and religious world was generally entertained so that the whole assembly cried out God willeth it A speech which was afterwards used as a fortunate watch-word in their most dangerous designes Then took many of them a crosse of red cloth on their right shoulder as a badge of their devotion And to gain the favourable assistance of the Virgin Mary to make this warre the more happy her Office was instituted containing certain prayers which at Canonicall houres were to be made unto her If fame which hath told many a lie of others be not therein belyed her self the things concluded in this Councel were the same night reported at impossible distance in the utmost parts of Christendome What spirituall intelligencers there should be or what echoes in the hollow arch of this world should so quickly resound news from the one side thereof to the other belongeth not to us to dispute Yet we find the overthrow of Perseus brought out of Macedon to Rome in foure dayes fame mounted no doubt on some Pegasus in Domitians time brought a report 2500 miles in one day Chap. 9. Arguments for the lawfulnesse of the Holy warre IT is stiffely canvased betwixt learned men whether this warre was lawfull or not The reasons for the affirmative are fetcht either from piety or policie And of the former sort are these 1. All the earth is Gods land let out to tenants but Judea was properly his demesnes which he kept long in his own hands for himself and his children Now though the infidels had since violently usurped it yet no prescription of time could prejudice the title of the King of Heaven but that now the Christians might be Gods champions to recover his interest 2. Religion bindeth men to relieve their brethren in distresse especially when they implore their help as now the Christians in Syria did whose intreaties in this case sounded commands in the eares of such as were piously disposed 3. The Turks by their blasphemies and reproches against God and our Saviour had disinherited and devested themselves of all their right to their lands and the Christians as the next undoubted heirs might seize on the forfeiture 4. This warre would advance and increase the patrimony of Religion by propagating the Gospel and converting of infidels If any object that Religion is not to be beaten into men with the dint of sword yet it may be lawfull to open the way by force for instruction catechising and such other gentle means to follow after 5. The beholding of those sacred places in Palestine would much heighten the adventurers devotion and make the most frozen heart to melt into pious meditations 6. This enterprise was furthered by the perswasions of sundry godly men S. Bernard and others Now though a lying spirit may delude the prophets of Achab yet none will be so uncharitable as to think God would suffer his own Michaiah to be deceived 7. God set his hand to this warre and approved it by many miracles which he wrought in this expedition and which are so confidently and generally reported by credit-worthy writers that he himself is a miracle that will not beleeve them Neither want there arguments derived from policie 1. Palestine was a parcell of the Romane Empire though since won by the Saracens and though the Emperour of Constantinople could not recover his right yet did he alwayes continue his claim and now as appeared by his letters read in the Placentine Councel Alexius requested these Princes of the West to assist him in the recovery thereof 2. A preventive warre grounded on a just fear of an invasion is lawfull But such was this Holy warre And because most stresse is laid on this argument as the main supporter of the cause we will examine and prove the parts thereof Though umbrages and light jealousies created by cowardly fansies be too narrow to build a fair quarrel on yet the lawfulnesse of a preventive warre founded on just fear is warranted by reason and the practice of all wise nations In such a case it is folly to do as countrey-fellows in a fense-school never ward a blow till it be past but it is best to be before-hand with the enemie lest the medicine come too late for the maladie In such dangers to play an after-game is rather a shift then a policie especially seeing warre is a tragedy which alwayes destroyeth the stage whereon it is acted it is the most advised way not to wait for the enemie but to seek him out in his own countrey Now that the Mahometans under whom the Turks and Saracens are comprehended differing in nation agreeing in religion and spite against Christians were now justly to be feared cannot be denied So vast was the appetite of their sword that it had alreadie devoured Asia and now reserved Grecia for the second course The Bosporus was too narrow a ditch and the Empire of Grecia too low an hedge to fense the Pagans out of West-Christendome yea the Saracens had lately wasted Italy pillaged and burned many churches neare Rome it self conquered Spain inroded Aquitain and possessed some islands in the mid-land-sea The cafe therefore standing thus this Holy warre was both lawfull and necessarie which like unto a sharp pike in the bosse of a buckler though it had a mixture of offending yet it was chiefly of a defensive nature to which all preventive warres are justly reduced Lastly this warre would be the sewer of Christendome and drain all discords out of it For active men like mill-stones in motion if they have no other grist to grind will set fire one on another Europe at this time surfeted with people and many of them were of stirring natures who counted themselves undone when they were out of doing and therefore they employed themselves in mutuall jarres and contentions But now this Holy warre would make up all breaches and unite all their forces against the common foe of Christianitie Chap 10. Reasons against the Holy warre YEt all these reasons prevail not so forcibly but that many are of the contrary opinion and count this warre both needlesse and unlawfull induced thereunto with these or the like arguments 1. When the Jews were no longer Gods people Judea was no longer Gods land by any peculiar appropriation but on the other side God stamped on that countrey an indelible character of desolation and so scorched it with his anger that it will never change colour though Christians should wash it with their bloud It is labour in vain therefore for any to endeavour to reestablish a flourishing kingdome in a blasted countrey and let none ever look to reap any harvest who sow that land which God will have to lie fallow 2. Grant the Turks were no better then dogs yet were they to be let alone in their own kennel They and the Saracens their predecessours had now enjoyed Palestine foure hundred and sixty yeares Prescription long enough to sodder the most crackt
a Tyrant both detaining the dowrie and imprisoning the person of Joan wife to William late King of Sicilie and sister to King Richard But in what a case was he now having two such mightie Monarchs come unto him To keep them out was above his power to let them in against his will Well he knew it was wofull to lie in the rode where great armies were to passe For power knoweth no inferiour friend and the land-lord commonly loseth his rent sometimes his land where the tenant is too potent for him At last he resolved how wisely or honestly let others judge openly to poise himself indifferent betwixt these two Kings secretly applying himself to the French which King Richard quickly discovered as dissembling goeth not long invisible before a judicious eye Mean time the citizens of Messana did the English much wrong if not by the command with the consent of the King For though it be unjust to father the base actions of unrulie people on their Prince yet Tankred not punishing his people for injuring the English when he might and was required thereunto did in effect justifie their insolencies and adopt their deeds to be his Wherefore King Richard to avenge himself took Messana by assault seised on most forts in the Island demanding satisfaction for all wrongs done to him and his sister Tankred though dull at first now pricked with the sword came off roundly with many thousand ounces of gold and seeing as the case stood his best thrift was to be prodigall gave to our King what rich conditions soever he demanded Worse discords daily encreased betwixt the Kings of France and England King Richard slighting the King of France his sister whom he had promised to marrie and expressing more affection to Beringaria daughter to the King of Navarre Some Princes interposing themselves in this breach rather asswaged the pain then removed the maladie So dangerous are ruptures betwixt great ones whose affections perchance by the mediation of friends may be brought again to meet but never to unite and incorporate King Philip thinking to forestall the market of honour and take up all for himself hasted presently to Ptolemais Richard followed at his leisure and took Cyprus in his way Isaac or Cursac reigned then in Cyprus who under Andronicus the Grecian Emperour when every factious Noble-man snatched a plank out of that shipwracked Empire seised on this Island and there tyrannized as a reputed King Some falsely conceive him a Pagan and his faith is suspected because his charitie was so bad killing the English that landed there not having so much man as to pitie a woman and to suffer the sea-sick Lady Beringaria to come on shore But King Richard speedily overran the Island honoured Isaac with the magnificent captivitie of silver fetters yet giving his daughter libertie and princely usage The Island he pawned to the Templars for readie money And because Cyprus by antiquitie was celebrated as the seat of Venus that so it might prove to him in the joyous moneth of May he solemnly took to wife his beloved Lady Beringaria Chap. 8. The taking of the citie Ptolemais WHilest King Richard stayed in Cyprus the siege of Ptolemais went on and though the French King thought with a running pull to bear the citie away yet he found it staked down too fast for all his strength to stirre Mean time the plague and famine raged in the Christians camp which the last yeare swept away fiftie Princes and Prelates of note Who no doubt went hence to a happie place though it was before Pope Clement the sixth commanded the angels who durst not but obey him presently to convey all their souls into Paradise which should die in their Pilgrimage This mortalitie notwithstanding the siege still continued And now the Christians and Turks like two fensers long playing together were so well acquainted with the blows and guards each of other that what advantage was taken betwixt them was merely casuall never for want of skill care or valour on either side It helped the Christians not a little that a concealed Christian within the citie with letters unsubscribed with any name gave them constant and faithfull intelligence of the remarkable passages amongst the Turks No Prince in this siege deserved more then Leopoldus Duke of Austria who fought so long in assaulting this citie till his armour was all over gore bloud save the place covered with his belt Whereupon he and his successours the Dukes of Austria renouncing the six Golden larks their ancient arms had assigned them by the Emperour a fesse Argent in a field Gules as the paternall coat of their family By this time King Richard was arrived taking as he came a dromond or Saracen ship wherein were fifteen hundred souldiers and two hundred and fiftie scorpions which were to be imployed in the poisoning of Christians and now the siege of Ptolemais more fiercely prosecuted But all their engines made not so wide a breach in that citie walls as envie made betwixt the French and English Kings Yet at last the Turks despairing of succour their victuals wholly spent yeelded up the citie by Saladines consent on condition to be themselves safely guarded out of it all Christian prisoners Saladine had were to be set free and the Crosse to be again restored The houses which were left with the spoil and prisoners were equally divided betwixt Philip and Richard Whereat many Noble-men partners in the pains no sharers in the gains departed in discontent Some Turks for fear embraced the Christian faith but quickly returned to their vomit as religion died in fear never long keepeth colour but this dayes converts will be to morrows apostates Hereupon it was commanded that none hereafter should be baptized against their wills Here the English cast down the ensignes of Leopoldus Duke of Austria which he had advanced in a principall towre in Ptolemais and as some say threw them into the jakes The Duke though angrie at heart forgot this injurie till he could remember it with advantage and afterwards made King Richard pay soundly for this affront It is not good to exasperate any though farre inferiour for as the fable telleth us the beetle may annoy the eagle and the mouse befriend the lion When the citie was taken it grieved the Christians not a little that their faithfull correspondent who advised them by his letters could no where be found Pitie it was that Rahabs red lace was not tied at his window But indeed it was probable that he was dead before the surrendring of the citie Greater was the grief that the Crosse did no where appear either carelessely lost or enviously concealed by the Turks Whilest the Christians stormed hereat Saladine required a longer respite for the performance of the conditions But King Richard would not enlarge him from the strictnesse of what was concluded conceiving this was in effect to forfeit the victorie back again Besides he
having no paternall lands considerable no bottom to begin on though through his thrift and providence he first laid the foundation of the Austrian familie Yet somewhat to answer expectation he sent Henry Duke of Mechlenburg with competent forces into Palestine Who coming to Ptolemais made many notable incursions into the countrey about Damasco with fire sword destroying all as he went carrying thence many rich booties till at last he was circumvented and taken prisoner by the Mammalukes Twenty six yeares he lived in captivity keeping his conscience free all the while At last the Sultan of Egypt a renegado Germane who formerly had been engineer to this Dukes father set him at liberty together with Martine his servant that he who so long had shared of his misery might also partake of his happinesse No sooner had this Duke put to sea but he was again taken by pirates and the Sultan out of pity to this distressed Prince and out of scorn that fortune should frustrate and defeat his reall courtesie set him free again At last he came safely home and was there welcomed with as much wonder as joy his subjects conceiving his return a resurrection having buried him in their thoughts long before Here he found two counterfeits who pretended themselves to be this Duke and on that title challenged lodging with Anastasia his Lady But the one of them had a softer bedfellow provided him a pool of water wherein he was drowned the other was made a bonefire of to solemnize the joy of the Dukes return Chap. 31. Charles King of Ierusalem His intentions in Syria stopped by the Sicilian Vespers His death and sonnes succession BY this time Charles King of Jerusalem and Sicily had made great preparations for the Holy warre And to make his claim to the Kingdome of Jerusalem the stronger he bought also the title of Maria Domicella Princesse of Antioch which pretended a right to the same He sent also Roger the Count of S. Severine as his Vice-roy to Ptolemais where he was honourably received in despite of Hugh King of Cyprus by the especiall favour of Albertine Morisine the Venetian Consul there And now his navie was reported to be readie and that by the way he had a project upon Michael Paleologus the Emperour of Greece When all his intentions were suddenly blasted it so happening that on Easter day as the bell tolled to Even-song all the throats of the Frenchmen in Sicily were cut in a moment by the natives thereof and that Island wonne by Peter King of Aragon The grand contriver of this massacre was one Jacobus Prochyta a Physician and I dare say he killed more in an houre then he cured all his life-time Those that condemn the Sicilians herein cannot excuse the French such formerly had been their pride lust covetousnesse and cruelty to the people of that Island putting them causelessely to exquisite torture so that an ordinary hanging was counted an extraordinary favour But the secrecie of contriving this slaughter of the French was little lesse then miraculous that so many knowing it none should discover it like cunning dogs barking in triumph after they had bitten not before to give any warning Hence grew the proverb of the Sicilian Vespers though their Even-song was nothing to the English Mattens intended in the Gunpowder-treason Mean time King Charles was at Rome beholding the making of Cardinals when this dolefull news was brought unto him and struck him to the heart He survived a yeare or two longer but dull and melancholick living as it were without life and died at last having reigned King of Jerusalem twenty yeares A Prince which had tasted of various successe fortune for a while smiling on him and at last laughing at him His sonne Charles succeeded him in the Kingdome of Naples and in the title of Jerusalem He was surnamed Cunctator Delayer not in the same sense as Fabius the Shield of Rome was so called he onely stayed till opportunity was come our Charles till it was passed I find nothing memorable of him except this That offended with the Templars in Palestine for taking part against him with the King of Cyprus he seised on their lands and confiscated all their goods they had in Naples or any other part of his dominions How-ever let him have room in the catalogue of our Kings of Jerusalem For as high hills neare the sea-side though otherwise never so base and barren ground yet will serve to be sea-marks for the direction of mariners so this Charles together with Hugh John and Henry Kings of Cyprus pretending also to Jerusalem though we reade nothing remarkable of them will become the front of a page and serve to divide and distinguish times and to parcel the history the better to our apprehension As for the bare anatomie of their reigne for we find it not fleshed with any history with the dates of their beginnings and endings we shall present it to the reader hereafter in our Chronologie Chap. 32. The succession of the Mammaluke Princes in Egypt Alphir taketh Tripoli and Tyre The wofull estate of Ptolemais BUt whilest these titular Kings slept the Mammaluke Princes were vigilant to infest the reliques of the Christians in Palestine Which Princes succession we will adventure to set down nor are we discouraged with the difficulties which encounter us herein The hardnesse in the story of the Mammalukes proceedeth as we conceive from one of these causes First the State is not written directly but by reflexion not storied by any constant writer of their own but in snaps and parcels as the Chroniclers of neighbouring Christian countreys have catched at them Secondly out of a popular errour their chief Captains by reason of their large authority passe for absolute Kings Thirdly the same King hath many names and the same name by translation in sundry languages is strangely disguised How-ever we will use our best conjectures in these uncertainties and a dimme candle is better then no light Bendocdar or Bandodacar otherwise Melechdaer was the last Egyptian Prince we mentioned A dangerous man to the Christians but that Abaga the Tartarian took him to task and kept him in continuall imployment This Abaga had a pretty trick to make cowards valiant causing them that ranne away from the battel ever after to wear womens clothes Bendocdar died at Damascus of a wound he received in Armenia or as some say by cold in swimming over Euphrates Elpis succeeded him his sonne say some but the Mammalukes laws forbid that except his extraordinary worth was his faculty dispensed with him ad succedendum patri But who knoweth not that the Eastern tongue speaketh nephews and kinsmen to be sonnes Some wholly omit him enough to make us suspect that he was onely some Deputy clapped in to stop up the vacancie till Melechsaites was chosen Melechsaites called by Marinus Melechmessor wonne the strong castle of Mergath from the Hospitallers He much loved and was
home who would not substitute their own necks to save theirs from the ax nor by hoping for help from forrein parts who could send them no seasonable succour This counsel harsh at first grew tunable in the eares of the Hospitallers so that contented rather to exchange their clothes for worse then to be quite stript they resigned all into the Kings hands He allowed to Sr William Weston Lord Prior of the Order an annuall pension of one thousand pounds But he received never a penny thereof but dyed instantly struck to the heart when he first heard of the dissolution of his Priory and lieth buried in the Chancell of Clarkenwell with the portraiture of a dead man lying on his shroud the most artificially cut in stone saith my Authour that ever man beheld Others had rent assigned them of 200l l 100l l 80l l 60l l 50l l 20l l 10l l according to their severall qualities and deserts At the same time justs and tornaments were held at Westminster Wherein the challengers against all comers were Sr John Dudley Sr Thomas Seymore Sr Thomas Poinings Sr George Carew Knights Antonie Kingstone and Richard Cromwell Esquires To each of whom for reward of their valour the King gave a hundred marks of yearly revenues and a house to dwell in to them and their heirs out of the lands belonging to these Hospitallers And at this time many had Danae's happinesse to have golden showres rained into their bosomes These abbey-Abbey-lands though skittish mares to some have given good milk to others Which is produced as an argument That if they prove unsuccessefull to any it is the users default no inherencie of a curse in the things themselves But let one keep an exact Register of lands and mark their motions how they ebbe and flow betwixt buyers and sellers and surely he will say with the Poet 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And this is most sure Let land be held in never so good a tenure it will never be held by an unthrift The Hospitallers Priory-church was preserved from down-pulling all the dayes of King Henry the eighth but in the third yeare of King Edward the sixth with the bell-towre a piece of curious workmanship graven gilt and enamelled it was undermined and blown up with gunpowder and the stone imployed in building the Lord Protectours house in the Strand Thus as chirurgeons in cutting off a gangrened leg alwayes cut it off above the joynt even where the flesh is whole and sound so belike for fear of further infection to banish Monkerie for ever they rased the structures and harmlesse buildings of Priories which otherwise in themselves were void of any offense They feared if Abbeys were onely left in a swound the Pope would soon get hot water to recover them To prevent which they killed them and killed them again overturning the very foundations of the houses infringing altering and transferring the lands that they might never be reduced to their old propertie Some outrages were committed in the manner of these dissolutions Many manuscripts guiltie of no other superstition then red letters in the front were condemned to the fire and here a principall key of antiquitie was lost to the great prejudice of posteritie But in sudden alterations it is not to be expected that all things be done by the square and compasse Chap. 8. Queen Mary setteth up the Hospitallers again They are again deposed by Queen Elisabeth QUeen Mary a Princesse more zealous then politick attempted to restore Abbeys to their pristine estate and former glory And though certain of her counsellers objected that the state of her Kingdome and dignitie thereof and her Crown imperiall could not honourably be furnished and maintained without the possession of Abbey-land yet she frankly restored resigned and confirmed by Parliament all ecclesiasticall revenues which by the authoritie of that high court in the dayes of her Father were annexed to the Crown protesting she set more by her salvation then by ten kingdomes But the Nobilitie followed not her example They had eaten up the Abbey-lands and now after twentie yeares possession digested and turned them into good bloud in their estates they were loth therefore to emptie their veins again and the forwardest Romanist was backward enough in this costly piece of devotion How-ever out of her own liberalitie she set up two or three bankrupt Covents as Sion and Westminster and gave them stock to trade with The Knights also of S. John of Jerusalem she reseated in their place and S ◠Thomas Tresham of Rushton in Northamptonshire was the first and last Lord Prior after their restitution For their nests were plucked down before they were warm in them by the coming in of Queen Elisabeth To conclude In the founders of Religious houses were some good intents mixt with superstitious ends amongst the Religious persons themselves some pietie more loosenesse and lazinesse in the confounders of those houses some detestation of the vices of Friars more desire of the wealth of Friaries in God all just all righteous in permitting the badnesse and causing the destruction of these numerous Fraternities Chap. 9. Observations on the Holy warre The horrible superstition therein WE have finished the story of the Holy warre And now I conceive my indentures are cancelled and I discharged from the strict service and ties of an Historian so that it may be lawfull for me to take more libertie and to make some observations on what hath been past Before I go further I must deplore the worlds losse of that worthy work which the Lord Verulam left unfinished concerning the Holy warre an excellent piece and alas it is but a piece so that in a pardonable discontent we may almost wish that either it had been more wholly to have satisfied our hunger or lesse not at all to have raised our appetite It was begun not in an historicall but in a politick way not reporting the Holy warre past with the Turks but advising how to manage it in the future And no doubt if he had perfected the work it would have proved worthy the Authour But since any have been deterred from finishing the same as ashamed to adde mud-walls and a thatched roof to so fair a foundation of hewen and polished stone From that Authour we may borrow this distinction That three things are necessarie to make an invasive warre lawfull the lawfulnesse of the jurisdiction the merit of the cause and the orderly and lawfull prosecution of the cause Let us apply to our present purpose in this Holy warre For the first two Whether the jurisdiction the Christians pretended over the Turks dominions was lawfull or not and Whether this warre was not onely operae but vitae pretium worth the losing so many lives we referre the Reader to what hath been said in the first book Onely it will not be amisse to adde a storie or two out of an Authour of good account When Charles the sixth
Emissa and Cesarea young King Baldwine lay close in Askelon not daring to adventure on so strong an enemy With whose fear Saladine encouraged dispersed his army some one way some another to forrage the countrey King Baldwine courted with this opportunity marched out privately not having past foure hundred horse with some few footmen and assaulted his secure enemies being six and twenty thousand But victory standeth as little in the number of souldiers as verity in the plurality of voices The Christians got the conquest and in great triumph returned to Jerusalem This overthrow rather madded then daunted Saladine Who therefore to recover his credit some moneths after with his Mammalukes fell like a mighty tempest upon the Christians as they were parting the spoil of a band of Turks whom they had vanquished put many to the sword the rest to flight Otto grand Master of the Templars and Hugh sonne in law to the Count of Tripoli were taken prisoners and the King himself had much ado to escape And thus both sides being well wearied with warre they were glad to refresh themselves with a short slumber of a truce solemnly concluded and their troubled estates breathed almost for the space of two yeares Which truce Saladine the more willingly embraced because of a famine in the kingdome of Damascus where it had scarce rained for five yeares together Chap. 41. The fatall jealousies betwixt the King and Reimund Earl of Tripoli BUt this so welcome a calm was troubled with domesticall discords For the Kings mother a woman of a turbulent spirit and her brother his steward accused Reimund Count of Tripoli governour of the Realm in the Kings minority as if he affected the Crown for himself which accusation this Earl could never wholly wipe off For slender and lean slanders quickly consume themselves but he that is branded with an hainous crime though false when the wound is cured his credit will be killed with the scarre Before we go further let us view this Earl Reimunds disposition and we shall find him marked to do mischief and to ruine this Realm He was sonne to Reimund grandchild to Pontius Earl of Tripoli by Cecilie the daughter of Philip King of France great-grandchild to Bertram first Earl of Tripoli great-great-grandchild to Reimund Earl of Tholose one of speciall note amongst the primitive adventurers in the Holy warre His mother was Hodiern third daughter of Baldwine the second King of Jerusalem A man whose stomach was as high as his birth and very serviceable to this State whilest the sharpnesse of his parts were used against the Turks which at last turned edge against the Christians Proud not able to digest the least wrong and though long in captivity amongst the Turks yet a very treuant in the school of affliction who never learned the lesson of patience So revengefull that he would strike his enemy though it were through the sides of religion and the Christian cause For this present accusation of treason good authours seem to be his compurgatours for this at this time though afterwards he discovered his treacherous intents And because he could not rise by his service he made his service fall by him and undid what he had done for the publick good because thereby he could not attain his private ends He commanded over the Earldome of Tripoli which was a territory of large extent wherein he was absolute Lord. And by the way we may take notice of this as one of the banes of the Kingdome of Jerusalem That the principalities of Antioch Tripoli and Edessa whilest it was Christian were branches of this Kingdome but too big for the body For the Princes thereof on each petty distast would stand on their guard as if they had been subjects out of courtesie not conscience and though they confessed they owed the King allegeance yet they would pay no more then they thought fitting themselves To return to King Baldwine This suspicion of Earl Reimund though at first but a buzze soon got a sting in the Kings head and he violently apprehended it Whereupon Reimund coming to Jerusalem was by the way commanded to stay to his great disgrace But some of the Nobility foreseeing what danger this discord might bring reconciled them with much labour However Baldwine ever after looked on this Earl with a jealous eye Jealousie if it be fire in private persons is wild-fire in Princes who seldome rase out their names whom once they have written in their black bills And as the Italian proverb is Suspicion giveth a passe-port to faith to set it on packing so this Earl finding himself suspected was never after cordially loyall smothering his treachery in this Kings life which afterwards broke forth into an open flame Chap. 42. Saladine is conquered by King Baldwine and conquereth Mesopotamia Discords about the Protectourship of Ierusalem The death and praise of Baldwine the fourth THe kingdome of Damascus being recovered of the famine Saladine having gotten his ends by the truce would now have the truce to end and breaking it as not standing with his haughty designes marched with a great army out of Egypt through Palestine to Damascus much spoiling the countrey And now having joyned the Egyptian with the Damascene forces re-entred the Holy land But young King Baldwine meeting him though but with seven hundred to twenty thousand at the village Frobolet overthrew him in a great battel and Saladine himself was glad with speedy flight to escape the danger and by long marches to get him again to Damascus Afterward he besieged Berytus both by sea land but the vigilancie and valour of King Baldwine defeated his taking of it Saladine finding such tough resistance in the Holy land thought to make a better purchase by laying out his time in Mesopotamia Wherefore passing Euphrates he wonne Charran and divers other cities and then returning in Syria besieged Aleppo the strongest place the Christians had in that countrey so fortified by nature that he had little hope to force it But treason will runne up the steepest ascent where valour it self can scarce creep and Saladine with the battery of bribes made such a breach in the loyaltie of the governour that he betrayed it unto him Thus he cometh again into the Holy land more formidable then ever before carrying an army of terrour in the mentioning of his name which drove the poore Christians all into their fenced cities As for King Baldwine the leprosie had arrested him prisoner and kept him at home Long had this Kings spirit endured this infirmity swallowing many a bitter pang with a smiling face and going upright with patient shoulders under the weight of his disease It made him put all his might to it because when he yeelded to his sicknesse he must leave off the managing of the State and he was loth to put off his royall robes before he went to bed a Crown being too good a companion for one to part with
professed that she saw in a vision Christ and his Angels rejoycing For the losse of the earthly Canaan was gain to the heavenly peopling it with many inhabitants who were conquerours in their overthrow whilest they requited Christs passion and died for him who suffered for them But for the truth both of the doctrine and historie hereof none need burden their beleef farther then they please We will conclude all with Roger Hovedens witty descant on the time When Jerusalem was wonne by the Christians and afterwards when it was lost an Urbane was Pope of Rome a Frederick Emperour of Germany an Heraclius Patriarch of Jerusalem But by his leave though the first of his observations be true the second is a flat falsitie the third a foul mistake and may thus be mended It is charity to lend a crutch to a lame conceit When the Crosse was taken from the Persians Heraclius was Emperour and when it was taken from the Turks Heraclius was Patriarch Thus these curious observations like over-small watches not one of a hundred goeth true Though it cannot be denied but the same name as Henry of England one the winne-all another the lose-all in France hath often been happy and unhappy in founding and confounding of kingdomes But such nominall toyes are rags not worth a wise mans stooping to take them up The end of the second Book The Historie of the HOLY WARRE Book III. Chap. 1. Conrade of Montferrat valiantly defendeth Tyre and is chosen King IN this wofull estate stood the Christian affairs in the Holy land when Conrade Marquesse of Montferrat arrived there His worth commandeth my penne to wait on him from his own countrey till he came hither Sonne he was to Boniface Marquesse of Montferrat and had spent his youth in the service of Isaacius Angelus the Grecian Emperour This Isaacius fitter for a Priest then a Prince was alwayes bred in a private way and the confining of his body feemeth to have brought him to a pent and narrow soul. For he suffered rebells to affront him to his face never fending any army against them but commending all his cause to a company of bare-footed Friars whom he kept in his Court desiring them to pray for him and by their pious tears to quench the combustions in the Empire But our Conrade plainly told him he must use as well the weapons of the left hand as of the right meaning the sword as well as prayers And by the advice of this his Generall he quickly subdued all his enemies Which his great service found small reward onely he was graced to wear his shoes of the Imperiall fashion a low matter but there forsooth accounted an high honour But soon after Isaac was sick of this Physician who had cured his Empire If private debters care not for the company of their creditours much lesse do Princes love to see them to whom they ow themselves and their kingdome so unwelcome are courtesies to them when above their requitall Now it is an ancient policie to rid away high spirits by sending them on some plausible errand into remote parts there to seek for themselves an honourable grave To this end Isaacius by the perswasions of some spurred on Conrade free enough of himself to any noble action to go into Palestine there to support the ruinous affairs of the Christians Conrade was sensible of their plot but suffered himself to be wrought on being weary of the Grecians basenesse and came into the Holy land with a brave company of Gentlemen furnished on their own cost For a while we set him aside and return to Saladine Who by this time had taken Askelon on condition that King Guy and Gerard master of the Templars should be set at liberty Nor long after was the castle of Antioch betrayed unto him by the Patriarch and the citie scarce got with eleven moneths siege was lost in an instant with five and twenty strong towns more which attended the fortune of Antioch and many provinces thereto belonging came into the possession of the Turks Must not the Christians needs be bankrupts if they continue this trade buying deare and selling cheap gaining by inches and losing by ells With better successe those in Tripoli which citie the wife of Earl Reimund after his death delivered to the Christians defended themselves against Saladine For shame they would not forgo their shirts though they had parted with their clothes Stark-naked from shelter had the Christians been left if stripped out of Tripoli and Tyre Manfully therefore they defended themselves and Saladine having tasted of their valour in Tripoli had no mind to mend his draught but marched away to Tyre But Conrade of Montferrat who was in Tyre with his army so used the matter that Saladine was fain to flie and leave his tents behind him which were lined with much treasure And the Christians had that happinesse to squeeze that sponge which formerly was filled with their spoil They in Tyre in token of gratitude chose this Conrade King of Jerusalem swearing themselves his subjects who had kept them from being the Turks slaves To strengthen his title he married Elisa or Isabella Authours christen her with either name formerly espoused to Humfred of Thoron sister to Baldwine the fourth daughter to Almerick King of Jerusalem By this time King Guy was delivered out of prison having sworn never more to bear arms against Saladine which oath by the Clergie was adjudged void because forced from him when he was detained in prison unjustly against promise The worst was now he had gained his liberty he could not get his Kingdome Coming to Tyre they shut the gates against him owning no King but Conrade Thus to have two kings together is the way to have neither king nor kingdome But Guy following the affront as well as he might and piecing up a cloth of remnants with his broken army besieged Ptolemais The Pisanes Venetians and Florentines with their sea-succours came to assist him But this siege was Church-work and therefore went on slowly we may easier perceive it to have moved then to move especially if we return hither a twelve-moneth hence Chap. 2. The Church-story in the Holy land to the end of the warre The use and abuse of titular Bishops WE must now no longer look for a full face of a Church in the Holy land it is well if we find one cheek and an eye Though Jerusalem and Antioch were wonne by the Turks the Pope ceased not to make Patriarchs of both We will content our selves with the names of those of Jerusalem finding little else of them remarkable After Heraclius Thomas Agni was Patriarch present in the Laterane Councel under Innocent the third Geraldus succeeded him who sided with the Pope against Frederick the Emperour Albertus Patriarch in Jerusalem when the Christians lost their land in Syria He prescribed some rules to the Carmelites After him Antonie Beak
lavish physick on him in whom he seeth faciem cadaverosam so that death hath taken possession in the sick mans countenance finding this warre to be desperate and dedecus fortitudinis they even fairly left the Holy land and came into Europe meaning to lay out their valour on some thing that would quit cost But hereof hereafter Chap. 6. Richard of England and Philip of France set forward to the Holy land The danger of the interveiws of Princes THe miseries of the Christians in Syria being reported in Europe made Richard the first King of England and Philip the second surnamed Augustus King of France to make up all private dissensions betwixt them and to unite their forces against the Turks Richard was well stored with men the bones and quickly got money the sinews of warre by a thousand Princely skills gathering so much coin as if he meant not to return because looking back would unbowe his resolution To Hugh Bishop of Duresme for his life he sold the County of Northumberland jesting he had made a new Earl of an old Bishop He sold Barwick and Roxburgh to the Scottish king for ten thousand pounds Yea he protested he would sell his citie of London if any were able to buy it rather then he would be burdensome to his subjects for money But take this as he spake it for a flourish for pretending he had lost his old he made a new seal wherewith he squeezed his subjects and left a deep impression in their purses forcing them to have all their instruments new-sealed which any wayes concerned the Crown Having now provided for himself he forgot not his younger brother John Earl of Morton who was to stay behind him an active man who if he misliked the maintenance was cut for him would make bold to carve for himself Lest therefore straitned for means he should swell into discontent King Richard gave him many Earldomes and honours to the yearly value of foure thousand marks Thus he received the golden saddle but none of the bridle of the Common-wealth honour riches were heaped upon him but no place of trust and command For the King deputed William Bishop of Ely his Viceroy choosing him for that place rather then any lay-Earl because a Coronet perchance may swell into a Crown but never a Mitre For a Clergie-mans calling made him uncapable of usurpation in his own person Thus having settled matters at home he set forth with many of our nation which either ushered or followed him Of these the prime were Baldwine Archbishop of Canterbury Hubert Bishop of Salisburie Robert Earl of Leicester Ralph de Glanvile late chief Justice of England Richard de Clare Walter de Kime c. The Bishops of Duresme and Norwich though they had vowed this voyage were dispensed with by the court of Rome quae nulli deest pecuniam largienti to stay at home His navie he sent about by Spain and with a competent number took his own journey through France At Tours he took his Pilgrimes scrip and staff from the Archbishop His staff at the same time casually brake in pieces which some whose dexteritie lay in sinister interpreting all accidents construed a token of ill successe Likewise when he and the French king with their trains passed over the bridge of Lyons on the fall of the bridge this conceit was built That there would be a falling out betwixt these two Kings which accordingly came to passe their intercourse and familiaritie breeding hatred and discontent betwixt them Yea the interviews of equall Princes have ever been observed dangerous Now Princes measure their equalitie not by the extent of their dominions but by the absolutenesse of their power so that he that is supreme and independent in his own countrey counteth himself equall to any other Prince how great soever Perchance some youthfull Kings may disport and solace themselves one in anothers companie whilest as yet pleasure is all the elevation of their souls But when once they grow sensible of their own greatnesse a lesson they will quickly learn and shall never want teachers then emulation will be betwixt them because at their meeting they cannot so go in equipage but one will still be the foremost Either his person will be more proper or carriage more court-like or attendance more accomplished or attire more fashionable or some thing will either be or conceived to be more majesticall in one then the other And corrivalls in honour count themselves eclipsed by every beam of state which shineth from their competitour Wherefore the best way to keep great Princes together is to keep them asunder accommodating their businesse by Embassadours lest the meeting of their own persons part their affections Chap. 7. King Richard conquereth Sicilie and Cyprus in his passage to the Holy land AT Lyons these two Kings parted their trains and went severall wayes into Sicilie King Richard in his passage though within fifteen miles of Rome wanting forsooth either devotion or manners vouchsafed not to give his Holinesse a visit yea plainly told Octavian Bishop of Ostia the Popes Confessour that having better objects to bestow his eyes on he would not stirre a step to see the Pope Because lately without mercie he had simoniacally extorted a masse of money from the Prelates of England At Messana in Sicilie these two Kings meet again where to complete King Richards joy behold his Navie there safely arriving which with much difficultie and danger had fetched a compasse about Spain And now King Richard by his own experience grew sensible of the miseries which merchants and mariners at sea underwent being alwayes within few inches often within an hairs breadth of death Wherefore now touched with remorse of their pitifull case he resolved to revoke the law of Wracks as a law so just that it was even unjust For formerly both in England and Normandie the Crown was intituled to shipwrackt goods and the King jure gentium made heir unto them which otherwise jure naturali were conceived to be in bonis nullius pertaining to no owner But now our Richard refused to make advantage of such pitifull accidents and to strip poore mariners out of those rags of their estates which the mercie and modestie of the waves and winds had left them And therefore on the moneth of October at Messana in the presence of many Archbishops and Bishops he for ever quitted the claim to Wracks So that if any man out of the ship cometh alive to the shore the propertie of the shipwrackt goods is still preserved to the owner Yea this grant was so enlarged by our succeeding Kings that if a dogge or a cat escaped alive to land the goods still remained the owners if he claimed them within a yeare and a day Tankred at this time was King of Sicilie a bastard born and no wonder if climbing up to the throne the wrong way he shaked when he sat down Besides he was
shaved as bare as their crowns and a poore Priest who had but twenty shillings annuall pension was forced to pay two yearly to the King And this by my Authour is made the cause of his following ill successe there being much extortion used by his under-officers No wonder then if the wings of that armie did quickly flag having so heavy a weight of curses hanging upon them And though money be the sinews of warre yet ill-gotten money like gouty sinews rather paineth then strengtheneth True it is that this pious King was no way guilty thereof but such as were under him and oftentimes the head doth ach for the ill vapours of the stomach He himself most princely caused to be proclaimed through his realm If any merchant or other had been at any time injured by the Kings exactours either by oppression or borrowing of money let him bring forth his bill shewing how and wherein and he should be recompensed How this was performed we find not but it was a good lenitive plaister to asswage the peoples pain for the present Having at Lyons took his leave of the Pope and a blessing from him he marched towards Avignon Where some of the city wronged his souldiers especially with foul language Wherefore his Nobles desired him that he would besiege the citie the rather because it was suspected that therein his father was poysoned To whom Lewis most Christianly I come not out of France to revenge my own quarrels or those of my father or mother but injuries offered to Jesus Christ. Hence he went without delay to his navie and committed himself to the sea Chap. 12. Lewis arriveth in Cyprus The conversion of the Tartarians hindred The treachery of the Templars SAiling forward with a prosperous wind he safely arrived in Cyprus where Alexius Lusignan King of the Island entertained him according to the stateliest hospitality Here the pestilence one of the ready attendants on great armies began to rage And though a French writer saith it was minax magis quà m funesta yet we find in others that two hundred and fourty Gentlemen of note died by force of the infection Hither came the Embassadours from a great Tartarian Prince but surely not from Cham himself invited by the fame of King Lewis his piety professing to him That he had renounced his Paganisme and embraced Christianity and that he intended to send messengers to Pope Innocent to be further instructed in his religion But some Christians which were in Tartary disswaded him from so doing left the Tartarians coming to Rome should behold the dissolutenesse of mens lives there and so refuse to suck the milk of sweet doctrine from so sowre and bitter nipples besmeared about with bad and scandalous conversation Yea never could the Christian religion be shewed to Pagans at any time on more disadvantages Grecians and Latines were at deadly feud amongst the Latines Guelfes and Gibellines sought to ruine each other Humility was every-where preached and pride practised They perswaded others to labour for heaven and fell out about earth themselves Their lives were contrary to their doctrines and their doctrines one to another But as for these Embassadours King Lewis received them very courteously dismissing them with bounteous gifts And by them he sent to their master a Tent wherein the history of the Bible was as richly as curiously depicted in needle-work hoping thus to catch his soul in his eyes and both in that glorious present Pictures being then accounted lay-mens books though since of many condemned as full of errata's and never set forth by authority from the King of heaven to be means or workers of faith Whilest Lewis stayed in Cyprus the Templars in the Holy land began to have his greatnesse in suspicion This Order as both the other of Hospitallers and Teutonicks though mown down to the bare roots at the last unfortunate battel yet now in three yeares space sprung up as populous as ever before their other brethren which lived in their severall Covents and Commandries over all Europe having now refurnished the houses in Palestine Now these Templars were loth King Lewis should come to Ptolemais though they counterfeited he should be very welcome there They formerly there had commanded in chief without controll and were unwilling having long sat in the saddle now to dismount and hold the stirrup to another Besides they would not have so neat and cleanly a guest see their sluttish houses fearing Lewis his piety would shame their dissolutenesse being one so godly in his conversation that by the preaching in his life he had converted many Saracens yea perchance he being a strict Disciplinarian would punish their vitious manners Wherefore they wrote to him out of Syria to accept of a peace with the Sultan of Egypt now offered and to proceed no further in warre against him The French King whose heart was ever open to any fair agreement and shut against any dishonourable suspicions had entertained the motion had not the King of Cyprus being more studied in the Templars treacheries better instructed him For he told him this was but a trick of their great Master who under-hand had sent to the Sultan and procured him to profer this peace onely for their own private ends for to divert the King from coming amongst them Lewis though the mildest and most patient of Princes yet not a drone which wanted the sting of anger commanded the Master of the Templars upon the price of his head thenceforward to receive no Embassage nor keep any intelligence with their enemy and resolved with himself to invade Egypt Chap. 13. The wise preparations of the Egyptians The valour of the French at their landing Damiata wonne BUt he stood so long in aiming that the bird saw him and had leisure to flie away and Meladine the Egyptian King to provide himself to make resistance Last time some thirty yeares before whē the Christians under John Bren invaded Egypt they were not impeached in their arrivall but suffered to land without any opposition But Meladine now was sensible of the discommodity in permitting his foes safely to come on shore For first they wasted spoiled the countrey the provision about them Secondly opportunity was given to male-contents and ill-disposed persons to flie to the enemie Lastly he found it most policie to keep the enemy off at arms end and to close at the last and not to adventure his Kingdome on the single die of a battel but rather to set it on a chance that so he might have the more play for it Wherefore he resolved to strengthen his maritime places and not suffer them to land though also herein he met with many difficulties For as nothing was more certain then that Lewis would set on Egypt so nothing more uncertain and because it was unknown at what time or place he would come all times and places were provided for This exhausted a masse of
of your friends Good is not good when proceeding from them from whom farre better is expected Your youthfull vertues are so promising that you cannot come off in your riper age with credit without performing what may redound to the advancing of the honour of your family and without building your houses one storie higher in the English Historie Now know next Religion there is nothing accomplisheth a man more then Learning Learning in a Lord is as a diamond in gold And if you fear to hurt your tender hands with thornie School-questions there is no danger in meddling with History which is a velvet-study recreation-work What a pitie is it to see a proper Gentleman to have such a crick in his neck that he cannot look backward yet no better is he who cannot see behind him the actions which long since were performed History maketh a young man to be old without either wrinkles or gray hairs priviledging him with the experience of age without either the infirmities or inconveniences thereof Yea it not onely maketh things past present but inableth one to make a rationall conjecture of things to come For this world affordeth no new accidents but in the same sense wherein we call it a new Moon which is the old one in another shape and yet no other then what hath been formerly Old actions return again furbished over with some new and different circumstances Now amongst all particular histories I may say none is more generall then this of the Holy warre which now I present to your Honours Some will condemn me for an ill husband in lavishing two Noble Patrones on one book whereas one of them might have served to have patronized many volumes But first I did it in the weak expression of my thankfulnesse unto you being deeply indebted to you both and I thought it dishonestie to pay all to one creditour and none to another and therefore conceived it best to share my estate joyntly betwixt you as farre forth as it would extend Secondly considering the weaknesse of this Work now being to walk abroad in the world I thought it must be led by both arms and needed a double supporter And now I am sure this Holy warre which was unhappie heretofore when acted will be happie hereafter now written and related because dedicated to your Honours So resteth Your Honours in all service THO. FULLER Broad-windsor March 6. 1638. To the Reader IN this work I can challenge nothing to my self but the composing of it The materialls were found to my hand which if any Historian will make let him not be commended for wit but shamed for falshood If every-where I have not charged the margin with the Authours names it is either because the storie is authour for it self I mean generally received or to avoyd the often citing of the same place Where I could not go abroad my self there I have taken aire at the window and have cited Authours on others citations yet so that the stream may direct to the fountain If the reader may reap in few houres what cost me more moneths just cause have I to rejoyce and he I hope none to complain Thus may the faults of this book redound to my self the profit to others the glory to God To his worthily deare friend THOMAS FVLLER B. D. upon his excellent work the HOLY WARRE PEace is thy Calling friend thy Title Warre What doth thy Title with thy Calling jarre The Holy warre this makes the wonder cease An holy warre becomes a man of peace Tasso be silent my friend speaks his Storie Hath robb'd thy poeme of its long-liv'd glorie So rich his vein his lines of so high state Thou canst not feigne so well as he relate Godfrey first entred on this warre to free His Saviours Tombe from Turks captivitie And too-too meanly of himself he deems If thus he his Redeemer not redeems A glorious end nor did he fear to erre In losing life to gain Christs Sepulchre But I dare say were Godfrey now alive Godfrey who by thy penne must needs survive He would again act o're his noble toil Doing such deeds as should the former foil If for no other reason yet to be Deliver'd unto time and fame by thee Nor would he fear in such exploits to bleed Then to regain a Tombe now not to need ROBERT GOMERSALL Vicar of Thorncombe in Devon OF this our Authours book I 'le say but this For that is praise ample enough 'T is his Nor all the Muses nor Apollo's layes Can sing his worth be his own lines his bayes ROBERT TYRLING On Mr FULLERS Historie of the HOLY WARRE THen Christians rest secure ye need not band Henceforth in Holy leagues for th' Holy land To conquer and recover 't from the Turk 'T is done already FVLLERS learned work And penne more honour to the cause doth bring Then did Great Godfrey or our Lion-King Ierusalem with darknesse long beset Captiv'd to time more then to Mahomet Inthrall'd to silence and oblivion A bondage worse then that of Babylon Is now redeem'd Lo by this sacred Story How she revives into her ancient glory Look how her bury'd pinnacles 'gin to peep Out of their venerable dust and sleep See how the Temple and the Sepulchre Wak'd with the trumpet of this Holy warre From their own grave and ruines do resent A resurrection by this monument Stay Pilgrimes stay wander not hence so farre Set up your rest here in this Holy warre Here you may visit and adore the Shrine For which so many Saints in arms combine Behold the zealous squadrons how they stand Arm'd with devotion for the Holy land They 'l take you if not it while ye admire Their zeal your love will kindle at this fire Thus learned FVLLER a full conquest makes Triumphs o're time and mens affections takes Captive both it and them his historie Me thinks is not a Warre but Victorie Where every line does crown such strength it bears The Authour Laureate and a trophey rears JAMES DUPORT B. D. T. C. To his worthy and learned friend Mr THO. FULLER upon his excellently composed Historie of the HOLY WARRE CAptain of Arts in this thy Holy warre My Muse desires to be thy Trumpeter In thy just praise to spend a blast or two For this is all that she poore thing can do Peter the Hermite like an angry owl Would needs go fight all armed in his cowl What had the Holy man nought else to do But thus to lose his bloud and credit too Seeking to winne Christs Sepulchre God wot He found his own This was the ground he got Except he got more ground when he one day Besieging Antioch fiercely ran away Much wiser was the Pope At home he stay'd And made the world beleeve he wept and pray'd Mean while behold the fruit of feigned tears He sets the world together by the cares His head serves him whil'st others use their hands Whil'st Princes lose their lives he gets their lands To winne
the Holy land what need Kings roam The Pope can make an Holy land at home By making it his own Then for a fashion 'T is said to come by Constantines donation For all this Fox-craft I have leave I hope To think my friend farre wiser then the Pope And Hermite both He deals in Holy warres Not as a stickler in those fruitlesse jarres But a composer rather Hence this book Whereon whil'st I with greedie eyes do look Me thinks I travel through the Holy land Viewing the sacred objects on each hand Here mounts me thinks like Olivet brave sense There flows a Iordan of pure eloquence A Temple rich in ornament I find Presented here to my admiring mind Strange force of Art The ruin'd Holy citie Breeds admiration in me now not pitie To testifie her liking here my Muse Makes solemn Vows as Holy Pilgrimes use I vow deare friend the Holy warre is here Farre better writ then ever fought elsewhere Thousands have fought and died But all this while I vow there nothing triumphs but thy style Thy wit hath vanquisht Barbarisme more Then ever Godfrey's valour did before Might I but choose I rather would be farre Be authour of thy Book then of that Warre Let others fight I vow to reade thy works Prizing thy ink before the bloud of Turks J. BOOTH B. D. C. C. C. On the Title of this book HOw comes stern Warre to be accounted holy By nature fierce complexion melancholy I le tell you how Sh 'as been at Rome of late And gain'd an indulgence to expiate Her massacres and by the Popes command Sh 'as bin a Pilgrime to the Holy land Where freeing Christians by a sacred plot She for her pains this Epithet hath got HUGO ATKINS NOr need Ierusalem that holy mother Envy old Troy since she has found another To write her battels and her warres rehearse In prose as elegant as Homers verse Let Sueton's name august as Cesars be Curtius more worlds then Alexander see Let Joseph in his countreys siege survive And Phenix-like in his own ashes thrive Thy work great FVLLER will out-live their glory And make thy memorie sacred as thy Storie Thy style is clear and white thy very name Speaks purenesse and addes lustre to the frame All men could wish nay long the world would jarre So thou 'dst be pleas'd to write compose the Warre H. HUTTON M. A. C. Jes. To my friend Mr THOMAS FULLER on his book The Holy Warre WHile of thy book I speak Friend I le tâ—ink on Thy Iordan for my purest Helicon And for bifork'd Parnassus I will set My phansie on the sacred Olivet 'T is holy ground which now my measur'd feet Must tread on then as in due right 't is meet Let them be bare and plain for quâ—inter art May sacrifice to thee without a heart And while it praiseth this thy work may preach His glory rather then thy merits reach Here Reader thou may'st judge and well compare Who most in madnesse Iew or Romane share This not so blind yet in the clearest day Does stumble still on stocks on stones on clay The other will in bright and highest noon Choose still to walk by glimmering light o' th' Moon Here thou may'st represented see the fight Between our earthly Flesh and heavenly Sp'rit Lo how the Turk doth drive with flaming sword Salvation from him and Gods holy word As once the angel did rebellious vice With Adam force from blessed paradise And this in style diamond-like doth shine Which firmest parts and clearest do combine And o're the sad ground of the Iewish storie As light embroidrie explayes its glorie The Temple ras'd and ruin'd seems more high In his strong phrase then when it kiss'd the skie And as the Viper by those pretious tears Which Phaeton bemon'd of Amber wears A rich though fatall coat so here inclos'd With words so rare so splendent so compos'd Ev'n Mahomet has found a tombe which shall Last when the fainting Loadstone lets him fall HENRY VINTENER To his old friend Mr FULLER I Love no warres I love no jarres Nor strifes fire May discords cease Let 's live in peace This I desire If it must be Warre we must see So Fates conspire May we not feel The force of steel This I desire But in thy book When I do look And it admire Let Warre be there But Peace elswhere This I desire Tho. Jackson To his worthy Friend Mr THOMAS FULLER on his book The Holy Warre THere 's not a storie Friend in thy book told But is a jewell each line a thred of gold Though Warre sound harsh and doth our minds affright Yet cloth'd in well-wrought language doth delight Such is thy gilded phrase I joy to reade In thee massacres and to see men bleed Oft have I seen in hangings on a wall The ruines of great Troy and Priams fall A storie in it self so full of woe T' would make the Graecian weep that was the foe But being wrought in arras and made gay With rich embroydery makes th'beholder say I like it well This flame that scarre is good And then commends this wound that stream of blood Things in themselves distastfull are by art Made pleasant and do much delight the heart Such is thy book Though it of bloud relate And horrid Warre whose very name we hate Yet clad in arras-language and thy phrase Doth not affright but with delight amaze And with such power upon our senses seise That makes Warre dreadfull in it self to please WILLIAM JOHNSON Q. Coll. To his deare Friend Mr FULLER WE need not now those zealous vot'ries meet Or pilgrimes turn but on our verses feet Thy quill hath wing'd the earth the Holy land Doth visit us commanded by thy hand If envy make thy labours prove thy losse No marvel if a Croisade wear the Crosse. CLEMENT BRETTON Sidn Coll. Errata Page 10 Sabell Aen. Reade Sabell Enn. 12 Sabell Aen. Reade Sabell Enn. 72 For Paulinus Reade Pontius 114 For Charatux Reade Characux 155 For Noradine Reade Coradine 205 For Nanse Reade Nuise 243 For Burbant Reade Bourbon 264 For foure Albergies Reade seven Albergies 267 For necessarie security Reade necessarie severity 275 For offertures Reade offers Last page of the Chronol For Peter Belius Reade Peter Belvise In the Table For Charatux Reade Characux The Historie of the HOLY WARRE Book I. Chap. 1. The destruction of the citie and temple of Ierusalem by the Romanes under the conduct of Titus WHen the Jews had made the full measure of their sinnes runne over by putting to death the Lord of life Gods judgements as they deserved and our Saviour foretold quickly overtook them for a mighty army of the Romanes besieged and sackt the citie of Jerusalem wherein by fire famine sword civil discord forreigne force eleven hundred thousand were put to death An incredible number it seemeth yet it cometh within the compasse of our belief if we consider that the siege began at the time of
to excuse himself shewing he was chosen against his will and though preferment may not be snatched it needs not be thrust away But all would not do It was enough to put him out because the King put him in Wherefore he was commanded to return home and to wait the definitive sentence which Gibellinus Archbishop of Arles and the Popes Legate should pronounce in the matter Gibellinus coming to Jerusalem concluded the election of Ebremarus to be illegall and void and was himself chosen Patriarch in his place and the other in reverence of his piety made Archbishop of Cesarea And though Arnulphus the firebrand of this Church desired the Patriarchs place for himself yet was he better content with Gibellinus his election because he was a through-old man and hoped that candle would quickly go out that was in the socket To this Gibellinus King Baldwine granted that all places which he or his successours should winne should be subject to his jurisdiction and this also was confirmed by Pope Paschall the 2. But Bernard Patriarch of Antioch found himself much aggrieved hereat because many of these cities by the ancient canon of the Councel of Nice were subject to his Church At last the Pope took the matter into his hand and stroked the angry Patriarch of Antioch into gentlenesse with good language He shewed how since the Councel of Nice the countrey had got a new face ancient mountains were buried rivers drowned in oblivion and they new-christened with other names Yea the deluge of the Saracens tyranny had washed away the bounds of the Churches jurisdictions that now they knew not their own severals where Mahometanisme so long had made all common and waste He desired him therefore to be contented with this new division of their jurisdictions especially because it was reasonable that the King of Jerusalem and his successours should dispose of those places which they should winne with their own swords Bernard perceiving hereby how his Holinesse stood affected in the businesse contented his conscience that he had set his title on foot and then quietly let it fall to the ground as counting it no policie to shew his teeth where he durst not bite Gibellinus never laid claim to the citie of Jerusalem whether it was because in thankfulnesse for this large ecclesiasticall power which King Baldwine had bestowed upon him or that his old age was too weak to strive with so strong an adversarie He sat foure yeares in his chair and Arnulphus thinking he went too slow to the grave is suspected to have given him something to have mended his pace and was himself substituted in his room by the especiall favour of King Baldwine This Arnulphus was called mala corona as if all vices met in him to dance a round And no wonder if the King being himself wantonly disposed advanced such a man for generally loose Patrones cannot abide to be pinched and pent with over-strict Chaplains Besides it was policie in him to choose such a Patriarch as was liable to exceptions for his vitious life that so if he began to bark against the King his mouth might be quickly stopped Arnulphus was as quiet as a lambe and durst never challenge his interest in Jerusalem from Godfreys donation as fearing to wrestle with the King who had him on the hip and could out him at pleasure for his bad manners Amongst other vices he was a great church-robber who to make Emmelor his niece a Princesse and to marry Eustace Prince of Sidon gave her the citie of Jericho for her dowrie and lands belonging to his See worth five thousand crowns yearly And though Papists may pretend that marriage causeth covetousnesse in the Clergie yet we shall find when the Prelacie were constrained to a single life that their nephews ate more church-bread then now the children of married Ministers Yea some Popes not onely fed their bastards with church-milk but even cut off the churches breasts for their pompous and magnificent maintenance And thus having dispatched the story of the Church in this Kings reigne we come now to handle the businesse of the Common-wealth entirely by it self Chap. 9. A mountain-like army of new adventurers after long and hard travail delivered of a mouse Alexius his treachery THe fame of the good successe in Palestine summoned a new supply of other Pilgrimes out of Christendome Germany and other places which were sparing at the first voyage made now amends with double liberality The chief adventurers were Guelpho Duke of Bavaria who formerly had been a great champion of the Popes against Henry the Emperour and from him they of the Papall faction were denominated Guelphes in distinction from the Imperiall party which were called Gibellines Hugh brother to the King of France and Stephen Earl of Bloys both which had much suffered in their reputation for deserting their fellows in the former expedition and therefore they sought to unstain their credits by going again Stephen Earl of Burgundy William Duke of Aquitain Frederick Count of Bogen Hugh brother to the Earl of Tholose besides many great Prelates Diemo Archbishop of Saltzburg the Bishops of Millain and Pavie which led 50000 out of Lombardy the totall summe amounting to 250000. All stood on the tiptoes of expectation to see what so great an army would atchieve men commonly measuring victories by the multitudes of the souldiers But they did nothing memorable save onely that so many went so farre to do nothing Their sufferings are more famous then their deeds being so consumed with plague famine and the sword that Conrade Abbot of Urspurg who went and wrote this voyage beleeveth that not a thousand of all these came into Palestine and those so poore that their bones would scarce hold together so that they were fitter to be sent into an hospitall then to march into the field having nothing about them wherewith to affright their enemies except it were the ghost-like ghastlinesse of their famished faces The army that came out of Lombardy were so eaten up by the swords of the Turks that no fragments of them were left nor news to be heard what was become of them And no wonder being led by Prelates unexperienced in martiall affairs which though perchance great Clerks were now to turn over a new leaf which they had no skill to reade Luther was wont to say that he would be unwilling to be a souldier in that army where Priests were Captains because the Church and not the Camp was their proper place whereas going to warre they willingly outed themselves of Gods protection being out of their vocation But the main matter which made this whole voyage miscarry in her travail was the treachery of the midwife through whose hands it was to passe For Alexius the Grecian Emperour feared lest betwixt the Latines in the East in Palestine and West in Europe as betwixt two milstones his Empire lying in the midst should be ground to powder Whereupon
of no force but may freely be broken because not freely made Others alledged That when Antiochia was first wonne it was offered to Alexius and he refused it so fair a tender was a paiment Others argued That that generation which made this contract was wholly dead and that the debt descended not on them to make it good But most insisted on this That Alexius kept not his covenants and assisted them not according to the agreement Indeed he called these Princes his sonnes but he disinherited them of their hopes and all their portion was in promises never payed No reason then that the knot of the agreement should hold them fast and let him loose The worst of these answers had been good enough if their swords had been as strong as the Grecian Emperours But he coming with a numerous army in few dayes overcame all Cilicia which for fourty yeares had belonged to the Prince of Antioch and then besieged the city of Antioch it self Force is the body and resolution the soul of an action both these were well tempered together in the Emperours army and the city brought to great distresse Whereupon Fulk King of Jerusalem with some other Princes fearing what wofull conclusion would follow so violent premisses made a composition between them So that Reimund did homage to the Emperour and held his principality as a vassall from him And though foure yeares after the Emperour came again into these parts yet he did not much harm pillaging was all his conquest Some yeares after he died being accidentally poisoned by one of his own arrows which he intended for the wild boar A Prince so much better to the Latines then his father Alexius as an honourable foe is above a treacherous friend His Empire he disposed to Emmanuel his sonne Chap. 22. The succession of the Turkish Kings and the Saracen Caliphs Of the unlimited power of a Souldan Some resemblance thereof anciently in the kingdome of France NO great service of moment was performed in the reigne of King Fulk because he was molested with domesticall discords and intestine warres against Paulinus Count of Tripoli and Hugh Earl of Joppa Onely Beersheba was fortified and some forts built about Askelon as an introduction to besiege it Also skirmishes were now and then fought with variety of successe against Sanguin one of the Turks great Princes And here let the reader take notice that though we have mentioned many Commanders as Auxianus Corboran Ammiravissus Tenduc Gazi Balak Dordequin Borscquin Sanguin some Turkish some Saracen yet none of these were absolute Kings though perchance in courtesie sometimes so styled by writers but were onely Generals Lieutenants accountable to their superiours the Caliphs either of Babylon or Egypt Who what they were we referre the reader to our Chronologie Caliph was the Pope as I may say of the Saracens a mixture of Priest and Prince But we need not now trouble our selves with curiosity in their successions these Caliphs being but obscure men who confined themselves to pleasures making play their work and having their constant diet on the sawce of recreation We are rather to take notice of their Generals and Captains which were the men of action For a Souldan which was but a Vice-roy with his borrowed light shineth brighter in history then the Caliph himself Yet may we justly wonder that these slothfull Caliphs should do nothing themselves and commit such unlimited power to their Souldans especially seeing too much trust is a strong tentation to make ambitious flesh and bloud disloyall Yet something may be said for the Caliph of Egypt besides that the pleasures of that countrey were sufficient to invite him to a voluptuous life First the awfull regard which the Egyptians had of their Princes gave them security to trust their officers with ample commission Secondly herein they followed an ancient custome practised by the Pharaohs anciently who gave unto Joseph so large authority as we may read in Genesis Some example also we have hereof in France about nine hundred yeares ago Childerick Theodorick Clovis Childebert Dagobert c. a chain of idle Kings well linked together gave themselves over to pleasures privately never coming abroad but onely on May-day they shewed themselves to the people riding in a chariot adorned with flowers and drawn with oxen slow cattel but good enough for so lazy luggage whilest Charles Martell and Pipin Maiors of the palace opened packets gave audience to Embassadours made warre or peace enacted and repealed laws at pleasure till afterwards from controllers of the Kings houshold they became controllers of the Kings and at last Kings themselves To return to Egypt Let none be troubled pardon a charitable digression to satisfie some scrupulous in a point of Chronologie if they find anciently more Kings of the Egyptians and longer reigning then the consent of times will allow room for for no doubt that which hath swelled the number is the counting Deputies for Kings Yea we find the holy Spirit in the same breath 1. Reg. 22.47 speak a Vice-roy to be a King and no King There was no King in Edom a Deputy was King Chap. 23. The lamentable death of King Fulk WHen Fulco had now eleven yeares with much industry and care though with little enlarging of his dominions governed the land he was slain in earnest as following his sport in hunting to the great grief of his subjects And we may heare him thus speaking his Epitaph A hare I hunted and death hunted me The more my speed was was the worse my speed For as well-mounted I away did flee Death caught and kill'd me falling from my steed Yet this mishap an happy misse I count That fell from horse that I to heaven might mount A Prince of a sweet nature and though one would have read him to be very furious by his high-coloured countenance yet his face was a good hypocrite and contra leges istius coloris saith Tyrius he was affable courteous and pitifull to all in distresse He was buried with his predecessours in the temple of the Sepulchre leaving two sonnes Baldwine who was 13 and Almerick 7 yeares old Chap. 24. The disposition of Baldwine the third The care of Queen Millesent in her sonnes minority BAldwine succeeded his father who quickly grew up as to age so in all royall accomplishments and became a most complete Prince well learned especially in historie liberall very witty and very pleasant in discourse He would often give a smart jest which would make the place both blush and bleed where it lighted Yet this was the better taken at his hands because he cherished not a cowardly wit in himself to wound men behind their backs but played on them freely to their faces yea and never refused the coin he payed them in but would be contented though a King to be the subject of a good jest and sometimes he was well-favouredly met with as the best fencer in
so that their luxury differed from Elias his austerity as much as velvet from sackcloth Wherefore that the Carmelites came from mount Carmel cannot be denied But on that mountain I find that both Elias and Baals priests gathered together and let the indifferent reader judge which of them their lives do most resemble Afterwards Pope Honorius 3. counting the party-coloured coats these Carmelites did wear to be too gaudy caused them to wear onely white the colour which nature doth die simple and therefore fittest for religion But Melexala King of Egypt who formerly was very bountifull to the Carmelites knew not his Alms-men in their new coats but changed his love as they their livery and persecuted them out of all Egypt It seemeth afterwards by the complaint of Mantuan that they wore some black again over their white For he playeth on them as if their bad manners had blacked and altered their clothes Now though Palestine was their mother England was their best nurse Ralph Fresburg about the yeare 1240 first brought them hither and they were first seated at Newenden in Kent An hundred and fourty English writers have been of this order And here they flourished in great pomp till at last King Henry the 8. as they came out of the wildernesse so turned their houses into a wildernesse not onely breaking the necks of all Abbeys in England but also scattering abroad their very bones past possibility of recouniting them Chap. 27. Edessa lost The hopefull voyage of Conrade the Emperour and Lewis King of France to the Holy land blasted by the perfidiousnesse of Emmanuel the Grecian Emperour EMpires have their set bounds whither when they come they stand still go back fall down This we may see in the kingdome of Jerusalem which under Godfrey and the two first Baldwines was a gainer under Fulk a saver under the succeeding Kings a constant loser till all was gone For now Sanguin Prince of the Turks as bloudy as his name wrested from the Christians the countrey and city of Edessa one of the foure Tetrarchies of the kingdome of Jerusalem And though Sanguin shortly after was stabbed at a feast yet Noradine his sonne succeeded and exceeded him in cruelty against the Christians The losse of Edessa wherein our religion had flourished ever since the Apostles time moved Conrade Emperour of the West and Lewis the 7. surnamed the Young King of France to undertake a voyage to the Holy land Pope Eugenius the 3. bestirred himself in the matter and made S. Bernard his soliciter to advance the designe For never could so much steel have been drawn into the east had not this good mans perswasion been the loadstone The Emperours army contained two hundred thousand foot besides fifty thousand horse Nor was the army of King Lewis much inferiour in number In France they sent a distaff and a spindle to all those able men that went not with them as upbraiding their effeminatenesse And no wonder when women themselves went in armour having a brave lasse like another Penthesilea for their leader so befringed with gold that they called her Golden-foot riding astride like men which I should count more strange but that I find all women in England in the same posture on their horses till Anna wife to King Richard the second some 200 yeares since taught them a more modest behaviour The Turks did quake hearing of these preparations which to them were reported farre greater then they were fame contrary to all other painters making those things the greatest which are presented the farthest off Conrade with his army took his way through Grecia where Emmanuel the Emperour possessed with an hereditary fear of the Latines fortified his cities in the way as knowing there needed strong banks where such a stream of people was to passe And suspecting that if these Pilgrimes often made his Empire their high-way into Palestine little grasse would grow in so troden a path and his countrey thereby be much endamaged he used them most treacherously giving them bad welcome that he might no more have such guests To increase their miseries as the Dutch encamped by the river Melas if that may be called a river which is all mud in summer all sea in winter deserving his name from this black and dismall accident it drowned many with its sudden overflowings as if it had conspired with the Grecians and learned treachery from them They that survived this sudden mishap were reserved for lingring misery For the Grecian Emperour did them all possible mischief by mingling lime with their meal by killing of stragglers by holding intelligence with the Turks their enemies by corrupting his coyn making his silver as base as himself so that the Dutch sold good wares for bad money and bought bad wares with good money by giving them false Conductours which trained them into danger so that there was more fear of the guides then of the way All which his unfaithfull dealings are recorded by that faithfull historian Nicetas Choniates who though a Grecian born affirmeth these things the truth of his love to his countrey-men no whit prejudicing his love to the truth Chap. 28. The Turks conquered at Meander The Dutch and French arrive in Palestine SCarce had the Dutch escaped the treachery of the Greeks when they were encountred with the hostility of the Turks who waited for them on the other side of Meander The river was not foordable ship or bridge the Christians had none when behold Conrade the Emperour adventured on an action which because it was successefull shall be accounted valiant otherwise we should term it desperate After an exhortation to his army he commanded them all at once to flownce into the river Meander was plunged by their plunging into it his water stood amazed as unresolved whether to retreat to the fountain or proceed to the sea and in this extasie afforded them a dry passage over the stream An act which like that of Horatius Cocles his leaping into Tiber plus famae ad posteros habiturum quà m fidei will find more admirers then beleevers with posterity The affrighted Turks on the other side thinking there was no contending with them that did teach nature it self obedience offered their throats to the Christians swords and were killed in such number that whole piles of dead bones remain there for a monument like those heaps of the Cimbrians slain by Marius neare Marseils where afterwards the inhabitants walled their vineyards with sculls and guarded their grapes with dead men Hence Conrade made forward to Iconium now called Cogni which he besieged in vain to the great losse of his army The King of France followed after with great multitudes and drank of the same cup at the Grecians hands though not so deeply till at last finding that those who marched through the continent met with an ocean of miserie he thought better to trust the wind and sea then
the Greeks and taking shipping safely arrived in Palestine where he was highly welcomed by Reimund Prince of Antioch Some weeks were spent in complying entertainments and visiting holy places till at last Elianor wife to the King of France who accompanied her husband made religion her pander and played bankrupt of her honour under pretense of pilgrimage keeping company with a base Saracen jester whom she preferred before a King Thus love may blindfold the eyes but lust boreth them out Yea now she pleaded that she might be no longer wife to the King because she was too neare unto him within the degrees forbidden This new-started scruple never troubled her before but some have sluces in their consciences and can keep them open or shut them as occasion requireth Chap. 29. Damascus besieged in vain The return of the Emperour and King with the censure on this voyage THe late-come Pilgrimes having sufficiently recreated themselves the Emperour and the King of France concluded to besiege Damascus for a small town was conceived too narrow an object of their valour whilest so eminent an action was adequate to the undertakers Damascus is so pleasant a citie that Mahomet durst never enter into it lest this deceiver should be deceived himself and be so ravished with the pleasures of the place that he should forget to go on in that great work he had in hand Some make Eliezer Abrahams steward builder of this citie because he is called Eliezer of Damascus though that phrase speaketh him rather to have had his birth or dwelling there then the citie her building from him To passe this by because as the foundations are hidden in the ground so the founders of most ancient places are forgotten It was for many yeares after the Metropolis of Syria and was now straitly besieged by the Christians with great hope of successe had they not afterwards fallen out amongst themselves who should eat the chickens before they were hatched Conrade and King Lewis destined the city to Theodorick Earl of Flanders lately arrived in those parts whilest other Princes which had been long resident in Palestine and born the heat of the warre grudged hereat and their stomachs could not digest the cruditie of a raw upstart to be preferred before them Yea some of the Christians corrupted with Turkish money though when they received it it proved but gilded brasse may all traitours be payed in such coin perswaded the King of France to remove his camp to a stronger part of the walls which they long besieged in vain and returned home at last leaving the city and their honours behind them The French proverb was verified of this voyage Much bruit and little fruit They not onely did no good in the Holy land save that some think their coming advantaged King Baldwine for the taking of the citie of Askelon but also did much harm For now the Turks seeing one citie both bear the brunt and batter the strength of both armies began to conceive that their own fear was their greatest enemy and those swords of these new Pilgrimes which they dreaded in the sheath they sleighted when they saw them drawn and shook off that aw which had formerly possessed them of the strength of the Western Emperour Many thousand Christians perished in this adventure whose souls are pronounced by all the writers of this age to be carried up into heaven on the wings of the holy cause they died for Whose blessed estate I will not disprove nor will I listen to the unhappy Dutch proverb He that bringeth himself into needlesse dangers dieth the devils martyr We must not forget how the French King coming homeward was taken prisoner by the fleet of the Grecian Emperour and rescued again by Gregory Admirall to Roger King of Sicilie When he was safely arrived in France in open Parliament his wife was divorced from him Her nearnesse in bloud was the onely cause specified and the King took no notice of her inconstancy accounting those but foolish husbands who needlessely proclaim their wives dishonesty He gave her back again all the lands in France which he had received with her in portion scorning her wealth which neglected his love Herein he did nobly but not politickly to part with the Dukedomes of Poictou and Aquitain which he enjoyed in her right for he brake his own garland by giving her her flowers back again mangled and dismembred his own kingdome and gave a torch into Henry King of England his hands who afterwards married her to set France on fire Chap. 30. An apologie for S. Bernard whom the vulgar sort condemned for the murderer of those that went this voyage SLander quicker then Martiall law arraigneth condemneth and executeth all in an instant This we may see in poore S. Bernard who was the mark for every mans tongue to shoot arrows against and when this voyage had miscarried many condemned him because his perswasion set this project not onely on foot but on wings as if he had thrust so many men as one morsel into the jaws of death But much may be alledged truly to excuse this good man First he was but an instrument imployed by Pope Eugenius and a Provinciall Councel of French Bishops to forward the designe Rather then should they have blamed his Holinesse who set him on work But the saddle oftentimes is not set on the right horse because his back is too high to be reached and we see commonly that the instruments are made skreens to save the face of the principall from scorching Secondly the true cause of the ill successe was the vitiousnesse of the undertakers For Germany at this time surfeted of lewd people and those grew the fattest which lived on the high-wayes But this voyage robbed the whole countrey of her theeves and then no wonder if they found their death in Asia who deserved it in Europe Heare what Otho Frisingensis who went this voyage speaketh impartially in the matter If we should say that Bernard that holy Abbot was inspired by Gods Spirit to incite us to this warre but we through our pride and wantonnesse not observing his holy commands deservedly brought on our selves the losse of our goods and lives we should say nothing but what is agreeable to reason and to ancient examples However it was an heavy affliction to S. Bernards aged back to bear the reproch of many people it being a great grief for one to be generally condemned as guilty for want of proof of his innocency And though God set his hand to S. Bernards testimoniall by the many miracles which that Father wrought yet still some challenged him for a counterfeit And surely this humiliation was both wholesome and necessary for him For the people who cannot love without doting nor approve without admiring were too much transported with an high opinion of this man and his directions as if that arrow could not misse the mark which came out of S.
handsomenesse preferred to be Patriarch William Archbishop of Tyre was violent against his election because of a prophesie That as Heraclius King of Persia wonne so an Heraclius should lose the Crosse. But others excepted that this exception was nothing worth For let God give the man and let the devil set the name As for those blind prophesies they misse the truth ofter then hit it so that no wise man will lean his belief on so slender a prop. But Heraclius had a worse name then his name the bad report of his vitious life keeping a Vintners wife whom he maintained in all state like an Empresse and owned the children he had by her Her name Pascha de Rivera and she was generally saluted The Patriarchesse His example infected the inferiour clergie whose corruption was a sad presage of the ruine of the realm For when Prelates the Seers when once those eye-strings begin to break the heart-strings hold not out long after In his time the Maronites were reconciled to the Romane Church Their main errour was the heresie of the Monothelites touching one onely will and action in Christ. For after that the heresie of Nestorius about two persons in our Saviour was detested in the Eastern Churches some thought not themselves safe enough from the heresie of two persons till they were fallen with the opposite extremity of one nature in Christ violence making men reel from one extreme to another The errour once broched found many embracers As no opinion so monstrous but if it hath had a mother it will get a nurse But now these Maronites renouncing their tenents received the Catholick faith though soon after when Saladine had conquered their countrey they relapsed to their old errours wherein they continued till the late times of Pope Gregory the thirteenth and Clement the eighth when they again renewed their communion with the Romane Church They live at this day on mount Libanus not exceeding twelve thousand households and pay to the great Turk for every one above twelve yeares old seventeen sultanines by the yeare and for every space of ground sixteen spanne square one sultanine yearly to keep themselves free from the mixture of Mahometanes A sultanine is about seven shillings six pence of our money To return to Heraclius Soon after he was sent Embassadour to Henry the second King of England to crave his personall assistance in the Holy warre delivering unto him the Royall standard with the keyes of our Saviours sepulchre the towre of David and the city of Jerusalem sent him by King Baldwine King Henry was singled out for this service before other Princes because the world justly reported him valiant wise rich powerfull and fortunate And which was the main hereby he might expiate his murder and gather up again the innocent bloud which he had shed of Thomas Becket Besides Heraclius entituled our Henry to the kingdome of Jerusalem because Geoffrey Plantagenet his father was sonne some say brother to Fulk the fourth King of Jerusalem But King Henry was too wise to bite at such a bait wherein was onely the husk of title without the kernel of profit Yet he pretended he would go into Palestine and got hereby a masse of money towards his voyage making every one as well Clerk as Lay saving such as went to pay that yeare the tenth of all their revenues moveables and chattells as well in gold as in silver Of every citie in England he chose the richest men as in London two hundred in York an hundred and so in proportion and took the tenth of all their moveables by the estimation of credible men who knew their estates imprisoning those which refused to pay sub eleemosynae titulo vitium rapacitatis includans saith Walsingham But now when he had filled his purse all expected he should fulfill his promise when all his voyage into Palestine turned into a journey into France Heraclius whilest he stayed in England consecrated the Temple-church in the suburbs of London and the house adjoyning belonging to the Templars since turned to a better use for the students of our municipall Law these new Templars defending one Christian from another as the old ones Christians from Pagans Chap. 40. Saladine fitteth himself with forrein forces The originall and great power of the Mammalukes with their first service IN the minority of King Baldwine who was but thirteen yeares old Milo de Plancia Noble-man was Protectour of the Realm Whose pride and insolence could not be brooked and therefore he was stabbed at Ptolemais and Reimund Count of Tripoli chosen to succeed him Now Saladine seriously intendeth to set on the Kingdome of Jerusalem and seeketh to furnish himself with souldiers for that service But he perceived that the ancient nation of the Egyptians had lasted so long that now it ranne dregs their spirits being as low as the countrey they lived in and they fitter to make merchants and mechanicks then military men For they were bred in such soft imployments that they were presently foundred with any hard labour Wherefore he sent to the Circassians by the lake of Meotis neare Taurica Chersonesus and thence bought many slaves of able and active bodies For it was a people born in a hard countrey no fewel for pleasure grew there nor was brought thither and bred harder so that warre was almost their nature with custome of continuall skirmishing with the neighbouring Tartars These slaves he trained up in military discipline most of them being Christians once baptized but afterwards untaught Christ they learned Mahomet and so became the worse foes to religion for once being her friends These proved excellent souldiers and speciall horsemen and are called Mammalukes And surely the greatnesse of Saladine and his successours stood not so much on the legs of their native Egyptians as it leaned on the staff of these strangers Saladine and especially the Turkish Kings after him gave great power and placed much trust in these Mammalukes Who lived a long time in ignorance of their own strength till at last they took notice of it and scorning any longer to be factours for another they would set up for themselves and got the sovereignty from the Turkish Kings Thus Princes who make their subjects over-great whet a knife for their own throats And posterity may chance to see the insolent Janizaries give the grand Seignor such a trip on the heel as may tumble him on his back But more largely of these Mammalukes usurping the kingdome of Egypt God willing in its proper place Thus Saladine having furnished himself with new souldiers went to handsel their valour upon the Christians invaded the Holy land burning all the countrey before him and raging in the bloud of poore Christians till he came and encamped about Askelon Mean time whilest Reimund Count of Tripoli Protectour of the Kingdome with Philip Earl of Flanders the chief strength of the Kingdome were absent in Celosyria wasting the countrey about
willingly But at last he was made to stoop and retired himself to a private life appointing Baldwine his nephew a child of five yeares old his successour and Guy Earl of Joppa and Askelon this childs father in law to be Protectour of the Realm in his minority But soon after he revoked this latter act and designed Reimund Earl of Tripoli for the Protectour He displaced Guy because he found him of no over-weight worth scarce passable without favourable allowance little feared of his foes and as little loved of his friends The more martiall Christians sleighted him as a slug and neglected so lazy a leader that could not keep pace with those that were to follow him Yea they refused whilest he was Protectour at his command to fight with Saladine and out of distast to their Generall suffered their enemie freely to forrage which was never done before For the Christians never met any Turks wandring in the Holy land but on even terms they would examine their passe-port how sufficient it was and bid them battel Guy stormed at his displacing and though little valiant yet very â—ullen left the Court in discontent went home and fortified his cities of Joppa and Askelon What should King Baldwine do in this case Whom should he make Protectour Guy had too little Reimund too much spirit for the place He feared Guy's cowardlinesse lest he should lose the kingdome to the Turks and Reimunds treachery lest he should get it for himself Thus anguish of mind and weaknesse of bodie a doughtie conquest for their united strengths which single might suffice ended this Kings dayes dying young at five and twenty yeares of age But if by the morning we may guesse at the day he would have been no whit inferiour to any of his predecessours especially if his body had been able but alas it spoiled the musick of his soul that the instrument was quite out of tune He reigned twelve yeares and was buried in the Temple of the Sepulchre a King happie in this that he died before the death of his Kingdome Chap. 43. The short life and wofull death of Baldwine the fifth an infant Guy his father in law succeedeth him IT is a rare happinesse of the family of S. Laurence Barons of Hoath in Ireland that the heirs for 400 yeares together alwayes have been of age before the death of their fathers For Minors have not onely baned families but ruined realms It is one of Gods threatnings I will give children to be their Princes and babes shall rule over them With this rod God strook the Kingdome of Jerusalem thrice in 40 yeares Baldwine the third fourth and fifth being all under age and this last but five yeares old He was the posthumus sonne of William Marquesse of Montferrat by Sibyll his wife sister to Baldwine the fourth daughter to King Almerick She afterwards was married to Guy Earl of Joppa and Askelon Now Reimund Earl of Tripoli challenged to be Protectour of this young King by the vertue of an Act of the former King so assigning him But Sibyll mother to this infant to defeat Reimund first murdered all naturall affection in her self and then by poyson murdered her sonne that so the Crown in her right might come to her husband Guy This Baldwine reigned eight moneths eight dayes saith mistaken Munster and some mistake more who make him not to reigne at all cruel to wrong his memorie of his honour whom his mother had robbed both of his life and Kingdome His death was concealed till Guy his father in law had obtained by large bribes to the Templars and Heraclius the Patriarch to be crowned King One more ennobled with his descent from the ancient family of the Lusignans in Poictou then for any eminencie in himself His gifts were better then his endowments Yet had he been more fortunate he would have been accounted more vertuous men commonly censuring that the fault of the King which is the fate of the kingdome And now the Christian affairs here posted to their wofull period being spurred on by the discords of the Princes Chap. 44. Church-affairs Of Haymericus Patriarch of Antioch Of the Grecian Anti-patriarchs and of the learned Theodorus Balsamon WHilest Heraclius did Patriarch it in Jerusalem one Haymericus had the same honour at Antioch He wrote to Henry the second King of England a bemoning letter of the Christians in the East and from him received another fraught with never-performed fair promises This man must needs be different from that Haymericus who began his Patriarchship in Antioch anno 1143 and sat but twelve yeares say the Centuriatours But Baronius as different from them sometimes in Chronologie as Divinitie maketh them the same Then must he be a through-old man enjoying his place above fourtie yeares being probably before he wore the style of Patriarch well worn in yeares himself I must confesse it passeth my Chymistrie to extract any agreement herein out of the contrariety of writers We must also take notice that besides the Latine Patriarchs in Jerusalem and Antioch there were also Grecian Anti-patriarchs appointed by the Emperour of Constantinople who having no temporall power nor profit by church-Church-lands had onely jurisdiction over those of the Greek Church We find not the chain of their succession but here and there light on a link and at this time in Jerusalem on three successively 1. Athanasius whom though one out of his abundant charitie is pleased to style a Schismatick yet was he both pious and learned as appeareth by his epistles 2. Leontius commended likewise to posteritie for a good Clerk and an honest man 3. Dositheus inferiour to the former in both respects Isaac the Grecian Emperour sent to make him Patriarch of Constantinople and Dositheus catching at both held neither but betwixt two Patriarchs chairs fell to the ground Antioch also had her Greek Patriarchs As one Sotericus displaced for maintaining some unsound tenets about our Saviour After him Theodorus Balsamon the oracle of the learned Law in his age He compiled and commented on the ancient Canons and principally set forth the priviledges of Constantinople listening say the Romanists to the least noise that soundeth to the advancing of the Eastern Churches and knocking down Rome wheresoever it peepeth above Constantinople This maketh Bellarmine except against him as a partiall writer because a true Historian should be neither partie advocate nor judge but a bare witnesse By Isaac the Grecian Emperour this Balsamon was also deceived he pretended to remove him to Constantinople on condition he would prove the translation of the Patriarch to be legall which is forbidden by the Canons Balsamon took upon him to prove it and a Lawyers brains will beat to purpose when his own preferment is the fee. But herein he did but crack the nut for another to eat the kernel For the Emperour mutable in his mind changing his favourites as well
knew he did it onely to gain time to fetch new breath and if he yeelded to him his bounty had not been thanked but his fear upbraided as if he durst not denie him Yea in anger King Richard commanded all the Turkish captives which were in his hands seven thousand in number to be put to death except some choice persons on that day whereon the articles should have been but were not performed For which fact he suffered much in his repute branded with rashnesse and crueltie as the murderer of many Christians For Saladine in revenge put as many of our captives to death On the other side the moderation of the French King was much commended who reserving his prisoners alive exchanged them to ransome so many Christians Chap. 9. The unseasonable return of the King of France MEan time the Christians were rent a sunder with faction Philip the French King Odo Duke of Burgundie Leopold Duke of Austria most of the Dutch all the Genoans and Templars siding with King Conrade King Richard Henry Count of Champaigne the Hospitallers Venetians and Pisans taking part with King Guy But King Conrades side was much weakened with the sudden departure of the French King who eighteen dayes after the taking of Ptolemais returned home pretending want of necessaries indisposition of body distemper of the climate though the greatest distemper was in his own passions The true cause of his departure was partly envie because the sound of King Richards fame was of so deep a note that it drowned his partly covetousnesse to seise on the dominions of the Earl of Flanders lately dead Flanders lying fitly to make a stable for the fair palace of France If it be true what some report that Saladine bribed him to return let him for ever forfeit the surname of Augustus and the style of The most Christian Prince His own souldiers disswaded him from returning beseeching him not to stop in so glorious a race wherein he was newly started Saladine was already on his knees and would probably be brought on his face if pursued If he played the unthrift with this golden occasion let him not hope for another to play the good husband with If povertie forced his departure King Richard profered him the half of all his provisions All would not do Philip persisted in his old plea How the life of him absent would be more advantageous to the cause then the death of him present and by importunitie got leave to depart solemnly swearing not to molest the King of Englands dominions Thus the King of France returned in person but remained still behind in his instructions which he left with his armie to the Duke of Burgundie to whom he prescribed both his path and his pace where and how he should go And that Duke moved slowly having no desire to advance the work where King Richard would carrie all the honour For in those actions wherein severall undertakers are compounded together commonly the first figure for matter of credit maketh ciphres of all the rest As for King Philip being returned home such was the itch of his ambition he must be fingering of the King of Englands territories though his hands were bound by oath to the contrary Chap. 10. Conrade King of Ierusalem slain Guy exchangeth his Kingdome for the Island of Cyprus ABout the time of the King of France his departure Conrade King of Jerusalem was murdered in the market-place of Tyre and his death is variously reported Some charged our King Richard for procuring it And though the beams of his innocencie cleared his own heart yet could they not dispell the clouds of suspicions from other mens eyes Some say Humphred Prince of Thoron killed him for taking Isabella his wife away from him But the generall voice giveth it out that two Assasines stabbed him whose quarrel to him was onely this That he was a Christian. These murderers being instantly put to death gloried in the meritoriousnesse of their suffering and surely were it the punishment not the cause made martyrdome we should be best stored with Confessours from gaols and Martyrs from the gallows Conrade reigned five yeares and left one daughter Maria Iole on whom the Knight-Templars bestowed princely education And this may serve for his Epitaph The Crown I never did enjoy alone Of half a Kingdome I was half a King Scarce was I on when I was off the throne Slain by two slaves me basely murdering And thus the best mans life at mercie lies Of vilest varlets that their own despise His faction survived after his death affronting Guy the anti-King and striving to depose him They pleaded that the Crown was tied on Guy's head with a womans fillet which being broken by the death of his wife Queen Sibyll who deceased of the plague with her children at the siege of Ptolemais he had no longer right to the Kingdome they objected he was a worthlesse man and unfortunate On the other side it was alledged for him that to measure a mans worth by his successe is a square often false alwayes uncertain Besides the courtesie of the world would allow him this favour That a King should be semel semper once and ever Whilest Guy stood on these ticklish terms King Richard made a seasonable motion which well rellished to the palate of this hungrie Prince To exchange his Kingdome of Jerusalem for the Island of Cyprus which he had redeemed from the Templars to whom he had pawned it And this was done accordingly to the content of both sides And King Richard with some of his succeeding English Kings wore the title of Jerusalem in their style for many yeares after We then dismisse King Guy hearing him thus taking his farewell I steer'd a state warre-tost against my will Blame then the storm not th' Pilots want of skill That I the Kingdome lost whose emptie style I sold to Englands King for Cyprus Isle I pass'd away the land I could not hold Good ground I bought but onely aire I sold. Then as a happy Merchant may I sing Though I must sigh as an unhappy King Soon after Guy made a second change of this world for another But the family of the Lusignans have enjoyed Cyprus some hundred yeares and since by some transactions it fell to the state of Venice and lately by conquest to the Turks Chap. 11. Henry of Champaigne chosen King The noble atchievements and victories of King Richard COnrade being killed and Guy gone away Henry Earl of Champaigne was chosen King of Jerusalem by the especiall procuring of King Richard his uncle To corroborate his election by some right of succession he married Isabella the widow of King Conrade and daughter to Almerick King of Jerusalem A Prince as writers report having a sufficient stock of valour in himself but little happie in expressing it whether for want of opportunitie or shortnesse of his reigne being most spent in a truce He more
truth thereof If any object That the head of the same Saint is shewed at severall places the whole answer is by a Synecdoche That a part is put for the whole As for the common exception against the Crosse That so many severall pieces thereof are shown which put together would break the back of Simon of Cyrene to bear them it is answered Distrahitur non diminuitur and like the loaves in the Gospel it is miraculously multiplied in the dividing If all these fail Baronius hath a rasour shaveth all scruple clear away For saith he Quicquid sit fides purgat facinus So that he worshippeth the false Reliques of a true Saint God taketh his good intention in good worth though he adore the hand of Esau for the hand of Jacob. But enough of these fooleries Chap. 13. King Richard taken prisoner in Austria sold and sent to the Emperour dearly ransomed returneth home KIng Richard setting sail from Syria the sea and wind favoured him till he came into the Adriatick and on the coasts of Istria he suffered shipwrack Wherefore he intended to pierce through Germanie by land the next way home But the nearnesse of the way is to be measured not by the shortnesse but the safenesse of it He disguised himself to be one Hugo a merchant whose onely commodity was himself whereof he made but a bad bargain For he was discovered in an inne in Austria because he disguised his person not his expenses so that the very policie of an hostesse finding his purse so farre above his clothes did detect him Yea saith mine Authour Facies orbi terrarum nota ignorari non potuit The rude people flocking together used him with insolencies unworthy him worthy themselves and they who would shake at the tail of this loose Lion durst laugh at his face now they saw him in a grate Yet all the weight of their cruelty did not bow him beneath a Princely carriage Leopoldus Duke of Austria hearing hereof as being Lord of the soil seised on this Royall stray meaning now to get his peny-worths out of him for the affront done unto him in Palestine Not long after the Duke sold him to Henry the Emperour for his harsh nature surnamed Asper and it might have been Savus being but one degree from a tyrant He kept King Richard in bands charging him with a thousand faults committed by him in Sicilie Cyprus and Palestine The proofs were as slender as the crimes grosse and Richard having an eloquent tongue innocent heart and bold spirit acquitted himself in the judgement of all the hearers At last he was ransomed for an hundred and fourty thousand marks Collen weight A summe so vast in that age before the Indies had overflowed all Europe with their gold and silver that to raise it in England they were forced to sell their Church-plate to their very chalices Whereupon out of most deep Divinity it was concluded That they should not celebrate the Sacrament in glasse for the brittlenesse of it nor in wood for the sponginesse of it which would suck up the bloud nor in alchymie because it was subject to rusting nor in copper because that would provoke vomiting but in chalices of latten which belike was a metall without exception And such were used in England for some hundred yeares after untill at last John Stafford Archbishop of Canterbury when the land was more replenished with silver in knotteth that Priest in the greater excommunication that should consecrate Poculum stanneum After this money Peter of Bloys who had drunk as deep of Helicon as any of that age sendeth this good prayer making an apostrophe to the Emperour or to the Duke of Austria or to both together Bibe nunc avaritia Dum puteos argenteos Larga diffundit Anglia Tua tecum pecunia Sit in perditionem And now thou basest avarice Drink till thy belly burst Whil'st England poures large silver showres To satiate thy thirst And this we pray Thy money may And thou be like accurst The ransome partly payed the rest secured by hostages King Richard much befriended by the Dutch Prelacie after eighteen moneths imprisonment returned into England The Archbishop of Cullen in the presence of King Richard as he passed by brought in these words in saying masse Now I know that God hath sent his angel and hath delivered thee out of the hand of Herod and from the expectation of the people c. But his soul was more healthfull for this bitter physick and he amended his manners better loving his Queen Beringaria whom he slighted before As souldiers too often love women better then wives Leave we him now in England where his presence fixed the loyaltie of many of his unsettled subjects whilest in Austria the Duke with his money built the walls of Vienna So that the best stones and morter of that bulwark of Christendome are beholden to the English coin We must not forget how Gods judgements overtook this Duke punishing his dominions with fire and water which two elements cannot be Kings but they must be tyrants by famine the eares of wheat turned into worms by a gangrene seising on the Dukes body who cut off his leg with his own hand and died thereof Who by his testament if not by his will caused some thousand crowns to be restored again to King Richard Chap. 14. The death of Saladine His commendation even with truth but almost above belief SOon after Saladine the terrour of the East ended his life having reigned sixteen yeares Consider him as a man or a Prince he was both wayes admirable Many Historians like some painters which rather shew their skill in drawing a curious face then in making it like to him whom it should resemble describe Princes rather what they should be then what they were not shewing so much their goodnesse as their own wits But finding this Saladine so generally commended of all writers we have no cause to distrust this his true character His wisdome was great in that he was able to advise and greater in that he was willing to be advised Never so wedded to his own resolves but on good ground he would be divorced from them His valour was not over-free but would well answer the spurre when need required In his victories he was much beholden to the advantage of season place and number and seldome wrested the garland of honour from an arm as strong as his own He ever marched in person into the field remembring that his predecessours the Caliphs of Egypt brake themselves by using Factours and imploying of Souldans His temperance was great diet sparing sleep moderate not to pamper nature but keep it in repair His greatest recreation was variety and exchange of work Pleasures he rather sipped then drank off sometimes more to content others then please himself Wives he might have kept sans number but stinted himself to one or two using them rather for posterity then
wantonnesse His justice to his own people was remarkable his promise with his enemies generally well kept Much he did triumph in mercy Fierce in fighting mild in conquering and having his enemies in his hand pleased himself more in the power then act of revenge His liberality would have drained his treasure had it not had a great and quick spring those Eastern parts being very rich Serviceable men he would purchase on any rate and sometimes his gifts bare better proportion to his own greatnesse then the receivers deserts Vast bribes he would give to have places betrayed unto him and often effected that with his gold which he could not do with his steel Zealous he was in his own religion yet not violent against Christians quà Christians Scholarship cannot be expected in him who was a Turk by his birth amongst whom it is a sinne to be learned and a souldier by breeding His humility was admirable as being neither ignorant of his greatnesse nor over-knowing it He provided to have no solemnities at his funerals and ordered that before his corpse a black cloth should be carried on the top of a spear and this proclaimed Saladine Conquerour of the East had nothing left him but this black shirt to attend him to the grave Some entitle him as descended from the Royall Turkish bloud Which flattering Heralds he will little thank for their pains counting it most honour that he being of mean parentage was the first founder of his own Nobility His stature for one of that nation was tall His person rather cut out to strike fear then winne love yet could he put on amiablenesse when occasion required and make it beseem him To conclude I will not be so bold to do with him as an Eastern Bishop doth with Plato and Plutarch whom he commendeth in a Greek hymn to Christ as those that came nearest to holinesse of all untaught Gentiles Belike he would be our Saviours remembrancer and put him in mind to take more especiall notice of them at the day of judgement But I will take my farewell of Saladine with that commendation I find of him He wanted nothing to his eternall happinesse but the knowledge of Christ. Chap. 15. Discords amongst the Turks The miserable death of Henry King of Ierusalem SAladine left nine some say twelve sonnes making Saphradine his brother overseer of his will Who of a tutour turned a traitour and murdered them all excepting one called also Saphradine Sultan of Aleppo who not by his uncles pity but by the favour and support of his fathers good friends was preserved Hence arose much intestine discord amongst the Turks all which time the Christians enjoyed their truce with much quiet and security Not long after Henry King of Jerusalem as he was walking in his palace to solace himself fell down out of a window and brake his neck He reigned three yeares But as for the particular time he died on I find it not specified in any Authour Chap. 16. Almerick the second King of Ierusalem The great armie of the Dutch adventurers doeth little in Syria AFter his death Almerick Lusignan brother to King Guy was in the right of his wife crowned King of Jerusalem For he married Isabella the Relict of Henry the last King This Lady was foure times married first to Humphred Prince of Thorone then to the three successive Kings of Jerusalem Conrade Henry and this Almerick He was also King of Cyprus and the Christians in Syria promised themselves much aid from the vicinity of that Island But though he was neare to them he was farre from helping them making pleasure all his work being an idle lazy worthlesse Prince But I trespasse on that politick rule Of Princes we must speak the best or the least if that be not intended when the truth is so late that danger is entailed upon it In his time Henry Emperour of Germany indicted by his conscience for his cruelty against King Richard seeking to perfume his name in the nostrils of the world which began to be unfavourie set on foot another voyage to the Holy land Pope Celestine the third sent his Legates about to promote this service shewing how God himself had sounded the alarm by the dissension of the Turks Jerusalem now might be wonne with the blows of her enemies onely an army must be sent not so much to conquer as to receive it Generall of the Pilgrimes was Henry Duke of Saxony next him Frederick Duke of Austria Herman Landtgrave of Thuringia Henry Palatine of Rhene Conrade Archbishop of Mentz Conrade Archbishop of Wirtzburg the Bishops of Breme Halberstadt Regenspurg with many more Prelates so that here was an Episcopall army which might have served for a nationall Synod Insomuch that one truly might here have seen the Church Militant We have no ambition saith one of their countrey-men to reckon them up for they were plurimi nulli many in number none in their actions Some of these souldiers were imployed by Henry the Emperour who knew well to bake his cake with the Churches feuel to subdue his rebells in Apulia This done they passed through Grecia and found there better entertainment then some of their predecessours Hence by shipping they were conveyed into Syria Here they brake the truce made by King Richard it seemeth by this it was the â—â—st five yeares the Pope dispensing therewith who can make a peace nets to hold others but a cobweb for himself to break through The citie Berytus they quickly wanne and as quickly lost For Henry the Emperour suddenly died the root which nourished this voyage and then the branches withered Henry also Duke of Saxony Generall of this army was slain And Conrade Archbishop of Mentz one of the Electours would needs return home to the choice of a new Emperour knowing he could more profitably use his voice in Germany then his arms in Syria Other Captains secretly stole home and when their souldiers would have fought their Captains ran away And whereas in other Expeditions we find vestigia pauc a retrorsum making such clean work that they left little or no reversions of this voyage many safely returned home with whole bodies and wounded credits The rest that remained fortified themselves in Joppa And now the feast of S. Martin was come the Dutch their Arch-Saint This man being a Germane by birth and Bishop of Tours in France was eminent for his hospitality and the Dutch badly imitating their countrey-man turn his charity to the poore into riot on themselves keeping the eleventh of November I will not say holy-day but feast-day At this time the spring-tide of their mirth so drowned their souls that the Turks coming in upon them cut every one of their throats to the number of twenty thousand and quickly they were stabbed with the sword that were cup-shot before A day which the Dutch may well write in their Kalendars in red letters died
village in France but by reason hereof of had widows and orphanes cursing this expidition And his Holinesse after he had made allowance for his losse of time bloud and credit found his gain de claro very small Besides such was the chance of warre and good Catholicks were so intermingled with hereticks that in sacking of cities they were slain together Whereupon the Pope resolved of a privater way which made lesse noise in the world attracted lesse envy and was more effectuall To prosecute them by way of Inquisition Hereby he might single them out by retail rooting out the tares without hurting the corn and overthrowing them by piece-meal whom he could never stagger in grosse Dominick a Spaniard was first authour hereof Well did his mother being with child of him dream that she had a dog vomiting fire in her wombe This ignivomous curre sire of the litter of Mendicant Friars called Dominicanes did bark at and deeply bite the poore Albingenses After his death Pope Honorius for his good service bestowed a Saintship on him For he dreamed he saw the Church of Rome falling and Dominick holding it up with his shoulders wherefore he canonized this Atlas of their religion The proceedings of this Inquisition were the abridgement of all cruelty turning the sword of Justice into the butchers ax But no doubt God when he maketh inquisition for bloud will one day remember this bloudy Inquisition And who can but admire at the continuance of the doctrine of the Albingenses to this day maugre all their enemies Let those privy-counsellers of Nature who can tell where swallows lie all winter and how at the spring they have a resurrection from their seeming deadnesse let those I say also inform us in what invisible sanctuaries this doctrine did lurk in spite of persecution and how it revived out of its ashes at the coming of Luther To conclude it is observed That in those parts of France where the Albingenses were most cruelly handled now the Protestants heirs to most of their tenets flourish most as in the countreys of Gascongne Daulphine and Languedoc Chap. 23. King Almerick for his lazinesse deposed by the Pope WElcome the Holy land welcome Ptolemais How shallow and almost quite dry is the stream of Pilgrimes grown here since the Pope hath drained it with so large a by-chanel into France As for Almerick the idle King of Jerusalem we find him as we left him drowning his cares constantly in wine his hands being lazier then those are printed in the margent of a book which point what others should read whilest he would neither do nor order what should be done So true was it of him what is said of another Titularis non tutelaris Rex defuit non praefuit Reipublicae And now the warre betwixt Noradine Saladines sonne and Saphradine his uncle about the sovereignty lasting nine yeares ended with Saphradines death and Noradine contented himself with the government of Aleppo whilest Saphradines two sonnes shared his dominions Coradine commanding in Damascus and Syria and Meladine in Egypt The former of these without any resistance built a fort in mount Tabor to the great annoyance of the Christians To prevent farther mischief arising from Almericks negligence the Pope who would have a finger in every Crown and a hand in this deposed him from the Kingdome This Almerick grieved to lose what he was never carefull to keep soon after died for sorrow But how doth this agree with Marinus Sanutus who maketh him to die of a surfet of gilt-heads five yeares sooner and saith there was five yeares interregnum in Palestine wherein the Christians had no King at all Chap. 24. Iohn Bren made King of Ierusalem A most promising voyage into Palestine of new Pilgrimes which remove the seat of the warre into Egypt IN the place of Almerick the Pope appointed John de Bren a private French Gentleman to be King Who to twist his title with another string married Maria Iole the sole daughter of Conrade late King of Jerusalem This John had behaved himself right valiantly amongst other Latine Princes in the voyage against the Greeks and was a most martiall man as all do witnesse Onely one calleth him imbellem hominem why I know not except he be of that humour to delight to be one of the Antipodes treading opposite to a world of writers besides In the beginning of his reigne this accident whether monstrous or miraculous fell out In France a boy for his yeares went about singing in his own tongue Iesus Lord repair our losse Restore to us thy holy Crosse. Numberlesse children ranne after him and followed the same tune their captain and chanter did set them No bolts no barres no fear of fathers or love of mothers could hold them back but they would to the Holy land to work wonders there till their merry musick had a sad close all either perishing on land or drowned by sea It was done saith my authour by the instinct of the devil who as it were desired a cordiall of childrens bloud to comfort his weak stomach long cloyed with murdering of men Soon after began the Laterane Councel under Innocent the third Wherein many things were concluded for the recovery of the Holy land as That the Crosse should every where be preached with zeal and earnestnesse to procure Pilgrimes That all tiltings in Christendome for three yeares should be forbidden that so the spears of Christians might onely be broken against Infidels That Clergie-men that went this voyage might if need were mortgage their Church-livings for three yeares to provide themselves with present necessaries That all debters during their Pilgrimage though bound by oath in conscience the strongest specialty should be dispensed with to pay no use to their creditours who if Christians by excommunications if Jews were to be forced by the secular power to remit their interest That all Priests should contribute the twentieth part of their revenues for three yeares to advance this designe And lest saith his Holinesse we should seem to lay heavy burdens on others which we will not touch with our least finger we assigne a ship at our own cost to carry our Pilgrimes of the citie of Rome and disburse for the present what can be spared from our necessary expenses to the summe of thirty thousand pounds to further the project and for three yeares to come we and our brethren the Cardinals of Rome will fully pay the tenth of our Church-profits Hereupon next spring a numerous armie set forward to Palestine conducted by Pelagius the Popes Legate Andrew King of Hungarie who having washed himself in the river of Jordan would stay no longer but instantly returned home the three Electorall Archbishops with those of Liege Wirtzburg Bamberg Strassburg Paris c. Lewis Duke of Bavaria Leopold of Austria a navie of our English besides Florentines Genoans and many other nations The autumne they spent in the
rather watered then baptized affrighted with cruelty into Christianity deserve not to be accounted settled and well-grounded professours of their religion As for reconciliation betwixt the Grecians and Latines it is utterly improbable except the Greeks submit to the Popes Primacie which they will never do No hope then of their meeting together when neither party will stirre step towards other True it is some fourty yeares since anno 1594 the Bishops of little Russia a countrey following the Eastern Church but under the King of Poland on condition they would accept the Popes supremacie were dispensed with and permitted in other matters to adhere to the Greek Church and keep union with it the Pope manifesting herein that he aimeth not so much at the reduction of the Greeks to the truth as to his own obedience Besides the hatred they have against the Popes pride another great hindrance of the union is the small intercourse the Eastern Christians have or desire to have with the Western They live amongst the Turks and are grown to be contented slaves and having long since parted with their hopes now almost have lost their desire of liberty We must not forget how some fifty yeares ago solemn news was reported in Rome that the Patriarch of Alexandria with all the Greek Church in Africa by their Embassadours had submitted and reconciled themselves to the Pope and from him received Absolution and Benediction All which was a politick lie perchance therefore reported that it might make impression in the minds and raise and confirm the spirits of the vulgar who easily beleeve all that their betters tell them And though afterwards this report was controlled to be false yet mens spirits then being cold were not so sensible of it as before and the former news came to many mens eares who never heard afterwards of the check and confutation thereof Nor is there any State in the world that maketh such use and advantage as the Papall doth of false news To conclude As it is a maxime in Philosophy Ex quibus constamus ex iisdem nutrimur so a great part of their religion consisting of errours and falshoods it is suitable that accordingly it should be kept up and maintained with forgeries and deceits To return to Palestine This rent not in the seam but whole cloth betwixt these Churches was no mean hindrance to the Holy warre Formerly the Greeks in Syria were not so clearly cut asunder from the Latines but that they hung together by one great sinew in the common cause agreeing against the Turk the enemy to both But since this last breach the Greeks did in their desires propend and incline to the Turks being better contented they should conquer from whom they should have fair quarter free exercise of their religion and secure dwelling in any citie paying a set tribute then the Latines who they feared would force their consciences and bring their souls in subjection to the Popes supremacie Expect we then never hereafter that either their hearts or hands should afford any assistance to our Pilgrimes in their designes Some conceive that at this day if the Western Christians should stoutly invade Turkie with any likelihood to prevail the Greeks therein would runne to aid them But others are of a contrary judgement considering First the inveterate and inlaid hatred not to be washed off they bear the Latines Secondly the jealousie they have that they will never keep promise with them who have alwayes a warrant dormant from the Pope to break all contracts prejudiciall to the Romish Church Thirdly that custome and long continuance in slavery have so hardened and brawned their shoulders the yoke doth not wring them so much yea they had rather suffer the Turks being old full flies to suck them then to hazard their galled backs to new hungry ones finding by experience That they themselves live on better terms of servitude under the Turk lesse grated and grinded with exactions then some of their countrey-men do under the Latines for instance in Zante and Candie under the Venetians Chap. 7. Theobald King of Navarre maketh an unsuccessefull voyage into Palestine THe ten yeares truce by this time was expired which Frederick made with the Turks and Reinold Vice-roy of Palestine by instructions from him concluded another truce of the same term with them He saw that this young Christian Kingdome of Jerusalem like an infant would thrive best with sleeping with peace and quietnesse Nor was it any policie for him to move at all where there was more danger to hurt then hope to help their present estate But though this peace was honourable and profitable having no fault but that Frederick made it yet the Templars who did not relish the father must needs distast the child They complained that this peace was not used as a slumber to refresh the souldiers spirits but as a lethargie to benumme their valour and chiefly snarled at this indignity That the Turks had accesse to the temple of the Sepulchre and that Goats had free commonage in the Sheeps pasture Wherefore Pope Gregory to despite the Emperour Frederick caused the Dominicanes and Franciscanes his trumpeters to incite people to the Holy warre These were two twin-orders but the Dominicane the eldest which now were no sooner hatched in the world but presently chirped in the pulpits In that age Sermons were news and meat for Princes not common men Yea the Albingenses with their preaching had drowned the voices of secular Priests if these two Orders had not helped to out-noise those supposed hereticks These amplified with their rhetorick the calamity of the Christians tyrannie of the Turks merit of the cause probability of successe performing their parts with such gravity shew of devotion accents of passion not glued on for the present purpose but so naturall as from true affection that many were wooed to undertake the voyage Principally Theobald King of Navarre Almerick Earl of Montfort Henry of Champaigne Peter Earl of Bretaigne with many others of inferiour rank Ships they had none wherefore they were fain to shape their passage by land through Grecia where they were entertained with treachery famine and all the miseries which wait on distressed armies These came last that way I may say shut the doore For no Christian army ever after went that tedious journey by land Having passed the Bosporus they marched into Bithynia thence through Galatia they came unto the mountain Taurus where they were much damnified by the Turks who fell on and off upon them as they were advised by their own advantages The Christians desired no other gift but that a set battel might be given them which the Turks would not grant but played at distance and would never close But with much ado the Christians recovered to Antioch having scarce a third part of them left their horses all dead and themselves scarce mounted on their legs miserably weak as what the mercy of sword plague
this day confesse not to the beholders that any such cost was ever bestowed there He also caused the corpses of the Christians killed at the late battel at Gaza and hitherto unburied decently to be interred and appointed an annuall salarie to a Priest to pray for their souls Hereby he had the happinesse with little cost to purchase much credit and the living being much taken with kindnesse to the dead this burying of those Christians with pious persons wonne him as much repute as if he killed so many Turks At last the truce for ten yeares was concluded with the Sultan all Christian captives were discharged and set free many forts of them restored and matters for the main reduced to the same estate they were at the first peace with Frederick the Emperour and Richard returning through Sicily and by Rome where he visited his Holinesse safely came home to England Where he was welcomed with bad news that a discontented Cornish man banished for his misdemeanours had found out tinne-mines in Bohemia which afterwards more asswaged the swelling of this Earls bags then all his voyage to Palestine For till that time that metall was onely fetched from England which afforded meat to some forrein countreys and dishes to all His voyage was variously censured The Templars which consented not to the peace flouted thereat as if all this while he had laboured about a difficult nothing and as good never a whit as never the better for the agreement would never hold long Others thought he had abundantly satisfied any rationall expectation For he compelled saith one the Saracens to truce a strange compulsion without violence except the shewing of a scabbard he restored many to the life of their life their liberty which alone was worth all his pains the peace he concluded was honourable and a cheap Olive-branch is better then deare Bayes Two of our English Richards were at Palestine one famous for drawing his sword the other his purse He was also remarkable herein that he brought all his men and ships safe home next of kin to a miracle and none will deny but that in such dangerous adventures a saver is a gainer One good he got hereby This journey brought him into play amongst forrein Princes henceforward the beyond-sea-world took notice of him and he of it Never would he have had the face to have courted the Crown Imperiall if these his travels had not put boldnesse and audacity into him which made him afterwards a stiff rivall to bid for the Empire of Germany Chap. 9. The Corasines cruelly sack the city of Ierusalem and kill the Christians therein ABout this time though we find not the punctuall date thereof happened the death of Reinoldus Fredericks Lieutenant in Syria who by his moderation had been a good benefactour to the Holy warre But the Templars counted him to want metall because he would not be mad and causelesly break the truce with the Sultan In his grave was buried the happinesse of the Christians in Palestine for now the lawlesse Templars observe no other rule but their own will And now the inundation of the Tartarians in spite of all dammes and banks overranne the North of Asia and many nations fled from their own countreys for fear of them Amongst other the Corasines called by some Choermines and Groissoms a fierce and warlike people were notwithstanding by the Tartarians forced to forsake their land Being thus unkennelled they had their recourse to the Sultan of Babylon and petitioned him to bestow some habitation upon them Their suit he could neither safely grant nor deny A deniall would egge their discontents into desperatenesse and such sturdy dangerous vagabonds might do much harm to admit them to be joynt-tenants in the same countrey with the Turks was a present inconvenience and would be a future mischief In stead therefore of giving them a house he sent them to a work-house yet so that they apprehended it a great courtesie done unto them For he bestowed on them all the lands which the Christians held in Palestine liberall to give away what was none of his and what the others must purchase before they could enjoy The Sultan encouraged them to invade that countrey whose people he pretended were weak and few the land wealthy and fruitfull so that the conquest would be easie especially they having his assistance in the present service and perpetuall patronage hereafter Animated herewith in come the Corasines with their wives and children bringing their housholds with them to win houses and lands for them into Syria and march directly to Jerusalem which being a weak and unfortified place was taken without resistance Weak and unfortified Strange It is confessed on all sides that Frederick the Emperour and Reinoldus his Lieutenant spared no expense in strengthening this city since which time we find no solemn taking it by the Turks Who then can expect lesse then an impregnable place where so much cost was sown Which driveth us to conceive one of these three things Either that the weaknesse of this citie was chiefly in the defenders hearts Or else that formerly there happened some blind and silent dispoiling of this place not mentioned by Authours Or lastly that Jerusalem was a Jericho I mean a place cursed in building like Pharaohs lean kine never a whit the fatter for devouring much meat and which still went in rags though her friends bestowed change of raiment upon her Thus this city after that it had been possessed fifteen yeares by the Christians was wonne by this barbarous people never since regained to our religion Sleep Jerusalem sleep in thy ruines at this day of little beauty and lesse strength famous onely for what thou hast been The Christians flying out of Jerusalem with their families took their course towards Joppa but looking back beheld their own ensignes advanced on the citie-walls so done in policie by their enemies Whereupon their credulity thus commented That their fellows had beaten the Corasines in Jerusalem and by these banners invited them to return But going back they found but cold or rather too hot entertainment being slain every mothers child of them Dull nostrils not to sent so stale and rank a stratageme of their foes so often used so easily defeated not to send some spies to tast the bait before all swallowed it But men marked out for destruction will runne their own heads into the halter Chap. 10. Robert Patriarch of Ierusalem with the whole strength of the Christians conquered by the Corasines THe desperatenesse of the disease priviledgeth the taking of any Physick The Christians being now in deep distresse resolved on a dangerous course but as their case stood thought necessary For they made peace with the Sultan of Damascus and Seisser and with the Sultan of Cracci These were Dynastes in Syria of some good strength and were at discord with the Sultan of Babylon and swearing them to be faithfull borrowed an armie of their forces
with them joyntly to resist the Corasines seeking saith Frederick the Emperour to find fidem in perfidia trust in treachery Many suspected these auxiliary forces thinking though the forrest-wolves fell out with the mountain ones they would both agree against the sheep Robert Patriarch of Jerusalem was a most active commander over all S. Lukes day was the time agreed upon for the fatall battel neare Tiberias was the place As the Christians were ordering themselves in aray it was questioned in what part of their armie their new Turkish assistants should be disposed and concluded that they should be placed in the front where if they did no other good they would dull the appetite of their enemies sword This is thought to have been a notorious errour and cause of their overthrow For though those souldiers who mean to be false will never be made faithfull in what place soever they be bestowed yet may they be made lesse dangerous if cast into the body or main battel of the army whence they have no such scope to fling out and to take advantage of place to do mischief as they have either in the front or wings thereof Thus in Cesars time Crassus an experienced Generall under him being to bid the Gauls battel auxiliares copias quibus ad pugnam non multum confidebat in mediam aciem colloâ—â—vit that so being hemmed in before and behind they might be ingaged to fight manfully without starting away And to instance in later times our Richard the third who though he usurped the Crown had as none will deny a true title both to prowesse and martiall policie marching to Bosworth placed suspected persons whose bodies were with him and hearts with Earl Henry in the midst and those whom he most trusted before behind and on every side The battel being joyned the Turks ranne over to the other side though some braved them onely with cowardlinesse not treachery and that they fled from the battel but not fell to the enemies The Christians manfully stood to it and though over-powerd in number made a great slaughter of their enemies till at last they were quite overthrown Of the Teutonick Order escaped but three of three hundred Templars but eighteen of two hundred Hospitallers but nineteen The Patriarch to use his own words whom God reputed unworthy of martyrdome saved himself by flight with a few others And this great overthrow to omit lesse partner-causes is chiefly imputed to the Templars former so often breaking the truce with the Sultan of Babylon Thus were the Christians conquered by the Corasines and beaten by a beaten nation Palestine being wonne by those who could not keep their own countrey Improving this victorie they left nothing to the Christians but Tyre Ptolemais and Antioch with some few forts Soon after these Corasines elated herewith fell out with the Sultan himself who in anger rooted out their nation so that none of their name remained Yea all writers are silent of them both before this time and ever after as if God at this very instant had created this people to punish Christians which service performed they were annihilated again Chap. 11. Lewis the ninth setteth forward against the Turks The occasion of his journey and his attendants SOme two yeares after Lewis the ninth of that name King of France came to assist the Christians The occasion of his voyage this He had been visited with a desperate sicknesse insomuch that all art cried craven as unable to help him and the Physicians resigned him to Divines to begin with him where they ended They also gave him over and for a while he lay in a trance not the least breath brought news of any life left in him Then Blanch the Queen-mother and Queen of mothers for her care of her sonne and his Kingdome applied a piece of the Crosse unto him Thereat whether thereby let others dispute he revived and recovered and thereupon was Croised and in thankfulnesse bound himself with a vow to sail to the Holy land But his Nobility disswaded him from that designe The dangers were certain the successe would be doubtfull of so long a journey his own Kingdome would be left desolate and many mischiefs unseen as yet would appear in his absence Besides his vow was made in his sicknesse whilest reason was scarce as yet in the peaceable possession of his mind because of the remnant-dregs of his disease It might also be dispensed with by the Pope yea his deserts did challenge so much from his Holinesse King Lewis as perswaded hereat laid down the Crosse to the great comfort and contentment of all the beholders But then altering his countenance he required the Crosse should be restored to him again and vowed to eat no bread untill he was recognized with the Pilgrimes badge And because his vow should suffer no diminution or abatement from his disease now no longer Lewis the sick but Lewis the sound undertook the Holy warre His Nobles seeing him too stiff to be unbent and counting it a kind of sacrilegious counsel to disswade him from so pious a work left him to his own resolutions There went along with him his two brothers Charles Earl of Anjou Robert Earl of Artois his own Queen and their Ladies O do the Popes Legate Hugh Duke of Burgundie William Earl of Flanders Hugh Earl of St. Paul and William Longspath Earl of Sarisbury with a band of valiant English men who went without licence from Henry King of England For in those dayes this doctrine went currant That their Princes leave was rather of complement then essentiall to their voyage as if the band of this Holy warre was an acquittance from all others Our Henry displeased at this Earls departure for his disobedience deprived him of his Earldome and castle of Sarisbury not suffering that sheep to grase in his pasture which would not own him for his shepherd William also sonne to this Earl smarting for his fathers fault never enjoyed that honour And though King Henry himself being a Prince of more devotion then policie did most affectionately tender this Holy cause yet he used this necessary severity towards this Earl at this time first because it would weaken his land thus to be dispeopled of martiall men secondly his subjects forwardnesse might be interpreted a secret check of his own backwardnesse in that warre thirdly the sucking in of forrein aire did wean people from their naturall Prince and did insensibly usher into their hearts an alienation from their own Sovereigne and a dependence on the King of France lastly he had some thoughts on that voyage himself and reserved such prime Peers to attend on his own person thither The Pope gave to this King Lewis his charges the tenth of the Clergies revenues through France for three yeares and the King imployed the Popes collectours to gather it knowing those leaches were the best suckers Hereupon the states of the Clergie were
treasure to keep in pay so many souldiers for many moneths together But it is no time to dispute about unnecessary thrift when a whole Kingdome is brought into question to be subdued And because the landing-places in Egypt are of great disadvantage to the defendants yeelding them no shelter from the fury of their enemies artillery being all open places and plain the shores there being not shod against the sea with huge high rocks as they are in some other countreys because the land is low and level Meladine was forced to fortifie welnigh an hundred and eighty miles along the sea-side and what Nature had left bare Art put the more clothes on and by using of great industry such as by Tully is fitly termed horribilis industria in short space all that part of Egypt was fenced which respecteth the sea Winter being past Robert Duke of Burgundie and Alphonse King Lewis his brother arrived in Cyprus with a new armie and hereupon they concluded to set forward for Egypt and attempted to land neare Damiata But the governour thereof with a band of valiant souldiers stoutly resisted them Here was a doubtfull fight The Egyptians standing on the firm ground were thereby enabled to improve and inforce their darts to the utmost whilest the French in their ticklish boats durst not make the best of their own strength Besides those on land threw their weapons downwards from the forts they had erected so that the declivity and downfall did naturally second the violent impression of their darts How-ever the Infidels at last were here beaten with what commonly was their own weapon I mean multitude so that they fled into the town leaving behind them their governour and five hundred of their best souldiers dead on the shore Damiata was a strong city the taking whereof was accounted the good task of an armie for a yeare But now the Egyptians within were presented afresh with the memory of the miseries they indured in the last long siege by the Christians and fearing lest that tragedy should be acted over again set fire on their houses and in the night saved themselves by flight The French issuing in quenched the fire and rescued much corn and other rich spoil from the teeth of the flame Meladine much troubled with this losse to purchase peace offered the Christians all Jerusalem in as ample a manner as ever formerly they had enjoyed it all prisoners to be restored with a great summe of money to defray their charges and many other good conditions So that we may much wonder at his profusenesse in these profers and more at the Christians indiscretion in their refusall For though some advised to make much of so frank a chapman and not through covetousnesse to outstand their market yet the Popes Legate and Robert Earl of Artois heightened with pride that they could not see their profit and measuring their future victories by the largenesse of their first footing in Egypt would make no bargain except Alexandria the best port in Egypt were also cast in for vantage to make the conditions down-weight And King Lewis whose nature was onely bad because it was so good would in no wise crosse his brother in what he desired Whereupon the Turks seeing themselves in so desperate condition their swords being sharpened on extremity provided to defend their countrey to the utmost Chap. 14. Discords betwixt the French and English The death disposition of Meladine King of Egypt ABout this time brake out the dissensions betwixt the French and English The cause whereof as some say was for that the Earl of Sarisbury in sacking a fort got more spoil then the French But surely the foundation of their discontents lay much lower being an old enmity betwixt the two nations and Robert Earl of Artois used Earl William and his men with much discourtesie This Robert stood much on the Royaltie of his descent being brother to King Lewis though nothing of kin in conditions being as bountifull to deal injuries and affronts as the other alms and charitable deeds The English Earl though he stood on the lower ground in point of birth yet conceived himself to even him in valour and martiall knowledge And though godly King Lewis used all his holy-water to quench these heart-burnings his successe answered not his pains much lesse his desires onely his cooling perswasions laid their enmities for the present fairly asleep Amidst these broils died Meladine the Egyptian King A worthy Prince he was though some write very coursely of him as he must rise early yea not at all go to bed who will have every ones good word Let Christians speak of him as they found whose courtesies to them when they were half-drowned in Egypt if they will not confesse they deserve to be wholly drowned for their ingratitude In the latter end of his age he quite lost the good will of his subjects and lived unloved and died unlamented though a deserving and fortunate man which oftentimes covereth a multitude of faults The chief reason whereof was because they suspected him to be unsound in his religion and offering to Christianity Besides having reigned above thirty yeares his government became stale and good things if of long continuance grow tedious they being rather affected for their variety then true worth Lastly the rising sunne stole the adorers from the sunne setting and Melechsala his sonne being an active and promising Prince reigned before in mens desires over the Kingdome To him now they all applied themselves and having more wisdome in their generation then the Christians instantly ceased their private dissensions And now the Sultans of Damascus Aleppo and Babylon twisted themselves in a joynt agreement with Melechsala to defend their Mahometane religion Chap. 15. Robert Earl of Artois fighting with the Egyptians contrary to the counsel of the Master of the Templars is overthrown and drowned FRom Damiata the French marched up towards Cairo the governour whereof offended with Melechsala promised to deliver that regall citie to the French With some danger and more difficulty they passed an arm of Nilus being conducted by a fugitive Saracen to a place where it was foordable Hence Earl Robert marched forward with a third part of the army and suddenly assaulting the Turks in their tents whilest Melechsala was absent in solemnizing a feast put them to flight Hereupon this Earl proclaimed himself in his hopes Monarch of the world This blow made his enemies reel the next would fell them Now speed was more needfull then strength This late victory though gotten was lost if not used What though they were not many the fewer the adventurers the greater the gain Let them therefore forwards and set on the whole power of the Turks which was incamped not farre off But the Master of the Templars in whom the sap of youth was well dried up advised the Earl to stay and digest the honour he had gotten expecting the arrivall of the rest of
onely exchange their slavery by becoming vassals to their own passions Yet many of them in their kinds were worthy Princes for government no whit inferiour to those which are advantaged with royall birth and breeding Secondly it is a wonder they should be so neglective of their own children How many make an idol of their posterity and sacrifice themselves unto it stripping themselves out of necessaries to provide their heirs a wardrobe yea it is a principle in most moderate minds to advance their posterity thinking hereby in a manner they overcome death and immortalize their memories in leaving their names and honours to their children Whereas the contrary appeared in these Mammalukes Thirdly it is admirable that they fell not out in the election of their Prince being in a manner all equall amongst themselves We see elective States in Christendome though bound with the straitest laws often sagge aside into schismes and factions whereas this strange Empire in their choice had no dangerous discords but such as were quenched in the kindling Lastly who ever knew a wall that had no better cement to stand so sure and so long Two hundred sixty and seven yeares this State endured and yet had it to do with strong and puissant enemies Some Kingdomes ow their greatnesse not so much to their own valour and wisdome as to the weaknesse of their neighbours but it fared not thus with the Mammalukes To omit Prester John who neighboured them on the south on all other sides they were encompassed with potent opposers From whom right valiantly they defended themselves till in the yeare 1517 they were overcome by Selimus the great Turkish Emperour To conclude As for the Amazons and their brave atchievements with much valour and no manhood they and their State had onely being in the brains of fabulous writers As for the Assasines or regiment of rogues it never spread to the breadth of any great countrey nor grew to the height of a Kingdome but being the jakes of the world was cast out in a place betwixt barren hills But this Empire of vassals was every way wonderfull stretching so farre over all Egypt and most of Syria and lasting so long A strange State wherein slavery was the first step to their throne and apostasie the first article in their religion Chap. 20. The manner of the death of Frederick King of Ierusalem His Will and posterity after him An interregnum both in Germanie and the Kingdome of Ierusalem IN this same yeare Frederick King of Jerusalem and Emperour of Germany ended his troublesome dayes A Prince who in the race of his life met with many rubs some stumbles no dangerous falls Besides the Turk he had to do with the Pope the Pope immortall in his succession And though his Holinesse was unfit for warre as being alwayes old and never ripe for that place till almost rotten yet he used his own head and commanded the hands of others whereby he kept Frederick in a continuall warre Yet never could he have beaten him with fair play had he not used a weapon if not against the law of Arms against the law of God and against which no guard Arming his subjects against him and Dispensing with the oath of allegeance But he gave Frederick the mortall wound in setting himself against himself I mean Henry his eldest sonne And though Frederick easily conquered that rebellious youth and made him fast enough keeping him in prison in Apulia where he died yet he carried the grief hereof to his grave For now he knew not where or in whom to place any confidence as suspecting the single cord of Loyaltie would not hold in others which brake in his own sonne though twisted with Naturall affection The greatnesse of his spirit was a great hastening of his death and being of a keen eager and active nature the sharpnesse of the sword cut the scabbard the sooner asunder Bowe he could not break he must What-ever is reported he died of no other poison then sorrow which ushered him into a wasting ague grief being a burden whereof the strongest shoulders can bear the least As for the fame that Maufred his base sonne should stifle him with a pillow though I must confesse he might be taken on suspicion as likely enough to play such a devilish prank yet it is unreasonable that he who is acquitted by the Authours of the same time should be condemned on the evidence of the writers of after-ages He died at Florence in an obscure castle on S. Lucies day having reigned King of Jerusalem three and twenty yeares By his Will he bequeathed many ounces of gold to the Knights Templars and Hospitallers in recompense of the wrongs they had received by him He left a great summe of money for the recovery of the Holy land to be disposed at the discretion of the foresaid Knights He forbad any stately funerall for himself though in his life immoderately excessive in pomp as if he would do penance for his pride after death A Prince who had he not been hindred with domesticall discords would have equalized Cesar himself For if thus bravely he laid about him his hands being tied at home with continuall dissensions what would he have done if at liberty A scandal is raised since his death That he was but a millers sonne but he would have ground them to powder who in his life-time durst have averred it Indeed he was very happy in mechanicall matters such as we may term Liberall handy-crafts as casting founding carving in iron and brasse Neither did this argue a low soul to dabble in such mean imployments but rather proved the amplitude and largenesse thereof of so generall acquaintance that no Art was a stranger to him But the suspicion of his birth rose from the almost miraculous manner of it Constantia his mother bearing him when welâ—igh sixty yeares of age But both in Scripture and other writers we may see the sonnes of long-barren mothers to have been fruitfull in famous atchievements Pity it was that he had some faults yea pity it had been if he had not had some But his vices indeed were notorious and unexcusable Many wives and concubines he had and by them many children His wives His legitimate children Their preferment 1. Constantia Queen of Aragon Henry who rebelled against him King of the Romanes 2. Iole daughter to John Bren. Conrade Duke of Suevia 3. Agnes daughter to the Marquesse of Moravia childlesse divorced   4. Rutina   5. Isabella of Bavaria Agnes Married to Conrade Landtgrave of Hessen 6. Mawd daughter to John King of England Constance His â—â—se sonnes Wife to Lewis Landâ—grave of Hessen His concubine   Blanch. 1. Henzius King of Sardinia 2. Maufred Usurper of Sicily 3. Frederick Prince of Antioch It is much that succession adventured in so many severall bottoms should miscarry Yet these foure sonnes dying left no lasting issue and in the third generation
the very ruines as thirsty of revenge killing those that ruined them Serapha evened all to the ground and lest the Christians should ever after land here demolished all buildings the Turks holding this position That the best way to be rid of such vermine is to shave the hair clean off and to destroy all places wherein they may nestle themselves Some say he plowed the ground whereon the city stood and sowed it with corn but an eye-witnesse affirmeth that still there remain magnificent ruines seeming rather wholly to consist of divers conjoyned castles then any way intermingled with private dwellings No fewer then an hundred thousand Latine Christians all that were left in Syria fled at this time into Cyprus It is strange what is reported That above five hundred matrones and virgins of noble bloud standing upon the shore of Ptolemais and having all their richest jewels with them cried out with lamentable voice and profered to any mariner that would undertake safely to land them any-where all their wealth for his hire and also that he should choose any one of them for his wife Then a certain mariner came and transporting them all freely safely landed them in Cyprus nor by any enquiry could it after be known when he was sought for to receive his hire who this mariner was nor whither he went The Hospitallers for haste were fain to leave their treasure behind them and hide it in a vault which being made known from time to time to their successours was fetched from thence by the galleys of Malta about three hundred yeares afterwards Henry King of Cyprus to his great cost and greater commendation gave free entertainment to all Pilgrimes that fled hither till such time as they could be transported to their own countreys and thanks was all the shot expected of these guests at their departure Thus after an hundred ninety and foure yeares ended the Holy warre for continuance the longest for money spent the costliest for bloudshed the cruellest for pretenses the most pious for the true intent the most politick the world ever saw And at this day the Turks to spare the Christians their pains of coming so long a journey to Palestine have done them the unwelcome courtesie to come more then half the way to give them a meeting The end of the fourth Book A Supplement of the Historie of the HOLY WARRE Book V. Chap. 1. The executing of the Templars in France MY task is done Whatsoever remaineth is voluntary over-measure onely to hemme the end of our historie that it ravel not out As to shew What became of the Templars the Teutonick Order and the Hospitallers What were the hindrances of this warre What nation best deserved in it What offers were afterwards made to recover Jerusalem By how many challengers that title at this day is claimed What is the present strength of Jerusalem What hope to regain it with some other passages which offer attendance on these principall heads Know then Some nineteen yeares after the Christians had lost all in Palestine the Templars by the cruel deed of Pope Clement the fifth and foul fact of Philip the Fair King of France were finally exstirpated out of all Christendome The historie thereof is but in twilight not clearly delivered but darkened with many doubts and difficulties We must pick out letters and syllables here and there as well as we may all which put together spell thus much Pope Clement having long sojourned in France had received many reall courtesies from Philip the King yea he owed little lesse then himself to him At last Philip requested of him a boon great enough for a King to ask and a Pope to grant namely all the lands of the Knights Templars through France forfeited by reason of their horrible heresies and licentious living The Pope was willing to gratifie him in some good proportion for his favours received as thankfulnesse is alwayes the badge of a good nature and therefore being thus long the Kings guest he gave him the Templars lands and goods to pay for his entertainment On a sudden all the Templars in France they clapt into prison wisely catching those Lions in a net which had they been fairly hunted to death would have made their part good with all the dogs in France Damnable sinnes were laid to their charge as sacrificing of men to an idol they worshipped rosting of a Templars bastard and drinking his bloud spitting upon the crosse of Christ conspiring with Turks and Saracens against Christianitie Sodomie bestialitie with many other villanies out of the rode of humane corruption and as farre from mans nature as Gods law Well the Templars thus shut in prison their crimes were half-proved The sole witnesse against them was one of their own Order a notorious malefactour who at the same time being in prison and to suffer for his own offenses condemned by the Master of their Order sought to prove his own innocency by charging all his own Order to be guiltie And his case standing thus he must either kill or be killed die or put others to death he would be sure to provide water enough to drive the mill and swore most heartily to whatsoever was objected against the Order Besides the Templars being brought upon the rack confessed the accusations to be true wherewith they were charged Hereupon all the Templars through France were most cruelly burned to death at a stake with James the grand Master of their Order Chap. 2. Arguments produced on either side both for the innocencie and guiltinesse of the Templars THere is scarce a harder question in later historie then this Whether the Templars justly or unjustly were condemned to suffer On the one side it is dangerous to affirm they were innocent because condemned by the Pope infallible in matters of such consequence This bugbear affrighteth many and maketh their hands shake when they write hereof If they should say the Templars were burned wrongfully they may be fetched over the coals themselves for charging his Holinesse so deeply yea hereby they bring so much innocent bloud on the Popes head as is enough to drown him Some therefore in this matter know little and dare speak lesse for fear of after-claps Secondly some who suspect that one eye of the Church may be dimme yet hold that both the eyes the Pope and generall Councel together cannot be deceived Now the Councel of Vienne countenanced the exstirpation of the Templars determined the dissolution of their Order and adjudged their lands to be conferred on the Knights-Hospitallers Men ought then to be well advised how they condemn a generall Councel to be accessorie post factum to the murder of so many men For all this those who dare not hollow do whisper on the other side accounting the Templars not malefactours but martyrs First because the witnesse was unsufficient a malefactour against his Judge and secondly they bring tortured men against themselves Yea there want not those that
maintain that a confession extorted on the rack is of no validitie If they be weak men and unable to endure torment they will speak any thing and in this case their words are endited not from their heart but outward limbes that are in pain and a poore conquest it is to make either the hand of a child to beat or the tongue of the tortured man to accuse himself If they be sturdie and stubborn whose backs are paved against torments such as bring brasen sides against steely whips they will confesse nothing And though these Templars were stout valiant men yet it is to be commended to ones consideration whether slavish and servile souls will not better bear torment then generous spirits who are for the enduring of honourable danger and speedie death but not provided for torment which they are not acquainted with neither is it the proper object of valour Again it is produced in their behalf that being burned at the stake they denied it at their death though formerly they had confessed it and whose charitie if not stark-blind will not be so tender-eyed as to beleeve that they would not breathe out their soul with a lie and wilfully contract a new guilt in that very instant wherein they were to be arraigned before the Judge of heaven A Templar being to be burned at Burdeaux and seeing the Pope and King Philip looking out at a window cried unto them Clement thou cruel tyrant seeing there is no higher amongst mortall men to whom I should appeal for my unjust death I cite thee together with King Philip to the tribunal of Christ the just Judge who redeemed me there both to appear within one yeare and a day where I will lay open my cause and justice shall be done without any by-respect In like manner James grand Master of the Templars though by piecemeal he was tortured to death craved pardon of God and those of his Order That forced by extremitie of pain on the rack and allured with hope of life he had accused them of such damnable sinnes whereof they were innocent Moreover the people with their suffrage acquitted them happie was he that could get an handfull of their ashes into his bosome as the Relique of pious martyrs to preserve Indeed little heed is to be given to peoples humours whose judgement is nothing but prejudice and passion and commonly envie all in prosperitie pitie all in adversitie though often both undeservedly And we may beleeve that the beholding of the Templars torments when they were burned wrought in the people first a commiserating of their persons and so by degrees a justifying of their cause However vulgus non semper errat aliquando eligit and though it matters little for the gales of a private mans fansie yet it is something when the wind bloweth from all corners And true it is they were generally cried up for innocents Lastly Pope Clement and King Philip were within the time prefixed summoned by death to answer to God for what they had done And though it is bad to be busie with Gods secrets yet an argument drawn from the event especially when it goeth in company with others as it is not much to be depended on so it is not wholly to be neglected Besides King Philip missed of his expectation and the morsel fell besides his mouth for the lands of the Templars which were first granted to him as a portion for his youngest sonne were afterwards by the Councel of Vienne bestowed on the Knights-Hospitallers Chap. 3. A moderate way what is to be conceived of the suppression of the Templars BEtwixt the two extremities of those that count these Templars either Malefactours or Martyrs some find a middle way whose verdict we will parcel into these severall particulars 1. No doubt there were many novices and punies amongst them newly admitted into their Order which if at all were little guiltie for none can be fledge in wickednesse at their first hatching To these much mercie belonged The punishing of others might have been an admonition to them and crueltie it was where there were degrees of offenses to inflict the same punishment and to put all of them to death 2. Surely many of them were most hainous offenders Not to speak what they deserved from God who needeth not pick a quarrel with man but alwayes hath a just controversie with him they are accounted notorious transgressours of humane laws yet perchance if the same candle had been lighted to search as much dust and dirt might have been found in other Orders 3. They are conceived in generall to be guiltlesse and innocent from those damnable sinnes wherewith they were charged Which hainous offenses were laid against them either because men out of modestie and holy horrour should be ashamed and afraid to dive deep in searching the ground-work and bottome of these accusations but rather take them to be true on the credit of the accusers or that the world might the more easily be induced to beleeve the crimes objected to be true as conceiving otherwise none would be so devilish as to lay such devilish offenses to their charge or lastly if the crimes were not beleeved in the totall summe yet if credited in some competent portion the least particular should be enough to do the deed and to make them odious in the world 4. The chief cause of their ruine was their extraordinary wealth They were feared of many envied of more loved of none As Naboths vineyard was the chiefest ground for his blasphemie and as in England Cornwall Lord Fanhop said merrily That not he but his stately house at Ampthill in Bedfordshire was guiltie of high treason so certainly their wealth was the principall evidence against them and cause of their overthrow It is quarrel and cause enough to bring a sheep that is fat to the shambles We may beleeve King Philip would never have took away their lives if he might have took their lands without putting them to death but the mischief was he could not get the hony unlesse he burnt the bees Some will say The Hospitallers had great yea greater revenues nineteen thousand Mannors to the Templars nine thousand yet none envied their wealth It is true but then they busied themselves in defending of Christendome maintaining the Island of Rhodes against the Turks as the Teutonick order defended Spruce-land against the Tartarian the world therefore never grudged them great wages who did good work These were accounted necessarie members of Christendome the Templars esteemed but a superfluous wenne they lay at rack and manger and did nothing who had they betook themselves to any honourable employment to take the Turks to task either in Europe or Asia their happinesse had been lesse repined at and their overthrow more lamented And certain it is that this their idlenesse disposed them for other vices as standing waters are most subject to putrifie I heare one bird sing a different note
from all the rest in the wood namely that what specious shews soever were pretended the true cause of their ruine was that they began to desert the Pope and adhere to the Emperour If this was true no doubt they were deeply guiltie and deserved the hard measure they suffered Sure I am how-ever at this time they might turn edge they had formerly been true blades for his Holinesse All Europe followed the copie that France had set them Here in England King Edward the second of that name suppressed the Order and put them to death So by vertue of a writ sent from him to Sir John Wogan Lord chief Justice in Ireland were they served there and such was the secrecie of the contrivance of the businesse that the storm fell upon them before they saw it and all crannies were so closely stopped that none could steal a glimpse of the mischief intended against them In Germanie they found some mercie and milder dealing for Hugh Wildgrave coming with twenty of his Order all in armour into a Councel of Dutch Bishops who intended to execute the sentence of the Pope upon them there protested his innocencie and appealed to the next Pope who should succeed Clement as to his competent judge Hereupon their lives were spared onely they were forced to renounce the name of Templars and to enter themselves into other Orders chiefly of Hospitallers and Teutonicks on whom their lands were bestowed We will conclude all with that resolution of a brace of Spanish writers who make this epilogue to this wofull tragedie Concerning these Templars whether they were guiltie or not let us suspend our censure till the day of judgement and then and no sooner shall we certainly be informed therein Chap. 4. Of the Teutonick Order When they left Palestine and on what conditions they were entertained in Prussia Their Order at last dissolved FRequent mention hath been formerly made of the Teutonick Order or that of Dutch Knights who behaved themselves right valiantly clean through the Holy warre And which foundeth much to their honour they cannot be touched either for treason or faction but were both loyall and peaceable in the whole service But at last they perceived that by the course of the cards they must needs rise losers if they continued the warre in the Holy land and even resolved to abandon it It happened at the same time that Conrade Duke of Mazovia offered them most honourable conditions namely the enjoying of Prussia on condition they would defend it against the Infidels which annoyed it Indeed the fratres gladiferi or sword-bearing brothers brave slashing lads undertook that task but finding either their arms too weak or swords too blunt to strike through their enemies they imployed the aid of and conjoyned themselves to this Teutonick Order Hereupon in the yeare of our Lord 1239 Hermannus de Saltza fourth Master of these Dutch Knights came with most of his Order into Prussia yet so that he left a competent number of them still in Palestine which continued and did good service there even to the taking of Ptolemais But the greater number of these Dutch Knights in Prussia did knight-service against the Tartarians and were Christendomes best bank against the inundations of those barbarous people By their endeavours the Prussians which before were but heathen-Christians were wholly converted many a brave citie builded specially Marienburg where formerly a great oak stood who would think so many beautifull buildings would spring out of the root of one tree and those countreys of Prussia and Livonia which formerly were the course list are now become the rich fringe of Europe At last the Prussians grew weary of the tyrannous oppression of those Dutch Knighâ—â— as appeareth by the grievances they presented and applied themselves to Casimire King of Poland He took to task Lewis Erlinsufe the Master of their Order and so ordered him that whereas before he pleaded himself to be a free Prince of the Empire hereafter he should acknowledge the King of Poland for his Lord and Master The successours to this Lewis fretted against this agreement as prejudiciall to them They could do no lesse then complain and could do little more for the King of Poland in spite of their resistance held them to their agreements Albert of the house of Brandenburg was the last grand Master of this Order and first Duke of Prussia He brake the vow of their Order losing his virginitie to keep his chastitie and married Dorothie daughter to the King of Denmark The other Teutonicks protested against him and chose Gualther Croneberg in his room Yea Albert was proscribed in a Diet in Germanie and his goods confiscated but the proscription never executed the Emperour of Germanie being the same time employed in matters of greater moment which more nearly concerned himself And thus in this Albert for ought we can find to the contrarie the Teutonick Order had its end and was quite dissolved Chap. 5. The severall flittings of the Knights-Hospitallers from Cyprus by Rhodes Nice Syracuse to Malta WE must now wait on the Hospitallers to their lodgings and we have done We left them driven from Ptolemais and landed at Cyprus where King Henry courteously entertained them But a friends house is no home Hence therefore they were conveyed to their severall Alberges in Europe But such active spirits could not long be idle such running streams would not end in a standing pond Wherefore they used all their own strength and improved their interest with all their benefactours to furnish out a fleet Which done under Fulk de Vilderet their grand Master they wonne the Island of Rhodes from the Turks eighteen yeares after Ptolemais was lost and there seated themselves Besides Rhodes they also enjoyed these five adjacent Islands saith my Authour Nicoria Episcopia Iolli Limonia and Sirana places so small that consulting with maps will not find them out enough almost to make us think with Tertullian of Delos that once there were such Islands which at this day are quite vanished away Two hundred and fourteen yeares to the terrour of the Turks comfort of the Christians and their own immortall fame they maintained this Island and secured the seas for the passage of Pilgrimes to Jerusalem till at last in the yeare 1523 after six moneths siege they surrendred the citie to their own honour and shame of other Christians who sent them no succour in season Yet changing their place they kept their resolution to be honourably imployed Hence they sailed to Nice in Piemont a citie lying opposite to Africa from whence the Moores and Saracens much infested Christendome Wherefore Charles Duke of Savoy bestowed that citie upon them to defend it counting the courtesie rather done to him then by him that they would accept it Afterwards they perceived it was more needfull to stop the Turks invasions then their pillagings They had lately wonne Buda and as it was thought would quickly stride over the Adriatick sea
and have at Italie Wherefore the Hospitallers left Nice and planted themselves at Syracuse in Sicilie Where they right valiantly behaved themselves in defending that countrey But Charles the fifth a politick Prince though he saw their help was usefull yet desired not much to have them live in his own countrey He liked their neighbourhood better then their presence to have them rather neare then in his Kingdome Wherefore he appointed them the Island of Malta to keep for themselves their grand Master onely paying yearly to the King of Spain a Falcon in acknowledgement they held it from him Loth were the Hospitallers to leave Sicilie that Paradise of pleasure and went very unwillingly from it Malta is an Island in the mid-land-sea seated betwixt Europe and Africa as if it meant to escape out of both as being in neither Here S. Paul suffered shipwrack when the viper stung him not but the men did condemning him for a murderer And here the Hospitallers seated themselves and are the bulwark of Christendome to this day giving dayly evident proof of their courage But their master-piece was in the yeare 1565 when they couragiously defended the citie of Malta besieged by Soliman When he discharged seventie eight thousand bullets some of them seven spans in compasse against it big enough not onely to overthrow walls but overturn mountains yet notwithstanding they held out valiantly five moneths and at last forced the Turk to depart These Knights of Malta are at this day a good bridle to Tunis and Algiers I am informed by a good friend who hath spent much yet lost no time in those parts that these Knights are bound by vow not to flie from the Turks though one man or one galley to foure half which ods Hercules himself durst not venture on but if there be five to one it is interpreted wisdome not cowardlinesse to make away from them Also if a Christian ship wherein there is a Knight of Malta take a Turkish ship that Knight is bound by his Order first to go aboard to enter it The grand Master of this Order hath a great command and is highly esteemed of insomuch that the authour of the Catalogue of the glory of the world beleeveth he is to take place next to absolute Kings above all other temporall Princes even above Kings subject to the Empire Sure he meaneth if they will give it him otherwise it seemeth improper that the alms-man should take place of his benefactours Yet the Lord Prior of the Hospitallers in England was chief Baron of the Realm and had precedencie of all other Lords and here his Order flourished with great pomp till their finall period which I now come to relate Chap. 6. The Hospitallers in England stoutly withstand three severall assaults which overthrew all other Religious foundations THe suppression of the Hospitallers in England deserveth especiall notice because the manner thereof was different from the dissolving of other Religious houses for manfully they stood it out to the last in despite of severall assaults 1. Cardinall Wolsey by leave from the Pope suppressed certain small houses of little value therewithall to endow his Colledges in Oxford and Ipswich He first shewed Religious places were mortall which hitherto had flourished in a seeming eternitie This leading case of Wolseys did pick the morter out of all the Abbey-walls in England and made a breach in their strongest gate-houses teaching covetousnesse an apt scholar a readie way to assault them For it is the dedication not the value of the thing dedicated stampeth a character of sacrednesse upon it And King Henry the eighth concluded if the Cardinall might eat up the lean Covents he himself might feed on the fat ones without danger of a sacrilegious surfet True it is Wolsey not wholly but in part alienated the lands of these pettie houses reserving them still to the generall end of pious uses But the King followed this pattern so farre as it was for his purpose and neglected the rest 2. For not long after the Parliament granted him all Religious houses of and under the value of two hundred pounds yearly and it was thought that above ten thousand persons masters and servants lost their livelihoods by the demolishing of them And for an introduction to the suppression of all the residue he had a strait watch set upon them and the Regulars therein tied to a strict and punctuall observation of their orders without any relaxation of the least libertie insomuch that many did quickly un-nunne and disfriar themselves whose sides formerly used to go loose were soon galled with strait lacing 3. Then followed the grand dissolution or judgement-day on the world of Abbeys remaining which of what value soever were seised into the Kings hands The Lord Cromwell one of excellent parts but mean parentage came from the forge to be the hammer to maul all Abbeys Whose magnificent ruines may lesson the beholders That it is not the firmnesse of the stone nor fastnesse of the morter maketh strong walls but the integritie of the inhabitants For indeed foul matters were proved against some of them as Sodomie and much uncleannesse Whereupon unwillingly willing they resigned their goods and persons to the Kings mercie But the Knights-Hospitallers whose chief mansion was at St-Johns nigh London being Gentlemen and souldiers of ancient families and high spirits would not be brought to present the King such puling petitions and publick recognitions of their errours as other Orders had done They complained it was a false consequence as farre from charitie as logick from the induction of some particular delinquents to inferre the guiltinesse of all Religious persons Wherefore like stout fellows they opposed any that thought to enrich themselves with their ample revenues and stood on their own defense and justification Chap. 7. The Hospitallers at last got on an advantage and suppressed BUt Barnabe's day it self hath a night and this long-lived Order which in England went over the graves of all others came at last to its own They were suffered to have rope enough till they had haltered themselves in a Praemunire For they still continued their obedience to the Pope contrary to their allegeance whose usurped authoritie was banished out of the land and so though their lives otherwise could not be impeached for any vitiousnesse they were brought within the compasse of the law The case thus standing their deare friends perswaded them to submit to the Kings mercie and not to capitulate with him on conditions nor to stop his favour by their own obstinacie but yeeld whilest as yet terms honest and honourable would be freely given them That such was the irresistiblenesse of the Kings spirit that like a torrent it would bear down any thing which stood betwixt him and his desires If his anger were once inflamed nothing but their bloud could quench it Let them not flatter themselves into their own ruine by relying on the aid of their friends at
own bowels Yet such was her charitie that whilest her own house was on burning she threw some buckets of water to quench her neighbours and as other nations cast their superfluitie she her widows mite into the treasurie of this action and produceth two Theobalds Kings of Navarre and Alphonse King of Castile that undertook expeditions to Palestine Hungary sheweth one King Andrew who washed himself in Jordan and then shrinking in the wetting returned presently home again But this countrey though it self did go little yet was much gone through to the Holy warre being the rode to Syria for all land-armies and merited well in this action in giving peaceable passage and courteous entertainment to Pilgrimes as to Duke Godfrey and Frederick Barbarossa with all their souldiers as they travelled through it Had the Kings of Hungarie had the same principle of basenesse in their souls as the Emperours of Grecia they had had the same cause of jealousie against the Christians that passed this way yet they used them most kindly and disdained all dishonourable suspicions True it is at the first voyage King Coloman not out of crueltie but carefulnesse and necessarie securitie did use his sword against some unruly and disorderly Pilgrimes but none were there abused which first abused not themselves But what-ever Hungarie was in that age it is at this day Christendomes best land-bulwark against the Turks Where this prettie custome is used That the men wear so many feathers as they have killed Turks which if observed elsewhere either feathers would be lesse or valour more in fashion Poland could not stirre in this warre as lying constant perdue of Christendome against the Tartarian yet we find Boleslaus Crispus Duke or King thereof waiting on shall I say or accompanying Conrade the Emperour in his voyage to Palestine and having defraid all his and his armies costs and charges towards Constantinople he returned home as not to be spared in his own countrey But if by King Davids statute the keepers of the baggage are to be sharers in the spoil with the fighters of the battel then surely Poland and such other countreys may entitle themselves to the honour of the warre in Palestine which in the mean time kept home had an eye to the main chance and defended Europe against forrein invaders Norway in that age the sprucest of the three Kingdomes of Scandia and best tricked up with shipping though at this day the case is altered with her and she turned from taking to paying of tribute sent her fleet of tall souldiers to Syria who like good fellows asked nothing for their work but their victuals and valiantly wonne the citie of Sidon for the King of Jerusalem And it is considerable that Syria but a step or stride from Italie was a long race from Norway so that their Pilgrimes went not onely into another countrey but into another world Denmark was also partner in the foresaid service Also afterwards Ericus her King though he went not quite through to the Holy land yet behaved himself bravely in Spain and there assisted the winning of Lisbon from the Infidels His successour Canutus anno 1189 had provided his navie but was prevented by death his ships neverthelesse came to Syria Of Sweden in this grand-jurie of nations I heare no Vous avez but her default of appearance hath been excused before Chap. 23. Of the Scottish Welsh and Irish their severall adventures THere remain behind the Scottish Welsh and Irish. It may occasion suspicion that these nations either did neglect or are neglected in this Holy warre because clean through this Historie there is no mention of them or their atchievements True it is these countreys can boast of no King of their own sent to Syria nor of any great appearing service by them alone performed It seemeth then they did not so much play the game themselves as bet on the hands of others and haply the Scottish service is accounted to the French the Welsh and Irish to the English That Scotland was no ciphre in this warre plainly appeareth 1. In that David Earl of Huntington and younger brother to William the Elder King of Scotland went along with our Richard the first no doubt suitably attended with souldiers This David was by a tempest cast into Egypt taken captive by the Turks bought by a Venetian brought to Constantinople there known and redeemed by an English merchant and at last safely arrived at Alectum in Scotland which Alectum he in memorie and gratitude of his return called Dundee or Dei donum Gods gift 2. By the plentifull provision which there was made for the Templars and Hospitallers Who here enjoyed great priviledges this amongst many others Take the Scottish law in its pure naturals That the Master of the Knicts of the Temple and cheefe Priors of the Hospitall of Jerusalem wha were keepers of strangers to the Haly grave sould be receaved themselves personally in any suit without entertaining a procuratour for them Nor must we here forget a Saint William a Scot of Perth by birth by trade a baker in charitie so abundant that he gave his tenth loaf to the poore in zeal so fervent that he vowed to visit the Holy land But in his journey as he passed through Kent he was slain by his servant buried at Rochester afterwards Sainted and shewed many miracles Neither may we think whilest all other nations were at this Martiall school that Wales the while truanted at home The Welsh saith my Authour left their forrests and now with them no sport to the hunting of Turks especially after that Wizo and Walter his sonne had founded the fair Commandrie for Hospitallers at Slebach in Pembroke-shire and endowed it with rich revenues Ireland also putteth in for her portion of honour in this service Indeed for the first fourescore yeares in the Holy warre Ireland did little there or in any other countrey It was divided into many pettie Kingdomes so that her peoples valour had no progressive motion in length to make any impression in forrein parts but onely moved round in a circle at home their pettie Reguli spending themselves against themselves till our Henry the second conquered them all After which time the Irish began to look abroad into Palestine witnesse many houses for Templars and the stately Priorie of Kilmainam nigh Dublin for Hospitallers the last Lord Prior whereof at the dissolution was Sir John Rawson Yea we may well think that all the consort of Christendome in this warre could have made no musick if the Irish Harp had been wanting Chap. 24. Of the honourable Arms in scutcheons of Nobilitie occasioned by their service in the Holy warre NOw for a corollarie to this storie if we survey the scutcheons of the Christian Princes and Nobilitie at this day we shall find the Arms of many of them pointing at the atchievements of their predecessours in the Holy warre Thus the
senselesse ignorant profession it is not able to go to the cost of a controversie And all colours may well agree in the dark Next the strength followeth the wealth yea it is part thereof For all rich Kingdomes may be strong and purchase artificiall fortification The certain and constant revenues of the great Turk are not great if withall we consider the spatiousnesse of his Dominions Some have mounted his ordinarie yearly in-come to eight millions of gold But men guesse by uncertain aim at Princes revenues especially if they be so remote We may beleeve that in their conjecture herein though they misse the mark they hit the butt Farre greater might his intrado be if husbandrie and chiefly merchandise were plied in his countrey merchants being the Vena porta of a Kingdome without which it may have good limbes but emptie veins and nourish little Now although this Empire be of a vast extent having many safe harbours to receive strangers there and Staple commodities chiefly if industrie were used to allure them thither yet hath it in effect but foure prime places of trading Constantinople Cairo Aleppo and Tauris As for the extraordinarie revenues of the Grand Signor by his escheats and other courses if he pleaseth to take them they are a Nemo scit For in effect he is worth as much as all his subjects or slaves rather throughout his whole Empire are worth his spunges to squeeze at pleasure But the Lion is not so fierce as he is painted nor this Empire so formidable as fame giveth it out The Turks head is lesse then his turbant and his turbant lesse then it seemeth swelling without hollow within If more seriously it be considered this State cannot be strong which is a pure and absolute tyrannie His subjects under him have nothing certain but this That they have nothing certain and may thank the Grand Signor for giving them whatsoever he taketh not away from them Their goods they hold by permission not proprietie not sure that either they or theirs shall reap what they sow or eat what they reap and hereupon husbandrie is wholly neglected For the plowman as well as the ground he ploweth will be soon out of heart if not maintained and as I may say composted with hopes to receive benefit by his labours Here great officers if they love themselves must labour not to be beloved for popularitie is high treason and generally wealth is a sinne to be expiated by death In a word it is a cruel tyrannie bathed in the bloud of their Emperours upon every succession a heap of vassals and slaves no Nobles except for time being by office no Gentlemen no Free-men no inheritance of land no Stirp or ancient families a nation without any moralitie arts and sciences that can scarce measure an acre of land or houre of a day And needeth not that Kingdome constant and continued pointing which is cemented with fear not love May we not justly think that there be many in this Empire which rather wait a time then want desire to overthrow it For though some think the Grecians in Turkie bear such inveterate hate to the Latine Christians that they would rather refuse deliverance then accept them for their deliverers yet surely both they and perchance some native Turks out of that principle of desiring libertie the second rule next preserving life in the charter of Nature would be made if this Empire were seriously invaded so that the foundation thereof did totter sooner to find two hands to pluck it down then one finger to hold it up And we have just cause to hope that the fall of this unweldie Empire doth approch It was high noon with it fiftie yeares ago we hope now it draweth neare night the rather because luxurie though late yet at last hath found the Turks out or they it When first they came out of Turcomania and were in their pure naturals they were wonderfully abstemious neglecting all voluptuousnesse not so much out of a dislike as ignorance of it But now having tasted the sweetnesse of the cup they can drink as great a draught as any others That Paradise of corporall pleasure which Mahomet promised them in the world to come they begin to anticipate here at leastwise to take an earnest of it and have well soked themselves in luxurie Yea now they begin to grow covetous both Prince and people rather seeking to enjoy their means with quiet then enlarge them with danger Heaven can as easily blast an oak as trample a mushrome And we may expect the ruine of this great Empire will come for of late it hath little increased its stock and now beginneth to spend of the principall It were arrant presumption for Flesh to prescribe God his way or to teach him when he meaneth to shoot which arrow in his quiver to choose Perchance the Western Christians or the Grecians under him though these be better for seconds then firsts fitter to foment then raise a faction or his own Janizaries or the Persian or the Tartarian or some other obscure Prince not as yet come into play in the World shall have the lustre from God to maul this great Empire It is more then enough for any man to set down the fate of a single soul much more to resolve the doom of a whole nation when it shall be These things we leave to Providence to work and posteritie to behold As for our generation let us sooner expect the dissolutions of our own Microcosmes then the confusion of this Empire For neither are own sinnes yet truly repented of to have this punishment removed from us nor the Turks wickednesse yet come to the full ripenesse to have this great judgement laid upon them Soli Deo gloria The Preface to the Chronologie HErein I present the Reader with a generall view and synopsis of the whole story of the age of the Holy Warre that he may see the coherence betwixt the East and the West and in what equipage and correspondency of time the Asian affairs go on with those of Europe for they will reflect a mutuall lustre and plainnesse on one another The Chronologie is marshalled into Ranks Files The Ranks or transverse spaces contain twentie yeares on a side the Files or columnes directly downward are appropriated to those severall States whose name they bear In the six first columnes I have followed Helvicus with an implicite faith without any remarkable alteration both in ingraffing of yeares and making them concurre as also leaving sometimes emptie spaces In the other columnes I have followed severall authours and left the yeares unnoted where the time was uncertain counting it better to bring in an Ignoramus then to find a verdict where the evidence was doubtfull and obscure Such long notes as would not be imprisoned within the grates of this Chronology we have referred by asterisks to the foot of the page Know that every note belongeth to that yeare wherein it beginneth except signed with
fruitlesse besieging of the fort of mount Tabor whilest King John Bren wonne from the Turks the castle of Pilgrimes a piece of great consequence on the sea-side Then was it debated on both sides of translating the warre into Egypt Which many advised to be done For that countrey afforded the Turks their victuals and munition and the best way to draw them low was to stop them in the fountain It was also most honour to rouse the Lion in his own denne And Palestine was so forraged that there was nothing to be gleaned in the stubble whereas Egypt was so rich and fruitfull it cared not for the frowns of heaven so it might have the favour of Nilus and there was no fear to want bread in that the granary of the world That according to the rule Plus animi est inferenti periculum quà m propulsanti the Christians would be heartened but the Egyptians discouraged in the invasion of Egypt The sad spectacle of their countreys vastation would disturb their minds make them diffident of their own worth and unsufficient to maintain their cause Lastly the Christians might leave when they list reserving at all times Ptolemais to entertain them in case fortune should crosse their designes But the reasons to the contrary wanted not weight but weighing They considered not what was objected That to invade a strong entire countrey without having a partie within it to side with them was to endeavour to cleave a tree with a beetle without a wedge Besides Egypt was an exception from the rules of all other countreys had certain locall maximes of leading of an armie appropriated to it-alone That Valour must needs have the fall when it wrestleth with Nature it self and fighteth against bogs rivers and inundations That it was more agreeable to reason first to recover and defend what once was their own before they attempted other mens possessions That these their forces afforded little hope of victory in another Kingdome which were not able to clear their own countrey and the forts in Syria from so dangerous an enemy Lastly That the Egyptians fighting for their fathers wives and children would raise their valour to the highest point of resolution These arguments notwithstanding the watch-word was given for Egypt whither all addressed themselves And here began the discords betwixt King John and the Popes Legate who challenged not onely an influence but a predominancy in every thing and would dictate to the Generall what he should do in martiall affairs He presumed on his book-learning to controll the practice of experienced captains by his military speculations The King stormed hereat shewing there were some mysteries in the Captain-craft not communicable to any which had not served the trade and which the heart of a Scholar was too narrow to contain That though Scholarship was a stock fit to graff any profession on yet some good time is requisite thereunto and that they must not think to proceed military Masters at their first admission in a camp That though the Legate might conceive himself to know the latitude of warlike principles yet he knew not the use of distinctions exceptions and cautions of application and might easily be misled by disproportion and dissimilitude of examples the variation of circumstances the infinitenesse of punctuall occurrences Wherefore he forbad him to meddle with martiall matters challenging them to belong to his own disposall But Pelagius the Legate highly opinioned of his own sufficiencie as if his place made him infallible in every thing and loth to confesse himself besides the cushion whilest he sat in the chair would have an oar in all actions He held this conclusion That the generall rules of warre were easily known and as for the qualification of them pro exigentia hîc nunc herein reason was the key of the work which scholars having most perfected by learning were thereby the most competent judges what should be done on all occasions How dearly the Christians payed for this his errour and how this discord smothered for a while brake out we shall see hereafter Mean time hoising up sails the Pilgrimes navie safely arrived at Damiata Chap. 25. Damiata besieged and taken The Christians unadvisedly refuse honourable conditions DAmiata is a chief haven of Egypt anciently Pelusium seated on the Eastern-most stream of Nilus Here the East and West world met together to exchange their wares she grudging for trade to give the upper hand to Alexandria it self At their landing the moon was almost totally eclipsed whence the Christians conceited ghesse the frailnesse of the building by the unconstancy of the foundation that the overthrow of the Mahometanes whose ensigne was the Half-moon was portended But the calculatours of after-chances seldome hit right In the siege of this citie they were to encounter with a fourefold difficulty besides Damiata it self First with a great chain crossing the harbour which with indefatigable pains and art mingled with labour they brake asunder industry in action being as importunity in speech by continuall inculcation forcing a yeelding beyond the strength of reason Secondly the river Nilus did much annoy them This river the height of whose flowing is the Egyptian Almanack whereby they prognosticate future plenty or penury now out of time and beyond measure drowned the countrey Bold fishes swamme into the Christians tents who took them with their hands though willingly they could have wanted such dainties for the sauce was more then the meat Against this mischief they fensed themselves with prayer and a publick fast enjoyned by the Legate whereby the water soon abated And lest Gods mercie herein when gotten should be forgotten a publick thanksgiving was proclaimed that this favour obtained by prayer might be kept by praises Thirdly they were to grapple with the fort of Pharia a seeming-impregnable place betwixt them and Damiata To check this fort the Christians built a towre on ships which suddenly falling brained many bruised more of their own men and all who felt not the blow were stricken with the fright King John comforted his souldiers discouraged hereat desiring them to apprehend actions by their true causes and as not to vaunt of blind victories so not to be dismayed at casuall mishaps so purely accidentall that there was no guard against them in the schools of defense either of wisdome or valour By his advice a more substantiall towre was built the rarest piece in that kind the world ever saw by the manning whereof after many bloudy assaults they mastered the fort of Pharia Fourthly they had to do with Meladine King of Egypt who lay besides them constantly furnishing the citie with men and victuals and exercising the Christians with continuall skirmishes In one with his wild-fire he did them much harm and King John was dangerously scorched But seeing that the Christians hewed their way through the rocks of all difficulties he propounded peace unto them by the mediation of Noradine his brother King
of Damascus profering them if they would depart to restore them the true Crosse the citie of Jerusalem and all the land of Palestine The English French and Italians would have embraced the conditions pleading That honourable peace was the centre of warre where it should rest That they could not satisfie their conscience to rob these Egyptians of their lands without a speciall command from God That it was good wisdome to take so desperate a debt whensoever the payment was tendred otherwise if they would not be content with their arms full they might perchance return with their hands emptie But the Legate would no wayes consent alledging this voyage was undertaken not onely for the recovery of Palestine but for the exstirpation of the Mahometane superstition And herein no doubt he followed the instructions of his master whose end in this warre was That this warre should have no end but be alwayes in doing though never done He knew it was dangerous to stop an issue which had been long open and would in no case close up this vent of people by concluding a finall peace Besides an old prophesie That a Spaniard should win Jerusalem and work wonders in those parts made Pelagius that countrey-man more zealous herein Coradine angry his profer was refused beat down the walls of Jerusalem and all the beautifull buildings therein save the towre of David and the temple of the Sepulchre Not long after Damiata having been basieged one yeare and seven moneths was taken without resistance plague and famine had made such a vastation therein The Christians entred with an intent to kill all but their anger soon melted into pity beholding the citie all bestrawed with corpses The sight was bad and the sent was worse for the dead killed the living Yea Gods sword had left their sword no work Of threescore and ten thousand but three thousand remained who had their lives pardoned on condition to cleanse the citie which imployed them a quarter of a yeare Hence the Christians marched and took the citie of Tanis and soon after the Pope substituted John de Columna a Cardinall Legate in the place of Pelagius Chap. 26. New discords betwixt the King and the Legate They march up to besiege Cairo GReat was the spoil they found in Damiata wherein as in strong barred chests the merchants of Egypt and India had locked up their treasure A full yeare the Christians stayed here contented to make this inne their home Here arose new discords betwixt the King and the new Legate who by vertue of his Legation challenged Damiata for his Holinesse which by publick agreement was formerly assigned to the King Bren in anger returned to Ptolemais both to puff out his discontents in private to teach the Christians his worth by wanting him For presently they found themselves at a losse neither could they stand still without disgrace nor go on without danger The Legate commanded them to march up but they had too much spirit to be ruled by a Spirituall man and swore not to stirre a step except the King was with them Messengers therefore were sent to Ptolemais to fetch him They found him of a steelie nature once through-hot long in cooling yet by promising him he should have his own desires they over-perswaded him not to starve an armie by feeding his own humours Scarce after eight moneths absence was he returned to Damiata but new divisions were betwixt them The Legate perswaded the armie to march up and besiege Cairo he promised if they would obey him they should quickly command all Egypt by present invading it Let defendants lie at a close guard and offer no play Delayes are a safe shield to save but celerity the best sword to winne a countrey Thus Alexander conquered the world before it could bethink it self to make resistance And thus God now opened them a doore of victorie except they would barre it up by their own idlenesse But the King advised to return into Syria That Cairo was difficult to take and impossible to keep That the ground whereon they went was as treacherous as the people against whom they fought That better now to retire with honour then hereafter flie with shame That none but an empirick in warre will denie but that more true valour is in an orderly well grounded retreat then in a furious rash invasion But the Legate used an inartificiall argument drawn from the authority of his place thundering excommunication against those that would not march forward And now needs must they go when he driveth them The crafty Egyptians of whom it is true what is said of the Parthians Their flight is more to be feared then their fight ran away counterfeiting cowardlinesse The Christians triumphed hereat as if the silly fish should rejoyce that he had caught the fisherman when he had swallowed his bait The Legate hugged himself in his own happinesse that he had given so successefull advice And now see how the garland of their victory proved the halter to strangle them Chap. 27. The miserable case of the drowned Christians in Egypt Damiata surrendred in ransome of their lives EGypt is a low level countrey except some few advantages which the Egyptians had fortified for themselves Through the midst of the land ran the river Nilus whose stream they had so bridled with banks and sluces that they could keep it to be their own servant and make it their enemies master at pleasure The Christians confidently marched on and the Turks perceiving the game was come within the toil pierced their banks and unmuzzling the river let it runne open mouth upon them yet so that at first they drowned them up but to the middle reserving their lives for a further purpose thereby in exchange to recover Damiata and their countreys liberty See here the land of Egypt turned in an instant into the Egyptian sea See an army of sixty thousand as the neck of one man stretched on the block and waiting the fatall stroke Many cursed the Legate and their own rashnesse that they should follow the counsel of a gowned man all whose experience was clasped in a book rather then the advice of experienced captains But too late repentance because it soweth not in season reapeth nothing but unavoidable miserie Meladine King of Egypt seeing the constancy and patience of the Christians was moved with compassion towards them He had of himself strong inclinations to Christianity wearie of Mahometanisme and willing to break that prison but for watchfull jaylers about him He profered the Christians their lives on condition they would quit the countrey and restore Damiata They accepted the conditions and sent messengers to Damiata to prepare them for the surrendring of it But they within the citie being themselves safe on shore tyrannized on their poore brethren in shipwrack pretending That this armie of Pilgrimes deserved no pity who had invited this misfortune on themselves by their own rashnesse That if they