do
so, the familiar names of Germany and France.
Thus we get our first glimpse of France in the modern
sense, a creation of the ninth century, not of the fifth. As
Sir Francis Palgrave says,* "this division created terri-
torial France." Modern France was thus created, but it
* History of En-land and Normandy, i. 345.
VII.] THE FRANKS ASD THE GAULS. 187
was created purely by accident. Charles was king over
Neustria ; and the Emperor Lewis, wishing to enlarge the
appanage of his favourite son, added the kingdom of
Aquitaine, which fell vacant by the death of his brother
Pippin. Neustria and Aquitaine together made France,
such a France as lasted till the fourteenth century; a
France without Alpine slopes or frontiers of the Rhine ; a
France which, instead of the Rhine, barely reached to the
Rhone, and which still had to " reunite," not only Savoy
and Nizza, but Provence, Dauphiny, the county of Eur-
gundy, Lyons, Presse, Bugey, Elsass, and Lothringen, And
even within the limits of the new kingdom, the position of
Aquitaine shows how utterly accidental and artificial the
creation was. Aquitaine, the kingdom of Pippin, had no
love for the sway of Charles of Neustria ; it was constantly
revolting on behalf of Pippin's heirs, as the representatives
of its national independence. Aquitaine was joined to
Neustria by the command of Lewis the Pious ; but no
effectual union took place for ages ; all that the command
of the pious Emperor brought about was to invest the
Neustrian king with vague and nearly nominal rights,
which did not fully become realities for six hundred years.
Aquitaine was to the Kings of the French pretty much
what Romagna was to the Popes. Constantino or Pippin
or Charles or Matilda or Rudolf o-ave Romacrna to the Holv
See ; but the sovereignty of the Holy See was of the most
unpractical kind till its rights were at last enforced by
the sword of Cpesar Borgia. So it was with Aquitaine :
nominally part of the kingdom of Charles the Bald, it soon
split into two great principalities, differing in nothing but
name from sovereign kingdoms. The Duke of Aquitaine
and the Count of Toulouse came to rank among the princes
of Europe. They might be vassals of the King of France,
but their vassalage went no further than placing the royal
name in the dates of their charters. During the busy
French and Norman history of the tenth century, the
French chroniclers tell us much about Germany and some-
188 THE FBAKKS AND THE GAULS. [Essay
thing about England, but about Southern Gaul we only
hear just enough to assure us that it had not vanished from
the face of creation. The Loire seems in those days to have
been the truest natural boundary ; between Northern and
Southern Gaul we find few relations either of peace or war,
but something very like utter mutual oblivion. As time
rolled on,the Aquitanian duchy was, in the twelfth century,
united to the crown of England ; while the eastern portion
of Old Aquitaine, Languedoc, or the county of Toulouse,
became, in the next age, one of the first and greatest acqui-
sitions of the kings of Paris. Few portions of history are
less understood than that of the noble duchy which so long
formed one of the fairest possessions of our own kings.
Few Englishmen understand the difference between the
English tenure of Bordeaux and the English tenure of
Calais. When the Black Prince kept his court at Bordeaux
as Prince of Aquitaine, most readers look upon him as an
English conqueror, just like Henry the Fifth at Paris.
Bordeaux is marked in the modern map as part of France ;
therefore people do not understand that, till its loss in the
fifteenth century, the kings of France had never held it at
all, except during the momentary and fraudulent occupation
of Aquitaine by Philip the Fair. When Talbot fell before
Chastillon, he fell in the cause, not of the bondage, but of
the independence of the Pyrenrean duchy, in the same
cause which Hunholt and Lupus fought against Charles the
Great, and Pippin and Sancho against Charles the Bald.
In short, Lewis the Pious might grant Aquitaine in
the ninth century to Charles the Bald, but it was only
Charles the Seventh, in the fifteenth century, who first
really obtained possession of the gift.
The Frank] sh Empire, as we have seen, was divided by
the treaty of Verdun into three kingdoms : the Eastern and
Western, which grew severally into modern Germany and
France, and the central realm of Italy and Lotharingia,
which soon fell asunder. The next forty years form little
but a history of unions and partitions. Each father tried
TIL] THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. 189
to divide his dominions amongst his sons ; each brother or
uncle did his best to seize to himself the inheritance of his
brothers and nephews. Of all the princes of that age, the
Emperor Lewis the Second, reigning in Italy as a I'eal
Roman Ca-sar, and fighting in the cause of Christendom
against the Saracen, is the only one who can claim any
portion of our esteem. Even he was not altogether free
from the general vice ; but he has at least merits to set
against it which we do not find in the case of his fellows.
The whole period is one of utter confusion and division.
At last, in 885, nearly the whole of the Carolingian Empire
was reunited in the person of Charles the Fat. He had
gradually gathered on his brow the Imperial crown of
Rome and the royal crowns of Germany, Italy, and the
Western Kingdom. Still to this reunion one important
exception must be made. One state, part of the Lotharingia
of forty years earlier, had set the example of entire revolt
from the blood of the great Charles. In 879 Count Boso
was elected and crowned king over a kingdom which, as
Sir Francis Palgrave says, has almost vanished from history,
but whose memorj^ it is just now highly desirable to recall.
Boso made the beginnings of the short-lived kingdom of
Burgundy or Aries, a kingdom l^'ing between France and
Italy, and which may be roughly described as the country
between the Rhone and the Alps. In modern geographical
language, it includes Provence, Orange, the Venaissin,
Dauphiny, Lyons, Eresse, Bugey, the County of Burgundy,
(or Tranche Comie), with Savoy, Nizza, and a large part of
Switzerland. On the theory of natural boundaries, the
Kingdom of Burgundy seems quite as well marked out as
the Kingdom of France. The Rhone and the Saone to the
west, the Alps to the east, the Mediterranean to the south,
make as good lines of demarcation as one commonly meets
with in the political map. Nearly all its inhabitants were
of the Romance speech — all except a small German terri-
tory in what long afterwards became Switzerland. As far
as we can see, Burgundy had much more right to ask
190 THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. [Essay
to extend herself to the Ocean by swallowing up the kindred
province of Aquitaine than Parisian France had to ask to
extend itself to the Alps by swallowing up the far more
foreign Kingdom of Burgundy.
In 887 Charles the Fat was deposed by common consent
of his various realms, which were from henceforth separated
with a far more thorough and lasting separation than before.
The Carolingian Empire vanishes ; even the rank of Em-
peror sinks into a kind of abej'ance. Emperors indeed were
crowned during the first half of the ninth century ; but
there was no dynasty which permanently united Imperial
power to Imperial pretensions till, in 962, Otto the Great
finally annexed the Roman Empire and the Italian king-
dom to his own Teutonic crown. The division of 888 was
really the beginning of the modern states and the modern
divisions of Europe. The Carolingian Empire was broken
up into four separate kingdoms : the Western Kingdom,
answering roughly to France, the Eastern Kingdom or
Germany, and those of Italy and Burgundy. Of these, the
three first remain as the greatest nations of the continent :
Burgundy, by that name, has vanished ; but its place as an
European pow^er is filled, far more worthily than by any
king or Csesar, by the noble Confederation of Switzer-
land.
Of the four kingdoms thus formed, three at once cast
away their allegiance to the Carolingian blood. Germany
elected Arnulf, a bastard of the Imperial house ; but, after
the death of his son Lewis, the Teutonic sceptre passed
altogether away from the male line of Pippin and Charles.
Boso of Burgundy was connected with that race only by
marriage. Italy chose shifting kings and Emperors of her
own. The Western Kingdom chose the patriarch of that
long line which was, with tv^^o periods of intermission, to
rule her down to our own day, which still reigns over
Castile and Aragon,* and which we have seen happily
* [In 1S60 I did not foresee an Italian — in S6o lie would have been a
Burgundian — King of Spain.] [1S71.]
VII.] THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. 191
expelled from the minor thrones of Parma and of both the
Sicilies.
The division of 843 first introduced us to a Romance —
that is, really a Celtic — Franna, as distinguished from the
elder Teutonic Francia of the old Frankish kings. The
division of 888 first introduces us to a Capetian and a
Parisian Francia. Since the death of the great Charles, the
city on the Seine, the old home of Julian, had been
gradually rising in consequence. It plays an important
part during the reign of his son Lewis the Pious. Charac-
teristically enough, Paris first appears in our history as
the scene of a conspiracy against her Teutonic master.
There it was that, in 830, the rebels gathered who seized
and imprisoned, and at last deposed, the pious Emperor.
Later in the ninth century Paris won a more honourable
renown ; she became the bulwark of Gaul against the
inroads of the Northmen. The pirates soon found out the
importance of the position of the city in any attack or
defence of Gaul from her northern side. Through her
great deeds and sufferings in this warfare, Paris grew into
a centre, a capital, first a ducal and then a royal city.
The great siege of Paris in 885 and 886, and its gallant
defence by Count Eudes or Odo, fixed the destiny of the
city as the future capital of the land. On the deposition
of Charles the Fat, Count Odo was, after some ineffectual
attempts on behalf of other candidates, elected and con-
secrated to what we are now strongly tempted to speak
of as the Kingdom of France.
Yet the notion of a great Frankish realm, held in a sort
of co-parcenary, long survived the day when the descend-
ants of Charles ceased to be its masters. Germany, the old
Frankish land, long clave to the Frankish name. One of
her greatest Imperial dynasties was of Frankish blood.
Nor did their Saxon predecessors and their Swabian suc-
cessors reject the title. As late as the reign of Frederick
Barbarossa, the name of Frank was still used, and used
too with an aii" of triumph, as equivalent to the name of
192 THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. [Essay
German."^ The kings and kingdoms of this age had indeed
no fixed titles, because all were still looked on as mere
portions of the great Frankish realm. Another step has
now been taken towards the creation of modern France ;
but the older state of things has not yet wholly passed
away. Germany has no definite name ; for a long time
it is Francia Orieufalls, F^rancia Teutonlca ; then it becomes
Hegnnm Teuionlcum , Hegnvvd TeutonicoTiim.'\ But it is equally
clear that, within the limits of that Western or Latin
France, Francia and F\ancns were fast getting their modern
meanings of France and Frenchman, as distinguished from
Frank or German ; % they were, in fact, names of honour
to which each of the divided nations clave as specially its
own. Even so early as the reign of Lewis the Pious, one
writer distinguished Franci and Germani^^ meaning by the
former the people of the Western Kingdom. Gradually the
name was, in the usage of Gaul and of Europe, thoroughly
fixed in this sense. The Merwings, the Karlings, the Capets,
all alike called \\\Q\:£iS,^y%^ Fleges Francorum ; Fraiicns having
of course totally changed its meaning in the meanwhile.
In the Eastern Kingdom, on the other hand, the German
sovereign, when he had grown into a Roman Emperor,
gradually dropped his style as Frankish king. It is this
continuity of name and title which gives to modern,
"Western," "Latin," France a false appearance of being
* Otto of Pi'eisiiigen, passim. See especially the speech of Frederick, ii. 22
(Muratori, vi. 722).
f In the bull of deiiosition of Henry IV., Hildebrand uses the curious form
" totius re^^'ni Theiitonicorum et Italia? guberuacuLi contradico" (Bruno de
Bel. Sax. cap. 70, ap. Pertz, vii. ,^54). Italy had a local name; Germany had
none. So Henry just before talks of " regnuni Italite," but we do not remem-
ber '•'regiium Germanise" or "Alemania'" in that age.
X [The use of the word Francia in writers of the ninth century is very
vague. Sometimes it seems to be used of the whole lle<jnuni Occidentale.
This is an intermediate sense between its widest and its narrowest meaning,
and a sense roughly answering to that to which it has come back in modern
times. But within the Western kingdom it soon became fixed to the Parisian
duchy with its dukes and kings, and in tlie East to Francia Orkntalis or
Teulunicn.'] [1S71.]
§ N'ita Hludowici Imp. cap. 45, ap. Pertz, ii. 633.
VIT.] THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. 193
a continuation or representative of the old Frankish king-
dom. But no one who really understands the history of
the time can doubt for a moment that, among the four
kingdoms which arose out of the ruins of the Carolingian
Empire, it was "Eastern i^'awcw," the "Teutonic Kingdom,"
which might most truly claim, in extent of territory, in
retention of language, in possession of the old seats of
royalty, to be the true representative of the Francia of
Charles the Great.
Odo of Paris then, in 888, became Bex FrancorMii in a
sense which, modern as the words sound, cannot be so
well translated as by the familiar title of " King of the
French." We have at last France before us, with Paris
for her capital and the lord of Paris for her king. But
neither the Carolinojian race nor the Carolinjjian interest
was as yet extinct in the Western Francia. The next
century is a history of a continued struggle in various
forms between the German and what we may now call
the French blood, between the Carolingian and the Cape-
tian house, between Paris and Laon, between the Duke
of the French, the lord of Paris, and the lord of laon,
still the West-Frankish king. Odo was elected as the
hero of the siege of Paris, the true champion of Gaul and
of Christendom. But he soon found a rival in the in-
capable Charles the Simple, whose only claim was the
doubtful belief that the blood of his great namesake flowed
in his veins. Charles was again overthrown by Duke
Robert, the brother of King Odo, who himself afterwards
reigned as the second of the Parisian kings. Charles in
his turn overthi-ew Ilobert, who died in battle at Soissons
in 923. The heir of the Capetian house was Hugh, sur-
named the Great. His career was a strange one : ho
refused the offered crown, and preferred the character of
a king-maker to that of a king. One can hardly help
thinking that he had some superstitious dread of a title
which had brought little but sorrow to his father and
uncle ; for he certainly bore himself as a king in every-
194 THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. [Essay
thinsf but name. He bore what to us sounds the strange
title of I)nx Franconiw ; and, as Duke of the French, he
was a far more powerful potentate than the King of the
French who was his nominal sovereign. On the death
of Robert, he declined the royal dignity for himself, and
passed it on to his brother-in-law, Rudolf or Raoul, Duke
of French Burgundy. He next, like our own king-maker
of a later day, passed it on to Lewis the son of Charles.
The Carolingian king once more reigned on the rock of
Laon, but he found anything but a peaceful subject in the
mighty Duke of Paris. The Duke of the French allowed
himself full power of revolt, of disobeying, attacking, ex-
pelling, imprisoning the King of the French, — anything, in
short, but avowedly reigning in his stead. King Lewis
was succeeded by his son Lothar, and Duke Hugh the
Great by his son Hugh Capet. The younger Hugh how-
ever, though in no imprudent hurry to obtain a crown, had
not his father's rooted objection to receive one. He re-
mained Duke of the French during the long reign of Lothar
and the short reign of his son Lewis ; at last, in 987, on
the death of Lewis, Hugh brought about his own election.
The struggle went on for a while in the person of Charles
of Lotharingia, the Carolingian pretender ; but Hugh kept
his crown and handed it on to his descendants. He
founded, in short, the most enduring of all dynasties.
No other royal patriarch has been succeeded by more
that eight centuries of direct male descendants, by three
centuries and a half of unbroken succession from father
to son. Since 987 no King of France of any other line
has felt the touch of the consecrating oil of Rheims.
Hugh's own city has indeed beheld the coronation of one
English king and of one Corsican tyrant. Both alike
yielded to the claims of the returning Capetian. Who
can tell whether a race endowed with such an unparalleled
gift of permanency may not again return to the city which
their forefathers first raised to greatness ?
The immediate results of Hugh's elevation were not veiy
VII.] THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. 195
marked. The Duke of the French became the King of
the French, and the same prince reigned at Paris and at
Laon. But in the greater part of Gaul the change from
the Carolingian to the Capetian line was hardly felt. To
Hugh's own subjects it made little practical difference
whether their prince were called Duke or King. Beyond
the Loire men were utterly heedless who might reign
either at Paris or at Laon. But slight as may have been
the immediate change, the event of 987 was a real revolu-
tion : it was the completion of a change which had been
preparing for a century and a half, and it was the true
beginning of a new period. The modern kingdom of
France dates its definite existence from the election of
Hugh ; the partitions of 843 and 888 showed in what way
the stream of events was running, but the change of 987
was the full establishment of the thing itself. There was
now at last, what till quite lately there has been ever
since, a French king reigning at Paris. When we remember
all that Paris has been since, how completely it has become,
not merely the centre of France, but France itself, it is
clear that the mere change of the royal city was alone an
event of the highest importance. The rock of Laon could
never have won the same position as the island-city of the
Seine. It might have remained a royal fortress ; it could
never have become a national capital. The Karlings
remained German to the last ; the kings of Laon were
Franks in the old sense, the kings of Paris were French-
men in the new. The native tongue of King Lewis was
Teutonic ; the native tono;ue of king Hugh was Romance.
France now breaks off all traces of her old connexion with
Germany. Hitherto the " King beyond the Rhine " has
been, in friendship or in enmity, an important personage in
the politics of Latin Francia ; even in the middle of the
tenth century we find Otto of Saxony and Lewis of Laon
still acting like royal colleagues in the administration of
one Frankish realm. From the election of Hugh the
German Csesar becomes an utter stranger to the Capetian
o 2
196 THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. [Essay
realm. Lotharingia too becomes definitely German. As
long as kings of the Carolingian house still reigned in
Western Fraucia, Lotharingia was a border-land of France
and Germany, the seat of loyalty to the Carolingian house,
but preferring a German to a mere Frenchman. But after
the Capetian revolution it becomes an undoubted fief of
the Teutonic kingdom. Its Carolingian loyalty remained
untouched ; it still might boast of having a descendant of
Charles and Pippin for its immediate ruler ; but that ruler
was no longer a King of the Western Fraucia or a pretender
to its crown, but a Duke holding his states in fee of the
Saxon Emperor.
Thus the change of dynasty in 987 marks the final
establishment of France in the modern sense. The geo-
graphical name was still, for the most part, confined to
the Parisian Duchy, but the liefinum Francorum, in its
modern sense, had now come into being. Its boundaries,
as they stood under the early Parisian kings, differed
hardly at all from the West-Frankish boundaries as settled
in 843. But we should bear carefully in mind how utterly
nominal the royal authority was over the greater part of
the territory comprised within those limits. It should be
thoroughly understood, first, that the kingdom as it then
stood was very much smaller than modern France ; secondly,
that, even within the kingdom, the King was merely the
head of a body of sovereign princes, some of whom were
at least as powerful as himself. The subsequent history of
France is the history of two processes : first, the conversion
of a nominal feudal superiority into a direct sovereignty
over the whole kingdom ; secondly, the annexation of
divers states which formed no part of the kingdom at all.
The two processes are not accurately distinguished in
popular imagination, and the Parisian phrase of "rc^union"
greatly tends to confound them. To talk of the "reunion"
of Normandy or French Burgundy is not absolute non-
sense, because Normandy and French Burgundy were, at
all events by a fiction of feudal law, grants proceeding
VII.] THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. 197
from the crown of France, which were afterwards re-
incorporated with the royal domain from which they had
been severed. But a " reunion " of Provence, Lorraine, or
Savoy, is absolute nonsense, because those provinces never
formed any part of the Capetian monarchy. These two pro-
cesses, of internal consolidation and of external ajjijression,
have now been going on side by side for six hundred
years. It will best suit our purpose to give a brief sketch
of the results of each separately.
The Kingdom of France, as it stood in 987, contained
six great principalities besides the royal domain, namely,
those aftei-wards called the six Lay Peerages — Flanders,
Normandy, Aquitaine, Toulouse, Burgundy, and Cham-
pagne. The titles of Toulouse and Champagne may be
a little later, but the states themselves already existed.
Besides these, there were a crowd of smaller potentates,
holding either of the crown or of these great vassals. With
the exception of the Spanish March and of part of Flanders,
all these states have long been fully incorporated with the
French monarchy. But we must remember that, under
the earlier French kings, the connexion of most of these
provinces with their nominal suzerain was even looser
than the connexion of the German princes after the peace
of Westfalia with the Viennese Emperors. A great French
duke was as independent within his own dominions as
an Elector of Saxony or Bavaria, and there were no common
institutions, no Diet or assembly of any kind, to bring
him into fellowship either with his liege lord or with
his fellow- vassals. Aquitaine and Toulouse, as we have
already said, seem almost to have forgotten that there
was any King of the French at all, or at all events that
they had anything to do with him. They did not often
even pay him the compliment of waging war upon him,
a mode of recognition of his existence which was constantly
indulged in by their brethren of Normandy and Flanders.
Normandy was the possession of Scandinavian invaders,
whom a residence in Gaul was fast transforming into
198 THE FEAi\KS AND THE GAULS. [Essay
Frenchmen of a grander type. Charles the Simple granted
the province to Hrolt' Ganger, the Rou or Rollo of French
and Latin writers, and along with it he granted a feudal
superiority over the turbulent Celts of Britanny. The
Norman dukes speedily changed into French princes, and
played a most important part in French history. At last
one of their number won the crown of England, and nearly
a century later a count of Anjou inherited England and
Normandy from his mother, and received Aquitaine and
Poitou as the dowry of his wife. A perfectly novel power
was thus formed in France. We must not transfer to the
twelfth century the ideas of two or three centuries later,
and look upon Henry the Second as an English king
reigning in France. Henry was a French feudatory, who
had contrived to unite in his own hands an accumulation
of French fiefs, which rendered him, even on French
ground, far stronger than his nominal suzerain. The pos-
session of Enjjland gave him a hio;her title than that of
Duke of Normandy and Aquitaine ; its valiant inhabitants
of both races added to his military strength. But England
was not his home ; it was not the Englishman who reigned
over Anjou, but the Angevin who reigned over England.
Henry and Richard held greater territories in France than
those of the King and the other feudatories put together.
They held the mouths of all the great rivers, and possessed
the great cities of Rouen, Tours, Poitiers, and Bordeaux.
The King meanwhile, the lord of Paris and Orleans, was
cooped up in the centre of his nominal dominions. Thus
matters stood at the beginning of the thirteenth century ;
but they were not a little altered before its close. When
Philip Augustus came to the throne, the King of the French
did not own a single seaport ; but Philip the Fair could
boast of a seaboard on the English Channel, the Ocean,
and the Mediterranean. The crimes of John lost him all
the northern part of his French possessions. Normandy,
Maine, Anjou, and Touraine were incorporated with the
royal domain. Britanny, the arriere-jief of Normandy,
VII.] THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. 199
became an immediate fief of the crown till the time when
it was united with France through the marriage of Lewds
the Twelfth and Anne of Britanny. The loss of Normandy
and the other lands wrested by Philip from John had the
twofold effect of making both the King of the French and
the King of the English what their formal titles imported.
When the crown of France had entered by forfeiture on
Normandy, Anjou, and Touraine, it had become far
stronger than any single feudatory. Again, the English
kings of the Anoevin house, now cut off from their old
home, began to be really English rulers. Hitherto England
had been a dependency of Normandy or Anjou ; now
Aquitaine became a dependency of England. The wars
of Henry the Second and Richard the First were French
wars, the struggles of a French feudatory striving to get
the better of his suzerain. The wars of Edward the Third,
and still more the wars of Henry the Fifth, were English
wars. They began indeed in French dynastic claims, but
it soon appeared that their real object was the subjection
of France to England. As such, they do not immediately
concern our subject. The aspect in which they do bear
upon it is this. By the Peace of Bretigny Edward the
Third gave up his claims on the crown of France ; but he
was acknowledged in return as independent Prince of
Aquitaine, without any homage or superiority being reserved
to the French monarch. When Aquitaine therefore was
conquered by France, partly in the fourteenth, fully in the
fifteenth century, it was not the "reunion" of a forfeited
fief, but the absorption of a distinct and sovereign state.
The feelings of Aquitaine itself seem to have been divided.
The nobles to a great extent, though far from universally,
preferred the French connexion. It better fell in w^ith their
notions of chivalry, feudal dependency, and the like ; the
privileges too which French law conferred on noble birth
would make their real interests lie that way. But the great
cities and, we have reason to believe, the mass of the people
also, clave faithfully to their ancient dukes ; and they had
200 THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. [Essay
good reason to do so. The English kings, both by habit
and by interest, naturally protected the municipal liberties
of Bordeaux and Bayonne, and they exposed no part of
their subjects to the horrors of French taxation and general
oppression. When, in 145 1 , the first conquest was achieved,
and the Bordelese for the first time felt what the hand of
a French master really was, they speedily revolted in favour
of the more distant and more indulgent lord. The French
conquest of Aquitaine was very much like what a French
conquest of the Channel Islands would be now. The theory
of natural boundaries claims them equally, and the theory
of identity of language claims them with better right. But
in the teeth of all theories, the people of Bordeaux knew
then, and the people of Jersey know now, that practical
liberty and good government does not lie on the side
of the power to which abstract theories would assign
them.
We have somewhat overshot our mark in order to
complete the history of the English dominion in France.
We now come back to the thirteenth century. Besides
Normandy and Anjou, the forfeited goods of the felon
John, the crown of France, during that century, obtained
the county of Champagne by marriage, and that of
Toulouse as the ultimate result of the Albigensian wars.
Of the six lay peerages, Flanders and Burgundy alone
remained. French Burgundy was granted out by Hugh
Capet to a younger branch of his own family, and, when
that race of dukes became extinct, the same policy was
carried on by Charles the Fifth in 1363, when ho invested
his son Philip with the duchy. Philip obtained by mar-
riage the remaining peerage, the county of Flanders.
Under Philip the Good and Charles the Bold there seemed
every prospect of Burgundy, in the later sense, becoming
a greater kingdom than ever Burgundy had been in the
old. The fiefs which the Dukes of Burgundy of the House
of Valois held of the Empire and of the crown of France
raised them to a place among the greatest powers of
VII.] THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. 201
Europe. At last the might and the hopes of Charles were
shivered beneath the halbeit of the free Switzer. Ducal
Burgundy itself fell into the grasp of Lewis the Eleventh,
and a fifth great fief was "reunited" to the Parisian
crown. But Flanders remained, together with those Im-
perial fiefs which nature seems to have connected with
it, to become not the least valuable possession of the
universal monarchy of Charles the Fifth. For Flanders
and for Artois Charles the Fifth was the nominal liegeman
of his rival Francis. The Treaty of Madrid abolished
this antiquated claim ; and in vain did the Parliament
of Paris, some years later, strive to win back the right,
and to carry out against Charles the same process which,
three hundred years sooner, had been so successfully
carried out against John Lackland. The Count of Flan-
ders and Artois was summoned to the court of his liege
lord, and, as he did not appear, he was deprived of his
lands for contumacy. But the sentence was more easily
pronounced than executed against a Count of Flanders
and Artois who was also Emperor of the Romans and
King of Spain and the Indies. Flanders and Artois re-
mained to the House of Austria till the wars of Lewis the
Fourteenth incorporated all Artois and part of Flanders
with the French monarchy. The rest of Flanders was
reserved, by a happier lot, to form part of the free monarchy
of Belgium.*
Thus, at various periods spread over more than four
hundred years, all the great feudal states of France were
gradually incorporated with the crown. On the other
hand, the nominal boundaries of Capetian France have
gone back in three places. The feudal superiority of the
French crown extended over three districts which now
form part of other states. As we have implied in our
last paragraph, King Leopold owes no homage to the
Parisian despot for the county of Flanders ; nor is any
* The extreme northern part of the ohl county belongs to the Kingdom of
the Netherlands, but much the greater part is Belgian.
202 THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. [Essay
paid by the Catholic Queen for the county of Barcelona,''^
the royal rights over which, even more nominal than
elsewhere, were finally surrendered by Saint Lewis. Our
own sovereign also retains, with the most perfect good
will of the inhabitants, those insular portions of the
duchy of Normandy against which Philip's sentence of
forfeiture was pronounced in vain. With these three ex-
ceptions, the France of i860 takes in the whole of the
France of 9(S7 ; it also takes in a great deal besides.
We have thus traced the steps by which the kings of
Paris gradually gathered under their immediate dominion
the whole, or nearly so, of those states which were at
least nominally dependent upon them. We have now to
follow the course of annexation in those countries which
had never, even nominally, formed part of the Capetian
monarchy. In so doing we may pass lightly over mere
temporary conquests, and confine ourselves to those an-
nexations which have really become part and parcel of the
French monarchy. Thus the Valois kings were always
conquering and always losing Naples and Milan, as well
as Piedmont and Savoy; but Piedmont, Naples, and Milan
have never permanently become parts of France. Thus
again, under Napoleon the First, the French " empire "
threatened to become the empire of all Europe ; but
happily this extended dominion did not descend to Na-
poleon the " Third." But we suspect that people in general
are not aware how much territory, originally French in
no sense, has been gradually and permanently swallowed
up by the Parisian monarchy since the reign of Pliilip the
Fair.
France, as it stood under the early Capets, was bounded
to the south by the various kingdoms of Spain, to the east
by the states holding of the Holy Roman Empire. With
Spain France has had comparatively little to do. The
existence of a real " natural boundary " may have had
something to do with this ; still the line of the Pyrenees
* [i860.]
VIL] THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. 203
has not always been held perfectly sacred on either side.
More than one of the French kings held the kingdom of
Navarre by a personal hereditary right. The Bourbon
dynasty permanently bore the title ; but their Navarre
consisted only of that small portion of the kingdom which
lies north of the Pyrenees. At the eastern end of the
mountain range the frontier was long unsettled, and
Roussillon did not finally become French till the Peace
of 1659. In the space between Navarre and Roussillon,
the sovereigns of France, in the character however not of
kings but of Counts of Foix, have appeared in the more
honourable aspect of protectors of the republic of Andorra.
But the relations of France towards Spain are of far less
importance than her relations towards the Empire. We
left the German kingdom at the moment of its definitive
separation from that of Western Francia in 888. In the
next century Otto the Great permanently united to it
the crown of Italy or the Lombard kingdom, and also the
Imperial crown of Rome. In the next century the king-
dom of Burgundy was acquired by virtue of the bequest
of its last separate sovereign. Thus were the kingdoms
of Germany, Italy, and Burgundy united under a single
ruler. The King of the Eastern Franks inherited the
Imperial style of Charles the Great, and he possessed three
out of the four divisions of his Empire. He held alike
the Teutonic and the Italian capital of the great Emperor.
Western France might look like a single province torn
away from the main body of the Frankish realm. During
the first three centuries of the Capetian dynasty, France
was weak and Germany strong. The great Saxon,
Frankish, and Swabian Emperors wielded a far more
practical authority over the whole of their vast dominions
than the king of Paris wielded over his nominal realm of
Latin France. But while the Capetians were gradually
consolidating their power over France, the Emperors began
to lose theirs over Germany and Italy, and in the greater
part of their Burgundian dominions the Imperial authority
204 THE FEA.\KS AND THE GAULS. [Essay
became more nominal still. Frederick Barbarossa was
crowned at Aries as King of Burgundy ; but a century
afterwards the allegiance of Provence to King Rudolf of
Habsburg was very precarious indeed. As France grew
stronger and more united, she found her whole eastern
frontier, from Hainault to Provence, formed by a succes-
sion of petty states, duchies, counties, bishoprics, and free
cities, disunited among themselves, and owning a very
nominal subjection to their Imperial suzerain. The King
of the French was to most of them at once a nearer and
a more powerful neighbour than the Emperor of the
Romans : he was a more dangerous foe and a more de-
sirable friend. Some provinces had a greater likeness in
language and manners to France than to Germany. To
the nobles, and even to the princes themselves, the
splendours of the French court offered a constant attrac-
tion. To take a familiar instance, the great house of
Guise, in the sixteenth century, forsook their position as
princes of the sovereign blood of Lorraine to assume that
of French nobles and French party-leaders. The whole
of these small states lay admirably open alike to French
intrigue and to French violence ; by one means or the other
nearly all have been won. The five centuries and a half
since Philip the Fair are one long record of French aggran-
dizement at the expense of the territories of the Empire.
Of the three kingdoms attached to the Empire, Italy has
been constantly overrun by French armies, and portions,
like Milan, Piedmont, and Genoa, have been held by
France, by conquest or by some pretended hereditary right,
for considerable periods. But no portion of the Italian
mainland has been permanently retained by France. But
in the last century, by one of the most disreputable of
juggles, France obtained the Italian island of Corsica without
a shadow of right, and has been repaid by obtaining from
thence the line of her own tyrants.
The Kingdom of Germany has suffered large dismem-
berments. In the sixteenth century the three Lotharingian
VII. J THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. 205
bishoprics of Metz, Toul, and Verdun were won by a mix-
ture of force and fraud ; but it was only late in the last
century that the duchy in which those bishoprics were
endures was finally incorporated with France. The Peace
of Westfalia gave France, not, as many people think, the
whole of Elsass, but the possessions and rights of the
House of Austria within it. Such a cession left large
portions of the province legally as much parts of the
Empire as they were before. But such a cession opened
a most taking field for the process of " reunion," and the
" reunion " went on bit-by-bit till the last robbery was
done at the great Revolution. One act of this long drama
stands out above all others, the seizing of Strassburg by
Lewis the Fourteenth in a time of perfect peace. The same
monarch, too, at the time when he recovered a portion of
the old French fief of Flanders, seized also a portion of the
Imperial fief of Hennegau — G alike Hainault.
But it has been against the old kingdom of Burgundy
that the aggressions of the Parisian monarchy have been
most constant and most successful. For that very reason
they are much less familiarly known : there are more
people who know that Lorraine has not always been
French than there are people who know that the same is
true of Provence. It is therefore specially desirable to
trace them in order. We have seen that the old frontier,
the '• natural boundary," of France to the east, was the
Rhone, the line above Lyons being continued along the
Saone. The land between the Rhone and the Alps was the
kingdom of Boso, afterwards, as we have seen, united to
the Imperial crown. At the expense of that kingdom
France has, in the space of five centuries, gained fifteen
departments, counting those which she has made out of her
last stealings of Savoy and Nizza. The Burgundian king-
dom, lying further away from the Imperial power than
either Germany or Italy, fell away earlier and more com-
pletely than either, and split up into a host of small princi-
palities and commonwealths. All of these, except those
206 THE FRANKS AND THE GA ULS. [Espay
which still retain their independence as portions of the
Swiss League, have been gradually swallowed up by the
vultures of Paris. The Rhone frontier was first perma-
nently violated by Philip the Fair in 1310. In the free
Imperial city of Lyons, as in so many others, violent dis-
putes raged between the citizens and the prince-arch-
bishops. Philip seized the favourable opportunity treacher-
ously to occupy the city, and to reduce prince and people
alike to bondage. Later in the century, the Bauphiny or
county of Vienne was bequeathed by its last prince to the
eldest son of the King of France for the time being, to be
held as a separate sovereignty with the title of Dauphin.
This of course soon sank into actual annexation. Lewis
the Eleventh, in the next century, seized upon the county
of Provence by a pretended hereditary right. The way to
this acquisition was doubtless not a little smoothed by the
fact that the sovereign counts had for some generations been
princes of the blood-royal of France. Bresse and Bugey,
part of the dominions of Savoy, were acquired by Henry
the Fourth in exchange for the French claims on the
marquisate of Saluzzo, a change which first made France
an immediate neighbour of Switzerland. Tlie little state of
Orange was obtained in 1732 by exchange with Prussia.
The county of Burgundy was first acquired in the four-
teenth century, like Navarre, by a hereditary claim ; but
like Navarre, or like Hanover in the case of our own
kings, it was separated again before it had been really in-
corporated with the French monarchy. It was not till the
days of Lewis the Fourteenth that, after many vicissitudes,
the once sovereign county-palatine of Burgundy, and the
once free Imperial city of Besanyon, were finally engulfed
in the Charybdis of French domination. At the breaking-
out of the French Revolution all that had escaped of the
Burgundian kingdom was the duchy of Savoy, the western
part of Switzerland and the neighbouring allies of the
Swiss Leagues, and the papal possessions of Avignon and
Venaihsin, long surrounded by earlier annexations. All
VII.] THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. 207
these were swallowed up by the revolutionary torrent ; ^
but all save the Papal territory recovered their independ-
ence by the settlement of 1 814-15. The last act as yet of
the drama, one surpassed in perfidious baseness by none of
those which have gone before it, has been just performed
beneath our own eyes.
It is, we think, not only curious as a piece of past history,
but really important as a matter of present politics, to
trace the gradual stages of French aggression in this
quarter. A steady course of aggrandizement has been
carried out for five hundred years, and the policy of the
Capet has been continued by the Buonaparte. The first
step was taken by Philip the Fair, the father of the old
royal tyranny; the last step as yet has fallen to the
lot of the kindred genius of Louis Napoleon ; — we say the
last step as yet, because it is impossible to believe that a
voluntary check will be put on a settled scheme which is
now all but accomplished. There is no difference in
principle between the absorption of Savoy and Nizza and
the absorption of Vaud and Neufchatel. Whatever argu-
ments justify the one would with an equally "irresistible
logic " justify the other. We are told that Nizza and Savoy
are provinces "essentially French;" they can bo so only
in a sense in which Geneva and Lausanne, and yet more
Brussels and Saint Heliers, are essentially French also.
Those obligations of treaties which guarantee the inde-
pendence and neutrality of Switzerland are not more
sacred than those which guarantee that neutrality of
northern Savoy without which the independence of
Switzerland is a name. That this scheme of aggrandize-
ment, that all schemes of aggrandizement, are solemnly
denied, proves about as much as was proved some months
* [No part of any of the old Swiss cantons was formally incorporated with
France ; indeed Vaud owed to France its independence of Bern. But Swit-
zerland became practically dependent on France, and the allied states of
Geneva, Wallis, NeufchS,tel, and the bishopric of Basel, were actually seized.]
[1871.]
208 THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. [Essay
ago by the no less solemn denial of all designs upon Savoy.*
We have long learned how to trust the man whose lips
uttered the words " Je le jure," and who kept the oath by
a December massacre.
In short, among a crowd of ancient and independent
states which have been gradually swallowed up, one alone
remains. Switzerland, the very home and cradle of free-
dom, is the last remnant of the many centres of political
life which once existed between the Rhone and the Alps.
Marseilles, Lyons, Eesan^on, were once as free as Bern and
Geneva. The Imperial Rabshakeh may stand before the
still unattacked citadel of freedom, and point to the lands
which he has destroyed utterly, and ask in his pride if the
remnant which is left shall venture to hope for deliverance.
French cannon bristling on the shores of the Lake of
Geneva can be pointed in one direction only, that direction
which French aggression has been constantly taking since the
banner of the jleiir-de-lys first showed itself east of the
Rhone. It remains for Europe to determine whether it will
sit by and see the perpetration of a wrong before which
the annexations of Provence and Lorraine, and of Savoy
itself, would sink into insigniticcince.f
We have thus traced out the long history of Parisian
aggression; but, in common justice, we must make one
remark on the other side. We said at the outset that,
except for the monstrous deceptions by which they have
always been defended, tlie aggressions of France are in no
way more guilty than the aggressions of other powers ; in
one important respect France has much less to answer for
than other conquering states. To be conquered by France
has been at all times a less immediate evil than to be
* [i860.]
f [I let all this stand as it was wi-ilteti in i860. It is well to bear in mind
that France has ever been the same under all forms of government, and that
Switzerland and Europe will have to keep on their guard against any kingdom
or commonwealth which may arise out of the chaos of the moment, just
as much as they had to keep on their guard against the fallen tyranny.]
[1871.]
VII.] THE FRAXKS AND THE GAULS. 209
conquered by Spain, Austria, or Turkey. A province
conquered by France has always been really incorporated
with France : no French conquests have ever been kept in
the condition of subject dependencies ; their inhabitants
have at once been admitted to the rights and the wrongs,
the good and the evil fortune, of Frenchmen, and they have
had every career offered by the French monarchy at once
opened to them. No French conquest has ever been kept
in the state in which Spain kept Milan, Naples, and the
Netherlands, in which Austria has kept Hungary and
Lombardy, in which the whole Ottoman Empire is kept to
this day. Savoy will lose much by its transfer from the
rule of constitutional Sardinia to that of despotic France,
but there is no fear of its being brought down to the
condition of Venetia. The geographical position of all the
French conquests, except Corsica, has of course tended to
this complete incorporation, as well as that inherent spirit
of French centralization which tends to wipe out all local
distinctions. One must allow that, if conquests are to be
made, this is a generous and liberal as well as a prudent
way of conquering. But it has its bad side also. The
inhabitants of a country conquered by France become
Frenchmen, and swell the ranks of the aggressors. The
subtle process of denationalization cuts off that hope of
undoing the evil work which always exists when a country
is kept down under an avowed foreign tyranny. One
cannot doubt that, when a part of the Spanish Netherlands
was seized by Lewis the Fourteenth, the inhabitants found
an immediate gain in becoming an integral portion of
France, instead of a distant dependency of Spain. But the
immediate gain has been an ultimate loss ; had those
provinces then remained to the House of Austria, they
w^ould now swell the strength of independent Belgium.
So Elsass has not suffered at the hands of France as
Hungary has suffered at the hands of Austria ; but the
hope of seeing an independent Hungary is a hope far less
wild than that of seeing Elsass once more a member of a
P
210 THE FBAXKS AND THE GAULS. [Essay
German Confederation or Empire. The very best side of
French aggression makes us feel the more sadly that there
are vestigia nulla refrors/iu/.^^
We have thus done our best to show that Parisian
Franco in no Avay represents ancient Gaul or Carolingian
Francia. France and the French are a modern power and
a modern nation, of which we see the first glimmerings in
the ninth century, and which attain something like a
definite and lasting position in the tenth. France is
essentially an artificial, advancing state, just like Sardinia
and Prussia in more recent times. When mayors and
bishops hail Louis Napoleon as the "successor of Pepin
and Charlemagne," they are asserting a palpable untruth.
Modern Europe contains no real successor of either ; but
least of all is the successor of the elected king of Aachen,
the crowned Caesar of Rome, to be looked for in the upstart
usurper of Paris. The work of Charles was to make Italy
and Gaul alike subject to a German monarch. No work
could less call forth our sympathies at the present moment ;
but no work could be more unlike the process of extending
the frontiers of the Celt of Paris over Italian, Eurgundian,
and Teutonic lands. Italy, in the eighth century and in
the tenth, invoked a German king as her deliverer from her
intestine troubles. No such remedy now is needed. She
can now work her deliverance for herself, and she no more
needs the hypocritical friendship of the Gaul than the open
enmity of the Austrian. Before our eyes is growing up an
Italian kingdom truer and freer than that of Charles and
Otto, than that of Eerengar and Hugh of Provence ; and,
with a slight change of name and style, we may apply to
its first and chosen sovereign the words of the Papal
benediction to Charles himself. Not altogether for his own
sake, not forgetting the tortuous and faithless policy which
bartered away the old cradle of his house, still, as to the
* [I rejoice to have been here a false projihet. The eleven years since this
was written has given the world bolh a free Hungary and a Ciermjin Elsass.]
[1871.]
VII.] THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. 211
representative of Italian unity, we may say with heart and
voice : " Victori Emraanueli, a Deo coronato, magno et
pacifico Italorum regi, Romanoruin imperatori future, vita
et victoria! "*
* [Here, unlike the last note, I can rejoice in having been a true prophet.
Rome is again the head of Italy. Whether its sovereign would do well to take
up the title to which he, alone among Christian princes, has a real right, is
another matter. A purely Italian Em[)eror would simpl}' represent Majorian
and Lewis the Second.] [1871.]
V 3
212 THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. [Essay
VIII.
THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS *
The events of the last few months have in a special way
drawn the thoughts of men towards two cities which stand
out among European capitals as witnesses of the way in
which the history of remote times still has its direct bearing
on things which are passing before our own eyes. Rome
and Paris now stand out, as they have stood out in so
many earlier ages, as the historic centres of a period which,
there can be no doubt, will live to all time as one of the
marked j^eriods of the world's history. And it is not the
least wonderful phtenomenon of this autumn of wonders
that, while our eyes have been drawn at once to Rome and
to Paris, they have been drawn far more steadily and with
far keener interest towards Paris than they have been drawn
towards Rome. We can hardly doubt, whetlier we look
back to the past or onwards to the future, that the fall of
the Pope's temporal power is really a greater event than
any possible result of the war between Germany and
France. Yet such is the greater immediate interest of the
* [This essay was headed by the names of two books : Lcs ('(mites de Paris ;
Jlistoiie de V Avenemeut de la Troisieme Eace, par Ernest Moarin (Paris,
Didier & C'**) and liohert der Tapfere, Markfjraf von Anjou, der Stanim-
vater des Kapetinr/ixchen Ilauses. Von Dr. Phil. Karl von KalcJcstein (Berlin,
Lowenstein). M. Mouiiu's book, dated at Angers in 1869, is a careful and
pleasantly-written account of the origin of the Parisian kingdom, and it con-
tains one or two good hits at the state of things in 1S69. But it is amazing
to see a man who has really read the authorities for the ninth and tenth
centuries carried away by dreams about a French frontier of the Rhine. Dr.
V. Kalckstein's is a most thoroughgoing monograph, working up all that is
known about its hero from every quarter, but perhaps sometimes losing him a
little in the general events of his age. A more careful study of his book, which
I had barely time to glance at before the Article first appeared, has enabled
me to add and modify some sentences, and to add some further references.]
L1871.]
VIII.] THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. 213
present struggle, such perhaps is the instinctive attraction
of mankind towards the more noisy and brilliant triumphs
of the siege and the battlefield, that the really gi-eater
event, simply because of the ease with which it has hap-
pened, has passed almost unnoticed in the presence of the
lesser. The world has seen the Papacy in several shapes ;
but the shape of a Pontiff spii-itually infallible but poli-
tically a subject, and the subject not of an universal
Emperor but of a mere local king, is something which the
world has not seen before. What may come of it no man
can say ; but we may be pretty sure that greater things
will come of it, in one way or another, than can come out
of any settlement, in whatever direction, of conflicting
French and German interests. Still, at this moment, the
present fate of Paris unavoidably di-aws to itself more of
our thoughts than the future fate of Rome. But it is well
to keep the two cities together before our eyes, and all the
more so because the past history and the present position
of those two cities have points in common which no other
city in Europe shares with them in their fulness, which
only one other city in Europe can claim to share with them
in any degree.
The history of Rome, as all the world knows, is the history
of a city which grew into an Empire. It grew in truth
into a twofold, perhaps a more than twofold, Empire. Out
of the village on the Palatine sprang the Rome of the
Caesars and the Rome of the Pontiffs. From Rome came
the language, the theology, the code of law, which have
had such an undying effect on the whole European world.
Amidst all changes, the city itself has always been clothed
with a kind of mysterious and superstitious charm, and its
possession has carried with it an influence which common
militai'y and political considerations cannot always explain.
And from the Old Rome on the Tiber many of these attri-
butes passed — some were even heightened in passing — to
the New Rome on the Bosporos. From the days of Con-
stantine till now, no man has ever doubted that, in the
214 THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. [Essay
very nature of things, Constantinople, in whatever hands,
must be the seat of empire. To Western eyes this seems
mainly the result of her unrivalled geographical situation ;
over laroje regions of the East the New Rome wields the
same magic influence which in the West has been wielded
by the Old. TJie City^* the city of the Ctesars, is in
Christian eyes the one great object to be won; in Maho-
metan eyes it is the one great object to be kept. By the
Bosporos, as by the Tiber, it is the city which has grown
into the Empire, which has founded it, and which has
sustained it.
Now of the other capitals of Europe — the capitals of the
more modern states — one alone can claim to have been, in
this way, the creator of the state of which it is now the head.
Berlin, Madrid, Stockholm, Copenhagen, Saint Petersburg,
are simply places chosen in later times, for reasons of caprice
or convenience, as administrative centres of states which
already existed. Vienna has grown from the cajiital of a
duchy into the capital of something which calls itself an
empire ; but Vienna, as a city, has had nothing to do with
the growth of that so-called empire. London may fairly
claim a higher place than any of the cities of which we have
spoken. It was only by degrees, and after some fluctuations,
that London, rather than W^inchester, came to be per-
manently acknowledged as the capital of England. London
won its rank, partly by virtue of an unrivalled military
and commercial position, partly as the reward of the un-
flinching patriotism of its citizens in the Danish wars. But
London in no way formed England, or guided her destinies.
The history of London is simply that the city was found
to be the most fitting and worthy head of an already exist-
ing kingdom. But Paris has been what London has been,
and something more. Paris, like London, earned her pre-
eminence in Gaul by a gallant and successful resistance
to the Scandinavian enemy. It was the great siege of
Paris in the ninth century which made Paris the chief
* 'Es T(if 7roAi(/= Staiuboul.
VIII. ] THE EA RL Y SIEGES OF PARIS. 215
among the cities of Gaul, and its count the chief among
the princes of Gaul. Its position first marked it out for
the rank of a local capital, and, through the way in which
it used its position, it grew into the capital of a kingdom.
But it did not, like London, simply grow into the capital
of a kingdom already existing. The city created first the
county, and then the kingdom, of which it was successively
the head. Modern France, as distinguished both from
Roman Gaul and from the Western kingdom of the Karl-
ings, grew out of the county of Paris ; and of the county of
Paris the city was not merely the centre, but the life and
soul. The position of Paris in the earliest times is best
marked, as in the case of all Gaulish cities, by its place in
the ecclesiastical hierarchy. It was a city, not of the first,
but of the second rank ; the seat of a bishop, but not the
seat of a metropolitan.* Lutetia Parisiorum held the usual
rank of one of those head-towns of Gaulish tribes w^hich
grew into Roman cities. But it never became the centre of
one of the great ecclesiastical and civil divisions ; it never
reached the rank of Lyons, Narbonne, Vienne, or Trier.
Twice before the ninth century, the discerning eye, first of
a Roman and then of a Prankish master, seemed to mark
out the city of the Seine for greater things. It was the
beloved home of Julian ; it was the city which Hlodwig at
once fixed upon for the seat of his new dominion. But
the greatness of Paris, as the earliest settled seat of the
Prankish power, was not doomed to be lasting. Under the
descendants of Hlodwig Paris remained a seat of royalty ;
but, among the fluctuations of the Merowingian kingdoms,
it was only one seat of royalty among several. It was the
peer of Soissons, Orleans, and Metz — all of them places
which, in the new state of things, assumed a higher im-
portance than had belonged to them in Roman times.
But, as the Austrasian house of the Karlings grew, first
* We need hardly say that the archbishopric of Paris dates only from the
seventeenth century. Up to that time the Bishop of Paris had been a
suffragan of the Metropolitan of Sens.
21 G THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. [Essay
as Mayors, then as Kings, to the lordship of the whole
Frankish realm, the importance of the cities of Weste]-n
Gaul necessarily lessened. Paris reached its utmost point
of insignificance in the days of Charles the Great, whom
French legends have pictured as a French king, reigning
in Paris as his royal city. Whatever importance it had,
it seems to have derived from its neighbourhood to the
revered sanctuary of Saint Denis. By a strange accident,
the first king of the new house — the house with which
Paris was to wage a war of races and languages — died
either in the city itself, or in the precinct of the great
monastery beyond its walls. Pippin, returning from a
successful campaign in Aquitaine, fell sick at Saintes ;
from thence he was carried to Tours to implore the help of
Saint Martin, and thence to Paris to implore the help of
Saint Denis. He died at Paris, and was buried in the
great minster which became the burial-place of the next
and rival line of kings.* But Paris was neither the
crowning-place nor the dwelling-place of his son, nor was
it the object of any special attention during his long reign.
Of the two sons of Pippin, between whom his kingdom
was immediately divided, Paris fell to the lot of Karlmann.
But he chose Soissons for his crowning-place — the place
where his father had been crowned before him.f Charles,
crowned at Noyon, made Aachen his capital, and, in the
course of his whole reign, he visited Paris only on a single
progress, when it is incidentally mentioned among a long
string of other cities. J
* Eginh. Ann. 76S : " In ipsa tamen valetudiiie Turonos delatus, apud
Sancti Martini memoriam oravit. Inde quuiu ad Parisios venisset, viii. Kal.
Octobiis diem ob.it, cujus corpus in basilica beati Dionysii martyris luimatum
est." So Vita Karoli, 3 : " Apud Parisius morbo aqua intercutis diem
obiit." Mark the singular, but frequent, use of Parisius as an indeclinable
noun.
t Eginh. Ann. 753, 76S.
X Ibid. 800. The passage is worth quoting, as a specimen of the constant
locomotion of the German kings : — " liedeunte verna temperie, medio fere
Mariio rex Aquisgnuii digres.sus, litus oceani Gallici perlustravit, et in ipso
mari, quod tunc piratis Nordmannicis infestum erat, chissem in.-^tituit, praisidia
VIII.] THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. 217
But this time of utter neglect was, in the history of
Paris, only the darkness before the coming of the dawn.
In the course of the next reign Paris begins to play an
important part, and from that time the importance of
the cit}' steadily grew till it became what we have seen
it in our own day. The occasional visits of Lewis the
Pious to the city are dwelled on by his poetical biographer
with evident delight, and with even more than his usual
pomp of words.* And the city was now about to appear
in its most characteristic light. In the words of Sir
Francis Palgrave, who has sketched the early history of
Paris with great power and insight,t " the City of Revo-
disposuit, pasclia in Centulo apud sanctum Richarium celebravit. Inde iterinn
per litus maris iter agens, Eatumagum civitateni venit, ibique Sequana amne
transmisso, Turonos ad sanctum Martinuni orationis causa profectus est,
moratus ibi dies aliquot propter adversam Liutgardae conjugis valetudinem,
qufe ibidem et defuncta et huniata est; obiit autem diem ii. Non. .Tun. Inde
per Aurelianos ac Parisios Aquasgrani reversus est, et mense Augusto incho-
ante Mogontiacum veniens, generalem conventum ibidem habuit, et iter in
Italian! condixit, atque inde profectus cum exercitu Ravennam venit, ibique
septem non amplius dies moratus, Pippinum filium siium cum eodem exercitu
in terram Beneventanorum ir.e jussit, movensque de Ravenna simul cum filio,
Anconam usque perveuit, quo ibi dimisso Romam proficiscitur." This same
visit to Paris seems to be alluded to by the monk of Saint Gallen, Gesta
Karoli, i. lo (Pertz, ii. 735) ; '.' Quum vero ingeniosissimus Karolus quodam
anno festivitates nativitatis et apparitionis Domini apud Treverense vel Metense
oppidum celebrasset sequenti vero anno easdem sollenmitates
Parisii vel Turonis ageret."
* Ermoldus Nigellus, ii. 143 (Pertz, ii. 481) :
"Inde Parisiacas properant cito visere sedes,
Quo Stephanus martyr culmina summa tenet,
Quo, Germane, tuum colitur, sanctissime, corpus,
Quo GenuvefFa micat, vlrgo dicata Deo.
*****
Nee tua praeteriit Dionysi culmina martyr,
Quin adiens tibimet posceret auxilium."
And again, iii. 269 :
" C'iBsar iter tutum per propria regna gerebat.
Usque Parisiaca quo loca celsus adit.
Jam tua martyr ovans Dionysi tecta revisit,
Hilthuin abba potens quo sibi dona paras ;
Hinc, Germane, tui transivit culmina tecti
Martyris et Stephani, sou, Genuvefa, tui."
t History of Normandy and England, i. 279-2S1.
218 THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. [Es^ay
lutions begins her real history by the first French Revo-
lution." * In this particular case we do not even grudge
the premature use of the word " French," for the move-
ment of which he speaks was plainly a movement of the
Romanized lands of the West against their Teutonic master.
It is not likely that any such feeling was knowingly
present to the mind of any man ; but nations and parties
learn to shape themselves unknowingly, and cities and
regions learn to play their fitting parts, before they can
give any intelligible account of what they are doing.
The Emperor was leading an expedition against the re-
volted Bretons ; suddenly all the disaffected spirits of
the Empire, his own sons among the foremost, gathered
themselves together at Paris.t They then seized Lewis
himself at Compiegne, and their hated stepmother Judith
on the rock of Laon. But one part of his dominions was
still faithful to the imprisoned Caesar ; the German lands
had no share in the rebellion, and they eagerly sought
for the restoration of theii- sovereign. In marking out
the geographical divisions of feeling, the writer of the
ninth century, like those of the nineteenth, is driven,
as it were, to forestall the languao-e of a somewhat later
time. The Emperor had no confidence in the French, but
he put his trust in the Germans. J
* History of Norniaudy and England, i. 282.
t The fact that Paris was the gathering-place comes out most strongly in
the Annales Bertiniani, 830 (Pertz, i. 423): ''Nam aliqui ex prinioribus
rnurraurationeiu populi cognoscentes, convocaverunt ilium, ut eum a fide, quam
doiiino imperatori promissam habebant, averterent ; ideoque oumis popiilus qui
in Eritanniani ire debebat ad Parisium se conjunxit, nee non Hlothariuui de
Italia et Pippinum de Ac|uitania hostiliter adversum patreiii venire, ut ilium
de regno ejicerent et novercam suam perderent ac Bernardum interficerent,
compulerunt."
X Vita Hludowici, 45 (Pertz, ii. 633) ; " Quum autem instaret auctumnalis
teinperies, et qui imperatori contraria sentiebant alicubi in Francia conventum
fieri generalein volebaiit. Imperator autem clanculo obnitebatur, diffidens
quidem Francis magisque se credens Gennanis." (See above, p. 192.) One
cannot help talking here about France and French, though such is not the
established use of the words till long after. It should however be noticed that
the Francia of this writer, while it excludes Germany, equally excludes
VIII.] THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. 219
Such was the part — a characteristic part— played by
Paris in the Revolution of 830. Four years later Paris
appears playing an opposite yet a no less characteristic
part. The Emperor Lewis, already restored and again
deposed, is held as a prisoner by his eldest son Lothar,
and is led in bonds to Paris.* Again the men of the East,
the faithful Germans, are in arms for their sovereign
under Lewis, at that moment his only loyal son. But
by this time the city has changed sides. Lothar, for fear
of the German host, flees to the South, leaving his father
at liberty; the late captive is led by his rejoicing people
to the minster of Saint Denis, and there is girt once more
with the arms of the warrior and with the Imperial robes
of the Csesar.f Once then in the course of its long history
did Paris behold the inauguration of a lawful Emperor.
But it was the re-inauguration of an Emperor whom one
Parisian revolution had overthrown, and whom another
Parisian revolution had set up again ; and in the moment
alike of his fall and of his restoration the force of loyal
Germany forms at one time a threatening, at another time
an approving, background.
We thus see Paris, well-nigh unheard of during the
reign of Charles the Great, suddenly rise into importance
under his son. Under Charles the Bald its importance
becomes greater still, and it begins to assume the peculiar
function which raised it to the head place in Gaul. The
Burgundy and Aquitaine. (See c. 49.) The assembly was held at Neomaga
(Niniwegen), and we read that " oninis Gerniania eo confluxit imperatori
auxilio futura."
* Annales Bertiniani, 834: " Quum hoc Lotharius cognovisset, de Aquis
abscessit, et f atrem suum usque ad Parisius sub memorata custodia deduxit."
So in the Vita Hludowici, 50: " Hlotharius patre assumpto per pagum Has-
baniensem iter airipuit, et Parisius urbem petivit, ubi obviani fore cunctos sibi
fideles prsecepit."
•[ Annales Bertiniani, 834 : " lUo abscedente, venerunt episcopi qui prsesen-
tes aderant, et in ecclesia sancti Dionysii domnum Imperatorem reconciliaverunt,
et regalibus vestibus annisque induerunt. Deinde filii ejus Pippinus et
Ludoicus cum ceteris fidelibus ad eum venientes paterno animo gaudenter
suscepti sunt, et pluriraas illis ac cuncto populo gratias egit, quod jam alacriter
illi auxilium prjebere studuissent."
220 THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARTS. [Essay
special wretchedness of the time was fast showing the
great military importance of the site. Under the rule
of the Austrasian mayors and kings there had been
endless wars, but they had been wars waged far away
from Paris. Above all, no hostile fleet had for ages sailed
up the Seine. Lutetia on her island must, under the
Frankish power, have enjoyed for some generations a
repose almost as unbroken as she had enjoyed in the
days of the Boman Peace. Now all was changed. The
Empire was torn in pieces by endless civil wars, wars
of brother against brother : and the fleets of the Northmen,
barely heard of in the days of Charles the Great, were
making their way up the mouths of all its rivers. Men
now began to learn that the island city, encompassed by
the broad Seine, with its bridges and its minsters and
the Roman palace on the left bank, was at once among
the most precious possessions and among the surest bul-
warks of the realm. It is not without significance that,
when the great Charles himself for once visited Paris, he
visited it in the course of a progress in which he had been
surveying the shores of the Northern Ocean.* He came
to Paris as a mourner and as a pilgrim, yet we may
believe that neither his grief nor his devotion hindered
him from marking the importance of the post. His eye
surely marked the site as one fated to be the main defence,
if not of his whole Empire, at least of its western portion,
against the pirate barks by which the Ocean was begin-
ning to be covered. And probably it was not by mere
accident that it was in the course of an expedition against
Eritanny that Paris became the centre of the conspiracy
of 830, In a Breton war, a war by land, Paris would
not be of the same pre-eminent importance as it was in
the invasion of the Northmen. Still the island strong-
hold would be of no small moment in case of a Breton
inroad, and in the days of Lewis the Pious a Breton in-
road was again a thing to be dreaded. Among the troubles
* See p. 216.
VIII.] THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. 221
of the next reign the pre-eminent importance of Paris
begins to stand out more and more strongly. Of the
newly-formed Western kingdom, the kingdom of Charles
the Bald, the kingdom to which it was a mere chance
that he did not for ever bequeath his name,* it seemed
at first that Paris was at once to become the capital ; no
other city filled so prominent a place in the early history
of his reign. In the very beginning of his reign we find
Charles making use of the position of the city and its
bridges to bar the progress of his brother, the Emperor
Lothar. We find him dwelling for a long time in the
city, and giving the citizens the delight of a spectacle
by appearing among them in royal pomp at the Easter
festival.f Four years later, the city began to appear in
its other character as the great mark for Scandinavian
attack. The Northern pirates were now swarming on
every sea, and the coasts of Britain, Gaul, and Germany
were all alike wasted by their harr^'ings. But they in-
stinctively felt that, while no shore lay more temptingly
for their objects than the shores of Northern Gaul, there
was no point either of the insular or of the continental
realm where their approach was better guarded against.
The island city, with its two bridges and its strongly
fortified Koman suburb on the mainland, blocked their
path as perhaps no other stronghold in Gaul or Britain
could block it. J In the very year of the fight of Fontenay,
* The Western kingdom is " regnum Karoli," its people Karoli, Karlenses,
just like "regnum Lotharii," Lotharii, Lotharienses. (See History of the
Norman Conquest, i. 600, ed. 2.) It is a mere chanee that Karolingia, CTiar-
laine, did not survive as the name of the Western kingdom, as Lotltaringia,
Lorraine, survived as the name of the Middle kingdom. It would have
saved many confusions if it had.
f See the Annals of Prudentius of Troyes, 841 (Pertz, i. 437), and the
story in Nithard, ii. 6-8 ; Palgrave, England and Normandy, i. 313, 314.
Hildwin, Abbot of Saint Denis, and Gerard, Count of Paris — the first we
remember bearing that title — had been among the first to break their oaths
to Charles.
X See the vivid description of Carolingian Paris and its first capture in
Palgrave, i. 433-439 ; but Sir Francis has not wholly withstood the tempta-
tion to exaggerate the antiquity of some of the e.\isting buildings.
222 THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARTS. [Essay
as if they had scented the mutual slaughter from afar,
the Northmen had sailed up the stream, and had harried
Rouen and the surrounding lands with the sternest horrors
of fire and sword* Four years later they pressed oti yet
further into the heart of the defenceless realm ; Paris was
attacked ; in strange contrast with the valour of its citizens
forty years later, no one had the heart to resist ; the city
was stormed and sacked ; and King Charles, finding his
forces unequal to defend or to avenge, was driven to
forestall the wretched policy of iEthelred, and to buy a
momentary respite from the invaders.f Other attacks,
other harryings, followed. One devastation more terrible
than all, in the year (S57, w'as specially remembered on
account of the frightful havoc wrought among the churches
of the city. The church of Saint Genoveva, on the left
bank of the river — wdiose successor is better known to
modern ears as the Pantheon — was burned ; Saint Stephen's,
afterwards known as Notre Dame, Saint German's, and
St. Denis, bought their deliverance only l)y large ransoms.:}:
* Ann. Prud. Tree. 841 (Pertz, i. 437) : " Interea piratse Danorum ab
Oceano Euripo devecti Eotuniam irruentes, rapinis, ferro, ignique bacchantes,
urbem, inonachos, reliquumque vulgura et csedibus et captivitate pessum-
dederunt, et omnia monasteria sen quaecumque loca fluniini Seqiianre adhseren-
tia aut depopulati sunt aut, multis acceptis pecuniis, teriita relinqunnt."
"t" Ann. Prud. Tree. 855 : " Nordmannorum naves centum viginti mense
Martio per Sequanam hinc et abinde cuncta vastantes, Loticiam Parisiorum
nullo penitus obsistente pervadunt. Quibus quum Carolus occurrere moliretur,
sed pipevalere sues nullatenus posse prospiceret, quibusdam pactionibus, et
mnnere septem milium librarum eis exhibito, a progrediendo compescuit, ac
redire persuasit." So in tlie Annals of Fulda, 845 (Pertz, i. 364) : " Nord-
manni regnum Karoli vastantes, per Sequanam usque Parisios navigio vene-
runt, et tarn ab ipso quam incolis terraj accepta pecunia copiosa cum pace dis-
cesserunt."
X Ann. Prud. Tree. 857 : "Dani Sequanro insistentes cuncta libere vastant,
Lutetiamque Parisiorum adgressi, basilicam beati Petri et sanctre Genovefai
incendunt et ceteras onines, praeter domum sancti Stepliani et ecclcsiam sancti
Vinceiitii atque Germaiii proeterque ccclesiam sancti Diony.sii, pro quibus
tantummodo, ne incenderentur, multa solidorum summa soluta est." Sir
Francis Palgrave (i. 459, 464") gives a vivid picture of this sack of P.aris. Of
Saint Denis he adds: "Saint Denis made a bad bargain. Tiie Northmen did
not hold to their contract, or another company of pirates did not consider it as
binding : the Monastery was burnt to a shell, and a most heavy ransom paid
VIII.] THE EARLY SIEGES OF FAEIS. 223
In the minds of the preachers of the time, the woes of
Paris suggested the woes of Jerusalem, and a wail of
sorrow went up from the Jeremiah of the age for the
havoc of the city and its holy places.*
When we remember the importance to which Paris was
plainly beginning to rise under Lewis the Pious, we may
perhaps be led to think that it was the constant attacks to
which the city was exposed which hindered it from be-
coming the permanent dwelling-place of royalty under
Charles the Bald. That the city held a place in his
affections throughout his life is shown by his choosing
Saint Denis as the place of his burial. But it never
became the royal city of the kings of his house. We need
hardly look on it as a mark of personal cowardice in
Charles that he preferred to hx his ordinary seat of govern-
ment in some other place than the most exposed fortress
of his kingdom. Compiegne now often appears as a royal
dwelling-place ; f but the home and centre of Carolingian
for the liberation of Abbot Louis, Charlemagne's grandson by his daughter
Eothaida." Sir Francis, as usual, gives no reference : but we may be sure that
he could, if he had pleased, have given one for the burning of the monastery
as well as for tlie capture of the Abbot, which the Annals mention under the
next year, though not in connexion with the sack of Paris.
* Sir Francis Palgrave (i. 462) says : "Amongst the calamities of the times,
the destruction of the Parisian monasteries seems to have worked peculiarly on
the imagination. Paschasius Radbertus, the biographer of Wala, expatiates
upon this misery when writing his Commentary on Jeremiah." Some extracts
are given in Pertz, i. 450 : "Quis umquam ci-ederet, vel quis ufnquam cogitare
potuisset ut piratse, diversis admodum collecti ex familiis, Parisiorum
attingerent fines, ecclesiasque Christi hinc inde cremarent circa litus ? . . . .
Fateor eniin quod nullus ex regibus terrse ista cogitaret, neque ullus habitator
orbis nostri audire potuisset quod Parisium nostrum hostis intraret."
f Compifegne comes out with amusing grandeur in the Fragmenta Historian
Fossatensis, Pertz, ix. 372. There Charles tlie Bald figures as a very great
prince indeed: " Hie post multas Imperii divisiones, post innumeras bellorum
angustias, Pipino et Lothario decedentibus rex et iiiiperator constituitur.
Ludovicus autem Germaniam obtinebat. Quunique universo pene orbi Karolus
imperaret, placuit prse ceteris nationibus Gallias honorare reliquiasque qiias
patruus suus Karolus Magnus Constantinopoli advectas Aquisgrani posuerat,
clavum scilicet et coronam apud Sanctum Dyonisium ; Compendium vero, quod
instar Constaiitinopnleos suis diebus decreverat fabricari, ut de nomine suo
Karnopolim, sicut Constantiaus Constantinopolim, appellaret, sindonem dele-
gavit."
224 THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. [Essay
royalty in the Western kingdom gradually fixed itself on
a spot the most opposite to Paris in position and feeling
which the Western kingdom could afford. Paris and Laon
were in every sense rivals ; their rivalry is stamped upon
their very outward appearance. Each is a representative
city : Paris, like Chalons and Bristol, is essentially an island
city ; the river was its defence against ordinary enemies,
however easily that defence might be changed into a
highway for its attack in the hands of the amphibious
Northmen. But Laon is the very pride of that class of
towns which, out of Gaulish hill-forts^ grew into Roman
and mediaeval cities. None stands more proudly on its
height ; none has kept its ancient character so little
changed to our own day. The town still keeps itself
within the walls which fence in the hill top, and whatever
there is of suburb has grown up at the foot, apart from
the ancient city. Paris again was the home of the new-
horn nationality of the Romance speech, the home of the
new French nation. Laon stood near the actual German
border, in a land where German was still spoken ; it was
fitted in every way to be, as it proved, the last home of a
German dynasty in the West. There can be little doubt
that, by thus moving eastward, by placing themselves in
this outlying Teutonic corner of their realm, the Carol-
ingian kings of the West threw away the chance of putting
themselves'at the head of the new national movement, the
chance of reigning as national kings, if not over the whole
Romance-speaking population of Gaul, at least over its
strictly French portion north of the Loii'e.
Of such a mission we may be sure Charles the Bald and
his successors never dreamed. The chances are that those
to whom that mission really fell dreamed of it just as
little. We must never forget that the national movements
of those days were for the more part instinctive and
unconscious ; but they were all the more powerful and
lastiui; for bcino- instinctive and unconscious. An act of
Charles the Bald, one of the ordinary grants by a king to
YIII.] THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. 225
one of his vassals, created the French nation. The post from
which the King himself shrank was entrusted to a valiant
subject, and Robert the Strong, the mightiest champion of
the land against the heathen invader, received the govern-
ment of the whole border-land threatened by the Breton
and the Northman.* We may be sure that the thoughts
of the King himself did not at the most reach beyond
satisfaction at haviug provided the most important post in
his realm with a worthy defender. To shield himself from
the enemy by such a barrier as was furnished by Robert s
county in Robert's hands was an object for which it was
wise to sacrifice the direct possession even of the fair
lands between the Loire and the Seine. The dominion of
Robert was a mark ; his truest title was Marquess. And
this frontier district, like so many other frontier districts,
was destined to great things. Rome itself was most likely,
in its beginning, a mark of the Latin League against
the Etruscan. Castile, a line of border-castles against the
Saracen, grew into the ruling kingdom of all Spain. The
Eastern Mark, the mark of Germany against the Hun-
garian, and the Mark of Brandenburg, her mark against the
Wend, grew, under the names of Austria and Prussia, to
become the leading powers of Germany, while one of them
in a manner has become Germany itself. So the mark
granted to Robert grew into the Duchy of France and the
Kingdom of France. Robert no doubt, like the other
governors and military chiefs who were fast growing from
magistrates into princes, rejoiced in the prospect of be-
comingthe source of adynasty,a dynasty which could not fail
to take a high place among the princes of Gaul. But he
hardly dreamed of founding a line of kings, and a line of kings
the most lasting that the world ever saw. Still less did he
* Regino, 86i : " Carolns rex placitum habuit in Compeiidio, ibique ciim
optimatum consilio Roberto coniiti ducatum inter Ligerim et Seqiianam adver-
sum Erittones commendavit, quem cum ingenli industria per aliquod tempus
rt-xit." In the same writer, under S67, be appears as " Ruotbertus qui iiiarcaiii
tenebat." So Hincmar (ann. 865) calls him " Marchio in Andegavo." He
held also the County of Autun. Hincmar, 866.
Q
226 THE EAULY SIEGES OF PARIS. [Essay
dream of founding a nation. But he himself founded a
line of kings, and his son founded a nation for those kings
to rule over. It may be doubted whether Robert's mark
between the Loire and Seine took in the city on the Seine.
Once indeed he went to its help :* but, if it was part of his
dominions, it was at least not their capital or centre.
Robert was in a special manner Count or Marquess of
Anjou. It was his son, the Count of Paris, the defender
of Paris, who was the real founder of the nation of which
he became the first king. In saving Paris Odo created
France. The counts who held the first place of danger
and honour soon eclipsed in men's eyes the kings who had
retired to the safer obscurity of their eastern frontier. The
city of the river became a national centre in a way in
which the city of the rock could never be. The people of
the struggling Romance speech of Northern Gaul found a
centre and a head in the rising city and its gallant princes.
That Robert was himself of German descent, the son of a
stranger from some of the Teutonic provinces of the
Empire, mattered not a whit.f From the beginning of
their historic life the Parisian dukes and kings have been
the leaders and representatives of the new French nation-
ality. No roj-al dynasty has ever been so thoroughly
identified with the nation- over which it ruled, because no
royal dynasty could be so truly said to have created the
nation. Paris, France, and the dukes and kings of the
French, are three ideas which can never be kept asunder.
A true instinct soon gave the ruler of the new state a
hiofher and a more sionificant title. The Count of Paris
was merged in the Duke of the French, and the Duke of
* Hinemar, 866.
■\ The origin of Tlohert the Strong has been discnssed by M. Mourin, p. 19,
and more fully by Dr. Kalckstein in his first " Exkiir.s." The best-known
passage is tliat in Richer, i. 5 : " Odo patreni habuit ex equestri ordine Rotber-
tnni, avum vero paternuin Witichinuni, advenani Gernianum." In Ainion of
Fleury, ile Iteijihua Francorum (Pertz, ix. 374), he appears as " Rotbertns
Andegavensia comes, Saxonici generis vir." In the Annales Xantenses, 867
(Pertz, ii. 232), he is " Ruodbertus, vir valde strenuus, ortus de Frantia,
dux Karoli." By this German writer Vruntia is of course opposed to Gallia.
VIII.] THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. 227
the French was soon to be merged in the King. The name
of Francia, a name whose shiftings and whose changes of
meaning have perplexed both history and politics — a name
which Eastern and Western writers seem to have made it
a kind of point of honour to use in different meanings*
— now gradually settles down, as far as the Western
kingdom is concerned, into the name of a territory which
answers roughly to the Celtic Gaul of the elder geo-
graphy.f It has still to be distinguished by epithets like
Occidental is and Latina from the Eastern Francia of Teu-
tonic speech, but, in the language of Gaul, Francia and
Franci for the future mean the dominion and the subjects
of the lord of Paris. France was still but one among the
principalities of Gaul ; but it was the principality destined,
by one means or another, to swallow up the rest. From
the foundation of the Parisian duchy we may date the
birth of the French state and nation. From that day
onwards France is whatever can, by fair means or foul,
be brought into obedience to Paris and her ruler.
Count Robert the Strong, the Maccabseus of the West-
Frankish realm, the patriarch of the old Capets, of the
Valois, and of the Bourbons, died as he had lived, fighting
for Gaul and Christendom ao-ainst the heathen Dane. t But
his dominion and his mission passed to a son worthy of
* The monk of Saint Gallen (Gesta Karoli, i. lo) gives us a definition of
Francia in the widest sense : " Franciani vero interdum quum noiiiinavero, omnes
Cisalpinas provincial significo .... in illo tempore propter excellentiam glorio-
sissimi Karoli et Galli et Aquitani, ^dui et Hispani, Alamaimi et Baioarj,
noil parum se insignitos gloriabantur, si vel nomine Francorum servorum cen-
seri mererentur."
f Richer (i. 14) twice speaks of the dnchy of France as " Celtica " and
"Gallia Celtica." "Rex [Karolus] Celt'cae [Rotliertiim] ducem praeficit."
These are Charles tlie Simple and the second Robert, afterwards king.
X Ann. Fuld. 867 (Pertz, ii. 380): " Riiodbertus Karoli regis comes apud
Ligerim fluvium contra Nordmannos fortiter dimicans occiditur, alter quodam-
niodo nostris teraporibiis Machabaeus, cujns proelia qure cum Brittonibus et
Nordmannis gessit, si per omnia sciipta fui^sent, Machabaei gestis aequipa-
rari potuissent." See tlie details in Regino, 867 ; Hincmar, Ann. 866. Tlie
meagre annals of Fleury (Pertz, ii. 254) kindle into life at the exploits of
Robert: " Rhothbertus atque Rainnulfus, viri mirse potentise armisque strenui
et inter primes ipsi priores, Northmannorum gladio necantur."
Q 2
228 THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARTS. [Essay
him — to Odo, or Eudes, the second Count of his house,
presently to be the first of the kings of Paris. At his
father's death Odo was deemed too young to take the place
of his father. The duchy between the Seine and the Loire
was granted to Abbot Hugh ;* some fiefs alone of unknown
extent were first given to Odo and then taken from him.f
But somewhat later we find him holding the post of Count
of Paris, without any notice as to the extent of territory
which formed* his county. But when at a later time, on the
death of Hugh, he received a grant of his father s duchy,
the great step was taken ; France, with Paris as its capital,
was created. J The grant was fittingly made in the very
midst of his great deeds, in the midst of that great struggle,
that mighty and fiery trial, which was to make the name
of Paris and her lord famous throughout the world. On the
great siege of Paris by the Northmen, the turning-point in
the history of the city, of the duchy, and in truth of all
Western Europe, we may fairly dwell at somewhat greater
detail than we have done on the smaller events which paved
the way for it. We must bear in mind the wretched state
of all the countries which made up the Carolingian Empire.
The Northmen were sailing up every river, and were
spreading their ravages to every accessible point. Every
year in the various contemporary annals is marked by the
harrying of some fresh district, by the sack of some city, by
the desecration of some revered monastery.§ Resistance,
* Regiiio, 867 : " Hugo abba in locutn liuotberti substitutus est ... ,
siquidem Odo et Ruotbertus filii Euotberti adhuc parviili erant ; quando
pater exstinctus est, et idcirco iion est illis ducatiis conimis-tus."
•)■ Hincmar, 868 : " Ablatis a Rotberti filio liis quiB post mortem patris de
honoribua ipsiiiH ei concesserat [Carolus] et per alios divisis."
X Regino, 887 : " Ducatus quem [Hugo] tenuerat et streniie rexerat Odoni
filio Rodberti ab imperatore traditur, qui e-X tempestate rarisiorum comes
©rat."
§ See especially the entries in the Annales Vedastini (Pertz, ii. 200), under
874 and several following years. Take, above all, tlie general jiicture under
884 : " Nortmanni vero non cessant captivari atque interfici populum Christi-
annm, atque ecclesias subrui, destructis mceniis et villis crematis. Per omnes
enim plateas jacebant cadavera clericorum, laicorum, nobilium atque alioruin,
inulierun), juvenuni, et lactentium : non enim erat via vel locus quo non jactrent
VIII.] THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. 229
when there was any, was ahnost wholly local ; the in-
vaders were so far from encountering the whole force of the
Empire that they never encountered the whole force of any
one of its component kingdoms. The day of Saulcourt,
renowned in that effort of old Teutonic minstrelsy which
may rank alongside of our own songs of Brunanburh and
Maldon,^ the day when the young King Lewis led the
West- Prankish host to victory over the heathen, f stands
out well-nigh alone in the records of that unhappy time.
While neither realm was spared, while one set of invaders
ravaged the banks of the Seine and the Loire, while another
more daring band sacked Aachen, Koln, and Trier, J the
rival kings of the Franks were mainly intent on extending
their borders at the expense of one another. Charles the
Bald was far more eager to extend his nominal frontier to
the Rhine,§ or to come back from Italy adorned with the
Imperial titles, || than he was to take any active step to
mortui ; et erat tribulatio omnibus et dolor, videntes populum Christianuni
usque ad internecionem devastari."
* The Ludwiydied is printed in Max MtiUer's German Classics, also in
the second volume of Scliilter's Thesaurus.
f A full account of the battle is given in the Annales Vedastini, 88l.
+ Annales Vedastini, 882 : " Australes Franci ^that is, Eastern, Austrasian,
not Southern) congregant exercitum contra Nortmannos, sed statim terga
vertunt, ibique VValo, Mettensis episcopus, corruit, Dani vero famosissimum
Aquisgrani palatium igne cremant, et monasteria atqne civitates, Treveiis
niibilissimam et Coloniam Agrippinani, palatia quoque regum et villas, cum
habitatoribus terrse interfectis, igne cremaverunt."
§ Annales Fuldenses (Pertz, i. 390), 876 : " Karolns vero, Hhidowici morte
comperta, regnum illius, cupiditate ductus, invasit et suae ditioni subjugare
studuit ; existimans se, ut fama vulgabat, non solum partem regni Hlotharii,
quam Hludowicus tenuit et filiis suis utendam dereliquit, per tyrannidem
posse obtinere, verum etiam cunctas civitates regni Hludowici in occidentali
litore Rheni fluminis positas huo regno addere, id est Mogontiam, Worma-
tiain, et Nemetum, filiosque fratris per potentiam opprimere, ita ut nullus ei
resistere vel contradicere auderet." The first entry under the next year irs :
" Hludowicus rex mense Januario, geneiali conventu habito apud Francono-
furt, quos de regno Karoli tenuit captivos remisit in Galliam."
II Ann. Fuld. 876. The way in which Charles' Imperial dignity is recorded
is remarkable. After a satirical description of the Imperial costume, the annalist
goes on : " Omnem enim consuetudinem regum Fraiicorum contemnens, Gryecas
glorias optimas arbitrabatur, et ut majorem suae mentis elationem ostenderet,
230 THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. [Essay
drive out the common enemy of all the kindred realms. At
last the whole Empire, save the Burgundian kingdom of
BosOj was once more joined together under Charles the
Fat. Paris was again under the nominal sovereignty of an
Emperor whose authority, equally nominal everywhere,
extended also over Rome and Aachen. Precarious and
tottering as such an Empire was, the even nominal union
of so many crowns on a single head, however unfit that
head was to bear their weight, does seem to have given for
the moment something like a feeling of greater unity, and
thereby of greater strength, Paris, defended by its own
Count and its own Bishop, was defended by them in the
name of the Emperor, Lord of the World.* The sovereign
alike of East and West was appealed to for help, and at
least a show of help was sent in the name of both parts of
the Frankish realm. f The defence of Paris was essentially
a local defence, waged by its own citizens under the com-
mand of their local chiefs. Still the m-eat check which the
invaders then received came nearer to a national act on the
part of the whole Frankish Empire than anything which
had happened since the death of Charles the Great.
Our materials for the great siege are fairly abundant.
Several of the contemporary chronicles, in describing this
gallant struggle, throw off somewhat of their accustomed
meagreness, and give an account conceived with an unusual
ablato regis nomine, se imperatorem et Augustum omnium regum cis mare
consistentium apjiellare prajcepit." The phrase "cis mai'e" i.s remarkable,
when we think of the English claims to Empire, and of the constant use of
the word " traiismai inus " to express England and English things. The com-
Ufion name for Charles in these Annals is " Gallise t^^rannus."
* Abbo, i. 48 (Pertz, ii. 780) : —
" Urbs niandata fuit Karolo nobis basileo,
Imperio cujus regitur totus proj^e koimus
Post Dominum, regem dominatoremqiie potentuni,
Excidium per earn regtium non quod patiatur,
Sed quod salvetur per earn sedentque serenuni."
+ Ilegino, 887 (Pertz, i. 596) : " Heinricus cum exeroitibus utriusque regni
Parisius venit." " Utrumque regnum " means of course the E;ist and the
West Franks. The same Annuls, in the next j'ear, speak of C'harits as reigning
over '• omiiiii regna Fraucurum."
VI 1 1.] THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. 231
degree of spirit and carried out with an unusual amount of
detail.^ And we have a yet more minute account, which,
even as it is, is of no small value, and which, had it been a
few degrees less wearisome and unintelligible, would have
been of the highest interest. Abbo, a distinguished church-
man of those times, a monk of the house of Saint German,
and not only a contemporary, but a spectator and sharer in
the defence, t conceived the happy idea of writing a minute
narrative of the stirring scenes which he had witnessed.
But unhappily he threw his tale into the shape of hexa-
metres which have few rivals for affectation and obscurity.
The poetical biographer of Lewis the Pious at least writes
Latin ; Abbo writes in a Babylonish dialect of his own
composing, stuffed full of Greek and other out-of-the-way
words, and to parts of which he himself found it needful to
attach a glossary. Still, with all this needless darkness, he
gives us many details, and he especially preserves many
individual names which we should not find out from the
annalists. A fervent votary of Saint German, a loyal
citizen of Paris, a no less loyal subject of the valiant count
who, when he wrote, had grown into a king, Abbo had
every advantage which personal knowledge and local in-
terest could give to a narrator of the struggle. Only we
cannot help wishing that he had stooped to tell his tale, if
not in his native tongue, whether Romance or Teutonic,
yet at least in the intelligible Latin of Nithard in a past
generation and of Richer in a future one. J
* yee especially the Annales VeJastini, SS5-890 ; other details come from
the Chronicle of Eegino, SS7-890.
\ Let us take one out of several passajres where he describes his own
exploits (ii. 300-302) : —
" Nemo stetit supra speeulam, solus nisi ssepe
Jam saiicti famulus dicti, lignum crucis almse
In flammas retinens, oculis hsec vidit et inquit."
J The book is printed in the second volume of Pertz, 776-S05. The Third
Book has a sort of Int rpretatio throughout. We give a few lines (15-18) as
a specimen : —
" laicorum
Tapefe midique villofie populorum lectus in itinere,
Amphytiippa laou ex tat, badanola necnon^;
232 THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. [Essay
The poet begins with a panegyric on his city, in which
he may, while deahng with such a theme, be forgiven for
somewhat unduly exalting its rank among the cities of the
world.* Its position, the strength of the island-fortress,
connected with the mainland by its castles on either side,
is plainly set forth. f The defenders of the city are clearly
set before us : Odo the Count, the future King, as we are
often reminded,J and Gozlin tlie Bishop, stand forth in the
front rank. Around the two great local chiefs are gathered
a secondary band of their kinsfolk and supporters, clerical
and lay. There is Odo's brother Robert, himself one day to
wear a crown in the city which he defended, but in times
to which the foresight of the poet did not extend ; there is
the valiant Count Ragnar ; there is the warlike Abbot
Ebles of Saint German's, whose exploits are recorded with
special delight by the loyal monk of his house.§ A crowd
of lesser names are also handed down to us. names of men
Ornamentnm decorum ralde amant vestem pnfam vel gniufan clarum jjotio-
nem par linteiim.
Effipiam diamant, stragulam pariterque propomarn.
lenocinatio J't'nat paleant
Ag.-igula celebs aginat peeiules nee ablundam."
But the narrative ])ortions of the poem, though often obscure enoug!), are
not altogether in this style.
* Abbo, i. lo : —
" Nam medio Sequanse recubans, culti quoque regni
Francigenum, temet statuis per celsa canendo :
Sum polls, ut regina micans omnes super urbes !
Quae statione nites cunctis venerabiliori,
Quisque cupiscit opes Francoruni, te veneratur."
t Ibid. i. 15 :—
" Insula te gaudet, fluvius sua fert tibi giro
Brachia, complexo muros mulcentia circum
Dextra tui pontes habitant tentoria liuifie
Laevaque claudentes ; horuni hinc inde tutrices
Cis urbem speculare falas, citra quoque flumen."
: Ibid. i. 45:—
" Hie consul venerabatur, rex at(jue futurus,
Urbis erat tutor, legni venturus et altor."
§ Ibi.l. i. 66 :—
" Hie comites Odo fraterque suus radiabant
Kotbertus, pariterque conies Tlageuarius ; illic
Pontificiscjue nepos Ebolus, fortiasimus abba."
VIII. ] THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. 233
who had their honourable share in the work, but with
whose bare names it is hardly needful to burthen the
memories of modern readers. A great object of attack on
the part of the Northmen was the castle which guarded the
bridge on the right bank of the river, represented in after-
times by the Grand Chdfelet. The watchful care of the
Bishop had been diligent in strengthening this and the
other defences of the city; but the last works which were
to guard this important point were not yet fully finished.*
The Danish fleet now drew near, a fleet manned, so it was
said, by more than thirty thousand warriors.f As in the
tale of our own Brihtnoth.t the invaders began with a
peaceful message. The leader of the pirates, Sigefrith, the
sea-king — a king, as the poet tells us, without a kingdom §
— sought an interview with Count Odo, and demanded
a peaceful passage through the city. Odo sternly answers
that the city is entrusted to his care by his lord the
Emperor, and that he will never forsake the duty which
has been laid upon him.|| The siege now began; the
Northmen strove to storm the unfinished tower. After two
days of incessant fighting, and an intervening night spent
in repairing the defences, the valour of the defenders
prevailed. The Count and the Bishop, and the Abbot who
could pierce seven Danes with a single shot of his arrow, ^
finally drove back the heathen to their ships ; and, instead
of the easy storm and sack which they doubtless looked for
* Ann. Ved. S85 : " Nortmanni, patrata victoria valde elati, Parisius adeunt
tunimque statim aggressi, valide oppugnant; et quia necdum perfecte firmata
fuerat, earn se capi sine mora existimant."
i* Regino, 887 : " Erant, ut ferunt, triginta et eo amplius adversariorum
millia, omnes peue robusti bellatores."
X See History of the Norman Conquest, i. 270, ed. ii.
§ Abbo, i. 38 : " Solo rex verbo, sociis tamen imperitabat."
II See above, p. 230.
H i. 107 :—
" Fortis Odo innumeros tutudit. Sed quis fuit alter 1
Alter Ebolus huic socius fuit sequiperansque ;
Septenos una potuit terebrare sagitta,
Quos ludens alios jussit prsebere quoquinae."
23-i THE EARLY SIEGES OF PA/? IS [E^^say
on this as on earlier occasions, the Northmen were driven
to undertake the siege of the city in form.*
One is a little surprised at the progress in the higher
branches of the art of war which had clearly been made
by the enemy who now assaulted Paris. The description
of their means of attack, if not intelligible in every detail,
at least shows that the freebooters, merciless heathens as
they were, were thorough masters of the engineering
science of their age.f But, through the whole winter of
885, all their attempts were unavailing. The skill and
valour of the defenders were equal to those of the besiegers,
and their hearts were strung by every motive which could
lead men to defend themselves to the last. But early in
the next year, in the February of 886, accident threw a
great advantage into the hands of the besiegers. A great
flood in the Seine swept away, or greatly damaged the
lesser bridge, the painted bridge, that which joined the
island to the fortress on the left bank of the river.:}: That
fortress and the suburb which it defended, the suburb
which contained the Roman palace and the minsters of
Saint Genoveva and Saint German, were thus cut off from
the general defences of the city. The watchful care of the
Bishop strove to repair the bridge by night. But the
* Anil. Ved. 8S5 : " Dani, niultis suorum amissis, rediere ad naves ; indeqiie
sibi castrum statuunt adversus civitatem, eamque obsidione valiant machinas
construunt, ignein supponuut, et omne ingenium suum apponunt ad captionem
civitatis ; sed Christian! adversus eos fortiter dimicando, in omnibus exstitere
siiperiores."
+ Let us take Abbo's description (i. 205) of an engine which may have been
only a sow or a tortoise, but which certainly suggests the Trojan horse :
" Ei'go bis octonis faciunt mirabile visu,
Monstra rolis ignara ; modi conipacta triadi,
Robt)ris ingentis, super argete quodque cubante
Donuite sublinii cooperto. Nam capiebant
Claustia binds arcana uteri penetralia veutris
Sexaginta viros, ut adest rumor, galeatos."
X Ann. Ved. 866 : "Octavo Idus Februarii contigit grave discrimen infra
civitatem habitantibus, nam ex gravissima inundatione fluminis minor pons
disriiptus est." It is called "pictus pons" by Abbo, i. 250. It was perhaps
something like the bridges at Luzeru, with their series of paintings of scriptural
and other subjects.
VIII.] THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. 235
attempt was forestalled by the invaders ; the tower was
isolated and surrounded by the enemy. The Bishop and
the other defenders of the city were left to behold, to weep,
and to pray from the walls, at the fate of their brethren
whom they could no longer help."^ The tower was fiercely
attacked ; the gate did not give way till fire was brought
to help the blows of the Northmen ; the defenders of the
tower all perished either by the flames or by the sword, and
their bodies were hurled into the river before the eyes of
their comrades. f The conquerors now destroyed the tower,
and from their new vantage-ground they pressed the siege
of the island city with increased vigour.
The chances of war seemed now to be turning against
the besieged. The stout heart of Bishop Gozlin at last
began to fail ; he saw that Paris could no longer be
defended by the arms of its citizens only. He sent a
message to Henry, the Duke of the Eastern Franks, pray-
ing him to come to the defence of the Christian people.
The Duke came ; we are told that his presence did little or
nothing for the besieged city; J yet in the obscure verses of
* Ann. Ved. SS6 : " Illis vero qui intra turrim erant acriter resistentibus, fit
clamor niultitudinis usque in coelum ; episcopus desuper muro civitatis cum
omnibus qui in civitate erant nimis flentibus, eo quod suis subvenire non
possent, et quia nil aliud agere poterat, (^hristo eos commetidabat."
"t* Ibid. : " Nortmanni cum impetu portam ipsius turris adeunt ignemque sub-
ponunt. Et hi qui intra erant, fracti vulneribus et incendio, capiuntur
atque ad opprobrium Christiauorum diversis iaterficiuntur modis, atque in
flumine preecipitantur."
X Ibid. : " HerkeDgerus [the messenger sent by the Bishop, described as
Comes] . . . Henricum cum exercitu Farisius venire fecit ; sed nil ibi profecit
. . . atque in suani rediit regioneui."
Regino (887) makes the same confession: ''Imperator Heinricum ducem
cum exercitu veinali tempore dirigit, sed minime prsevaluit." The Fulda
Annals alone ^886) seem to make out something of a case for Henry. His army
*' in itinere propter imbrium inundationem et fiigus imminens non modicum
equorum suoruni perpessi sunt damnum." The annnlist then adds : " Quum
illuc pervenissent, Nordmanni rerum omnium abundantiam in munitionibus
suis habentes, manum cum eis conserere nee voluerunt, nee ausi sunt." He
goes on to say that they spent the whole of Lent and up to the Rogation-days
in vain labours (" inani labore consuniptis"). They then went home, having
done nothing except kill some Danes whom they found outside their camp, and
carry ofi a large number of horses and oxen.
236 THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. [Essay
the poet we seem to discern something like a night attack
on the Danish camp on the part of the Saxon Duke and his
followers.* But in any case the coming of the German
allies did nothing for the permanent relief of the city.
They went back to their own land ; Paris was again left to
its own resources ; and at last the Bishop, worn out with
sorrow and illness, began to seek the usual delusive remedy.
He began to enter into negotiations with Sigefrith, which
were cut short by the prelate's death. The news was
known in the Danish camp before it was commonly known
within the walls of Paris, and the mass of the citizens first
learnt from the insultinsf shouts of the besiegers that their
valiant Bishop was no more.f
The Bishop, as long as he lived, had been the centre and
soul of the whole defence, yet it would seem that, at the
actual moment of his death, his removal was a gain. We
hear no more, at least not on the part of the men of Paris,
of any attempts at treating with the enemy. One bitter
wail of despair from the besieged city reaches our ears, and
the hero of the second act of the siege now stands forth.
The spiritual chief was gone ; the temporal chief steps into
his place, and more than into his place. Count Odo appears
as cheering the hearts of the people by his eloquence, and
as leading them on to repeated combats with the besiegers. J
* Abbo, ii. 3 :
" Saxonia vir Ainricus foi-tisque potensqiie
V'enit in auxilium Gozlini prsesulis urbis,
At tribuit victus illi letuiuque cruentis
Heu paucis auxit vitam nostris, tiilit araplam
His piffidam. Sub nocte igitur quadam penetravit
Castra Dandra, multos et equos illic sibi cepit."
After some further description he adds :
" Sic et Ainricus postremum castra reliquit,
Culpa tamen, fugiente mora, defertur ad arcem."
+ Ann. Ved. 886 : " Gauzlinus vero, dum omnibus modis populo Christiano
juvare vellet, cum Sigfrido, rege Danorum, amicitiam fecit, ut per hoc civitas ab
obsidione liberaretur. Dum hsec nguntur, episcopus gravi corruit in infirmi-
tate, diem clausit extremum, et in loculo poaitus est in ipsa civitate. Cujus
obitus Nortniannis non latuit ; et antequani civibus ejus obitus nuntiaretur.
a Nortmannis de foris prfe licatur episcopum esse niortuum.'
X Ibid. : " Dehinc vulgus pertsesi una cum morte patris obsidione, irremedi-
VIIL] THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. 237
At last hunger began to tell on the strength of the de-
fenders ; help from without was plainly needed, and this
time it was to be sought, not from any inferior chief, but
from the common sovereign, the Emperor and King of so
many realms. Count Odo went forth in person on the
perilous errand ; he called on the princes of the Empii-e for
help in the time of need, and warned the sluggish Augustus
himself that, unless help came speedily, the city would be
lost for ever.* Long before any troops were set in motion
in any quarter for the deliverance of Paris, the valiant
Count was again within its walls, bringing again a gleam
of joy to the sad hearts of the citizens, both by the mere
fact of his presence and by the gallant exploit by which he
was enabled to appear among them. The Northmen knew
of his approach, and made ready to bar his way to the city.
Before the gate of the tower on the right bank, the tower
which still guarded the northern bridge, the lines of the
heathen stood ready to receive the returning champion.
Odo's horse was killed under him, but, sword in hand, he
hewed himself a path through the thick ranks of the
enemy; he made good his way to the gate, and was once
more within the walls of his own city, ready to share every
danger of his faithful people.f
Such a city, we may well say, deserved to become the
seat of kings, and such a leader deserved to wear a
royal crown within its walls. Eight months of constant
fighting passed away after the return of Odo before the
abiliter contri.stantur ; quos Odo, illustris comes, suis adhortationibus roborabat.
Nortmanni tamen quotidie non cessant oppiignare civitatem ; et ex utraque
parte mult: interfioiuntnr, pluiesque vulneribus debilitantur, escse etiam
ccepei unt minni in civitate."
* Ann. Ved. 886 : " Odo videns affligi popnlum, clam exiit de civitate,
a principibus regni requirens auxilium, et ut imperatori innotesceret velocius
perituram civitatem, nisi ei auxilium detur."
-|- Ibid. : " Dehinc regressus, ipsam civitatem de ejus absentia niniis repperit
nicerentem ; non tamen in earn sine admiratione intruiit. Nortmanni ejus
reiiitum prsescientes accurrerunt ei ante portam turris ; sed ille, omisso equo,
a dextris et siuistris adversarios csedens, civitatem ingressus, tristem populum
reddidit laetum."
238 THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. [Essay
lord alike of Eome, of Aachen, and of Paris appeared
before the city where just now his presence was most
needed. Towards the last days of summer Duke Hemy
again appeared, but it was fully autumn before the Em-
peror himself found his way to the banks of the Seine. '^
Duke Henry came with an army drawn from both the
Frankish realms, Eastern and Western.f With more show
of prudence than he had shown at his former coming,
Henry began by reconnoitring both the city and the camp
of the enemy, to judge at what point an attack might
be made with least risk. J But the Northmen were too
wary for him. They had surrounded their whole camp
with a network of trenches, three feet deep and one foot
wide, filled up with straw and brushwood, and made to
present the appearance of a level surface. § A small party
only were left in ambush. As the Duke drew near, they
sprang up, hurled their javelins, and provoked him with
shouts. Henry pressed on in wrath, but he was soon
caught in the simple trap which had been laid for him ;
his horse fell and he himself was hurled to the ground.
The enemy rushed upon him, slew him, and stripped him
in the sight of his army.|| One of the defenders of the
* "yEstivn tempore, antequam segetes in miinipulos redigerentur," s.ays
Regino (887) of the coming of Henry, and adds, "Post liasc imperator . . .
venit." This does not practically contradict the Annales Vedastini (886) :
"Circa auctnnini tempora imperator Cari.siacum veniens cum ingenti exercitu,
prsemisit Heiniienni, dictum ducem Austrasiornm, Paiisius."
•\ Eeginii, 8S7 : " Idem Heinricus cum exercitibus utriusque regni Parisius
venit."
+ Ann. Ved. 886: "Qui qnum advenisset illuc cum exercitu prope civi-
tatem, cum panels inconsnlte coepit equitare circa castra Danorum, volens
invisere qualiter exercitus castra eorum posset attingere, vel quo ipsi castra
figere deberent." To which Pegino (f^87) adds: "Sitiim loci contemplatur
aditumque jierquirit, quo exercitui cum hostibus minus periculosus patcret
congn^ssus."
§ This is told most fully by Ilegino (887) : " Porro Nordmanni audicntes
appropiiiquare exercitum, foderant foveas, latitudinis unius pedis et profunditatis
trium, in oircuitu castrorum, casque quisquiliia et stipula operuerant, semitas
tantuiii discursui necessarias intactas reservantes."
II Ibid. : " Aapiciente uuiver.'so exercitu, absque mora trucidant, arma auferunt,
et spolia ex parte diripiunt."
VIII.] THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. 239
city, the brave Count Ragnar, of whom we have already
heard, came in time only to bear off the body, at the
expense of severe wounds received in his own person.*
The corpse of the Duke Avas carried to Soissons and was
buried in the Church of Saint Medard. The army of
Henry, disheartened by the loss of their chief, presently
returned to their own homes. Paris was again left to its
own resources, cheered only by such small rays of hope as
might spring from the drowning of one of the besieging
leaders in the river.f
The news of the death of Henry was brought to the
Emperor. Notwithstanding his grief — perhaps an euphem-
ism for his fear — he pressed on towards Paris with his
ai'my ; but even the chronicler most favourable to him is
obliged to confess that the lord of so many nations, at the
head of the host gathered from all his realms, did nothing
worthy of the Imperial majesty.^ All in truth that the
* The exploit of Count Ragnar comes only from the Annates Vedastini :
" Qiium nudassent ilium ainiis siiis, f^npervenit quidam e Francis, Eagnerus
nomine comes, ejiisqiie corpus non absque vulneribus illis tulit ; quod statim
imperatori nuntiatuni est." Eegino says only, '"Agminibus impetum facienti-
bus, vix cadaver exanime eruitur." He adds, " Exerc:tu.s, amisso duce, ad pro-
pria levertitui."
■\ Abbo, ii. 217 :
" En et Ainricus, superis crebro vocitatus,
Obsidione volens illos vallare, necatur.
Inque sues, nitens Sequanam transire, Danorum
Eex Sinric, geminis ratibus spietis, ]ienetravit
Cum sociis ter nam quinqnagenis, patiturque
Naufragium medio fiuvii, fundum petiturus,
Quo iixit, comitesque simul, tentoria iiiorti,
Hie sua castra prius Sequanae contingere fundum
Quo surgens oritur, dixit, quani linquere regnum
Francorum, fecit Domino tribuente quod iiiquit."
X Eegino, 887 : " Post hsec iniperator, Galliarum populos perlustrans,
Parisius cum immenso exercitu venit, ibique adversos hostes castra posuit, sed
nil dignum im]ieratoria majestate in eodeni loco gessit." So Ann. Ved. 886:
''Ille vero audito nuiltuin doluit ; accepto tamen consilio, Parisius venit cum
manu validii ; sed quia dux periit, ipse nil utile ges.sit." So the Annals of
Fulda, 886 : " Imperator per Burguiidiam obviam Nortmannos in Galliam,
qui tunc Parisios erant, usque pervenit. Occ'so ibi Heiurico, marchensi
Francorum, qui in id t' mpas Iviustriani tenuit, rex, parum prospere actis rebus,
revertitur in sua."
240 THE EARL Y SIEGES OF PARTS. [Essay
Emperor Charles did was to patch up a treaty with the
barbarians, by virtue of which, on condition of their raising
the siege of Paris, they received a large sum as the ransom
of the city, and were allowed to ravage Burgundy without let
or hindrance.* We are told indeed that this step was taken,
because the land to be ravaged — are we to understand the
kingdom of Boso ? — was in rebellion.f At all events, the
Christian Emperor, the last who reigned over the whole
Empire, handed over a Christian land as a prey to pagan
teeth, and left Paris without striking a blow. Charles went
straight back into Germany, and there spent the small
remnant of his reiscn and life in a diss^raceful domestic
quarrel.J One act however he did which concerns our
story. Hugh the Abbot, the successor of Robert the
Strong in the greater part of his duchy, had died during
the siege. The valiant Count of Paris was now, by imperial
grant, put in possession of all the domains which had been
held by his father. §
But the Count was not long to remain a mere Count ;
the city and its chief were alike to receive the reward of
their services in the cause of Christendom. Presently came
that strange and unexampled event by which the last
Emperor of the legitimate male stock of the great Charles
was deposed by the common consent of all his dominions.
The Empire again split up into separate kingdoms, ruled
over by kings of their own choice. The choice of the
Western realm fell, as it well deserved to fall, upon the
illustrious Count of Paris. Later writers, full of hereditary
* Ann. Ved. 886 : "Factum est vere consilium miserum ; nam utrumque,
et civitatis redemptio illis promissa est, et data est via sine impedimento, ut
Burgundiani hieiiie deprsedarent." So Ann. Fiild. 886: "Imperator perterri-
tu«, quibusdam per Burgundiam vagandi licentiam dedit, quibusdam plurimani
promisit pecuniam, hi a regno ejus statnto inter eos tempore discederent."
t Kegiuo, 887: "Ad extremum, concessis terris et regionibus (pue ultra
Sequanam erant Nordmannis ad depraedandum, eo quod iuoolae illarum sibi
obtemiierare nollent, recessit."
X Tiie details follow immediately after in Regino.
§ See aliove, p. 227. So Aim. Ved. 886 : " Terra patris sui Rothberti Odoni
coniiti conceosa, imperator castra movit."
YIII.] THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. 241
ideas, seem hardly to have understood the first election of
a national king, and to have looked upon Odo as simply
chosen as a guardian for the young heir of the Karlings, the
future king Charles the Simple.* But Charles, instead of
Odo's ward, appeared as his most dangerous rival. For tlie
reign of Odo was not undisturbed, nor was his title undis-
puted. He had to struggle in the beginning of his reign
with a rival in the Italian Guy, and in later years he had
to withstand the more formidable opposition of Charles
himself. And, chosen as he was by the voice of what we
may now almost venture to call the French people, hallowed
as king in the old royal seat of Compiegne by the hands of
the Primate of Sens, the metropolitan of his own Paris,!
Odo had still to acknowledge the greater power and higher
dignity of the Eastern king. He had to acknowledge
himself the man of Arnulf, to receive his crown again at
Arnulfs hands, while Arnulf was not as yet a Roman
Emperor, but still only a simple King of the East Franks.J
* Aimon of Fleury, de Regibus Francorum (Pertz, ix. 374) : " Karolus, qui
Simplex postea est dictus, in cunis sevuni ageus, patre orbatus remansit.
Cujus setatein Franeiae primores incongruam, ut erat, exercendse dominationis
arbltrati, maxime quum jam recidivi Nortmannorum nuntiarentur motus,
concilium de summis ineunt rebus. Supererant duo filii Kotberti ; senior Odo
dicebatur, Rotbertus alter, patrem nomine referens. Ex his majorem natu
Odonem Franci, licet reluctantem, tutorem pueri regnique elegere guberiia-
torem, qui mente benignus et reijjublicse hostes arcendo strenue prsefuit, et
l>arvulum optime fovit, atque adolescenti et sua repetenti patienter regna
reludit, a quo parte regni redonatus quo advixit tempore hostibus terribilis
eique semper exstitit fidelis." This account leaves out all mention of Charles
the Fat, as is done also in the Historia Francorum Senonen«is (Pertz, ix. 365) :
" Post hsec defunctus est Hludovicus rex Francorum, filius Karoli Calvi,
relinquens filium suum parvulum, Karolum nomine, qui Simplex appellatur,
cum regno in custodia Odonis principis. Eo tempore gens incredula Nor-
mannorum per Gallias sese difFudit, csedibus, incendiis, atque omni crudelitatis
gtnere debacchata. Deinde Franci, Buigundiones, et Aquitanenses proceres,
congregati in unum, Odonem principem elegerunt sibi in regem." Alberic of
Trois Fontaines, on the other hand, speaks of Charles the Simple as intrusted
to the care of Odo by Charles the Fat.
t Ann. Ved. 888.
+ Ibid.: " Odo rex Rends civitatem contra misses Arnulfi perrexit, qui ei
coronam, ut ferunt, misit, quam in ecclesia Dei genitricis in natali sancti
Briccii capiti impositam, ab omni populo rex adclamatur." Cf. Ann. Fuld,
K
242 THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARTS. [Essay
Still the Count had become a king ; the city which his
stout heart and arm had so well defended had become
a royal city. The rank indeed both of the city and its
king was far from being firmly fixed. A hundred years of
shiftings and changings of dynasties, of rivalry between
Laon and Paris, between the Frank and the Frenchman,
had still to follow. But the great step had been taken ;
there was at last a King of the French reigning in Paris.
The city which by its own great deeds had become the
cradle of a nation, the centre of a kingdom, had now won
its fitting place as their head. The longest and most
unbroken of the royal dynasties of Europe had now begun
to reisrn. And it had beffun to reio-n, because the first man
of that house who wore a crown was called to that crown
as the worthiest man in the realm over which he ruled.
But we must go back to the enemy before Paris. By the
treaty concluded with the Emperor, they were to raise the
siege, but they were left at libert}^ to harry Burgundy and
other lands. The citizens of Paris however steadfastly re-
fused to allow them to pass up the Seine ; so the Northmen
ventured on a feat which in that age was looked on as un-
paralleled.* They saw, we are told, that the city could not
be taken ; so they carried their ships for two miles by land,
and set sail at a point on the river above the city.f While
the Empire was falling in pieces, while new kingdoms were
888-895 ; Regino, 895. Aniulf was not crowned Emperor till 896. An
amusing perversion of this confirmation by Arniilf will be found in Alberic
des Trois Fontaines (8SS), who turns it into a confirniaiiou b}' Cliarles the
Fat: " Normanni, fugati a civitate Parisian, Henonas venerunt, quorum
timore Waltherus Senonensis archiepiscopu.s unxit Odonem in regem, ut exiret
contra cos. Fuit enim i«te Odo frater ex niatre supra dicti Hiigonis abbatis,
filii Karoli niagni ex regina ; unde aliqua erat ratio quod ei in tutela rcgni
Kuccessit. Pdtuit igitur fieri, ut primo ungeretur ab archiepiscopo, postea
confirmaretur, quod factum erat a memorato imperatoie Karolo."
* Kegino, 888 : '' Nordmantii, qui Parisiorum urbem obsiilebant, miram et
inauditam rem, non solum nostra, sed etiani superiore atate fccerunt."
t Ibid. : " Qnum civitatem inexpugnabilem esse persensissent, omni virtute
oumique ii'genio laborare copperunt, quatenus urbe post tergum relicta clas-
sem cum omnibus copiis per Sequanam sursum possent evehere, et sic Hion-
na.m fluvium ingredi(.nies, Burgundia; fines absque obstaculo penetrarent."
VIII.] THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. 213
arising and were being struggled for by rival kings, the
Northmen were harrying at pleasure. Soissons was sacked ;*
after a long and vain attack on the mighty walls of Sens,
the enemy found it convenient to retire on a payment of
money, f Meaux also, under the valiant Count Theodberht,
stood a siege ; but, after the death of their defender, the
citizens capitulated. The capitulation was broken by the
Northmen ; the city was burned, and the inhabitants were
massacred. % By this time Odo was King. Meanwhile the
Northmen, after their retreat from Sens, had made another
attempt on Paris, and had been again beaten off by the
valiant citizens. § The King now came to what was now
his royal city, and established a fortified camp in the
neighbourhood to secure it from future attacks. || Yet,
when the Northmen once more besieged Paris in the
autumn of 889, even Odo himself had to stoop to the
common means of deliverance. The new king, the first
Parisian king, bought off the threatened attack by the
payment of a Danegeld, and the pirates went away by
land and sea to ravage the Constantine peninsula, the land
which, a generation or two later, was to become the special
land of the converted Northmen.^
Paris was at last secured against Scandinavian attack by
* Ann. Ved. 886. + Ibid. J Ibid.
§ Kegino, 889 : " Nordmanni a Senonica urbe recedentes, denuo Parisius
cum omnibus copiis devenerunt. Et quum illis descensus fluminis a civibus
omnino inhiberetur, rursus castra ponunt, civitatem totis viribu.s oppugnant,
sed, Deo opem ferente, nihil prEevalent."
11 Ann. Ved. 888 : " Circa autumni vero tempera Odo rex, adunato exercitu,
Parisius venit ; ibique castra metatus est prope civitatem, ne iterum ipsa
obsiiieretur."
^ Regino, 890: "Civibus qui continuis operiim ac vigiliarum laburibus
indurueraut, et assiduis bellorum conflictibus exercitati erant, audaciter reluc-
tantibus, Nordmanni, ilesperatis rebus, naves i)er terram cum magno sudore
trahunt, et sic alveiim repetentes, Britanniae finibus classem trajiciuiit. Quod-
dam castelluin in Constantiensi territorio, quod ad sanctum Loth dicebatur,
obsident." The action of Odo comes from Ann. Ved. 889 : " Contra quos
[Danos] Odo re.K venit ; et nuntiis intercurrentibus, munerati ab eo regressi
a Parisius, relictaque Sequana, per mare navale iter atque per terram pcdestre
tt equestre agentes in territorio Constantiae civitatis circa castrum sancti Laudi
sedem sibi faciunt, ipsumque castrum oppugnare non cessant."
R 2
244 THE EAliLY SIEGES OE PARIS. [Espay
the establishment of the duchy of Normandy. By the
Treaty of Clair-on-Epte in 913, Hrolf Ganger (changed in
French and Latin mouths into Rou and Rollo) became the
man of the King of Laon for lands which were taken away
from the dominion of the Duke of Paris. Charles the
Simple, the restored Karling, was now King ; Robert, the
brother of Odo, was Duke of the French ; and there can be
no doubt that the tottering monarchy of Laon gained much
by the dismemberment of the Parisian duchy and by the
establishment at the mouth of the Seine of a vassal bound
by special ties to the King himself. The foundation of the
Rouen duchy at once secured Paris against all assaults of
mere heathen pirates. France had now a neighbour to the
immediate north of her — a neighbour who shut her off from
the sea and from the mouth of her own great river —
a neighbour with whom she might have her wars as with
other neio^hbours — but a neiafhbour who had embraced her
creed, who was speedily adopting her language and manners,
and who formed part of the same general political system
as herself. The shifting relations between France and
Normandy during the tenth and eleventh centuries form
no part of our subject, but it will be well to bear in mind
that Paris was at once sheltered and imprisoned through
the Norman possession of the lower course of the Seine.
It follows then that the next besiegers of Paris came from
a different quarter ; and these next besiegers came from the
quarter from which its last foreign besiegers have come.
In the course of the tenth century, the century of so many
shifting relations between Rouen, Laon, and Paris, while
the rivalry between King and Duke sometimes broke forth
and sometimes slumbered, Paris was twice attacked or
threatened by German armies. Botli the first and the
second Otto at least appeared in the near neighbourhood
of the city. In 946, the first and greatest of the name, not
yet Emperor in formal rank, but already exercising an
Imperial pre-eminence over the kingdoms into which the
Frankish Empire had split up, entered the French duchy
VIII.] THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. 245
with two royal allies or vassals in his train. One was the
Burgundian King Conrad, lord of the realm between the
Rhone and the Alps ; the other was the nominal King of
Paris and its Duke, Lewis, alike the heir of all the Karlings
and the descendant of our own Alfred, whose nominal
reign over the Western kingdom was in truth well nigh
confided to the single fortress of Compiegne. Among the
shifting relations of the princes of the Western kingdom,
Hugh Duke of the French and Richard Duke of the
Normans were now allied asrainst their Carolinofian over-
lord. He had lately been their prisoner, and he had been
restored to freedom and kingship only by the surrender of
the cherished possession of his race, the hill and tower of
Laon. Otto, the mighty lord of the Eastern realm, felt
himself called on to step in when Teutonic interests in the
Western lands seemed to be at their last gasp. The three
kings united their forces against the two dukes, and
marched against the capitals both of France and Nor-
mandy. But never were the details of a campaign told
in a more contradictory way. There can be little doubt
that Rouen was besieged, and besieged unsuccessfully.
Thus much at least the German historian allows ; * in
Norman hands the tale swells into a magnificent legend.f
What happened at Paris is still less clear. Laon, for the
moment a French possession, was besieged unsuccessfully,
and Rheims successfully.^ Then, after a vain attempt on
* Widukind, iii. 4: " Exinde, collecta ex onini exercitu electorum militum
manu, Rothun Danorum urbem adiit, bed difficultate locorum, asperioriqiie
hieme ingruente, plaga eos quidem magna percussit ; incolumi exercitu, in-
fecto negotio, post tres menses Saxoiiiam regressus est."
t See Dudo's account in Duchesne, Rer. Norm. Sciiptt., 130-134; or
Palgrave, ii. 562-578.
X Richer, ii. 54 : " Tres itaque reges, in unum collecti, primi certaminis
laborem Lauduno inferendum decernunt. Et sine mora, illo exercituin
ducunt. Quum ergo ex adverse moiitis eininentiam viderent, et oiiini parte
urbis situm explorarent, cognito incassum sese ibi certaturos, ab ea urbe dis-
cedunt et Romos adoriuntur." He then goes on to describe the taking of
Rheims. This is confirmed by Widukind, iii. 3: "Rex cum exercitu Lug-
dunum adiit, eamque armis tentavit." He places the taking of Rheims after
246 THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. [Essay
Senlis, the combined armies of the kings of Aachen, Aries,
and Compiegne drew near to the banks of the Seine.
Flodoard, the canon of Rheims, the discreetest writer of
his age, leaves out all mention of Paris and its duke ;
he tells us only that the kings crossed the river and
harried the whole land except the cities.* The Saxon
Widukind tells us how his king, at the head of thirty-
two legions, every man of whom wore a straw hat,f
besieged Duke Hugh in Paris, and duly performed his
devotions at the shrine of Saint Denis. J From these two
entries we are safe in inferring that, if Paris was now in
any strict sense besieged, it was at least not besieged
successfully. But Richer, the monk of Saint Remigius, one
of the liveliest tale-tellers of any age, is ready with one of
those minute stories which, far more than the entries of
more solemn annahsts, help to bring us face to face with
the men of distant times. The kings were drawing near to
the Seine. In order that the enemy might be cut off from
all means of crossing, the Duke of the French, Hugh the
Great, had bidden all vessels, great and small, to be taken
away from the right bank of the river for the space of
twenty miles. But his design was hindered by a cunning
stratagem of the invaders. Ten young men, who had
made up their mind to brave every risk,§ went in advance
the attack on Paiis, and afterwards, perhaps inadvertently, speaks of Laon as
if it had been taken. LiujiJumwi is of course a mistake for Laadiumm.
* Flodoard, 946 (Pertz, iii. 393) : " Sicque trans Sequanam contendentes,
loca quisque prseter civitates gravibus atterunt deprredatioiiibus."
+ Widukind (iii. 2) records Otto's an-*wer to a boastful message of Hugh :
" Ad quod rex famosuin satis reddit respoiisum ; sibi vero fore tantam
multitudinem pileorum ex culmis contextorum, quos ei praesentari oporteret,
qnantam nee ipse nee pater suua umquam videret. Et revera, qmini esset
niagnus valde exercitus, triginta sc'licet duarum legionuni, non est inventus
qui hujusmodi non uteretur tegumento, nisi raiissimus quisque." On these
straw hats see Pertz's note.
* Widukind (iii. 3), innnediatcly after the attempt on Koueu, adds : " Inde
J'arisius perrexit, Hugonenique ibi obsedit, nieinoriaui (juoque Dionysii niar-
tyris digne honorans veneratus est."
§ Richer, ii. 57 : " Decern numero jUvenes quibus consianti mente fixum
erat omne periculuin subire." He then describes their pilgrim's garb.
VIII.] THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARTS. 247
of the army of the kings, having laid aside their warhke
garb and provided themselves with the staves and wallets
of pilgrims. Protected by this spii-itual armour, they
passed unhurt and unchallenged through the whole city of
Paris, and crossed over both bridges to the left bank of the
river. There, not far from the suburb of Saint German,
dwelled a miller, who kept the mills which were turned by
the waters of the Seine.* He willingly received the comely
youths who professed to have crossed from the other side of
the river to visit the holy places. They repaid his hospitality
with money, and moreover laid in a stock of wine, over
which they spent a jovial day. The genial drink opened
the heart and the lips of the host, and he free'y answered
the various questions of his guests. He was not only a miller ;
he was also the Duke's head fisherman, and he moreover
turned an occasional penny by letting out vessels for hire.
The Germans praised the kindness which he had already
shown them, which made them go on to ask for further
favours. They had still other holy places to pray at, but
they were wearied with their journey. They promised
him a reward of ten shillings — no small sum in the tenth
century — if he would carry them across to the other side.
He answered that, by the Duke's orders, all vessels were
kept on the left bank to cut off the means of crossing
from the Germans. They told hira that it might be done
in the night without discovery. Eager for his reward, he
agreed. He received the money, and, accompanied by
a boy, his stepson, he guided them to the spot where
seventy-two ships lay moored to the river-side. The boy
was presently thrown into the river ; the miller was seized
* Richer, ii. 57 : " Ille furlnariuin sese memorat, at illi prosecuti, siquid
nmplius pussit inteiToi;ant. Ille etiani piscatorum ducis magistrum se asserit,
et ex navium accouimodatione questum aliquem .sibi adesse." This miller of
the Seine appears also in a story of Geoffrey Grisegonelle in the Gesta Con-
suliim Andegavensium (D'Achei-y, Spicilegium, iii. 247) : "In crastino consul
furtivus viator, egreditur, non longe a Parisiaca urbe burgum sancti German!
devitans, a molendinario qui molendinos Secanae custodiebat, date ei suo
habitu, uavigium sibi parari impetravit."
248 rilE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. [Essay
\>y the throat, aud compelled by threats of instant death to
loose the ships. He obeyed, and was presently bound and
put on board one of the vessels. Each of the Germans now
entered a ship and steered it to the right bank. The whole
body then returned in one of the vessels, and each again
brought across another. By going through this process
eight times, the whole seventy-two ships were brought
safely to the right bank. By daybreak the army of the
kings had reached the river. They crossed in safety, for all
the men of the country had fled, and the Duke himself
had sought shelter at Orleans. The land was harried as far
as the Loire, but of the details of the siege of Rouen and of
the siege of Paris, if any siege there was, we hear not
a word.*
The military results of the first German invasion of France
and Normandy were certainly not specially glorious. Laon,
Senlis, Paris, and Rouen were, to say the least, not taken.
All that was done was to take Rheims and to ravage
a large extent of open country. But in a political point
of view the expedition was neither unsuccessful nor unim-
portant. From that time the influence of the Eastern
king in the aflairs of the Western kinofdom becomes of
paramount weight, and under his protection, the King of
the West-Franks, king of Compiegne and soon again to
be king of Laon, holds a far higher place than before in
the face of his mighty vassals at Paris and Rouen. The
next German invasion, forty years later, found quite
another state of thinj^s in the Western kingdom. The
relations between King Lothar and Duke Hugh Capet
were wholly diflferent from the relations which had existed
between their fathers. King Lewis and Duke Hugh the
Great. No less different were the relations between Lothar
* All tliat Richer (ii. 58) tells us is that Otto's troops, after crossing the
river, " terra recepti incendiis pra^disque vehementibus totain regioiiem usque
Ligerim deiiopulati sunt. Post hsec feruntur in terrain piratarum ac solo tenus
devastant. Sic(iue regis injuriam atrociter ulti, iter ad sua retorquent." The
" terra piratarum " is of course Normandy.
TUT.] THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. 249
and Otto the Second from those which had existed between
their fathers Lewis and Otto the Great. The elder Otto
had been a protector, first to his brother-in-law and then
to his nephew ; the younger Otto was only a rival in the
eyes of his cousin.* On the other hand, it was the policy
of Hugh Capet to keep up the dignity of the crown which
he meant one day to wear, and not to appear as an open
enemy of the dynasty which he trusted quietly to sup-
plant. For a while then the rivalry between Laon and
Paris was hushed, and the friendship of Paris carried with
it the friendship of Eouen and Angers. Thus, while Lewis,
a prince than whom none ever showed a loftier or more
gallant spirit, was hunted from one fortress or one prison
to another, his son, a man in every way his inferior, was
really able to command the forces of the whole land north
of the Loire. Again the king of Gaul looked Rhine-
wards ; the border land of Lotharingia kindled the am-
bition of a prince who might deem himself king both of
Laon and Paris. That border land, after many changes to
and fro, had now become an acknowledged portion of the
Eastern kingdom. But a sudden raid might win it for the
king of the West, and the Duke of Paris would be nothing
loth to help to make so great an addition to the kingdom
which he meant one day to make his own. The raid was
made ; the hosts of the King and the Duke crossed the
frontier, and burst suddenly on the Imperial dwelling-place
of Aachen. The Emperor, with his pregnant wife, the
Greek princess Theophano, had to flee before the approach
of his cousin, and Lothar had the glory of turning the
brazen eagle which his great forefather had placed on the
roof of his palace in such a direction as no longer to be
a standing menace to the Western realm. f As in a more
* Lothar was the son of Lewis and of Gerberga the sister of Otto the
Gieat ; Lothar and the younger Otto were therefore cousins.
f Richer, iii. 71 : " ^ream aquilam quae in vertice palatii a Karolo Magno
ac si volans fixa erat, in Vulturnum converterunt. Nam Germani earn in
Favonium converterant, subtiliter significantes GaHos suo equitatu quandoque
posse devinci." h"0 Thietmar of Merseburg, iii. 6 (Pertz, iii. 761), records the
250 THE EARLY SIEGES OE PARIS. [Essay
recent warfare, the Gaul began with child's play, and the
German made answer in terrible earnest. The dishonour
done to their prince and his realm stirred the heart of all
Germany, and thirty thousand horsemen — implying no
doubt a far larger number of warriors of lower degree —
gathered round their Emperor to defend and avenge the
violated Teutonic soil. Lothar made no attempt to defend
his immediate dominions ; he fled to crave the help of his
mighty vassal at Paris.* The German hosts marched,
seemingly without meeting any resistance, from their own
frontier to the banks of the Seine. Everywhere the land
was harried ; cities were taken or surrendered ; but the pious
Emperor, the Advocate of the Universal Church, ever}'-
where showed all due honour to the saints an<i their holy
places. t In primatial Rheims, in our own days to be the
temporary home of another German king, the German
Coesar paid his devotions at the shrine of Saint Remigius,
the saint who had received an earlier German conqueror still
into the fold of Christ. + At Soissons Saint Medard received
equal w^orship. and, when the church of Saint Bathild at
Chelles was burned without the Emperor's knowledge, a
large sum was devoted to its restoration. But if the shrines
of the saints were reverenced, the palaces of the rival king-
were especially marked out for destruction, Attigny was
burned, and nearly equal ruin fell upon Compiegne itself.
Meanwhile the King had fled to Etampes, in the immediate
turning of the eagle and adds : " Hsec stat in orieutali parte doinfls, niorisqtie
fuit oniniuni hiinc locum possidentium, ad sua earn vertere regna." The raid
on Aachen is also described by lialilric in the Gesta Episcoporum Caniera-
censiuni, i. 96 (Pertz, vii. 440). He always .speaks of Lotliar as " rex Karlen-
.siiim," and of his kingdom as "' partes KarleuNiuni." In Thietmar he is " rex
Karolingcrum." S^e above, p. 221.
* Uicher, iii. 74: "Sic etiam versa vice, Ijothariiim adurgens, eo quod
militum copiam non haberet, fluvium Sajuanam transire compulit, et geme-
bunduiii ad ducem ire coegit."
t Gest. Ep. Cam. i. 97 : " Patcrnis moi-ibus inslructus, ecclesias observavit,
immo etiam opulentis miineribus dilare potius testimavit."
+ Kicher, iii. 74: "Per fines urbis Kemorum transieus sancto Kemigio
mullum honorem exhibuit."
VIII.] THE EARLY SIEGES OF EARfS. 251
territory of the Duke, while Hugh himself was gathering
his forces at Paris. At last the German host came within
sight of the ducal city. Otto now deemed that he had done
enough for vengeance. Ho had shown that the frontiers of
Germany were not to be invaded with impunity; he had
come to Paris, not to storm or blockade the city, but to
celebrate his victorious march with the final triumph of
a pious bravado. He sent a message to the Duke to say that
on the Mount of Mart^'rs he would sing such a Hallelujah
to the martyrs as the Duke and people of Paris had never
heard. He performed his vow ; a band of clergy were
gathered together on the sacred hill, and the German host
sang their Hallelujah in the astonished ears of the men of
Paris. This done the mission of Otto was over, and after
three days spent within sight of Paris, the Emperor turned
him to depart into his own land."^
Such, at least, is the tale as told by the admirers of the
Imperial devotee. In the hands of the monk of Rheims
the story assumes quite another shape, and in the hands of
the panegyrist of the house of Anjou it inevitably grows
into a legend. f Richer tells us how the Emperor stood for
three days on the right bank of the river, while the Duke
was gathering his forces on the left ; how a German Goliath
challenged any man of France to single combat, and
presently fell by the dart of a French, or perhaps Breton,
* This story comes from Baldric, Gest. Ep. Cam. i. 97 : " Deinde vero ad
pompandam victoriaj suae gloriam Hugoni, qui Parisius residebat, per lega-
tionem deiiuntiaiis, quod in tautam sublimitatem Alleluia faceret et decantari
in quiinta non audierit, accitis quam pluribus clericis Alleluia te martyviim in
loco qui dicitur Mons Martyrum, iu tantnm elatis vocibus ilecantari praecepit,
nt attonitis auribus ipse Hugo et omnis Pari.siorum plebs miraretur." The
" Mon.s Martyrum" is, we need .scarcely say, Montmartre.
f Gest. Cons. Andeg. vi. 2. Very little can be made of a story in which the
invasion of Otto is placed in the reign of Pobert, the son of Hugh Capet, who
is represented as King, his father being still only Duke. The expedition of
Otto is thus described : " Otto siquidem rex Alemannorum cum nniversis
copiis suis Saxonum et Danorum Montem Morentiaci obsederat et urbi Parisius
niultos assultus ignominiose faciebat." Geoffrey Grisegonelle couies to the
rescue with three thousand men.
252 THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. [Essay
David ;* how Otto, seeing the hosts which were gathering
against him, while his own forces were daily lessening, deemed
that it was his wisest course to retreat.f As for the details
of the retreat, our stories are still more utterly contradictoiy.
One loyal French writer makes Lothar, at the head of the
whole force of France and Burgundy, chase the flying
Emperor to the banks of the Maes, whose waters swallowed
up many of the fugitives.! The monk of Rheims transfers
the scene of the German mishap to the nearer banks of the
Aisne.§ while the Maes is with him the scene of a friendly
conference between the two kings, in which Lothar, dis-
trusting his vassal at Paris, deems it wiser to purchase the
good will of the Emperor by the cession of all his claims
upon Lotharingia.|| The most striking details come from
the same quarter from which we get the picture of the
Hallelujah on Montmartre. The Emperor, deeming that he
had had enough of vengeance, went away on the approach
of winter : ^ he reached the Aisne and proposed to encamp
* Richer, iii. 76, The name of the French champion is Ivo.
+ Ibid. iii. 77 : " Otto, Gallorum exercitiim seiisim coUigi noii ignorans, siuim
etiam tarn longo itinere qiiam hostiuna incursu posse minui sciens, redire dis-
poiiit, et datis signis ca.stra ainoverimt."
X Rudolf Glaber, i. 3. His way of telling the whole story sliould be noticed :
" Lotharius .... lit erat agilis corpore, et validiis, sensuque integer, tentavit
redintegrare regnnm, ut olim fiierat." This is explained in the next sentence:
" Nam partem ipsius regni superiorem, quae etiam Lotharii regnum cognomi-
natur, Otto rex Saxonuiii, inimo imperator Romanorum [this means Otto the
Great, ' primus ac maximus Otto '], ad suum, id est Saxonum, inclinaverat
regnum." The retreat is thus described : " Lotharius ex omni Francia atque
Burgundia niilitari manu in unum coacta, persecutus est Oitonis exercitum
usque ill fluvium Mosani, multosque ex ipsis fugientibus in eodem flumine
contigit interire."
§ Richer, iii. 77 : " Axonte fluvii vada festinantes alii transmiaerant, alii
vero ingrediebaiit quum e.xercitus a rege missus a tergo festinantibus afFuit.
Cjui reperti fuere mox gladiis hostium fusi sunt, plures quidem at nullo
nomine clari."
II Ibid. iii. 80, 8i : " Eelgicte pars quse in lite fuerat in jus Ottonis transiit."
Rudolf Glaber clearly means the same thing when he says, " Dehinc vero
uterque cessavit, Lothario minus explente quod cupiit."
^ (iest. Ep. Cam. i. 98 : " Qui [Otto] quum satis exhausta ultione congruam
vicissitudinein se rependisae putaret, ad hihorna oportere se concedere ratus,
inde simul revocato equitatu, circa festivitatem sancti Andrese, jam hieme
VIIT.J THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS 253
on its banks. But by the advice of Count Godfrey of
Hennegau, who warned him of the dangers of a stream
specially liable to floods, he crossed with the greater part of
his army, leaving on the dangerous side only a small party
with the baggage.* It was on this party that Lothar,
hasteniDg on with a small force, fell suddenly, while a sudden
rise of the stream hindered either attack or defence on the
part of the main armies. f Otto then sends a boat across
with a challenge, proposing that one or the other should
allow his enemy to cross without hindrance, and that the
possession of the disputed lands should be decided by the
result of the battle which should follow.:]: '-Nay, rather,"
cried Count Geoffrey, probably the famous Grisegonelle of
Anjou, " let the two kings fight out their differences in their
own persons, and let them spare the blood of their fol-
lowers."§ " Small then, it seems," retorted Count Godfrey
in wrath, •' is the value that j^ou put upon your king. At
least, it shall never be said that German warriors stood
tamely by while their Emperor was putting his life in
jeopardy." II At this moment, when we are looking for
subeunte, reditum disposuit ; lemensoque itinere, bono successu gestaium
rerum gaudens super Axonam fluvium castra metari prsecepit."
* Gest. Ep. Cam. i. 98 : " Paucis tamen famulorum remanentibus, qui re-
trogradientes — nam sarcinas bellicse supellectilis convectabaiit — prae fatigatione
oneris, tenebris siquidem jam noctis incumbentibus, transitum in ctastino
differre arbitrati sunt."
•[ Ibid. : " Ipsa etenim nocte in tantum excrevit alveolus, ut difficultate
importuosi litturis neuter alteri inanum conferre potuerit ; hoc ita sane, credo,
Dei voluntate disposito, ne strages innumerabilis ederetur utrimque."
X Ibid. The prize was to be, "Commissa invicem jjugna, cui Deus annueret
laureatusregni imperio potiretur." This challenge again reminds us of Brihtuoth.
Compare the references in History of the Norman Conquest, i. 271, note i.
§ Ibid.: "Quid tot ab utraque parte caedentur? Veniaut ambo reges in
unnm tantuminr do, nobisque procul spectantibus, summi periculi soli subeuntes
una conferantur, unoque tuso cateri reservati victori subjiciantur."
II Ibid. : " Semper vestrum regem vobis vileni haberi audivimus non cre-
dentes ; nunc autem vobismetip^is fateiitibus, credere fas est. Numquam
nobis quiescentibus noster imperator pugnabit, numquam nobis sospitibus in
picelio periclitabitur." Compare the proposal of the Argeians for a judicial
combat to decide the right to tlie disputed laud of Thyrea ; Thuc. v. ^i,rois Se
AaKfSaifj.oi'ioii to fiiv irpSirov kSuKU fxwp'ta tivai ravra, much as it seemed to
Count Godfrey.
254 THE EARLY SIEGES OF PARIS. [Essay
some scene of exciting personal interest, the curtain sud-
denly falls, and our most detailed narrator turns away
from the fortunes of emperors and kings to occupy him-
self with his immediate subject, the acts of the bishops
of Cambray.'^
Putting all our accounts together, it is hard to say
whether, in a military point of view, the expedition of
Otto the Second was a success or a failure. If his design
was to take Paris, he certainly failed. If he simply wished
to avenge his own wrongs and to show that Germany
could not be insulted with impunity, he undoubtedly suc-
ceeded. In either case the political gain was wholly on
the German side. King and Duke acted together during
the campaign ; but each, in its course, learned to distrust
the other, and each found it expedient to seek the friend-
ship of the Emperor as a check against his rival, f And
more than all, the Imperial rights over Lotharingia were
formally acknowledged by Lothar, and were not again
disputed for some ages. J
This campaign of 976 has a special interest just now,
as its earlier stages read, almost word for word, like a
forestalling of the events of the last and the present year
of wonders. But it is a campaign which marks a stage
in the history of Europe. It is the first war that we
can speak of as a war waged between Germany and any-
thing which has even the feeblest claim to be called an
united France. When Otto the Great marched against
Paris and Rouen, he was fio^htinfj in the cause of the
* His comment (Gest. Ep. Cam. i. 99) is: " Hoc igitnr modo regibus inter
se discordantibus, jam dictu difficile est quot prucellis factionum intoiiantibus
ab ipsis suis vassallis afficitnr Tetlido episi-'opus."
+ Richer, iii. 78. Lotliar debates whether he shall oppose Otto or make
friends with him : " Si staret contra, cogitabat possibile esse ducem opibus
corrumpi, et in amicitiam Ottoiiis relabi. Si veconciiiaretur hosti, id esse
accelerandum, ne dux prae^^entiret, et ne ipse quoque vellet i-econciliari.
Talibus in dies afficiebatur, et exinde his duobus Ducem susjiectuni habuit."
See also the story of Hugh's dealings with Otto (S2-85).
J So Thietinar of Merseburg, iii. 6: " lleversus inile imj)er.ator triumphali
gloria, tantum liostibus incussit terrorem \it numquam post talia incipere
auderent ; recompensatumque est iis quicquid dedecoris piius intulere nostris."
YIIL] THE EARLY SIEGES OF l\iR IS. 255
King of the West-Franks, the lawful overlord of the
dukes against whom he was fighting. When Otto the
Second marched against Paris, he was fiofhtino: asfainst
king and dukes alike, and king and dukes between them
had at their call all the lands of the strictly French
speech, the tongue of oil. Aquitaine, and the other lands
of the tongue of oc, had of course no part or lot in the
matter ; then, as in later times, there were no Frenchmen
south of the Loire. But if the expedition of Otto was
in this sense the lii-st German invasion of France, it was
also for a long time the last. It is not often that Imperial
armies have since that day entered French territory at
all. The armies of Otto the Fourth appeared in the
thirteenth century at Bouvines, and the armies of Charles
the Fifth appeared in the sixteenth century in Provence.
But Bouvines, lying in the dominions of a powerful and
rebellious vassal, was French only by the most distant
external allegiance ; and Provence, in the days of Charles
the Fifth, was still a land newly won for France, and
the Impeiial claims over it were not yet w^ioUy forgotten.
Botli invasions touched only remote parts of the kingdom,
and in no way threatened the capital. Since the election
of Hugh Capet made Paris for ever the head of France
and of all the vassals of the French kingdom, the city
has been besieged and taken by pretenders, native and
foreign, to the Capetian crown, but it has never, till our
own century, been assailed by the armies of the old
Teutonic realm. The fall of the first Buonaparte was
followed by a surrender of Paris to a host which called
up the memories alike of Otto of Germany and of Henry
of England. The fall of the second Buonaparte was fol-
lowed before our own eyes by the siege of Paris, the
crowning-point of a war whose first stages suggest the
campaign of the second Otto, but which, for the mighty
interests at stake, for the long endurance of besieger and
besieged, rather suggests the great siege at the hands
of Sigefrith. But all alike are witnesses to the position
256 THE EARLY SIEGES OE PARIS.
which the great city of the Seine has held ever since the
days of Odo. Paris is to France, not merely its greatest
cit}^ the seat of its government, the centre of its society
and literature ; it is France itself ; it is, as it has been
so long, its living heart and its surest bulwark. It is
the city which has created the kingdom, and on the life
of the city the life of the kingdom seems to hang. What
is to be its fate?^ Is some wholly different position in
the face of France and of Europe to be the future doom
of that memorable city ? Men will look on its possible
humiliation with very different eyes. Some may be dis-
posed to take up the strain of the Hebrew prophet, and
to say, '• How hath the oppressor ceased, the golden city
ceased ! " Others will lament the home of elegance and
pleasure, and what calls itself civilization. We will, in
taking leave of Paris, old and new, wind up with the
warning, this time intelligible enough to be striking, of
her own poet : —
" Francia cur latitas vires, narra, peto, priscas,
Te majora triumphasti quibus atque jugiisti
Regna tibi ? Propter vitium triplexque piaclum.
Quippe supercilium, Veneris quoque feda venustas,
Ac vestis preciosiB elatio te tibi tollunt !
Afrcdite adeo, saltein quo arcere parentes -j-
Haud valeas lecto, nionachas Domino neque sacras ;
Vol quid naturain, siquideni tibi sat mulieres,
Despicis, occurrant? Agitainus fas<[ue nefasque.
Aurea sublimem mordet tibi fibula vesteui,
Efficis et calidaiu Tyria carnem preciosa.
Non prseter chlaniydem auratam cupis indusiari
Tegmine, decu:'ata tuos geuimis niai zona
Nulla fovet luinbos, aurique pedes nisi virgse,
Non habitus humilis, non te valet abdeie vestis.
HiEC facis ; hsec aliae faciunt gentes ita nullse ;
Haec tria ni linquas, vires regnunique paternum
Omne scelua super his Cliristi, cujus quoque vates,
Nasci testaiitur bibli ; fuge, Francia, ab istis!"
* [In Januaiy 1871 I did not foresee — who did ? — a second siege of Paris —
still less a burning of Paris — at the hands of Frenchmen.]
■)■ That is, simply kinswomen ; parentes in the French sense.
(257)
IX.
FREDERICK THE FIRST, KING OF ITALY *
Op all the many odd freaks of diplomacy which we have
seen of late, perhaps the very oddest was when an Austrian
statesman last year defended the possession of Lombardy
by his master on the ground that that province was " a
fief of the German Empire." Considering that there never
was such a thing as " the German Empire " — considering
also that, if there was, Lombardy never was a fief of it f —
considering again that Francis Joseph of Lorraine is in
no sense the heir or successor of the old German kings —
considering also that, if he were, it would by no means
prove his right to any particular fief of their kingdom —
considering all this, the statement, whether as a historical
assertion or a political argument, is certainly remarkable
in all its parts. We do not undertake to decide whether
the diplomatist who made it was really so strangely igno-
rant himself, or whether he was, after the manner of
diplomatists, merely practising upon the presumed igno-
rance of others. In either case it shows the reckless way
in which people allow themselves to turn the facts of
past times into political arguments about present afiairs.
If it is true in any sense that " Lombardy is a fief of the
German Empire," it is equally true of all Germany, of
* [This Essay appeared in January 1861, and I keep the political allusions
as thev were then written. It is curious and pleasant to see all that ten years
have done.
The peculiar title was chosen, because the Essay dealt mainly with the
Italian side of Frederick, and also to show people that there had been Kings
of Italy.] [1871.]
f [That is to say, Lombardy was a fief of the Eoman Empire .and of the
Kingdom of Italy, not of the Kingdom of Germany.] [1871.]
2.-8 FREDERICK THE FIRST, KISG OF ITALY. [EsfAY
the greater part of Italy and Felgium, of nearly all Hol-
land, all Switzerland, and about a third of France. If
Francis Joseph is lawful mastei* of Lombardy, because
Lombardy was "a fief of the German Empire," his claim
must be equally good to be absolute lord of all the coun-
tries which we have reckoned up, to say nothing of vaguer
claims to superiority over Poland, Denmark, England, and
the world in general.
We have mentioned this diplomatic freak as an instance
of the way in which the ancient relations of Germany
and Italy may be misrepresented or misconceived from
the German side. Not long ago we fell in with an Italian
novel, fairly interesting, but not very remarkable, which
shows how they may be misrepresented or misconceived
from the Italian side. This novel, Foleheflo Alalef^pina by
name, dealt with the days and the deeds of — since the
great Charles himself — the greatest German who ever set
foot upon Italian soil. Now most certainly any one who
drew his idea of Frederick Barbarossa fiom that story
alone w^ould set him down as having as little business
in Italy as Francis Joseph has at Venice and Cjacow,
or Louis-Napoleon at Rome and Chambery. It would
never occur to a reader of Fule/teUo j\Iak\y)iHa that Frede-
rick, German as he was, was the elected, crow^ned, and
anointed King of Italy and Emperor of the Romans, a
king whose sovereignty was acknowledged in theory by
all Italy, and was zealously asserted in act by a large
portion of the Italian nation.
It is most desirable, for the sake both of the present
and the past, that misconceptions of this sort should not
be allowed to confuse the right understanding of either.
We undertook in a former Essay to show that Louis-
Napoleon Buonaparte was not the successor of Charles
the Great. We now assert, with equal confidence, that
Francis Joseph of Lorraine is just as little the successor
of the Saxon Ottos or the Swabian Fredericks. The legal
and traditional riijhts of the old Teutonic kings have
IX.] FREDERICK THE FIRST, KING OF ITAL Y. 259
absolutely nothing in common with the brute force of
the modern Austrian tyranny. Let this be well under-
stood on both sides, and it will be impossible to dress
up an imposture of yesterday in the borrowed plumes
of a fallen but still venerable power, and it will be need-
less to pervert and depreciate a great cause and a great
man, because, at a superficial glance, his career seems to
run counter to the cause which has the sympathy of every
generous heart of our own day.
Our immediate business is to give a picture, both per-
sonal and political, of Frederick Earbarossa as the greatest
and most typical of the German kings of Italy, and therein
to show that there is absolutely nothing in common between
the position of the old Swabian and that of the modern
Austrian. We have chosen Frederick, both as being the
most famous name amonor the Teutonic kings, and because
he is really the best suited for our purpose. Charles the
Great stands by himself, alone and without competitor.
He was the founder ; those who came after him were
at most his successors. And again, the four centuries
which elapsed between Charles and Frederick had greatly
altered the position of the world. Charles belongs to the
debateable ground between ancient and raedifeval history;
Frederick belongs to a century which is the most typical
of all the middle ages. In the days of Charles much was
still living and practical which in the days of Frederick
had become matter of learninof and tradition. Charles was
really a Roman Augustus ; he stepped, as naturally as
a barbarian Frank could step, into the place of which the
female usurper at Byzantium was declared unworthy.
Frederick was a real king of Germany, and a king
almost equally real of Italy ; but the Imperial title was
now little more than a magnificent pageant, to be disputed
about by priests and lawyers. In the days of Charles,
the Bishop of Rome was as clearly the subject of the
Emperor as his rival at Constantinople. In the days of
Frederick the Popes had reached that ambiguous condition,
S 2
260 FBEDERICK THE FIRST, KING OF IT A L T. [Essay
neither subject nor sovereign, which was in truth the
source of their most efficient power. In short, it would
require the ingenuity of a French bishop to see any
likeness between Charles the Great and anything now
on the face of the earth. But Frederick comes near
enough to us to be easily misunderstood. In his days
the old Francia had vanished. Germany, France, and
Italy, in the modern sense of those words, already existed.
A King of Germany warring in Italy, now conquering,
now conquered, building up with one hand, and pulling
down with another, has enough of superficial likeness to
phsenomeua of our own times to make it worth while to
stop to show the points of real unlikeness. And again,
Frederick is the best suited for our purpose of the post-
Carolingian Emperors, if only because he is far the best
known. Like Charles the Great, he has become a hero
of romance : he has become, as it were, the patriarch of
a nation, and his memory still lives in the German heart
as the impersonation of German unity. Frederick was
certainly not personally superior to his predecessors Otto
the Great and Henry the Third ; but he has contrived
to attract to himself a greater portion of the world's
lasting fame. Again, in the reign of Henry the Fourth
the chief interest, as far as Italy is concerned, is of an
ecclesiastical kind ; in the reign of Frederick the eccle-
siastical interest is subordinate to the political. Hilde-
brand himself is the arch-antagonist of Henry, but one
cannot help looking at Alexander the Third chiefiy as
the ally of Milan. Again, Frederick Barbarossa, like all
other German kings, and indeed like almost all other
men, cannot be compared, in extent and variety of natural
gifts, to his wonderful grandson and namesake. But the
very genius of Frederick the Second, and the whole cir-
cumstances of his life, put him out of all competition.
Frederick Barbarossa is essentially a man of a particular
age and country ; he is in everything, for good and for
evil, a German of the twelfth century. But his grandson
IX.] FREDERICK THE FIRST, KING OF ITALY. 261
can hardly be said to belong to any particular nation.
The child of a German father and a Norman mother,
born and brought up in his half-Greek, half- Saracen realm
of Sicily, the first patron of the newborn speech and
civilization of modern Italy, it is hard to say what blood
or what culture predominated in him ; but it is clear
that the Teutonic element was the weakest of all. In
the largeness of his views, in the versatility of his powers,
he rises intellectually as far above his grandfather as he
sinks beneath him morally. It is never desirable for
history to descend, either with prudish or with prurient
curiosity, into the secrets of private life ; still it is im-
possible to avoid comparing the almost acknowledged
harem of the second Frederick, his concubines and bas-
tards openly thrust upon the w^orld, with the seemingly
decent and regular household of his grandfather. Perhaps
indeed we may be more inclined to forgive the license
which produced Manfred and Hensius, than the lawful
matrimony which gave birth to Henry the Sixth ; still,
as concerns the men themselves, it is clear that the elder
Frederick lived the life of a Christian king, and the
younger that of a Saracen sultan. In matters coming
more properly within the sphere of history, we cannot
fancv Frederick Barbarossa wanderins: into the reo-ions
of forbidden religious speculation ; but still less can we
imagine him acting the part of a cruel persecutor of
heretics,* without a particle of religious bigotry, simply
to ward off the suspicion of heterodoxy from himself.
Frederick the Second, in the higher parts of his character,
was beyond his age, almost beyond all ages ; but for that
very reason he had but little real influence upon his own
generation, and is least of all men to be taken as typical
* How far Frederick Barbarossa was responsible for the death of Arnold
of Brescia does not seem quite clear ; but to have spared a man whom every
Catholic looked on as a heretic, and every Ghibelin as a traitor, would have
required as keen a vision as that of Frederick the Second combined with
a clemency beyond that of his grandfather.
262 FREDERICK THE FIRST, KIJSG OF ITAL Y. [Essay
of it. Eut the elder Frederick was one whose every idea
was east in the mould of his own age and nation. He
devoted himself, with a steadfast and honourable devotion
which won the respect of his enemies, to those objects
to which it was natural that a German king of the twelfth
century should devote himself. Most of those objects are
utterly alien to the sympathies of our own time ; many
of them were opposed by those men of his own day with
whom we are naturally most inclined to side. Still, a
candid mind will ever honour the zealous devotion of
a life to any cause not palpably unrighteous, and un-
stained by means which are palpably dishonourable. A
prince whose life was mainly given up to crush the grow-
ing liberties of Italy appears at first sight as an object
of something almost like abhorrence. But only look at
him with the eyes of a contemporary German, or of an
Italian of his own side, and we shall soon see that the
enemy of Italy in the twelfth century was at least one
of a far nobler mould than the Bourbon, the Corsican,
and the Lorrainer, witli whom she has had to struggle
before our own eyes.
Our present object is chiefly to consider the character and
position of Frederick with regard to the kingdom of Italy ;
his relations with powers like Poland and Denmark, his
two crusades, even his internal policy in his German realm,
hardly concern us. Now, fully to understand that position,
we must, for a short space, take up that general thread of
early mediseval history which we dropped in our Seventh
Essay. We there saw that the great Frankish Empire of
Charles the Great was, at least from the year cS8(S, cut up
into the four kingdoms of Eastern Fraueia or Germany,
Western Fraticla, Burgundy, and Italy ; and that of these it
was Eastern Francia, the Fi'f/nitm TenUmiciim, which had by
far the fairest claim to be looked upon as the true continu-
ation of the kingdom of Charles and Pippin. The Eastern
Frank clave to the tongue and manners of his forefathers,
and kept possession of the city which was the great
IX.] FREDERICK THE FIRST, KIXG OF TTA L Y. 263
Emperors chosen dwelling during life and his resting-place
after death. For nearly four hundred years the crown of
Germany passed through a succession of dynasties, which
produced at least their fair share of able and valiant kings.
We have been so used for some ages past to look upon
Germany as a country utterly divided, or united only
by the loosest of federal ties, that we have some difficulty
in realizing the Regmim Tenfouicum of the early middle age
as a single kingdom, and, for those times, far from a dis-
united kingdom. Of course it would not answer modern
ideas of English good government, still less Parisian ideas
of centralization. A Duke of Saxony or Bavaria was a
very formidable subject, and he had very little scruple about
rebelling; against his liesre lord. But he was far more
orderly and obedient than a Duke of Normandy or a Count
of Flanders. In short, the Germany of Henry the Third
was nearly as united as the England of Edward the
Confessor, and incomparably more united than the France
of Philip the First. A revolt in Germany, like a revolt in
England, was a rebellion, and was felt and spoken of as
such ; but hostilities between Rouen and Pai-is have rather
the character of foreign war. The object of the great
Saxon war against Henry the Fourth was to dethrone the
reigning king and to set up another, a tribute to his
importance which the king of Paris never received from
his refractory feudatoi'ies. While the King of the French
never got farther from his capital than Orleans or Com-
piegne, the kings of the Teutonic kingdom were constantly
moving from province to province and from city to city
throughout the whole of their vast realm. Above all, while
no diet or assembly of any kind brought the French
feudatory into peaceful contact either w^ith his lord or with
his fellow- vassals, all Germany was constantly flocking
together to those Collorpiia which occupy as important a
place in the pages of Lambert of Herzfeld as our own
Witenagemots, Great Councils, and Parliaments do in those
of our own early historians. In a word, the Saxon,
2G4 FREDERICK THE FIRST, KIXG OF ITALY. [Essay
Frankish, and Swabian Emperors were, in a true and prac-
tical sense, Kings of Germany ; the early Capetians were only
in the vaguest and most nominal way Kings of France.
But the kingdom of Germany was not the only realm
which obeyed the sceptre of Frederick. For nearly two
hundred years before his time it had been acknowledged
that the prince who was elected to the sovereignty of the
regnum Teutonicum acquired thereby at least an inchoate
right to the iron crown of the Italian kingdom and to the
golden crown of the Roman Empire. Otto the Great had
appeared in Italy, at the call of the Italians themselves, as
the most powerful among the successors of the Great
Charles ; he was crowned and anointed Emperor of the
Romans, and, as Emperor of the Romans, he exercised the
fullest sway over the Pontiff and the people of the Eternal
City. From his time onward the rank of King of Germany
was but a step to the higher rank of Roman Emperor ; till
at last the very name of the German kingdom was lost,
and the prince who was crowned at Aachen, but not yet
crowned at Rome, bore the title of King, instead of
Emperor, of the Romans. It is easy to see that this
increase of dignity proved the real ruin of the German
kingdom. It involved at least one Italian campaign in
every reign ; each successive king had to fight his way to
his Italian capital. It called off the sovereign from the
aiFairs of his native kingdom to struggle with Popes and
commonwealths in a land which it was vain to hope really
to hold in any constant and regular obedience. And again,
the very rank of Roman Emperor, with all the halo of
superhuman grandeur which surrounded it, must have
tended to diminish the real power of the German king.
Csesar Augustus might well be looked upon as almost too
exalted to act as the local king of a particular kingdom.
His power gradually diminished ; the Impcrator Urhis et Orbis
at last owned hardly a foot of ground in his Imperial
capacity, and another prince was formally acknowledged as
sovereign of the city from which he drew his highest title.
IX.] FREDERICK THE FIRST, KING OF ITALY. 265
Had therefore the German kings Otto, Henry the Third,
and Frederick himself, sternly abstained from all inter-
meddling in Italian affairs, we can hardly doubt that the
German kingdom would have greatly gained thereby. Per-
haps their once compact and powerful realm might have
remained compact and powerful to this day. But it would
have required foresight more than human to refuse the
Imperial crown for themselves and for their nation.
National distinctions had not then made themselves so
distinctly felt as they have since. The universal sway of
the old Csesars, its more recent renovation by Charles, were
not yet forgotten among men. That there should be a
Roman Caesar was something in the eternal fitness of
things ; and to whom could that highest place on earth be
so worthily decreed as to the best and most powerful of the
successors of Charles ? Again, a large part of the higher
ranks in northern Italy were of German descent, and they
probably had not yet wholly forgotten their German origin.
And, though the speech of daily life was different in
Germany and in Italy, yet the use of one language for
every public purpose throughout Western Europe greatly
tended to make national distinctions less strongly felt.
Their practical effect was just as strong; but men did not
then, as they do now, openly assert and act upon the
principle that difference of race or language is a ground for
difference of political government. We do not remember
during the whole of Frederick's Italian warfare, any distinct
and openly-avowed case of Italians as Italians acting
against the German as a German. No man denied
Frederick's right either to the Kingdom of Italy or to the
Roman Empire. The only doubt was as to the nature and
extent of his royal rights ; and no doubt the growing
republican spirit of the cities would quite as readily have
disputed the rights of a native sovereign. And Frederick
was throughout the chief of a large Italian party, who
supported him with even greater zeal than his German
countrymen. Possibly theii* loyalty was misplaced, but it
2GG FREDERICK THE FIRST, KING OF ITALY. [Essay
was loyalty to an acknowledged legitimate king, not
traitorous adhesion to a foreign invader. Frederick was in
Italy the king of a party ; if he was cursed as a destroyer
at Milan, he was worshipped as a founder at Lodi. The
truth is that, in the twelfth century, Italian patriotism did
not exist. Each man had the warmest local aflection for
his own city, but of Italy as a country he had no idea
whatever. Indeed, as the cities more and more assumed
the character of independent republics, as the notion of a
separate Italian kingdom grew fainter and fainter, national
as distinguished from local patriotism grew fainter and
fainter also. A variety of circumstances in each particular
case made the Emperor the friend of one city and the
enemy of another. But the Milanese who resisted
Frederick resisted the enemy, not of Italy, but of Milan ;
the men of Cremona and Pavia who followed his banner
never dreamed that in supporting their own friend, they
were supporting the enemy of their country. Difference of
blood, speech, and manners may have silently aggravated
the bitterness of the conflict ; yet the German historian*
holds up his hands in horror at the cruelty of the Italians
to one another, compared with which the mutual hate of
German and Italian was love and gentleness. Nowhere,
in short, do we find any signs of that really national feeling
which awoke in aftertimes, the feeling with which stout
Pope Julius longed for the expulsion of the Barbarians, or
that which now unites all Italy from the Alps to the Pharos
in loathing at the sway of Austria. The union of Germany
and Italy under a single king was, in truth, something
utterly hopeless ; the attempt to bring about such an union
brought much of lasting evil on both countries ; but
openly to acknowledge that it was hopeless would have
required a more long-sighted statesman than the twelfth
century was likely to produce. We sympathize with the
* " Noll ut cogiiatus pnpulus, iion lit cl<jiiiesticiis iiiiiniciis, seJ velut iu
externos liostes, in alieiii^'ena*, tauta in sese iiivicein sui gentiles crudulitate
BiEviunt quanta nee in barbaros deceret." — Otto Fris. lib. i. cap. 39.
IX.J FREDERICK THE FIRST, KING OF ITALY. 267
Italian opponents of Frederick, but we sympathize with
them rather as the assertors of civic freedom as against
Imperial power than as the defenders of Italy against
a foreign invader. Italy, in short, in the twelfth century
was not an '• oppressed nationality."
It was therefore in support of claims consecrated by long
and venerable traditions, of claims admitted in name by
the whole nation and zealously supported by a powerful
party, that Frederick waged his long warfare in Italy. We
have endeavoured to give some notion of the cause which
he represented ; we will now attempt to draw a picture of
the man himself, and to give a slight sketch of his policy
and actions as far as concerns Italy. In so doing we shall
endeavour, as far as possible, to draw our estimate of the
man and his acts directly from contemporary sources. It
is of course impossible but that remembrances of Gibbon,
Sismondi, and Milman should now and then influence us ;
but we have certainly done our best to form our judgement
from the evidence of men who were spectators, and some-
times actors, in the events. Most of the chronicles of this
period are to be found in the sixth volume of the great
collection of Muratori. Among these, the first place in
rank belongs to no less a person than Frederick himself,
who gives a summary of the early events of his reign in a
letter to Otto, Bishop of Freising, prefixed to that prelate^s
history. The second place in dignity and the first in im-
portance is undoubtedly due to Otto himself. This episcopal
historian was himself of princely, even of Imperial descent ;
he was the son of Leopold the Third, Margrave of Austria,
by Agnes, daughter of the Emperor Henry the Fourth.
But as this same Agnes, by her first marriage with
Frederick the First, Duke of Swabia, was the mother of
Duke Frederick the Second, the father of the Emperor
Frederick, it follows that Bishop Otto was himself the
uncle of the subject of his history. That historj^, as we
have said, may be read in the sober text of Muratori ; *
* [It lias since appeared in one of the latest volumes of Pertz.]
268 FREDERICK THE FIRST, KING OF ITAL Y. [Essay
but we have chosen rather to study it in a noble old copy,
dated Strassburg 15x5, ushered in with Imperial diplomas
from King Maximilian, and adorned with abundance of
Imperial eagles. Otto first wrote a general history of the
w^orld in seven books, ending with the election of his
nephew Frederick, in 1152, followed by an eighth book, of
a diviner sort, containing an account of what is to happen
at the end of the world. Like all chronicles of the kind, it
is valueless alike for prophecy and for early history, but it
becomes useful as it draws near the writer's own time. He
afterwards accompanied his Imperial nephew in his first
Italian expedition, and wrote two books Be Gestis Friderkl
Primi, which fill one of the highest places in the list of
mediteval writings. He however unluckily gets no
further than the fourth year of his hero's reign ; but his
work is continued in two books more by Radevic, a canon
of his own church, down to 1160, the year in which
Radevic wrote. Both these authors, of course, write from
the Imperial side, but both seem to write as fairly as one
can expect, and they are especially valuable in quoting
contemporary documents. Otto writes like a prince,
admiring his nephew without worshipping him, and
showing throughout the wide grasp of a statesman, and a
most remarkable spirit of observation in everyway. Radevic,
as becomes his place, is not the rival, but, as far as in him
lies, the careful imitator of the prelate who promoted him.
Both of them were high-minded German churchmen, and
we look on their witness on the Emperor's side with far
less suspicion than on that of the Imperialist writer next
in importance. This is Otto Morena of Lodi, an Italian
lawyer, who filled some judicial ofiice under Frederick and
the two preceding kings, Lothar and Conrad. We must
remember that this was just the time when the study of
the Civil Law was reviving ; and there can be no doubt
that its study was of no small advantage to the Imperial
cause. Frederick came into Italy with the sword of
Germany in the one hand and the books of Justinian in
IX.] FREDERICK THE FIRST, KING OF ITAL Y. 269
the other. No doubt the jurisconsult of Lodi honestly saw
in the Swabian king the true successor of Augustus and
Constantine, the Csesar of whom it was written that quod
principi placuif, hgh Iiahet vigorem.^ But no doubt this
conviction produced in the mind of Otto the Judge an
allegiance of a far more servile kind than the Teutonic
loyalty of Otto the Bishop. We can fully understand the
enthusiastic affection which every citizen of Lodi would
feel for his royal patron and founder ; still we soon get
wearied of the sancfiss'ujms, the fltdcissimiis, the Chnsfian-
usimu-^, and the whole string of superlatives which Otto
delights to attach to every mention of the Imperial name.
Otto's own chronicle goes down to 1162; both as judge
and as annalist he was succeeded by his son Acerbus, an
equally firm adherent to the Imperial cause, but who is
somewhat less profuse in his adulation, and who does not
scruple sometimes to pronounce censure on his master's
actions. His attachment to Frederick himself never fails ;
but he paints in strong colours the evil deeds of the
Imperial lieutenants during Frederick's absence,! and the
little heed which the Emperor himself took to punish
them. J The history of Acerbus Morena ends with his own
death, in 1167 ; the record of that event, and the character
of the author, were doubtless added by another hand.
These are the chief writers on the Imperial side. On the
other side we have the too brief chronicle of the Milanese
Sire Raul in the sixth volume of Muratori, and the life of
Pope Alexander in the collection of the Cardinal of Ai-agon
in the third. The sixth volume also contains a few
smaller pieces on particular parts of the story ; one of
which is Buoncompagni's Narrative of the Siege of Ancona,
a most interesting piece of description, but to which, as it
is not strictly contemporary, it strikes us that Sismondi
has given more weight than it deserves as a historical
* Inst. Just. lib. i. cap. ii. § 6.
t Apud Muratori, t. vi. col. 1 127. J Ibid. col. I131.
270 FREDERICK THE FIRST, KIXG OF ITALY. [Essay
document. We may remark generally, that the writers on
the papal and republican side commonly speak of the
Emperor with a strong feeling of respect. If we want
good hearty abuse of Frederick Barbarossa, we must turn
to the letters of our own Saint Thomas of Canterbury and
his correspondents. The cause of the difference is obvious.
To the French and English partizans of Alexander, Fred-
erick was a mere distant bugbear, a savage enemy of the
Church, to be abhorred as much or more than any Sultan
of Paynimrie. Those who saw him nearer, even as an
enemy, understood him better. Those who fought against
him knew that they were contending with a noble and
generous enemy, and with one who, after all, was their
own acknowledged sovereign. Popes too always com-
manded, even from their own party, less of reverence in
Italy than they did anywhere else ; the sacrilegious war-
fare of the Ghibelin, which seemed so monstrous on this
side the Alps, assumed a dye far less deep in the eyes of
those among and against whom it was actually waged.
Frederick was elected King in 1152. He came to the
crown by that mixture of descent and election w^hich was
so common in the early middle age, and which modern
writers so constantly misunderstand. Nearly every modern
state has settled down into a hereditary monarchy, and has
enacted for itself a strict law of succession, because it has
been found that, wdiatever arguments may be brought
aijainst that form of government, it has at least the great
practical advantage of hindering dissensions and civil
w^ars. Those earlier times had no clear idea of strict
hereditary right ; but the family feeling was intensely
strong, and in those days the personal character of a king
was everything. A king could not then be a mere con-
stitutional puppet ; a great man was loved or he was
feared — in either case he was obeyed ; a small man, with
equal legal autliority, was despised, disobeyed, perhaps
deposed (jr murdered. The ideal king needed two (]uali-
fications : he must be the descendant of former kings, and
IX.] FREDERICK THE FIRST, KISG OF ITAL Y. 271
he must be himself fit foi' the kingly office. Hence we
constantly find a king succeeded, not by the person whom
we should call his next heir, but by him who was deemed
the worthiest of the royal house. Thus Coni-ad, by his last
will, recommended, not his son, but his nephew Frederick,
as his fittest successor in his kingdoms : and the princes of
those kinofdoms confirmed his choice. Conrad's eldest son,
who, according to a common practice, had been crowned
in his lifetime as his successor, was dead ; his second son
was too }Oung: Germany had no desire for such another
minority as that of Henry the Fourth ; Frederick was
young, brave, vigorous ; he united the blood of the two
great contending houses ; the son of a Ghibelin father
and a Guelfic mother, he was the man of all others who
might be expected to secure peace* at home and victory
abroad. He was therefore unanimously chosen King by
the assembly at Frankfurt, and he received the crown
of the Teutonic kingdom f at Aachen, the royal city of
the Franks. J But besides Germany, the newly-elected
monarch had at least an inchoate right to the royal crowns
of Burgundy and Italy and to the Imperial diadem of
Eome. Of Burgundy we need say little more than that he
visited the kingdom once or twice, that he secured his in-
terest there by his marriage with the Burgundian princess
Beatrice, and at last, rather late in his reign, in the year
1 1 78, found leisure for a solemn coronation at Aries. §
But our interest centres round him in his character of
King of Italy and Emperor of the Romans. Otto of
Freising distinctly tells us that Italian barons took a part
in Frederick's election at Frankfurt. || We know not who
* Otto Fris. ii. 2 : cf. Urspergeiisis in anno (p. 295), wbo plays on the name
rriedrich = Pad's Dives.
•\ " Post primam unctionem Aquisgrani et acceptam coronam Teutonic!
regni." — Ep. Frid. ap. Otton. Fris.
X " In sede regni Franeoriini, quae in eadem ecclesia a Caiolo magno posita
est, collocatur." — Otto Fris. ii. 3.
§ '' Anno Domini niclxxviii. iii. nonas Augusti Fridericus primus imperator
coronatus fuit apud Arelatem." — Vit. Alex. iii. ap. Muratori, toui. iii. p. 447.
II " Non sine quibusdam ex Italia taronibus." — Otto Fris. ii. i.
272 FREDERICK THE FIRST, KING OF ITALY. [Essay
these Italian barons may have been, what was their number,
or how far they were really entitled to speak in the name
of the Italian kingdom. But whoever they were, whether
many or few, whether they were summoned or came of
their own accord, it is clear that their presence must have
tended to give at least an outward appearance of right
to the new king's claims over Italy, both in his own eyes
and in those of others. As King-elect of Italy, his course
was to hold an assembly of the Italian kingdom at Ron-
caglia, to receive at Milan the iron crown of the Lombard
kings, and thence to advance to Rome, and there receive the
golden crown of the Roman Empire at the hands of the
Roman Pontiff. This was the regular course for each
newly-elected king ; in theory he went on a peaceful errand
to his capital ; in practice he commonly had to fight his
way at every step. Two things always strike us in these
Imperial progresses : no Emperor ever gets to Rome and
leaves it aijain without meeting with more or less of resist-
ance^ and yet that resistance never assumes any organized
national form. No man denies his claims ; a strong party
zealously asserts them ; and yet no king is turned into an
Emperor without bloodshed. The truth is that it was an
utter unreality for a German sovereign of the twelfth
century to attempt to unite Italy under his sceptre, yet no
one fully understood that it was an uni-eality. The German
king claimed only what his predecessors had always
claimed ; half Italy was ready to receive him with open
arms ; learned doctors of the Civil Law told him that his
Imperial rights were something all but eternal ; — how were
his eyes to be opened 1 Rome herself lived upon memories
of the past ; she fluctuated between memories of the republic
and memories of the Empire. Sometimes she set up a
consul, a senator, a tribune ; sometimes she welcomed the
German invader as the true Augustus Csesar. The whole
atmosphere of the age seems saturated with this kind of
unreality; it was unreal, but it was not knowingly put on ;
people thoroughly believed in it, and therefore the unreality
IX.] FREDERICK THE FIRST, KING OF ITALY. 273
became real, and had most important practical results. We
are half inclined to laugh when the German sovereign calls
himself Romanorum Imperafor semper Atig^istus.^ — when the
German historian studiously adopts Koman language, talks
about urhs and orhis Homanus, and dates from the foundation
of the city of Romulus. It is quite impossible to avoid
laughing, even at the great Frederick, when he writes, or
causes some eloquent bishop to write in his name, to tell
the Saracen Sultan that he is speedily coming to avenge
the defeat of Crassus, and once more to restore his Empire
to its widest limits under Trajan.* It sounds strangest of
all when the Romans themselves send, first to Conrad and
then to Frederick, asking him to come and live among
them, and reign over them as a constitutional Emperor, the
choice and the child of the Roman Senate and People.f
This last was too much ; when it came to this, Frederick
did find out that, if he was to reign at all, it could only be
as a Teutonic conqueror. The successor of Charles and Otto
was not prepared to be told that he was a stranger whom
Rome had taken in ; and when Rome asked five thousand
pounds of gold as the price of her recognition, Rome
learned, in the triumphant words of Bishop Otto, that the
Franks did not buy Empire with any metal but steel. All
this was very absurd and very unreal ; that is, we at this
distance of time see that it was so. But it is not very won-
derful that the men of the time were less clearsighted, that
old traditions and venerable names were too strong for them.
The result is, that, in reading the history of the times, we
can fully sympathize with both sides. Our first and most
natural sympathy is with the heroes of Italian freedom, the
defenders of Milan, the founders of Alessandria, the men who
routed Frederick, himself upon the glorious field of Legnano.
But we should do very wrong if we looked upon Frederick
* See Frederick's letter to Saladin, in Roger of Howden, ii. 357, Stubbs;
Ralph of Diss, Decern Script. 640. The copy in Roger of Wendover (vol. ii.
p. 429, ed. Coxe) le.ives out the flourishes about Crassus and Marcus Antonius.
t See the letter to Conrad, Otto Fris., i. 28 ; the embassy to Frederick,
ii. 21.
274 FREDERICK THE FIRST, KISG OF ITALY. [Essay
as a cruel and unprovoked aggressor, or on his Italian par-
tisans as traitors to their native land. Neither side has a
monopoly of right or a monopoly of wrong. As no candid
man can read our own history of the seventeenth centuiy,
and not enter into the feelings alike of the best supporters
of the King and of the best supporters of the Parliament, so,
if we look upon Frederick and his enemies with the eyes of
the twelfth and not with those of the nineteenth century,
we shall find equal cause for admiration in the patriots of
Lodi and in the patriots of Tortona, in the assertors of the
venerable rights of the Roman CiEsar and in the assertors of
the new-born freedom of the commonwealths of Lombardy.
Frederick then came into Italy as a claimant of strictly
legal rights, but of rights which we can now see to have
been inconsistent with the circumstances of the time. The
Imperial rights in Italy could be exercised only by fits and
starts. Frederick came after one of the periods of inter-
mission. During the reigns of Lolhar and Conrad the royal
authority in Italy had fallen very low ; Frederick came to
raise it again, to claim and to win back every power which
had been exercised by Charles and Otto and Henry the
Third. But he did not come in exactly the same character
as any of those great Emperors. They came at the prayer
of Italy, as deliverers from utter anarchy, from the tyranny
of cruel kings, or from the abominations of rival and wicked
pontiffs. Frederick had no such advantage. During the
practical interregnum which preceded his reign, a spirit had
been at work, and a power had been gi'owing up, in Italy
against which earlier Emperors had not had to struggle.
The freedom of the cities had made wonderful advances ;
municipalities were fast growing into sovereign common-
wealths. With this spirit a king, anxious to assert his
royal rights to the full, especially after a time of partial
disuse, could not fail to come into conflict. Otto and
Henry the Third came into Italy as champions of right
against wrong ; they did not sin against a freedom which
in their days was not yet in being ; Frederick unhappily
TX.] FREDERICK THE FIRST, KING OF ITALY. 275
was driven to appear, as no earlier Emperor had appeared,
as the direct enemy of freedom. The rights of the crown,
as he understood them, and the rights of the republics, as
the republics understood them, must have clashed sooner or
later. The immediate occasion of his warfare with Milan is of
comparatively little moment, because the immediate occa-
sion, whatever it was, was not the real determining cause.
In the narrative of Otto Morena the wrongs of Lodi hold
the first place ; the holy and merciful king comes mainly
to deliver Otto and his fellow-citizens from Milanese op-
pression.* The Milanese Raul seems hardly to think Lodi
worth speaking of: the sagacious Frederick f wishes to
bring Italy under his power ; Milan is at war with Pavia ;
his sagacity leads him to take the side of Pavia as the
weaker city. Frederick's own laureate tells us how, through
the neo-lect of former kino's, the wicked had grown stronc^
in Lombardy, and how the proud city of Saint Ambrose
refused to pay tribute to Csesar.J The Prince-Bishop of
Freising sets forth a variety of motives as working on the
mind of his Imperial nephew : the wrongs of Lodi are not
forgotten, though they are less prominent in the pages
of Otto the Bishop than in those of his namesake the
Judge. The immediate occasion of the attack was almost
accidental; the consuls of Milan wilfully led the King's
array through a country where no provisions were to be
had. and that at a time when the soldiers were generally
out of humour at the bad weather.§ Anyhow the war, which
could not have been long put off, now began, — that great
struggle which occupied thirty years out of the thirty-eight
of the reign of Frederick.
* Otto Mor ap. Muratori, torn. vi. col. 957 et seriq.
■j- " Rex Fedricus, homo industrius, sagacissimus, fortissimus." Ap. Mur.,
torn. vi. col. 1 1 73.
% " De tributo Csesaris nemo cogitabat;
Omnes erant Caesare?, nemo censum diibat;
Civitas Ambrosii velut Troja stabat ;
Deos parum, homines minus formidaliat."
Gedichte auf Kiittiy Friedrich, p. 65.
§ Otto Fris., ii. 1 3.
T %
27G FREDERICK THE FIRST, KLXG OF ITALY. [Essay
We of course cannot pretend to give anything like a
narrative of this long warfare. All that we can do is
to comment on a few points which illustrate the character
of Frederick and his cause. Primarily the war was a
purely political one ; it was only by accident that it put on
anything of a religious character. The struggle between
Frederick and Alexander the Third is not exactly analogous
to the struggle between Henry the Fourth and Hildebrand,
or to that between Frederick the Second and a whole suc-
cession of pontiffs. Pope and C?esar never could pull
together, and Frederick, almost as a matter of course, had
several matters of dispute with Pope Hadrian. One indeed
concerned nothing less than the tenure of the Imperial
crown. The controversy turned on a word. Hadrian spoke
of the heni'jic'ini)! which he had conferred upon Frederick
by officiating at his Roman coronation.* Frederick, doubt-
less with a feudal lawyer at his elbow, asks if the word
beneJiciuM is meant to imply that the Emperor of Rome
was a v&,ssal of the Bishop of Rome. Hadrian disclaims
any such intention ; he held that he had done the Emperor
a benefit.^ but he did not pretend to have invested him
with a henejjce. It is not unlikely that, if Hadrian had
lived, a struggle of the Henry and Hildebrand type might
have arisen between him and Frederick. As it was the
strife was of another kind. Henry and Frederick the
Second were, as far as Popes were concerned, open foes of
the Church ; Frederick the Second certainly was more
sinned against than sinning ; still, he was condemned,
deposed, excommunicated, by pontiffs and councils whose
authority was not disputed. Henry the Fourth indeed
disputed the rights of Hildebrand and set up a Pope of his
own; but he did not do so till his crimes had brought down
upon him the wrath of the hitherto undisputed pontiff.
Indeed, Henry did not enthrone his Anti-pope in Rome till
Gregory had set up an Anti-Csesar in Germany. The case
of Frederick Barbarossa was quite different ; he was not the
* Kad. Fris., iii. 15 et seqq.
IX.] FREDERICK THE FIRST, KISG OF ITALY. 277
foe of the Church, but merely of that party in the Church
which triumphed in the end. The Roman s^^ee was the
subject of a disputed election : the accounts of that election
are so utterly contradictory that it seems quite impossible
to adopt either statement without imputing (what one is
always loth to do) direct falsehood to the other party.
Frederick had to choose between the rival pontiffs, and he
doubtless chose the one whose disposition best suited his
policy. Roland, otherwise Alexander the Third, had ali-eady
shown himself a strong assertor of hierarchical claims ;
Octavian, otherwise Victor, was more disposed — at all
events while his party was the weaker — to yield to the
successor of Constantine and Justinian that loyal submission
which Constantine and Justinian* had most certainly
exacted from his predecessors. The cause of Alexander
naturally triumphed ; a Pope i-eigning under Imperial pro-
tection was no Pope at all ; Frederick's very support of
Victor drove strict churchmen to the side of Alexander.
Again, the mere fact of Alexander's long reign, which
allowed the papal power to be wielded for many successive
years by the same hand, greatly contributed to his strength
and dignity, as contrasted with the quick succession of the
Imperialist anti-popes. Above all, Alexander, the spiritual
enemy of Frederick, found it politic to coalesce with his
temporal enemies ; and the combined strength of the Church
and the republics proved in the end too much for the arms
of Csesar. Frederick was at last driven to seek absolution
from the Pope, and to acknowledge the liberties of the
cities. As Alexander was thus in the end triumphant, the
Church has branded Victor, his successors and his adherents,
with the charge of schism ; and Frederick, in the invectives
of churchmen in other lands, appears in the odious character
of a persecutor. Still one might think that to choose the
wrong Pope in a warmly-disputed and very doubtful case
was at worst a venial sin : it does not appear that Frederick
* Pope Hadrian was unlucky in quoting .Justinian as the type of Imperial
reverence for the papacy. Had. Fris., iii. 15.
278 FREDERICK THE FIRST, KING OF ITALY. [Essay
sinned against any acknowledged principle of the religion
of his age ; his warfare was not against the popedom, but
against a particular pope, whom he denounced, and whom
he may well have sincerely looked on, as an usurper of the
Holy See.
Our estimate of Frederick's personal character will be
mainly determined by the estimate which we may form of his
conduct during this long w^ar. Assuming its justice from
his own point of view, we can hardly fail to honour his
untiring devotion to the cause which he had taken in hand.
It is of course easy to say that that cause was simply his
own exaltation. It would of course be easy to draw a
touching picture of all the miseries of war, — of slaughter
and plunder and devastation, of stately cities levelled with
the ground, of men, women, and children driven from their
native homes — merely that one man might enjoy the delight
of exercising increased power, or that he might gratify the
more childish desire for an useless bauble and an empty
title. Nothing would be easier than to accumulate charges
of cruelty, obstinacy, and disregard of human suffering,
against a sovereign who spent nearly his whole reign in
warring against his own subjects. Talk of this sort is
extremely easy, but it would give a very false view of
the case. No one, we think, can go through the history
of the time without clearly seeing that Frederick w^as
not actuated by any low personal ambition, but that he
felt himself to have a mission, to which he zealously and
sincerely devoted himself. To him the rights of the Roman
Empire were a sacred cause, in whose behalf he was ready
to spend and to be spent. He was doubtless stirred up by
as clear a sense of duty to assert his Imperial claims as any
Milanese patriot was stirred up to withstand them. Of
course, in fighting for the rights of the Empire, he was also
fighting for his own gi-eatness and glory. And what man
is there who can quite separate himself from his cause?
Heroes, patriots, martyrs at the stake, do and suti'er for
a cause which they hold to be righteous ; but it is utterly
IX.] FREDERICK THE FIRST, KING OF ITAL Y. 279
impossible that they can wholly forget that the triumph of
their cause brings success and power to themselves, and
that, even in defeat and martj^rdom, they win the fame and
sympathy of mankind. Take the very purest of men,
heroes whom no temptation of rank or wealth or power
could ever corrupt for a moment, — Timoleun, Washington,
or Garibaldi, — even they, we cannot but believe, must feel
a greater excitement in the path of duty from the thought
that they are winning for themselves the present love and
gratitude of their fellow-citizens, and everlasting glory in
the pages of history. That Frederick therefore was fighting
in the cause of his own greatness really proves nothing
against him. His purpose was no petty, passionate, momen-
tary ambition, such as has too often influenced the policy of
rulers in all ages. We see in him a steady untiring devo-
tion to a cause which, in his eyes, was the cause of right.
That we do not sympathize with his cause proves nothing.
Let us compare him with a prince in almost everything his
inferior, but in whom we see a similar unbending devotion
to a cause conscientiousl}^ taken up. Whatever we think
of Charles the First in his days of power, his violations of
law, his breaches of solemn contracts, it is impossible not
to respect the thorough conviction of right which bears him
up through the more honourable days of his adversity.
When he whites to Rupert that to a soldier or statesman his
cause must seem hopeless, but that, looking on it as a
Christian, he knows that God wall not suffer rebels to
prosper nor his cause to be overthrown, it is impossible not
to feel that, despot as he was, he was something very different
from the vulgar run of despots. And if we feel this respect
for Charles, much more may we feel it for Frederick, whose
character rises far above that of Charles in those points
where Charles, even from a royalist point of view, decidedly
fails. Charles, notwithstanding his real devotion to a
cause, exhibits a strange mixture of irresolution and ob-
stinacy. Frederick was rationally firm ; he was unyield-
ing as long as there was a reasonable hope of winning his
280 FREDERICK THE FIRST, KIAG OF ITALY. [Essay
endsjbut his firmness never degenerated into blind obstinacy.
Again, Charles was one whom no man could really trust ;
Frederick was, above all princes of the twelfth century,
a man of his word.
We have claimed honour for Frederick on the ground of
his zealous and unbending devotion to a cause which he
honestly adopted as the cause of right. This however is
a doctrine which must not be pressed too far. It is im-
possible to doubt that Philip the Second was zealously and
conscientiously devoted to the cause of the Church and the
monarchy. The question in all such cases is, By what
means is the end sought fori We do not blame Philip
merely for coercing those whom he looked upon as rebels
and heretics ; to expect him to do otherwise would be
simply to expect him to be gifted with a discernment given
in its fulness to no European of that age save his Batavian
rival. What we do blame him for is the baseness, perfidy,
and wanton cruelty, of the means by which he sought to
compass his end. In Frederick Barbarossa we find nothing
of the kind. According to the standard of his own age,
Frederick certainly appears chargeable with neither cruelty
nor perfidy. We must remember what that age was,
though we really think that the twelfth century need not
shrink from a comparison with many later ages. W^ar was
in the twelfth century undertaken on very light grounds,
and it was carried on with very great cruelty. But it
certainly was not undertaken on lighter grounds, or carried
on with greater cruelty, than it was in the fifteenth, six-
teenth, and seventeenth centuries. The horrors of Burgun-
dian and Armagnac warfare, of the Italian wars of the age
of the Renaissance, of the Spanish rule in the Netherlands,
of the Thirty Years' War, equal anything in the very
darkest times, and they certainly far exceed anything that
can be laid to the charge of Frederick the First. Frederick
had no guilt upon his soul like the sack of Rome or the
Back of Magdeburg ; he never, like Charles the Bold,* rode
* Barante, Dues de Bourgogne, vol. x. p. 6.
IX.] FREDERICK THE FIRST, KIXG OF ITALY. 281
with delight through a town heaped with corpses, congratu-
lating himself on his '-good butchers." He did not drown
his captives like Philip Augustus, starve them to death like
John of England, or flay them alive like his own accom-
plished grandson.* Charles the Great beheaded four
thousand Saxons in cold blood ; Richard Coeur-de-Lion
massacred his Saracen prisoners wholesale ; the Black
Prince looked on unmoved from his sick litter while men,
women, and children were murdered in the streets of
Limoges. No such scenes marked the entry of the trium-
phant Csesar into vanquished Milan or Tortona. Stern,
even cruel, as he seems to us, yet, when we compare
Frederick with his predecessors, contemporaries, and suc-
cessors, we see that there is a meaning even in the chmen-
ik-uiiias axidi (Ink'isshnv-'i of Otto Morena. As long as opposi-
tion lasted, Frederick did not shrink from carrying out to
the utmost the cruel laws of war f of that stern age. He
did not scruple to cut off the hands of those who tried
to bring in provisions to a beleaguered town. He tied his
hostages to his engines, that they might perish by the darts
of their friends, or rather that their danger might move
their friends to submission. When submission came, the
injured majesty of Augustus required hard conditions of
peace ; but, such as they were^ they were always honour-
ably kept, and they at least never involved hurt to life
or limb. It was a hard sentence for the inhabitants of
a whole city to march forth with their lives alone, or with
so much of their worldly goods as they could carry on their
shoulders \X but such a doom was mercy compared with the
lot of those who fell into the jaws of Charles of Burgundy,
of Alva, or of Tilly. Milan was levelled with the ground,
doubtless as a high symbolic act of justice, a warning
against all who should resist the might of the lord of
Germany and of Rome. But the vengeance of Frederick
* " Quoscunque in caatellis suis ex adversariis cepit, aut vivos excoriavit aut
patibulo suspendit." Rog. Wend., iv. 209, ed. Coxe.
+ " Utar ergo deinceps belli legibus." Rad. Fris., iv. 50.
+ Otto Fris., ii. 20; Rad., iv. 56 Otto Morena, col. 981.
282 FREDERICK THE FIRST, KING OF ITALY. [Essay
was exercised wholly upon dead walls ; it was another
matter when restored Milan fell, three centuries and a half
later, into the hands of a Csesar of a more civilized, at all
events of a more polished, time. IMo doubt the wars and
sieges of Frederick caused much human misery ; vast, and
doubtless not very well disciplined, armies, living at free
quarters,* must have been a constant scourge to the country:
but all this is common to Frederick with countless other
warlike princes ; what is specially his own is his constant
moderation in victory. This alone would show that his
wars were not wars of passion or caprice, but were waged
in a cause which to him seemed a high and holy one. And
again, in an age not so much of deliberate bad faith as of
utter recklessness as to promises, an age when oaths were
lightly taken and lightly broken, Frederick's all but in-
variable adherence to his word stands out conspicuously
and honourably. Once, and only once, he failed. He
stooped to attack Alessandria during a time of truce. f and
he was deservedly driven back and obliged to raise the
siege. This is a deep stain upon Frederick's otherwise
straightforward and upright character. It is utterly unlike
any other of his recorded actions. We may therefore at
least believe that it was not a case of premeditated perfidy ;
we may trust that he concluded the truce in perfect good
faith, but that he was afterwards tempted into a breach of
faith by the sight of a favourable opportunity for attack
before the days of truce were expired.
But, after all, the most truly honourable scene in the
life of this great Emperor is that which followed his final
defeat. After the Battle of Legnano in 1176, it was plain
that he had no longer any hope of conquering the Lombard
cities. He sought for peace : the negotiations were slow,
but at last the Peace of Constance was agreed upon, and
* The patiejfyriwt of Acerbus Morena (col. 115.^,^ meiitious it as Lis special
and wonderful merit, that he abstained from plunder himself, and did all he
could to liiiider it in otiiers.
■\ Vit. Alex. III., ap. Muratori, t. iii. p. 464.
IX.] FREDERICK THE FIRST, KING OF IT A L Y. 283
became a law of the Empire. By this document the
Imperial rights over the commonwealths were confined
within certain moderate bounds. To Frederick's eternal
honour, when he had given his people a constitution, he
kept it. He did not act like German and Italian kings
ten years ago.* After the treaty was once concluded,
Frederick honestly threw himself into the altered state
of things. He did not even sullenly withdraw himself
from Italy altogether. In that very Milan whose citizens
had broken his power, the city whose very existence
showed how vain had been the schemes of his life, the
King of Italy came and dwelt as an honoured guest, and,
with perhaps too much regard for his new allies, he allowed
the banner of the Empire to be displayed in local war-
fare against the enemies of Milan. Doubtless it was now
Frederick's policy to preserve the peace of Italy, as his
great object now was to obtain the Sicilian kingdom for
his son.f Still there have been few monarchs who could
have so thoroughly adapted themselves to their altered
fate, or who would have so scrupulously adhered to their
faith when it was once plighted. We know few things
in history more touching, more honourable to all con-
cerned, than the last years of the Italian reign of Frederick.
At last the hero went forth in his later years, as he had
gone in his youth, on a yet higher errand than to maintain
the rights of the Roman Empire. The temporal chief of
Christendom, the highest and the worthiest of Western
kings, went forth once more to do battle for the sepulchre
of Christ. We may be sure that no man ever put the
cross upon his shoulder with a higher and a purer heart.
Well had it been if he had reached the goal of his pilgrim-
age, and had given the crusading host a worthy leader.
* [i860.]
■f- It must be remembered that the kinsjdom of Sicily and duchy of Apulia
did not — (le facto, at least — form any part of the kingdom of Italy, though
the Emperors s;eem always, naturally enough, to have looked on the Norman
kings as interlopers.
284 FREDERICK THE FIRST, KING OF ITALY. [Essay
But he died before he could again reach the Syrian border,
bequeathing the destinies of Germany, Italy, and Sicily to
the hands of his unworthy son, and leaving the champion-
ship of Christendom against the Moslem to the faithless
Philip of Paris and the brutal Richaid of Poitou.
The more private and personal character of Frederick
comes to us only in the language of panegyric. We have
his portrait as drawn both by a German and by an Italian
admirer,* After making all needful deductions, it is easy
to see in him a high and pleasing type of the pure Teutonic
character. He was a man of moderate stature, bright open
countenance, fair skin, yellow hair,f and, as his nickname +
implies, reddish beard. He was a kind friend and a
placable enemy ; he loved war but only as a means to
peace ; so at least the canon of Freising assures us. § He
was bountiful in almsgiving, and attentive to his religious
duties. As to his domestic life, we know that his first wife
Adelaide was divorced ; the fact is recorded, but we are
told little of the circumstances. || His second uife Beatrice
is described by his panegyrists as equally admirable with
her husband.Tf The amount of his literary accomplish-
ments seems doubtful. One passage in Radevic might
almost imply that he could not read ; ** but it may merely
* Rad. Fris., iv. So. Otto Morena, col. 111.5.
t " Flava csesaries, pauUulum a verlice frontis crispata. Aures vix siiper-
jacentibus eriiiibus operiuntur ; tonsore, pro reverentia Imperii, pilob capitis et
genarum assidua succisione curtante." Rad., loc. cit.
X We have not come across the familiar name Barbarossa in the contem-
porary writers. Probably, like many other royal nicknames, it was in popular
use during the owner's lifetime, but did n<jt find its way into written history
till later.
§ " Belloruin amator, sed ut per ea pax acquiratur." Rad., loc. cit.
II Otto of Saint Blaise (Mur., vi. 869) says it was "causa fornicatioiiis ;"
Otto of Freising says, " ob vincula consanguinitatis." In this Muratori (ad
Otto Mor., col. 1033) sees a contradiction, wliich we do not. Adultery was
no legal ground of divorce ; but a husband's e}es would become very much
more sharp-sighted to the consanguinity of a faithless wife. Muratori also
argues that a certain Dittho of iJavensliurg, who married her, would not have
married a divorced adulteress. Yet Henry the Second of England did.
1 Acerbus Morena, col. II 17.
** " Qui literas non ndsset." Read Fiis., iv. 6. By the way, Acerbus
IX.] FREDERICK THE FIRST, KING OF ITALY. 285
mean that he was not an accomplished scholar like his
grandson. The same writer tells us of his study of the
Scriptures and of ancient histories, which of course may
merely mean that they were read to him, but it is more
naturally understood of his reading them himself. Radevic
speaks of him also as eloquent in his own tongue, and as
having reached the same measure of Latin learning which
Charles the Great reached in Greek. He understood the
Latin tongue when spoken ; he could not speak it fluently
himself. Altogether, w^e do not see in Frederick Barbarossa
one of those mighty original geniuses who change the
world's destiny, like Alexander or Charles, or who vainly
struggle against the age in which they are cast, like
Hannibal or Frederick the Second. He is a man of his
own age : he adopts the feelings and opinions of his own
age without inquiry; he throws himself, without hesita-
tion, into all the traditions and prejudices of his own
position ; in short, he never rises above the received policy
and morality of his own day, but he carries out that policy
and morality in its best and most honourable form. It is
not needful to compare him either with the superhuman
virtue of Saint Lewis or with the superhuman wickedness
of John Lackland ; compare him with his great contem-
porary, our own Angevin master, Henry. Henry was
evidently a man of far greater original genius, of a far
more creative mind, than Frederick was ; but he utterly
lacks Frederick's honest good faith and steady adherence
to what, in his eyes, was the path of duty. In Henry too
there was an element of brutality, a trace of the daemon
line from which he was said to spring, of which we see
nothing in Frederick in his sternest moods. A far nearer
likeness, much as either party would have been amazed
at it, may be seen between the Swabian Ciesar and the
great contemporary English churchman. Frederick of
Hohenstaufen and Thomas of Canterbury were alike men
Morena (col. 1102) dictated his history. Could not a judge (" curiae imperialis
judex," col. 1153) write?
286 FREDERICK THE FIRST, KING OF ITAL Y. [Essay
of high and noble character, devoting themselves to objects
which, in the judgement of their own time, were righteous.
We can have no sympathy either with the exemption of
the clergy from temporal jurisdiction or with the subjuga-
l^on of Italy by a German monarch. We can rejoice that
both Frederick and Thomas failed in the long run, but we
can honour the men themselves all the same. Frederick
had the great advantage of finding himself in a position
which allowed all his qualities their free, full, and natural
developement. The lot of Thomas constrained him to a
course, sincere indeed, but still unnatural and artificial.
Frederick would have made but a strange saint and
martyr ; but had Thomas been bom of Frederick's princely
ancestry, he might have shone on the Imperial throne with
a glory equal to that of Frederick himself.
How far the reign of Frederick worked in the long run
for the good or for the ill of Italy may well be doubted.
A long and at last victorious struggle against such an
adversary of course raised the spirit and confidence of the
republics, and thus contributed to the freedom and glory
of the great age of mediaeval Italy. But the very same
cause doubtless made Italian unity further off than ever.
To be a citizen of Milan or Crema or Tortona was to bear
so glorious a name that men cared not to sink it in the
vaguer and less glorious name of Italians. The war with
Frederick gave Italy, as Sismondi says, the opportunity,
which she failed to grasp, of forming herself into a power-
ful and permanent confederation. Achaia, Switzei'land,
Holland, and America, formed themselves under similar
circumstances into great and Listing Federal republics;
the Lombard cities had no thought of any union closer
than that of strict offensive and defensive alliance. Doubt-
less the constitutional theory, admitted by Guelf no less
than Ohibeline, that the republics were municipalities
holding of the King of Italy must have stood in the way
of any closer union. The same cause may have hindered
even Switzerland from assuming the perfect federal form
IX.] FREDERICK THE FIRST. KISG OF ITA LY. 287
till our own day. The kinydom died out. and the cities
remained, not cantons of a strong Italian league, but sove-
reign states, weak against any powerful foreign invader.
In the next century Italy had another chance of union in
quite another form. The process which we see going on
under our own eyes might have happened from the opposite
quarter, and Italy might have formed a great and united
monarchy under the sceptre of the Sicilian Manfred. Such
a fate would have shorn Florence and Genoa and Venice
of some brilliant centuries ; but it would have saved
Milan from the rule of the Visconti and Rome from
the rule of Borgia, and it might have saved the whole
peninsula from the yoke of Spaniard, Austrian, and
i renchman.
To return, in conclusion, to the position from which we
started : what conceivable analogy is there between a King
of Italy and Emperor of the Romans, reigning by acknow-
ledged legal right, in whose election Italian barons had at
least a formal share, and who received the crown of Rome
from Rome's own Pontiff', a king whose right no Italian
denied, and in whose cause many Italians zealously fought,
and the lord of a strange disunited collection of kingdoms,
who unhappily possesses a corner of Italian soil, and who
till lately exercised an illegitimate influence over Italy in
general ? It is hard to see why the Archduke of Austria
calls himself Emperor, without election or coronation ; it is
hard to see what is meant by an " Emperor of Austria "
any more than by an Emperor of Reuss-Schleiz ; it is hard
to see how a prince the greater part of whose dominions lie
out of Germany can give himself out as the representative
of the old German kings ; but it is harder still to see the
likeness between the foreign prince who does not even
claim the Italian kingdom, who by mere brute violence
holds an Italian province without a single Italian partizan,
and the didchithnus Imperator who commanded the loyal
devotion of Pavia and Lodi and Cremona. One of the
very strangest notions is that " Austria " is an ancient,
288 FREDERICK THE FIRST, KING OF ITALY. [Essay
venerable, conservative power. History pronounces it to
be modern, upstart, and revolutionary, a power which has
risen to a guilty greatness by trampling on every historic
right and every national memory. The so-called " Empire "
of Austria — a lover of old German history almost shrinks
from writing the hateful title — is a mere creation of yester-
day, a mere collection of plunder from various quarters.
Hungary and Bohemia were once elective kingdoms ; Gali-
cia was rent from unhappy Poland by the basest of treachery
and ingratitude ; Venice and Ragusa were independent
commonwealths within the memory of man ; the liberties
of Cracow have been trampled to the earth before our own
eyes. What has such a power as this in common with the
old days of great and united Germany? What is its '"Im-
perial" master but a mere impostor, a bastard Csesar, a
profane mockery of the glories of Charles and Otto and
Henry and Frederick ? German as well as Italian patriot-
ism ought to shrink from the miserable sham. If the Im-
perial title — now become the prize of perjury and massacre
— has not sunk too low to be borne by the chief of a free
people, the true Csesar Augustus will be he whom we trust
soon to see enthroned in the old capital of Italy and the
world. And if the chosen king of liberated Italy can re-
cover either the iron crown of Monza or the golden crown
of Rome, not the least ennobling association of these vener-
able relics will be that they have pressed the noble brow of
King Frederick of Hohenstaufen.*
* [How all that called forth uiy protest of ten years back has utterly
changed every reader can see for himself. The cession of two or three small
districts is all that is needed to ni;il<e the Italian kingdom complete. The
King of Hungary — to give him his highest lawt'id title — has now a noble
future before him. Let his small Italian possessions revert to Italy; let
Austria and his other German possessions revert to their natural position as
parts of the new German Empire, and let Hungary stand forth as the centre
and head of the scattered and distracted nations of Eastern Christendom.
The Hungarian king is their natural champion alike against their Turkish
tyrant and tlieir insidious Russian deliverer. Union with a kingilom whicli
already contains so many inhabitants of their own speech would be a far
better fate for the troubled Roman provinces than incorporation with either
IX.] FREDERICK THE FIRST, KIXG OF ITAL Y. 289
Russia or Turkey, or than an independence for which they are clearly unfit.
Kaces, creeds, tongues, are so mingled together in tho.se regions that a strictly
national state of any size cannot be formed. But Magyars, Slaves, Eou-
mans, Bulgarians, even Transsilvanian Saxons, so far cut off from the Teu-
tonic body, might all find their places in a great federal union of the Lower
Danube. Buda was once the seat of a Turkish Pasha no less than Belgrade.
Hungary, freed from foreign foes, and having changed her tyrant into her
king, is marked out as the state charged with the mission of restoring free-
dom and civilization among all the neighbouring lands.] [1871.]
290 THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. [Essay
X.
THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND.
1. Historia Biplomatica Friderici Secundi, etc. Collegit, etc.
J. L. A. Huillaed-Breholles, auspiciis et sumptibus
H. DE Albert IS de Luynes. Prdface et Introduction.
Paris: H. Plon, 1859.
2. Histon/ of Frederick the Second, Fmperor of the Romans.
By T. L. Kington [Olipiiant], M.A. Cambridge and
London: Macmillan, 1862.
3. Vie et Correspo7idance de Pierre de la Vigne, Ministre de
lEmpereur Frederic II., etc. Par A. Huillard-Bre-
holles. Paris: H. Plon, 1866.
Stupor mundi Fredericus — Frederick the Wonder of the
World — is the name by which the English historian Mat-
thew Paris more than once speaks of the Emperor who di-ew
on him the eyes of all men during the greater part of the
former half of the thirteenth century, and whose name has
ever since lived in history as that of the most wonderful
man in a most wonderful age. We do not say the greatest,
still less the best, man of his time, but, as Matthew Paris
calls him, the most wonderful man ; the man whose cha-
racter and actions shone out most distinctively, the man
whose personality was most marked ; the man, in short,
who was in all things the most unlike to all the other men
who were about him. It is probable that there never lived
a human being endowed with greater natural gifts, or whose
natural gifts were, according to the means afforded him by
his age, more sedulously cultivated, than the last Emperor
X.] THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. , 291
of the house of Swabia. There seems to be no aspect of
human nature which was not developed to the highest de-
gree in his person. In versatility of gifts, in what we may
call manysidedness of character, he appears as a sort of
mediaeval Alkibiades, while he was undoubtedly far re-
moved from Alkibiades' utter lack of principle or steadi-
ness of any kind. Warrior, statesman, lawgiver, scholar,
there was nothing in the compass of the political or intel-
lectual world of his age which he failed to grasp. In an
age of change, when, in every corner of Europe and civilized
Asia, old kingdoms, nations, systems, were falling and new
ones rising, Frederick was emphatically the man of change,
the author of things new and unheard of — he was stupor
mundi et immuiator miralilis. A suspected heretic, a sus-
pected Mahometan, he was the object of all kinds of absurd
and self-contradictory charges ; but the charges mark real
features in the character of the man. He was something
unlike any other Emperor or any other man ; whatever
professions of orthodoxy he might make, men felt instinc-
tively that his belief and his practice were not the same as
the belief and the practice of other Christian men. There
can be no doubt that he had wholly freed his mind from the
trammels of his own time, and that he had theories and
designs which, to most of his contemporaries, would have
seemed monstrous, unintelligible, impossible. Frederick in
short was, in some obvious respects, a man of the same stamp
as those who influence their own age and the ages which come
after them, the men who, if their lot is cast in one walk,
found sects, and if it is cast in another, found empires. Of
all men, Frederick the Second might have been expected to
be the founder of something, the beginner of some new sera,
political or intellectual. He was a man to whom some great
institution might well have looked back as its creator, to
whom some large body of men, some sect or party or nation,
might well have looked back as their prophet or founder or
deliverer. But the most gifted of the sons of men has left
behind him no such memory, while men whose gifts cannot
U 2
292 THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOyD. [Essay
bear a comparison with his are reverenced as founders by
grateful nations, churches, political and philosophical parties.
Frederick in fact founded nothing, and he sowed the seeds
of the destruction of many things. His great charters to
the spiritual and temporal princes of Germany dealt the
death-blow to the Imperial power, while he, to say the least,
looked coldly on the rising power of the cities and on those
commercial leagues which were in his time the best element
of German political life. In fact, in whatever aspect we
look at Frederick the Second, we find him, not the first,
but the last, of every series to which he belongs. An Eng-
lish writer, two hundred years after his time, had the pene-
tration to see that he was really the last Emperor.* He
was the last prince in whose style the Imperial titles do not
seem a mockery ; he was the last under whose rule the three
Imperial kingdoms retained any practical connexion with
one another and with the ancient capital of aU. Frederick,
who sent his trophies to Rome to be guarded by his own
subjects in his own city, was a Roman Cassar in a sense in
which no other Emperor was after him. And he was not
only the last Emperor of the whole Empire ; he might
almost be called the last king of its several kinn-doms.
After his time Burgundy vanishes as a kingdom ; there is
hardly an event to remind us of its existence except the
fancy of Charles the Fourth, of all possible Emperors, to
go and take the Burgundian crown at Aries. Italy too,
after Frederick, vanishes as a kingdom ; any later exercise
of the royal authority in Italy was something which came
and went wholly by fits and starts. Later Emperors were
crowned at Milan, but none after Frederick was King of
Italy in the same real and effective sense that he was.
Germany did not utterly vanish, or utterly split in pieces,
like the sister kingdoms ; but after Frederick came the
Great Interregnum, and after the Great Interregnum the
* Capgrave, in his Chronicle, dates by Emperors down to Frederick, and
then adds: "Fro this tyme forward oure annotacion schal be aftir the regiie
of the Kyngis of Ynglond ; for the Umpire, in vianer, sesed here."
X.] THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. 293
Yoy?i\ power in Germany never was what it had been before.
In his hereditary kingdom of Sicily he was not absolutely
the last of his dynasty, for his son Manfred ruled prosper-
ously and gloriously for some years after his death. But it
is none the less clear that from Frederick's time the Sicilian
kingdom was doomed ; it was marked out to be, what it
has been ever since, divided, reunited, divided again, tossed
to and fro between one foreign sovereign and another.
Still more conspicuously than all was Frederick the last
Christian King of Jerusalem, the last baptized man who
really ruled the Holy Land or wore a crown in the Holy
City. And yet, strangely enough, it was at Jerusalem, if
anywhere, that Frederick might claim in some measure the
honours of a founder. If he was the last more than nominal
King of Jerusalem, he was also, after a considerable interval,
the fii-st ; he recovered the kingdom by his own address,
and, if he lost it, its loss was, of all the misfortunes of his
reign, that which could be with the least justice attributed
to him as a fault. In the world of elegant letters Frederick
has some claim to be looked on as the founder of that
modern Italian language and literature which first assumed
a distinctive shape at his Sicilian court. But in the wider
field of political history Frederick appears nowhere as a
creator, but rather everywhere as an involuntary destroyer.
He is in everything the last of his own class, and he is not
the last in the same sense as princes who perish along with
their realms in domestic revolutions or on the field of battle.
If we call him the last Emperor of the West, it is in quite
another sense from that in which Constantine Palaiologos
was the last Emperor of the East. Under Frederick the
Empire and everything connected with it seems to crumble
and decay while preserving its external splendour. As
soon as its brilliant possessor is gone, it at once falls
asunder. It is a significant fact that one who in mere
genius, in mere accomplishments, was surely the greatest
prince who ever wore a crown, a prince who held the
greatest place on earth, and who was concerned during
294 THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. [Essay
a long reign in some of the greatest transactions of one
of the greatest ages, seems never, even from his own
flatterers, to have received that title of Great which has
been so lavishly bestowed on far smaller men. The world
instinctively felt that Frederick, by nature the more than
peer of Alexander, of Constantine, and of Charles, had left
behind him no such creation as they left, and had not
influenced the world as they had influenced it. He was
sfiijwr mundi et inuiiutator mirahilis, but the name oi Frideriais
Magnus was kept in store for a prince of quite another age
and house, who, whatever else we say of him, at least
showed that he had learned the art of Themistokles, and
knew how to change a small state into a great one.
Many causes combined to produce this singular result,
that a man of the extraordinary genius of Frederick, a man
possessed of every advantage of birth, office, and opportunity,
should have had so little direct effect upon the world. It is
not enough to attribute his failure to the many and great
faults of his moral character. Doubtless they were one
cause among others. But a man who influences future
ages is not necessarily a good man. No man ever had a
more direct influence on the future history of the world
than Lucius Cornehus Sulla. The man who crushed Rome's
last rival, who saved Rome in her last hour of peril, who
made her indisputably and for ever the head of Italy, did a
work greater than the work of Csesar. Yet the name of
Sulla is one at which we almost instinctively shudder. So
the faults and crimes of Frederick, his irreligion, his private
licentiousness, his barbarous cruelty, would not of them-
selves be enough to hinder him from leaving his stamp
upon his age in the way that other ages have been marked
by the influence of men certainly not worse than he. Still,
to exercise any gi-eat and lasting influence on the world,
a man must be, if not virtuous, at least capable of objects
and efl'orts which have something in common with virtue.
Sulla stuck at no crime which could serve his country or
his party, but it was for his country and his party, not for
X.] THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. 295
purely selfish ends, that he laboiu*ed and that he sinned.
Thorough devotion to any cause has in it something of
self-sacrifice, something which, if not purely virtuous, is
not without an element akin to virtue. Very bad men
have achieved very gi-eat works, but they have commonly
achieved them through those features in their character
which made the nearest approach to goodness. The weak
side in the briUiant career of Frederick is one which seems
to have been partly inherent in his character, and paiily
the result of the circumstances in which he found himself.
Capable of every part, and in fact playing every part by
turns, he had no single definite object, pursued honestly
and steadfastly throughout his whole life. With all his
powers, with all his brilliancy, his course throughout life
seems to have been in a manner determined for him by
others. He was ever drifting into wars, into schemes of
policy, which seem to be hardly ever of his own choosing.
He was the mightiest and most dangerous adversary that
the Papacy ever had. But he does not seem to have with-
stood the Papacy from any personal choice, or as the
voluntary champion of any opposing principle. He became
the enemy of the Papacy, he planned schemes which in-
volved the utter overthrow of the Papacy, yet he did so
simply because he found that no Pope would ever let him
alone. It was perhaps an unerring instinct which hindered
any Pope from ever letting him alone. Frederick, left
alone to act according to his own schemes and inclinations,
might very likely have done the Papacy more real mischief
than he did when he was stirred up to open enmity. Still,
as a matter of fact, his quarrels with the Popes were not of
his own seeking ; a sort of inevitable destiny led him into
them, whether he wished for them or not. Again, the most
really successful feature in Frederick's career, his acquisition
of Jerusalem, is not only a mere episode in his life, but it is
something that was absolutely forced upon him against his
will. The most successful of crusaders since Godfrey is
the most utterly unlike any other crusader. With other
296 THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. [Essay
crusaders the Holy War was, in some cases the main
business of their lives ; in all cases it was something
seriously undertaken as a matter either of policy or of
relio-ious duty. But the crusade of the man who actually
did recover the Holy City is simply a grotesque episode in
his life. Excommunicated for not going, excommunicated
af>'ain for going, excommunicated again for coming back,
threatened on every side, he still went, and he succeeded.
What others had failed to win by arms, he contrived to win
by address, and all that came of his success was that it was
made the ground of fresh accusations against him. For
years the cry for the recovery of Jerusalem had been sound-
ino" through Christendom ; at last Jerusalem was recovered,
and its recoverer was at once cursed for accomplishing the
most fervent wishes of so many thousands of the faithful.
The excommunicated king, whom no churchman would
crown, whose name was hardly allowed to be uttered in
his own army, kept his dominions in spite of all oj)position.
He was hindered from the further consolidation and exten-
sion of his Eastern kingdom only by a storm stirred up in
his hereditary states by those who were most bound to
show towards him something more than common inter-
national honesty. Whatever were the feelings and circum-
stances under which he had acted, Frederick was in fact
the triumphant champion of Christendom, and his reward
was fresh denunciations on the part of the spiritual chief
of Christendom. The elder Frederick, Philip of France,
Richard of England, Saint Lewis, Edward the First, were
crusaders from piety, from policy, or from fashion ; Frederick
the Second was a crusader simply because he could not
help being one, and yet he did what they all failed to do.
So again in his dealinefs with both the German and the
Italian states, it is impossible to set him down either as a
consistent friend or a consistent enemy of the great political
movements of the age. He issues charters of privileges to
this or that commonwealth, he issues charters restraining
the freedom of commonwealths in general, simply as suits
X.] THE EAIPEEOR FREDERICK THE SECOND. 297
the policy of the time. In his dealings with the Popes,
perhaps in his dealings with the cities also, Frederick was
certainly more sinned against than sinning. But a man
whose genius and brilliancy and vigour shine out in every
single action of his life, but in the general course of his
actions no one ruling principle can be discerned, who is as
it were tossed to and fro by circumstances and by the
actions of others, is either very unfortunate in the position
in which he finds himself, or else, with all his genius, he
must lack some of the qualities without which genius is
comparatively useless.
In the case of Frederick probably both causes were true.
For a man to influence his age, he must in some sort belong
to his age. He should be above it, before it, but he should
not be foreign to it. He may condemn, he may try to
change, the opinions and feelings of the men around him ;
but he must at least understand and enter into those
opinions and feehngs. But Frederick belongs to no age ;
intellectually he is above his own age, above every age ;
morally it can hardly be denied that he was below his
age ; but in nothing was he of his age. In many incidental
details his career is a repetition of that of his grandfather.
Like him he struggles against Popes, he struggles against
a league of cities, he wears the Cross in warfare against the
Infidel. But in character, in aim, in object, grandfather
and grandson are the exact opposite to each other.
Frederick Barbarossa was simply the model of the man,
the German, the Emperor, of the twelfth century. All the
faults and all the virtues of his age, his country, and his
position received in him their fullest developement. He
was the ordinary man of his time, following the objects
which an ordinary man of his time and in his position
could not fail to follow. He exhibited the ordinary
character of his time in its very noblest shape ; but it
was still only the ordinary character of his time. His
whole career was simj)ly typical of his age, and in no way
personal to himself; every action and every event of his
298 THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. [Essay
life could be understood by every contemporary human
being, friend or enemy. But his grandson, emphatically
stiqwi- vijoidi, commanded the wonder, perhaps the admira-
tion, of an age which could not understand him. He
gathered indeed around him a small band of devoted
adherents ; but to the mass of his contemporaries he
seemed like a being of another nature. He shared none
of the feelings or prejudices of the time ; alike in his
intellectual greatness and in his moral abasement he had
nothing in common with the ordinary man of the thir-
teenth century. The world probably contained no man,
unless it were some solitary thinker here and there, whose
mind was so completely set free, alike for good and for
evil, from the ordinary trammels of the time. He appeared
in the eyes of his own age as the enemy of all that it was
taught to hold sacred, the friend of all that it was taught
to shrink from and wage war against. What Frederick's
religious views really were is a problem hard indeed to
solve ; but to his own time he appeared as something far
more than a merely political, or even than a doctrinal,
opponent of the Papacy. Men were taught to believe that
he was the enemy of the head of Christendom simply
because he was the enemy of Christianity altogether.
Again, the crimes and vices of Frederick were no greater
than those of countless other princes ; but there was no
prince who trampled in the like sort upon all the moral
notions of his own time. He contrived, by the circum-
stances of his vices, to outrage contemporary sentiment
in a way in which his vices alone would not have outraged
it. A man who thus showed no condescension to the
feelings of his age, whether good or evil, could not directly
influence that age. Some of his ideas and schemes may
have been silently passed on to men of later times, in
whose hands they were better able to bear fruit. He may
have shaken old prejudices and old beliefs in a few minds
of his own age ; he may even have been the fountain of a
tradition which was powerfully to affect distant ages. In
X.] THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. 299
many things his ideas, his actions, forestalled events which
were yet far remote. The events which he forestalled he
may in this indirect and silent way have influenced. But
direct influence on the world of his own age he had none.
He may have undermined a stately edifice which was
still to survive for ages ; but he simply undermined. He
left no traces of himself in the character of a founder ;
he left as few in the character of an open and avowed
destroyer.
There was also another cause which, besides Frederick's
personal character, may have tended to isolate him from
his age and to hindei- him from having that influence over
it which we may say that his genius ought to have had.
This was his utter want of nationality. The conscious
idea of nationality had not indeed the same effect upon
men's minds which it has in our own times. The political
ideas and systems of the age ran counter to the principle
of nationality in two ways. Nothing could be more opposed
to any doctrine of nationality than those ideas which were
the essence of the whole political creed of the time, the
ideas of the Universal Empire and the Universal Church. On
the other hand, the conception of the joint lordship of the
world, vested in the successor of Peter and the successor of
Augustus, was hardly more opposed to the doctrine of
nationality than was the form which was almost every-
where taken by the rising spirit of freedom. A movement
towards national freedom was something exceptional ; in
most places it was the independence of a district, of a city,
at most of a small union of districts or cities, for which
men strove. A German or Italian commonwealth strusfgled
for its own local independence ; so far as was consistent
with the practical enjoyment of that independence, it was
ready to acknowledge the supremacy of the Emperor, Lord
of the World. Of a strictly national patriotism for Germany
or Italy men had very little thought indeed. These two
seemingly opposite tendencies, the tendency to merge
nations in one universal dominion, and the tendency to
300 THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. [Essay
divide nations into small principalities and commonwealths,
were in truth closely connected. The tendency to division
comes out most strongly in the kingdoms which were united
to the Empire. Other countries showed a power of strictly
national action, of acquiring liberties common to the whole
nation, of legislating in the interest of the whole nation,
almost in exact proportion to the degree in which they
were placed beyond the reach of Imperial influences.
Spain, Scandinavia, Britain, were the countries on which
the Empire had least influence. Spain, Scandinavia, Britain,
were therefore the countries in which we see the nearest
approaches to true national life and consciousness. Still
there is no doubt that, even within the Empire, national
feelings did exercise a strong, though in a great measure
an unconscious, influence. Local feelings exercised an
influence still stronger. But there was no national or
local feeling which could gather round Frederick the
Second. There was no national or local cause of which
he could be looked on as the champion. There was no
nation, no province, no city, which could claim him as
its own peculiar hero. Ruling over men of various races
and languages, he could adapt himself to each of them
in turn in a way in which few men before or after him
could do. But there was none of the various races of his
dominions, German, Burgundian, Italian, Norman, Greek,
or Saracen, which could claim him as really bone of its
bone and flesh of its flesh. His parentage was half German,
half Norman, his birthplace was Italian, the home of his
choice was Sicilian, his tastes and habits were strongly
suspected of being Saracenic. The representative of a
kingly German house, he was himself, beyond all doubt,
less German than anything else. He was Norman, Italian,
almost anything rather than German ; but he was far from
being purely Norman or purely Italian. In this position,
placed as it were above all ordinary local and national
ties, he was, beyond every other prince who ever wore the
Imperial diadem, the embodiment of the conception of an
X.] THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. 301
Emperor, Lord of the World. But an Emperor, Lord of the
World, is placed too high to win the affections which attach
men to rulers and leaders of lower degree. A king may-
command the love of his own kingdom ; a popular leader
may command the love of his own city. But C?esar,
whose dominion is from the one sea to the other and from
the flood unto the world's end, must, in this respect as in
others, pay the penalty of his greatness. Frederick was,
in idea, beyond all men, the hero and champion of the
Empire. But practically the championship of the Empire
was found less truly effective in his hands than in the
hands of men who were further from carrying out the
theoretical ideal. The Imperial power was more truly
vigorous in the hands of princes in whom the ideal cham-
pionship of the Empire was united with the practical
leadership of one of its component nations. Frederick
Barbarossa, the true German king, the man whom the
German instinct at once hails as the noblest developement
of the German character, really did more for the greatness
of the Empire than his descendant, whose ideal position
was far more truly Lnperial, The men who influence their
age, the men who leave a lasting memory behind them, are
the men who are thoroughly identified with the actual
or local life of some nation or city, Frederick Barbarossa
was the hero of Germany; but his grandson", the hero of
the Empire, was the hero of none of its component parts.
The memory of the grandfather still Hves in the hearts of
a people, some of whom perhaps even now look for his
personal return. The memory of the grandson has every-
where passed away from popular remembrance ; the Wonder
of the World remains to be the wonder of scholars and
historians only.
In this last respect the memory of Frederick the Second
has certainly nothing to complain of. Few princes have
ever had such a monument raised to them as has been
raised to the memory of the last Swabian Emperor by
the munificence of the Duke of Luynes and the learning
302 THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. [Essay
and industry of M. Huillard-Br^holles. Here, in a series
of noble quartos, are all the documents of a reign most
fertile in documents, ushered in by a volume which,
except in not assuming a strictly narrative form, is essen-
tially a complete history of Frederick's reign. M. Huil-
lard-Br^holles seems literally to have let nothing escape
him. He discusses at length everything which in any
way concerns his hero, from the examination of schemes
which look very like the institution of a new religion
down to the minutest details of form in the wording,
dating, and spelling of the Emperor's official acts. We
never saw a book which is more thoroughly exhaustive
of the subject with which it deals. It is not a history,
merely because the form of an introduction or preface
seems to have laid M. Brdholles under the necessity of
giving us, instead of a single regular narrative, a series
of distinct narrative discussions of each of the almost
countless aspects in which the reign of Frederick can be
looked at. M. Br^hoUes has also followed up his great
work by a monograph of the life and aims of one whose
history is inseparably bound together Avith that of Frede-
rick, his great and unfortunate minister, Peter de Vinea.
In this he examines at full length a subject to which we
shall again return, and which is perhaps the most inter-
esting of all which the history of Frederick presents,
namely, the relation of the freethinking and reforming
Emperor to the received religion of this age. On this
point we cannot unreservedly pledge ourselves to all the
details of M. BrehoUes' conclusions ; but they are at least
highly ingenious, and the contemporary evidence on which
he grounds them is most singular and interesting, and
deserves most attentive study. Altogether we can have
no hesitation in placing M. BrehoUes' investigation of
the reign of Frederick the Second among the most im-
portant contributions which our age has made to historical
learning.
Nor has the character and history of Frederick failed to
X.] THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. 303
attract notice among scholars in our own country. His
career supplies materials for one of the most brilliant parts
of Dean Milman's History of Latin Christianity; there is
no part of his great work which is more palpably a labour
of love. More recently has appeared the history of Frede-
rick by Mr. Kington-Oliphant, the production of a young-
writer, and which shows want of due preparation in some
of the introductory portions, but which also shows real
research and real vigour as the author approaches his
main subject, the hfe of Frederick himself. JMi*. Oliphant
is confessedly a disciple of M. Breholles, and his volumes,
as supplying that direct and continuous narrative which
M. Breholles' plan did not allow of, may be taken as a
companion-piece to the great work of his master."^
The reign of Frederick, like that of his predecessor
Henry the Fourth, was nearly co-extensive with his life.
His history began while he was in his cradle. Like Heniy
the Fourth, after filUng the fii'st place in men's minds
for a long series of years, he died at no very advanced
time of life. Frederick, born in 1194, died in 1250, at
the age of fifty-six, Henry at the time of his death was
a year younger. Yet it marks a difference between the
two men that historians seem involuntarily, in defiance of
chronology, to think and speak of Henry in his later years
as quite an aged man. No one ever speaks in this way
of Frederick. The Wonder of the World seems endowed
with a kind of undying youth, and after all the great
events and revolutions of his reign, we are at last surprised
to find that we have passed over so many years as we
really have. Frederick was a king almost from his birth.
The son of the Emperor Henry the Sixth and of Constance
the heiress of Sicily, he was born while his father was
in his full career of success and cruelty. His very birth
gave occasion to mythical tales. The comparatively ad-
vanced age of his mother, which however has been greatly
* [Mr. Oliphant is now better known for researches into the history of the
English language.] [i886.]
304 THE EMPFAIOR FREDERICK THE SECOND. [Essay
exaggerated, gave occasion to rumours of opposite kinds.
His enemies gave out that he was not really of Imperial
birth, and that the childless Empress had palmed off a
supposititious child on her husband. His admirers hailed
his birth as wonderful, if not miraculous, and placed the
conception of Constance alongside of the conceptions of
the mothers of Isaac, of Samuel, and of John the Eaptist.
Elected King of the Romans in his infancy, his father's
death left him in his third year his successor in the
Sicihan kingdom, and his mother s death in the next year
left an orphan boy as the heir alike of the Hohenstaufen
Emperors and of the Norman kings. His election as
King of the Romans seems to have been utterly forgotten ;
after the death of his father, the crown was disputed by
the double election of Otto of Saxony and of Frederick's
own uncle . Philip. The child in Sicily was not thought
of till Philip had been murdered just when fortune seemed
to have finally decided for him ; till Otto, reaping the
advantage of a crime of which he was guiltless, had been
enabled to secure both the kingdom and the Empire,
and till he had fallen into disgrace with the Pontiff by
whose favour he had at fii'st been supported. Meanwhile
the Sicilian kingdom was torn by rebellions and laid
waste by mercenary captains. The land had at last been
restored to some measure of peace, and the young king
to some measure of authority, by the intervention of the
overlord Pope Innocent. Frederick was a husband at
fifteen, a father at eighteen, and almost at the same
moment as the birth of his first son, Henry the future
king and rebel, he was called to the. German crown by
the party which was discontented with Otto, now under
the ban of the Church. Frederick, destined to be the
bitterest enemy of the Roman see, made his first appear-
ance on German soil as its special nursling, called to
royalty and Empire under the auspices of the greatest
of the Roman Pontiffs. He came thither also, there seems
little reason to doubt, under patronage of a less honour-
X.] THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. 305
able kind. The long disputes between England and France
had already begun, and, by a strange anticipation of far
later times, they had already begun to be carried on
within the boundaries of the Empire. Otto, the son of
an English mother, was supported by the money and
the arms of his uncle John of England, while the heir
of the Hohenstaufen partly owed his advancement to the
influence and the gold of Philip of France. In 121 1
Frederick was elected King ; three years later, Otto, in
Mr. Oliphant's words, " rushed on his doom." At Eou-
vines, a name hardly to be written without an unpleasant
feeling by any man of Teutonic blood and speech, the
King of the French overthrew the Saxon Emperor and
his English and Flemish allies. The power of Otto,
akeady crumbling away, was now utterly broken. In
1 2 15, while John was quailing before his triumphant
barons, Frederick, the rival of his nephew, received the
royal crown and assumed the cross. Three years later,
the death of Otto removed all traces of opposition to
his claims, an event which, by a singular coincidence,
was nearly contemporaneous with the birth of one des-
tined to be himself, not only a king, but the beginner
of a new stage in the history of the Empire, the famous
Rudolf of Habsburg. In 1220 Frederick's son Henry,
then only eight years old, was elected King, although
his father was not yet crowned Emperor. But in the
course of the same year Frederick received the Imperial
diadem at the hands of Pope Honorius. His coronation
was an event deserving of special record in the Roman
annals, as one of the very few times when an Emperor
received his crown without bloodshed or disturbance, amid
the loyal acclamations of the Roman people. Possibly
some conscious or unconscious feeling of national kindred
spoke in favour of an Emperor born within the borders
of Italy, and under whose rule it might seem that Germany
and not Italy was likely to be the secondary and de-
pendent realm. In truth, in that same year, before leaving
X
306 THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. [Essay
his Northern kingdom, Frederick had, seemingly as the
price of the election of his son, put the seal to the de-
struction of the royal power in Germany. The charter
which he granted in that year to the German princes is
one of the marked stages of the long process which changed
the kingdom of Charles and Otto and Henry into the lax
Confederation which has so lately fallen in pieces before
our eyes."^
Frederick was still, to all appearance, a dutiful son of
the Church ; but there were already signs that a storm
was brewing. The union between a Pope and a Hohen-
staufen Emperor was something which in its own nature
could not be lasting. The magnificent theory which looked
on the spiritual and temporal chiefs of Rome as the co-
equal rulers of the Church and the world always gave
way at the slightest strain. Even before his Imperial
coronation, Frederick had fallen under the displeasure of
Honorius ; he had received rebukes and had had to make
excuses. As usual, the two swords were always clashing;
the King of Sicily w^as charged with meddling with eccle-
siastical fiefs and with the freedom of ecclesiastical elections.
But the great point was the Crusade. Frederick had be-
come a crusader at the time of his assumption of the
German crown ; but no crusade had he as yet waged.
Damietta had been won, and Damietta was soon after
lost again, without the temporal head of Christendom
striking a blow to win or to defend it. The position
thus lightly dealt with was held to be the very key of
the Holy Land. In the eyes of a Pope such neglect was
a wicked forsaking of the first of duties. It might per-
haps have appeared in the same light in the eyes of an
ideal Emperor. But the hereditary King of Sicily, the
elected King of Germany, Italy, and Burgundy, found
occupation enough in the lower duties of ordinary royalty.
In all his kingdoms there were matters calling for his
attention. In his own hereditary realm he had a work
* [December, 1866.]
X.] THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. 307
to do which he might fairly plead as an excuse for not
engaging in warfare beyond the sea. He had no need
to go and seek for Saracen enemies in distant lands while
the Saracens of his own island were in open revolt. He
brought into subjection both the turbulent infidels and
the no less turbulent nobles, and he made Sicily the
model of a civilized and legal despotism, framed after
the pattern of the best days of the Eastern Empire. The
wild Saracens of the mountains were partly constrained
to adopt a more peaceful life, partly transferred to a spot
where, instead of restless rebels, they became the surest
defence of his throne. He planted them in the city of
Nocera in Apulia, wheie, isolated in a surrounding Chris-
tian country, they dwelt as his housecarls or janissaries,
bound by the single tie of personal loyalty — soldiers who
could always be trusted, for over them Popes and monks
had no influence. Besides this work in his native king-
dom, a work enough by itself to tax all the energies of
an ordinary mortal, he had other work to do in all his
Imperial realms. Not the least interesting among the
notices of this part of his reign are those which concern
the states along his western frontier. On the one hand
France was already encroaching ; on the other hand a
movement was beginning which, had it prospered, might
have placed an unbroken line of independent states be-
tween the great rival powers. The duty which Switzer-
land and Belgium, at too great an interval from one
another, have still to discharge, fell, in the thirteenth cen-
tury, to the lot of a whole crowd of rising commonwealths.
From the mouths of the Rhine to the mouths of the Rhone,
republics, worthy sisters of the republics of Italy and
Northern Germany, were springing up through the whole
length of ancient Lotharingia and Burgundy. It is sad
to see Frederick everywhere interfering to check this new
birth of freedom. Everywhere the local count or bishop
was encouraged to subdue the presumptuous rebels of the
cities. Take two instances from cities widely apart in
X 2
308 THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. [Essay
geographical position. Massalia, the old Ionian common-
wealth, the city which had braved the might of Csesar
and which was before many years to brave the might of
Charles of Anjou, had begun her second and shorter career
of freedom. In the eyes of Frederick the citizens were
mere rebels against their bishop, and the Count of Pro-
vence was bidden to bring them back to their due obedi-
ence. So, at almost the other end of the Empire, the
citizens of Cam bray failed to pay due submission to the
Imperial commands. But here a more dangerous influence
was at work. The Emperor was still on good terms with
the King of the French ; he had lately concluded a treaty
with him ; binding himself, among other things, to enter
into no alliance with England. But the instinctive ten-
dencies of the Parisian monarchy were then, as ever, too
strong for mere written engagements. France was in-
triguing with the citizens of Cambray, and the Emperor
had to call upon King Lewis to cease from any inter-
meddling with his disaffected subjects.
We have brought out these points, though of no special
importance in the life of Frederick, because they at once
illustrate the varied relations of a mediaeval Emperor to
all kinds of rulers and communities, great and small, and
because they specially illustrate the reality of power
which the Emperor still retained both in his Burgundian
kingdom and in other portions of the Empire which have
since been swallowed up by the encroachments of France.
Neither of our authors brings out this point as it should
be brought out. M. Breholles is far too learned to be
ignorant of, far too candid to suppress, any one fact in
his history. Still he is a Frenchman, and we can hardly
expect him to enter a formal protest against tlie most
popular of all French delusions. Mr. Oliphant knows
his facts, but he does not fully grasp them. It is with
a kind of surprise that he finds " that many provinces,
now included within the boundaries of France, then looked
for direction to Hagenau or Palermo, not to Paris." To
X.] THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. 309
be sure Mr. Eryce's tabular view of the Ten Burgundies
had not been drawn up when Mr. Oliphant wrote.
At last we reach Frederick's crusade, perhaps rather to be
called his progress to the East. The marriage of Frederick
with Yolande of Brienne put him into altogether a new rela-
tion to the Holy Land and all that pertained to it. His
journey to Jerusalem was now, not that of a private adven-
turer or pilgrim, not that of an Emperor acting as the
common head of Christendom, but that of a king going to
take possession of one of his own kingdoms, to receive yet
another crown in another of his capitals. And in truth
Frederick, when he had once set out, found less difficulty in
winning his way to the crown of Jerusalem than some of his
predecessors in the Empire had found in winning their way
to the crown of Rome. Everything seemed against him ; the
papal throne had a new and very different occupant ; to the
mild Honorius had succeeded the stern and unbending
Gregory. Frederick's second Empress was already dead,
and with her, it might be argued, he had lost his right to a
kingdom which he could claim only through her. He him-
self was excommunicated at every step ; if he went, if he
stayed, the ban was equally launched against him for going
and for staying. Yet he went : on his way he successfully
established his Imperial rights over the Frank king of
Cyprus, a rival claimant for the crown of Jerusalem.
Without striking a blow, by dexterous diplomacy, by
taking advantage of the divided and tottering state of the
Mahometan powers, he gained the main object for which
Christendom had striven in vain for forty years. A
Christian king again reigned in the Holy City, and the
sepulchre of Christ was again in the hands of His wor-
shippers. It was a strange position when the excom-
municated king, in whose presence any religious office was
forbidden, placed on his own head the crown of the Holy
Land in the church of the Holy Sepulchre. It might almost
seem as if it was in this strange moment of trial that
Frederick's faith finally gave way. The suspicion of
310 THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. [Essay
Mahometanism which attached to him is of course, in its
literal sense, utterly absurd ; but it is wortliy of notice that
it was not confined to Christian imaginations. The con-
duct of Frederick at Jerusalem impressed more than one
Mahometan writer with the belief that, if the Emperor was
not an actual proselyte to Islam, he was at least not sound
in the faith which he outwardly professed. It must be re-
membered that the toleration of Mahometan worship within
its walls was one of the conditions on which Frederick
obtained possession of the Holy City. A stipulation like
this might well arouse suspicions of his Christian orthodoxy
in the minds of Christians and Mussulmans alike. In modern
eyes his conduct appears simply just and reasonable;
setting aside any abstract doctrine of religious toleration,
the view of a modern statesman would be that Frederick
preferred, and wisely preferred, instead of putting every-
thing to the hazard of the sword, to win his main object by
treaty, and to yield on some lesser points. The essence of
a treaty between two powers treating on equal terras is that
each should abate somewhat of that which it holds to be
the full measure of its rights. Few will now condemn
Frederick for choosing to accept such large concessions by
treaty rather than to trust everything to the chances of
war. Had he done otherwise, he might probably have had
to return to Europe after wasting his forces in a struggle
as bootless as those of most of the crusaders who had gone
before him. And it seems that, even in his own age, a large
amount of general European feeling went with him. His
treatment at the hands of the Pope and the papal party -was
so manifestly unjust as to arouse a deep feeling in his
favour in all parts of Christendom. In Italy, in Germany,
in England, the chief writers of the time all side with
Frederick against Gregory. Allowance w^as made for his
position ; he had done what he could; had he not laboured
under an unrighteous excommunication, had he not been
thwarted and betrayed by the clergy and the military orders,
he would have done far more. Still the iudiunation of the
X.] THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. 3 1 1
extreme ecclesiastical party against Frederick was, from
their own point of view, neither unnatural nor unreasonable.
In the eyes of some zealots any treaty with the infidels was
in itself unlawful ; even without going this length, a treaty
which, though it secured the Holy Sepulchre to the
Christian, left the " Temple of the Lord" to the Mahometan,
could not fail to offend some of the most deep-seated
feelings of the age. Whatever might be Frederick's own
faith, he at least had not the orthodox hatred for men of
another faith. Various incidental actions and expressions
of the Emperor during his stay at Jerusalem impressed the
Mahometans themselves with the idea that he at least put
both religions pretty much on a level. We must remember
that his toleration of Mahometanism would be a thing
which few Mahometans would appreciate, and which would
of itself raise suspicions in most oriental minds. A man
who could act with justice and moderation towards men of
their law would seem to them to be no real believer in the
law which he himself professed. But this could not have
been all : the impression of Frederick's lack of orthodoxy,
and of his special tendency towards Mahometanism, was
too deeply fixed in the minds of men of both creeds to have
rested only on an inference of this kind. And it is perfectly
credible in itself. A King of Sicily, who from his child-
hood had had to do with Saracens in his own kino-dom
both in peace and in war, who, if he had sometimes had to
deal with them as enemies, had also found that they could
be changed into its bravest and most loyal soldiers, could
not possibl}^ hate the unbelievers with the hatred which in
the breast of a King of England or France might be a per-
fectly honest passion. Then, just at the moment when he
was naturally stung to the heart by his ill treatment at the
hands of the head of his own faith, when he was denied
communion in Christian rites, when the ministers and de-
fenders of the Christian Church shrank from him as from
one worse than an infidel — just at such a moment as this,
he came across a fuller and more splendid developement of
312 THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. [Essay
the Mahometan law among the independent Mahometan
powers of the East. There was much in the aspect of
Mahometan society to attract him. The absolute authority
of the Mahometan sovereigns was congenial to his
political notions. The art and science, such as it was,
of the more civilize! Mahometan nations appealed to his
intellectual cravings. The license allowed by the Mahometan
law fell in no less powerfully with the impulses of his
voluptuous temperament. That Frederick ever, strictly
speaking, became a Mahometan is of course an absurd
fable. It is not even necessary to believe that he ever
formally threw aside all faith in the dogmas of Christianity
as understood in his own age. But that Frederick, with
all his professions of orthodoxy, was at least a freethinker,
that he indulged in speculations which the orthodoxy of his
age condemned, it is hardly possible to doubt. That he
aimed at the widest changes in the external fabric of the
Christian Church, in the relations between the spiritual
and the temporal, between the Papal and the Imperial,
powers, there can be no doubt at all. And, if there was
any one moment of change in Frederick's mind, any one
moment when doubt, if not disbelief, obtained the supremacy
over his mind, no moment is so likely as that in which he
saw Christianity and Islam standing side by side in the
Holy City of both religions, and when, as regarded him-
self, it could not have been Christianity which appeared in
the more attractive light.
We had hoped to give a sketch, if only a short one, of the
main events in Frederick's later career — his reconciliation
with Gregory, his season of comparative tranquillity in his
Sicilian realm, his schemes of government and legislation,
his second and final rupture with Gregory, his last struggle
with Innocent, his last excommunication and deposition,
and the political consequences of that bold stretch of papal
authority in the appearance of rival kings in Germany and
the general weakening of the Imperial power throughout
the Empire. But the reflexions to which we have been led
X.] THE EMPEIWR FREDERICK THE SECOND. 313
by the consideration of Frederick's position at Jerusalem
lead us at once to questions which may well occupy our
remaining space. On the question of Frederick's religion
Mr. Oliphant hardly enlarges at all; Dean Milman sums up
his own view in a few remarkable words : —
"Frederick's, in my jnclgiuent, was neither scornful and godless infidelity,
nor certainly a more advanced and enlightened Christianity, yearning after
holiness and purity not then attainable. It was tlie shattered, duhious, at
times trembling faith, at times desperately reckless incredulity, of a man
under the burthen of an undeserved excommunication, of which he could
not but discern the injustice, but could not quite shake off the terrors ; of
a man whom a better age of Christianity might not have made religious ;
whom his own made irreligious."
Eut M. Breholles, both in his general Introduction and in
his special monograph of Peter de Vinea, goes very much
deeper into the question. He gathers together a great
number of passages from contemporary writers, which, in
his judgement, are evidence that Frederick was, in the eyes
of a small knot of enthusiastic admii'ers, looked on as some-
thing like the apostle, or rather the Messiah, of a new
religion. Such a notion is certainly much less improbable
in itself than, with our modern notions, it seems to us.
Everything was then looked at from a religious point of
view. Political partizanship took the form of religious
worship ; the man who died for his country or for his
party was canonized as a martyr, and miracles were
deemed to be wrought at his grave. The famous case of
Simon of Montfort, a younger contemporary of Frederick,
is perhaps the strongest of any. Simon died under a papal
excommunication ; but no excommunication could hinder
the English people, and the mass of the English clergy
among them, from looking on the martyred earl as the
patron of the English nation, whose relics possessed healing
virtues on earth, and whose intercession could not fail to
be availing in heaven. The age of Frederick moreover was
eminently an age of religious movement. The new
monastic orders on the one hand, the countless heresies on
the other, sprang out of the same source, and sometimes
314 THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. [Essay
mingled together in a strange way. The heretic who was
sent to the stake and the Dominican friar who sent liim
thither were, each in his own way, witnesses to a general
feeling of dissatisfaction with the existing state of the
Church, to a general striving after something new, in
dogma^ in discipline, or in practice, according to the dis-
position of each particular reformer. Strange writings,
setting forth strange doctrines, were afloat before the days
of Frederick and remained afloat after his days. The
whole of the inner circle of the Franciscan order, the order
of personal self-sacrifice and mystic devotion, seemed fast
sweeping into something more than heresy. Even the
pillars of orthodox}^ the unrelenting avengers of every
deviation from the narrow path, the stern, practical, relent-
less, Dominicans, did not escape the suspicion of being
touched by the same contagion. That contagion was indeed
more than heresy ; it was the preaching of a new religion.
To the believers in the " Everlasting Gospel " Christianity
itself seemed, just as it seems to a Mahometan, to be a
mere imperfect and temporary dispensation, a mere prepara-
tion for something better which was to come. The reign
of the Father, with its revelation in the Mosaic Law, had
passed away; the reign of the Son, with its revelation in
the Christian Church, was passing away; the reign of the
Holy Ghost was approaching, with its own special revela-
tion, more perfect than all. The age was one which could
hardly bear to look upon anything in a purely secular way.
Even when the spiritual and temporal powers came into
conflict, the conflict was of a somewhat diflerent kind from
similar conflicts in our own day. The Ghibelin doctrine
was far from being a mere assertion of the superiority of a
power confessedly of the earth, earthy, over a power con-
fessedly of higher origin. The Empire had its religious
devotees as well as the Popedom. In the ideas of both
parties a Vicar of Christ was a necessity; the only question
was whether the true Vicar of Christ was to be looked for
in the Roman Pontifl' or in the Roman Csesar. To the
X.] THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. 315
enthusiastic votaries of the Empire the Emperor seemed as
truly a direct representative of Divinity, as literally a
power reigning by divine right as ever the Pope could seem
in the eyes of the strongest assertor of ecclesiastical claims.
It is the growth of independent nations and Churches which
has, more than anything else, dealt the death-blow to both
theories. But in Frederick's time no man within the
limits of the Empire could be a vehement opponent of the
temporal or spiritual claims of the Pope without in some
measure asserting a spiritual as well as a temporal power
in the Emperor. This deification of the Imperial power
attained its fullest and most systematic developement
among the writers who undertook the defence of Lewis of
Bavaria ; but there is no doubt that ideas of the same kind
were ah-eady busily at work in the days of Frederick. So
far as Frederick was an opponent of the papal power, so far
as he contemplated any transfer of power from the Papacy
to the Empire, so far in short as he appeared at all in the
character of an ecclesiastical reformer, he could only do so,
if not in his own eyes at least in those of his admirers, by
transferring to himself, as Roman Emperor, some portion
of that official holiness of which he proposed to deprive the
Roman Pontiff.
Now, perplexing as is the question of Fredericks personal
belief, his external position, as Emperor and Kiug, towards
ecclesiastical questions is intelligible enough. He always
professed strict orthodoxy of dogma in his own person, and
in his legislation he strictly enforced such orthodoxy within
the pale of the Christian Church. To the Jew and the
Mahometan he gave full toleration ; the Christian heretic
found in him a persecutor as cruel as the most enthusiastic
Dominican turned loose upon the victims of the elder
Montfort. There is no necessary inconsistency in such
a position ; it is, in fact, one which was acknowledged by
the general treatment of the Jews throughout the middle
ages. The Jew or the Mahometan is something altogether
external to the Church. He is a foreign enemy, not an
316 THE EMPEROR EREDERTCK THE SECOND. [Essay
inborn rebel ; he is one against whom the Church may
rightfully wage war, but not one whom she can claim
to bring before her domestic judgement-seat. But the
heretic is a home-bred traitor ; he is not a foreign enemy
of the Church, but a native rebel against her ; he is there-
fore an object, not of warfare, but of judicial punishment.
A Christian sovereign then, according to the mediaeval
theory, is in no way bound to molest Jews or Maho-
metans simply as Jews or Mahometans ; he must secure
Christians from any molestation at their hands, from any
proselytism of their creed ; but the Jew or the Mahometan
is not amenable to punishment simply on the ground of
his misbelief. But the heretic is so amenable. The Jew
has never been under the allegiance of the Church ; he is
a foreigner, not to be injured unless he commits some act
of national enmity. But the heretic is one who has cast
oti' his allegiance to the Church ; he is a spiritual rebel
to be chastised as unsparingly as the temporal rebel. This
principle was acted on throughout the middle ages. The
Jew was often exposed to unfavourable legislation ; he
was still more commonly visited with illegal or extra-legal
oppression ; but a Jew, simply as a Jew, was never held
to be liable to the penalties of heresy. What is remark-
able in Frederick's legislation is the real and eftective
nature of the toleration which he secured to Jews and
Mahometans, combined with the fact that such a man as
he was should appear as a religious persecutor under any
circumstances. If he really handed over heretics to the
flames in cold blood, simply to keep up for himself a
character for orthodoxy which he did not deserve, it is
hardly possible to conceive a greater measure of guilt.
And the guilt is hardly less if ho employed the popular
prejudice against heresy to destroy political enemies under
the garb of heretics. But it is possible to explain Frede-
ricks persecutions without attributing to him such detest-
able wickedness as this. Though a legislator may be per-
Bonally a freethinker, or oven a confirmed unbeliever, it
X.] THE EMPFAIOR FREDERICK THE SECOND. 317
does not at all follow that he thinks it either possible or
desirable to abolish the public establishment of Christianity
in his dominions. And, in the view of all times and places
up to his day and long after, the public establishment of
any religious system involved the legal punishment of
those who separated from it. Frederick might thus hold
it to be a matter of public order and public justice to
chastise men for publicly rebelling against a system in
which he had himself lost all personal faith. Persecution
of this sort is far more hateful than the persecutions of the
honest fanatic, who burns a few men in this world to save
many from being burned in the next. Still it does not
reach the same measure of guilt as the detestable hypocrisy
which at first seems to be the obvious explanation of
Frederick's conduct in this respect.
Frederick then professed strict orthodoxy of dogma, and
persecuted those who departed from such orthodoxy. But
it is plain that, as to the relations between the spiritual
and temporal powers, he was not orthodox in the papal
sense. It was hardly possible that any Emperor should
be so. In the ideal theory of the two powers, the Pope
and the Emperor are strictly coequal ; the authority of
each is alike divine within its own range. But rigidly
to define the range of each is so hard a matter that this
ideal theory could hardly fail to remain an ideal theory.
The practical question always was whether the Emperor
should be subject to the Pope or the Pope subject to the
Emperor. On this question we cannot doubt that Frederick
had formed a very decided judgement indeed. With such
an intellect as his, in such a position as his, the subjection
of the Pope to the Emperor would be an established prin-
ciple from the first moment that he was capable of specu-
lating about such matters at all. Every event of his life,
every excommunication pronounced by a Pope, every act
of hostility or treachery on the part of churchmen or
military monks, would tend to confirm his decision. How
far Frederick, the innovator, the revolutionist, the despiser
318 THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. [Essay
of received beliefs, may have been influenced by the tra-
ditional theories of the Holy Eoman Empire is another
matter. It is possible that he employed them as useful
for his purpose, without that honest faith in them which
clearly moved the Ottos and his own grandfather. The
magnificent theory of the Empire may well have kindled
his imagination, and he may have consciously striven to
change that magnificent theory into a living reality. But
the dominion at which he aimed was the effective imme-
diate dominion of a Byzantine Emperor or a Saracen
Sultan, rather than the shadowy lordship of a world every
inch of which was really partitioned out among inde-
pendent princes and commonwealths. But, whether strictly
as Emperor or in any other character, there can be no
doubt that Frederick gradually came to set before himself,
as the main object of his life, the depression of the spiritual,
and the exaltation of the temporal, power.
As we said before, whatever might have been Frederick's
own secret views, such a transfer of power as this could,
in that age, hardly take any outward form or shape except
that of a further deification of the temporal power, a more
complete acknowledgement of the Emperor, and not the
Pope, as the true Vicar of Christ upon earth. We must
also remember the tendencies and ways of expression of
that age, how every thought took a religious turn, how,
just as among the Puritans of the seventeenth century,
every strong feeling instinctively clothed itself in scrip-
tural language. Every one who knows anything of the
literature of those times is familiar with the way in which
the thoughts and words of Scripture are liabitually applied
by men to their own public or private affairs, applied in
the most thorough good faith, but in a tone which to our
habits seems in-everent, and sometimes almost blasphemous.
It is therefore in no way wonderful to find devoted par-
tizans of Frederick investing him with a relio^ious cha-
racter, and lavishing upon him the most sacred language
of prophets and apostles. Again, the Christian Empei'ors
X.] THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. 319
had all along kept on from their pagan predecessors several
official phrases borrowed from the old heathendom. The
Emperor and all that belonged to him was " divine " and
"sacred;" his rescripts were "oracles;" his parents and
his children were spoken of as if they belonged to a stock
higher than mankind. Between these two influences we
are not surprised to find Frederick spoken of in terms
which, with modern feelings, we should apply only to the
holiest of objects. The question now comes, Was Frederick
ever directly and seriously put forth by himself or by
his followers as the prophet, apostle, or Messiah of a new
religion 1
That he was so put forth seems to be the opinion of
M. Breholles, and we must wind up by a glance at the
evidence on which he founds his belief. He would hardly
rely with any great confidence on two or three scoffing
speeches attributed to Frederick himself, which may or
may not have been really uttered by him, but w^hich in any
case illustrate the conception which men in general formed
of him. Thus, as is w^ell knowm, he was commonly be-
lieved to have said that Jews, Christians, and Saracens
had been led away by three impostors, Moses, Jesus, and
Mahomet, and that he, Frederick, would set up a better
religion than any of them. If such a speech w^as ever
made, it could only have been in mockery ; it would
convict Frederick of utter contempt for all religion, rather
than of any serious scheme for setting up a religion of
his own. The real stress of the argument lies on the
meaning to be put on certain passages in which con-
temporary partizans of Frederick speak of him in lan-
guage wdiich undoubtedly has, at first sight, a very ex-
traordinary sound. It is not w^onderful, in an age when
every name was played upon and made the subject of
mystical explanations, that the fact that Frederick's great
minister bore the name of Peter should have been made
the subject of endless allusions. The parallel drawn be-
tween Simon Peter and his master and Peter de Vinea
320 THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. [Essay
and his master shocks the taste of our times, but it was
thoroughly in the taste of the thirteenth century. Peter
is to go on the water to his master ; he is converted and
he is to strengthen his brethren ; his master has committed
to him the trust to feed his sheep and to bear the keys
of his kingdom. All these and other expressions of the
same kind are found in the original documents collected
by M. Breholles. So we find Frederick hailed as a saint ;
■ — Vivat, vie at Saucfi Friderici nomeu in popido. We find
Frederick himself, in one and the same passage, applying
to his mother the old title of pagan divinity, and speaking
of his birthplace in a way which implies a parallel between
himself and Christ. Constance is diva mater voi<tra, and
Jesi is Bethleem, tiostra. But there is one passage which
goes beyond all the rest. This is found in a letter from
a Sicilian bishop to Peter de Vinea, a letter which is by
no means easy to understand by reason of the figurative
lano-uao-e used throughout, but in which there is a direct
parallel of the most daring kind between Christ and
Frederick. After an allusion, brought in in a strange
way, to the Last Supper and the rite then instituted, the
writer goes on thus : —
" Unde nou immerito me inovet hsec externa relatio, quod Petrus, in cnjns
petra fiindatur imperialis eccle^ia, quinn augustalis animus roboratur in crena
cum discipulis, tale certum potuit edixisse.'"
The language here is what we should nowadays call
blasphemous, but it is really only the habit of scriptural
application pushed to its extreme point. We should also
remember that Frederick and his partizans, against whom
so much Scripture had been quoted, would have a certain
pleasure in showing that they could quote Scripture back
again, as certainly no one ever did with more vigorous
etfect than Frederick himself at some stages of his con-
troversy with Gregory. But we do not see that this or
the other passages quoted are enough to justify some of
the expressions used by M. Breholles ; such we mean as
when he says: —
X.] THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. 321
"Ecrivant aux cardinaux durant la vacance du saint-si^ge, en 1243, il
leur rappelle I'exetnple des Israelites, qui, errant sans chef dans le desert
pendant quarante jours, en vinrent k prendre un veau d'or pour leur dieu :
' S'il faut renoncer k la consecration d'un nouveau pape, ajoute-t-il, qu'un autre
saint des saints paiaisse enfin, mais quel sera-t-il? ' [Si papalis cessavit uiictio,
veniet ergo alius sanctus sanctorum, et quis ille est ?] Lui-meme apparemment,
puisqu'il aspire au rdle de piophfete et de Messie: et sur ce point les conteiii-
porains ne se trompaient gubre quand ils accusaient Frederic de chercher a
usurper pour son propre compte le souverain pontificat. Delk a se di^clarer
d'une essence presque divine, il n'y a qu'un pas."
M. Breholles here quotes the passages in which Frederick
calls his son Camrei sanrjuinU divma jji'olts, and speaks of
his own mother and his own birth-place in the way in
which we have already spoken. Elsewhere he says : —
" Ainsi Frederic II. semble bien, de son vivant, adore et divinise k peu prfes
comme une emanation de I'Esprit-Saint. Dans les termes qui servent k ex-
primer sa suprt^matie religieuse, il y a quelque chose qui tient k la fois du
paganisme de I'Orient, qui rap[)elle le culte personnel impose a leurs sujets par
les empereurs de I'ancienue Rome et par les califes fatimites de I'Egypte." *
Surely this language is stronger than the passages quoted
will bear out. To us it seems that the actual designs of
Frederick were not unlike those of Henry the Eighth.
We forego any comparison between the two men, than
whom no two men could well have less of likeness to
each other. Henry was at least a firm believer in his
own theological system. Frederick, w^e cannot help think-
ing, looked on all theological systems chiefly as political
instruments. But the immediate object of each was the
same, to bring the spiritual power under the control of
the temporal, to transfer to the King the ecclesiastical
supremacy of the Pope. Within his own kingdom of
Sicily the position of Frederick must have been identical
with the position of Henry. If he could do no more, he
could at least be both Pope and King in his own lealra.
But, as Emperor, he must have at least dreamed of a far
wider supremacy, even if he gave up any practical hope
of obtaining it. The Emperor, Lord of the World, miglit
* Was there any calipli, except Hakem, who imposed on his subjects
anything which could be strictly called " culte persomieV 1
322 THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. [Essay
dream of establishing a spiritual as well as a temporal
supremacy ovei" all the realms which were in theory placed
beneath his superiority. He might deem it really possible
to establish such a superiority within those realms which
still retained some measure of connexion with the Empire.
The result would have been the subjection of Western
Europe, or, at all events, of three of its most important
portions, to the deadening yoke of a caliphate.
Our remarks have been desultory and imperfect. Such
a subject as the life and objects of Frederick the Second
might furnish materials for volumes. We can profess to do
little more than to call attention to some of the most won-
derful chapters of European history, and to point to the
collection of M. Br^holles as one of the most wonderful
treasure-houses of original materials with which any scholar
has ever enriched historical learnings.
XI.] CHARLES THE BOLD. 323
XL
CHARLES THE BOLD*
Hutory of Charles the Bold, Ditke of Burgundy. By John
Foster Ktrk. London: Murray. Vols. Land H. 1863.
Vol. in. 1868.
We welcome with genuine pleasure a narrative of an im-
portant portion of history by a writer who shows in no small
degree the possession of real historic power. And we wel-
come it with still greater pleasure when we find that it
proceeds from an American writer, a countryman of Mr.
Prescott and Mr. Motley, a writer fully entitled to take his
place alongside of them, and in some respects perhaps to be
preferred to either. It is a matter of real satisfaction that
so good an historical school should be still growing and
prospering, and that untoward political events have not
wholly checked its developement.f A very slight glance
at Mr. Kirk's book is enough to show that we are dealing
with a real historian, that we have before us a work of a
wholly different kind from the countless volumes of super-
ficial talk which are unceasingly poured out upon the world
under the degraded garb of history. Mr. Kirk has his
* [I reviewed Mr. Kirk's first and second volumes in the Natioi:al Review
for April, 1864, and the third in the Fortnightly Review for October ist,
1868. The former article was necessarily without my name, and the latter
was necessarily with it. But I acknowledged the authorship of the National
article in a note to the Fortnightly article. A certain amount of repetition
could hardly be helped. I have therefore thrown the two into one continuous
essay, but I have taken care to preserve the substance and sentiments of
both, especially so far as they regard my estimate of Mr. Kirk's book.]
[1871.]
•\ [Mr. Kirk wrote, and I wrote, wliile the American civil war was going
on.] [1 8 7 1.]
Y 2
324 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
faults both of style and of matter. That we do not always
come to the same conclusions as he does, in one of the most
perplexed mazes to be found in the whole range of history,
is as likely to be our fault as his. But, besides this, there
are features in Mr. Kirk's style which hardly conform to
the laws of a pure taste, and portions of his matter which
hardly conform to the laws of accurate reasoning. Still
his merits in both ways, alike as to form and as to sub-
stance, are real and great. He has studied history in its
real sources, in the chronicles and documents of the time,
and in the best modern writers of the various nations con-
cerned. His research has been unwearied.; and in dealing
with his materials, he displays, notwithstanding a certain
tendency to make the best of his hero, a very considerable
degree of critical power. His narratives of events and his
general pictures of the time are often of a very high order ;
it would not be going too far to say that many of them are
first-rate. In his wider political speculations he is less
happy. Long disquisitions on matters which hardly bear
on his subject are needlessly brought in, and they are far
from being written with the same clearness and power as
the narrative portions of the book. And in his occasional
references to times earlier than his own immediate subject
Mr. Kirk's accuracy is certainly not unimpeachable. Besides
a few strange errors in detail, it is plain that he is not
wholly free from those popular misconceptions which have
perverted the whole early history of Germany and France.
These are serious defects ; but they are defects which are
quite overbalanced by the sterling excellences of the work,
and they in no way hinder us from gladly hailing in
Mr. Kirk a welcome recruit to the small band of real
historians.
In estimating Mr. Kirk's style, it would be unfair not to
take into account the fact that we are dealing, not with
a British but with an American writer. We use the word
British by choice, as best expressing mere geographical and
political distinctions ; for we trust that Mr. Kirk is not one
XI.J CHARLES THE BOLD. 325
of those whose birth on the other side of the Ocean leads
them to despise the name of Englishmen. American litera-
ture has a special interest, as bearing on the probable future
fate of the language which is still common to all men of
English blood in both continents. It is quite clear that
good writers and speakers in the two countries speak and
write — and will doubtless long go on to speak and write —
exactly the same language. The divergences of speech
which may occasionally be noticed between England and
America simply arise from the fact that in both countries
the language is corrupted by bad speakers and writers, and
that British and American corruptions of speech do not
always follow the same course. A few local expressions
springing out of the several wants and circumstances of the
two countries, a few words kept in use in one country after
they have become obsolete in the other, make hardl}^ any
perceptible difference. They are only worth speaking of
because half-informed people often apply the name of
Americanisms to expressions which have simply dropped
out of use in England, or which linger only in particular
districts or among old-fashioned people. In Mr. Kirk's
style it is not often that we detect any signs of the Ameri-
can origin of his book. Here and there indeed we find
such words as "proclivities," "reliable,"* and the like ; but
these, though American corruptions of the language, have
become too common among British writers to be marked as
sure signs of American birth. But the worst of Mr. Kirk's
defects is that, in some very important points, he does not
improve as he goes on. In point of style there is a great
and gradual falling-off from the beginning of the first volume
to the end of the third. Mr. Kii'k forms, in this respect, a
striking contrast to his countryman Mr. Motley. When Mr.
Motley began his work, he constantly mistook extravagance
for eloquence. This was shown both in many of his
descriptions and in his trick of giving fantastic — what we
* [It is perhaps worth noting that seven years ago I looked on these ugly
and needless words as Amez-icanisms.] [1871.]
326 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
may call sensational — headings to his chapters. But Mr.
Motley's style, as his work went on, became gradually
improved and chastened, till in his later volumes, though
traces of the old leaven may still be tracked out, they appear
only as casual blemishes, not seriously interfering with
the general merits of a clear and forcible diction. Mr. Kirk,
on the other hand, began far better than he went on.
In the early part of his work his story is well told ; he
writes, especially in his strictly narrative portions, at once
with clearness and with purity. It is only here and there
that we stumble on a passage where a forced expression, or
a confusion of metaphors, might offend a refined taste.
Take for instance a passage in the second volume. The
following parable is quite beyond us ; indeed, we suspect
some confusion in the writer's mind between the shaft of a
pillar and the shaft of a pit : —
"The shaft of Saxon liberty, raised high and solid in the time of the deepest
obscurity, — while the Continental races were still undergoing the crushing and
rending of a veritable chaos, — had pierced through the supervening layers of
the Norman Conquest and of feudalism, incrusting itself with glittering ex-
traneous decorations, but preserving its simple and massive proportions ; and
now, in like manner, it towered above the too aspiring pretensions of royalty,
reared upon other and narrower foundations" (ii. 339).
As the work goes on, passages of this sort become thicker
on the ground. As he warms with his tale, Mr. Kirk begins
to take a pleasure in ever and anon lashing himself into a
cei'tain vehemence of language which often rises to the
level of actual rant. In the third volume he stops at every
crisis of his narrative to pour forth a page or so of what
can be called by no name but that of absolute raving.
Over the death-scene of his hero Mr. Kirk becomes simply
frantic. He who, when he chooses, can tell a story as well
as any man, breaks off into that wild spasmodic style whose
mildest form consists in the writer rigidly turning his back
on all the historical tenses. A scene, than which none more
striking can be found in the whole range of history, dissolves
in Mr. Kirk's hands into page on page of tawdry bombast.
" Night ! thou art crueller than Day." " Bid his brother,
XI.] CHARLES THE BOLD. 327
his captive nobles, his surviving servants, come." " Let
Rene come." '• Gentle Rene, good and gentle prince, God,
we doubt not, hath pardoned many a fault of thine for
those tender thoughts." " Thou art right, Commines." And
so on, through several pages, till the book itself winds up
with — " Alas! Alas!" in all the dignity of
sensational printing. What can have possessed Mr. Kirk
to take to this sort of thing it is impossible to guess. It
certainly is not because he cannot do better. This frenzied
way of writing is simply put on now and then as a kind of
holiday garb. In his general narrative there is none of it.
His battle-pieces are admirable ; and, when he chooses, he
can moralize without ranting. There is something really
striking and pathetic when, after describing the spoil of
Granson, the wanderings of the three great diamonds, the
relics still treasured up in the Swiss towns, Mr. Kirk goes
back to the days of Charles's own triumph and hard-
heartedness at Dinant and Liittich : —
" For our own part, while looking at these trophies, or turning over the
leaves of the time-stained lists in wiiich they are enumerated, we have been
reminded of other relics and another inventory. Tlie ' little ivory comb,' the
'pair of bride's gloves,' the 'agnus enchased with silver,' the 'necklace with
ten little paternosters of amber,' picked up among the ashes of Dinant, and
duly entered to tlie credit of ' my lord of Burgundy ' — was there no connec-
tion between those memorials of humble joy, of modest love, of ruined homes,
and these remains of fallen pride and grandeur ? Yes, without doubt ! though
it be one which history, that tracks the diamond from hand to hand, is in-
capable of tracing."
Perhaps even here a very stern critic might say that Mr.
Kirk was verging on the sensational, but if this had been
the extreme point which Mr. Kirk had allowed himself, it
would have been unreasonable to find fault. Mr. Kirk, in
a word, can write well, and he constantly does write well.
But there is for that very reason the less excuse for his ever
deliberately choosing to write in the wild fashion in which
he has written the last pages of his book.
To turn from manner to matter, large parts of the general
disquisitions contained in the second and third chapters of
328 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
Mr. Kirk's fourth book seem to us wanting both in force
and in clearness. In many places Mr. Kirk needlessly goes
out of his way to grapple with earlier writers, as Hallam
and Macaulay, and that sometimes altogether without
ground. Thus Mr. Kirk tells us in a note : —
"We cannot help protesting* against what seems to us the most radically
false, the most pernicious in the general inferences to be drawn from it, and
yet the most characteristic — inasmuch as it even runs through his literary
criticisms — of the paradoxes in which Macaulay loved to indulge. Speaking
of England in the reign of John, he says : ' Her interest was so directly
opposed to the interest of her rulers that she had no hope but in their errors
or misfortunes. The talents and even the virtues of her six first French
Kings were a curse to her. The follies and vices of the sevrnfh were her
salvation.^ And so too when he comes to a later period he writes : ' Of
.Tames the First, as of John, it may be said that if his administration had
been able and splendid, it would probably have been fatal to our country,
and that we oive more to his weaknesses and meannesses than to the wisdom and
courage of much better sovereigns^ " (ii. 355).
Now Mr. Kirk looks on these words of Lord Macaulay's
as contradicting a remark of his own that the English Par-
liament and nation, in contradistinction to the communes and
Estates of the Netherlands, " seconded the enterprising spirit
of their monarchs while assertinsj and enlarging their own
constitutional rights." But there is no contradiction and
no paradox. What Lord Macaulay says and what Mr. Kirk
says are both perfectly true of different periods of English
history. Lord Macaulay is speaking of our " French kings,"
of the first seven kings after the Conquest. And what he
says of them is perfectly true. England had no interest in
the aggrandizement of Henry the Second in France. For
the Duke of Normandy and Aquitaine to strengthen himself
at the expense of the King of Paris could in no way profit
the kingdom which he held as a sort of insular de-
pendency. The folly of John lost Normandy and all his
other French possessions except Aquitaine. That loss was
* By the way, we cannot help protesting, in our turn, against Mr. Kirk's
fashion of speaking of himself as " we " and " us." In a newspaper or review
there are manifest reasons for the practice, none of which apply to a book
written by a single avowed author. Such a man should not talk of himself
more than need be; but, when he does talk of himself, he should say "I"
and " me."
XI.] CHARLES THE BOLD. 329
the salvation of England. Hitherto England had been, like
Sardinia and Sicily in later times, the source of the highest
title, but by no means the most valued possession, of her
sovereigns. But now England again became the most im-
portant part of the King of England's dominions. England
had been a dependency of Anjou ; Aquitaine was now a
dependency of England. At last a King of England under-
took a war of aggrandizement in France, from which England
and English freedom were then in a position to reap great,
though doubtless only indirect, advantage. All this was the
direct result of the follies and vices of John. What Lord
Macaulay says is perfectly true of the reign of John ; what
Mr. Kirk saj^s is perfectly true of the reign of Edward the
Third. There is no kind of opposition between the two
statements, and, both in this and in several other places,
Mr. Kirk need not have gone out of his way to pass censures
on Lord Macaulay which are quite undeserved.
We also mentioned occasional inaccuracies and miscon-
ceptions as to earlier times as among the faults of Mr. Kirk's
book. It is ludicrous to place (i. 288) the saying " Non
Angli sed angeli " in the mouth of Gregory the Seventh.
It is hardly less so to call Citeaux (i. 45) the " head of the
great Carthusian order." And such a passage as the follow-
ing is utterly inaccurate in fact, and still more false in
deduction •
" But the Norman sovereigns of England were not related, at least by
any close affinity, to the Capetian race. They had acquired their chief pos-
sessions in France, as they had acquired the English crown, not by grant or
inheritance, but by the power of tlieir aims. They were foreigners and open
enemies; their only adherents in France were secret traitors or avowed rebels ;
and they could not, therefore, mask their designs against it under the pretext
of serving the nation and reforming the state" (i. 3).
We suppose that Mr. Kirk is not here thinking of the
strictly '• Norman sovereigns of England," the Conqueror
and his sons. It is not hkely that he means any king
before Henry the Second. But Henry the Second did not
acquire his chief possessions in France by force of arms, but
by lawful inheritance and marriage : Normandy came from
330 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
his mother, Anjou from his father, Aquitaine from his wife."^
He was not a foreigner, but a Frenchman by blood and
language ; he was an open enemy only as every powerful
and turbulent vassal was an open enemy ; in what sense his
" adherents in France " were " secret traitors or avowed
rebels " we cannot in the least understand. It is not likely
that Mr. Kirk uses the word France in the older sense, the
sense in which it is opposed to Aquitaine and Normandy ;
and it is hard to understand how a loyal subject and
" adherent " of the Duke of Normandy or Aquitaine can be
called a rebel or a traitor against the King of France. It
may be — indeed the next paragraph makes it probable —
that Mr. Kirk intends this description to apply, not to
Henry the Second and Richard the First, but to Edward the
Thii-d and Henry the Fifth. But the " Norman sovereigns
of England" is an odd way of describing the two latter
princes, and the assertion as to the origin of the dominion
of the Kings of England in France remains equally in-
accurate in any case.
In point of research Mr. Kirk's labours have been in
every way praiseworthy. He has made diligent use of all
printed sources, and he has also toiled unweariedly among
the manuscript archives of the Swiss Cantons ; nor has he
neglected another object of study, which is quite as worthy
of the historian's attention as anything recorded by pen and
ink. He has thoroughly mastered the geographical features
of the districts where the great events of his history took
place. Mr. Kirk's geographical minuteness, illustrated as
it is by careful ground-plans, makes his battle-pieces clear,
lively, and intelligible. We can here speak as something
more than a mere reader. We cannot pretend to have gone
over the field of Granson with the same minuteness as Mr.
Kii-k has done, but we have seen enough of it to be able to
* [Henry inherited Normandy, liis mother's inheritance, peacefully ; but his
father liad conquered it from Stephen.
I Bhould now hardly speak of Normandy ami Aquitaine as "possessions in
France."] 1886.
XI.] CHARLES THE BOLD. 331
bear a general testimony to the merit of his description of
the sieoe and the battle ; and at the same time we heard
enough in Switzerland of Mr. Kirk's labours among manu-
script sources of information to make us put full confidence
in whatever he professes to have drawn from archives which
we have not ourselves examined.
Putting aside then Mr. Kirk's occasional bursts of extra-
vagance, which might be simply cut out of his book without
doing it the least damage, and making some other deduc-
tions which we shall have to make before we have done, we
have no hesitation in saying that Mr. Kirk has given us
a good, clear, and vigorous narrative of the career of Charles
the Bold, containing much that will be quite new to the
English reader. Where he breaks down is in failing to give
his subject the necessary connexion with the general history
of Europe before and afterwards. Mr. Kirk, who ends his
history with a frantic ejaculation over his hero's dead body,
does not even attempt to connect his hero's story with any-
thing that came after him, and his attempts to connect it
with anything that went before cannot be called successful.
Mr. Kirk hardly attempts to trace matters at all further
back than to the establishment of the princes of the house
of Valois in the French duchy of Burgundy, and the few
references which he makes to earlier times, or to countries
beyond the immediate range of his story, show no width or
accuracy of grasp. He has not, for instance, mastered the
various meanings and uses of the name Burgundy, of which
minute inquirers have reckoned up no less than ten. In
truth it was not likely that Mr. Kirk should make himself
thoroughly master of this aspect of his subject, because he
shows throughout his book that he has failed fully to grasp
the importance of historical geography. Physical and pic-
turesque geography he is thoroughly master of, as he shows
by his descriptions of Granson and Morat. But he has not
been able fully to emancipate himself from bondage to the
modern map. Of course he knows that the frontiers of
France and of Switzerland were widely different then from
332 CHABLES THE BOLD. [Essay
what they are now. But he has not got rid of a sort of
superstition which affects many even among people who
know the facts — a sort of notion that, even if France, as
a matter of fact, once had a narrower frontier than it has at
present, still it was in the eternal fitness of things that it
should some day reach to its present frontier, or to a
frontier wider still. In short, Mr. Kirk has listened to
French babble about natural boundaries and the frontier of
the Rhine. Now every one who has mastered historical
geography knows that this sort of talk is babble and
nothing else. There was no more reason in the nature
of things why Aries or Nancy should bow to Paris than
there was why Paris should bow to Aries or Nancy. Mr.
Kirk does not thoroughly understand the utter difference
in blood and speech between Gaul north and south of the
Loire, heightened by utter difference in political position
between Gaul east and west of the Saone. He seems
throughout to identify the modern kingdom of France with
that ancient monarchy of the Franks which is far more
truly to be identified with the German kingdom which
was dissolved in 1806. Thus, in introducing a really
beautiful description of the county of Burgundy, he tells
us how,
" After a long separation from the Duchy of Burgund}', it again became
subject to the same rule in the early part of the fourteenth century. It
was a fief, however, not of France, but of the Empire, thotiijh situated within
the natural boiiiictaries qf France, governed by a line of princes of French
descent, and inhabited by a people who spoke the French language " (i. 47).
Here Mr. Kirk knows the facts, but he does not fully
understand them. He is in a manner surprised at finding
a great fief of the Empire within what, on the modern map,
are the boundaries of France. As for " natural boundaries,"
they may of course be placed wherever any one pleases. It
is quite as easy to call the Elbe the natural boundary of
France as it is so to speak of the Rhine. It is quite as
easy, and more true historically, to give that name to the
Rhone and the Saone. The French counts of Burgundy,
one of them a reigning king of France, had come in quite
XI.J CHARLES THE BOLD. 333
lately through female succession from the descendants of
Frederick and Beatrice. As for language, the county of
Burgundy, like nearly the whole of the kingdom of Bur-
gundy, spoke a Romance lauguage ; but we greatly doubt
its speaking in those days anything that could fairly be
called French. In another place we read :
"Wherever the French race existed, wherever the French language was
spoken, wherever mountain or river difered a bulwark to the integrity of
the French soil, there the French monarchy must seek to fix its swaj' and
establish its supremacy. France, in distinction from all other nations or
countries, aspires to uniformity and completeness. Her foreign wars, her
foreign conquests, for the most part have had for their object the attain-
ment or recovery of her ' natural boundaries.' Again and again the tide
has swollen to those limits, often with a force that cairied it beyond them.
Again and again it has receded, leaving a margin still to be reclaimed, but
bearing still the traces of a former flood" (ii. 157).
Towards the end of this passage Mr. Kirk gets so meta-
phorical that we hardly know what he means. But what
on earth is " the French race " ? Why are all sorts of
Romance dialects to be jumbled together under the name
of " the French language " ? And Elsass at least is surely
not peopled by " the French race," nor did its inhabitants
ever speak the tongue either of oc or of oil. On Mr. Kirk's
principles we must take to "rectifying " the map of Europe ;
and a poor look-out it will be for Brussels, Saint Heliers,
Neufchatel, and Geneva.
So again with regard to Switzerland. Though it is a
point essential to Mr. Kirk's argument to bear in mind that
Vaud was, in Charles the Bold's time, a country absolutely
foreign to Switzerland, though he constantly points out the
fact whenever his narrative calls for it, yet he still carries
about with him some notion about Helvetia and the Hel-
vetii, as if that Celtic tribe had some kind of historical
connexion with the Swabian cities and districts which
united to form the Old League of High Germany* Of
* It is most curious to see how early this sort of confusion arose. Valerius
Anshehn, who flourished about 1530, speaking of the County of Burgundy,
says : — " Ein wunderbare Sach, dass die uralten Eydijenonaen so vil uf dise
Graflschaft gesetzt hatten, dass ehe sie davon stahn wcilltiut [sie] ehe ihr
Land, Lyb und Gut gegem Ecimischen Keiser Julio unabwyslich wagteut"
334 CHAVxLES THE BOLD. [Essay
course he knows these things, but he does not fully grasp
them ; and through not realizing them, he often fails fully
to grasp the true position of Charles and of those with
whom Charles had to deal. He of course knows, but he
does not seem thoroughly to enter into, the purely German
position and purely German feeling of the Confederates of
those days. In the Swiss writers the war is always a war
of Dutch and Welsh {Tiltscheu and Wdhchen), and the position
of the Confederates as members of the Roman Empire and
of the German nation is always put strongly forward. The
'• tlitsche Nation " is constantly heard of in Swiss mouths
as something entitled to the deepest patriotic affection, and
we hear not uncommonly of "das heilig Rych," and of
'•unser Herr der Keiser," as of objects to which Swiss
loyalty had by no means ceased to be due. Now there is
no habit of the historical mind so hard to acquire in its
fulness as this habit of constantly bearing in mind the
political divisions and the nomenclature of the particular
time of which one is Meriting, and of utterly freeing oneself
from what we have already spoken of as the bondage of the
modern map. It is by no means always a question of mere
knowledge, but rather a question of practically remembering
and making use of one's knowledge. Many a man who, if
directly asked for the names and divisions which existed at
a particular date, would at once give the right answer, will
go away and use some expression which shows that his
knowledge of them is not a real living thinef which he con-
stantly carries about with him. We do not at all mean
that Mr. Kirk is a remarkable offender this way, or that his
pages are full of geographical blunders. It is quite the
(Berner-Chroiiik, i. 145). To call the Helvetii " Uralten E;/(J[/etws>ten" is
even more wonderful than when Machiavelli calls the Gauls of Brennus
Frenchmen : but it ia almost more amazing still when, in another passage
(i. 140), Valerius Anshelm distinctly claims the ancient frontier of the Hel-
vetii as the hereditary frontier of tlie Confederates : " Hat ein gliicksame
Stadt Bern, mit Bystand ihrer Eydgnossen . . . eroberet und gewunnen der
■urdllen Eydiinoasuchaft uralte Landmarch, gegen Sonnen-Nidergang rei-
chend — namlich das Land zwiisclien dem Liiberer-Gebirg und dem Kotten, von
Erlach und Murten an bis gan lenf an die Brugg," &c.
XI.] CHARLES THE BOLD. 335
contrary. Mr. Kirk's position as an historian is many-
degrees above that level. We only mention what strikes
us as his deficiencies in this respect, because it influences
the general character of his narrative, and sometimes
hinders him from fully grasping the aspect of affairs as
it looked in the eyes of a contemporary.
It follows from what we have said that the earlier part of
Mr. Kirk's work is the best. The career of Charles the
Bold, as he points out, naturally falls into two parts, and
Mr. Kirk is more successful in dealing with the former of
the two. This twofold division is naturally suggested by
Charles's twofold position. His career divides itself into a
French and a German portion. In both alike he is exposed
to the restless rivalry of Lewis of France ; but in the one
period that rivalry is carried on openly within the French
territory, while in the second stage the crafty king finds
the means to deal far more effectual blows through the
agency of Teutonic hands. That Charles should thus play
a part in the affairs of both countries naturally followed
from his position as at once a French prince and a prince of
the Empire ; but it is certainly remarkable that his two
spheres of action can be thus mapped out with almost as
much chronological as geographical precision. The position
of Charles was a very peculiar one ; it requires a successful
shaking-off of modern notions fully to take in what it was.
He held the rank of one of the first princes in Europe
without being a king, and without possessing an inch of
ground for which he did not owe service to some superior
lord. And, more than this, he did not owe service to one
lord only. The phrase of " Great Powers " had not been
invented in the fifteenth century ; but there can be no
doubt that, if it had been, the Duke of Burgundy would
have ranked among the foremost of them. He was, in
actual strength, the equal of his royal neighbour to the
west, and far more than the equal of his Imperial neighbour
to the east. Yet for every inch of his territories he owed a
336 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
vassal's duty to one or other of them. Placed on the
borders of France and the Empire, some of his territories
were held of the Empire and some of the French crown.
Charles, Duke of Burgundy, Count of Flanders and Artois,
was a vassal of France ; but Charles, Duke of Brabant,
Count of Burgundy, Holland, and a dozen other duchies
and counties, held his dominions as a vassal of Csesar.
His dominions were large in positive extent, and they were
valuable out of all proportion to their extent. No other
prince in Europe was the direct sovereign of so many rich
and flourishing cities, rendered still more rich and flourish-
ing through the long and, in the main, peaceful adminis-
tration of his father. The cities of the Netherlands were
incomparably greater and more prosperous than those of
France or England ; and, though they enjoyed large
municipal privileges, they were not, like those of Germany,
independent commonwealths, acknowledging only an ex-
ternal superior in their nominal lord. Other parts of his
dominions, the duchy of Burgundy especially, were as rich
in men as Flanders was rich in money. So far the Duke
of Burgundy had some great advantages over every other
prince of his time. But, on the other hand, his dominions
were further removed than those of any prince in Europe
from forming a compact whole. He was not king of one
kingdom, but duke, count, and lord of innumerable duchies,
counties, and lordships, acquired by different means, held
by diflerent titles and of different overlords, speaking-
different languages, subject to different laws, transmitted
according to diflerent rules of succession, and each subject
to possible escheat to its own lord. These various terri-
tories moreover had as little geographical as they had
political connexion. They lay in two large masses, the two
Burgundies forming one and the Low Countries forming
the other, so that their common master could not go from
one of his capitals to another without passing through a
foreign territory. And, even within these two great
masses, there were portions of territory intersecting the
XI.] CHARLES THE BOLD. 337
ducal dominions which there was no hope of annexing by
fair means. The dominions of a neighbouring duke or
count might be acquired by marriage, by purchase, by
exchange, by various means short of open robbery. But
the dominions of the free cities and of the ecclesiastical
princes were in their own nature exempt from any such
processes. If the Duke of Burgundy became also Duke of
Brabant, the inhabitants simply passed from one line of
princes to another ; no change was involved in their laws or
in their form of government. But, as Mr. Kirk well points
out, the bishopric of Llittich could never pass by marriage,
inheritance, forfeiture, or purchase. Just as little could
the free Imperial city of Besangon. The duke whose
dominions hemmed them in could win them only by sheer
undisguised conquest, a conquest too which must necessarily
change the whole framework of their government. The
rights of princely government were in no way affected by
the transfer, even the violent transfer, of a duchy from one
duke to another; but the rights of the Church in one case,
and the rights of civic freedom in the other, would have
been utterly trampled under foot by the annexation of a
bishopric or a free city. Charles too, lord of so many
lordships, was also closely connected with many royal
houses. In France he was not only the first feudatory of
the kingdom, the Dean of the Peers of France ; he was
also a prince of the blood royal, with no great number of
lives between him and the crown. On his mother's side
he claimed descent from the royal houses of England and
Portugal: he closely identified himself with England; he
spoke our language ; he played an active part in our
politics : he seems to have cherished a hope, one perhaps
not wholly unreasonable, that, among the revolutions and
disputed successions of our country, the extinction of both
the contending houses might at last place the island crown
upon his own brow. Looking to his eastern frontier, to the
states which he held of the Empire, he was beyond all
comparison the most powerful of the Imperial feudatories.
z
338 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
The next election might place him upon the throne of the
Caesars, where he would be able to rei^n after a very
different sort from the feeble Austrian whom he aspired to
succeed or to displace. Or, failing of any existing crown,
he might dream of having a crown called out of oblivion
for his special benefit. Burgundy might again give its
name to a kingdom, and his scattered duchies and lord-
ships might be firmly welded together under a royal
sceptre. Perhaps no man ever had so many dreams, dreams
which in any one else would have been extravagant,
naturally suggested to him by the position in which he
found himself by inheritance.
And now what sort of man was he who inherited so
much, and whose inheritance prompted him to strive after
so much more 1 We wish to speak of him as he was in his
better days ; towards the end of his life the effect of un-
expected misfortunes darkened all his faults, even if it did
not actually touch his reason. Mr. Kirk is a biographer,
and, as such, he is bound by a sort of feudal tenure to " re-
habilitate," as the cant word is, the lord under whom he
takes service. We do not at all blame him for trying to
make out the best case he can for his hero ; indeed we can
go much further, and say that, in a great degree, he success-
fully makes out his case. Though he is zealous, he is by
no means extravagant, on behalf of Charles. Though he
holds, and we think with reason, that Charles has com-
monly had less than justice done to him, he by no means
sets him up as a perfect model. He rates both his
abilities and his character higher than they are commonly
rated, but he does not claim for him any exalted genius,
neither does he undertake to be the apologist of all his
actions. He is satisfied with showing that a man who
played an important part in an important time was neither
the brute nor the fool that he has been described both by
partizan chroniclers and by modern romance-writers. Even
in the point where we see most reason to differ from Mr.
Kirk, we have little to object to as far as regards Charles
XI.] CHARLES THE BOLD, 339
himself. We shall presently see that, in estimating the
causes of the war between Charles and the Swiss, Mr. Kirk
lays the whole blame upon the Confederates, and represents
the Duke of Burgundy as something like an injured victim.
Allowing for a little natural exaggeration, we think Mr.
Kirk is fairly successful in his justification of Charles ; we
do not think him equally successful in his inculpation of
the Confederates.
Charles was perhaps unlucky in the age in which he
lived ; he was certainly unlucky in the predecessor whom
he succeeded and in the rival against whom he had to
struggle. It may be, as Mr. Kirk says, that he was
better fitted for an earlier age than that in which he
lived ; it is certain that he was quite unfit either to
succeed Philip the Good or to contend against Lewis the
Eleventh. One can have no hesitation in saying that
Charles was morally a better man than his father. He
had greater private virtues, and he was certainly not
stained with greater public crimes. Yet Philip passed
with unusual prosperity and reputation through a reign
of unusual length, while the career of Charles was short
and stormy, and he left an evil memory behind him.
Philip, profligate as a man and unprincipled as a ruler,
was still the Good Duke, who lived beloved and died
regretted by his subjects. Charles, chaste and temperate
in his private life, and with a nearer approach to justice
and good faith in his public dealings than most princes
of his time, was hated even by his own soldiers, and
died unlamented by any one.* As in many other men,
the virtues and the vices of Charles were closely linked
together. He knew no mercy either for himself or for
anybody else. Austere in his personal morals and a strict
* Charles, to say the least, never became a national hero anywhere. The
writers of the sixteenth century, who compiled their chronicles within his
dominions and inscribed them to his descendants, Oudegherst, Pontus Heute-
rus, his copyist Haiseus, and the like, speak of him without any sort of en-
thusiasm ; indeed, they are full of those views of his character and actions
which Mr. Kirk strongly, and often truly, denounces as popular errors.
Z %
340 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
avenger of vice in others, he probably made himself
enemies by bis very virtues, where a little genial pro-
fligacy might have made him friends. His home govern-
ment was strictly just ; his ear was open to the meanest
petitioner, and he was ready to send the noblest offender
to the scaffold. But such stern justice was not the way
to make himself popular in those days. A justice which
knows not how to yield or to forgive is hardly suited
for fallible man in any age, and in that age Charges some-
times drew blame upon himself by acts which we should
now look on as crowning him with honour. His inex-
orable justice refused to listen to any entreaties for the
life of a gallant young noble* who had murdered a man
of lower degree. In this we look on him as simply dis-
charging the first duty of a sovereign ; in his own age
the execution seemed to men of all ranks to be an act
of remorseless cruelty. In short, Charles, as a civil ruler,
practised none of the arts by which much worse rulers
have often made themselves beloved. He was chary of
gifts, of praise, of common courtesy. No wonder then
that so many of his servants forsook him for a prince
who at least knew how to appreciate and to reward their
services. And what Charles was as a ruler he was even
more conspicuously as a captain. In warfare his discipline
was terrible ; he imposed indeed no hardship on the lowest
sentinel which he did not equally impose upon himself;
but the commander who had no kind word for any one,
and a heavy punishment for the slightest offence, did not
go the way to win the love of his soldiers. His cruelty
towards Dinant and Liittich did not greatly exceed — in
some respects it did not equal — the ordinary cruelty of
the age ; but the cold and ^?<a-v/-judicial severity with
which he planned the work of destruction is almost more
* See the story of the Bastard of Haniaide in Barante, Dncs de Bourgogne,
I. ii6 ; Kiik, i. ^62. Tlie better known tale told by Pontus Heuterus (Rerum
Burgundiacaruni, lib. v. cap. 5), and worked up into the story of Rliynsault and
Sapphira in the .Spectator, wlietlier true or false, is at least quite in character.
XL] CHARLES THE BOLD. 341
repulsive than the familiar horrors of the storm and the
sack. It was his utter want of sympathy with mankind
which made Charles the Bold hated, while really worse
men have been beloved. The ambition of Philip the Good
was more unprincipled than that of his son, but it was
more moderate, and kept more carefully within the bounds
of possibility. The means by which he gained large por-
tions of his dominions, Holland and Hennegau especially,
were perhaps more blameworthy than anything in the
career of Charles, and in particular acts of cruelty and
in violent outbursts of wrath there was little to choose
between father and son. But Philip's ambition was satis-
fied with now and then seizing a province or two which
came conveniently within his grasp ; he did not keep the
world constantly in commotion ; he had no longing after
royal or Imperial crowns, and indeed refused them when
they came in his way; his rule was on the whole peaceful
and beneficent, and his very annexations, when they were
once made, secured large districts from the horrors of border
warfare. But Charles was always planning something,
and the world was always wondering what he might be
planning. He attacked and annexed so widely that it
was no wonder if even those whom he had no mind to
attack deemed it necessary to stand ready for him. His
loftiest fliohts of ambition were far from beino- so wild
and reckless as they are commonly represented ; his dream
of a new Burgundian kingdom was far from irrational ;
still less was there anything monstrous either in a great
French prince aspiring to a paramount influence in France,
or in a great German prince aspiring to the crown of the
Empire. But the misfortune of Charles was that he was
always aspiring after something ; he was always grasping
at something which he had not, instead of enjoying what
he had. Neither his own subjects nor strangers were
allowed a moment's peace : wars with France, wars with
Liittich, Gelders annexed, Elsass purchased, Neuss besieged,
Lorraine conquered, Provence bargained for, were enough
342 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
to keep the whole world in commotion. The ten years
of Charles's reign are as rich in events as the forty-eight
years of his father.
Mr. Kirk is fond of enlarging on Charles's good faith,
and, for a prince of the fifteenth century, the praise is
not wholly undeserved. As compared with the contem-
porary kings of England and France, the Duke of Burgundy
may fairly pass for a man of his word."^ He certainly did
not openly trample on oaths and obligations like Edward
the Fourth, nor did he carry on a systematic trade of secret
intrigue like Lewis the Eleventh. Even in the affair of
P^ronne, to which Mr. Kirk frequently points as an excep-
tion to Charles's general straightforwardness, there seems
to have been no deliberate treachery on Charles's part,
though there certainly was a breach in words of the safe-
conduct which he had given to Lewis. The King sought
an interview of his own accord ; it was to take place in
the then Burgundian town of Peronne. The Duke gave
the King a safe-conduct, notwithstanding anything which
had happened or might happen. While Lewis was at
Peronne, Charles discovered, or believed that he had
discovered, evidence that the King was plotting with the
revolted people of Luttich. Charles then kept him as a
prisoner till he had signed an unfavourable treaty, and
further obliged him to accompany him on his campaign
against Luttich, and to witness and take a part in the
utter overthrow of his allies. Here was undoubtedly a
breach of an engagement : according to the letter of the
bond, Charles should have taken Lewis safe back into
his own dominions, and should have declared war and
pursued him the moment he had crossed the frontier. But,
setting aside the literal breach of faith, to deal with Lewis
as he did, to humble him before all the world, to make
him follow where he was most unwilling to go, was quite
in character with the stern and ostentatious justice of
* "Quod nuinqiiam antea fecerat, nipta fide," says Heuter (liv. v. c. 12)
of the execution of the prisoners at Grauson.
XL] CHARLES THE BOLD. 343
Charles. As a mere breach of faith, it was a light matter
compared with the everyday career of Lewis himself. But
what shocked the feeling of the time was for a vassal to
put his suzerain lord under personal duress. To rebel
against such a lord and make war upon him was an
ordinary business ; but for a Duke of Burgundy to make
a King of France his prisoner was a breach of all feudal
reverence, a sacrilegious invasion of the sanctity of royalty,
which carried men's minds back to a deed of treason
more than five hundred years old.* We cannot look upon
this business at Peronne as being morally of so deep a
dye as the long course of insincerity pursued by Charles
with regard to the marriage of his daughter. It is clear
that he was possessed with a strong and not very in-
telligible dread of a son-in-law in any shape. Like many
other princes, he shrank from the notion of a successor ;
he shrank especially from a successor who would not be
one of his own blood, but the husband of his daughter,
one who most likely would seek in her marriage and his
affinity nothing but stepping-stones to the ducal or royal
crown of Burgundy. So far one can enter into the feeling ;
but it is clear that Charles first carried it to a morbid
extent, and then made use of it for a disingenuous political
purpose. He held out hopes of his daughter's hand to
every prince whom he wished for the moment to attach
to his interests, without the least serious intention of
bestowing her upon any of them. Mary was used as the
bait for Charles of Guienne, for Nicolas of Calabria, for
Maximilian of Austria. Now this, though it might serve
an immediate end, was a base and selfish policy, which
could not fail to leave, as in the end it did leave, both
his daughter and his dominions without any lawful or
acknowledged protector. The feelings alike of a father
* As Comines says (liv. ii. c. 7), " Le Roy se voyoit loge rasibus d'une
grosse tour, oti un Conite de Vermandoia fit mourir un sien predecesseur
Roy de France." The allusion is to the two imprisonments of Charles the
Simple at Peronne (928-9) by Count Hubert of Vermandois ; see Richer,
lib. i cc. 46, 54 ; Flodoard in anno ; Palgrave, Normandy and England, ii. 93.
344 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
and of a sovereign should have made Charles overcome his
dread of an acknowledged successor, rather than run the
risk of leaving a young girl to grapple unprotected with
the turbulent people of Flanders and with such a neigh-
bour as Lewis the Eleventh. It is here, we think, rather
than in his formal breach of faith at Peronne, that we
should look for the most marked exception to that general
character for good faith and sincerity which is claimed
for Charles by his biographer. It is certain that he piqued
himself upon such a character, and that his conduct was
on the whole not inconsistent with it. The worst deeds
of his later career, his treatment of the princes of Lorraine
and Wlirtemburg, his unprovoked attack on Neuss, his
cruelties after the loss of Elsass, were deeds of open
violence rather than of bad faith. Through the whole
of his dealings with Austria and Switzerland there runs
a vein of conscious sincerity, a feeling that his own
straightforwardness was not met with equal straightfor-
wardness on the part of those with whom he had to deal.
Where then Charles failed was that he had neither the
moral nor the intellectual qualities which alone could have
enabled him to carry out the great schemes which he was
ever planning. Success has often been the lot of brave,
frank, and open-hearted princes, who have carried every-
thing before them, and who have won hearts as well as
cities by storm. Sometimes again it has fallen to the
lot of a cold, crafty, secret plotter, like Charles's own
rival and opposite. The gallant, genial, Ren^ of Lorraine
won the love of subjects and allies, and recovered the
dominions which Charles had stolen from him. Lewis,
from his den at Plessis, established his power over all
France ; he extended the bounds of France by two great
provinces, and permanently attached the stout pikes and
halberts of Switzerland to his interest. But Charles the
Bold, always planning schemes which needed the genius
and opportunities of Charles the Great, was doomed to
failure in the nature of things. A prince, just, it may be,
XI.] CHARLES THE BOLD. 345
and truthful, but harsh and pitiless, who never made a
friend public or private, whose very virtues were more
repulsive than other men's vices, who displayed no single
sign of deep or enlarged policy, but whose whole career
was one simple embodiment of military force in its least
amiable form, — such a prince was not the man to found
an empire ; he was the very man to lose the dominions
which he had himself inherited and conquered.
And now we turn from the character of the man to the
events in which he was the actor or the instrument. The
history of Charles is a history of the highest and most
varied interest. The tale, as a mere tale, as a narrative of
personal adventure and a display of personal character, is
one of the most attractive in European history. As such
it has been chosen by Scott as the material for two of his
novels, one of which, if not absolutely one of his master-
pieces, at any rate ranks high among his writings. It is
probably from Quentin Durward that most English readers
have drawn their ideas of Lewis the Eleventh and of
Charles the Bold ; some may even have drawn their main
ideas of the fights of Granson, Morat, and Nancy from the
hurried narrative in Anne of Geierstein. In fact a nobler
subject, whether for romance or poetry or tragedy, can
hardly be conceived than the exaltation and the fall of the
renowned Burgundian Duke. But to the historian the fate
of Charles and his duchy has an interest which is far
higher and wider than this. Chronologically and geo-
graphically alike, Charles and his duchy form the great
barrier, or the great connecting link, whichever we choose
to call it, between the main divisions of European history
and European geography. The dukes of Burgundy of the
house of Valois form a sort of bridge between the latter
Middle Age and the period of the Renaissance and the
Reformation. They connect those two periods by forming
the kernel of the vast dominion of that Austrian house to
which their inheritance fell, and which, mainly by virtue
346 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
of that inheritance, fills such a space in the history of the
sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. But the dominions
of the Burgundian dukes hold a still higher historical
position. They may be said to bind together the whole of
European history for the last thousand years. From the
ninth century to the nineteenth, the politics of Europe have
largely gathered round the rivalry between the Eastern and
the Western kingdoms — in modern language, between Ger-
many and France. From the ninth century to the nine-
teenth, a succession of efforts have been made to establish,
in one shape or another, a middle state between the two.
Over and over again during that long period have men
striven to make the whole or some portion of the frontier
lands stretching from the mouth of the Rhine to the mouth
of the Rhone into an independent barrier state. The first
expression of the idea is to be seen in the kingdom of
Lothar, the grandson of Charles the Great, a kingdom of
which Provence and the Netherlands were ahke portions.
The neutralizations, or attempted neutralizations, of Swit-
zerland, Savoy, Belgium, and Liizelburg, have been the
feebler contributions of the nineteenth century to the same
work. Meanwhile various kingdoms and duchies of
Burgundy and Lorraine have risen and fallen, all of them,
knowingly or unknowingly, aiming at the same European
object. That object was never more distinctly aimed at,
and it never seemed nearer to its accomplishment, than
when Charles the Bold actually reigned from the Zuyder
Zee to the lake of NeufchcUel, and was not without hopes
of extending his frontier to the gulf of Lyons.
To understand his position, to understand the position of
the lands over which he ruled, it is not needful to go back
to any of the uses of the Burgundian name earlier than the
division of the Empire in 8(S8. The old Lotharingia of
forty years earlier, the narrow strip reaching from the
German Ocean to the Mediterranean, had then ceased to
exist as a separate state. Its northern portion had become
the later Lotharingia, that border land between the Eastern
XI.] CHARLES THE BOLD. 347
and Western kingdoms, which for a hundred years formed
an endless subject of dispute between them. Its southern
portion had become what our Old-English Chroniclers
emphatically call the " middel-rice " — the Middle kingdom,
the state placed between France, Germany, and Italy.
This is that Burgundy, sometimes forming one kingdom,
sometimes two, which was at last annexed to the Empire,
and of which Aries was the capital, where those Emperors
who chose to go through a somewhat empty ceremony took
the crown of their Burgundian kingdom.* This kingdom
took in the County Palatine of Burgundy, better known as
Franche Comte, which, till the days of Lewis the Fourteenth,
remained a fief of the Empire. It did not take in the
Duchy of Burgundy, the duchy of which Dijon was the
capital, which was always a fief of the crown of France.
Now there can be no doubt that Charles, Duke of the
French Duchy, Count of the Imperial Palatinate, Duke, by
inheritance, of the Lower Lorraine (or Brabant), Duke,
by conquest, of the Upper Lorraine, had always before his
eyes the memory of these earlier Burgundian and Lothar-
ingian kingdoms. Holding, as he did, parts of old Lothar-
ingia and parts of old Burgundy, there can be no doubt that
he aimed at the re-establishment of a great Middle king-
dom, which should take in all that had ever been Burgundian
or Lotharinojian j^round. He aimed in short, as others have
aimed before and since, at the formation of a state which
should hold a central position between France, Germany,
and Italy — a state which should discharge, with infinitely
greater strength, all the duties which our own age has
endeavoured to throw on Switzerland, Belgium, and Savoy.
Now Mr. Kirk is by no means wholly blind to this
peculiar aspect of his hero, an aspect which brings him into
so remarkable a connexion with times long before him and
with times long after him. But it is not present to his
mind in any life-like way; it is not present as it would be
to one who was really master of European history as a
* See above, pp. 189, 271.
348 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
whole. In our way of looking at it, the career of Charles
the Bold forms the central point in the history of a thousand
years, and it cannot be worthily treated without constantly
looking both forwards and backwards. There can be no
doubt that, through the whole latter part of Charles's reign,
his object was thus to extend his dominions, and to reign
as a Burgundian king, the peer of either of his two over-
lords to the right and left of him. This view seems to us
to explain the whole of his latter policy. It seems also to
explain the mixture of dread and wonder with which he
was looked on, and the restless apprehensions which never
ceased to work among all who felt that they were possibly
marked out for annexation.
This twofold position of Charles, as at once a French and
a German prince, forms the key to his history. When he
had turned away his thoughts from his schemes of pre-
eminence within the French kingdom, the creation of such
a middle state as we have spoken of was a natural form for
his ambition to take. His schemes of this kind form the
great subject of the second of the two great divisions of his
history. The second division then is undoubtedly the more
important, but the former is by far the better known. It
has the great advantage of being recorded by one of the
few mediaeval wiiters — if Philip of Comines is to count as
a mediaeval writer — who are familiar to many who are not
specially given to mediaeval studies. It is a plain straight-
forward tale, about which there is little difficulty or con-
troversy, and it is so constantly connected with the history
of our own country as to have special attractions for the
English student. The German career of (Jharles holds a
very different position. One or two facts in it, at least the
names of one or two great battles, are familiar to the whole
world. Every one can point the moral how the rash and
proud Duke was overthrown by the despised Switzer at
Granson, at Morat, and at Nancy. But the real character
and causes of the war are, for the most part, completely
unknown or utterly misrepresented. In fact^ no part of
XT.] CHARLES THE BOLD. 349
history is more thoroughly perplexing than this: the
original sources are endless ; the inferences made from
them by later writers are utterly contradictory ; and neither
the original sources nor their modern commentators are at
all familiar to English students in general. We think then
that we shall be doing our readers more service if we pass
lightly over the earlier and better known years of Charles's
history, and give as much space as we can to the perplexing
story of his relations towards Switzerland, Austria, and the
Empire.
Each of the two positions which were held by Charles
assumes special importance in one of the two great divisions
of his career. He succeeded to the ducal crown in 1467;
but his practical reign may be dated from a point at least
two years earlier, when the old age and sickness of Philip
threw the chief management of affairs into his hands.
What we have called his French career lasts from this
point till 1472. In these years, both before and after the
death of his father, he appears mainly as a French prince.
His main policy is to maintain and increase that pre-
dominance in French politics which had been gained by
his father. During this period, with the single exception
of his wars with Liittich, his field of action lies almost
wholly within the kingdom of France ; and Liittich,
though it lay within the Empire, had at this time a closer
practical connexion with France than with Germany.
Charles's chief French dominions were the duchy of Bur-
gundy and the counties of Artois and Flanders, the last
being strictly a French fief, though circumstances have
always tended to unite that province, together with some
of its neighbours, into a system of their own, distinct alike
from France and from Germany. There was also that
fluctuating territory in Picardy, the towns on the Somme,
so often pledged, recovered, ceded, and conquered within
the space of so few years. These possessions made Charles
the most powerful of French princes, to say nothing of the
fiefs beyond the kingdom which helped to make him well
350 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
nigh the most powerful of European princes. As a French
prince, he joined with other French princes to put limits
on the power of the crown, and to divide the kingdom into
great feudal holdings, as nearly independent as might be of
the common overlord. As a French prince, he played his
part in the War of the Public Weal, and insisted, as a
main object of his policy, on the establishment of the
King's brother as an all but independent Duke of Nor-
mandy. The object of Lewis was to make France a
compact monarchy ; the object of Charles and his fellows
was to keep France as nearly as might be in the same state
as Germany. But, when the other French princes had
been gradually conquered, won over, or got rid of in some
way or other, by the crafty policy of Lewis, Charles
remained no longer the chief of a coalition of French
princes, but the personal rival, the deadly enemy, of the
French King.
In the second part of his life his objects were wholly
different. His looks were now turned eastward and south-
ward, or, if they were turned westward, it was with quite
different aims from those with which he went forth to fight
at Montlhery, His object now was, not to gain a paramount
influence within the kingdom of France, not to weaken the
French monarchy, in the character of one of its vassals,
but to throw it into the shade, to dismember, perhaps
to conquer it. in the character of a foreign sovereign. For
this end probably, more than for any other, Charles sought
to be King of the Romans, King of Burgundy, King of
England. For this end he strove to gather together
province after province, so as to form his scattered territories
into a kingdom greater than that of France, a kingdom
external and antagonistic to France. As he had found
that the French monarchy was too strong for him in his
character of a French vassal, he would no longer be a
Frenchman at all. To curb and weaken the now hostile
and foreign realm, he would form a state which should
altogether hem it in from the North Sea to the Mediter-
XI.] CHARLES THE BOLD. 351
ranean. That is to say, he would call again into being that
Middle kingdom, call it Burgundy or Lorraine"^ as we will,
which he had a better chance of calling into being than
any man before or since. And undoubtedly it would
have been for the permanent interest of Europe if he had
succeeded in his attempt. It would be one of the greatest
of political blessings if a Duke or King of Burgundy or
Lorraine could suddenly appear now.f A strong inde-
pendent power standing in the gap between France and
Germany J would release the world from many difficulties,
and would insure the world against many dangers. It
would in fact accomplish, in a much more thorough-going
way, the objects which modern statesmen have tried to
accomplish by guaranteeing the neutrality of the smaller
states on the same border. How vain such guaranties are
the experience of the last few years has taught us. But
the kingdom which Charles dreamed of, had it been held
together long enough to acquire any consistency, would
have needed no guaranty, but would have stood by its
own strenofth. Such a state would indeed have had two
great points of weakness, its enormous extent of frontier §
and the heterogeneous character of its population. But
German and Italian neighbours would hardly have been
more dangerous to Burgundy than they have been to
France, and such a Burgundy would have been far better
* Charles, of course, aimed at restoring a kingdom of BiirgiDuly, not of
Lorraine ; but the extent of the dominions which he either actually pos-
sessed, or is believed to have aimed at, would answer very nearly to the
ancient kingdom of Lorraine, while it would far surpass the extent of any
of the successive kingdoms of Burgundy, of none of which did the Nether-
lands form any part. In fact, the county of Burgundy is the only ground
common to Charles's actual dominions and to the later Burgundian kingdom.
His dominions in Picardy and Elsass lay beyond the limits of either Burgundy
or Lorraine in any sense.
•|- [In 1871 such a power would come too late, but it might have been
useful in 1870.]
J " Ut, inter Germanos Francosque medius imperans, utiisque terrorem
incuteret." — Heuter, lib. v. c. ii.
§ On this point see Johannes von Mtiller, b. iv. c. 8, note 469. [The extent
of frontier would not have been greater than that of Prussia up to 1866 : but
this argument might be used in two opposite ways.] [1871.]
352 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
able to resist the aggressions of France than Germany and
Italy have been.* The population would certainly have
been made up of very discordant elements, but they would
have been less discordant than the elements to be found in
the modern "empire" of Austria, and they would have had
a common interest in a way in which the subjects of
Austria have not. Perhaps indeed a common government
and a common interest might in course of time have fused
them together as closely as the equally discordant elements
in modern Switzerland have been fused together. Anyhow
the great dream of Charles, the formation of a barrier power
between France and Germany, is one which, if it only
could be carried out, would be most desirable for Europe to
have carried out. Statesmen of a much later age than
Charles the Bold have dreamed of the kingdom of Burgundy
as the needful counterpoise to the power of France. But
though the creation of such a state would be highly desir-
able now, it does not follow that it was desirable then,
still less does it follow that any prince or people of those
days could be expected to see that it was desirable. With
the map of Europe now before us, it seems madness in
Switzerland, or in any other small and independent state,
to league itself with France and Austria to destroy a
Duke of Burgundy. That is to say, it is very easy to be a
Prometheus after the fact. But neither princes nor com-
monwealths can be expected to look on so many centuries
before them. Austria was in those days the least threaten-
ing of all powers. Its sovereigns were small German
dukes, who had much ado to keep their own small
dominions together. In fact, the Duke of Austria with
whom we have to do was only a titular Duke of Austria ;
his capital was not Vienna, but Innsbruck ; his dominions
consisted of the county of Tyrol and the Swabian and
Alsatian lordships of his house. And it would have been
only by a miraculous foresight of which history gives few
examples that a citizen of Switzerland or of any other
* [In 1864 I did not foresee 1870.] [1871.]
XI.] CHARLES THE BOLD. 353
country could have perceived that France was a power
more really dangerous to the liberties of Europe than
Burgundy was. Lewis seemed to have quite enough to
do to maintain his power in his own kingdom, while
Charles seemed to ride through the whole world, going
forth conquering and to conquer. In this case, as in
all others, we must try to throw ourselves into the
position of the times, and not to judge of everything
according to the notions of our own age. The warning is
important, because by some writers,* though not very
conspicuously by Mr. Kirk, it is made part of the case
against the Confederates that they helped to destroy a
power which was really useful to them as a check upon
France. This, as we have said, is perfectly true in a
modern European point of view ; but the Swiss of the
fifteenth century could not see with the eyes of the
nineteenth century. And, valuable as a kingdom of
Burgundy would have been in an European point of
view, it is by no means clear that it would have been
equally valuable in a Swiss point of view. Indeed, it
is hard to see how its existence could have been con-
sistent with the retention of Swiss independence in any
shape.
We have thus reached that later portion of Charles's life
which brings him mainly into contact wnth the Empire,
both in the person of its head and in those of many of its
members. His dealings now lie mainly with Lorraine and
Savoy, with Koln, Elsass, and Austria, with the Old League
of High Germany, and with Csesar Augustus himself. His
relations to his Imperial overlord were such as might be
looked for w^hen he had to deal with a prince who lived
politically from hand to mouthy like the Emperor Frederick
the Third. The Confederates were at one moment ordered,
at another moment they were forbidden, on theii* allegiance
as members of the Empire, to march against a prince who
* As, for instance, in the notes of De la Harpe in the French translation of
Miiller's History of Switzerland.
A a
354 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
was at one moment proclaimed as the chief enemy of the
German nation, and who at another moment seemed
marked out as the destined chief of Germany and the
Empire. The unwise and dishonourable policy which
Charles followed with resfard to the marriao-e of his
daughter is one main feature of this period. The hand of
Mary of Burgundy was promised in succession to every
prince whom such a promise might make useful for a
moment, and seemingly without any serious purpose of ever
really bestowing it on any of them. But it was tow^ards
the formation of the Middle Kingdom that everything
tended throughout Chailes's later years. That kingdom
would no doubt have been, in Charles's hands, directly
designed as a rival and an enemy to France. Its relations
towards Germany were less certain. There is little doubt
that Charles at one time aimed at the Imperial crown ;
there is no doubt at all as to his expectations of receiving
a crown of some sort or other from the hands of the
Emperor. Among the many striking and awful pictures
which the history of Charles contains, among heavy blows
dealt and heavy blows received, the tale is relieved by at
least two remarkable touches of the ludicrous. We can
hardly help laughing over the field of Montlhdry, over the
two hosts, each of which fancied itself beaten, and over the
tall thistles which bore so terrible a likeness to hostile
spears. We laugh still more heartily when Charles has
got everything ready for his coronation at Trier, and when
the Lord of the World suddenly decamps in the night,
leaving the expectant king of Burgundy, or Lorraine, or
whatever his kingdom was to be, to go back a mere duke
as he came. One thing how^ever is shown by the willing-
ness of Charles to accept a crown at the hands of the
Emperor. A crown so received could only have been a
vassal crown. A King of Burgundy so crowned, more
than the rival of an Emperor in real power, w^ould still
have been, in formal rank, the peer only of a King of
Bohemia, not of a Kinjr of France or Enjjland. With such
XI.] CHARLES THE BOLD. 355
a vassal crown Charles no doubt hoped some day to unite
the Imperial diadem itself. But it is plain that at this
stage of his life, vassalage to the Empire was less irksome
to Charles's mind than vassalage to France. Indeed, he
seems to have quite cast away the thought that he was not
only a vassal of France, but by descent a Frenchman. He
fell back on his ancestry by the female line, and instead of
being French he would rather be Portuguese on the
strength of his mother, or English on the strength of his
grandmother. In English affairs, we must always re-
member, Charles constantly took a deep and by no means
a disinterested or sentimental interest. By birth a de-
scendant of the house of Lancaster, by marriage a member of
the house of York, each English party looked to him in turn
as an ally, while he no doubt dreamed that he might one
day be called in as more than an ally. And, had not that
been an age when the first thing needed in a King of
England was to be an Englishman, the claims of Charles,
descended as he was from a legitimate daughter of John
of Gaunt, might have seemed stronger than those of
bastard Beauforts or Tudors. It would indeed have been
the highest consummation of Charles's hopes could he
have thus won a higher crown than that of Burgundy or
Lorraine, and could have gone on once more to attack his
old enemy in the new character of a King of England and
France. But though there is little doubt that such dreams
did flash across his mind, they had no serious results.
Charles probably knew England well enough to feel sure
that, except in some most strange conjunction of events,
a stranger had no chance of the island crown. It was to
aggrandizement eastward and southward, to the union of
the two detached masses of his dominions by the annex-
ation of Lorraine, that Charles's whole immediate policy
looked in his later days. But there can be little doubt
that all this had a further aim, that of turning round some
day to deal a blow at his Western rival at the head of an
irresistible power. Truces might be made and renewed,
A a 2
356 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
but they were merely truces ; Charles and Lewis each
knew well enough what were the aims of the other. And
the wary King of France knew well how to throw the
most eftectual check in the way of his rival by raising up
against him the most terrible of enemies within the limits
of the Empire, partly within the ancient bounds of that
Buro^undian kingdom of which he dreamed.
With Mr. Kirk's way of looking at things it is not
wonderful that his treatment of the early part, what we
may call the French period, of Charles's career, is better
than his treatment of the later, what we may in some sort
call its German period. In the latter portion, just as in
the former, we have no charge to bring against Mr. Kirk
on the ground of research, none on the score of narrative
and descriptive power in ti-eating the main events of his
history. Still there is a distinct falling-off, both in style
and, in a certain sense, in matter. During the later years
of Charles the main interest of his story gathers round
his relations with the Swiss. And, though Mr. Kirk has
probably worked more diligently at the Swiss history and
the Swiss archives of that age than any man who is not a
native Switzer, still, after all, he does not seem fully to
grasp the relations between Charles and the Confederates.
And it is certain that it is during this latter part of Mr.
Kirk's labours that his way of writing begins to change for
the worse. He writes far more distinctly as a partizan,
with a strong feeling for Charles and against the Swiss.
In this there is nothing specially to quarrel with. English
readers are so apt to take up the Swiss side of the quarrel
too unreservedly, that it is no bad thing to have the story
told, fervidly and vigorously told, from the Burgundian
side. But there are signs that there is somewhere a screw
loose in Mr. Kirk's treatment of these events. He is evi-
dently less at his ease than before ; he is more palpably
influenced by the feeling that he has a cause to plead, a
case to make out, than in his story of Charles's doings
at Montlh^ry and Pdronne, at Dinant and Liittich. It is
XI.] CHARLES THE BOLD. 357
from the beginning of the second period that Mr. Kirk
begins to disfigure his pages with those passages of forced
and extravacrant rhetoric which are the ffreat blemish
of his book, and which thicken through the third volume
till we reach the mere ravings with which the history
ends.
We have thus reached the great point of controversy, the
origin of the famous war between Charles the Bold and the
Swiss. The popular conception of this war is simply that
Charles, a powerful and encroaching prince, was over-
thrown in three great battles by the petty commonwealths
which he had expected easily to attach to his dominion.
Granson and Morat are placed side by side with Morgarten
and Sempach. Such a view as this implies complete
ignorance of the history; it implies ignorance of the fact
that it was the Swiss who made war upon Charles, and not
Charles who made war upon the Swiss ; it implies ignor-
ance of the fact that Charles's army never set foot on
proper Swiss territory at all, that Granson and Morat were
at the beginning of the war no part of the possessions of
the Confederation. That is to say, the war between
Charles and the Swiss, like most other events in history,
will always be misunderstood as long as people do not
thoroughly master the facts of historical geography. The
mere political accident that the country which formed the
chief seat of war now forms part of the Swiss Confederation
has been with many people enough to determine their
estimate of the quarrel. Granson and Morat are in Switzer-
land ; Burgundian troops appeared and were defeated at
Granson and Morat ; therefore Charles must have been an
invader of Switzerland, and the warfare on the Swiss side
must have been a warfare of purely defensive heroism. The
simple fact that it was only through the result of the
Burgundian war that Granson and Morat ever became
Swiss territory at once disposes of this line of argument.
This is just the sort of simple fact than which nothing can
be simpler, but on which the real aspect of whole pages of
358 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
history sometimes turns. But it is also just the sort of
simple fact which people find so hard really to master and
carry about with them. The plain facts of the case are
that the Burgundian war was a war declared by Switzer-
land against Burgundy, not a war declared by Burgundy
against Switzerland, and that in the campaigns of Granson
and Morat the Duke of Burgundy was simply driving back
and avenging Swiss invasions of his own territory and the
territory of his allies. A Burgundian victory at Morat
would no doubt have been followed by a Burgundian
invasion of Switzerland ; but, as the Swiss were victorious
at Morat, no Burgundian invasion of Switzerland took
place. Mr. Kirk, we need hardly say, knows all this as
well as any man. He is the last of all men to need
teaching that Vaud was not Swiss ground in 1474. He is
no doubt doing good service by teaching many people in
Enofland and America that it was not so. Thus far he is
acting as an useful preacher of historical geography. Yet
the lack of a full grasp of historical geography atFects his
argument even here. I cannot think that he has fully
understood the light in which a possible restoration of the
Burgundian kingdom must have looked in the eyes of the
Old League of High Germany,
How then is the war between Charles and the Swiss
commonly looked at ? We fancy that to most of those
who go a little further into the matter than usual, to those
who, without having looked very deeply into details, still
have a knowledge of the history somewhat deeper than
mere popular talk, the aspect of the war is something of
this kind. It is held to have been, though not immediately
defensive, yet in every way justifiable in right and in
policy; it is held to have ])een provoked, though not by
actual invasion on the part of Charles, yet by various
wrongs and insults at the hands of his officers, and by the
cruellest oppression inflicted on a neighbouring and allied
people. In this view, the Swiss, in beginning the war,
simply took the bull by the horns, and attacked a power
XI. J CHARLES THE BOLD. 359
which was on the very point of attacking them. The
agency of the King of France is too plain to be altogether
kept out of sight ; but his interference would be held to
have been shown simply in fomenting a quarrel which had
already arisen, and aiding — after his peculiar fashion — the
Confederates in a struggle in which he had the deepest
possible interest, but which would have taken place equally
had he not existed. Those who are used to look at the
matter in this light will certainly be somewhat amazed at
the way in which the story is told by Mr. Kirk. In his
view — a view not really new, though doubtless new to
most of his readers — Charles was wholly in the right, and
the Confederates were wholly in the wrong. Charles had
no hostile intentions towards the Confederates, but was
full of the most friendly dispositions towards them. The
mass of the Swiss people had as little wish to quarrel with
Charles as Charles had to quarrel with them. The alleged
grounds of complaint were either matters with which the
Swiss had no concern, or else mere trifles which the Duke
would at once have redressed on a frank understandins:.
The war was wholly the device of Lewis of France, who
thought that it would be more convenient to overthrow
his great adversary by the arms of the Swiss than by his
own. He bribed and cajoled certain citizens of Bern,
Nicolas von Diessbach at their head ; and they contrived
to entangle Bern and the whole Confederation in a war in
which they had no national interest. The Swiss patched
up a hurried alliance with an old enemy in order to attack
an old friend w^ho had neither done nor designed them any
wrong. The alleged grounds of provocation given by
Charles were utterly frivolous, and if the Confederates had
been as anxious for peace as the Duke, an understandincr
might easily have been come to. The execution of Peter
von Hagenbach, above all, was an act of directly illegal
violence on the part of the Swiss and their allies. The
war against Charles was so far from being defensive that it
was utterly unprovoked ; it was not even a war of policy;
360 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
the Confederates were neither defending their own country
nor supporting the rights of an ally. They acted simply
as mercenaries, as the " hired bravos " of a power which
had corrupted thera. The victories of Granson, Morat, and
Nancy may be glorious as mere displays of valour, but
they were unrighteous triumphs won in a cause in which
the victors had no interest ; instead of being classed with
Sempach and Morgarten, they ought rightly to be classed
with the displays of Swiss mercenary valour in later times.
The Confederates carried a cruel and desolating war into
the dominions of Savoy, a country whose rulers and people
had given them no offence ; they hunted the Duke of
Burgundy to death, and broke the power of his house at a
moment when its preservation was a matter of European
interest. And all this they did simply in the interest of
their paymaster the King of France, who himself, as soon
as he had hopelessly involved them in the war, left them
to fight their battles for themselves. From that time
began the disgraceful system of foreign pensions and
mercenary service which permanently degraded the Swiss
character and made Swiss valour a mere article of mer-
chandize. The only section of the Confederates to whom
any sympathy is due in the matter are those, whether
states or individuals, who did their best to hinder the war,
and who joined in it only when it became a matter of
national duty to give help to those who were already
enofased in it. Such amonsj states was Unterwalden : such
among individuals was Hadrian von Bubenberg, the de-
fender of Morat. In the war itself and its great victories
those who take this line see nothing but successful strokes
of brigandage. And in those who brought about the war,
in the leading Bernese statesmen, above all in Nicolas
von Diessbach, Mr. Kirk sees nothing but traitors of the
blackest dye.
We believe that this is a fair exposition of the view
which Mr. Kirk now brings, for the first time, as far as we
know, before English and American readers. But it is a
XL] CHARLES THE BOLD. 361
view which is far from beingf unknown in Switzerland
itself. It was fully set forth by the late Baron Frederick
de Gingins-la-Sarraz, whose papers on the subject will be
found reprinted as an appendix to the sixth and seventh
volumes of M. Monnard's French translation — not a very
accurate translation, by the way — of Johannes von Miiller s
great History of the Swiss Confederation. De Gingins
was perhaps the only example in Europe of his own class.
He was essentially a Burgundian of the kingdom of Bur-
gundy. He had deliberately given his life to the study of
every phase of Burgundian history, and Charles, duke of
one Burgundy, count of another, and would-be king of all,
was naturally a character in whom he took a deep interest.
Add to this that De Gingins, though he probably cherished
no actual wish to be other than the Swiss citizen which
modern geography made him, was at heart a Burgundian
noble, like his forefathers four hundred years back. He had
not forgotten that those forefathers had swelled the armies
of Charles, and that their ancestral castle had been burned
by the Confederates. A scholar of unwearied research, he
worked manfully at this as at all other Burgundian sub-
jects, and he had evidently a special pleasure in bringing
forwa,rd those facts which tell for the Burgundian and
against the Swiss side. Considering how exclusively the
story had been hitherto looked upon from the Swiss side,
he was, in so doing;, doing a service to the cause of truth.
Mr. Kirk seems to have dived yet deeper into the same
stores, and distinctly with the same bias. But it was to be
borne in mind that, novel as his view of the case may seem
to an English reader, he is only working in the beat of
De Gingins, by whom his main facts and arguments have
been already strongly set forth. Our own views have been
mainly formed on those set forth by another Swiss scholar,
John Caspar Zellweger, the historian of Appenzell, in a
most elaborate essay "^j followed by a large collection of
* " Versuch die wahren Griinde des burgundischen Krieges aus den Quellen
darzustellen und die dariiber verbreiteten irrigen Ausichten zu bericlitigeii."
362 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essat
hitherto unpublished documents, printed in the fifth volume
of the Arcliiv fur scliiveizerische Geschichte (Zurich, 1H47). It
is not for us to guess how many of Mr. Kirk's readers,
British or American, are likely to have read Zellweger or
De Gingins, or even Johannes von Midler himself. Swiss
historical works, both original authorities and modern
writers, are not very common in England, and cannot
always be got at a moment's notice. And the best autho-
rities for this period consist of documents, documents too,
as must always happen in a Confederation of small states,
scattered about in all manner of local archives. Each fresh
writer brings forth some paper which nobody had seen
before, and by its help be crows over the mistakes of those
who were unlucky enough to write without having seen it.
Zellweger has done a real service by printing his documents
at full length, while other writers merely give references
which are little better than a mockery, or extracts which
make us wish to see the context. But no reader probably
would wish us, even if we had the space, to go minutely
through every disputed point of detail. We will confine
ourselves to setting forth the general conclusions to which
we have come, and to pointing out a few considerations
which seem to have escaped Mr. Kirk's notice.
First of all, we must bear in mind at every moment the
real extent and position of Switzerland at that time. We
are accustomed to conceive Switzerland as including Geneva,
Basel, and Chur at its different corners, and as being a per-
fectly independent power, quite distinct from Germany.
We are also accustomed to point to Switzerland as the
most remarkable example of a country where diversity of
blood, language, and religion does not hinder the existence
of a common feeling of nationality. We are also accus-
tomed to look upon Switzerland as a power conservative
but not aggressive, and on the Swiss as a people who are
as ready as of old to defend themselves if attacked, but
who have neither the will nor the means to annex any of
the territory of their neighbours. Such is the Switzerland
X[.] CHARLES THE BOLD. 363
of our own time, but such was not the Switzerland with
which Charles the Bold had to deal. In those days the
name of Switzerland, as a distinct nation or people, was
hardly known. The names Swite?ises, Stviizois, Suisses, were
indeed beginning to spread themselves from a single
Canton to the whole Confederation ; but the formal style
of that Confederation was still the " Great (or Old) League
of Upper Germany " — perhaps rather of " Upper Swabia." *
That Leasfue was much smaller than it is now^ and it was
purely German. It consisted of eight German districts and
cities, united, like many other groups of German cities, by
a lax federal tie, which tie, while other similar unions have
died away, has gi'adually developed into a perfect federal
government, and has extended itself over a large non-
German territory. The League then consisted of eight
Cantons only — Zurich, Bern, Luzern, Uri, Schwyz, Unter-
walden, Zug, and Glarus. All these states were practically
independent commonwealths ; in theory they were im-
mediate subjects of the Emperor, holding certain large
franchises by ancient grant or prescription. Moreover the
League was looked on as an eminently advancing, not to
say an aggressive, power; it was always extending its
borders, always winning new allies and subjects which
stood in various relations to the older Cantons. Bern,
above all, was always conquering, purchasing, admitting
to citizenship, in a way which affords a close parallel to
old Rome. The League was feared, hated, or admired by
its neighbours according to circumstances ; but it was
a power which all its neighbours were glad to have as
a friend rather than as an enemy. But as yet, with all
its advances, the League itself had not set foot on WeUt —
that is, Romance-speaking — ground. Neufchatel, Geneva,
Vaud, even Freiburg, were not yet members or even allies
* Liga vetus Alemannise altae (Treaty with Chiirles the Seventh, ap.
Zellweger, 75). Domini de Liya Alamaniae (ibid. 130). Domini de Liga
magna Alamanite superioris (ibid. 132). "AUemannia" might either mean
Germany in general or Swabia in particular; in either case, " Upper AUe-
mannia " is opposed to the " Lower Union " of the cities on the Rhine.
364 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
of the Confederation, though some of them stood in close
relations to the particular canton of Bern. All these are
points which must be carefully borne in mind, lest the
history be misconceived through being looked at through
too modern a medium. Above all, the strictly German
character of the League, and its close relation to the Empire,
must never be allowed to pass out of mind. The German
national spirit breathes strongly in all the chronicles which
record the great national war between Dutch and Welsh.
Under the former name the Confederate troops are constantly
joined with those of Austria and the free cities, in a way
which would certainly not be done by any Swiss writer
now. As to their relations to the Empire, there is the
manifest fact that the Imperial summons is put prominently
forward in the Swiss declaration of war against Burgundy.
The Confederates make war upon Duke Charles at the
bidding of their gracious lord the Emperor of the Romans.
Mr. Kirk rather sneers at this, and asks whether the Swiss
were on all other occasions equally obedient to the orders
of the chief of the Empire. Now we certainly do not
believe that mere loyalty to any Emperor, least of all to
such an Emperor as Frederick the Third, would have led
the Swiss into a war to which they were not prompted by
nearer interests. But it does not at all follow that the
prominence given to the Imperial summons was mere pre-
tence. The Swiss, like the other members of the Empire,
had little scruple in acting against the Emperor when it
suited him to do so ; still it was a great point to have the
Imperial name on their side whenever they could ; it gave
a formal legitimacy to their doings, and it doubtless really
satisfied the consciences of many who might otherwise have
hesitated as to the right course. And in truth the relations
of the Swiss to the Empire had commonly been very
friendly. Certain Emperors and kings of the Austrian
house, Frederick himself among them, had indeed been
guilty of wrongs against the Confederacy, but that had
been in pursuit, not of Imperial but of Austrian interests.
XI.] CHARLES THE BOLD. 365
But with Emperors of other lines the League had commonly
stood well ; the war of Charles the Fourth against Ziiiich
is the only important exception. The gi-eat Fredericks,''^
Henry the Seventh, Lewis of Bavaria, and Sigismund,
had always been on the very best terms both with the
old Forest Cantons and with the more extended League.
There can be no doubt that the name of C«sar still com-
manded a deep reverence throughout the cantons, which
died away only as the Imperial title sank into little more
than one of the elements of greatness in the dangerous
house of Austria. It is evident that in the war with
Charles, the Swiss^ though they certainly never forgot
their own interests, sincerely felt that they were fighting
for German nationality and for the majesty of that Empire
with which German nationality was so closely identified.
That the Emperor himself, when he had once stirred them
up, disgracefully left them in the lurch proves nothing as
to the original feeling ; when their blood was once up, they
were not likely to turn back for King, Csesar, or Pontifi".
But feelings of German nationality and of loyalty to the
Empire, though they were elements in the case which must
not be left out, were certainly not the moving causes of the
war between Charles and the Confederates. They might
well turn the balance with those who were doubtful, but
they were not the things which stirred up mens minds in
the first instance. What then was the character of the war 1
We have seen that it was not a war of the Morgarten type,
a war of pure defensive heroism. Was it then, as De
Gingins and Mr. Kirk would have us believe, a war of
mere brigandage, an ungrateful attack upon an old friend
under the influence of the bribes of a concealed enemy?
Or shall we, with Zellweger, look upon it as a war which
was brought about by the corrupt intrigues of Lewis the
* Of course in their day the extended League did not exist. But the
three original cantons were doubtless already bound together by that
traditional tie which later written engagements only confirmed ; and the
Swabians of those cantons were among the most devoted suj'porters of the
Swabian Caesars.
366 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
Eleventh with Nicolas von Diessbach, a war in which the
Confederates generally were taken in hy these crafty men,
but one in which they themselves could not be fairly looked
upon as wanton aggressors 1
This last view is one which seems to us to come much
nearer to the truth than Mr. Kirk's ; indeed, we are dis-
posed to go a little further on behalf of the Confederates
than Zellweger seemed disposed to do. It seems to us that
the war was no more a war of mere brigandage than it was
a war of pure defensive heroism. It was rather, like most
other wars, a war of policy — whether of good or of bad
policy is another question — a war which had something to
be said for it and something to be said against it, a war
which an honest man might advocate and which an honest
man might oppose. It seems to us, like most other wars,
to have had its ori2:in in a combination of causes, none of
which alone would have brought it about. The Swiss, as
a body, were taken in ; they were made the tool or play-
thing — the SpieJhall, as Zellweger expressively calls it — of
the contending powers and of crafty and dishonest men
among themselves. They were forsaken alike by the
Emperor who summoned them to the field on their alle-
giance to the Empire, and by the king whose policy and
whose gold were undoubtedly among the chief determin-
ing causes of the war. We say among the chief determining
causes, not the determining cause. We clearly see the
hand of Lewis throughout the matter, and we believe that
without his interference the war would most likely never
have broken out. It is certain that the Confederation had
no immediate interest in the war. Tnere can be no doubt
that territorial conquest was from the beginning one main
object in the eyes of Bern, and that in the later stages of the
war a mere eagerness for booty began gradually to mingle
itself with other motives. It is certain that large sums
were paid by Lewis to many leading men in Switzerland,
especially at Bern and Luzern ; and it is certain that from
this time the baneful practice of mercenary service took
XT.] CHARLES THE BOLD. 3G7
a far wider developement, and the yet more baneful system
of pensions and of military capitulations with the states
themselves took its tirst beginning. It is hardly less certain
that of the men who took the gold of Lewis, some at least
took it as a bribe in the strictest sense, and were simply
dishonest traitors^ sold to the service of a foreign prince.
At their head we have as little hesitation as Mr. Kirk in
placing the name of Nicolas von Diessbach. In so doing
we are only following in the steps of Zellweger, and repeat-
ing a sentence which was before him pronounced by De la
Harpe. All this we readily admit ; but it does not follow
that the war was a war of pure brigandage. It was a war
very much like all other wars, except those few heroic
struggles in which men have simply fought to deliver their
country from an unprovoked invasion. Such a war, even
if, after weighing the arguments on both sides we pronounce
it to have been unjust, is quite a different thing from a war
of pure brigandage. Our Russian war fourteen years back*
was thoroughly needless and thoroughly unjust, a war
waged in a bad cause against a people who had not wronged
us; but there was quite enough to be said on its behalf to
take it out of the class of wars of pure brigandage. And
the Swiss had in the Burfjundian war, not indeed a case like
their own case at Morgarten and Sempach, but a better case
than England, France, and Sardinia had in the Russian war.
As for particular acts of cruelty, those may be found on
both sides, and there is nothing to excuse them on either
side except the ferocious customs of the age, customs far
more ferocious than the customs of some centuries earlier.
Swiss cruelty at Orbe and Estavayer was as blameworthy
as Burgundian cruelty at Dinant, Liittich, and Granson.
That it was more blameworthy we cannot see.
That there was a weak side to the Swiss cause is plain, if
only from the witness of their own historians. The most
important sources for this period are undoubtedly the
documents which have been worked with such good results
* [1865.]
368 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
both by Zellweger and by Mr. Kirk. But the chroniclers
are in some sort better indexes of what was in men's minds
at the time. One most important authority, and one most
strongly anti-Eurgundian in its spirit, is the Chronicle of
Diebold Schilling of Bern.* Now throughout his story
there reigns a sort of uncomfortable, artificial, apologetic,
tone, as if the writer was trying, by dint of using the
strongest epithets and putting everything in the strongest
way, to justify in the eyes of his readers a course that he
himself knew could not be fully justified. No contrast can
be greater than between Diebold Schilling and Mr. Kirk's
favourite author, Valerius Anshelm. Anshelm wrote just
after the Reformation, full of all the zeal which awakened
that political and moral reformation which was a temporary
result of the religious change. f His righteous soul is
thoroughly vexed by the unlawful deeds of his own
generation and of the generation before him. He declaims
against the foreign pensions and everything that has to do
with them, with the fervour, the sarcasm, and somewhat of
the parabolic vein, of a Hebrew prophet. Lewis the
Eleventh, whom Diebold Schilling is rather inclined to
worship, is painted by Anshelm in the blackest colours. J
To be sure he paints Charles of Burgundy in colours
* This clii-unicle has long been known. It must not be confounded with
the contemporary chronicle of the otlier Diebold Schilling of Luzern, which
was printed only a few years back, and which is much less full.
+ Not, I would say, as far as I can see, the result of the peculiar dogmas
of the Ileforination, but of that moral elevation and prritication which must
always accompany any great and sincere change in religion. Zwingli un-
doubtedly wrought a wonderful moral reformation at Ziirioh ; but Saint
Chaile.s Borronieo wrought an e(iually wonderful moral reformation at Luzern.
In neither case do I believe the reformation to have been the result of those
dogmas on which those two good men spoke different langua;^es, but rather of
those on which they spoke the same. And neither theological system proved
itself capable of setting up an earthly paradise for more than a short time.
+ See vol. 1. p. lOD of his ' Berner Chronik.' The great point is the con-
trast between liCwis — " der eigensinnig, listig, frevel Delfin" and his father —
" von sinem milden, giitigen und wysen Vater, Kiing Karl, dem Sibenten."
But he gets just as elo(]uent over his comi)arison between Charles the Bold
and his father Philip the Good : Lewis and Charles alike are compared to
Turkish tyrants.
XI.] CHARLES THE BOLD. 369
equally black, and throughout his narrative of the time two
feelings seem to contend, a natural sympathy for the military
prowess of his countrymen, and a profound conviction
of the evils which followed on once touchino^ the gold of
France. But, like most rebukers of the vices of their time,
Anshelm's righteous zeal, as Zellweger thinks it needful to
warn us, sometimes carries him beyond the mark. We
have to strike the balance between ancient partizans of two
opposite sides as well as between their modern followers.
In striking this balance there are some points which Mr.
Kirk can hardly be said to keep steadily enough before him.
He insists on the facts that Charles had no hostile inten-
tions against the Confederation, and that it was very hard
to make the members of the Confederation agree to the war
against him, except those greater and more ambitious states
which lay nearest to the frontier, and which were most open
to the agency of France. Now let us think for a moment
what the interest of the Confederation really was. To us,
looking calmly at the matter from our distance of time, the
overthrow of Charles, the acrfrrandizement of Lewis, the
blighting of the best hope which had ever appeared for the
formation of a strong Middle Kingdom, seem a great and
lasting European calamity. But it is not fau* to expect the
Swiss of those days to look so many hundred years forwards
and so many hundred years backwards. Putting such
distant views out of sight, and putting also out of sight for
a moment the question of French influence in the business,
had the Old League of Upper Germany any good reason
for making war upon the Duke of Burgundy? It seems to
us that they had as good grounds for war as nations com-
monly have for wars which are not purely defensive ; but
it also seems to us that the quarrels which formed the
ostensible casus belli could easily have been made up by
a frank understanding between the parties, if it had not
been the interest of other powers to keep their differences
alive.
There is no reason to believe that Charles had any
Bb
370 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
immediate intention of attacking the Swiss. Indeed, what-
ever were his ultimate intentions, it was clearly his interest
to keep on good terms with them while he w^as carrying on
his other conquests. It is also clear that the great mass
of the Confederates had no sort of wish to quarrel with
Charles. His father Philip had been an old friend and a
good neighbour ; and, whatever we say of Hagenbach,
Charles personally had certainly done the Confederates no
direct wrong. But it does not follow from this that peace
was the best policy, or that the war was without excuse.
Two questions have to be asked : — First, was the general
position of Charles really threatening to the Confederates,
so as to make it good policy to attack him while he could
still be attacked in concert with powerful allies, instead of
waiting merely to be devoured the last ? Secondly, were
there any particular acts on the part of Charles which,
apart from these more distant considerations, rendered
immediate hostilities justifiable ?
On the former ground the advocates of war could make
out at least a very plausible case. Charles was, by various
means, annexing province after province, in a way which
pointed to settled schemes of annexation which put all his
neighbours in jeopardy. He had annexed Gelders, he had
annexed Elsass ; he was clearly aiming at uniting his scat-
tered dominions by the annexation of Lorraine ; he was
besieging the German town of Neuss, in a quarrel with
which he had not the least concern, in a dispute about the
rightful possession of the archbishopric of Koln * — a ques-
tion surely to be judged at the tribunal of the Emperor or
the Pope, and not to be decided by the arms of the Duke of
Burgundy. All these were facts known to all the world.
* Charles's policy with regard to the Bee of Kijln seems to be the same as his
earlier pulicy towards Luttieh. As he could hardly annex the bishopric to his
dominions, his object was to convert the ecclesiastical sovereign into his instru-
ment. Charles, however, is said to have meditated the annexation by Imperial
authority of the four great ecclesiastical principalities which intersected hie
doniinions in tlje Netherlands — the bishoprics of Utrecht, Liittich, Cambray,
and Tournay. — Heuter, lib. v. c. 8.
XI.] CHARLES THE BOLD. 371
All the world knew also how Charles had, in 1473, goi^e
to Trier, to be raised by the Emperor to the rank of king
of some kingdom or other, and how he had been left to
pack up his newly-made crown and sceptre and go home
again. More lately there had been rumours, true or false,
that the restoration of the kingdom was again designed,
that Charles was to be Imperial Vicar throughout the old
Burgundy, that the free Imperial city of Besangon was
to become his capital, that he was negotiating with good
King Ren^ for the cession or inheritance of Provence. All
these things were enough to frighten anybody, especially
those who dwelt within the limits which would naturally
be assigned to the revived kingdom. Even among the
original cantons, Schwyz and Uri indeed lay without the
borders of Burgundy in any meaning of the name, yet
among the endless fluctuations of those borders, Unter-
walden had sometimes been counted to lie within the
Lesser Burgundian duchy. And Bern and her allies of
Solothurn and Freiburg all stood on undoubted Burgundian
soil, and they were far from being forgetful of the fact."^
The re-establishment of the Bursjundian kingdom would
thus, if it did not altogether destroy the Confederation, at
least dismember it ; it would despoil it of its greatest city,
and give the eastern cantons a powerful foreign king,
instead of one of their own Confederates, as their western
neighbour. Any serious prospect of such a change was
enough to alarm the whole Confederacy ; the least hint of
* " Als Krone iin Burgundenreich,
Als freier Stadte Krone,
Als reiner Spiegel, der zugleich
Ganz mal und mackel ohne :
Wird Bern geriihmt all iiberall
Von Jungen wie von Greisen,
Auch muss den grossen Heldensal
Das ganze Teutschland preisen."
Lied ilh^r Gugler, 1376, in Rocliholz's Eidgenoasische Lieder-Chronik
(Bern, 1842). It is much to be regretted tliat the compiler of this collection
should have modernized the language of the old songs in the way that he has
done.
B b 3
372 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
the possibility of such a change was surely enough to
alarm Bern. This is a feeling which Mr. Kirk does not
enter into so much as an historian would to whom his-
torical geography was more of a living thing. But there
can be no doubt that the fear existed at the time, and that
it was far from being an unnatural fear. Bern then, more
directly threatened and better versed than her sisters in
the general politics of the world, naturally took the lead in
the movement. That the older cantons lagged behind is
nothing wonderful : Uri, Schwyz, and Unterwalden were
far less directly threatened, and their position and manner
of life naturally hindered them from keeping so keen an
eye on the general politics of the world as the astute and
polished statesmen of Bern. That Bern therefore was eager
for war, while the other cantons somewhat unwillingly
followed her lead, was just what the circumstances of
the case would naturally lead us to expect. The alliance
with Austria was a necessary part of any scheme of hostility
against Burgundy. It of course offended all Swiss tra-
ditional sentiment. Austria had up to this moment always
been their enemy, while Burgundy had long been their
friend, and had only ceased to be so under Austrian influ-
ence. But such a feeling was purely sentimental. If Bur-
gundy was really dangerous, Austria was a natural ally.
Sigismund, far too weak to do the Swiss any mischief by
himself, was yet strong enough to give them valuable help
against a common enemy.
The case, in fact, is one in which what we may call the
policy of the moment agreed with the permanent policy of
Europe, while what we may call the policy of the age, the
policy which it needs a long-sighted statesman to reach
and which the most long-sighted of statesmen seldom get
beyond, suggested another course. The smaller and more
remote cantons, those which lay further from the scene of
action and which knew less of the general politics of the
world, those which had no hope of that territorial aggran-
dizement which the war opened to Bern and Freiburg,
XL] CHARLES THE BOLD. 373
naturally shrank from attacking a prince who had not
directly attacked them. This short-sighted policy acci-
dentally agrees with our judgement four hundred years after
that the overthrow of Charles and his power has proved a
great European evil. But, at the time, a more long-sighted
policy might argue that the part of wisdom was to meet
the blow before it came, and, as Charles had given real
provocation, not to wait till provocation grew into inva-
sion. The particular grievances alleged against Burgundy
were gi-ievances of that kind which can be easily got over
when both parties are so disposed, but which easily lead to
war when the mind of either side is exasperated on other
grounds. That the Swiss had real grievances cannot be
denied : their merchants had been seized, the Bernese terri-
tory had been violated, their allies of Miihlhausen had
been attacked. We cannot doubt that Peter von Hasen-
bach had used violent and insulting language towards the
Confederates. But, except the attack on Miihlhausen, none
of these were Charles's own acts. For the affair of Miihl-
hausen he had an excuse which might seem just to himself,
though it hardly would seem so to the Confederates ; for
the acts of Hagenbach and others he was quite ready to
make reasonable atonement. But it was not the interest
of France, it was not the interest of Bern, it was perhaps
not the more remote interest of the whole League, that such
atonement should be accepted. A little friendly mediation
might no doubt have easily brought both sides to a mo-
mentary good understanding. The question was whether
such a momentary good understanding was in harmony
with sound policy. And in weighing what was sound
policy at the time, it is not reasonable to expect men to
look forward for four or five hundred years.
As for Hagenbach, we freely grant to Mr. Kirk that his
execution was a breach of the law of nations. Whatever
were his crimes, neither the Duke of Austria, nor the Con-
federates, nor the Free Cities of the Rhine, had any right
to judge him. He was an officer of the Duke of Burgundy,
374 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
in a country of which the Duke of Burgundy had a lawful,
though only a temporary, possession. His deeds, if left
unpunished, might form a casus hcUi against his master ;
we might be inclined to shut our eyes if he had perished
in a popular tumult ; but his solemn judicial trial was a
mere mockery of justice. But it is quite in vain that
Mr. Kirk attempts to whitewash the man himself His
resolute and Christian end, acknowledged by his bitterest
enemies,''^ proves very little. Men often die well who have
lived ill. And Hagenbach at least knew that he was dying
by an unjust sentence. But the genuine and bitter hatred
of all the Alsatian and Swabian towns could not have been
aroused for nothing. The whole people of Breisach were
not in the pay of King Lewis, nor had they all been led
astray by the eloquence of Nicolas von Diessbach. The
fact is plain ; they revolted against a cruel, lustful, and
insolent ruler. The particular stories in Konigshoven f
and elsewhere may perhaps be lies, or at any rate exagger-
ations ; but even slander commonly shows some regard to
probability. The real deeds of Hagenbach must have been
very bad before men could invent such stories about him.
The particular grounds of indignation were just those
which do most stir up men's indignation, namely, lustful
excess combined with violence and insult. It is quite in
vain for Mr. Kirk to solten down the stories of Hagenbach
into his being merely " a man of immoral life." People do
not rise up against mere immorality in a ruler ; it some-
times even makes a ruler more popular. Philip the Good,
Sigismund of Austria, Edward of England, the pious King
of France himself, were all men of immoral life, but we do
not find that anybody revolted against them on that ac-
count. X But then, whatever were their moral offences,
* See Schilling of Luzern, p. 65.
t Die Alteste Teutsche so wol allgemeine als insonderheit Elsassische
iind Strassburgische Chionicke, von Jacob von Konigshoven, Priestern in
Strassburg. (Strassburg, 1698.)
X Unless indeed we accept that version of the quarrel between Warwick
and Edward which attributes Warwick's bitternes;* against the King to an
XL] CHARLES THE BOLD. 375
they at least abstained from those specially galling forms
of vice which brought destruction on Peter von Hagenbach
and on the victims of the Sicilian vespers.
As we grant to Mr. Kirk the unlawfulness of the execu-
tion of Hagenbach, we can also grant to him another point.
The decisive moment of the struggle was when Sigismund
of Austria reclaimed the lands in Elsass which he had
pledged to Charles. We admit that the repayment of the
money — the PfandscJnlling, as the old chroniclers call it —
was made in a way not contemplated in the treaty, and
that Charles was therefore justified in treating the redemp-
tion as null and void. But we think that this admission
leaves the main case very much as it stood before. The
important point is the zeal with which the various towns
helped to raise the money, and their eagerness to have
Sigismund for their master or neighbour rather than
Charles. Mr. Kirk tells us — and we are ready to believe
it — that the Burgundian government was stricter and more
regular than the Austrian, and that the towns simply stood
out for franchises which were inconsistent with the general
good. So possibly they were, but it would have been
hard to make the citizens of those towns think so. At
any rate we may be quite sure that men did not mingle
their political cries with their Easter hymns without some
good reason.*
We hold then that, taking all these things together, — the
generally dangerous designs of Charles, the particular
wrongs done by Hagenbach and others, the oppression of
insult offered by him to the Earl's daughter or niece. If so, we are
approaching the same ground as the tales of Hagenbach. As a general
rule, Edward's gallantries seem rather to have made him popular than
otherwise.
* The Easter Song of 1474 ran thus :
" Clirist ist erstanden, der Landvogt ist gefangen ;
Des sollend wir fro syn.
Siegmund soil unser Ti'o^t syti, Kyrie eleison.
War er nit gefangen, so war's iibel gangen ;
Seyd er nun gefangen ist, hilft ihm niit syn bose List."
J. V. Mtiller, b. iv. c. vii. note 572. So Schilling of Luzem, p. 66.
376 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
neighbouring and friendly commonwealths, the summons to
the Confederates in the name of the Emperor, — there was
quite enough to explain, perhaps enough to justify, the
Swiss declaration of war. And the peculiar position of
Bern fully explains and justifies her eagerness and the
backwardness of the other cantons. If the career of
Charles did not immediately threaten the Confederates, yet
it threatened them in the long run, and it had directly
touched their allies. German national feeling, and that
vague loyalty to the Empire which was by no means with-
out influence, called the Confederates, along with other
Germans, to withstand the threatening Welsh power against
whom Caesar had summoned all his liegemen. That Caesar
afterwards forsook the liegemen whom he had summoned
would count for very little when the die was once cast.
These were motives which would appeal to the sentiments
of the Confederates in general. They would be met by
strong motives on the other side. Mere sluggishness, mere
unwillingness to stir without manifest necessity, would count
for something. A powerful sentimental feeling would op-
pose itself to a war with Burgundy, an old friend, under-
taken in concert with Austria, the old enemy. There
would be the feeling of jealousy on the part of the small
cantons against Bern, when Bern was so sure to reap the
chief advantages of war. Motives would thus be pretty
evenly balanced. In the end the Confederation was hurried,
one might almost say cheated, into the war by French
intrigue and Bernese diplomacy. All that did happen
might possibly have happened, even though the gold and
the intrigues of King Lewis had played no important part
in the business. But we are far from denying that they
did play a very important part. They clinched, as it were,
the whole matter. They made that certain which otherwise
would have been only possible ; they hastened what other-
wise might have been delayed ; they made a quarrel irre-
concileable which otherwise might have been made up, at
least for a season. We do not doubt that the linger of
XI.] CHARLES THE BOLD. 377
Lewis was to be traced everywhere, at Eern. at Innsbruck,
in the Alsatian towns, seizing opportunities, removing
difficulties, aggravating what needed to be aggravated
and sottening what needed to be softened. We do not
doubt that the Confedei-ates were made the tool of a policy
which few among them understood, except the special
agents of Lewis. All that we say is that Lewis's inter-
ference was not the sole explanation of the matter ; that,
though a very important influence, it was only one con-
spiring influence among several ; that the Confederates had
at least a plausible case against Charles, and that they
might even have acted as they did though Lewis had never
been born. So far as they were unduly or unworthily
influenced by the tempter, they had their fitting reward ;
when they were once committed to the struggle with the
power of Burgundy, their royal ally forsook them no less
basely than their Imperial lord, and the baneful habits
brought in by this first handling of French gold remained
the shame and cuise of the Swiss commonwealths till the
stain was wiped out in our own day.
How far then was the Bernese diplomacy corrupt 1 Was
Bern, were its statesmen, simply bought by Lewis ? Nicolas
von Diessbach most likely sold himself, soul and body, to
the French King. But did the whole commonwealth so sell
itself? To our thinking, Mr. Kirk does not make enough
of allowance for the wide difference between the feelings
of those days and the feelings of ours with regard to any
taking of money by public men. Our feeling on the sub-
ject is undoubtedly a much higher and better one, and it
is a safeguard against practices which, even in their most
harmless shape, are at least very dangerous. But we must
judge men according to the feelings of their own time.
Every man who took the King's money was not necessarily
acting corruptly. No doubt it would have been nobler to
refuse to touch a so^i of it in any case. The high-minded
refusal of Freiburg at the time of the King's first offers
reads like some of the noblest stories of the best days of
378 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
old Rome. To take the money, whether for a common-
wealth or for an individual, was dangerous and degrading ;
but it was far from being so dangerous or so degrading as
the like conduct would be now. We have no right to say
that either a commonwealth or an individual was bribed
or bought, unless it can be shown that he or they were led
by gifts to adopt a line of conduct which their unbought
judgements condemned. Diessbach may have been a traitor
of this kind ; Zellweger demands his condemnation as well
as Mr. Kirk, and Bern and Switzerland can afford to give
him up. But we must not extend the same harsh measure
to every man who grasped a few gold pieces from the royal
storehouse. It might be a reward ; it might be a subven-
tion ; it was not necessarily a bribe, as we now count
bribes. We have a feeling nowadays about taking money
at all which had no sort of existence in the fifteenth
century. In those days men freely took what they could
get : judges took presents from suitors and ambassadors
took presents from the princes to whom they were sent ;
sovereigns and their councillors became the pensioners of
other sovereigns; kings on their pi ogresses did not scruple
to receive purses filled with gold as an earnest of the love
of their subjects. To sell ones country for money, to
change one's policy for money, was as shameful then as it
is now ; but simply to take money, either as a help or as
a reward, from a richer fellow- worker in the same cause
was not thou<J|;ht shameful at all. Kines with their ministers
and ambassadors, commonwealths and their leading citizens,
freely took money in such cases. Charles spent his money
in Switzerland as well as Lewis ; Englishmen took the
money of Lewis no less readily than Switzers. If Diess-
bach or any one else took French money in order to beguile
his country into a course which, had he not received
French money, he would not have counselled, he was a
corrupt traitor. But if Diessbach or any one else, be-
lieving a war with Burgundy to be just and politic, took
French money as a help towards the common cause, or
XI.] CHARLES THE BOLD. 379
even as a reward for his services in promoting that cause,
the morality of the time did not condemn him. And many
of these practices long survived the days of Charles the
Bold. The English patriots of the reign of Charles the
Second took the money of Lewis the Fourteenth as freely
as Aratos in old times took the money of King Ptolemy.
But neither Aratos nor Algernon Sidney can fairly be
called corrupt ; the interest of the patriot was in either
case believed to be the same as the interest of the foreign
king, and the patriot did not disdain the foreign kings
money as help given to the common cause. The sub-
ventions publicly granted by Lewis the Eleventh to the
several cantons were really of much the same nature as
the subsidies in which England not so long ago dealt very
largely. In all these cases there is much of danger and
temptation in handling the seducing metal, but the mere
act is not of itself necessarily corrupt. The worst to be
said of the Swiss is that, in a not very scrupulous age,
they did not show themselves conspicuously better than
other people. The friends of France took the King's
money, and the friends of Burgundy took the Duke's ; for
Charles had his paid partizans also, though he was both
less bountiful and less discreet in the business than his
rival. In taking foreign money, as in serving as mer-
cenaries, the Swiss simply did like the rest of the world,
only various circumstances made these bad habits more
conspicuous and more permanent in them than in other
nations. The help of France, which took the ugly form of
receiving French money, had a great deal to do with fixing
the purpose both of Bern and of the other Confederates.
And it is pretty clear that, with some particular men, the
receiving of French money was simply the receiving of
French bribes. But as regards the state, the subsidy need
not have been more than a subsidy ; to receive French
money as a help against the common enemy was not neces-
sarily any more corrupt than to receive the help of French
troops. We do not deny the danger of such practices ; we
380 CHARLES THE BOLD. [Essay
do not deny their evil eifects in this particular case, in
■which they undoubtedly led, as Valerius Anshelm shows,
to the political demoralization of Switzerland. These
transactions with Lewis were the beginning of these evil
practices, practices which seriously lowered the dignity
and independence of the Swiss people down to the aboli-
tion of the military capitulations by the Constitution of
1848. The beginning of these degrading habits is to be
traced to the war of Burgundy ; but it is not fair to speak,
as De Gingins and Mr. Kirk do, of the war of Burgundy
itself as an instance of mercenary service. We believe that
in that war the Swiss were neither strictly fighting for
their hearths and homes nor yet basely shedding their blood
in an alien quarrel. They were fighting in a war of policy,
a war into which they had drifted, as the phrase is, through
a variety of influences. But we decline to look on French
gold and intrigues as the single cause of the war, of which
we hold them to have been only one cause among several.
We look on the war, like most other wars, as a war of
doubtful justice and expediency, a war which had much
to be said for it and much to be said against it. We
cannot look on it as a war of mere brigandage, or on the
Swiss who were engaged in it as mere mercenary butchers.
The Swiss then acted simply like other people, neither
better nor worse ; only there is a sort of disposition in
many minds specially to blame the Swiss if they did not
act better than other people. They were republicans, and
they ought to have set examples of all the republican
virtues. But in truth the Swiss of that age w^ere not
theoretical republicans at all. They had the strongest
possible attachment to the rights of their own cities and
districts, but they had no notion whatever of the rights of
man. They had no rhetorical horror of kings, such as
appears in some measure among the old Greeks and Romans,
and in a form of exaggerated caricature among the French
revolutionists. In truth they were subjects of a king ; true
they had no king but Caesar, but C?esar was their king,
XL] CHARLES THE BOLD. 381
though they had contrived to cut down his royal powers
to a vanishing point. Again, people often fancy that the
Swiss of that day were wholly a people of shepherds and
mountaineers, like the Swiss of a hundred and fifty years
earlier. They expect to find in every part of the Con-
federation the supposed simple virtues of the inhabitants
of the Forest Cantons. But the refined and skilful states-
men and diplomatists of the Bernese aristocracy were men
of quite another mould. They lived in the great world of
general politics, and they were neither better nor worse
than other people who lived in it. Their standard was
doubtless always higher than that of the mere slaves of
a court, but we have no right to expect from them an
impossible career of heroic virtue; it is enough if they
reach the contemporary standard of fairly honest men in
other countries.
There are then points in which we cannot unreservedly
follow Mr. Kirk, and points in which we think that his way
of looking at things is defective. There are also faults of
style, which are the more provoking because Mr. Kirk can
write thoroughly well whenever he chooses. But we must
not be thought to be blind to Mr. Kirk's real and great
merits. He is many degrees removed from that class of
historians who draw their facts and their inferences alike
from their imaginations, who blunder in every detail, and
who, when their blunders are pointed out, repeat them in
pamphlets or in new editions, as may be convenient. Mr.
Kirk belongs to the school of good, honest, hard work.
Such faults as he has clearly arise, not from any want of
due care in dealing with his immediate subject, but rather
from not fully grasping the position of his immediate
subject in the general history of the world. On one point
especially Mr. Kirk has done really good service ; that is,
with regard to the character of his own hero. It is, of
course, easy for a man whose studies have gathered round
one particular person to rate that person somewhat above
382 CHARLES THE BOLD. [E?say
his merits, especially if he be one who has commonly been
rated below his merits. But it is just as easy to cry out
" hero- worship " whenever a man's studies have led him to
take a more favourable view of any historical character
than has commonly been taken. Mr. Kirk is very far
from being an undiscerning panegyrist or apologist of
Charles the Bold. But some ingenious hand might doubt-
less, by carefully bringing forward this passage and care-
fully leaving out the other, give the impression that he is
an undiscerning panegyrist. To us he certainly seems
somewhat to overrate Charles, but he does not overrate
him more than is almost unavoidable in one to whom
Charles must have been for many years the main subject
of his thoughts. And the overratinor of Charles is un-
doubtedly a fault on the right side. The novels of Scott
have led people in general to see nothing but an embodi-
ment of brute force in a man whose very mixed character
is a really instructive study of human nature. It would
be an abuse of words to call Charles either a great man or
a good man; but there were in his character strong ele-
ments both of greatness and goodness. To compare him
with a man who soars in all things far above him, we may
see in Charles the same inflexible will, the same stern and
unbending justice, many of the same personal virtues,
which mark the character of William the Great. We may
see in him too the same utter indifference to human
suffering ; but in both it is simple indifference, and never
grows into actual delight in oppression. But no man was
ever further than Charles from William's political skill;
he had no trace of that marvellous power by which William
knew how to make every man his instrument, how to
adapt the fitting means to every end, how to mark the
right time, the right way, the right place, for the accom-
plishment of every scheme. Hence, lacking the guidance
of that master intellect, those very qualities which made
William well nigh the master of destiny made Charles only
the sport of fortune. His later history is conceived in the
XI.] CHARLES THE BOLD. 383
very spirit of iEschylean tragedy. And as far as the part
of the Messenger is concerned, one can hardly wish for any
improvement in Mr. Kirk's acting. It is then the more
pity that he should have failed so thoroughly, failed, so
to speak, by his own choice, as he has failed in the part
of Chorus.
On the whole then we welcome Mr. Kirk as a worthy
accession to the same company as his countrymen Prescott
and Motley. The subjects of the three are closely connected.
The historian of Philip the Second and the historian of
the United Netherlands do, in effect, carry on the story of
Charles, his family, and his dominions. Their tale tells
how one corner of those dominions rose for a short time
to the highest point of European glory, and how the great
work of the Middle kingdom, to act as the bulwark of
Germany and of Europe against the aggression of the
Western kingdom, was thrown on a few of the smallest
of the many states whose names served to swell the roll-
call of Charles's titles. And when we see other large
portions of those states now helping to swell the might of
the power which they once held in check, we cannot help
wishing, even without throwing ourselves on the other side
with all the zeal of Mr. Kirk, that the stout pikes and
halberts of Switzerland had never been wielded against one
who seemed marked out by destiny as the restorer of the
Middle kinsfdom.
384 PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT. [Essay
XII.
PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT.
Is planning a political constitution — an employment
which always has a slightly ludicrous side to it, but
which, in many conditions of a nation, is a sad necessity
— the makers of the new machine have to consider the
necessary partition of powers under a twofold aspect.
They have to decide both as to the number of depart-
ments among which authority is to be divided, and as
to the hands in which authority of each kind is to be
vested. Thus, the British Constitution in its legal theory,
the Federal Constitutions of America and Switzerland,
and the type of constitution common among the American
States, all agree in dividing the powers of government
between two Legislative Chambers and an executive power
distinct from both. The partition of powers, as far as the
number of departments goes, is much the same in all these
cases ; but the nature of the hands in which power is
placed differs widely in the different examples. There is
undoubtedly a considerable difference in the amount of
power which each of these constitutions gives to its exe-
cutive; but the difference in the amount of power is less
striking than the difference in the nature of the hands in
which that power is vested. England entrusts the exe-
cutive authority to an hereditary King ; the United States,
and the several States generally, entrust it to an elective
President or Governor; the Swiss Confederation entrusts
it to an elective Council. America, it is clear, here forms
XIL] FRESIDESTIAL GUVERSMEXT. ^385
a mean between Switzerland and Eng^land. It agrees with
England — that is, with the legal theory of England — in
placing the executive power in the hands of a single
person, and not in those of a Council ; it agrees with
Switzerland in making the depository of executive power
elective and responsible instead of hereditary and irre-
sponsible. An almost infinite number of cross divisions
might be made by comparing any of these constitutions
with those which agree with them in some particular
points and differ in others. Thus the French constitution
of 1 79 1 had an hereditary King, and only a single Chamber ;
and the present kingdom of Greece, where the Senate was
abolished by the last-made constitution, has followed the
same model. These constitutions, so far as their executive
is single, approach to the English and American type ; so
far as their executive is hereditary, they approach to the
English type as distinguished from the American ; but so
far as they have only a single Legislative Chamber, they
forsake the models of England, America, and federal
Switzerland, and approach to the type of constitution
common among the Swiss cantons. Almost any number
of changes can be rung in this way. We thus see how
inadequate any one classification of governments is, if it
is sought to apply it to all purposes, and how almost every
topic of political disquisition calls for a classification of
its own. In the little way that we have gone, we find
monarchic and republican constitutions showing marks of
likeness or unlikeness to one another, quite independent of
their likeness or unlikeness as monarchies and republics.
And any questions between aristocracy and democracy
have not as yet come in at all. The aristocratic or demo-
cratic nature of a constitution depends much more on the
constitution of the Legislative Chambers than either on
their number or on their relation to the executive. No
doubt the purest forms of democracy and of aristocracy,
those in which all power is vested in an assembly of the
whole people or of the whole privileged class among the
c c
386 PKESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT. [Essay
people, would be inconsistent with any of the forms of
executive which we have spoken of. But any of these
forms could co-exist with what is now generally under-
stood by aristocracy or democracy, namely, an aristocratic
or a democratic way of choosing the Legislative Chambers.
Of the many possible cross divisions the one which concerns
us for the purpose of the present essay is one which ar-
ranges constitutions accordino- to the nature of the hands
in which the executive power is vested ; according, for
instance, as that power is placed in the hands of a King,
a President, or a Council.
The distinction between an executive President and an
executive Council is obvious. Is there, or is there not,
some one person to whose sole hands the executive power
is committed in such a degree that whatever is done in
the executive department is his personal act, while any
other persons who may be concerned are merely his agents
or advisers 1 The American President is a President of
this kind ; every executive act is his act ; many things
depend wholly on his personal pleasure ; other acts of his
require the confirmation of the Senate ; still the Senate
merely confirms, and cannot act of itself ; the act is strictly
the act of the President. The President has his ministers ;
but they are strictly Jiis ministers, named by him, and
dependent on him ; they are his advisers and agents, not
his colleagues. The position of the Swiss President of the
Confederation [Btindesjyyasidenf), though his title is so
similar, is wholly different. He is simply chairman, with
the usual powers of a chairman, of the real executive body,
the Federal Council [Bumlesrafl/). The other members of
that Council are his colleagues, not his mere agents or
advisers ; executive acts are the acts of the Council as
a body, not of the President personally, and it is of course
possible that a majority of the Council may come to a
resolution of which the President does not approve. These
two systems may be taken as typical examples. Few
republican states have invested a single magistrate with
XII.] PRESIDESTIAL GOVERyMEST. 387
such large powers as the American President, while few
commonwealths have given a nominal chief magistrate so
small a degree of power as belongs to the Swiss President.
In truth, the Swiss President is not a chief magistrate at
all ; he is simply chief of a board, which board, in its col-
lective character, acts as chief magistrate. It is not the
Federal President personally, but the Federal Council as
a body, which answers to the Presidents. Consuls, Doges,
and Cionfaloniers of other commonwealths. His title in
truth is a misleading one ; he is not President of the Con-
federation, but simply President of the Federal Council.
Between these two extreme t}-pes it is easy to imagine
several intermediate forms, some coming nearer to the
American and some to the Swiss type. Thus the General
of the Achaian League, whose position so wonderfully fore-
stalled that of the American President, differed from him
in his relation to what may be called his Cabinet, the
Council of (leiiiioitrrjoi. In most matters the General and
his Council seem to have acted together, while others
came within the distinct competence of the General alone
and of the Council alone. But, even where the General
and Council acted together, they acted as two distinct
authorities in the state ; the action of the General in such
a case was something between that of the American Presi-
dent asking the confirmation of the Senate to an executive
act and that of the Swiss President taking the chair at
a meeting of his colleagues. So again, many of the Ameri-
can States have, at different times, assisted or encumbered
their chief magistrate with a Council of State. For in-
stance, the Pennsylvanian Constitution of 1776 vested
executive power in a President and Council, the President
being apparently a mere chairman. This is hardly dis-
tinguishable from the Swiss Federal model. The Virginian
Constitution of the same year gave its Governor a Privy
Council, but allowed him a somewhat more independent
position. He was bound, in most cases, to act by the
advice of the Privy Council, but this is a different thing
c c a
388 PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT. [Essay
from being a mere chairman of that body. The Swiss
cantons again commit the executive power to Councils ;
there seems to be no canton where the chief magistrate
holds the independent position of an American Federal
President or an American State Governor. But here too
intermediate shades may be seen ; in many of the cantons
the chief magistrate, like the Federal President, is a mere
chairman of the Council, but in others he holds a decidedly
higher relative position. His official title, for instance,
often forms part of the style of the canton ; in the purely
democratic Cantons, the Landammann has the great ad-
vantage of presiding both in the executive Council and
in the Lamltsgemeinde or Assembly of the People ; in Inner-
Appenzell he even has large constitutional powers to be
exercised personally. In fact, in these cases where the
executive power belongs to a President and Council, it is
easy to conceive every possible shade between the two
types. There is manifestly a w^ide difference between
merely presiding in a Council, with a casting-vote in case
of necessity, and having to act by the advice of a Council.
If, in the latter case, the President retains the sole initi-
ative, his position will come very nearly to that of the
President of the United States with regard to the Senate.
Another type of executive, which may in some sort be
called intermediate between the Council and the inde-
pendent President, may be found in such a magistracy
as that of the Eoman Consuls. Here are two chief magis-
trates of equal power, whose number at once distinguishes
them alike from the Council and from the single President.
The Achaian League too, in its earlier da3's, placed two
Generals at the head of the state. The lirst impression
of a modern reader is that such a government must have
come to a perpetual dead-luck. Yet it is certain from
the Roman history that such was not the ordinary con-
dition of the Roman commonwealth. Interruptions to the
regular march of government arose much more commonly
from the clashing of the consular and tribunitian power
XIL] PRESIDESTIAL GOVERXMEXT. 389
than from dissensions between the Consuls themselves.
But in truth, though the Consuls were the chief magistrates
of the commonwealth, it cannot be said that the executive
power was vested in them in the same sense in which it is
vested in the President of the United States The govern-
ment of Rome, in the modern sense of the word government,
was certainly vested in the Senate. The other magistrates
also, though inferior in rank* to the Consuls, were still
strictly co-ordinate with them, and were in no sense their
agents or delegates. We know so little of the Achaian
League during the days of the double generalship that we
cannot say from direct evidence how it worked. But the
fact that a single General was, after a few years, substi-
tuted for two, seems to show that it worked badly.
As a President is, on the one hand, clearly distinguished
from a Council, so he is, on the other hand, no less clearly
distinguished from a King. This distinction seems almost
more obvious than the former one ; yet intermediate forms
may be seen here also, and to define a King may not be
quite so easy as it seems at first sight. What, for instance,
was the King of Poland or the Doge of Venice'? What
were the two Kings of Sparta ? The Spartan case may be
easily set aside. Sparta was not a case either of regal or
of presidential government. The Kings were so far from
being Kings in the ordinary sense that they were not even
chief magistrates. The real executive was a Council, the
College of Ephors. The Kings were hereditary generals
and hereditary priests ; they were reverenced on account
of their divine ancestry, and were placed in a position
where an able king might attain to a commanding in-
fluence in the state ; but their constitutional powers were
of the very narrowest kind. The mere title of King proves
nothing ; it was kept on in other Greek commonwealths
* That is the regular permanent magistracies, all of which were inferior
to the consulship. The dictatorship was only an occasional office, and,
though Censors were appointed at regular intervals, their office was not a
permanent one.
390 PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT. [Essay
besides Sparta ; it was even the style of one of the annual
Arehons under the democracy of Athens. The two modern
cases are more difficult. Venice and Poland, though both
had princes, both bore the name of republics, and Venice
is universally classed among republican states. Poland
is less usually recognized as a republic. This is probably
because there is felt to be a contradiction in the notion of
a republic under a King, which is not felt in the notion
of a republic under a Doge. People do not fully grasp
that l)oge is simply the local form of Dnke, nor do they
fully grasp that other Italian dukes were, in all save a
barren precedence, the equals of kings. But the King of
Poland and the Duke of Venice were in the beginning as
truly sovereign as other kings and other dukes ; * only
their powers had been gradually cut down to a point
which seemed almost to remove them out of the class of
princes into that of mere magistrates. But, as having
once been really sovereigns, they still kept much of that
personal position which distinguishes the prince from the
magistrate. The King of Poland especially, though he
might not be of royal birth, though he was not in the
possession of ordinary royal powers, was still, in personal
rank and privilege, looked on as the peer of other kings.
The constitutional authority of both princes was far less
than that of the American President, but, being elected
for life, they enjoyed, like the Spartan Kings, far greater
opportunities of obtaining a permanent influence in the
state. Other instances might be found elsewhere, as the
hereditary Stadholder in the United Provinces, the Lord
Protector in England, the First Consul in France. But it
may be observed that this ambiguous kind of government
has seldom been lasting. Venice and Poland have been the
only countries where it could really be called permanent.
* [When I wrote this, I could hardly have taken in that the Venetian Duke
began as a magistrate under the Emperor reigning at Constantinoi)le. But the
saying is perhaps not far fmm the trutli as regards liis position towards the
Venetian state. iSS6.]
XII.] PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT, 391
In France and England — we might perhaps add Holland —
it has either fallen to pieces or grown into undisguised
monarchy.
Setting aside these intermediate cases, and forbearing
also to speculate as to the exact nature of kingsliip, we may-
say that the main difference between a King and a Presi-
dent is that the President is distinctly responsible to the
laAV, that he may be judged and deposed by a legal process,
and that there is nothing about him of that mysterious
personal dignity which, in the minds of most people, still
hangs about a King. Whether the powers of a President
are great or small, he is simply a magistrate, who is to be
obeyed within the range of his powers, but who is liable to
legal punishment if he outsteps them. This would seem to
be the most essential difference between a President and a
King. A King, however limited his powers may be, is, in
all modern constitutions, personally ii-responsible. His
command is no justification of any illegal act done by
another, but no constitutional monarchy seems to supply
any regular means of punishing an illegal act done by the
King's own hands. If the King be deposed or set aside in
any way, it is clearly by some unusual — not necessarily
unjustifiable — stretch of authority on the part of some other
power in the state ; there is no court before which the King
can be arraigned in ordinary process of law. But the
President holds office only during good behaviour, and he
may be deposed by sentence of a competent court. This
responsibility of the President and irresponsibility of the
Kins: seems to be the main difference between them. It
seems indeed essential that the President should be elective,
but this is no necessary point of difference between the
President and the King. An elective King is none the less
a King, but an hereditary President would have made
a most important advance towards exchanging president-
ship for royalty. So, though it is essential to kingship that
the oflice should be held for life, this again is no necessary
distinction between a King and a President. A republican
392 PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT. [Essay
President may be elected for life, as the Florentine Gon-
falonier was in the latter days of that republic, and as the
President of the United States would have been according
to the first scheme of Alexander Hamilton. The one real
distinction lies in the President's responsibility. The
divinity which hedges in a King, and which does not
hedge in a President, is something which is of no small
practical importance, but it is hardly capable of political
definition. This special feeling about a King seems mainly
to arise from that vague religious character with which
most nations have loved to invest their princes. In most
heathen nations a supposed divine descent is held to be
essential to the royal office ; most Christian nations have
supplied an analogous kind of sanctity in the form of an
ecclesiastical consecration of the monarch. But even this is
not an essential distinction. Some modern kings dispense
with any ecclesiastical ceremony; and though no religious
character attaches to any modern republican ruler, such
has not been the case in all commonwealths. The official
sanctity of the Roman Kings clave in no small measure to
the republican magistrates among whom their powers were
divided ; and there is, to say the least, no contradiction in
terms in conceiving an ecclesiastical inauguration of a
responsible President as well as of an ii-responsible King.
We have thus reached our definition of a President. He
is a single, elective, responsible, magistrate to whom the
chief executive power in a commonwealth is entrusted.
His responsibility distinguishes him from a King ; his
numerical unity distinguishes him from an executive Coun-
cil. His elective character he shares with the Council ; he
may share it with the King. Whether he is elected for life
or for a term is a point of detail in the particular constitu-
tion under which he acts. It may be here remarked that
the examples of the several classes which have been chosen
have been taken indiscriminately from single common-
wealths and from Federations. For in a perfect Federal
government, one where the Federal and the State power
XII.] PRESlDEyTIAL GOVERXMEyT. 393
are strictly co-ordinate, where the Federal power has direct
authority, within its own range, over every citizen, the
powers, executive, legislative, and judicial, to be distributed
among the Federal authorities will be precisely the same as
in a consolidated state. The form of government may be
exactly the same in a great confederation as in a single
small canton. The peculiar position of a Federal Govern-
ment, its special duties, relations, and dangers, may suggest
one form of legislature or of executive as preferable to
another, just as any other circumstances of the common-
wealth may do so. But there is nothing in the Federal
character of any particular state which directly affects the
distribution of the powers of government, or which hinders
its constitution from being fairly compared with other con-
stitutions which are not Federal. The President of the
Union and the Governor of the State are powers exactly
analogous within their several spheres ; that they both form
part of one greater political system in no way affects their
position as the heads of two distinct and parallel political
constitutions.
We have compared our President with a King and with
a Council, and we have distinguished him from both. But
it will at once be felt that the comparison between the
President and the constitutional King is not a very practical
one. In most limited or constitutional monarchies the
person really to be compared with the President is not the
King, the legal and apparent head of the state, but another
person of whose position as practical head of the state the
law in most cases knows nothing. That is to say, it is not
the King, but his First Minister, who fills the position
which is really analogous to that of the President of a
republic. At the same time it may be as well to remark
that this is by no means necessarily the case in all consti-
tutional monarchies. It is curious to see how people always
assume that "constitutional monarchy" must mean that
particular form of it where the royal power is practically
vested in the King's ministers. In like manner it is
391 PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT. [Esfay
commonly assumed that "parliamentary government" must
mean that particular form of it where Parliament is assisted,
guided, or controlled by the same body, a body it may be,
as in our own country, wholly unknown to the law. That
is to say, by " constitutional monarchy" and " parliamentary
government" people understand exclusively that form of
government by which all the powers of the King and a
large portion of the powers of the Parliament are practically
transferred to the body known as a Cabinet or Ministry.
This mode of speech puts out of sight those states where the
powers of the King are distinctly limited by law, but where,
within the limits of his legal powers, he acts according to
his personal will. Such is the case with the constitutions
both of Sweden and of Norway. Both are constitutional
monarchies, both are parliamentary governments ; but the
device of a Cabinet to guide both King and Parliament till
Parliament prefers the guidance of some other Cabinet is
unknown to them. The Noi*wegian constitution is probably
the most democratic form of government that ever included
an hereditary king as one of its elements. The royal
authority is more narrowly limited than in any other king-
dom ; yet the personal will of a King of Norway counts for
more than the personal will of a King of England. That is
to say, small as is the degree of authority which the law
gives him, he is free to exercise it according to his personal
discretion. The constitution binds him to consult his State
Council, but it distinctly affirms that the final decision of
all matters within the range of his authority rests with
himself. He is personally u-responsible ; all responsibility
rests with his Councillors, but any Councillor who dissents
from the royal decision may escape all responsibility by
a formal protest against it. Here is a limited monarchy,
a constitutional monarchy, but a monarchy in which there
is no approach to a Ministry in our sense of the word.
King and Parliament have their distinct functions traced
out by law; but in case of differences between them, they
are brought face to face as opposing powers, in a way
XIL] PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT. 395
in which an Enghsh King and an English Parliament have
not been brought face to face for some generations. Here
then is a king who clearly may be personally compared
with a republican President. He is personally irrespon-
sible ; he succeeds by hereditary right and not by election ;
but his actual functions are as nearly as possible the same
as those of a President, and they are quite different from
those of an English King. In England it is not the King,
but his chief Minister, with whom the President should
really be compared.
The theory of cabinet government, of what is commonly
called constitutional or parliamentary government, is that
the legal functions of the King and a large portion of the
legal functions of Parliament are transferred to a body of
ministers. These ministers are appointed by the King, but
as they must be appointed out of the party which has the
upper hand in the House of Commons, they may be said to
be indirectly chosen by the House of Commons itself. They
exercise the executive functions of the Crown, and they
possess a practical initiative in all important points of legis-
lation. If their policy is censured, or even if any important
ministerial proposal is rejected, they resign office. They
may indeed escape for a season by dissolving Parliament,
but if the new House of Commons confirms the adverse
vote of its predecessor, there is no hope for them left. At
the head of this body stands one minister, the chief of the
Cabinet, the leader of one or other House of Parliament,
who is really the person to be compared with the President
under the other system. Now all this is purely conven-
tional ; the law knows nothing of the Ministry as a
Ministry ; it knows the several ministers as personal holders
of certain offices ; it knows them as Privy Councillors and
as members of one or other House of Parliament ; in all
these characters, if they come within the reach of the law,
the law can deal with them. A Minister who acts illegally
in his office, a Privy Councillor who gives the sovereign
illegal advice, can be touched by impeachment or other-
396 PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT. [Essay
wise ; his parliamentary conduct, like that of any other
member, is cognizable by that Honse of Parliament to
which he belongs. All this is matter of law ; but the doc-
trine of ministerial responsibility, the duty of a Ministry to
resign if the House of Commons disapprove of its policy,
the duty of the whole Ministry to stand together in Parlia-
ment, the consequent duty of a dissentient minister to
compromise or conceal his differences with his colleagues or
else to resign his office — all these doctrines, familiar as we
are with them, are mere customs Avhich have gradually, and
some of them very recently, grown up, and of which the
law of England knows nothing. The power of the Cabinet
has gradually increased during the last hundred years. The
names by which the persons actually in power have been
called at different times bear witness to their rapid increase
in importance. In George the Third's reign people spoke of
"Administration;" at the time of the Reform Bill it was
"Ministers," or "the Ministry;" it is only quite lately that
the word " Government," which once meant Kings, Lords,
and Commons, has come to be applied to this extra-legal
body. Yet we now habitually speak of "the Government,"
of " Lord Palmerston s Government," of " Lord Derby's
Government," meaning thereby a certain knot of Privy
Councillors, of whom it would be impossible to give any
legal definition. The expression is so common that people
use it without in the least thinking how very modern it is,
and how singular is the state of things which it implies.
As Lord Macaulay says, the Cabinet seems to have been
unknown to writers like De Lolme and Blackstone, who
never mentioned it among the powers of the state. It is
more important to remark that the existence of the British
Cabinet seems to have attracted no attention among the
disputants for and against the American Constitution. The
opponents of the Constitution objected to the position and
powers of the President as being too near an approach to
kingship. Hamilton answered them by showing how much
greater were the restrictions placed upon the power of the
XII.] PRESIDENTIAL GOVERXMEXT. 397
President than those which were placed upon the power of
the King. But neither party seems to have paid any atten-
tion to the fact that the President can exercise his smaller
powers far more freely than the King can exercise his
greater powers. They speak as if the King of Great Britain
could act as independently within his own range as the
King of Sweden and Norway. The}^ recognize the re-
strictions imposed by the written law, but they pay no
attention to the further restrictions which were even then
imposed by the conventional " constitution." This shows
how widely the Cabinet system has developed since Hamil-
ton's time, and how complete is the recognition which,
without receiving any more legal sanction than before, it
has obtained in general opinion and in popular modes of
speech. No one now could fail to see the fallacy of com-
paring a President who acts for himself, or by the advice of
ministers chosen by himself personally and dependent on
him only, with a King who acts at ever}^ step by the advice
of ministers who may have been forced upon him in the
first instance, and whom he may, at any moment, be called
on to dismiss. Every one now would see that the real
comparison, for likeness and unlikeness, lies between the two
practical leaders of the state under the two systems, though
the chiefship of the one is a matter of positive legal enact-
ment, while the chiefship of the other is a matter of
unwritten constitutional tradition.
The main distinction between the President of a republic
and the First Minister of a constitutional kingdom seems
to be this. The President is elected for a definite time,
and, except in the case of some definite crime being judi-
cially proved against him, he cannot be constitutionally
got rid of before the end of that time. Be his rule never
so bad, still, if he does not break the letter of the law,
he must be endured till the end of his year or of his four
years ; be his rule never so good, the country must part
with him at the end of his term, or at any rate his further
existence in oflice must be put to the risk of a fresh
398 PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT. [Essay
election. But the First Minister, holding a purely con-
ventional office, holds it for no fixed term ; if his policy
be disapproved, a vote of the House of Commons can
get rid of him at any moment : if he continues to give
satisfaction, he may, without any formal vote about it,
be continued in office for the rest of his days. This seems
to be the one essential difference between a President and
a First Minister ; any other differences are not inherent
in the nature of the two offices, but depend on the cir-
cumstances of particular countries and on the provisions
of particular constitutions. It follows that there is an
important difference between the position of an English
Minister and that of an American President with regard
to the national Legislature. The English Minister and
all his colleagues in the Cabinet are necessarily members
of one or other House of Parliament ; they take the lead
in its debates, and have the chief management of its
business ; it is in the House, as members of the House,
and not as an external power, that they explain their
policy and defend it against objectors. In America, on
the other hand, neither the President nor his ministers
can be members of either House of Congress. The Presi-
dent indeed, under a representative constitution, can hardly
be conceived as being a member of either branch of the
legislature. He can communicate with Congress only by
formal messages and speeches like a king ; he cannot take
his place as a member and join in a debate.'^ But the
exclusion of the President's ministers is a mere point of
detail in the American Constitution, which mio-ht quite
well have been otherwise ordered. There is not indeed
the same necessity for the President's ministers to be
* [Tlie existing state of things ill France (.Tanuary, 1872) — one can hardly
dignify it hy the name of constitution — does give us a President who is also a
memlier of the Assendjly.
I ought perhaps to have mentioned, though it does not strictly bear on
the position of Presidents, that the members of the Swiss Federal Council
mjty attend and 8])eak in either House of the Federal Assembly, but witli-
out the right of voting.]
XII.] PRESIDESTIAL GOVERNMENT. 399
members of the legislature as there is in a constitutional
monarchy ; but there seems no inherent cliiBculty in their
being so if it should so happen. Accordingly the Consti-
tution of the Confederate States has somewhat relaxed
the restriction."^ By that constitution no office-holder can
be a member of Congress, but Congress is empowered to
gi'ant by law to certain great officers a seat in either
House, with the right of discussing measures affecting
his own department. And in one class of republics it
is clear that neither the President nor any officer of the
state can be excluded from the legislative body. In a
pure democracy, transacting its affairs in a primary as-
sembly, the magistrates, as citizens of the commonwealth,
can be no more shut out of the assembly than any other
citizens. Thus in the purely democratic Cantons of Switzer-
land, the chief magistrate, the Landammann, is President
alike of the executive council and of the Landcsgeineinde
or general assembly of all citizens of full age. So in the
Achaian League, the General, being an Achaian citizen,
was necessarily a member of the Federal Assembly, and,
being a member of the Assembly and moreover not being
its President, he naturally took a place in it exactly
answering to that of our Leader of the House. In fact,
the constitution of the Achaian Assembly, as a primary
assembly, allowed the Achaian General to hold a position
much more nearly answering to that of an English First
Minister than the representative constitution of the Amer-
ican Congress allows to the American President. A Roman
Consul again, as being a Roman citizen, was necessarily a
member of the Roman popular Assembly, which he could
convoke and preside in at pleasure. And this same rule
equally applies to aristocratic commonwealths possessing
a primary assembly, one, that is, in which every member
* [I leave the references to American affairs as I wrote them in October,
1864. The Confederate constitution is just as well worth studying as a
piece of constitution-making as if the Southern Confeileration had lasted.]
[1871.]
400 PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT. [Essay
of the privileged order has a seat by right of birth without
any election. Thus the Duke of Venice could not be shut
out from the Great Council nor the Spartan Kings from
the Assembly of the Spartan citizens. It follows therefore
that this peculiarity of the American Constitution, by
which all executive officers are excluded from the legis-
lature, is by no means inherent in the nature of Presi-
dential Government. Still less is the mode of election,
or any other detail of the American Constitution. The
one real and essential difference between a President and
a First Minister is that given already, that a President
holds a legal position for a definite time, a First Minister
holds a conventional position for such a time as the legis-
lature, or one branch of it, may tacitly think fit.
And now for a few words as to the practical working
of Presidential Government, especially in its American
form, as compared with the working of constitutional
monarchy as it is understood among ourselves. In making
this comparison we must take care to confine it to the
points which really enter into the comparison ; for there
are many points of difference between the British and
American Constitutions which arise wholly from other
causes, and which have nothing to do with the diftereuce
in the form of the executive. Thus both Houses of Con-
gress are elective, while one House of our Parliament is
hereditary."^ But in other constitutional monarchies the
body answering to our House of Lords is often elective
or nominated, and an hereditary chamber in a republic,
though not at all -likely, is perfectly possible. So again,
the peculiar constitution of the American Senate arises
from the fact that the American constitution is a Federal
constitution, but it has nothing to do with the special
form of the American executive. The same constitution of
the Senate is, as we see in Switzerland, equally consistent
* [Mainly hereditary, I should have said. We are apt to forget the exist-
ence of one class of the immemorial official Witan, alongside of the greater
number of the comparatively modern hereditary class. i886.]
XTL] PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT. 401
with an executive Council ; it would be equally consistent
with a Federal monarchy, a form of government as yet
untried^ but perfectly possible in idea."^ But some of
the special functions of the Senate, the necessity of its
confirmation to certain acts of the President, are, in the
nature of the case, derived from the fact that there is a
President, and could hardly exist in a state governed by
a First Minister. f Again, the fact that the constitution
of the American House of Kepresentatives is much more
democratic than that of the English House of Commons J
has nothing whatever to do with the form of the American
Executive. A House of Commons chosen by universal
suffrage is perfectly consistent with hereditary kingship,
and a House chosen by as narrow a body of electors as
may be thought good is perfectly consistent with Presi-
dential Government. In fact, it is a mistake to look
upon the American constitution as one inherently demo-
cratic. The American Federal Constitution is in itself
neither aristocratic nor democratic, but it is capable of
being either, or any mixture of the two, according to the
nature of the State constitutions. § None of these points
* [It has at last arisen in the German Imperial Constitution of 1871.]
■\ One can conceive the acts of an hereditary king, needing the confirmation
of one branch of his legislature, just like the acts of the American President.
Such an arrangement would be quite possible in a monarchy where the King,
as in Sweden and Norway, acts for himself within the legal limits of his
authority ; but it can hardly be conceived as existing, or at least as being
practically efficient, in a monarchy where the King is in the hands of a
ministry.
X [1864.]
§ Speaking roughly, we may say that both the House of Representatives
and the electors of the President — that is, practically, the President himself —
are now chosen by universal suS'rage ; but the Constitution in no way orders
such a mode of election ; it is consistent with it, but it is equally consistent
with modes of election highly aristocratic. The House of Representatives is
to be chosen by those persons who have votes for the most numerous branch of
the Legislature of their own State, a provision perfectly consistent with an
aristocratic, or even with an oligarchic, constitution of the State Government ;
and it is well known that, though no State could ever be strictly called aristo-
cratic, yet most of the States at first required a higher or lower property quali-
fication in the electors. Again, the electors of the President in each State are
Dd
402 PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMEyT. [Essay
have any immediate connexion with the fact that the
head of the American commonwealth is neither a King
nor a Council, but a President. They may influence the
practical working of the executive, but they have nothing
to do with determining its form. We have now to look
only at those differences which arise immediately from
the special form of the American executive, again distin-
guishing those which are inherent in Presidential Govern-
ment as such from those which arise from special provisions
in the American Constitution.
The main differences between the two systems, the main
weaknesses, as Englishmen are apt to think them, of the
American system, are obvious enough, and they have been
set forth by many writers. But most English writers,
writing, as they commonly do, with some immediate party
aim, have not taken the needful pains to distinguish what
is essential in either system from what is incidental ; and
they have too often used the whole controversy merely
as a means of pointing declamations against federalism
or democracy or republican government in general. The
first difference which immediately flows from the nature
of Presidential Government, as distinguished from Cabinet
Government, has been already stated. It is this, that the
President's ofiice comes to an end at a fixed time, till
which time he cannot, save in very exceptional cases, be
removed, while the First Minister may be got rid of at
once or may be continued indefinitely. What we call
" a ministerial crisis " is, under the Presidential system,
necessarily brought on at some time fixed beforehand.
In England such a "crisis" occurs whenever the ministry
is not in harmony with a majority of the House of Com-
mons, and it can hardly happen at any other time. When
it does happen, the Minister either resigns or dissolves.
The Ministry and the House are thus brought into har-
appointed as the Legi.'lature of each State may determine, which of course is
not necessarily by a popular vote. The Legislature of South Carolina always
kept the nomination of the electors in its own hands.
XII.] PRESIDENTIAL GOVERyMEyT. 403
inony, either by the formation of a new Ministry in
harmony with the House or by the election of a new
House in harmony with the Ministry. But in America,
if the President and the Congress do not agree, neither
party has any means of getting rid of the other. The
President cannot dissolve Congress, and he is in no way
called on to resign his own office. Thus it is quite pos-
sible that the executive and legislative branches may be
in state of discord for four years.'^ On the other hand,
a President of whom Congress thoroughly approves, and
of whom the country thoroughly approves, may come to
the end of his term of office when nothing calls for any
change of men or of measures, and^ though he may be re-
elected, yet his continuance in office is at least jeoparded,
and the country is obliged to go through the excitement
and turmoil of a presidential election. This disadvantage
seems inherent in any sort of Presidential Government.
The Confederate constitution gives the President six years
instead of four, and makes him ineligible for re-election.
The difficulty is in no way avoided by this change. It
indeed enables a good President to be kept in office for
a longer time, but it also requires a bad President to be
endured for a longer time. By forbidding re-election,
it escapes certain evils which have been produced by the
possibility of re-election, but it does so only at the risk
of introducing at least an equal evil. It is possible, and
indeed probable, that the Confederate provision may de-
prive the commonwealth of the services of its best citizen
just when they are most wanted. In truth the evil is
one inherent in the form of government ; it may, by
judicious provisions, be made less baneful, but it cannot
be got rid of altogether. It is the weak point of Presi-
dential Government, a weak point to be fairly balanced
against its strong points and against the weak points of
other systems.
* [It will be remembered that this actually happened in the presidency which
followed that in which I \vrote. 1886.]
D d 2
404 PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT. [Essay
This weak point however would not have been so obvious,
nor would it have needed to be so much dwelled upon as
it has been, if it had not been aggravated rather than
diminished by certain provisions in the American Consti-
tution. If the President were elected by Congress, or
by some body chosen by or out of Congress, if his ministers
were allowed to be members of Congress or to appear and
speak in Congress, the evils of the system would be greatly
diminished, while the essential principles of Presidential
Government would remain untouched. The system of
election actually employed, one which most certainly was
not contemplated by the founders of the Union, carries the
evils of a great party struggle to their extreme point. The
founders of the Union doubtless hoped that the election of
electors would be a reality, that the primary electors would
choose those men to whom they could best confide so great
a trust, and that the electors thus chosen would elect inde-
pendently and fearlessly. There was nothing absurd in
such an expectation on the face of it. In some states of
society the election of electors seems a perfectly reasonable
system. It is the system adopted in the election of the
legislature under the highly democratic constitution of
Norway. But in Norway there are no political parties
answering to those of England or America. In such a
country the matters brought before the Storthing must be
mainly of two kinds. There may be questions touching
the national independence, about which there is only one
opinion in the country ; there may be questions of practical
improvement, not implying political differences, but requir-
ing practical knowledge or acuteness for their decision. A
Parliament which has to discharge such functions as these,
to decide questions where the only difference is as to means
and not as to ends, will most likely be better chosen by an
intermediate body of electors. But such an intermediate
body becomes a farce in any country where there are
strongly marked political parties. Whether it be a Parlia-
ment or a President which has to be elected, the only
XII.] PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT. 405
question asked of the primary candidate will be, " For whom
will you vote ? " It is clear that, when it comes to this, the
popular vote had much better be given directly. The in-
termediate electors exercise no real choice ; their interposi-
tion does but serve to prolong the crisis of the election and
the time of unsettlement and no-government which it in-
volves. The presidential election, as it is now conducted,
is simply a party struggle on the most gigantic scale. The
founders of the constitution doubtless hoped that the local
question in each State or district would lie, not between
this or that candidate for the presidency, but between this
or that candidate for the electorship of the President.
But experience has shown this to be hopeless when the
elector is simply chosen to elect, and has no other duties.
As it is, the election of the President is a trial of strength
between national parties, intensified because the same
personal question, the same choice between two or three
candidates, is presented to a whole nation. It is a national
election by universal suffrage, in which, after all, the can-
didate elected may not have a numerical majority"^ of the
nation. This last possibility, whether it be reckoned as a
gain or a loss, is the only way in which the existence of
an intermediate body has any practical effect on the result
of the election.
The gradual falling off which has been often remarked in
the character of the American Presidents, so far as it is a
fact, is the natural result of the practical mode of election.
When each party selects its candidate in large conventions,
it is not likely that the best man of the party will be
chosen. An inferior man, who is less known, and who
therefore has fewer enemies, is found to be a safer card.
This is a great evil in itself, and it further tends to prevent
reaUy superior men from meddling with public affairs at
* If the majority of the presidential electors are chosen by small majori-
ties in their several States, while the minority are chosen by large majorities,
it may well happen that the person who is chosen President may not have
a numerical majority of the popular vote. [It has happened since this was
written. 1886.]
406 PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT. [Essay
all. Eut, after all, the fact must be taken with some
modifications, and other causes have contributed to the
result besides the mode of election. Great events bring
great men to the surface ; in quieter times the average is
lower, and there is less obvious need for choosing the
greatest even of those who are to be had. The history of
Rome shows this very plainly. In ordinary times the
people chose ordinary Consuls, who very often broke down
if any event occurred which required special ability. In
most of the later Roman wars, the early campaigns are
unsuccessful ; an average Consul was sent to discharge
duties which needed powers above the average ; defeat was
therefore the result, till the right man, Scipio or Flamininus
or iS^milius Paullus, was sent to retrieve the errors of his
predecessors. So, in America, the republic started under
the guidance of one of the very lirst of men, a man to
whom but a few parallels are supphed by the whole
history of the world. To expect a succession of Washing-
tons would have been chimerical on the face of it. But it
would have been hardly less unreasonable to look for a
perpetual supply of Presidents of the stamp of Washing-
ton's successors from the elder Adams to the younger.
That remarkable succession of able men of different parties
was the natural fruit of a great struggle like the War of
Independence. In another generation it was not to be ex-
pected either that men of equal power should appear in
equal abundance, or that they would be equally sure of
rising to the highest places if they did appear. The mode
of election into which that designed by Washington and
Hamilton gradually changed did but aggravate this natural
tendency, and made that a certain evil which was other-
wise only a probable danger. Yet it needs a good deal of
prejudice to refuse to see in late elections the beginnings
of better things. Mr. Buchanan, whatever were his actual
shortcomings, started from a previous career of much
greater promise than most of his recent predecessors. Few
Englishmen will be found to approve of all the doings of
XII.] PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT. 407
Mr. Lincoln, still it is ridiculous to speak of him as the
mere drivelling idiot which it suits party prejudice to
call him."^ And Mr. Lincoln, it should be remembered, was
chosen before the crisis, as a mere average President in
ordinary times. The choice of General M'Clellan as his
opponent was a distinct return to the older and better
system. That the South, choosing after the crisis had
begun, and with infinitely more at stake than the North,
put its best men at its head, is universally allowed. But
the constitutional mode of election in the two confederations
was exactly the same. He therefore who admires the result
of the system in the one case has no right to decry it as
irretrievably corrupt in the other.
After' all, it may be fairly asked whether the average of
the American Presidents is not pretty much on a level with
the average of Ministers in the constitutional states of
Europe. We must look at their acts, not at their words ;
we must allow for the natural self-assertion of a people at
once young and powerful ; we must remember that America
has not, like the nations of Europe, the advantage of the
discipline provided by constant friendly or hostile inter-
course with surrounding neighbours on equal terms.
Looking fairly at the case, we must say that really great
men are the exception, both in Europe and in America.
And there is no more security in the one case than in the
other that the greatest man who can be had shall be put at
the head of affairs. Li any country it is hard to say how
much credit is due to the form of government, how much
to the personal character of rulers, how much to causes
over which Kings, Parliaments, and Presidents have no
control. But the American system has at least not been
inconsistent with a high degree of peace, freedom, and
prosperity. Most people indeed look only at the present
* [The time when this was written, when Mr. Lincoln was a candidate for
his second presidency, will be remembered.] [1871.]
[Later elections, specially the last of all, have gone a good way to set
aside much that is here said. 1886.]
408 PRESIDENTIAL G0VERN3IENT. [Essay
moment, and think that whatever goes on before their own
e3"cs must needs be greater, for good or for evil, than any-
thing that ever happened before. Such people cry out at
the present American war as something horrible beyond all
comparison in past history. This feeling is generally
mingled with unreasonable abuse of the form of govern-
ment which is common to both the contending parties.
The fact that so large a mass of mankind never before
remained for so long a time in the enjoyment of so large a
portion at once of peace^ and of freedom, as the American
people enjoyed in the interval between the War of Indepen-
dence and the War of Secession, is altogether forgotten. No
one will say that this great blessing has been the personal
work of the successive Presidents. But at least neither
their personal character, nor the system of government
under which they were appointed, has proved any hindrance
to national prosperity. Few nations, whether monarchies
or republics, can say more of so long a succession of
rulers.
At the same time it is clear that the mode of presi-
dential election which is now in use in the United States
is essentially vicious. A system which was meant to be a
check upon party spirit has become its most effectual in-
strument. It may be hoped that some means may be
found for remedying this evil even in the American Union
itself ; at all events, the warning should not be lost on any
future States which may adopt the Presidential system.
For surely the Presidential system, with all its faults, is
far better, far more honest, far more stable, than those
mockeries of ministerial or " responsible " government
which are to be seen in our .still unemancipated colonies.
Our peculiar system, complicated and conventional as it
is, works well in England because it is the natural and
gradual growth of the circumstances of England. It is a
* Madison's war with England and the later Mexican war — neither of
them struggles on any very great scale — are the only serious exceptions to
seventy-eight years of jteace.
XII.] PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT. 409
delicate and doubtful task to transfer it to other Euro-
pean kingdoms, but this has, in one or two cases, been
successfully done. But in any European kingdom there
is some groundwork to go upon. There are older titles,
institutions, traditions, which can be dexterously pressed
into the service, and can be clothed with new objects and
duties. But a conventional system of this kind is the
very last thing which ought to be set up in a perfectly
new commonwealth which supplies none of the elements
which are needed for its success. We do not feel the
unreal position of a constitutional King, because the un-
reality is at once veiled by the traditions of ages, and is
fully counterbalanced by its incidental advantages. But
the unreality, one might say the absurdity, of a Governor
and a "responsible Ministry" in Australia or New Zealand
stands out in all its nakedness. A President safe in power
for four years or for one year would be an element of
stability compared with the ephemeral ministers which
supplant one another almost daily. Any new states which
adopt the Presidential system will have to consider two
main points, the way of electing the President, and the
question whether he should or should not be capable of
immediate re-election. With regard to the election, the
American system as now practised is one extreme, the old
ducal elections at Venice were another. The strange mix-
ture of chance and selection, the repeated choosings and
drawings, by which the electors of the prince were finally
appointed, have in our eyes somewhat of the ludicrous.
No one probably would propose a system quite so com-
plicated ; still the Venetian mode of election must have
shut out the main evils of the American mode. The
electors, when at last appointed, may have chosen well or
ill, honestly or corruptly, but they really did choose.
Utterly unknown as it was beforehand who would finally
have to elect, they at least could never have elected at the
bidding of a party convention. If the choice were vested
in the legislature, or in some committee of it, or in some
410 PEESIDESTIAL GOVERNMENT. [Essay
class of persons previously existing and not appointed for
the special purpose of election, the election would doubtless
still be a struggle between two political parties in the
state ; indeed, within proper limits, it ought to be a
struggle between political parties, wherever political parties
exist. But, with such modes of election as have just been
hinted at, the election of the national chief magistrate
would not become a local struggle in every district, and
it would run a much fairer chance of being a struggle
between parties represented by the best men on each
side.
The other question, that of re-election, is, like most
other political questions, a balance of evils. The chief
reason for allowing re-election has been already stated ; if
it is forbidden, it may easily happen that the country may
be deprived of the services of its best statesman just when
they are most wanted. In many of the ancient common-
wealths re-election was forbidden ; in Achaia the General
could not serve for two successive years ; at Rome it was
at no time lawful for the same man to be Consul for two
years together, and at one time it was forbidden for a man
who had once been Consul ever to be Consul again. But
in those commonwealths there was a constant and not un-
reasonable dread lest a chief magistrate constantly re-
elected should grow into a tyrant. And, where magistrates
are annual, to shut a man out for a single year is a
diflferent thing from shutting him out for four years or for
six. And the extreme case, the law forbidding a Consul
to be chosen again after any lapse of time, was found, as
might have been looked for, to work badly, and it was
therefore repealed. Even the law which forbade two suc-
cessive consulships was dispensed with when Rome needed
the arm of Caius Marius against the Teutonic invader.
In the democratic Cantons of Switzerland, the re-election
of the Landammann has always been very common, both in
past times and in our own day. Sometimes the office,
though always filled by annual election, became almost
XII.] PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT. 411
hereditary in a single family. But in Switzerland there
has never been the same fear of tyrants which there was
in Greece, and on the other hand it is hardly safe to
argue from such very small communities as the democratic
cantons to republics of the size of America or even of Achaia.
If there are strong arguments for re-eligibility, there are
strong arguments against it. And the controversy has
somewhat shifted its ground since the days when re-
eligibility was defended by Hamilton in the Federalist.
Men then professed the old Greek fear, lest a President
often re-elected should grow into a tyrant. Experience
has shown this fear to be quite groundless, and Jefferson,
its chief mouthpiece, lived himself to disprove it in his own
person. But other evils have arisen from the practice
which Hamilton could hardly foresee. His whole argu-
ment presupposes the possibility of a wicked President,
but it hardly presupposes the possibility of a weak Pre-
sident. In truth, the smaller man the President is, the
greater becomes the evil, not merely of his re-election, but
of his re-eligibility. In all cases where re-election is pos-
sible, the magistrate in office is placed in the position of a
candidate. He is tempted, especially as his term of office
draws near to its end, to direct his administration mainly
with a view to secure popular favour. It is clear that, the
smaller the man in office is, the greater will be the force of
this temptation, and the smaller will be the means to
which he will resort to secure his re-election. The real
evil of re-eligibility did not come out in the days of those
great Presidents who were actually re-elected, but in the
days of those small Presidents who wished to be re-elected
and were not. And now, for the first time since the days
of Jackson, there appears a real change of a presidential
re-election. And why ? Clearly because, however small
Mr. Lincoln may seem in our eyes, he does not seem small
in the eyes of a vast party of his countrymen. Probably
no one puts him on a level with any of the Presidents
down to Jackson ; but it is just because he is felt to be a
412 PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT. [Essay
man of a difterent mould from any of the Presidents since
Jackson, that one of the great parties in the common-
wealth is prepared to raise him a second time to the head
of the state. "^
It is undoubtedly true that the possibility of re-election
does lay a President under temptation to act in all things
with a view to re-election ; that it degrades him, in short,
from a ruler into a canvasser. With a weak or mediocre
President these temptations are greatly increased. They
are again so aggravated in America by the present mode
of election that, while that mode of election prevails,
we may safely say that the arguments against re-eli-
gibility overbalance the arguments for it. Yet, after
all, we may ask whether the evil, though undoubtedly
far more glaring, is practically very much worse than
much that we see at home. It is more glaring, because
an English First Minister can never be driven directly
to canvass the whole country for votes to keep him
in the place of First Minister.f But he does the same
thing indirectly. The Minister is tempted, no less than the
President, to act in the way by which he may catch most
votes, whether that way be the best way or not. If he
wishes to keep office, he must, just as much as the Presi-
dent who aims at re-election, keep both the House of
Commons and the nation in good humour. The only
difference is that our conventional constitution throws a
decorous veil over much which in the American system
stands out nakedly. The English Minister can often gain
a point by dexterous dealing in Parliament about which an
American President would have to make an open appeal to
the multitude. The homage thus paid to vntue may or
may not be a gain, but the inherent vice is the same in
* So now — January, 1872 — there seems every chance of the re-election of
General Grant. >
[Since then the possibility of a third presidential term, hitherto deemed
impossible, has been at last discussed. 1886.]
t [Sometiiing much more like doing so than was heard of in 1864 has
come to be usual now. 1886.]
XII.] PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT. 413
both cases. A President of the Confederate States or a
King of Sweden and Norway has in this case the advantage
over either. The Confederate President is safe for six
years, and cannot be re-elected ; the Scandinavian King
is safe for hfe. Either of them can act far more freely
according to his own notion of the public interest than
is open either to a President of the United States or to an
English Minister. Whether it is a gain to allow either
King or President so wide a discretion is another matter.
Here, as ever, we can only balance the advantages each
way. So again the indirect power of deposing the Ministry,
which our conventional constitution vests in the House of
Commons, leads the House to abdicate many of its functions
in favour of the Ministry; it makes the possible fate of
a Ministry depend on the decision of questions which should
be judged on their own merits ; it affords a constant temp-
tation to members to vote this way or that, not because it
is the best way, but because it will help to keep in or turn
out such a Minister. The American system avoids all
this, but it avoids it, to mention no other disadvantages,
at the cost of too gi-eat an isolation of the executive and
legislative branches from one another. And our system,
though it tends to divert attention from real practical
interests to the maintenance of this or that man in power,
certainly does not thereby make party strife in England
any more bitter or any less personal than party strife in
America.
We have just compared the President with the constitu-
tional King acting at his own discretion within the limits
of the law and with the First Minister in constitutional
monarchies of another kind. It now only remains to con-
trast him with the other form of republican executive, the
Executive Council, as seen both in the Swiss Confederation
and in most of the several Cantons. The Swiss Federal
Constitution has several points of likeness with that of
America, and the constitution of the two Houses of the
Federal Legislature is clearly borrowed from the American
4H PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT. [Essay
model.'^ But, in the nature of its Executive, the Swiss
Confederation has utterly departed from American prece-
dent, and has produced something at least as widely-
different from an American President as an American
President differs from an European King. In Switzerland
the executive power of the Confederation is vested in a
Board or Council of seven, as the Buvdesralh or Conseil
Federal. This Council is elected by the two Houses of the
Federal Assembly acting together. he Federal Assembly
itself is chosen for three years, and, when it comes together,
it chooses an Executive to last as long as itself. The Pre-
sident and Vice-President are chosen yearly by the Assembly
from among the members of the Council, and neither of those
offices can be held by the same man for two years together.
The Council apportions the different departments of state
among its own members, but it is expressly declared that
this is simply an arrangement of convenience, and that all
decisions must issue from the Council as a body. The
members of the Council have a right to speak and make
proposals in either House of the Federal Legislature, but
not to vote.
The fust thing that strikes one on considering this
system is that it at once hinders the commonwealth from
making the most of a great man, and secures the common-
wealth from being dragged through the dirt by a small
man. The pr^idency of Washington and the presidency
of Pierce are in Switzerland alike impossible. The state
has no personal chief; the so-called President of the
Confederation is only chairman of a board of seven. He
cannot do a single act or make a single nomination by his
own personal authority. It is clear that this hampering
of individual action may be a great evil in the case of a
man of genius checked by inferior colleagues ; but it may
also be a great good in the case of a presumptuous or
* [I speak of the Federal Constitution as it was fixed in 1848. Important
changes are now — December, 1871 — January, 1^72— under discussion by the
Federal Assembly.]
XII.] PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT. 415
incompetent man rendered harmless by wiser colleagues.
America, with her personal chief, runs a risk which
Switzerland avoids. As in all cases of risk, the more
adventurous state sometimes reaps for itself advantages,
and sometimes brings on itself evils, from both of which
its less daring fellow is equally cut off. It may be that
each system better suits the position of the nation which
has adopted it. The people of America, a young, vigorous,
expanding people, with a whole continent lying open to
them, naturally preferred the energetic lead of a personal
head. They took their chance ; a bad President could
hardly do so much harm as a good President could do
good. In Switzerland, on the other hand, a good President
could hardly do so much good as a bad President could do
harm. Switzerland, though beyond all others a regenerate
nation, was still an old nation ; she was a small state
hemmed in by greater ones ; she lay between two of the
greatest powers of Europe, two of the bitterest and most
persevering enemies of right and freedom. Alike the
cradle and the refuge of continental liberty, she needed
above all things a system which should preserve every-
thing and jeopard nothing. She seized on a rare and
happy moment, when all the despots of Europe had enough
to do at home, to reform her constitution without foreign
intermeddling. And she formed a system which exactly
suits the position of a small, free, conservative, power ready
as ever to defend its own, but neither capable nor desirous
of aggrandizement at the expense of others. In such a
position as that of Switzerland, the first virtue in a govern-
ment is a certain dignified discretion. The League has to
hold its own, and sometimes to hold it with some difiiculty.
Anything like bravado and anything like servihty would
be alike out of place. An incompetent chief of the
commonwealth might do irretrievable mischief, and a man
of genius, unless genius were more than usually tempered
by discretion, might do fully as much mischief as a fool or
a traitor. It is then in a spirit of the truest wisdom that
416 PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT. [Essay
Switzerland declines to place herself at the mercy of any-
single chief. Where moderation and discretion are the
virtues most to be prized, a well-chosen Council is better
to be trusted than any one man. The wisdom of the
Swiss Constitution in this respect has been amply tested
by experience. Among all the changes and complications
of late years, no government in Europe has displayed a
higher degree of practical wisdom than the Federal Council
of Switzerland. In every question with foreign powers
it has preserved that dignified moderation which best suits
the position of the country. In domestic affairs, in the
local disputes wdiich still often distract the several Cantons,
the action of the Federal power has been invariably such
as to command the general respect of the nation. The last
event in Swiss history, the late unhappy outrage at
Geneva,'^ has been as honourable to the Federal Council as
it has been discreditable to the authorities of the Canton.
No despot could have acted with greater energy ; no Judge
on the bench could have acted with greater impartiality.
We can hardly conceive that any single President or
succession 'of Presidents could have guided the Confedera-
tion with the like wisdom through all the difficulties
of the last sixteen years. A weak President might have
cringed ignobly before Prussia or Austria or France ; a
daring President might have entangled the Confederation
in enterprises beyond its strength. The tutelary wisdom
of the Federal Council has steered equally clear of both
forms of error.
The sort of negative wisdom which the Swiss Govern-
ment shows, and which is what the position of the country
specially needs, is displayed both in the theory and
the practice of the Swiss Federal system. The form of
Executive which is chosen, and the relations between the
executive and legislative branches, avoid most of the
positive evils which have been pointed out in other
systems. The Council is elective; but its election cannot
• [1864.]
XII.] PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT. All
be made the subject of strife throughout the whole land.
There is no opportunity for caucuses and conventions where
the election is made by the Legislature itself. No doubt
the election of the Federal Councillors will always be a
party business ; no doubt they will always represent the
party which has the majority in the Assembly ; but they
are not themselves the direct creation of a personal
struggle carried into every corner of the land. Elected by
the Legislature, coming into office along with the Legisla-
ture, there is every chance of their acting in harmony with
it. Their power of taking a share in the debates of the
Assembly at once enables the Assembly to be better in-
formed on public affairs, and also takes away that blot on
the American system by which a statesman who is ap-
pointed to any executive office is debarred, for the time at
the least, from any parliamentary career. Irremoveable by
the existing Assembly, with the question of their re-
election dependent on an Assembly which is not yet in
being, they have less need than either English or American
statesmen to adapt their policy to meet any momentary
cry. On the other hand, acting always as a board, the
Swiss Federal Councillors have not the same opportunities
of making themselves known in the world which fall to
the executive chiefs of other countries. No Swiss states-
man enjoys an European reputation. The Ministers of
other powers, even of other minor powers, are often well
known. Every one just now is familiar with the names of
certain statesmen, not only in Prussia and Austria, but in
Denmark and Saxony."^ But when the affairs of Neuf-
chatel, of Savoy, of the Valley of Dappes, drew the eyes of
all Europe upon Switzerland, it was not this or that Swiss
statesman who was heard of, but the Federal Council as a
bod\^. It is hardly needful to point out how exactly
contrary this is to the state of things in America. No one
in England ever doubts who is Prime Minister ; no one in
* [The Saxon statesman of 1S64 has since become famous on a wider field.]
[1871.I
E e
418 PRESIDES TIAL GOVERXMEST. [Essay
the United States ever doubts who is President. But even
in Switzerland itself very well informed men cannot always
say off-hand who is the Bundesprdsident of the year. This
is by no means necessarily a fault ; perhaps it is just the
state of things which should be in a republic ; but it at
least strikes any one who is familiar with the personal
contests of England and America as a singular peculiarity.
We have thus contrasted Presidential Government with
Constitutional Monarchies on the one hand and with
Executive Councils on the other. Which system is the
best of the three is a question which can admit of no
general answer. The great lesson of political history is to
learn that no kind of government worthy to be called
government is universally good or bad in itself. All forms,
Kings, Presidents, Councils, anything in short except mere
tyranny and mere anarchy, may be the best, as they may
be the worst, in some particular age or country. Of the
three great systems whicli we have been considering, the
English, the American, and the Swiss, we may be sure that
each is, on the whole, the best suited to the country in
which it is found. None of the three countries would gain
by exchanging its own system for the system of either of
the others. But this does not show that any one of the
three may not profitably study the theory and practice of
the other two, and find therein either warnings or examples
for its own benefit. The Swiss system is, of all the three,
the least open to positive objection ; but it does not there-
fore follow that it is better in itself than that of England
or of America. Still its success within its own sphere
cannot fail to point it out as something worthy of the
attention and the admiration of both countries. The
American system, as we have seen, is open to objections
of the gravest kind, yet there can be little doubt that it will
bear transplanting bettor than either of the other two, and
that it is better suited than either of the other two to the
circumstances of those new commonwealths which are rising
in distant corners of the world. 1'hc attempt to transplant
XII.] PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT. 419
the traditional English sj^stem to lands where its historical
and social groundwork does no: exist has proved a lament-
able failure. And for a young, pushing, commonwealth, with
the world before it, the dash and enterprise of a well-
chosen personal chief will probably be more valuable than
the calm defensive wisdom of the Councillors of the Ever-
lasting League. It is the American system, in its most
essential features, which forms the natural object for the
imitation of other communities of Englishmen beyond the
seas. It is for them to seize on the leading principles of
the immortal work of Washington and Hamilton, to alter
such of its general provisions as experience has shown to
be defective, to work in such changes in detail as may be
needed by any particular commonwealth. The American
Constitution, with its manifest defects, still remains one of
the most abiding monuments of human wisdom, and it has
received a tribute to its general excellence such as no other
political system was ever honoured with. The States
which have seceded from its government, the States which
look with the bitterest hatred on its actual administrators,
have re-enacted it for themselves in all its essential pro-
visions. Nothing but the inveterate blindness of party-
spirit can hinder this simple fact from at once stopping the
mouths of cavillers. Sneers at republics, at democracies,
at federal systems, are, wherever they are found, mere
proofs of ignorance and shallowness ; but there are no
mouths in which they are so utterly inconsistent, so utterly
self-condemning, as in the mouths of champions of the
Southern Confederation.
THE END.
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