» % Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2014 https://archive.org/details/universalhistory21mull v AN UNIVERSAL HISTORY, IN TWENTY-FOUR BOOKS. TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN OF JOHN VON MULLER. IN THREE VOLUMES. VOL. II. LONDON: PRINTED FOR LONGMAN, HURST, REES, ORME, AND BROWN, PATERNOSTER-ROW. 1818. Printed by A. Stmhan, Printers-Street, London. #W6 CONTENTS OF THE SECOND VOLUME. BOOK XI. SETTLEMENT OF THE BARBAROUS NATIONS ON THE RUINS OF THE WESTERN EMPIRE. A. D. 476 615. PAGE Section I. — The Ostrogoths in Italy. 1 Sect. II. — The Lombards in Italy 8 Sect. III. — The Kingdom of Burgundy 14 Sect. IV. — The Allemanni - - - is Sect;V. — The kingdom of the Franks - - - 20 Sect. VI. — The Visigoths in Spain - 26 Sect. VII. — The Anglo-Saxons in Britain - - 28 Sect. VIII.— Constantinople - - - si BOOK XII. OF THE RISE OF THE MOHAMMEDAN RELIGION, AND THE ESTABLISH- MENT OF THE ARABIAN EMPIRE. FROM A.D. 622 — 732. Sect. I. — Arabia - 36 Sect. II. — Mohammed - - - 41 Sect. III. — The Empire of the Arabs - 45 Sect. IV. — Commanders of the Faithful of the House of Ommia 48 Sect. V. — The Arabs in Spain ... 49 Sect. VI. — The Arabs in Hindustan - - 52 Sect. VII. — France - - - - 53 Sect. VIII. — Germany - - 55 Sect. IX. — England - - - - 56 Sect. X. — Lombardy 57 Sect. XI. — The Arabs in France - ' - . 63 Sect. XII. — Constantinople and Rome - - - 64 Sect. XIII. — Recapitulation. 67 iv CONTENTS. BOOK XIII. THE AGE OF CHARLEMAIN AND HARUN AL RASHID. A. D. 732 — 841. PAGE Sect. L — State of Rome and Italy 69 Sect. II. — The Carlovingian Dynasty - - 71 Sect. III. — Fall of the Kingdom of the Lombards - - 73 Sect. IV. — Restoration of the Empire of the West 76 Sect. V. — Constitution of Italy 78 Sect. VI. — Constitution of the Kingdom of the Franks - 79 Sect. VII. — The Commanders of the Faithful of the House of Abbas - - - - 83 Sect. VIII. — Survey of the Arabian Empire 86 Sect. IX. — England ... 92 Sect. X. — Constantinople 92 BOOK XIV. DIVISION OF THE GREAT EMPIRES INTO SMALL STATES. A.D. 814—1073. Sect. I. — Introduction - - - - 95 Sect. II. — Dismemberment of the Arabian Empire, and Establish- ment of the Edrisides and Aglabites - -96 Sect. III. — Of the Tulunides 98 Sect. IV. — The Turks become masters of Bagdad - - 99 Sect. V. — The Buiyides render themselves masters of Bagdad 100 Sect. VI. — Of the Fatimite Sultans at Alkahira - - ib. Sect. VII. — The Zeirides at Tunis - - 102 Sect. VIII. — The Morabeths in Morocco - - ib. Sect. IX. — The Seljukian Turks - - - - 103 Sect. X. — The Sultans of Gasna and Choresmia - - ib. Sect. XI. — Spain - 104 Sect. XII. — Sicily 106 Sect. XIII. — Dismemberment of the Empire of the French 108 Sect. XIV. — The Kingdom of Lotharingia - - m Sect. XV. — The Carlovingians begin to lose their Empire - 112 Sect. XVI. — The Hungarians - - - 115 Sect. XVII. — The Age of Henry I. King of the Germans - 117 Sect. XVIII. — The Normans and Russia - - - - 119 Sect. XIX. — King Henry I. and his Son Otho - - 120 Sect. XX. — The Imperial Throne devolves on the Kings of Ger- many - 122 Sect. XXI. — The French Crown devolves on the Family of Capet 128 Sect. XXII. — Normandy - 130 CONTENTS. PAGE Sect. XXIII. — Of the Kingdom of Burgundy and the House of Savoy - 132 Sect. XXIV. — Houses of Hapsburg and of Lorraine - ib. Sect. XXV. — The Netherlands - - - -135 Sect. XXVI. — England - - - - 134 Sect. XXVII. — Scandinavia 135 Sect. XXVIIL— Iceland - - - - 136 Sect. XXIX. — Russia - - - - 157 Sect. XXX — Constantinople 139 Sect. XXXI. — Conclusion - - - 145 BOOK XV. the age in which the political influence of the papacy was established. from a.d. 1073 1177. Sect. I. — The Normans in Italy - - - 145 Sect. II. — Of the Papacy - - - 146 Sect. III. — The Hohenstaufens and the Guelphs - 155 Sect. IV. — Constitution of the German Empire - - 154 Sect. V. — Frederick Barbarossa -< - - 156 Sect. VI. — Of the Abbot Suger and the Kingdom of France 165 Sect. VII. — England loses her Constitution - - 165 Sect. VIII. — The Northern Nations - - 169 Sect. IX. — Constantinople - - - 172 Sect. X. — Of the Commanders of the Faithful - - 174 Sect. XL — The first Crusade - - - 175 Sect. XII. — The Mowaheddins - - - 178 Sect. XIII. — Spain - - - - 179 Sect. XIV. — Portugal r - 180 Sect. XV. — Conclusion - - - - 181 BOOK XVI. THE AGE IN WHICH THE PAPAL ASCENDANCY ATTAINED ITS HIGHEST PITCH. FROM A.D. 1177 — 1269. Sect. I. — The Empire of Germany : Bavaria - - 185 Sect. II. — Austria - - 184 Sect. III. — Brandenburgh - - - 185 Sect. IV. — Saxony - - - _ 135 Sect. V. — Brunswick - - - - - i87 Sect. VI. — Thuringia, Meissen, and Hessia - - 188 Sect. VII. — The Sultan Salaheddin ... 139 Sect. VIII. — Naples and Sicily - - - 192 Sect. IX. — Innocent the Third - - - 194 CONTENTS. PAGE Sect. X. — Constantinople taken by the Crusaders - 195 Sect. XI. — The Emperor Frederick the Second - - 199 Sect. XII. — The Interregnum - 202 Sect. XIII. — Bohemia - 203 Sect XIV. — Extinction of the Hohenstaufens - - 205 Sec?. XV. — Of the Hungarians 207 Sect. XVI. — Of the Tartars or Mongoles ' - - 208 Sect. XVII. — Fall of the Chalifat of Bagdad - - 211 Sect. XVIII. — The Mamelukes - - 213 Sect. XIX. — The Druses - - - - 215 Sect. XX. — The French Monarchy - - 216 Sect. XXI. — Tunis and Morocco - - - 219 Sect. XXII. — Spain - - - - - 221 Sect. XXIII. — Portugal and Castile - - 222 Sect. XXIV. — Progress of the French Monarchy - 225 Sect. XXV. — Foundation of English Liberty - - 227 Sect. XXVI. — The Netherlands - : - 229 Sect. XXVII.— The Power of Denmark - - 230 Sect. XXVIII. — Cultivation of Sweden - - 231 Sect. XXIX. — Livonia and Prussia - - 232 Sect. XXX. — Poland and Silesia - ib. Sect. XXXI. — Russia - 233 Sect. XXXII. — Constantinople » - © - ib. Sect. XXXIII. — Literature - 234 Sect. XXXIV. — Recapitulation ... 256 BOOK XVII. GRADUAL TRANSITION FROM THE SOCIAL ORDER Of THE MIDDLE AGES, TO THAT OF MODERN TIMES. A. D. 1273 1453. Sect. I. — Interregnum - Sect. II. — Rudolph of Habsburgh Sect. III. — Adolph and Albert, Kings of the Germans Sect. IV. — The House of Luxemburg Sect. V. — Naples and Sicily Sect. VI. — The Pope Sect. VII. — The Italian Republics Sect. VIII. — Florence - Sect. IX. — Venice - Sect. X. — Milan - Sect. XI. — Savoy - Sect. XII. — Lewis of Bavaria Sect. XIII. — Charles the Fourth Sect. XIV. — Wenceslaf - - Sect. XV. — Sigismund - 238 - 239 241 243 244 245 248 - 250 253 256 257 259 - 261 262 264 CONTENTS. vii PAGE Sect. XVI. — Austrian Emperors -. - - 265 Sect. XVII. — Naples and Sicily - -267 Sect. XVIII. — The Popes - - 269 Sect. XIX. — The Councils - 275 Sect. XX. — Florence ----- 277 Sect. XXI. — Cosmo de' Medici - 280 Sect. XXII. — Literature - 284 Sect. XXIII. — Venice - - - 288 Sect. XXIV. — Genoa - 299 Sect. XXV. — Ragusa - - 300 Sect. XXVI. — Milan 306 Sect. XXVII. — Savoy - - - - 308 Sect. XXVIII. — Switzerland 309 Sect. XXIX. — Austria ----- 319 Sect. XXX. — Bohemia - 322 Sect. XXXI. — Brandenburg - - - - 327 Sect. XXXII. — The Electorate of Saxony - - 329 Sect. XXXIII. — Hesse - - - 330 Sect. XXXIV.— The Palatinate and Bavaria - - 331 Sect. XXXV. — Spain ----- 333 Sect. XXXVI. — Portugal 336 Sect. XXXVII. — France - - - - 339 Sect. XXXVIII. — Burgundy - 349 Sect. XXXIX. — England 352 Sect. XL. — Scotland - - - 356 Sect. XLI. — Scandinavia - 357 Sect. XLII. — Poland ----- 359 Sect. XLIII. — Hungary - - - - - 361 Sect. XLIV. — The Turks - - - - 363 Sect. XLV. — The Mogols ... 368 Sect. XL VI. — Continuation of the Turkish History - 370 Sect. XLVII. — The Great Mogol - - 374 BOOK XVIII. OF THOSE REVOLUTIONS WHICH ESPECIALLY CONTRIBUTED TO DEVELOPE THE NEW ORDER OF POLITICAL AFFAIRS. A. D. 1453—1519. Sect. I. — Lewis the Eleventh - 376 Sect. II. — Maximilian - - - - - 383 Sect. III. — Italy - - - - 385 Sect. TV. — Florence - 387 Sect. V. — Venice - 390 Sect. VI. — The Lesser Italian Princes - 392 Sect. VII. — The French in Italy - id. Sect. VIII. — Ferdinand the Catholic ... 395 Sect. IX. — America - - 402 viii CONTENTS. I'AGE Sect. X. — Milan and Switzerland 403 Sect. XI. — Italian Wars 405 oect. A.U. — i^narics tne rittn 407 OECT. AJ.11. — x ortugai - 408 Sect. XIV. — France 409 Sect. XV. — Switzerland « 414 C- „™ V"\7"T TKn T\,-lr<, oect. Avi. — ine lurKs 421 oECT. AV11. — Kussia - 424 Sect. XVIII. — Poland Scandinavia Acy ft Sect. XIX. — England - ib* Sect. XX. — The Empire of the Germans 427 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. BOOK XL SETTLEMENT OF THE BARBAROUS NATIONS ON THE RUINS OF THE WESTERN EMPIRE. A. D. 476 615. SECTION L THE OSTROGOTHS IN ITALY. Since the death of Attila, the Ostrogoths, under their princes of the house of Amali, had gradually re-established their ancient independence. They now inhabited the coun- try between the Danube and the Save. They received a tribute from the emperors of the East, and in return gave them hostages for the maintenance of peace. Of this na- tion was the young Theodoric, son of Theudmir, whom Ehrenlieb, his concubine, had borne to the Gothic chief- tain, on the Ferto, in Hungary. At Constantinople Theodoric derived the same advantage, from the re- mains of the old Roman institutions, which Philip of Ma- cedon had drawn from the lessons of the conqueror of Leuctra. His father had been a successful warrior, and by victories over the Allemanni, had extended his dominion to the feet of the Alps. When Theodoric, in his eighteenth A D 484 ^ ear ' re ^ urne( ^ to n * s coun tryj at the head of six thousand warriors, devoted to his cause, he attacked, without the knowledge of his father, and defeated the armies of a Sarmatian king. The Goths assuming new courage, demanded to be led into regions where they might dwell with greater freedom, and obtain the reward VOL. II. b 2 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. of arms. Theudmir accordingly passed the boundaries of Illyrium, spread his troops over Macedonia, and conquered Larissa, the paternal town of Achilles. He obliged the imperial court to make considerable additions to those tri- butary recompences with which it was accustomed annu- ally to reward the valour of the Gothic youth. Theudmir on his death-bed declared Theodoric to be the most worthy, who accordingly was chosen to be his successor. The Emperor Zeno, a monarch of very moderate en- dowments, spared nothing in order to conciliate the young prince : he bestowed upon him the consular dignity in the same year when he himself bore it ; he per- mitted him to triumph, and erected to him an equestrian statue. But the gifts of the emperor not being sufficient to satisfy the wants, and still less the wishes of the Ostro- goths, who were now rising into national greatness ; and their land, on which they could not be induced to bestow a laborious cultivation, neither affording them sufficient bread, nor pastures so extensive as their herds required ; Zeno at length came to the resolution of formally surrendering Italy to Theodoric, by a pragmatic sanction, after recom- mending to his patronage the Roman senate, which row groaned under the sway of the Heruli. Immediately the Ostrogoths, under the guid- A.D.490. . . . J . . c .7. J \ ance of their cnier, now m his twenty-fourth year, set out with all their herds, and the whole of their property, from the Danube and the Save, and approached the confines of Italy. On the Lisorzo, which flows through fertile plains included in the modern Goritz, they were opposed by their first enemy. Theodoric twice defeated the Italian armies, who fought without zeal for their king, Odoacher; he entered the Venetian country, and the prince of the Heruli fled to Rome. This city, in the fifteenth year after the subversion of its empire, shut its gates against Odoacher, who took refuge in Ravenna. The territory which borders on the southern feet of the Alps, revolted *5 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 8 from his sway. Having shut himself up in Ravenna, a place strong by nature, from the morasses which sur- rounded it, and at that time fortified by art; Odoacher, at the head of twenty thousand armed men, held out to the third year. After the fortress had surrendered, and the king had suffered death, Theodoric laid aside the national dress of the Goths, and adorned himself with A.D.495. . - the Roman purple. The senate and people of Rome received him with re- spect. He re-established the court, the salaries, and the distributions of bread as they had been conducted under the emperors. Humanity, temperance, and prudence, elevated Theodoric above all other barbarian kings. Al- though he himself adhered to the Arian creed, he in no instance oppressed the church which maintained the Nicene faith ; on the contrary he treated its dignitaries with rever- ence, confidence, and favour; but it was kept in subjec- tion to him, and his will decided all contested elections. The Pope Johannes, who in an embassy had acted con- trary to his instructions, was suffered on that account to die in prison. By family alliances he became the relative and friend, by his power and wisdom the protector of all the kings of the west. His consort Odeflede was the daughter of Chil- debert king of the Franks, and a sister of that Clovis to whom the establishment of the French monarchy is chiefly to be ascribed. He gave his own sister to Hunnerich, son of Genserich, king of the Vandals ; Amalberge, his niece, to the king of Thuringia ; and his own daughters to Sigis- mund, king of Burgundy, and to Alarich the Second, king of the Visigoths. He had an army always ready for main- taining public tranquillity and undertaking necessary enter- prises. The former was his chief object ; and on that account he wrote to the young kings, with the authority of a father : e< All of you have proofs of my regard for you. You are youthful warriors, and it is my office to give you coun- i UNIVERSAL HISTORY. sel. Your disorderly proceedings occasion me vexation. It is not without concern that I observe you give yourselves up to the government of your passions." When Clovis had subdued the Allemanni, Theodoric wrote to him, re- commending clemency. When inevitable wars broke out among the kings, and when his own power could be ex- tended without injustice, he found means of obtaining his object without bloodshed ; and he made himself master of Sicily, Rhaetia, the Alps, and Geneva. The banks of the Po, which in the first years of his reign had been laid waste by the Burgundian king Gondebald, were by his command re-peopled with Allemanni, who sought a refuge under his gentle sway. Theodoric caused Pavia, where he often resided, as well as several other Italian cities, to be ornamented with magnificent architecture; and he was more proud of the arts and learning, which yet nourished in his kingdom, than of the power of his arms. This pride was displayed in his sending to Clovis a troop of mu- sicians, and to Gondebald water-glasses, which marked the lapse of time, together with persons who knew how to manage them. His chancellor, the senator Cassiodorus, was the most learned man of his age. Boethius, one of the last Roman authors, who wrote with elegance, was sent by Theodoric to the king of the Burgundians, and com- mended with the following remark: " Your people will no longer compare themselves with us when they learn that such men dwell among us.' , Theodoric himself was unable to write. At the approach of his death he assembled his counts and other nobles around him, and recommended to them Amalaswinde, his daughter, and her son Athalarich, then ten years old. He advised them to pay regard to public order ; to treat the senate and people of Rome with kind- ness ; and to maintain peace with the emperor A.D.526. 1 r 1 ot Constantinople. Dissensions however were soon excited between the son UNIVERSAL HISTORY. and his mother, by the intrigues of ambitious nobles; and the queen sought in vain for a new resource in associating her nephew Theudat in the regency. This prince was so blinded by the lust of power, that he became equally ne- glectful of gratitude and of his own interest, and Athalarich having perished by disease, he put to death Amnlaswinde. About the same time a similar crime had involved Ge- limir, the king of the Vandals, in a war against Justinian, who ruled the empire of the east with an energy to which it had long been unused. The queen, who had been assassi- nated, had favoured the emperor, by suffering provisions to be conveyed from the island of Sicily to his relief. The general, Belisarius, in whom the most splendid military virtues were displayed, defeated the Vandals ; and having forced Gelimir to surrender himself, brought him in triumph a prisoner to Constantinople, together with all the treasures amassed by Genserich, and obliged all Africa to submit to the imperial yoke. The instability of the barbarian kingdoms was elsewhere manifested by events : the sons of Clovis, in the course of a few years, made themselves masters of the territories of Thuringia and Burgundy. It was at this period that the crime of Theu- A.D. 535. . . . dat incited Justinian, by the aid of Belisarius, to revenge on the nation of the Ostrogoths the calamities of the house of Theodoric, which had been recommended to his protection. Sicily was speedily conquered, the chief- tains and the troops abandoning, either by choice or the necessity of arms, the cause of the falling king. The na- tion, accustomed to the splendour of victory, drove him with indignation from the throne; he was put to death, and Witig, a valiant warrior, was placed upon the A.iJ. 536. chair of the Amali. The latter, in order to confirm his authority, persuaded Mathaswinde, daughter of Amalaswinde, to become his consort. His intention b 3 6 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. was disappointed ; for Belisarius was unwilling that the Ostrogoths should choose a king at their own discretion, and without the consent of the emperor, as their ter- ritory was originally Roman, This general had lately taken Neapolis by stratagem, after it had resisted, with great constancy, a long siege ; and in order to infuse terror into others, he caused all the inhabitants to be put to death, without regard to age, sex, or rank. Rome was now abandoned by the Goths, and its fortifications were strengthened by Belisarius. A part of the wall which was built by this general is yet standing. He afterwards con- quered Tuscany, and gained a victory over the Goths near Perusia. Witig, in despair, resolved to arm all the men who were able to fight in his cause : and he led A.D. .538. . _ . f against Milan, and the neighbouring towns, an army of ten thousand volunteers from Burgundy, which was already in the possession of the Franks. Milan, perhaps out of preference for the faith of the Nicene council, had declared for the cause of the Byzantine emperor: it with- stood the Gothic king with a resolution which could scarcely be weakened by the pressure of a famine so severe, that its defenders were reduced to feed on human flesh. The Bur- gundians became masters of it, and massacred its inha- bitants, without even sparing infants at the breast, or priests who sought refuge in the sanctity of the altar : according to their own historians they put to death three hundred thousand men. At the same time Witig lay fourteen months before Rome, which lost all its splendour, and its ancient inhabitants, chiefly in these wars, Belisarius ^ ^ raised the siege : he even conquered Ravenna itself, and brought Witig a captive to Con- stantinople. The victories of the imperial arms excited the jealousy of the Franks, and a war ensued which had the same ter- mination as most of the former enterprises of the Franks in Italy. They over-ran the country, and, weakened by in- UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 7 temperance*, afforded their enemies opportunities of cutting them off. The Ostrogoths resisted with a heroism which they inherited from the great Theodoric; and after Euthar ^ ^ ^ and Hildebald had been elected to the throne, and deposed, on various pretexts, Totila showed himself worthy to renew the work of his illustrious prede- A D 541 cessor# ^ e S amec ^ many victories* and destroyed the walls of the towns, having experienced in sieges the effect of superior skill in the military art. He had the good fortune to make himself master of Rome in the presence of Belisarius, who had returned from quelling an insurrection in Africa, but found his army weakened and dispirited ; and he resolved upon the destruction of its fortifications, that he might not be obliged to employ the flower of his army in its defence. The people An D» 546. were driven out; those senators who had not obtained safety in flight, were carried away captives ; and the immeasurable circuit of the Roman walls almost levelled with the ground. Totila soon afterwards defeated the rein- forcements which Belisarius expected from Calabria. Being now, as he believed, secure lord of Italy, Totila renewed the gentle administration of Theodoric: he re- peopled Rome, and lived like a father among the inha- bitants of the reviving city. The restoration of Neapolis was effected by Belisarius, in consequence of the persuasion of the Pope Sylverius : those who still dwelt in the ruins of Cum#e, and the inhabitants of the small Liboric towns, Puteoli, Stabia, Sarrentum, of Calabria and Apulia, with captives from Africa and Sicily, resorted to Neapolis, again rising from its ruins. The intrigues of the court occa- sioned the recall of Belisarius, who was always worthy of his fame, but whose exertions were ill supported ; and the prosecution of the war, which was not wholly abandoned, was confided to the eunuch Narses. Yet one more im- portant service was rendered by Belisarius to his country, after a seclusioa of many years, in the defence of the im- B 4 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. penal city itself against a Slavonian horde which had in- vaded Thrace. Though benevolent and unsuspicious, he was not the more secure against envy; and for his final triumph over the calumny of his accusers, he was indebted not to his virtues, but to the influence of his unworthy spouse. Narses, now pro-consul, with his Lombard allies, pro- ceeded into Italy: and that superiority which could not fail to manifest itself on the side of a Roman army of sufficient number, under an able commander, gave him a victory, of which the death of Totila alone secured to him A. D. 558. . - . the fruits* The Gothic nobles in Pa via elevated Teja to the throne: but their efforts were vain ; and at Nocera, the last strength of the Ostrogoths fell with their prince, under AD. 555. * the arms ot JN arses. The Allemanni, who were subject to the Frankish king of Austrasia, also attempted, under Lanthacar and Buzelin, to snatch Italy from the grasp of the emperor. Their enterprise began gloriously ; but had the usual termination of such efforts, in famine, pestilence, and total defeat. SECTION II. THE LOMBARDS IN ITALY. Narses governed Italy under the Byzantine emperor ; and under his administration it enjoyed plenty, internal ^ tranquillity, and undisturbed peace. He quelled, without difficulty, the commotions which the Heruli excited in Tuscany. Rome again rose from her foundations; but the shadow of the old republic, the names of consuls and senators had passed away : the city remained without external power; but still great in fame, in the ma- jestic aspect of its ruins, and the increasing multitude cf its inhabitants. Narses at length incurred the disfavour of Vhe emperor Justin II., whose conduct was not always go- 14 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. verned by wise and moderate councils: he abandoned Rome, where he thought himself insecure ; and from Ne- apolis sent letters to invite the Lombard king Albwin into Italy. Albwin had not long before subdued the Gepidi, another tribe of the same kindred with his hereditary subjects ; he had drunk out of the skull of their prince Kunimund, and had taken Rosamond, the daughter of his enemy, to his bed. He possessed a warlike spirit, which gained him the hearts of the barbarians ; and his praises were celebrated in the songs not only of his own people but of the Saxons and Bavarians, for centuries after his death. A D 56, Forty-two years had elapsed since the Lom- bards, under his father Audwin, had conquered those tracts in Pannonia which the Ostrogoths formerly occupied, and three years since the wars of the Gepidi ; when, on the 2d of April King Albwin, at the invitation of Narses, broke up, with all the men, women and children of the Lombards, and set out from Pannonia, with 20,000 Saxons in his train. It was on a beautiful morning of the spring that the astonished multitude, from the heights of a projecting arm of the Alps, threw their delighted eyes on the extensive and luxuriant plains of their new country. Wherever Albwin advanced he paid veneration to the church, and sought to gain the love of his subjects. Mul- tiplied misfortunes weakened the power of Justin ; while tribes of Sarmatians, Allemanni, people from Noricum, and even Bulgarians, strengthened the armies of the con- queror. The possession of Pavia gave him at length a de- cisive preponderance in Italy. He stationed his nobles, Gisulf his marshal, and Zotto, over Friul and Benevento, as dukes, to guard the boundaries of his new domains. To the Romans of Constantinople, (for still, after nine centuries, they preserved this name,) Ravenna, the Gothic capital, still remained, together with the city of Penta- polis, Rome, and some other towns near the sea-coast. 10 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. Over tlicsc possessions a proconsul, or exarch, was ap- pointed to preside. It was fortunate for the Lombards that their valour was thus kept in exercise; for anarchy would otherwise have soon undermined the foundations of their power. After a few years, Rosamond made the revenge of her father's death an excuse for an intrigue; and the murder of Albwin made room for Kleph, a more severe master, who paid with his life for the throne which he had }ust ascended. The nobles, during the minority of his son, kept the government in their own hands, and A.D.575. j , conducted it by means ot a common council. The Lombard kingdom of Italv was as well secured on the north-east; in which quarter this nation had given up their seats in Pannonia to the Avari ; as the unstable charac- ter of predatory hordes, who too well recalled the remem- brance of the Huns, would permit. In Noricum, the Bavarians, who since their arrival in that country had given name to the greater part of it, maintained a league of amity with the Lombards. Authar, the son of Kleph, and Agilulf, his successor, espoused, one after the other, the Bavarian princess Theudelind, whose rare endowments were long revered by her people. The Franks were by far the most formidable enemies of the Lombard power: and it was only by the flattering distinctions and presents which they lavished on this nation that the emperors contrived to preserve their friendship, and with it the existence of the exarchate in Italy. Hence it has happened that this country has remained to the present day without a common government. The Venetian territory extended from Pannonia to the Adda : the islands of the Lagunes began to have inhabi- tants ; yet Aquileia continued to be called the capital, and Friul was the seat of the governor. Nearly all Lombard/ was included under the name of Liguria ; it was separated from the country of the Allemanni by both the Rhaetias. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 1 ? The first Alps, which rise from the Varo and run towards Savonna, were named the Cottish mountains. A particular province was distinguished by the name of the Apennine, which divided Tuscany from iEmilia. Tuscany reckoned Rome among its cities, while Piacenza, Parma, Imola, Bologna, . adorned the JEmilian province. To the south- ward, in.Umbria, from the time of Ferwald, a Lombard duke' held his residence in Spoleto. The country from Rome to the confines of Calabria was included in Cam- pania, a district important on account of the strength of its mountainous recesses, and the fertility of the beautiful ter- ritory which surrounded its four cities of Naples, Salerno, Benevento, and Capua. Capua and Salerno owed their restoration to Lombard dukes, and Benevento acquired from their munificence a splendour which it had never before seen. The impetuous Authar, king of the Lombards, pene- trated through Lucania to the straits, and thrust his spear into a pillar on the shore to point out how far his dominion extended. The dominions of the emperor lay chiefly on the coast of the Adriatic, and embraced Apulia, together with a part of Calabria. Here Otranto, and more especially Bari, rose to fame and magnificence, the opulence of the country de- pending on the fertility of the soil; and in the same vicinity was the residence of the Strategos or Catapan. In the an- cient Samnium, the boundaries of the dominion of .Con- stantinople and of Beneventum fluctuated with the fortunes or courage of the parties, and the Picenum and the Vale- rian province, almost to the gates of Rome, were the objects of frequent wars : in the former it appears that the Lom- bards finally prevailed, while in the latter they continued unwillingly to divide their power with the Greeks. Ra- venna, the seat of the exarch, was the capital of Flaminia. The Lombard kings held their residence at Pavia, where Theodoric the Ostrogoth had caused a splendid palace to be erected at the confluence of the Ticino and the Po. 12 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. Their dominion extended northwards as far as the pass of St. Gothard, and they defeated the Franks near the fortress of Bellinzona or Bilitio. The memorials of the Lombard kings are still preserved every where through the valley of Leventina, and the Devil's-bridge was probably their work. In the first years they penetrated over Mount St. Bernard as far as the Leman lake. Towards Rhaetia, the most fre- quented pass was at Spliigen. The towns of the Lombards were rather built for strength than for beauty; but this nation destroyed none of the remains of better times. The Lombards delighted in pasturage ; yet under their hands the newly conquered land obtained so fine a culti- vation that the dismal vestiges of former devastations were every day more and more obliterated. The king was sup- ported by the revenue of his estates ; he went round from time to time among his farms, and lived in the simplicity of the father of a family, with the dignity of a military chief- tain. The free subjects, as among the old Romans, laboured personally, with the assistance of their slaves, their freed- men, and aldions (who were perhaps hired servants), in the cultivation of the conquered lands. Agriculture flourished more especially around the monasteries in the vicinity of the wild Novalese, of Nonentula, Farfa, and particularly of Monte Cassino: their chronicles contain rather grateful than splendid annals of the victories which man gained over the sterility of nature, and of the gradual efforts which covered the ruins of ancient Italy with rich corn fields and smiling pastures. The king, with the concurrence of the nobles, proposed his laws to the general assembly of all the free Lombards. " His excellence," such is the preamble of this code — " His excellence, Rothar, seventeenth king of the Lombards, in the thirty-eighth year of his age, having taken into his con- sideration that the commoner may want the protection of ordinances generally known, against the cupidity of the UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 13 great officers; has, with the advice and consent of the chief judges, renewed the book of laws." The land was divided into districts, each of which had its amman or head-man. * On all affairs relating to property the beadle f gave judgement ; a count presided over several head-men and beadles, and over several counts a duke, aU of whom were under the controul of the king : the latter was chosen by the nation, or by persons to whom the elec- tion was confided. From this source contentions frequently arose : aspiring and crafty men, by means of presents, enter- tainments, and promises, often made their way to the supreme power, which on the other hand sometimes fell to the lot of those who were distinguished by popular virtues, by upright judgments, and courage in war. The kings, however, who had no independent resources of power, had always the nobles and the expectation of popular movements to keep them in check, for the arms of the nation could effect every thing. The residence of the exarch was a splendid city, the seat of all that remained of arts and sciences. The fear of the Lombards restrained him from rendering himself inde- pendent : he remained for the most part on the defensive side, and was satisfied to enjoy his dignity and to enrich his relatives. In Rome the emperors soon lost all their power. By participating in the theological disputes concerning the two natures, the double will and the impenetrable relations of Christf and by entering with little knowledge of human nature into the contest concerning the use of images, which was carried on by both parties with superstition and fanati - cism, they alienated the affections of their subjects ; and by degrees the popes, many of whom w r ere distinguished by great merits, became more respected in Rome than the emperors against whom they stood forwards as the pro- * Viz. Heriraannus or tribune. f Sculdais or sghultheiss. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. tcctors of liberty and of the faith. The pontificate of Gregory the Great, a true Christian bishop, " the chief ser- vant of the servants of God," distinguished by the fervour of his devotion, the sanctity of his discourse, and the ani- mation of his genius; had greater influence in exalting the power of the Church, than that of Boniface the Third, who first began to exult in the title of Patriarch of the World. SECTION III. THE KINGDOM OF BURGUNDY. The country which bordered on Lombardy, on the other side the Alps, had received the name of Burgundy. We have already seen both the Burgundies, and the land of the Allobroges, which included Savoy, Dauphine, and Ly- ons, united with the western part of Switzerland, under the former denomination. The Burgundians had con- cluded a compact with the native people of the country, by which the latter agreed to surrender to them two-thirds of their estates, the half of their forests, gardens, and houses, and a third of the whole number of their slaves. During fifty years every freed man obtained this allodium or lot, from his Burgundian lord ; and all Burgundy was called the great allodium of the Burgundians. Estates of this description were hereditary; they were divided on the prin- ciples of equality. Pasture and agriculture were the busi- ness of freemen, while all mechanical employments, in- cluding arts, belonged on the old footing to the servile class. Thus the ancient manners of the people were long maintained in their primitive simplicity. The royal boor was whipped if he refused to any person the rites of hos- pitality ; and a bondsman who had cut off the hair of a free woman forfeited his life. The law apportioned the reward of the soothsayer, who enabled the owner to discover stolen property. On the other hand it was no longer allowed to make a UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 15 composition for murder with a sum of money *, but re- venge of bloodshed was still permitted. Witnesses were allowed to maintain their testimony by the judicial combat, and the partisans of the worsted champion were condemned to no inconsiderable flues. Wives were purchased, and they might be dismissed in cases of adultery, the admi- nistering of poison, or witchcraft. The sentiment of per- sonal dignity had not as yet developed itself among this people : a man who had stolen a dog was condemned to kiss its haunches in the presence of the multitude ; yet there were already different ranks of society : the king's council, his domestics, his mayor and chancellor, his counts in the towns and in the country, and other officers of justice, be- longed to the first order of nobles f: there was a middle rank J, an inferior class of freed men §, and a still lower order, consisting of such as were born slaves. || In the law of the Lombards there was this difference between the two last-mentioned classes; that the king's slaves were consi- dered as equal to free-born persons, and his freed men be- came entitled to the rank of nobles. There were no per- quisites of justice, but the fief belonging to each office was its appropriate salary, and the royal viteschal or serjeant levied the amount of fines. As the Burgundian law was one hundred and thirty years older than that of the Lombards, and was a relic of the imperfect civilization of countries but little accessible to us ; 1 have not chosen to pass it over in silence, although it has already been treated of in another place. ^1 At their entrance into Gaul, the Burgundians had re- ceived instructions during seven days concerning the doc- trines of the Christian faith, and on the eighth had caused themselves to be baptized. * Chrenechruda lex deinceps nunquam valeat, quia per illam cecidit multorum poteotas ; Decret. Childeb. f Optimates Nobilium. J Mediocres. § Minores personae : lidi. leudi. || Originarii. 1 Hist, of Switzerland. Vol. i. chap. 8. 16 L fcl I VE II SAL HISTORY. Whether Gundechar, Gundioch, and the several chief- lains who probably conducted the enterprises of different tribes before the departure of the Burgundians from their native scats, were princes, or merely leaders in time oi war ; we are as little able to determine as with respect to tin commanders of other barbarous hordes. In either cast their power was prolonged in its duration, in consequence of the general desire to maintain the conquests acquired ; and it was increased in a very important manner by the addition of a patriciate, or permission to exercise imperial authority over the former inhabitants. This privilege was conceded by the eastern emperor, who judged it advisable to relinquish voluntarily what he was unable to maintain- Thus to the great influence which these chieftains already possessed as leaders of their hordes, was united the un- limited sway of the Roman despot. Whether they were originally generals or princes, they now became hereditary rulers in consequence of the preponderance that resulted from the greatness of their lot in the conquered land : for as there were no imposts it was necessary that the kings should be opulent. These beginnings of absolute and he- reditary monarchy are as ancient as the migration of our forefathers from the forests of Germany into the Roman empire : and as the free companions of the conqueror be- came nobles, we may at once discover why the nobility so frequently and so long opposed the kings, and why the crafty founders of arbitrary power sought so diligently to confound this less obedient order with those who had to thank the monarch solely for their promotion to dignity and honour. With this view Gondebald, the Burgundian king, had al- ready begun to show favour to his more obedient Roman sub- jects ; when the spiritual and temporal lords, and all the free Burgundian men assembled themselves at Geneva, and obliged A D 502 t * ie * r h* tnerto victorious monarch, in the thirty- sixth year of his reign, to abrogate the laws he UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 17 had made, and to enact at Ambleu, with the advice and subscription of thirty-six principal barons, that code, of which we have given an abstract in the foregoing pages. The same prince, in order securely to place the crown during his own life on the head of his son, whose talents were greatly inferior to his own, held a court at Quarre, not far from Geneva, in which Sigismund, according to the A D 515 anc * ent custom 9 was elevated upon a shield, and declared king. Anastasius, the Constantinc- politan emperor, conferred on him also the patriciate, Sigismund was so unfortunate as to sacrifice his son Sieg- reich, whom the daughter of Theodoric, king of the Os- trogoths had borne him, to the calumnies of a second consort; and this crime entailed the destruction of the Burgundian kingdom. Theodoric, in order to revenge his grandson, sent his general, Tolonik, against Sigismund, and excited in the sons of Clovis the Frank, a determin- ation to take that vengeance which their mother Chlotilda had long desired. Her own father, Hilfreich, had fallen by the cruelty of his brother Gondebald. The king, per- secuted by the stings of conscience, or perhaps more in- clined to the retirement of a cloister than to arms, fled to the monastery of St. Maurice, which he had founded at the entrance of the Valais ; he soon suffered a defeat, and fell by an ignominious death. During ten years his brother Godemar maintained the defence of the coun- A.D.526. tt i ™ ! 1 try. He slew Chlodomir, the son of Clovis, who had appeased the rage of his mother by the slaughter of Sigismund. The Franks, as if to dry up the tears of Chlotilda, laid waste Burgundy with fire and sword, until Godemar fell, and with him the royal house of his fathers, and the kingdom of Burgundy became ex- A.D. 534. tinct. The family of Clovis henceforth governed Burgundy, but the laws and usages of the kingdom remained, and the VOL. II. C 18 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. separate existence of the state in peace and war. Burgundy proper was governed by a duke under the king, and the country on both sides of the Jura by a patrician. SECTION IV. THE ALLEMANNI. From the Helvetic Aare to the Lahn, and further down towards Cologne, dwelt the Allemanni, who being a pas- toral people, retained their ancient virtues and poverty with greater constancy than those tribes who had learnt the practice of agriculture in the Roman empire. It was their custom to burn towns. They possessed cattle and arms, and knew no other property. Their territory was an undivided common land*, and their laws were un- written. The Allemanni carried on war against Clovis, the Frank, on account of the undetermined limits of their respective countries. A battle was fought near Zulpich, in the district ot Juliers; and the victory seemed ready to declare itself on the side of the Allemanni, when Clovis, in the sight of his army, of whom a great part were Gauls and Romans, raised his hands to heaven, and uttered a prayer to his God. His soldiers burning with zeal to show how much mightier was Christ than Thor or Woden, rushed upon their enemy and put him to the route. The Allemanni exclaimed, " Spare, O king of the Franks, thy own subjects ! We are thy vassals." Yet many of these people chose to migrate into distant lands, while several districts at length submitted to the conqueror, a national animosity may be traced in every age between the Allemanni and the Franks. King Theodoric, or Dietrich of Austrasia, the greatest * The common land of the nation was termed Allmende in the Upper German dialect. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 19 of the sons of Clovis, assembled the chiefs, and all the Christian people of the Allemanni, (for the worshippers of idols were excluded from participation in civil rights,) and appointed them a code of laws, which Childebert, Chlo- taire, and Dagobert, renewed, corrected, and amplified. According to these the duke, with the consent of the people, had the nomination of the counts, or justices of the hundreds. A hundred probably consisted originally of as many houses, and in the sequel comprehended a small district, which acknowledged the authority of a select body of a hundred persons. Each hundred or district had its convention every eighth or fourteenth day ; and on the first of March, every year, the general assembly * of the whole people was convened. For the rest there were the same divisions of rank as in the kingdom of Burgundy. The land, as it is still in some places, was cultivated by slaves for half the produce ; yet the distribution was various : in some districts the slave tilled the ground three days for the owner, and spent as many in turn upon that portion which was allotted for his own support. In general the agricul- turists were of servile condition, while the pastoral people were more free. The former consisted of those nations who had been formerly subdued by the Allemanni. There are accordingly in the laws prolix regulations, alluding to ' dogs and the chace : stags were tamed, and bears' flesh eaten. The object of these laws is evidently for the most ' part to render the manners of the people more gentle, % and on that account no man was allowed to visit another with arms about his person. If a man was killed by a dog the owner of the animal was fined half the sum by which- he might have made composition if he had himself been ■ guilty of the deed, or the dog was hanged up at the door of ' the owner's house, which remained open till he fell to pieces. Many precautions were adopted in order that no man might be murdered on his way to the judge, that the * Publicus Mallus. 20 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. country might not be betrayed by any man to the enemy, and that the son of a duke might never levy war against his father. As it was designed to alienate the people from bloodshed, the greater number of penalties consisted of pecuniary mulcts. Lastly, as the terrors and ordinances of religion were indispensable for the forming of manners, it was enacted, that he who neglected to attend public worship on the sabbath-day should be condemned to sla- very. The bishops enjoyed the same dignity as counts. Thirty-five of the former, (for their number was consi- derable as long as the duties of the function were more re- garded than the splendour and power attached to it), seventy-seven of the latter, and thirty-three dukes, were assembled with other freemen for the enactment of these re- gulations. SECTION V. THE KINGDOM OF THE FRANKS. Among the enterprising warriors of this age, the Franks were the most prosperous, as far as prosperity consists in victories and the possession of power. We saw them in the third century pass over, as a military confederation, from the wastes and swamps of lower Germany into Gaul, where, at the fall of the western empire, they afforded pro- tection to many cities. When Rome was stripped of her dominion, the lieutenants in Gaul acknowledged the no- minal sway of the Constantinopolitan emperor, but the nations of the west received no assistance in their difficulties. At this era Clovis *, descended from a race of former chief- tains, who had established themselves in the low countries, and had gradually extended their dominion as far as Paris, having attained the age of Alexander at the commencement of the Persian war, won a victory over the Roman lieu- * The author calls hiiti ChlodVig, but he is recognized by English readers under the name of Clovis UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 21 tenant, which secured the permanence and independence ^ ^ of the Frankish monarchy. He invited the Gauls to throw off the feeble sway of the em- perors, which was abused for the purposes of oppression, and to associate themselves with a more energetic and better government. In the course of twenty years he united, partly by voluntary accessions, and partly by his victorious arms, all the country, from the Maese to the Pyrenees, under one head. In the meantime he secured the old Salic settlements of his people by taming the Thuringians, and the Rhine by overcoming the Allemanni. The bishops of Gaul, offended with the emperors Anastasius and Zeno, for their interference in theological disputes which they were incompetent to decide, and not without hope of acquiring a salutary influence over the ardent and open mind of the young barbarian conqueror, favoured the cause of him who was alone able to protect them. How much more willing was their allegiance after Clovis had received baptism at the head of three thousand Franks ! A courage which was not founded on the consciousness of superior tactics, but inspired by the national character of ancient Germany, ge- nerally decided the contest on the side of the strongest party; but any unexpected turn, or sudden impression, often threw an army into confusion, or gave it the victory. Though Burgundy, the feet of the Pyrenees, and the southern provinces, were subject to other princes, while in Gascony and Armorica the genius of ancient freedom still exempted those countries from dependence, yet the king- dom of the Franks, after the death of Clovis, A.D. 511. . P , perhaps on account or those very circumstances, appeared too great for a single ruler. The principle of dividing monarchies became the more readily established, from the analogy which the exercise of the supreme power seemed to bear to the inheritance of a private estate, the civil law being the only one in existence, and the law of the realm being as yet unknown. On the same ground*, females C 3 22 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. came to be excluded from the succession, because a Salic estate required a male administrator in the council and in the field. The genius of Clovis survived with his posterity. His sons, as we have seen, amidst the conflicts of Burgundy with the Ostrogoth?, united that country to their domi- nions ; and the Franks, during the wars of the Ostrogoths and Romans, gained Provence, or the ancient Province, as the reward of their assistance or neutrality. While those kings extended the boundaries on this side, the fourth of them, Dietrich of Austrasia, penetrated far into the Ger- man forests, that he might obtain security for his frontiers, and increase the number of his subjects. Thuringia was A D 536 su k cmec * n ^ s arms > a country which compre- hended the territory now called by that name, together with lower Hessia, and various parts of the elec- torate of Brunswick. The Bavarian princes, intimidated by the barbarous hordes who were issuing from Pannonia and the Bohemian forest, willingly accepted a defensive treaty with the Franks. In the meantime the French kings in the west lost none of the opportunities which the fre- quent convulsions of the kingdom of the Visigoths afforded for taming the wild Gascons, and uniting the modern Languedoc under their sway. The kingdom of the Franks was at the same time here- ditary in the family of Clovis, and subject to an election among the descendants of his house. * He had obtained from the emperor the dignities of consul and patrician. The Salic laws were drawn up by four lords, who in three general assemblies of the elders and wise men of the people had given information concerning the rights and customs of the nation, and they were ratified by the king, the nobles, and the whole Christian people in the dominions of * Ita reges Francorum electione pariter et successione soliti sunt pto- creari, a primo Pharamundo usque in Hildericum regem. Chronic. Fossat. , . 5 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 23 the Merovingian princes or descendants of the royal house. The national liberties were at this time greater than when the nobles and deputies of the Bavarian people received their code of laws from the king of the Franks, at Chalons on the Marne. The name of the king did not at first figure at the head of all public ordinances. The most an- cient deed in which it is found is one of Childebert, " the A D 55 exa ^ e ^ man *" king of the Franks. These or- dinances were the resolutions adopted by the king, his liege servants, and the general assembly in the field of March, or in whatever place it might be necessary to summon them. The assemblies of the nation obtained, by the sanction of the bishops, who, in this respect, followed the practice of the old German priests, a kind of sacred authority. The bishops made use of these assemblies in order to pro- cure enactments favourable to the propagation of Chris- tianity. Their supreme pastor, the pope, came in this way to be regarded as a sort of father, or protector, of the growing states of the west, and in return he considered it as his duty to give stability to such conventions. " It has been ordained, not without the particular providence of God," said Sigismund, king of Burgundy, " that these assemblies should be held frvice in every year; they have been neglected, and we now receive from Rome the se- verest reprimands."! He commanded, accordingly, that an assembly should be held for the future on the 6th of September every year, tne source °f tne authority of the kings. The nobles, who were elevated by these grants, brought into fashion, through their influence in. the assemblies, a right of prescription, and afterwards caused their investments to be established by pragmatic A D 58 sanct ' on * From this time an aristocratical middle power began to arise between the king and the free men, a constitution, the advantages of which could only be maintained and dispensed by kings of extra- ordinary discrimination, until, in the 12th century, the accession of the class of burgesses established a balance of power, which lasted until the nobility were depressed, and all things reduced under the controul of a single ruler. The house of Clovis declined through a corruption of UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 25 manners which left no room for forming the rising princes of the family to the pursuit of great and noble enterprises. The same cause rendered these chieftains so often the sa- crifice of factions in the court and among the nobles, that in the course of forty years six kings perished by poison or by assassination. Protadius, a Roman patrician on the Jura, was the first who usurped the authority of the ancient chieftains; with this distinction, that as he exercised it in the name of the sovereign, he endeavoured to extend the power of the latter. With this view he sought to depress the nobles, who re- fused constitutionally their service in a war to which they had not agreed, until their true enemy, the minister, who was a favourite of the queen, should be removed out of the way. Protadius fell, but Queen Brunehild obtained re- venge for him, whereupon the nobles, remembering that the arms of the nation were in their hands, declared them- selves for Chlotaire the great grandson of Clovis, and the enemy of the queen, whom they gave up to a cruel death. A D 613 ^ n **" S occaswn Merovingian France became again united under a single sovereign. Soon after these events, the foundations of the French constitution were settled, at an assembly which Chlotaire held at Paris, assisted bv his nobles, liege sub- A.D.615. . . J . & jects, and bishops. Security of body and estate igainst arms, oppression, arbitrary taxation, and claims founded upon prescript, were its general principles. In order to obtain these objects, spiritual and temporal lords were provided with sufficient power and independence to render them competent guardians of liberty. Their pos- sessions were secured to them for this end ; and that the bishops might obtain an influence equivalent to that which the multitude of their vassals and bondsmen gave to the temporal lords, it was decreed that they should become the protectors of emancipated slaves. They were secure from all fear of deposition from their dignity, so long as they 26 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. observed the laws of the empire and of the church. Every free man was tried by his peers, and by the same forms to which his judges themselves would be subjected. No man was allowed to attain to any political trust in a country of which he was not a native, and with the customs of which he was therefore supposed to be unacquainted. Agriculture was thenceforward subjected to less frequent disturbances, and the kingdom attained a degree of splendour which had been unknown for many years. In the midst of the barbarians the long-haired Franks * flourished, without disturbance either from the vanquished tribes of northern Germany, who began to frequent peaceably the markets of St. Denys, from the more distant and divided Slavonians, the weaker Visigoths, or the Lombards, who were sepa- rated from them by the Alpine barrier. SECTION VI. THE VISIGOTHS IN SPAIN. Until the reign of Theodoric the Second, the son of that Theodoric who fell in the defence of the western nations against Attila, Toulouse remained the capital of the king- dom of the Visigoths. The Allemanni were the most powerful nation in Spain, and the complete subjugation of that country, which was threatened by the arms of the Visigoths, was impeded by the same circumstances, de- pending on local relations, which, during 1 71 years, had enabled the Spaniards to resist the efforts of the Roman le- gions. A hundred and seventy years also elapsed from the arrival of Adolf in Catalonia f, before King Leuvigild, in Braga, made captive Andika, the last king of the Alle* manni, and forced the whole peninsula to revere the throne of the Visigoths. Spain had boundaries appointed by na- ture, but circumstances prevented her during 1 200 years, * Crinosi, tficoracati : Childeb. Chron. Casin. f A.D. 414— -to 585. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 27 from enjoying the benefit of this privilege. A time had been, when, under King Eurich, the Visigoths seemed likely to extend their dominion in Gaul, and the southern districts still remained under their sway. But never was any elective monarchy exposed to more terrible convulsions than those which shook the Visigothic throne. In the course of 127 years, Leuvigild had seven- teen successors, of whom seven were allied in some manner to his house, and all the others obtained the crown by forcible and irregular means. The passions of envy and revenge played their unhappy game on a greater scale than in any other realm. The prevailing temper of manners contributed to this influence. The ordinances of the church or laws established through its ascendancy, were even at that period terrible in Spain. The nobles were filled with a spirit of haughtiness which led them to degrade the lower classes, and at the same time rendered them rebellious against the king. The people delighted in blood, and dis- played firmness and constancy only in following the bent of their violent passions. The hatred of heretics was the more strongly impressed by the religious orders in Spain, in pro- portion as the wild extravagance of the imagination of this people bad distorted the principles of the faith. A system of religious worship, burdensome by its trifling ob- servances, and imposing by its pomp, was introduced and exercised with extravagant practices. Montesquieu has justly termed the laws of the Visigoths puerile, full of error, ignorant, contradictory, rich in rhetoric and poor in sense, insignificant in their contents and prodigious in their pre- tensions. Under King Sisenand they were reduced at Toledo to a regular form. The Theodosian code, brought into use through Anianus, chancellor of Alarich the Second, and the ancient customs of the nation, were the sources of these laws. They were afterwards reformed by Ber- mudo the Second, and again amplified by a third king of the same name. It was under the second Bermudo that the canon law obtained the authority of a civil code. 28 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. SECTION VII. THE ANGLO-SAXONS IN BRITAIN. The Aborigines of Britain had long ago sought an asy- lum for their independence in the remotest mountains of their island, and maintained it by the practice of warfare, for which the Scots gave them perpetual occasion. The Hebrides were divided between the Scots and Hibernians, as the islands of the iEgaean sea had been shared by the Greeks and Persians. The first Belgic Britons in the southern parts of the island lost by the Roman victories their liberty and the strength of character which was necessary to restore it. Pressed by sea and land, they found themselves under the necessity of inviting a tribe of those Saxons whom we have elsewhere described as a nation of formidable navi- gators. • The English brought with them to Britain the simple and barbarous manners of the German tribes. The fol- lowers of Hengist and the other hordes, who successively passed over and occupied the country, maintained their national character with the greater purity, as the insular situation of England prevented intercourse with foreigners. They were animated by a love of their country and a spirit of independence, which were cherished during six hundred years, by the weakness of monarchy or by impediments arising from the various states of public opinion, and the inclinations of the nobility and the popular assemblies, which controuled the ambition of the kings. From this long contest there arose, at length, a constitution, which will continue to unite the various advantages of all the forms of government, and to avoid their evils, until the commercial spirit shall finally give rise to habits of think- ing incompatible with the self-devotion of patriotism* These causes maintained life and vigour in the state, UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 29 For the rest, England was divided into seven kingdoms, of which the subjects were chiefly Saxons, or those Britons whom their circumstances had not enabled to emigrate. The remainder of the Britons sought refuge in the moun- tains of Wales, or passed over the sea, to share the fate of Armorica, to which country they imparted the name of their native land. England, properly so called, was long before the time of Alfred divided into hundreds and counties. Every di- vision had its head, who was responsible to his superior, and all were subject to the king. Forty names of such counties serve still for the division of the country; but there are large cities which are within the jurisdiction of no county, and districts which give the tenths not to any bishop, but to the king, those towns having been built since the division of counties took place, and such districts brought into cultivation since the revenues of the church were allotted. The institutions of England are in this re- spect peculiar, that -the people have so much reverence for antiquity, as rather to bear with imperfections than to violate the venerable form of the political fabric. Liberty, which is founded on custom and precedent, does not admit of innovations. Every district elected its magistrate, so that even at that early period the ambitious had no way of obtaining their gratification but by seeking to gain the affections of the people by popular manners. Laws were enacted by the king, in the council of the nobles and wise men. The lat- ter long retained the impression of the wisdom of ancient Rome, a certain predilection for knowledge, as if the Muses had ever sought the land of freedom. This national council was assembled in a regular manner twice every year. Free men held that place in it, which in the records is distinguished by the name of Commons. The judg- ments that were given during these times, were the models and foundation of the common law, the oral remains of 30 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. original customs and rights, as they had been declared in every case by the voice of twelve men of the same rank with the accused. These decisions, handed down from an- tiquity, formed the favourite law of the country, the foun- dation of English liberty as it had descended from the earliest ages. Those institutions which had not their origin in the primitive manners of the people, were introduced in later times by violence and craft. How the constitution, manners, and religion of a people may undergo frequent alterations, while through all such vicissitudes the love of freedom may still remain inherent in them, and display proofs of its influence on every occa- sion ; how this general sentiment, exalted by all private in- terests, may yet in no particular give rise to any excess, but may produce an equilibrium of power in the whole fabric of the state; how this spirit of independence may find the way of limiting the power of the king, by means of a parliament, and the authority of the latter by means of the king, and the influence of one house by that of the other; and how these strong and multifarious bonds of liberty may give to all classes of the people a lofty elevation of character ; all these great and splendid problems find their solution in the history of the English nation. When we observe the old Albiones in the mountains of Caledo- nia, the Britons in Wales, and the English themselves all animated with the same spirit, we are obliged to conjecture the existence of some permanent, ever-operative cause, powerful enough to overcome the original characters which these nations brought with them from foreign realms. As we have observed the laws of the Chinese, Indians, and Egyptians, resist the effect of repeated vicissitudes, and of a long series of ages, and the institutions of Lycurgus maintain their relation to the rugged feet of the Taygetus ; as we have seen the Romans and Carthaginians acquire from local circumstances those characters which have ex- cited the "admiration of posterity ; the manners of the Ger- UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 31 mans remain permanent on their native soil, undergo in Spain a complete reverse, and give way in France to a more sprightly character; so we may contemplate the British isles, as destined by nature to become the land of freedom. Finer fruits are the gifts of a warmer climate; and colder regions bring forth still hardier bodies; but the former enervates and renders its peo- ple effeminate, the latter enables them to bear even slavery with patience; the climate of England holds the enviable mean, and moderation is the character of all its institutions. The whole northern region of the world was as yet un- known. Scarcely does a faint glimmering break forth by degrees more like the polar lights than the splendour of day. Scandinavia, Russia, Sarmatia, and the land of the Gepidi, to the confines of the Eastern empire, were still enveloped in this darkness. SECTION VIII. CONSTANTINOPLE. In Constantinople, Arcadius, son of the great A.D. 595. _ _ . \ y* 1 8 . Theodosius, was the sport ot a treacherous mi- A D 408 n * ster an ^ a t0 ° P ower ^ u ^ consort. The second Theodosius found himself unable to govern monks and eunuchs; how then was it probable that he would venture to resist Attila? It was his good fortune that Yezdejard reigned over the powerful empire of Per- sia, to whose upright tutelage it appears that Arcadius was not afraid of confiding the unripe years of the young prince. This monarch indeed showed so much favour to the Christians, that he made a most unfavourable impression on the supporters of the religion of his coun- try. His successor, Bahrain, whom the Persians extolled, 32 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. and who was hated by the Christians, weakened his own party by the persecutions he excited against the latter. Theodosius gave himself up to the quiet enjoyments of his court, to literature, and private friendship, and the chace. He is celebrated for the oldest collection of the Roman law which has come down to our time ; but his good qualities were abused by the evil genius of his age, above which he had not power to raise himself, and which ren- dered him a slave to the passions of insolent priests. The earlier council of the Church at Ephesus, which was held during the latter part of his reign, deserved no better ap- pellation than that that of a synod of robbers. It was here that the most impetuous of all prelates succeeded in exciting every species of violence and treachery against Nestorius. The Church was yet trembling under the consequences of these proceedings, when Pulcheria, the prudent sister of the emperor, ascended the throne, which, together with her hand, she confided to Marcianus, a soldier of great merit. She held the council of Chalcedon A.D.450. , ... .„ against JLutyches, which was still more to be deplored; not that its crimes exceeded those of the Ephe- sian council, for that would seem scarcely possible, but be- cause it furnished new occasion for the disquieting of the Christian churches. In the four councils of Nicaea, of Constantinople, (which was held by the elder Theodosius), of Ephesus and Chalcedon, it had been the aim of in- temperate priests to penetrate all the mysteries of the di- vine nature, and, without knowledge of languages or critical taste, to determine the sense of the more exalted passages in holy writ. By thus drawing away the attention of men from that wisdom and goodness which is given us to love and practise, the object of revelation was defeated, and the mind was turned to a servile reverence of unin- telligible dogmas. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 33 B _ The reign of Leo, who succeeded Marcianus, was disgraced by the ingratitude oi this prince towards Aspar, to whom he was indebted for the throne. The factions of the court and the affairs of the church con- tinued to engross the attention of the government, and Zeno, the son-in-law of Leo, was dethroned in the East, A D 4"4 a k° ut tne ^ me wnen Rome lost the empire of the West. While Clovis was founding the kingdom of the Franks, the East groaned under a religious edict of Zeno, now restored to the Byzantine throne. Even A D 491 ^ g 00 ^ qualities of the Emperor Anastasius were enslaved by the vain desire of deciding questions which he would more wisely have left untouched. Justin himself, the honest and ignorant warrior, had nearly ' entailed a persecution on the Catholics in Italy, A.D.519. , . | « . , . J by oppressing the Arians, who held the same creed with the Ostrogoth Theodoric. All these emperors were eager to reduce to unintelligible definitions all the various forms under which the mind of man represents to his view subjects of which it cannot penetrate the obscurity. Justinian also lived chiefly for the court, and adorned it with a dignified exterior; while two parties, in the church and on the arena, disturbed its tranquillity. By his com- mand the learned men of the empire made the most per- A D 527 ^ eCt com P^ a ^ on tnat was P oss ibl e °f the Roman law, while Belisarius restrained the Persian Nushirvan from extending his dominions, conquered Africa, and prepared in Italy laurels for Narses. We cannot refuse to allow that he displayed a perception of the magnificent, particularly in architecture: but the praise of having availed himself of the public prosperity, and the talents of his illustrious subjects, for the restoration of the real strength of the state, is denied to him by the events of his last years, and by the fate of his successors on the throne. vol. ii. r 34 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. During the reign of Justin the Second, the Empress Sophia possessed the same influence in public affairs which Theodora had exerted with such per- nicious effects in the time of Justinian. By her Narses was alienated, and Italy for the most part lost. The emperor, ^ ^ whose designs were upright, ended his reign under the gloom of calamity, having yielded the throne to the brave and generous Tiberius. The latter A jy 5 was t0 ° s °on succeeded by Mauritius, an ex- cellent soldier, who seems to have been deficient in that commanding genius and in those shining qualities which are necessary for the supreme ruler of an empire. The khan of the Avares defeated his troops, which were unskilfully commanded when the emperor was not at their head; and when Mauritius, like the old Roman senate, disdained to ransom those who had surrendered themselves to the enemy, Phocas availed himself of this occasion to corrupt the allegiance of the troops who had been strangers to military discipline. In consequence of this single instance A D 6 9 °^ sever ^y' * n * s exce ^ ent prince, and his whole house, lost their lives. The young Heraclius easily expelled from his throne an assassin stained with every crime: not so easy A.D.610. J was the defence of the empire against the Per- sians, whose victorious arms were already visible from the walls of the capital. But Heraclius assisted the defence by his presence, and their fortune, for the last time, deserted the house of the Sassanidae. Although the emperor excited the censures of his age by marrying within the forbidden degrees of consanguinity, and for departing from the re- ceived forms of belief concerning the unity of will in the double nature of Christ ; yet he would have terminated his reign with the most splendid renown, and with well-deserved good fortune, had not Fate at this period called forth into action a nation which had never yet played its part among the revolutions of mankind, but which now sprang forth 14 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 35 like lightning; and having displayed for a while astonishing energies, and at length returned to its first limits in free- dom and security, has left behind it, on the theatre of the world, its religion, and many striking effects of its customs and domination. D 2 ( 36 ) BOOK XII. OF THE RISE OF THE MOHAMMEDAN RELIGION, AND THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE ARABIAN EMPIRE. FROM A. D. 622, TO 732. SECTION I. ARABIA. Arabia, or the Western Land, received that name from the Chaldeans, whose country lay to the eastward of the desert. Among the Syrians, the tribes of the wilderness were called Saracens, or natives of the East. Their original name is Barbar, Sons of the Desert : they are proud of this distinc- tion, and look with contempt upon the inhabitants of cities. The Arabian peninsula is formed by two gulfs which ad- vance far into the land ; and the desert region to the north- ward occupies a large space between the empires of the Persians and the Romans. The whole extent of Arabia may be estimated at fifty-five thousand square miles. The wilderness exhibits nature dreary and destitute of life: the burning rays of the sun ever descend without interruption through a dry and unclouded atmosphere : the naked hills seem stripped of their covering by the winds, and offer unbounded prospects where no shelter refreshes the weary traveller, where no object attracts his view: an immeasurable space seems to spread itself out between him and the animate creation ; in which, here and there, under the shade of a few lonely palm trees, a spring of water bubbles forth and is quickly choked in sand. The Arab alone is acquainted with these halting places ; he alone fre- quents them : free, and possessing enough to satisfy his UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 37 simple wants, he conveys hither the treasures and the slaves which he robs from those caravans that venture to dispute the tolls exacted by the great emir of the desert. The camel affokls the only means of communication be- tween these islands in the ocean of sand. This animal, like his master, learns from his earliest years to endure hunger, thirst, and the loss of sleep. He often marches three or four hundred leagues without drinking more than once in eight or ten days, and eating any thing, in the space of twenty-four hours, except a few thistles or stalks of worm- wood. He often bears for weeks a load of thirteen hundred pounds, without ever being lightened of his burden. He constitutes the safety and the riches of the Arab, and is the most faithful companion of his life. While the camel bears double the burden of a mule, he is more frugal than an ass; his flesh is not less esteemed as food than that of the calf ; the value of his hair rivals the finest fleece ; his dung serves for fuel ; his urine affords sal ammoniac. A nod points out the way to him, and a song re-animates his steps. Amid orchards on the banks of the Euphrates, the chief hamlet of these roving tribes, the ancient Anah, stretches itself out through a long tract ; where the great emir of the Bedwins at particular periods fixes his abode. Among the Bedwins, several families obey the authority of one sheik, the noblest and richest of their clan ; and all the sheiks ac- knowledge the supremacy and claim the protection of the great emir. His capital is a moving town, which is laid out in regular streets meeting in one spot, where the tent is spread in which the emir dwells. He receives gifts from travellers, who purchase of him a secure and free passage through the desert. The celebrated schools and commercial towns of Cufa and Bassora lie on the confines of the desert. The names of many tribes remind us of Moses and of Job. The only enemy which the natives dread is the Samoom, the angel of death> a sulphureous wind which rises out of the wilderness, the D 3 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. fumes of which suffocate all the animals and men who fall in its way- It blows through Arabia and Africa, and is felt as far as Spain. We have already spoken of Arabia Petraea, which re- ceived its name from the town of Selah, called Petra by the Greeks. On the shores of the Arabian gulf are situated the cities of the prophet, Medinat-al-Nabi and Mecca. Of Yemen, or Arabia the Happy, the shores alone have been accurately explored. We only know that the interior is inhabited by a people of bold and animated character, who dwell in proud independence in their pastures, or in gardens which produce abundantly the most fragrant plants, such as frankincense, balsam, cinnamon, cassia, and coffee. Roads have been formed for communication between the principal towns, and the land in their vicinity is cultivated to the tops of the hills. From a shrub resembling tfre juni- per-tree, the Arabs gather that frankincense which smokes in the churches of Christendom and in the temples of the East. They collect coffee from a shrub which is said to have been transplanted from Abyssinia to the hills of Yemen. How little did Prosper Alpinus suspect when he described this plant in Egypt about two hundred years ago, and commended its medicinal qualities, that it would become in a few generations the favourite beverage of Europe, and an article of necessity, from the seraglio of the Turk to the huts of Switzerland, a source of much good and evil to .society ; and that physicians would write books to proscribe its use ! * The same region so much abounds with excellent horses, that if there is any place which is the native seat of that noble animal, and which produces his race in its greatest perfection^, it would seem to be Arabia, f The steeds of the Arabs are * Du Four, Traite du Cafe a la Haye. 1685. Linnaei Amcenitates. 6. •f Buffon. — I have abandoned this opinion, and now no longer consider Arabia, but the kingdom of Kuku, or some region of Africa, to the south or the west of Egypt, as the moot probable country of the horse, (Remark of the Author.) UNIVERSAL HISTORY. equally beautiful, though not so large as those of Africa . they are swift as ostriches, but fit only for the chace. One class of Arabian horses is preserved pure in the breed, with long and well attested registers of a remote ancestry : others are bred from the casual mixture of various races They are the daily and nightly companions of the Arabs, who are anxious to keep them clean and in good condition : they stand saddled through the day and feed by night. The coursers of the East, and of the African Moors, were brought originally from Arabia Felix. The shores of Yemen run down along the Arabian gulf as far as the straits of Babel Mandeb, in the vicinity of which lies Okad, where bards in ancient times contended for the prize of poetry. Here, among gardens and groves of coffee, is situated Mocha, the central point of Arabian commerce, in which is the chief receipt of the customs of Yemen. Nearer to the end of the peninsula, important by its situation and the excellence of its haven, Adel is seated on a promontory at the foot of a lofty rock. This place was visited by the Greeks and Romans, who sought spices also on the coast of Hadramaut, and brought the aloe from Sccotora. Mara and Oman have been less known to history. We have elsewhere made mention of the attempts of the Hebrews at Palmyra or Tadmor in the Wilderness, and at Thiphsach on the Euphrates, to settle towns which might afford protection to the shepherds who wandered with their flocks from Gilead : we have spoken also of their enterprises from the ports of Elath and Eziongeber, and of the com- mercial colonies of the Phoenicians on the gulf of Persia. The interior of Arabia has never yet been explored. There the Tobbah ruled at Saba by the authority of laws, without encroaching on their freedom, over valiant hordes : shut up in their palaces after the manner of Orientals, and sur- rounded with eunuchs, they exercised the judicial power to the common advantage of their nation, while nature had d 4 40 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. made sufficient provision for defence against foreign ene- mies. The traditions of Saba yet preserve the name of Balkis, that queen who admired the wisdom of Solomon, and who bore a son, the ancestor of the Negush who now reigns in Habesh. Above the city of the Sabaeans, which was also called Mareb, in an elevated valley to the north-west, there was a vast tank or artificial lake, of the walls of which are yet seen stupendous ruins. This lake supplied the ca- pital, and irrigated its gardens ; the water was one hun- dred feet in depth, and palaces were erected on its walls; the city was the abode of opulence and pleasure. In one night, as it is believed, during the' reign of Tiberius Caesar, this wall was broken down, and the town was swept away by the overwhelming waters. The years are com- puted from this calamity. In vain Alexander aspired to the sovereignty of Arabia, and vain were the efforts of the Romans. A Greek colony in Socotora may still be traced among the hills of that island. When Anastasius I. held the imperial sceptre at Constantinople, and Naowash, King of Hamyar, in Yemen, who professed the Jewish faith, persecuted the Christians ; the Arabs were overcome by a Christian, the Negush of Abyssinnia. Naowash, disdaining to submit, drowned himself in the sea. Thenceforward the African conquerors governed Yemen by means of deputies. The misfortunes of Arabia were of no long duration, yet the effect of them is still felt in Europe. The con- querors brought with them the small-pox from the poison- ous Africa : they communicated it to the Arabs, and com- merce has spread it through the world. At first it broke out seldom, but committed dreadful ravages. Before a hundred years had elapsed, it appeared in Italy, and made its way to Burgundy and to Germany. UNIVERSAL HISTORY- SECTION II. MOHAMMED. During these times of. anarchy, while the freedom of Arabia was suffering under the arms of the Negush and of Khosra Nushirvan the Persian monarch, Mohammed was born in the 570th year of the Christian era. He was de- scended from a family which had produced many chief- tains, and many enterprising merchants. His father, Abdallah, died early, and left to his mother, the Jewess Emina, five camels and a female slave. Mohammed displayed from his infancy reflection and a fiery imagination: he was generous beyond his fortune; compassionate, susceptible of warm friendship, and aban- doned to licentious pleasures. In his exterior he had that serious demeanour which distinguishes the oriental people : a dignified manner ; an animated and pleasing expression of countenance. He was of the middle stature, his limbs were well proportioned, and his features striking. In his twentieth year he bore arms in a sacred war, which his tribe the Koreish waged against certain bands of robbers, who disturbed the pilgrimage to Mecca. The black stone of the Caaba, in the great tower of Saba the son of Cush, had been from early times an object of venera- tion. It represented the earth, the mother of all, the cen- tral mass, around which the chaotic matter was distributed and reduced to order. It is still held sacred in the East. Five years afterwards he resorted to the fair of Damas- cus, to sell the merchandise of the rich widow Chadija. His genius and address gained the affections of the widow, and she. bestowed upon him her hand and fortune. As long as she lived Mohammed treated her with grateful respect and irreproachable fidelity. Mohammed beheld with sorrow the calamities of his coun- try, the abandonment of its ancient manners, and the intro- 42 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. duction of foreign customs. He had learnt from bis mo- ther that the Jews were still expecting the champion of Israel; he had heard from the Christians that Jesus had promised to those who loved him, the Comforter, who should lead them into all truth. He was persuaded, by the sug- gestions of his own mind, that he was the person who was capable of restoring happiness to the nations. In the for- ^ tieth year of his age happened the night of the decree of God, in which Gabriel, one of the archangels, as he believed, or as he declared, called him to be a prophet of the Most High. This event he related to Chadija, and to Varaca, his father-in-law. His words inflamed them with holy zeal, and they swore " by that God, in whose hand is the soul of Chadija and Varaca, Mohammed is the prophet of God." Immediately his cause was embraced by the young Ali, grandson of the chief Abutaleb, " the first of the witnesses" who received in marriage the daughter of the prophet. The old, respectable, and upright Abubeker soon joined himself to the party. Often when he was seized by fits of epilepsy, Mohammed fancied that he heard the voice of angels. The prophet began in sincerity, led astray by his fancied gift ; but fraud and violence enabled him to accomplish what piety and praiseworthy motives induced him to attempt. He ex- pected to succeed to the office of guardian of the sacred stone ; but the zeal of party excited a tumult which threat- ened his life. Mohammed fled in disguise and closely pursued from Mecca, and escaped through the groves of palm-trees to Yatreb, where the Jews had secured in his interest the chief men of the city. From that day*, which was the 16th of July, in the 622d year of our era, the Moslem conlpute the succession of time: this is the epoch of the Hejira, which Omar instituted in the year * Or rather from the commencement of the year, 68 days before. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 4?> 639. The prophet was welcomed at Yatreb by 500 disciples, and that town received the title of Medinat-al- Nabi, the prophetic city. Islam, the religion which Mohammed promulgated, con- tains these dogmas, that there is one God, and that Moham- med is his prophet, by whom the law of Moses and of Jesus is perfected and accomplished. He published no new tenets ; but only adorned and exhibited in a form adapted to the ideas, prejudices, and inclinations of the Orientals, that doctrine which is as ancient as the human race. He moreover enjoined many ablutions, well suited to the manners and necessities of the hotter climates : he ordained five daily prayers, that man might learn habitually to ele- vate his thoughts above himself, and above the sensible world : he instituted the festival of the Ramadan and the pil- grimage to Meccaj and commanded that every man should bestow in alms the 100th part of his possessions; for these observances already existed in established custom, or in the circumstances which gave occasion to their enactment. In like manner the prohibition of wine and the flesh of swine, circumcision, and the Friday's sabbath, are partly more ancient, and in part new, or rather recommended than strictly ordained. He established a law adapted to circum- stances, a religion for countries, in which the sublimity of Islam produced a greater impression than the subtle fri- volities which then divided the theologians of the Christian church. Enthusiasm joined its influence, and elevated the soul of the true believer above the whole visible world ; above the power of perishable things ; and above the fear of death itself. While an abject superstition debased the subjects of the Byzantine empire, the soul of the Arab was kindled into fervour by the elevated simplicity of a doc- trine which opposed few checks to the vehemence of his passions. Its power was first displayed in a war in which the prophet overthrew his enemies at Mecca. At the village of Beder. 41 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. where the Moslem pilgrims still offer up adorations, he obtained the first victory. Happy was he esteemed who had fallen for the true faith ! He had departed to endless enjoyment, in fragrant and shady groves, where beautiful black -eyed virgins awaited him; where heavenly youths sprinkled him with water of the roses of Paradise, from goblets of pearl and gold ! After the conquest of Mecca, his command was sent to Heraclius, Emperor of Constantinople, to Khosru Parviz, the King of Persia, to the Arabian emirs, to the Negush and the governor of Egypt : " In the name of him who formed heaven and earth, and who ordained Islam from eternity to endless ages ; believe in Mohammed, teacher of the divine and universal law." • Arabia willingly re- ceived his command, and acknowledged that he restored the faith of her patriarchs. The chieftain, Chalid, marched against the unbelievers, at the head of three thousand men, and defeated an army of twenty thousand. In the cause of the Lord of heaven and earth, fear found no place, especially when the prophet declared that the end of his mortal career is predestined from eternity to every man, in the counsels of Providence. When Mecca had become obedient, and all Arabia paid him reverence, Mohammed commanded Islam to be carried into every country, and all nations to be united by arms or by faith. The prophet having been poisoned, as it was believed, in the 63d year of his age, departed into the pre- sence of that Eternal Being, whose unity and goodness he caused, by the exertions of his whole life, to become the faith of more than half the ancient world. SECTION III. THE EMPIRE OF THE ARABS. Ali, the first of the faithful, aimed at succeeding his father-in-law the prophet : but his design was defeated by UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 45 the intrigues of Ayesha, one of Mohammed's widows, who had once received an affront from Ali ; and her father Abu- beker was raised, by the majority of voices, to the honour of chalif, or successor. The remains of the prophet were deposited in a coffin of white marble. His visions and re- velations were recorded in writing, that the tradition of his faith might be preserved in a firm and unchangeable basis. Such is the Koran, a work which, by the importance of its contents, the sublimity of its representations, the purity of its expression, has become not only the sacred, but also the classical book of the Moslem. While these affairs occupied the chalif, Chalid conquered all the countries which lie between the Tigris and Eu- phrates and the Mediterranean sea. Four thousand and five hundred of the faithful laid the foundation of the Arabian empire. This general and Amru displayed the energies of a nation bred in the hardy habits of the pas- toral stats, and roused to energy by the impulse of fanati- cism. A flame, which was destined soon to consume its own vital force, extended the dominion of the Moslem ; but the empire survived, supported by its relations to the country and people under its sway, and by the influence of ancient opinion and never-fading passions. The great Khosru Parviz, the Persian, the terror of the Byzantine emperors, who had carried away the true cross from Jerusalem, after a reign of nearly forty years ever victorious until shortly before its termination, was assassi- nated by his son Shiruyeh ; anarchy prevailed in the king- dom of the Sassanidae. In the course of three years twelve kings and queens ascended the throne, and a restless spirit of independence manifested itself in the fortresses of the chieftains. In Constantinople, the crimes of ambition, of faction, and the vices of a eorrupt court, ruled under the guise of superstitious sanctity. In the meantime Chalid tempered the fire of the Moslem by the rules of order and discretion. Old men, women, UNIVERSAL HISTORY. children, and ecclesiastics, excepting the shorn offspring of the devil, (for thus he termed the monks,) were spared by the sword. For the rest, to those Christians who submitted to the tribute, toleration and protection were promised. Accordingly, when, after the death of Abu- \ D 634 ™ beker, Omar, raised by the influence of the same Ayesha to the office of Emir el Mumenin, or com- mander of the faithful, attempted to recal Chalid ; the troops still remained devoted to him, and he carried his victorious arms and the law of Islam through Syria to the confines of Asia Minor. Amru, the son of Aasi, marched to the conquest of ^ Egypt. Since Egypt lost her native Pharaohs, she had been alike incapable of restoring her liberty and of submitting to the yoke : always eager to give assistance to the enemies of her present masters, she quickly abandoned the lieutenant of the Greek emperor. Then was the ancient Memphis burnt, Alexandria taken by storm, and, according to an old tradition preserved by Abul- pharagi, the remains of those archives of the human race, which had been collected by the Ptolemies, were consumed by fire. Amru attempted to complete a work often be- gun, by cutting through the land which separates the waters of the Mediterranean from those of the Red Sea. It has been supposed that the surface of the two seas, not being of the same level, the adjoining countries may be overwhelmed by the waters of the more elevated basin : but Omar forbad the undertaking, from the apprehension that the prophetic cities would be rendered accessible to the Christian fleets. Eastward of Memphis, Amru built Fost- hath, the remains of which are still seen in Old Kahira. It was the custom of the Arabs, in their conquests, to de- stroy all former things, to give to every region a new face, and to make the camp of their general the metropolis of every country. While Egypt was dismembered from the Byzantine do- UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 47 minion, King Yezdejard, the Sassanide, descendant of those* Sapors and of those Chosroes, before whose arms the Ro- mans had so often trembled, fought several battles against another Arabian chief, and at length was totally defeated in that of Meru. The fate of this monarch is differently related. Some historians report that the king was overtaken and slain, while he was entreating ^ ^ ^ a mariner to transport him across a river: others say that a necklace and bracelet of gold tempted the cupidity of a miller in Segastan, under whose roof he had taken shelter. His son, abandoned and des- titute, but too proud for submission, is said to have taken refuge in China. Cyprus and Rhodes were plundered : the Moslem pene- trated on one side through the chain of Taurus, and on the other into the deserts of Nubia. Amru was recalled by Osman, the successor of Omar ; but the warriors declared that, as they revered, in the commander of the faithful, the teacher of the law, so they would follow the most va- liant general in the field of battle. The chalifs were for the most part feeble sovereigns : but the empire, founded on the faith which was impressed upon the nation, supported it- self; and was invincible as long as the strength of this im- pression remained. It already extended from Persia to the desert of Kair- wan, and already the throne of the chalif tottered on its A D 65 f° un d&ti° n ' Ali succeeded Osman, but the widow of the prophet armed the troops against the first of the believers. The sacred chair was shaken by the arts of a woman, while both Romans and Persians fled before the standard of Islam. Ali was at length murdered at Cufa, and the Shiites still pay reverence to his A.D. 661. . . tomb m the vicinity of that city. The Shiites are a party who neither acknowledge his pre- decessors nor his successors as lawful chalifs ; but pay ho- nours to a sacred family descended from him, of which the 48 UNIVERSAL HISTORY* last individual, Mohammed Montatar, born in the 868th year of our era, is supposed by them still to survive in con- cealment, that he may appear as sovereign in the end of time. Of this persuasion is Persia. During the whole of June the Shiites keep fast in honour of Ali and his sons Hassan and Hosein : they lament them by night, when theatrical exhibitions are performed, representing their battles and assassination : effigies of their bodies, stained with blood, are carried in procession through the streets, and every Shiite learns to execrate the Sunnites, the ene- mies of Ali. Of this latter sect are the Ottoman Turks. SECTION IV. COMMANDERS OF THE FAITHFUL OF THE HOUSE OF OMMIA, TriE throne of the prophet devolved by inheritance on the house of his uncle Ommia. Abusofian, the son of Om- mia, had been the most implacable enemy of Mohammed; while the charms of his wife Hinda attracted the passionate addresses of Hamsa, one of the most eminent advocates of the new faith. Moawiah, sprung from these parents, per- ceiving the success of the prophet, acknowledged that he came from God, paid him religious homage, and having attached himself to his cause, became lieutenant of a pro- vince; and after the death of Ali, and the abdication of Hassan, received the dignity of Emir el Mumenin. While he roused the zeal of the nation in favour of the true faith, he knew how to distinguish the superfluous from the essen- tial : and he drank wine, clothed himself in silk, and re- moved the doctrinal chair from the humble Mecca to the splendid Damascus, which was reckoned one of the four paradises of the east. In Africa some w r andering tribes invited his general Ocbah to liberate them from the intolerable yoke of the Byzantine emperor. Ocbah achieved this enterprise, and in the country of the ancient Cyrene, the birth-place of so 12 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 49 many poets and philosophers, confirmed his conquest, by erecting the fortress of Kairwan. The city of A.D.671. Tr . b . ■ ' r c ! Kairwan was built not lar from the coast, at the foot of a hill, abounding in springs of fresh water, and surrounded by fertile meadows, in a soil rich in mines of salt. Okbah afterwards overran, in the course of a few years, the whole northern tract of Africa, which, while Carthage was yet free, had cost the Romans three Punic wars. A luxurious and refined people everywhere embraced the side of that faith which was dictated at the head of an A D 682 armec ^ nos k At this time Damia, queen of the Berbers, arose like a second Dido, and aimed at rendering her country independent ; she conquered Carthage, defeated the Arabs, and laid waste, as Italy to her cost experienced, those plains abounding in corn, which had long been the granary of Europe. She hoped that the enemy would be unable to resist this mode of warfare; but Hassan, at the head of the Arabs, called forth all the re- sources of enthusiasm, and Carthage fell before his arms. ^ jy 6 All the African coast, to the straits of Gibraltar, soon yielded to the sword of the Moslem. SECTION V. THE ARABS IN SPAIN. Spain and the south of France were yet under the do- minion of the Visigoths, whose power would have been in- vincible if they had known how to obey their rulers. We have already observed the throne of the Visigoths shaken by faction : their kings were not accustomed to govern by the maxims of tyrants, or they would have been more able to suppress sedition. No" sooner had Rodrigo hurled from the throne, and put out the eyes of King Vitiza, who held his nobles under an iron sceptre, than a Spanish count t Tx invited Musa Ebn 'Nasir, the Arabian go- A. D. 710. . . ® vernor of Africa, across the Straits. It has VOL. If. E 50 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. been rumoured that King Rodrigo had violated the sister of the count ; but it is more probable that the calamity of Spain had its origin in the spirit of faction. In the seventh year of Walid Ebn Abdulmalik, com- mander of the Faithful, Musa intrusted to his general Tarich, or Tarif, an army of Arabs, Moors, and Berbers, or wanderers of Africa. At the spot where he passed the Strait, a rocky hill rises 1400 feet above the sea, which it overhangs with a precipitous cliff towards the north and east, while the side which faces the extreme point of Europe ■ has a more gradual descent. This height Tarif A. D. 712. ° . fortified : it was his rock ; Gebel Tarif, or Gib- raltar ; and he thence extended his incursions through the A D 7\" count O r ' At length a battle took place at Xerez, where Rodrigo fought for the crown, the freedom, and the faith of the Visigoths, against Tarif and Musa, Islam, and the ferocity of the Moslem. Long and bloody was the contest ; Rodrigo fought heroi- cally, till the betrayer, who had invited the Arabs, with Oppas, Archbishop of Seville, expecting that the foreigners would only assist one party of Spaniards against the other, went over to the enemy. The flower of the army perished, together with their king, and the kingdom of the Visi- goths, divided and without a master, fell under the yoke of the Mohammedans. The latter extended their arms from sea to sea, and across the Pyrenaean bulwark : they conquered Narbonne, Carcassonne, and the country on the further side, as far as the Rhone and Lyons. Many old and flourishing cities were destroyed by them, and new ones built on the same territory. In other respects they established the constitution of things which they found; only the commander of the Faithful held the place of the king. The national assemblies, the nobles, the courts of judicature, and the laws remained. The Christians ob- tained a toleration for their worship, and were only for- bidden from speaking against the faith of Islam. The UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 51 tribute, or land-tax, was a tenth part of the revenue in those towns and countries which capitulated, and a fifth part in those which were subdued by arms. The product of both was given to the lieutenant of the caliph. The Visigoths' were unable to endure the command which enjoined them to refrain from disputing the faith of the conqueror, and thereby obtain the crown of martyr- dom; and the bishops in vain attempted to restrain the indiscreet effusions of holy zeal. Some who disdained all submission fled to the mountains of Asturia ; these were chiefly the nobles and the sons of the nobles. From the Pyrenees a long chain of hills stretches to Cape Finislerre, the extreme point of Gallicia. Ansena, one of these hills, afforded refuge to a troop of a thousand Goths, who sought hiding places in the caverns of our Lady of Cabadonga, and acknowledged Pelayo, a distinguished warrior, as their „ _ chieftain. The story is not free from the exag- A.D.718. . ■ . ' f . . 8 gerations ot national vanity ; yet Asturia enjoys, as the ancient asylum of the noble Goths, certain liberties which had no other origin than the achievements of her sons; and the hamlet of Gijon, on the coast, scarcely ob- served by the enemy, became the root of a lasting mo- narchy, which grew up among the mountains. The chiefs conquered Oviedo and Leon ; and it came to pass, after a contest of two hundred years, that Ordungo the A.D.914. J ° Second found himself sufficiently powerful to restore the royal authority at Leon. Political calamities were advantageous to the virtues and the genius of the Visigoths. A long war, waged with various fortunes, against enemies far more powerful, forced them to a glorious exertion of valour and heroism ; and they witnessed, among their conquerors, arts more perfect than those of barbarous Europe, and were taught by them to know the value of the conveniences and embellishments of life. But this happened in later ages : at that time the Arab himself knew only his faith and the use of his sword. 52 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. It is not certain whether the great prophet himself could read and write ; and Ali, the commander of the Faithful, was the first who ordered the Arabic language to be re- duced to grammatical forms, by Abul As wad Alduli, that his people might not lose, in their distant conquests, the purity of their speech. At the same period the dictionary was compiled by Chalil, and literature made little further progress under the house of the Ommiades. SECTION VI. THE ARABS IN HINDUSTAN. About the same time when the Caliph Walid at Da- mascus was informed of the calamities of the Visigoths in Spain, he Received information from other generals of con- quests achieved by his aru in Eastern India. Hindustan has never withstood the attempts of foreign invaders, yet it has always orlered an impenetrable resistance to the intro- duction of foreign manners. The laws of the country are so entirely founded on the manners of the people, or the latter have had so powerful an influence upon the former, that they have, in the course of time, and by the effect of continual use, grown into an impenetrable bulwark. To this effect not only their relation to the climate and soil have contributed, but the great interest which the numerous and dignified caste of Brahmans have ever felt in the main- tenance of this system. The caste of Cshatriyas, or war- riors, are interested in support of the same constitution by the enjoyment of great privileges. The mercantile order are chiefly anxious for tranquillity and the preservation of old customs; and the fourth caste, or the Sudras, are so humiliated, that they possess no political influence. The laws of India on this subject are more severe than those of Sparta with regard to slaves : in no country have the higher classes ventured more or obtained greater success in arrest- ing the progress of the human mind. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 53 The Brahmans had already to contend against the Sama- naeans and the Christians: with no benignant feeling had they beheld the colonies of Jews which were in old times settled in tluir country, and now the victorious Moslem brought with them the faith of Mohammed, and forced them, sorely against their inclination, to relax their severity, and to concede a greater measure of justice to degraded humanity. SECTION VII. FRANCE. The arms of the Arabs, scarcely heard of a century before, now domineered from the Ganges to Narbonne ; when the Spanish governor, Abderachman, enraged at the defection of the little territory of Cerdayne, carried war into the dukedom of Eudes of Aquitaine, and into the kingdom of the Fianks. In the western parts of Europe, the Franks were so superior to all other nations ; their empire so great, their ability and valour so distinguished ; that if they had been overcome, neither the Lombards nor any other German or Slavonian people could have restrained the Moslem from falling at once on all sides upon Italy and Constantinople. The kings of the Franks, since the time of Dagobert, son of that Chlotaire who held the assembly at Paris; had gradually declined in power through effeminacy, and the prodigal favour and confidence which they bestowed on the mayors of their palace, and by the effect of unfortunate contingencies, by which the latter contrived to further their own advancement. The splendour and pleasures of the court lulled the descendants of the Merovingians into a voluptuous repose: and as the mayors of the palace in the mean time omitted no exertion that coukl contribute to augment or confirm their power ; their influence, founded on splendid merit or successful boldness, increased to a pro- e 3 54 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. digious extent. The king proposed the mayors of the palace to the ecclesiastical and temporal lords at the time of election * : yet the power of this office, even in the age of Eberwin, so greatly exceeded that of the crown, that if Grimwald and Pepin d'Heristhal f had not concealed their usurped authority with greater address, they would have fallen victims, like that minister, to the jealousy of the nobles. Pepin and his descendants, as mayors of the palace, acquired and maintained by their merit a greater than royal power, both in Austrasia and in Neustria. % It was thought right that the greatest share of authority should be in the hands of those in whom the nation reposed the greatest confidence. That every thing depended on this recommendation, Pepin in his old age was persuaded ; and at his death, instead of his younger son, a minor born in lawful wedlock, recommended the bastard Charles to suc- ceed him in his important office. It was determined that the energies of the kingdom should be wielded by the hands of him who possessed the most kingly soul. The Franks had to carry on wars in Germany against the Frisians, Saxons, Sorbians, Bavarians, valiant enemies or faithless allies; or in defence of weak dependants who stood in need of their protection against barbarians. In these expeditions the mayors of the palace engaged with alacrity : they rejoiced to find themselves at the head of their troops, and they sought occasions for war. In time of peace they also possessed the power of pardoning offences: * Electione pontificum et cunctorurn ducum. f Eberwin was mayor of the palace in the reigns of Chiotaire III. and Thierri. He was an able and ambitious minister, and was at length assassinated as he was attempting to reduce Austrasia under his sway, A. D. 683. Pepin d'Heristhal succeeded him, and governed with more moderation. He was the father of Grimwald and of Charles Martel, and the founder of the Carlovingian house. He died about 712, A. D. T. J Pepinus Dux Francorum obtinuit regnura Francorum per annos 27, cum regibus sibi subjectis ; Ann. Fuld. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 55 they gave away offices, distributed vacant feofs, and left to the king the honour of his title, the enjoyments of luxury, and the rank of sovereign in the Champ de Mai. On that occasion the prince was seated before the assembly of the Franks on the throne of his forefathers : he saluted his liege- men, and received homage from them; accepted the donative offered by the nation, and gave it to the mayor of the palace who stood by his footstool: he divided the vacant estates according to his recommendation, and confirmed the distri- bution of those which were already given. He then mounted his chariot and was drawn by four oxen to his palace, where he remained till the following Champ de Mai. All matters of importance were proposed by the minister to the assem- bly, and the resolutions of that body were executed by him. His power was distinguished from that of the old German chieftains in these circumstances, that it continued in time of peace and was enjoyed for life; was handed down in a certain manner by hereditary descent ; and extended to the administration of all affairs. The dukes of the Allemanni, of Britanny, and of Aquitania, frequently, but in vain, op- posed their voices to these transgressions of constitutional forms. But the circumstantial detail of these events is unknown : fear, indifference, political disturbances, diminished the number of historians. These were the heroic times of Europe. Barbarians were forced to adopt civilized forms of life; forests were cut down, morasses drained; the nobility were free, and the people employed in producing the necessaries of life. SECTION VIII. GERMANY. An illustrious Englishman named Winifred, who was afterwards called Boniface, introduced into the German forests the first spark of religious light. In Bavaria, he E 4 56 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. renewed, purified, and regulated the profession of Christi- anity, according to his own sentiments and those of the Roman pontiff. The light of the Christian faith speedily diffused itself through Franconia, Thuringia, the banks of the Rhine, and in Saxony and Frisia. While Boniface established the humanizing worship of Jesus and Mary, in the places where Stuf and Bustrich had been the objects of veneration, he assembled congregations of people in villages which became the origin of towns. Pope Gregory II., eager to establish and extend the authority of the pontifical chair, remarked the talents and zeal of Boniface, and bestowed on him the episcopal dig- nity and the office of legate. The merits of Boniface ob- tained for him, by the favour which he acquired at Rome and the interest which he excited among the Franks, the bishoprick of Mentz, which was established for his sake. The ancient city of Mentz, since the devastation of the barbarians, had given the precedence to the more flourish- ing town of Worms. From thence the bishop A.D.756. & ■ p . , v * promulgated the Christian faith according to the representations of his age, together with the authority of the holy pontifical chair, and the milder manners and ordinances of the Franks, among those tribes whom the mayor of the palace had overcome or meditated to subdue. Thus were the Gospel and the law of Islam disseminated at the same time, and by similar means ! Moral and religious culture was extended through the north by means of cloistered societies, similar, but in many respects more venerable than those of the Pythagoreans. SECTION IX. ENGLAND. It is remarkable that the chief part of this laudable work was carried on by men who had imbibed the zeal of holy enterprise in the remote parts of Europe, at Hy in Ireland 3 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 57 and at Bangor among the Kymri. While the Scots waged wars against the Caledonians, while the dynasties of the Anglo-Saxons carried on mutual hostilities and were per- petually disturbed at home by domestic troubles, which continued till the West Saxons gradually gained the pre- ponderancy, the light of Christianity, but lately kindled, and a remnant of learning which had never fallen wholly into contempt, were more honoured in Britain than in any other region. Accordingly, while the nation was insignifi- cant in its external relations, peculiar talents and energies were displayed by individuals, which formed for them- selves a theatre of action embracing nearly all the western countries. SECTION X. LOMBARDY. The kingdom of the Lombards acquired greater stability after Authari the son of Kleph had obtained A.D.584. , ill i the government : each nobleman gave up to the king the half of his possessions, in order to place him out of the temptation to commit injustice, either from the pressure of his own necessities, or from the desire of conferring benefits upon his friends. Authari governed wisely, and fought heroically against the combined strength of the exarch and the French monarch : the Franks were less formidable in the intersected country of Lombardy than in open plains, where the fight was decided by an impetuous attack, and the Lombards possessed stronger fortresses. Theodelinde, the widow of Authari, chose for her hus- band Agilulf, the duke of Turin, and the nation adopted . _ him for their sovereign in the Champ de Mai, A.D.590. . . r In his time Fope Gregory I. mediated a peace which terminated the long continued hostilities A. JJ. 599. of the Lombards and the Greek exarchate, " What other consequence," said he to the contending 58 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. parties, " can arise from your persevering enmity, but the deaths of many thousands of men, whose hands are useful to the Romans and Lombards for tilling their land." Agilulf had also the wisdom to make peace with the Franks and Avari: his people possessed the best cultivated soil and more of the produce of industry, and it was more easy during external peace to preserve tranquillity at home among his restless dukes. Theodelinde confirmed the esta- blishment of Christianity, which humanized her subjects, and gave them an inclination to a peaceful life. The public repose was sometimes disturbed by the robberies and treachery of the khans of the Avari, but the warlike spirits which were thus roused were shortly obliged to subside into the calm of peace. The kingdom became better regulated, and was not further enlarged. The son-in-law of Agilulf was that Kins Ro- A.D.636. _ . _ iii , than, who, as we nave already mentioned, com- piled the legal code of the Lombards. It contained at first 390 enactments, and the num- ber was increased in the course of the next 110 years by the addition of 193 articles. It remained in force after the Lom- bards ceased to have kings of their own nation, and the conqueror only ordained an equal authority for the capitu- laries of the Franks. The law, compiled and augmented by Justinian, prevailed in Rome and in the exarchate, and hence arose that variety of foreign ordinances for which Italy is remarkable to the present day. In the law of the Lombards theft and adultery were punished with death : murder was not a capital crime. The excessive power of the great, and the confidence of the nation in the king, seem to indicate, that it was thought im- proper to arraign the conduct of him who had killed a man by the order of the sovereign, or had given his advice as to the method of destroying him. But whoever introduced an enemy into the country? as Narses introduced Alb win, whoever abandoned it himself, or aided a freeman in UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 59 alienating himself from the republic of the Lombards, had death for his portion. On the other hand, it was not ex- pressed that he who entered into conspiracy against the king ought to die ; but it was simply declared that such an act exposed him to the risk of death. It is worthy of re- mark, that he who excited a disturbance in the * church was subjected to a fine of forty shillings; if any man committed the same offence in the national assembly, his penalty was nine hundred ; and for any such act in the pa- lace of the king, death was the reward. The law of war, as in other legal institutions, decreed death peremptorily against him who excited the soldiery to resist the command of the general, or other officer, whom the king had set over the troops; or who induced any part of the army to neglect their duty, or who deserted his comrades in the field of battle. The general appointed by the nation pre- sided over the operations of war; the gastald of the king over the police and judicial regulations of the armyf, and each watched over the conduct and restrained the excesses of the other. In the estimation of their own law, the Lombards were the noblest people, and of far higher dignity than their neighbours, the Romans : the penalty for fornication com- mitted with a Lombard slave, was a greater sum by two- thirds than with a Roman. No woman was permitted to live without the safeguard of some protector |, or of the court. The distinction between free persons and bond- slaves was so great, that an irregular marriage was pu- nished with death; and if a free man was desirous of espousing his female servant, it was necessary that a cere- mony should previously be performed, which typified her * Scandalura commiserit. •j- Si Dux exercitatem molestaverit injuste Gastaldus eum solaciet usque ad praesentiam Regis, aut apud suum judicem ad justitiam per- ducat. £ Mundiburdium. GO UNIVERSAL HISTORY. regeneration. Great as was the distinction between free- men and the lower orders, human nature itself was held in but little higher dignity than the brutes: a man who struck a marc thai was with foal, was fined with die same penalty as if he had committed a similar violence towards a preg- nant female slave; and for either offence the punishment was only half so great as if he had torn off the tail of a horse. The freemen were either barons or of common family, or men who had obtained only personal freedom, or such as also possessed the right of disposing of their property. Illegitimate sons were in every way distinguished from those born in lawful wedlock;'.) ut when there was only one of the latter in a family, the former inherited one- third part ot the estate. In the servile class, the domestic servants who were employed in every kind of art, were distinguished from those who managed the estates, and these again from the labouring rustics. Among the latter, some were assigned to agriculture, others to pastoral em- ployments, and severally to the care of oxen, sheep, goats, and swine ; and in each division the master rustics were dis- tinguished from the apprentices. The domestic servants took care of the hawks, the swans, the cranes, and stags, that were kept as domestic animals. Among the Lombards the word virtus, as among the ancients, had the sense of strength, and solatium was used to signify the support of armed auxiliaries*, the only con- solation of the defenceless among barbarians. To this code were added, at a later period, the feudal customs, as they were compiled by Obert-ab Orto, of Milan, under the Emperor Frederic I., together with the ordinances of the pontifical chair. The whole system de- clined when, towards the end of the twelfth century, the cities began to be governed by particular statutes, and through the exertions of the professors of Bologna, the * Si quis homini libero insidiatus fueric cum virtute et solatio, ct subito battidcrit. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 61 Roman law became every where, except perhaps in Venice, the only scheme of jurisprudence that was used for the completion of local ordinances. The legal system of the Lombards maintained its ground most effectually in those quarters of Sicily where it had been freely adopted. It contained nothing that related to political institutions, because the code on which the security and property of the citizens depended, ought to be wholly unconnected with the mutable forms of government. The monarchy was given by election. On this account Agilulf took care to procure the nomination of his son Adelwald, to be his successor, twelve years before his own death. The young prince became idiotical after his father's death ; idiocy indeed, and the poison by which it is induced, are frequently mentioned in the history of the Lombards. Ariwald, his brother-in- law, was thereupon elected in his place. Ro- A.D.625. vi.. than, the legislator, was another brother-in- law of Adelwald. Rodwald, the son of Rothari, having fallen by the sword of a man whose wife he had seduced, the nation elected Ari- bert, nephew of Queen Theodelinde, desirous of combining, as far as it was possible, respect A.D.65S. _ . / , , ,\ . r v and gratitude towards the royal house, with the privilege of electing a king according to merit. Aribert, with more paternal than patriotic sentiment, determined to leave his two sons, Perthari and Godebert, joint sove- reigns; each of them endeavoured, by factious intrigues, to increase the strength of his own party, and they both be- came the victims of their own folly. Grimwald, A D 661 duke of Benevento, of Godebert's party, am- bitious and distrustful, because he supposed his designs to be suspected, slew Godebert ; and Perthari being in- . _ formed of this event flew into Hungary. The AD. 662. , & J genius of the Lombard government appears m the circumstance, that Grimwald, although he had con- C2 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. ciliated many friends by acts of munificence, and had se- cured his personal safety by a body-guard, found it needful, in order to protect his throne, to espouse the sister of the last king. The events by which he was finally compelled to resign his right to Perthari ; the imprudent joy of the people, which brought new dangers on the latter ; the va- lour of his friend, who saved the prince at the peril of his own life; the manner in which his foe rewarded this noble act, and the resolution of him who had performed it, rather to suffer with Perthari in misfortune, than to live with dignity and opulence in a splendid court ; all these circumstances compose a romantic story, in which the he- roic character of the Lombard nobles is strikingly pour- trayed. The Franks came to the aid of Perthari, and were defeated by Grimwald, who obtained his victory by pre- tending a flight, and leaving his camp well stored with wine. He afterwards reigned with such reputation for wis- dom and justice, that deputies were sent to his court by a tribe of the Bulgarians, begging that he would receive them into the number of his subjects : the territory of Molise was allotted to their establishment. This multitude of na- tions, each of which retained some part of its peculiar lan- guage, have given origin to the provincial dialects of Italy. We find in this country vestiges of all times, of all nations, and constitutions ; and if we comprise Switzerland in our survey, we have as it were an abstract or specimen of every form of government and period of civilization. After the death of Grimwald, the court and the assem- bly of nobles hastened into the passes of the Alps, to re- A D 671 CC ^ Ve P ertnarj 5 wno afterwards reigned with gentleness and benignity, having profited by the experience of misfortune. Grimwald having left a son, who was duke of Benevento, Perthari A.D.677. I . , ' _ _ took care, nine years before his death, to cause his own son, Cunibert, to be named as his successor. The latter was defeated by Alahis, duke of Trent ; but the gen- 12 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 63 tleness of his manners, and his respect for learning, and all estimable qualities, had obtained him the affections of his people. Nevertheless, under Luitbert, his almost infant son, Raimbert, duke of Turin, nephew of Perthari, by . ~ his brother, excited internal war, obtained the A.D. 700. A.D.701. throne, and bequeathed it to his son, Aribert the Second. The Bavarians having under- taken to effect the restoration of Luitbert, Aribert in vain sought to win over to his party the pope, by conceding a tri- bute from the Cottish Alps, whence are derived the revenues which Rome still obtains, to the present day, from Pied- mont. Both Luitbert and Aribert lost their lives in the contest that ensued ; and Ansbrand, a wise old Bavarian chief, was invited by the nation, to- gether with his son Luitbrand, to leave his country, which bordered on Lombardy, in the Tyrol ian mountains, and to assume the government. The latter was celebrated for many great and splendid qualities; never was the kingdom more powerful or better regulated than under his sway. He re- mained at peace with Bavaria, and with the Slavonians of Carinthia. Charles Martel, mayor of the palace to the king of the Franks, sent his son Pepin to Luitbrand, that his locks might be shorn by the hand of the Lombard king. The sons of the nobles, among the Franks, never suffered their hair to be shorn until they had passed the age of puberty, when he who first performed this ceremony was considered hence- forth as holding the relation of a second father. SECTION XI. THE ARABS IN FRANCE. Luitbrand made a league with Charles Martel, and they exerted themselves jointly to withstand the conquests of the Arabs, before whose victorious arms Constantinople, Paris, and Benares trembled. The Moslem had spread them- selves over the plains of Gascony; they had passed the 64 UNIVERSAL HISTORY* Dordogne, and had defeated Eudes, the duke of Aquitaine; parties of Arabs had appeared- on the borders of Bur- gundy : and already, Rainulf, lord of Die, Gap, and Gre- noble, had joined the infidels ; already they approached Nice, on their way to the kingdom of the Lombards, when Charles Martel and Luitbrand took up arms against Ab- derachman, in defence of themselves, of all Christendom, and of Europe. A D 2 Wh*l e tne Arabs were engaged in the plunder of Poictiers, the mayor of the palace united his forces with those of the humiliated duke of Aquitaine. During a whole week the hostile armies stood in array? opposed to each other, and consumed the produce of the country. The battle was fought on a Saturday in October, in a plain which extends between Tours and Poictiers. The Franks stood in a close and impenetrable phalanx, protected by their shields as by a bulwark, and sustained, unmoved, the onset of the infidels : then suddenly they rushed for- wards and assailed the enemy. Abderachman fell, and with him the flower of his army : the remainder, yet a powerful body, retreated towards Spain. It is believed that Charles Martel could have inflicted a severer punishment if he had not been desirous of still leaving a formidable enemy to be the terror of Aquitaine. This day was decisive with respect to the future limits of the Arabian empire. The king of the Lombards waited in the mean time with his army on the way to Nice, but the Arabs did not venture to attack him. SECTION XII. CONSTANTINOPLE AND ROME. Three princes had ascended the Byzantine throne in the space of one year after the death of the Emperor He- raclius : Constans II., the grandson of that monarch, re- UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 65 ^j^ el gained in possession of it. This was the tyrant who occasioned a more irreparable loss to the arts of antiquity than Alarich and Genserich at the head of the Goths and Vandals. . He carried on a war against the Lombards, in A.D. 642. . .... which his troops chiefly distinguished themselves by devastation, as the ruins of the formerly flourishing La- curia long testified. In a battle against the Lombard army, a strong and gigantic warrior of that nation transfixed the body of a young Greek officer, and held it aloft upon his halbert, above the ranks ; the sight of it so terrified the troops of Constans, that they immediately took flight, and the battle was lost. Constans then betook himself to Rome, and carried off all the chief specimens of the fine arts that he could find. The temple of all the gods, in which the senate had formerly been assembled, that prodigy of archi- tecture, built by Agrippa, the friend and minister of Au- gustus Caesar, was despoiled of its costly roof. After the emperor had employed himself twelve days in these occu- pations, he abandoned the city, bearing with him the ex- ecrations of its people and the contempt of his enemies. He afterwards exercised similar devastations in several towns of Italy, Sardinia, and Sicily, and approaciied Syracuse, laden with the splendid spoils of the provinces which he ^ ^ despaired of maintaining in their allegiance to his sway. The ships, however, which were des- tined to convey his plunder to Constantinople, were taken by the Arabs on their passage, and the proudest remains of the ancient arts were carried to Alexandria, where they perished by means which are unknown. Constans remained six years in Sicily, where he was at length as- A.D. 668. sassinated. A youth, whom the army forced to seat himself on the throne, and whose chief recommendacion was the beauty of his person, was easily overcome by Constantine the Fourth, son of the late emperor. In his reign Africa was lost to the VOL. II. F I MVEKsAL HISTORY! empire; and, without the aid of the Grecian fire, a compo- sition of which napththa was the basis, Constantinople itself would have fallen belbre the standard of Islam. It was this Constantine who held that council, in which it was established that the Monothelites were heretics, and unworthy qf Christian communion. * Under his son, Justinian II., an occurrence A.D.685. _ ' _ , . took place at Kavenna, on the occasion ot a military parade held on a Sunday, which may serve to give ws some idea of the manners that pre- vailed in the Koman exarchate. Ihe exer- cises were performed according to tribes, and it happened that one body found itself aggrieved. On the following Sunday, after the celebration of divine service, they invited the soldiers of the other tribe as guests, to their houses, on the pretext of promoting a reconciliation. Each guest w as murdered by his respective host, and the bodies of all were thrust into the sewers or concealed in the stables. The city remained three days in public lamentation ; the baths were shut up, the theatres abandoned ; every citizen sought his father or his friend ; processions were ordained, and the archbishop commanded a fast, which was to be observed even by sucking infants. When the secret was discovered, the guilty tribe suffered the same violence which they had in- flicted ; their houses were destroyed, and the part of the town which belonged to them still bears v the name of the Quarter of the Robbers. Soon after this catastrophe the emperor, who was a prince of ferocious character, and devoted to violent pas- sions, was dethroned, and deprived of his nose. A D 70^ ^ av ^ n g regained his power, he caused Leon- tius and Apsimarus, who had governed in the interval, to be put to death publicly, and ordered the eyes of the patriarch to be put out. The nobles were executed at their own doors, or they were drowned in sacks, or melted lead was poured down their throats. A similar fate UNIVEItSAL HISTORY. or befell the chief citizens of the distant Ravenna. Johanni- cius, a man distinguished by rare endowments of genius, was permitted to write his last will with his own blood. He wrote, Oh God, deliver us from the tyrant ! and im- mediately dashed out his brains against a wall. Philippicus Bardanes took vengeance on Jus- AD711. tinian for the sufferings of humanity, but he neglected his own interest and the empire. He was sur- prised, his eyes put out, and Anastasius Artemius, a gene- ral of considerable talents, succeeded him on the throne. The army? instead of carrying on wars against the Arabs, forced a private citizen of Adramyttium, whose A. D. 71.5. L . 1 , name was 1 neodosius, to assume the purple: he laid it aside as soon as he was permitted. Leo, who was an Isaurian, and a general of no mean parts, succeeded him on the throne, and A.D. 717- defended Constantinople more than two years against the Arabs; in the mean time pestilence and famine are said to have destroyed 300,000 men. It was this em- peror who published the ordinances, decreed prematurely, and with greater purity of intention than knowledge of human nature, against the use of images in the churches ; of which we shall hereafter trace the consequences. SECTION XIII. RECAPITULATION. In the period which we have been contemplating, two potentates made their appearance on the political stage; in the south the commander of the Faithful, with a pow- erful, well disciplined, and victorious army; in the north the mayor of the palace of the Franks, clothed with the authority which his merits acquired, and presiding over the resources and strength of the French, the Burgundian, the Thuringian, Bavarian, and Allemanic states. The king of 6$ UNIVERSAL HISTORY. the Lombards was rather great by himself than by any extent of power that could be compared to the sway of two such rivals. England, a world in itself, was destitute of any political influence on the Continent ; and the North was scarcely known. I ( 69 ) BOOK XIII. the age of charlemain and harun al rash id-. — a. d* 732—841. SECTION I. STATE OF ROME AND ITALY. The people of Rome had long been unwilling to receive commands from Ravenna, to be the subjects of a foreign court, and to be governed by Greeks, who were accustomed to despise all foreigners as barbarians. When peace and tranquillity had recruited their strength, the desire of throw- ing off the yoke was awakened among them. Under the Emperor Philippicus, who was not accurately orthodox in distinguishing the two natures in the second person in the Trinity, the assembly of the Roman people resolved " no A D 712 ^ on S er to °k e y tne commands of the imperial heretic, or to circulate his coinage;" and they refused permission that his statue should be erected in the church of St. John de Lateran, and ordered that his name should no longer be mentioned in the public prayers. A sedition was excited against those who were attached to the imperial party ; and scarcely could the spiritual power, by means of processions bearing crosses, gospels, and tapers in the via sacra, moderate the inflamed passions of the multi- tude. The cause they had undertaken excited no hostility on the part of the ecclesiastical authorities. The attempt was renewed with greater energy when Leo took away from the people the visible objects of their reli- gious worship. Images were the ancient ornaments of the churches : it was not towards the dead wood or stone that p 3 70 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. the adorations of the more enlightened were directed ; but the form served to lead the thoughts towards the ideal object which it typified, while to the rude and unlettered it had ever been impossible to elevate the mind to the concep- tion of an abstract and spiritual nature. Leo, not contented removing abuses which had been sanctioned by antiquity with and were connected with the weakness of human nature, caused the images to be broken in pieces with contempt and abhorrence, and imposed his own method of representation on the consciences of all. Gregory II., a native of Rome, who was then pepe, uttered warnings to the Christian people of the West* .A D 7^6 The cities and the armies of Italy loudly re- claimed against the imperial ordinance : the officers of the emperor were expelled, and independent men were elected in their places, and bound by oath to protect the party of the apostolic chair. Some provinces were desirous of choosing another emperor; but Gregory, with that pre- sence of mind which is the trait of a great man, repre- sented to them that as it was yet possible that the divine grace might find its way to the heart of Leo, precipitancy in their counsels would be culpable and intrusive. It thus came to pass that Italy recognized the authority of no emperor ; but the pope, as long as he lived, remained at the head of a powerful confederacy. At this epoch King Luitbrand was waging war against the exarchate, and endeavouring to unite Italy under one monarchy sufficient for the maintenance of its own security, and over which no foreign power would have been able in future to prevail. Although some of the Lombard dukes were too independent, yet the kingdom had augmented its power. The nobles trembled in the presence of Luitbrand, who was so gracious to the inferior ranks that he may be excused for his severity towards the great. Two of his nobles had formed a conspiracy against this monarch. He led them to the chace, and in a secluded place, in a forest UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 71 where he was alone with them, he upbraided them with their design, and throwing away his arms, exclaimed, " Here is Lutbrand, your king ! do towards him as you will." They threw themselves at his feet. He gave them presents as the pledges of forgiveness. " The king of the Lombards," says Paid Warnefried, " was no scholar ; but he was wiser than the philosophers." Against the power of this valiant leader Gregory III. de- fended Rome and Ravenna by means of menaces and exhortations. In the dominions of a king the papal chair could never have attained so exalted a degree of veneration. It was fortunately filled in succession by a number of en- lightened statesmen, who united eloquence and the lofty virtues of the Roman character with the dignity derived from their own office. The two Gregories were succeeded by Zacharias, a courageous man, who possessed a share of knowledge which was in those times rare. The latter was followed by the enterprising Stephen, who sought the assist- ance of the Franks against the arms of the Lombards: Paul, though brother of Stephen, held with wonderful dexterity a balance of power between the two opposing interests; and Hadrian the Second, in the most calamitous times, was distinguished by all those imposing qualities which enable a ruler to hold an ascendancy over the minds of men, and to use them as his instruments. Charlemain collected the correspondence between these popes and his father and himself. It shows us what a preponderance they were enabled to acquire by their ability, their knowledge of mankind, and by an eloquence which was worthy of better times. SECTION II. THE CARLOVINGIAN DYNASTY. After the death of Charles Martel, his house became weakened by divisions; and Slavonians, Bavarians, Alle- manni, and Saxons, took arms in the cause of his son t 4 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. Gripho against the brothers of the latter. Pepin and Car- loman conquered their enemy, and they availed themselves of this occasion for abolishing the ducal dignity in Germany. The house of Duke Luitfried lost itself in the crowd of the nobility ; and royal administrators held the office as the counts of Burgundy succeeded to the dukes and patricians. The house of the mayor of the palace could not endure the new dignities which began to rival it. The influence of the bishops was lessened by their love of arms, of wine, and of the chace : for a grave demeanour is the secret support of a power which is grounded on opinion. In this state of the French empire, in the A. D. 752. 266th year from the time when Clovis the Merovingian laid the foundations of it, the Franks assem- bled themselves at Soissons and obliged Childerich the Third, the last of the Merovingian house*, to lay down the insignia of royalty. Pepin, mayor of the palace, son of Charles Martel and grandson of the old Pepin d'Heristhal, was elected king of the Franks. Pope Stephen the Third confirmed, by the apostolical authority, the newly acquired power in the house of the Carlovingians. The new king, after he had acquired the sole sovereignty by the humiliation of the nobles and the ruin of his brothers, strengthened his power by an intimate alliance with the popes, and rendered the latter great and illustrious by his victories over the Lombards. In the seventeenth year of his reign he assembled all his dukes, counts, A.D.768. _ . _ s ' _ . , , _ bishops, and abbots, and with their consent divided the French empire between his sons, Charles and Carloman; the latter of whom died in the course of a few years, not without suspicion of having received A. D. 771. . ' . poison by order of his brother. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 73 SECTION III. FALL OF THE KINGDOM OF THE LOMBARDS. In the kingdom of the Lombards, after the death oi Luitbrand and the short administration of his successor Hildebrand, the staff of sovereignty was surrendered to A D 44 "^ u ^ e R ac * ns °f Friul. The latter, together with his queen Tasia and her daughter, having given themselves up to a life of devotion in the cloisters of the Benedictines on Monte Cassino, his brother Aistulf was chosen in his place. Aistulf conquered the ex- archate ; against him Pope Stephen, finding him A D 52 * 6SS sm ^ m ^ ss ^ ve tnan ^ s Predecessors, had called in the aid of Pepin, who forced the king to yield a part of his conquests ; and confided them, on account of their remoteness, to the administration of the pope. When Aistulf was dead, and Rachis satiated with the life of pious seclusion came forth from his cloister and again sought his throne, Desiderius duke of Tuscany obtained the sceptre through the influence of the Romish A.D.756. * & see. The latter, after the demise of the popes, who had pro- moted his fortunes, fell into a dispute with Hadrian the Second, concerning certain territories of the exarchate that were on their mutual boundaries ; and at the same time af- forded an asylum to the family of Carloman, who fled from the power of Charles king of the Franks. On this account Charles was the more easily stirred up by the pope to re- new the war against the Lombards. Charles held at Geneva the diet in which the Lombard war was resolved upon. With a part of his army he marched through Savoy, while Bernhard, his uncle, led the other division over the Mont Bernhard. The king of the Lombards sought an interview with the pope: Hadrian returned answer, that he could not enter into any negoci- T4 UNIVERSAL 1J1ST0KY. ation until Desiderius had punctually fulfilled all his de- mands. Spoleto, Rieti, and other places, immediately declared themselves for the strongest part} 7 . It was found impossible to resist the enemy in the passes of Suse and Novalese, where the paths had been betrayed to them, The Lombards could not support the onset of powerful bodies moving in firm array. Pavia was the central point of their defence. When the other cities had been reduced, and Pavia cut oftj Charles, on Easter day, paid a visit to the pope in Rome, accompanied by some of his dukes and counts. The nobility of Rome, with the standard of the imperial cit)v and the youth with branches of olive and palm, marched, out, together with the whole clergy, to "receive the king. The pope, surrounded by the great prelates and the Roman people, awaited him at the vestibule of the church of Saint Peter. The king, after returning thanks for the good fortune of his arms, entered into the sepulchre where the bones of the apostles lie. The pope did not neglect to ob- tain from him a confirmation of the gifts which the church had received from his father, and entered into a personal friendship with Charles, which they maintained through life.. The valiant Adalgis, son of the Lombard king, had abandoned Pavia and retired to Constantinople, where a brave and victorious emperor, inopportunely for his de- signs, died soon after his arrival. Pavia, ac- cording to some, by the treachery 01 a prin- cess, who had conceived a violent passion for the great Charles, according to others by the hand of a meaner traitor, was betrayed to the French king. The kingdom of Lombardy was united with that of France, and his " Excellency Charles, the illustrious king of the Franks, and patrician of Borne" a title bestowed upon him by the Ro- mans, was also declared sovereign of the Lombards. Paul Warnefried, the chancellor of Desiderius, and the historian of his nation, three times conspired for the resto- UNIVERSAL HISTORY. M ration of its independence, and proved that the vicissitudes of fortune were incapable of altering the resolutions of hi* mind. His judges had condemned him to lose his eyes and hands, but Charles, in this instance, imitating Caesar, exclaimed, " Where shall we find hands that shall be able to write history as these have done?" Charles was sovereign of the country as far as the Ga- rigliano, while the extensive and beautiful territory of Naples, as far as Brindisi, was maintained by Arichis, duke of the Lombards, at Benevento. This prince ruled from sea to sea, and his successors conquered the territories of the Greek emperor in lower Italy. Arichis had fortified Salerno: his magnificence, his wisdom, and justice ob- tained for him the admiration of Europe. Adalberge, his duchess, caused an abstract of Roman history, which was no despicable work, to be prepared.* Charles was well contented that Arachis manifested towards him the outward signs of submission. In Salerno the duke re- A.D.787. * , , , . ceived the royal commissaries, his army sur- rounded the palace, the young nobles, with falcons on their hands, formed rows for them through the public places, the hall was filled with the magistrates of the city, and the counsellors in their robes of state: the duke, who was seated on a golden throne, rose up and swore to be faithful to the king, to maintain peace, and to fight under his banners a league beyond the boundaries of the Beneventan territory. In all these affairs the city of Venice, which was forming itself in the islands of the Lagunes, took scarcely any part. It possessed no territory on the continent : and while fa- vouring sometimes the Lombards, at others the Greeks, or the French, remained free and unobserved. The Vene- tians seemed willing rather to favour Charles, whose great- ness depended on the sdul which he alone knew how to in- fuse into his empire, and who did not oppress them, as the old Lombard kings had done, by their continual presence. * Historia Miscella. 76 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. The Liburnian coasts also acknowledged Charles. He protected Corsica against the Arabs, while in Sardinia and Sicily the latter people contended for dominion with the Greeks. SECTION IV. RESTORATION OF THE EMPIRE OF THE WEST. Charles was already master of the peopled districts of lower Germany : the Frisians had learnt to obey his father and grandfather ; the Saxons in Westphalia and in lower Saxony as far up as Hessia, under Wittekind, had often renewed their warfare, with the same ruinous event, against his arms and laws, the faith of Christendom and the man- ners of the French : the Sorbians had in vain attempted to aid their allies, and Gottfried, king of the Danes, had opened to them free asylums where they might recruit their strength. The Obotrites, or Mecklenburghers, favoured the arms of the French : but it was Charles himself who imparted to them their chief energy. While he was con- quering Italy, and dissipating the conspiracies of the Lom- bard chiefs ; humbling the restless Vasci in Gascony, tra- versing the Pyrenees, taking Pamplona, and infusing terror into the Arab troops as far as Zaragoza ; driving them out of the south of France, and establishing a count to the southward of the Pyrenees, at Barcelona ; he never lost sight of the wilds of Saxony, but flew with his troop of Franks * from Spain to Paderborn, and having received there the obeisance of " Ibn al Arabi," damped the fire of rebellion in the west of Germany. Saxony was obliged to yield to the unceasing exercise of all the resources of mi- litary art. Charles conquered the most cultivated and the wildest parts of western Europe. He had at the same period to contend against the spirit of freedom which yet survived in * Scara Francisca. Frankenschaar. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 77 Britanny, with Duke Thassilo of Bavaria, who, not without impatience, acknowledged him to be his own superior, and ^ ^ with conspiracies in his own house. The treach- ery of Thassilo gave him an opportunity of uniting, under his immediate sway, the territory of Bavaria from the Lech to the Ens, and from the extensive plains of the Nordgau to the feet of the Tyrolian Alps, where the con- fines of his own Lombardy began. He spared the life of the chieftain ; who in the tranquillity of a cloister, forgot the laborious pursuits of ambition and his ill-directed patri- otism. Charles drove the restless Avari beyond the Raab, and laid waste their boundaries. He pursued still further the Wiltzes, Limones, and other Slavonian tribes inhabit- ing the territory of Brandenburg, in order that the unwill- ing Saxons might wear the yoke in the midst of subdued nations. He afterwards drew every third man from Saxony, and transplanted them into the interior of his kingdom ; gave to French subjects the farms that were left vacant, and appointed bishops in the marks of Brandenburg. He was desirous of civilizing the people whom he had subdued by arms, and in future to build his government on civil order and the sacred influence of the spiritual authority. A D 800 Charles, king of the French, conqueror of the Saxons, Bavarians, and Lombards; in Spain, the hope of Christendom, the protector of the islands, the terror of the Avari, as patrician of Rome the patron of the church, hastened, on the Christmas of the last year of the 8th century, from Paderborn to Rome, in order to quell a tumult which had been excited against Pope Leo the Third by the nephews of his predecessor. Men from all the sub- ject-nations, or from all the nations that frequented the capital of the western church of Christendom, were present with him at the solemnization of divine worship on the day of the birth of Christ, when Leo suddenly appearing of- fered him the imperial crown. The people exclaimed, Long life and victory to Charles the August, crowned by 7s UNIVERSAL HISTORY. God, our great and peace-restoring emperor ! and the pope knelt at his feet. In the 324th year from the abdication of Romulus Momyllus, the imperial dignity was restored by Charlemain. His dominion extended over Italy, France, Catalonia, the Balearic islands, and Friesland ; to the Elbe, to the Bohemian forest, to the Raab, and to the mountains of Croatia. SECTION V. CONSTITUTION OF ITALY. The great cities of Italy were governed by dukes, who sat in the courts of justice together with the bishops, abbots, counts, knights, and land-owners, and before whom the people were assembled. The Jaw of the nation to which the accused belonged decided in criminal causes ; and in local causes the law of the province where the estates of the parties were situated. We find that the abbot of Farsa, in a dispute relating to the warm baths in the Sa- bine country, refused the decision of the Roman laws, because the possession under litigation lay within the juris- diction of the laws of Lombardy. He gave testimony to that effect, and was tried according to the latter code, though only one person in the tribunal was acquainted with it. The pope possessed no estate ; but he was free, and ex- empted from civil offices. He was elected by the clergy and the people, and confirmed by the emperor, who invested him with the administration of his territorial fief. A D 816. " By this our deed of confirmation," says the act of investment, " we bestow upon the holy Peter, and on the paschalis, steward of the apostle, and universal bishop, and on all thy successors in ofnce, the city and the dukedom of Rome, and their domain in hills and plains, as you have heretofore possessed them, with the reservation ©f our supreme sovereignty, without prejudice or invasion 8 UNIVERSAL HrSTORY. 79 on our part of the spiritual and temporal constitution; as we desire to withdraw none of your people who fly to us from the judgment of the law of your land." The pope possessed at Rome the same power as the dukes in other cities : but he became more easily, and at an earlier period, independent of the sovereign. SECTION VI. CONSTITUTION OF THE KINGDOM OF THE FRANKS. Among the Franks there was no distinction between the ■army and the people : and hence the military art was per- fected at a later period, and the people remained so much the longer free. For the defence of the kingdom the na- tion was called to arms ; sudden exigencies were provided for by troops which traversed the country, and there was a watch, or wardship, in each district for the local police. The land-owners were under an obligation to the defence of the country ; and whoever possessed three or four allot- ments of land, went in person to the service of the king, while his slaves cultivated the soil : the poor, who possessed only one allotment, or none, paid for the maintenance of a warrior. Thus was formed a kind of armed represent- ation of the people. The military ordinances required that each man should provide himself with arms and clothes for half a year, and with provisions for a quarter of a year. The cavalry bore a shield, a lance, a sword, dagger, bow and arrows. He who was absent from the levy was punished for his neglect by a fine of sixty shillings. The count of the district led tne men of his own territory. The war paid its own expenses. The king and the lowest of the Franks lived on the re- venue of their own estates. Clothed in vestments which his own wife had spun for him, Charles gave laws to the na- tions, and issued directions to his bailiffs for the sale of his 80 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. eggs. Slaves were attached to the land, and paid a toli or land-tax for the farms that were leased out to them ; and the conquered nations paid a tribute for the support of the state. These equal contributions were levied by the chamber-commissary. Bridge-tolls and road-money were paid by the Franks, but in other respects they were free from all imposts ; they were indebted for their land to their own valour, and maintained it with their blood ; the king was tis much under obligation to them for their bravery, as the nation was to the king for his protecting care. Presents were voted to him in the popular assembly, according to the circumstances and abilities of the givers. The king had no legislative power : he discussed with his ministers in council what laws were necessary ; and the re- ferendary sent the projects of them to the archbishops, dukes and counts ; and these to bishops, abbots, hundred- men, and bailiffs of the cities, by whom they were laid be- fore the popular assembly, and the latter either confirmed them by raising their hands, or rejected them with mur- murs. If approved of by the majority, they were after- wards ratified by the king. The hundred-men held courts in their hundreds, and the district-counts, country-courts, in which twelve persons chosen by the people, or the distinguished men or not- ables, sat together with the bailiff of the diocese. Here all high crimes were tried, such as murder, burning, robbery, kidnapping, and here the causes of slaves against cruel masters, and all appeals in lesser instances. Towards the middle of May the royal commissioner came, in whose presence the bishops, abbots, counts, viscounts, hundred- men, bailiffs, and deputies from the convents, together with the kingsmen, assembled themselves. Hither all com- plaints were brought concerning the administration, and all causes, the decisions of which had not been satisfactory ; and here unjust judges were deposed from their dignities. On this occasion the youth who grew to man's estate gave UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 81 their allegiance. Asylums protected against violence, but not against the laws. Bondsmen v/ere allowed to leave * their master in four cases ; when he had attempted their lives, robbed them, given them a blow with a stick, or debauched their daughters. Charles the Great sometimes permitted the sons of counts, who had deserved well of the state, to succeed their fathers in the enjoyment of their dignities and fiefs. His succes- sors soon found themselves unable to refuse to any a pri- vilege which some had obtained by particular favour. In the mean time the multitude of separate dominations, which at length became independent, contributed more than any other form of government could have done to the improve- ment of the country, where they afforded so many centres of opulence and expenditure, and enabled every individual, of the meanest rank, to find protection in his own neigh- bourhood. The necessity of such a system, which arose from the circumstances of the times, gave it an earlier establishment. The vassals of the royal domains committed their property to the protection of the holy men in some celebrated monastery. * With this view Valtellin, in the Alps, was intrusted to the abbacy of St. Denys, the abbot of St. Denys being an able protector at the court. The monasteries were designed not only for the propa- gation of Christianity, the basis on which the new system of customs was erected, but for the purposes of hospitality, in an age when houses of entertainment were rarely found ; and as they served for the relief of the indigent and of lepers, they obtained the favour of the king. The people sought their protection the more anxiously, as the holy men of God were observed to impose as much reverence on the court itself as on the lowest country gentleman. N Charlemain renewed the ancient, but too often violated * Lex Carolom. 768. de homines fiscales de quolibct contracto attraere. VOL. II. G UNIVERSAL HISTORY. ordinance, that the bishops should not be appointed by royal authority, but elected by the people and ecclesiastics. The servants of the church had already been exempted by his father from the jurisdiction of the counts. It was sup- posed that the bishops might safely be relied upon to watch over the nobles, and restrain them from evil pursuits. Their people bore arms in time of war, and their decisions in judicial matters were revised by the royal commissary. The bishops appeared at the head of their servants and vassals in the royal army, until Charles, on the represent- ation of many of his liege subjects, chiefly of their own class, declared that it could no longer be allowed that the particular servants of God should bear arms for the de- struction of his own image ; that the clergy should only ap- point certain prelates to give their benediction to the arms of the nation, to preach the Christian doctrine, and to me- diate peace ; and that the king should nominate a com- mander to lead the vassals of the bishops. When the church became rich, the essential gave way to the acci- dental, and the principles of the ruling governments were adopted. The monks endeavoured to emancipate themselves from episcopal jurisdiction, being desirous, as well as other classes of freemen, to be dependent immediately on the king. Like the Lacedaemonians, they were so much the more greedy of power, as they passed their lives in the practice of strict obedience. Pepin and Charles, as they set the counts free from the authority of the dukes, with a similar view favoured the exemptions of monasteries, know- ing that power divided among a multitude of heads would make a less formidable opposition to the royal authority. The whole of the north was cleared of its forests, and colonised as soon as the views of ordinary men became sufficiently enlightened to enable them to understand the interests of their own petty dominions. Nothing is to be *3 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 33 despised which happens in its proper season ; but after the erection of the palace the scaffold falls by its own weight. We have elsewhere remarked, that it was a distinguished merit in Charles the Great, or a signal proof of his good understanding, that although wielding a power so exten- sive, and arms so victorious, he yet did not disdain to govern according to the laws of the land, and according to the counsel of his liege subjects. His empire consisted of a vast number of petty courts, each of which comprised a republic within itself. In each of these all the necessities of the inhabitants of the district were provided for. Pasturage and agriculture were the chief objects of care. The same Franks who conquered Wittekind, subdued in the north the sterility of nature, and waged war for their herds against uruses and wolves. In such a state of manners every man was independent and self-sufficient. Nothing was performed in the perfec- tion which our arts of life have attained, but each individual among the Franks could do more for himself than each of us. The present age has called forth a greater variety of ideas : the men of those times had individually abilities for more multiplied pursuits. They may be said to have pos- sessed the essentials of personal freedom, the foundations of which rest upon two points, on wanting but little, and possessing ability for many occupations. SECTION VII. THE COMMANDERS OF THE FAITHFUL OF THE HOUSE OF ABBAS. Two years before that period, when the father of Charlemain forced the last of the Merovingian princes to lay down the sceptre of his ancestors, Merwan the Se- cond, of the house of Ommia, lost for himself and his AD 54 ^ am ^y tne cna ^ r °f tne Arabian prophet. Abu Abbas Abdailah al Saftah, descended from an g 2 84 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. uncle of Mohammed, formed, with the aid of Abu Moslem? a party which deprived Merwan of his sovereignty and hia life. Among the Franks the family of Clovis descended into a private station ; and it is believed that in the house of Montesquieu, the posterity of the founders of the French monarchy may still be recognized. Among the Arabs the house of Ommia was extirpated ; even children were put to death ; and the bones of glorious conquerors, command- ers of the Faithful, were violated in their graves. One prince of this family had not, like Childerich, lost the spirit of his forefathers. Abderachman Dacheli, son of Moawiah, son of the Chalif Hesham, sought refuge in the remote countries of the west. His name procured him A D 755 a( ^^ ei ents * ^ e P asse d tne straits into Spain ; defeated the lieutenant Jussuf; and assuming the title of Emir-el-Mumenin, severed this great province from the empire of the Abbassidae. The opulence and prosperity of Spain were hereby increased, and the Arabs maintained so much the longer their dominion over it. The misfortunes and the weakness of the greater empires arise chiefly from the mal-administration of provincial governors. During two hundred and eighty-three years, the house of the Ommiadae reigned at Cordova over the eight provinces into which Spain was divided. After the premature death of SafFah, his brother and successor, Abu Jay afar Al Mansur, in a fruitful and beauti- ful plain, on both sides of the river Tigris, built A D. 762. . . Bagdad, the future residence of the chalifs. His troops carried their victorious arms into the region, to the east and north-east of the Caspian sea, which was called Turkestan, or the country of the Turks, A D 7615 The Turkish name, which is first known to us in the works of Mela and Pliny, is commpn to a number of wandering tribes in the southern provinces of the Rus- sian empire, whose increasing population, or internal dis- sentions, have given rise, from the earliest times, to UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 85 incursions, formidable or ruinous to the more civilized countries of the south. At this period, as among the Massagetae, when Cyrus invaded the same region, a queen reigned over this country, which was rich in gold and in preciorts stones. The gifts of the Greek emperors, and the commerce of Bucharia, and of the countries further towards the north-west, were the sources of her opulence. While the Arabian armies extended their sway towards Bucharia, on the other side they subdued Armenia, and made incursions through Asia Minor to the shores of the Bosphorus. In the time of Abderrachman-el-Muzzafer, who reigned in Spain, the Moslem of that country conquered the island of Crete, and made themselves masters of Can- A.D.825. . . \ dia, its new capital. When the soul, which infused energy through the French monarchy, had ceased to exist with Charlemain, Corsica, Sardinia, and the Belearic isles were rendered tributary, and forced to submit to the sway of Arabian chiefs. In the reign of the Greek Emperor, Michael the Stam- merer, who was scarcely able to uphold even in Constan- tinople the power which he had acquired by the murder of his more virtuous predecessor, the lieutenant who governed Sicily in his name excited the revenge of a powerful youth, from whom he had taken, by violence, the object of his affection, in order to bestow her upon a rich man, who had given him a sum of gold. Other writers give a differ- ent relation of this affair, but all agree respecting the con- sequences. The injured youth swore that " if he lost his Homoniza, those who inflicted his misery should have to lament many similar misfortunes." His wrath was the source of more direful woes to the Greeks than that of Achilles for the loss of the fair Briseis. He invited the Arab governor of Tunis to pass into Sicily. Zindat Allah, •of the Aglabite tribe, supported by the Moslem of Spain, G 3 86 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. invaded that island: the cities which were situated in he plains were unable to resist his arms but the governors of the fortresses, and of Palermo, Syracuse, and Chasuan, held out longer than whole kingdoms ; and fifty-and-three years passed before the final subjugation of Sicily. SECTION VIII. SURVEY OF THE ARABIAN EMPIRE. . _ The times of Harun Al Rashid the Just, A.D.786. , ni who was twenty-three years commander of the Faithful, gradually developed among the Arabs a love tor the sciences, which had already begun to display itself under Almansur, the grandfather of this prince, and became still more conspicuous in the reign of his son Almamun. The Moslem soon became as distinguished for their thirst of knowledge as for their love of mili- tary glory. During the period of their splendour, the East, Africa, and Spain, assumed a new aspect. Magnifi- cent palaces, gardens, water-works, schools, manufacto- ries, arose in every country, and the population became greatly increased. Spain never contained a greater number of flourishing cities. A characteristic circumstance in the conquests of the Arabs was, that whoever embraced the faith of Islam was henceforward reckoned among the victorious nation, and became as free as the conquerors themselves. The nation stood less in awe of the unlimited power of the chalifs, than of God and the prophet, whom the chalifs themselves feared. That fiery zeal which inspired them to conquer all the south incited them to the most difficult aud splendid enterprises. There was a loftiness of character in the whole nation, which became the source of magnanimous and be- neficent undertakings. It is to these times that most of our proverbs and romances must be referred; and the thousand and one nights have rendered Harun Al Rashkl UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 87 moie celebrated than his victorious march through Asia, when he displayed his terrific arms before Constantinople. The proverbial sayings of wise men have produced such an impression, that in the Egyptian battle of Lewis the Ninth, the courage of a warrior was daunted by the rcmemberance of one of them. The laws of this people were founded for the most part on the common principles of the under- standing, and on this account maintained their influence. The study of the sciences, properly so called, began among the Arabs with the translations which John of Damascus, or Mesne, made from the writings of the Greek physicians. The commanders of the Faithful had appointed him to this task, and they afterwards ordered translations to be made of the works of the astronomers and philosophers of Greece. In Bagdad, in Bassora, Cufa, Kesh, Nish- abur, schools of learning were established. The Arabs brought to perfection the art of clock-making, which was introduced from Constantinople; and in the pursuit of knowledge entered into a noble contest with the Greeks, by which the court of Bagdad was the most adorned, while the literature of Byzantium lay buried in unfrequented libraries. Among the western nations, the comprehensive mind of Charlemain alone possessed the taste for similar pursuits. This prince caused a school and a hospital to be erected near his palace ; and he was as distinguished for his ardent thirst of knowledge as for his munificence towards those whom he considered as men of learning, and with whom he lived in habits of friendly intercourse. His plans fell, how- ever, together with his power. We may in general remark, with respect to the literature of the Arabians, that the Greek authors who were trans- lated into their language were too far elevated above the previous knowledge of this people to be wholly intelligible to them. Accordingly they admired and imitated these authors without advancing further in the more important g 4 88 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. matters. These defects were encouraged by the prejudice, that anatomy was an impious violation of dead bodies ; that surgery was merely the work of the hand ; and by their de- votion to the wonderful and to antiquated notions, in conse- quence of which astrology, the interpretation of dreams, fortune-telling by the lines of the hand, and many other superstitious follies, were developed among them, and from them have descended to our times. From the influence of a similar taste they were less delighted with Hippocrates, who treads always on the path of experience, than with the more subtile Galen, who has a more learned and refined exterior. Razi Ebn Sina and Avcrrhoes, who were celebrated among the Arabs, have not left us so valuable a treasure as they would have done if they had confined themselves to the study of nature. We are more indebted to the Arabs for what they have preserved for our use than for what they have discovered. In philosophy they greatly admired the profound Aris- totle; with his categories, distributions, and syllogistic forms; and they learnt to distinguish words where he dis- tinguishes things. Such is the origin of a number of con- troversies which took place in Europe in the tenth century, when the Arabs introduced the writings of this philosopher, whom the present age only has learnt really to understand and rightly to estimate. They translated Ptolemy's description of the earth, and combined it with a better knowledge of the globe, and with an acquaintance with the starry heaven, which among them- selves was an ancient acquisition. On these branches of science they have left us important observations, the sum of which, as far as relates to geography, is contained in the work of Prince Ismael Abulfeda. Without the assistance of this author we cannot obtain an adequate knowledge either of the east or of the south, and his writings deserve a more complete and elaborate edition than has yet ap- 6 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 89 peared. The measurement of a degree of latitude was undertaken by the command of Harun Al Rashid. Our literature pays homage to that of the Arabs by the use of many words which have passed from their language into ours; but their influence on the revival of European knowledge was on the whole disadvantageous to us. The Arabs brought among our forefathers authors whom neither party understood, and learning became a mere display of words. The admiration of Aristotle prepared a new yoke for the mind already tortured by a false interpretation of the Scriptures ; and many great and celebrated authors were read without producing any effect on the mental character of the nations who admired them. Such was the state of things from the time when the Emperor Frederick the Second exerted himself with the best intentions to furnish us with the whole Arabian philosophy of Aristotle ; until Luther, Descartes, Locke, and Bayle, rendered the sciences popular, brought them down from the olympian heights of the universities among the multitude, and tore the veil with which a barbarous latinity had concealed the Muses. The Arabs were the authors of many improvements in arts and manufactures. Before the time of Chanlemain they had instructed the French in the art of weaving; and they introduced into Europe many eastern vegetables. The fair of Bagdad was the chiel market for silk. The mul- berry-tree was first planted in Lombardy in the sixteenth century, and Hertzburg now justly exults in its manufac- tory of robes from the silk of Brandenburg. In architecture, the Arabs were the founders of that style which we term Gothic, because our ancestors became ac- quainted with it in Visigothic Spain. It gives that expres- sion of boldness and extravagance which seems peculiar to the oriental people. Nature is never vast enough for them. The Grecian beauty is too tame for their imagination, which demands something gigantic, mysterious, and emblematical. As the Arabs dwelt originally under tents, so their al- 9< UNIVERSAL HISTORY. cassar was not a palace according to the ancient style. It contained long suites of rooms, and many single pavilions. They had fountains and water-jets even in their sleeping apartments, since their religion commanded frequent ablu- tions, and because in the wilderness water and shady places were regarded as the greatest of luxuries. The Romans had also gardens before their vestibules, but the Arabs were not contented without long and straight avenues of trees. They copied, in the decoration of their gardens, the para- dise which surrounds Damascus. The Chrysirrhoas, the Abuna, and the Pharphan, pour their waters from Lebanon into the same receptacle : the stream divides itself into three branches, from which a thousand winding channels flow under the shade of the finest fruit-bearing trees through a verdant plain. Many of these rivulets unite in the neigh- bourhood of the city, traverse its streets, and form beyond it a clear and unruffled lake. The court of the commander of the Faithful, in magnifi- cence, in the abundance of goldj of pearls, and of precious stones, exceeded the splendour of the Byzantine palace. The sacred alcassar was reflected in the form of a vast half-moon by the Tigris which flowed under its walls. The cities of the Arabs scarcely bore any resemblance to our towns : their walls enclosed large districts of beautifully cultivated ground : many of them were surrounded by the desert : they were the markets, the places of deposit, and the asylums of the wandering tribes. Such was Shiraz and such Bassora, where festive games were celebrated. Bas- sora contained twenty-four districts, whose innumerable multitudes were supported by the expenditure which all the nations of the Moslem made in the neighbouring Bagdad, before the court of their high-priest and prince. The moun- tains of Yemen were crowned with citadels, whence the people descended on terraces, covered by gardens and sup- ported on massive walls. Abulfeda reckons a thousand cities in a single province of Arabia. UNIVERSAL HISTORY* 91 Communication was maintained through all parts of the empire by means of posts which Moawiah, the first of the Ommiade chalifs, introduced about seven hundred years before they were established in France. The same prince established a maritime force which served to connect the remotest provinces. The Arabs became victorious not so much through any remarkable skill in military tactics as by the weakness of the Christians, to which they opposed their own enthusiasm. The invention of tournaments is ascribed to them, from whom they were introduced into Italy and France, and from these countries into Germany. A bold fanaticism was the foundation of the Arabian empire : paternal authority was its form : its character, and that of its people, rendered it great and prosperous. Should I attempt to compare the simple manners of Charles the Great with the splendour of the Sultan of a thousand and one nights ; the stedfastness of the Frankish warrior with the fire of the Arab ; the tedious progress by which we emerged from barbarism with the sudden apparition of a new faith, an universal empire, a refined civilization among the hordes of the desert ; it would be to draw a parallel between" the understanding and the imagination. We behold on one side the lofty flight of souls which are elevated by a phantom above the apparent bounds of possi- bility; we see the fire which animated them gradually diminish, from time to time break forth again, but finally lose itself in its primitive obscurity : on the other side we observe the slower developement of reason, stedfast in its exertions, assailed by a thousand errors and passions, strengthening itself by imperceptible degrees, and at length evolving a blaze of light which imparts at the same time the power of effecting greater things, and of calculating the utmost possible attainments of the human faculties. 92 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. SECTION IX. ENGLAND. Soon after the time of Charlemain, Egbert, king of Wessex, educated in the school of adversity and instructed A D 827 at ^ 6 coul t °^ ^ e l ?rencn emperor, united the kingdoms of the Anglo-Saxons which had hitherto existed separately. He conquered Kent and ren- dered tributary Mercia, in the limits of which name West Anglia was already included. His predecessors had already subdued Sussex; he added Essex to his territory, and after- wards received the submission of the double court of North- umberland, hitherto divided between the kingdoms of Deira and Bernicia. England and Ireland still maintained a pre- cedence in learning over France ; but the understanding of Charles the Great was of far greater worth than the lessons which he received from Alcuin. Already the pirates and adventurers of Denmark and Norway ventured into the Mediterranean sea. Charles, not without uneasiness, observed their increasing boldness, which portended future calamities to his country. SECTION X. CONSTANTINOPLE. The wise and victorious Emperor Constan- A. D. 741. tine the Fifth continued to wage against images the war which had been begun, and thus far carried on, by his predecessors. It was hoped that it would be the means of depriving the Arabs of one great censure which they cast upon Christianity, and of removing a principal cause of their alienation. In comparison with such an advantage as this, the loss of Ravenna would have been altogether insig- nificant. But after Leo the Fourth had unexpectedly terminated his short reign, not without suspicion A D 775 'of poison, his widow Irene, an Athenian lady, UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 93 during the minority of Constantine the Sixth, A.D.780. ; I i • » i induced either by womanly superstition or by the desire of founding her usurped dominion more securely on the good will of the monks and their partisans, gave up the undertaking of purifying Christendom from the pollution of idolatry. The attempt seemed the more A D 787 likely finally to succeed, because Charlemain was favourably inclined towards it. A D 797 After I rer| e had stained herself with the inno- cent blood of her son, and, with an address which became her sex, had shown for some years the first example of a female government directing the destinies of the empire, she at length fell unexpectedly by a bold attempt of Nicephorus, and died of vexation for the loss A.D.802. r of a throne which had incited her to more than one crime. Her successor, like Constantine the Fifth, whose conduct he imitated, was accused of the most flagitious vices by the worshippers of images, whom he treated with con- tempt. . Although he displayed great penetration and energy of character, he seems to have merited censure by opposing himself without prudence and caution to the idolatrous party, which had now attained strength and influence. All his enterprises were consequently impeded, A D 8io an( * P art ^ cu ^ ar ^y ms ^ ast expedition against the Bulgarians. Neither his son Stauratius, nor his daughter Procopia, who possessed more manly energy than . _ her husband Michael Rangabe, maintained A.D.811. & themselves on the throne : and fate bestowed it upon Leo Bardanes, a warrior whose character resembled A D sis t ^ lat °^ ^ onstant * ne » though he possessed greater talents. The factions of monks and the revo- lutions of the court prevented the progress of the policy he adopted ; and Leo himself fell a victim to these evils. . * The same causes also enfeebled the unfortunate A.D. 821. reign of Michael of Amorium, surnamed the Stammerer. 94 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. Nicephoms had preserved the dignity of his throne by sending an embassy to Charlemain while at Selz ; by which he bestowed upon that monarch the title of Roman Caesar, and intrusted to his government the western empire. The remains of literature were neglected amid the pur- suits of fanaticism ; and after the profound ignorance of which the council of Irene gave indications, George, the compiler of history, Syncellus to the patriarch Tarasius, appears a prodigy of learning, though he was as deficient in correct judgment as the pious Theophanes in impartiality. ( 95 ) BOOK XIV. DIVISION OF THE GREAT EMPIRES INTO SMALL STATES. A.D. 814 — 1073. SECTION L INTRODUCTION. After the Arabs had erected their dominion in the south, and the Franks in the north ; the people of both empires employed themselves in securing the boundaries and restor- ing the cultivation of their respective countries. Armed multitudes every where held the place of civil so- cieties, and the whole power, under enterprizing kings, was concentrated in the monarch : under weak sovereigns it fell into the hands of the nobles, or of some powerful in- dividual among them ; or the nation, like an ill-governed army, became the sport or the prey of foreigners. During the long peace which domestic order and external power afforded to the great empires, the nobles, who were the landholders, increased their influence by the growth of arts and manufactures in Spain and of agriculture among the Saxons. Weak administrations succeeded the reigns of Charlemain and Harun ; and the nobles, especially in the French empire, remembering their original freedom, and strong enough, as they believed, to subsist by them- selves, withdrew from their dependence on the court, and, dwelling separately on their own domains, sought to aug- ment their power by arms, by prudence, by their virtues and daring exploits, and by conciliating the favour of the surrounding populace, who stood in need of a protector near at hand. 96 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. These divisions altered the nature of the constitutions : the people became separated into unconnected tribes, with- out general assemblies, laws, or any means of protecting their rights against the great. The public liberty was thus undermined; its main support, the necessity of a general unanimity in the councils of the nation, ceased to exist; the councils themselves were not abolished, but the court no longer afforded protection to the people against powerful lords, who were always present, and whom it became ne- cessary to obey. From this separation of the people into distinct commu- nities arose great variations in their manners and dialects. The lands became better cultivated, the greatness of the lord depending on the multitude of his vassals, and the re- venues derived from his domains ; but they were more dis- turbed by feuds. The nobles, however, were accustomed to decide the contest, for the most part, among themselves, and the cavaliers thus acquired a decided superiority in military skill. These times excite a lively interest by the continual struggle they display between freedom and aristocratical power, and by containing the origin of a number of new states ; but in the history of them it is difficult to avoid the confusion which arises from the nature of the subject. SECTION IT. DISMEMBERMENT OF THE ARABIAN EMPIRE, AND ESTAB- LISHMENT OF THE EDRISIDES AND AGLABITES. Under the chalifs of the house of Ommia a diminution of pay, attempted by Yezid III., had excited discontents in the army, which would have been immediately followed by the dismemberment of the monarchy, if any contingency had occurred to show the possibility of success in such an attempt. After the fortunate result of Abderachman's en- terprise in Spain, and after the thirst of power and of UNIVERSAL HISTORY. »7 riches had ceased to find their gratification in new con- quests, the governors of provinces began to aim at their own exaltation. At first the power of the commander of the Faithful de- cayed insensibly in the remote provinces of the empire. The evil continually approached the centre, and at length the chalif, in his own palace, became the slave of a foreign yoke. Edris, descended from Fatima, the daughter of the pro- phet, fled from Arabia into the furthest regions of the west. It seemed disgraceful to the Moslem that the posterity of Mohammed should revere a foreign house upon the throne of the Faithful, and Edris disdained longer to submit to the indignity. His son, who bore the same name, founded the city of Fez, in the fertile plains of Mauritania, and made it the capital of a flourishing state. It soon became the seat of a vast population. Its founder maintained his dominion, which he extended and transmitted to his po- sterity. A D 805 Edris the Second yet reigned, when Ibrahim, the son of Aglab, governor of Kairwan, refused the tribute due to the commander of the Faithful ; and in that city, and in the territory of Carthage, erected a new dominion, of which Tunis afterwards became the capital. Both these events happened during the reign of Harun Al Rashid. _ This prince was the last Emir-il-Mumenim, A.D.809. - , . who performed in person the pilgrimage to the holy cities, where Islam took its rise. His successors, for the most part shut up and inaccessible in their palaces, were ignorant and indifferent with respect to the affairs of their empire, which fell under the power of court-favourites. Already, in the reign of Al-mamun, the go- vernors of the Indian and Persian provinces had begun to refuse obedience : and the weakness of a throne, founded on opinion, when it is not filled by a man VOL. II. h 93 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. of great talents, became continually more manifest. This secret was soon discovered by the Turkish slaves who com- posed the guard of the commander of the Faithful, and whose personal beauty had obtained the favour of some of the chalifs, and their knowledge was speedily turned to advantage. . • Thaher, to whom Al-mamun was indebted A. D.822. for the throne, under his reign acquired pos- session of Chorasan. Jacob, an enterprising blacksmith, son of Leit, a chief of the Soffarides, and Nasr, son of Achmed, a descendant of Saman, soon divided the em- pire of Persia with the house of his sovereign, and tarnished the splendour of the chalifat. SECTION III. OF THE TULUNIDES. ^ Achmed, son of Tulun, governor of Egypt, of the Turkish race, established for himself an independent sovereignty over that country : a treasure which he had discovered was the instrument of his ambitious en- terprise. Not far from the ancient Memphis he founded the city of Catay, which he adorned with the mosque of the Tu- lunides, and chose for the place of his residence. Achmed was the father of the poor, but the object of terror to all who resisted his power. In the sixteen years of his reign 1 8,000 persons suffered capital punishment by his order ; and even the spiritual authorities found safety only in sub- mission. The daughter of his son Chamarujah was espoused by Motabed, commander of the Faithful. On her journey from Catay to Bagdad, she found every night ready to receive her a costly tent, decorated like the pavilions in her father's palace. Achmed left thirty-three A.D.884. sons and daughters, seven thousand horses, and at least as many slaves, and a million of dinars in gold. But his grandson, Flarun, fell in the defence of his king- dom ; and Egypt, under Moktadi Billah, was AD. 905, ... . ° n ' . ' again joined to the cnalitat. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 99 SECTION IV. THE TURKS BECOME MASTERS OF BAGDAD. The chalif himself was dependent on the Turks, who were already the real masters of the empire. The physical force and the military habits of the guard, which was con- tinually renewed by enrolling the finest and strongest youths of Turkestan, rendered their will irresistible to the effe- minate court and the unwarlike multitude. Hence it hap- pened that the chalif Mostanser was enabled, A.D.861. I . . -f7 by their assistance, to mount the throne which he had rendered vacant by the murder of his father. Mos- tanser himself was their slave, and his uncle and successor , _ Mostayin found himself under the necessity of A.D.862. J[ ■ t . J . conceding to them not merely the nomination of the captain of his guard, but also of the Emir-el-Omrah, or emir of emirs, his chief minister of state. Against this yoke, which was more intolerable than the power of the mayor of the palace in the French monarchy, Moktadi, commander of the Faithful, had the boldness to exert his utmost efforts. He made captive Munes, the cap- tain of the Turkish guard, who was one of the best ge- nerals of his empire, and ordered his head to be thrown among the troops as they were storming the outworks of the palace. This act cost him his life ; and his brother and successor Moktader, in order at least to obtain A.D.907. personal freedom, was obliged to divide the guard, and station them as the best garrisons (for such was the commendation he bestowed upon them) on the boun- daries of his empire. But this measure enabled them sooner to become independent. Mohammed Yezid set them the example, who, twenty-nine years after the ruin A D 934 °^ ^ e k° use °f Tulun, a second time separated Egypt from the chalifat. 100 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. SECTION V. THE BUIYIDES RENDER THEMSELVES MASTERS OF BAGDAD. About the same period the Emir-el-Omrah A.D.945. . . incurred the displeasure of Rhadi, the com- mander of the Faithful, but the chalif soon found how little wealth and pomp can effect against real strength. The exiled minister fled to Dilem, a country in Media, and sought refuge in the camp of the Buiyides. The latter were three valiant youths, sons of one father : Buiyah had bred them up in poverty, on the produce of his fishing net, but in the remembrance that they were the descendants of the ancient Sassanidse, the progeny of Sapor and Khosru. Each had his comrades in arms, with whom they served Mardawij and Washmekir, chieftains of the Dilemites, and soon founded an empire of their own in Isfahan. Moaz-ed-daula, son of Buiyah, marched to Bagdad, con- quered the city, and forced the chalif Moti, whom he set upon the throne, not only to bestow on one of his family the office of chief Emir, but to declare that it should be hereditary in his house ; to give up all power into his hands, and to content himself with the exterior forms of the royal dignity, and with a moderate stipend. SECTION VI. OF THE FATIMITE SULTANS AT ALKAHIRA. A D 90 While the supreme sovereignty underwent these humiliations, Mahadi Obeidollah, a de- scendant, as he maintained, of Fatima, the daughter of the great prophet, raised his standard on the African coast, and carried on war against the princes of the house of Aglab, who reigned at Tunis. On a tongue of land which advanced into the sea, he founded the city of Mahadiah : the town covered the hill which rose in the back ground, 7 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 101 and the summit of which formed the citadel ; magnificent palaces of white marble, in which opulence and every spe- cies of luxury abounded, were bestowed by Mahadi on the companions of his fortune, and a spacious suburb afforded habitation for the populace. His reign was mild and just, and different in all respects from the faith and customs of the Arabs. " The world," as he thought, " has existed from eternity, now in one state and then in another ; perpetual movements impel it forward and change its condition. Such vicissitudes will always continue, but it behoves man to en- joy life, and to make his powers of enjoyment the only limits of his indulgence." He carried his arms, and propa- gated his principles into the western country, defeated the Aglabites, conquered the house of Edris, and subdued Fez. A D 969 Moezz-ladin-Allah, a descendant of Mahadi, dug wells in the desert, to the west of Egypt, and his army availed themselves of these for the conquest of that country, which, since the death of the eunuch Kafur, a wise statesman, and governor of that province, had no longer obeyed the house of Achmed. The sultan and chalif Moezz, with fifteen hundred camels, which bore the bones of his fathers, and a vast treasure, marched to A D 9 2 ^yP*' an ^ f° un d e d tne greatest city in the world, which he called Alkahira. The mo- narch, learned and wise, gentle and animated, founded his empire on the love and admiration of his people. Victo- rious captains were dispatched by him to conquer Syria, Damascus, Jerusalem, and Sinai; and for two hundred years the Fatimites, or the house of Mahadi, reigned over all the country, from Euphrates to the sandy wastes of Kairwan. h 3 102 UNIVERSAL HISTORY- SECTION VII. THE ZE1RIDES AT TUNIS. A D 971 ^ N ° ne P art ^ cu ^ ar Moezz displayed greater wisdom than other conquerors. He perceived that the desire of maintaining all may become the occasion of total overthrow; and that a monarch who resides in a distant capital cannot hold under his allegiance provinces, which nature, by assigning them an insulated situation, in the midst of vast deserts, seems to have formed for inde- pendent states. He consigned the western conquests of his great-grandfather to Yussuf Belkin, son of Zei'ri. Zeir i, son of Manad, sprang from an ancient Arabian house: a hermit had discovered splendid qualities in his mind, and from that time he carried on war at the head of a troop of adventurers, who were devoted to him. Moezz gave to Yussuf, son of this chief, all that he possessed on the north- ern coast of Africa, and the house of the Zeirides reigned one hundred and seventy-seven years. SECTION VIII. THE MORABETHS IN MAROCO. The prophet Abdollah arose among the A.D.1056. a • 11 tribes on the western coast ol Africa, and taught the law of Islam in its purity. His numerous followers, with that spirit which the love of military adventures unites in those countries with religious enthusiasm, took arms under the Lamtune Abu-bekr, son of Omar, in order to obtain converts to his doctrines. The Morabeths, or " men united in faith," invaded and gained easy victories over the the princes of Fez, of Segelmessa, of Saleh, Tangier, and Ceuta. After Abu-bekr Yussuf, son of his kinsman Teshfin, reigned, who, in the vicinity of fountains, which he had discovered in the de- 12 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 103 sert, founded the city of Maroco, the scarcely accessible seat of his future empire. To this town he conducted as plentiful a supply of water as could be obtained : he sur- rounded it, and filled the streets with palm-trees, for the double purpose of food and of protection against the solar rays. Maroco eclipsed the fame of the ancient Fez, and be- came, during the reign of its founder, the capital of an em- pire which extended to the straits. The Morabeths fed their flocks peaceably in the pastures of Atlas, and the son and posterity of Yussuf succeeded to a secure and pow- erful throne. SECTION IX. THE SELJUKIAN' TURKS. Shortly before the foundation of Maroco, Cayem _ Bramrillah, commander of the Faithful, in- A.D.1055. . . _ _ _ _ • _ ■■ _ , , vited logrul Beg, the son ot Michael, son of Seljuk, to assist him against the Buiyde princes, who were alike severe towards him and destitute of power against their enemies. Togrul, educated in Turkestan, like the rest of his nation, among herds and arms, had by the latter, in the course of twenty years, acquired great ce- lebrity. He conquered Bagdad, and gained possession of the dominion which the Buiydes had maintained during one hundred and twenty years ; and for two centuries To- grul and his heroic house preserved a greater or more limited sway in Western Asia. SECTION X. THE SULTANS OF GASNA AND CHORESMIA.. . _ The interior of Asia was divided between two A. D.976. empires. Nasir-ed-din Sobochtekin had as- sembled in Chorasan a numerous band, who, inspired by fanaticism and the hope of a plentiful booty, conquered h 4 104 UNIVERSAL HJSTORY. Hindustan as far as Visapur. This prince was the ancestor of the sultans of Gasna. Mohammed, son of Anastekin, of a Turkish tribe, go- vernor of Choresmia, a warlike and upright prince, and a lover of virtue and philosophy, took advantage of a fa- vourable opportunity, which the internal dissentions of the Seljuke Turks afforded him, and established for himself in Choresmia an independent and flourishing A. D. 1097. _ . . ^ 6 dominion. The dominion of the Arabs now contained six principal states. A great part of Hindustan obeyed the Sultan of Gasna, while the Choresmian sultan extended his power over the neighbouring countries of Persia, and beyond the Gihan in Mawaralnahra. The commanders of the Faithful were revered by all the Moslem, except the Fatimite sultans, as the heads of their religion ; but in temporal affairs the Turks of the house of Seljuk possessed even in Bagdad the supreme authority : the Fatimite sultans at Al-kahira ruled from the Euphrates to Kairwan : the Zei'rides reigned at Tunis, and the Morabeths at Maroco. SECTION XI. SPAIN. The revolt of the lieutenants subverted the dominion which Abderachman's bold and fortunate enterprise had acquired at Cordova for the last of the Ommiadae. Fac- tions in the royal house contributed to this misfortune. We saw Ordunyo restore in Leon a Christian throne, and re-establish in his realm the laws of the Visigoths. The love of glory, religious enthusiasm, and the hope of acquiring dominion, developed military and political vir- tues among the Christians. The heroic age of Spain be- gan, in which Christian knights and barons distinguished themselves in more splendid achievements as they had be- come less softened by the arts of peace, and as the an- UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 105 cient faith of the Visigoths had less abated from its original fire. Thus the earldom which had arisen at Bur- A. D. 933. gos, after the failure of the posterity of Ferrando Gonzalez, its founder, was erected into the .loss. j c j n g < ^ om Q f Castile in favour of Ferrando, son of Sanchez, king of Navarre. The descendants of the brave Gascon, Count Asnar, who had crossed A. D. 831. the Pyrenees to gain a territory from the infi- dels, had reigned as kings from the time of Garcia Ximenez, over the mountainous country at Na- varre, and had thence extended the dominion of their house over the fruitful plains of Catalonia. It for- tunately happened that the Christian power in Spain be- came almost united in the person of the great A.D.iooo. ' , , i , a i • Sanchez, at the time when the Arabian mo- narchy hastened to the hour of its dismemberment. That prince, patriotic or provident, fearing the evils which might arise if his posterity attained too early to extensive power without first becoming great by their virtues, be- queathed only Navarre to his first-born : he A.D.1035. ^ , , . , . ' gave Castile to lerrando, who inherited Leon by marriage, and of the baronies which lay on the river of Aragon, and in the neighbouring mountains, formed for his illegitimate son Ramirez a new kingdom of Aragon, which, under a succession of great and fortunate princes, attained to the rank of the first state in Spain, and united all the rest under its dominion. Bernhard, the count whom Charles the Great had esta- blished at Barcelona, descended from the house of the earls of Aquitaine, a gallant and accomplished knight, be- A D 864 came independent according to the spirit of the succeeding times, and under Winifred, one of his descendants, the league of fealty to France was broken off. The Catalonians were distinguished by commerce and warlike adventures through the whole Mediterranean sea. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. k _ Their Count Raymond Berenoar obtained by A. D. 1137. . ° J marriage the throne of Aragon. At Leon and Burgos, at Pamplona, Zaragoza and Barce- lona, the kings and counts of the Christians encroached upon the divided emirs. Heroism and enthusiasm ani- mated both parties, but the want of union seems to have been greatest on the side of the Arabs. The latter became sensible of their weakness, and resolved to invite Yussuf the Morabeth, founder of Maroco, to their A.D.1091. . ' . r assistance. He came to their camps on his thickly-mailed camel, and the Morabeths, animated by the fiery zeal of a new form of faith, disappointed for a time the Christians of their victory, and united Mohammedan Spain under the banner of Yussuf. They carried Mo- tamed, son of Mohammed, the great emir of Seville? prisoner across the Straits : poetry was his solace during many long years of captivity; and his daughter, by her skill in the art of embroidery, procured for him the means of softening the remainder of his life. In Spain the contest became more violent. The enemy against whom the Christian kings had now to contend, was lord of all the countries from Atlas to the mountains of Castile. His power was new, and not yet enervated or weakened by the effect of time and negligence. SECTION XII. SICILY. While the empire of the Arabs was falling into a num- ber of small states, they completed the conquest of Sicily, in which they had been engaged for fifty years, by taking the city of Syracuse. Of this capture we have the follow- ing account from the pen of an eye-witness : A. JD.880. " Theodosius, the monk, sends his salutation to Leo, the arch-deacon. We have held out ten months, during which time we have fought often by day, and many UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 107 times by night, by water, by land, and under the ground. We have left nothing unatlempted against the enemy and against his works. The grass which grows upon the roofs was our food, and we caused the bones of animals to be powdered in order to use them for meat. At length chil- dren were eaten, and terrible diseases were the consequences of famine. Confiding in the security of our towers, we hoped to hold out until we received succour : the strongest of our towers was overthrown, and we still resisted for three weeks. In an instant, when exhausted by heat, our soldiers took respite, a general storm was made on a sudden, and the town was taken. We fled into the church of St. Sal- vator : the enemy followed us, and bathed his sword in the blood of our magistrates, priests, monks, old men, women and children. Afterwards the most noble of our people, a thousand in number, were put to death before the town, with stones, whips and clubs: the governor, Nicetas of Tarsus, half flayed alive, with his entrails torn out, was beaten to pieces against a stone: all the great houses were burnt, and the capitol pulled down. On the day when they celebrate Abraham's sacrifice, (viz. the Bairam,) * many of them wished to burn us with the archbishop, but an old man, who possessed great authority among them, protected us. This is written at Palermo, fourteen feet under the ground, among innumerable captives, Jews, Afri- cans, Lombards, Christian and unchristian people, whites and Moors." Even before this time the Arabs had molested the coasts of Italy; but they afterwards carried on their enterprises with greater effect : they levied contributions on most of the towns, and several times threatened Rome. From Fresne, not far from Aries, where they had fortified them- selves, they became the terror of Piedmont and of Pro- vence ; and they carried their predatory incursions as far as Upper Burgundy and the Pays de Vaud. We have thus rapidly surveyed the empire of the Arabs, 108 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. which extended from Gasna, where the sultans persecuted the worshippers of Brahma, to the mountains on which the Moslem fought against the Spanish knights of Christendom ; and from the deserts of Maroco to the heretofore peaceful lake of Geneva, which was now no longer protected by the Alpine barrier. SECTION XIII. DISMEMBERMENT OF THE EMPIRE OF THE FRENCH. Charlemain left to his son Lewis the Good the empire A D 843 °^ t ^ ie ^ ran ^ s un( * er tne same consitution with which he had received it from his father Pepin. The spiritual and temporal lords and freemen, assembled in diet, elected the king, who swore to " observe to- wards his liege subjects all that a king who is true to his duty ought and it appears that the bishops considered it as their office to observe that his actions corresponded with his oath. Charles and Lewis were desirous of bequeathing a king- dom to each of their sons : it was intended that neither should inherit any thing in the realm of the other, and that no vassal should serve two kings. How could they hope that the genius and plan of such a system could be maintained ? It was ordained that the younger brother should never make war or peace without the consent of the elder, that he should constantly pay him respect, and that the latter should never abuse his prerogative. Neither of his brethren was allowed to marry without his approbation, and they were ordered to present to him annual gifts. The understanding of Charles, perhaps, comprehended the un- natural condition of great monarchies, but why then did he not suffer Adalgis to retain his dominion at Pavia ? and why was he not contented with civilizing the Saxons ? The system of partition was so little in unison with human nature, that the good Lewis caused the eyes of UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 109 his nephew Bernhard, King of Italy, who could never be- come formidable to him, to be put out, in order to re- duce the kingdom of the latter under his own A.D. 818. & sceptre. A year before this act Lewis had divided his kingdoms between his sons without considering that the A D 817. number of his offspring might increase. His second wife Jadith, to whom he was much attached, after- wards bore him a son, and he appointed the A. D. 823. _ - , , r . n , . latter a portion between the dominions ot his brothers, comprising the countries of Rheetia and of the Allemanni on both sides of the Rhine. The A. D. 827. brothers unwilling to surrender any part of their possessions, and greedy of absolute power, rebelled, accused their stepmother of a criminal connection with Bernhard, Count of Barcelona, and deposed their father from the throne: but the jealousies which inevitably sprang up among them oca- sioned his restoration. It would be a tedious and useless task to relate all the conse- quences of the partition. The Emperor died consumed with vexation, and grieving for the misfortunes A.D. 840. 5 5 oi his house. His three sons and the descendant of the fourth were in arms against each other. A sanguinary battle near Fon- tenay, in the territory of Auxerre, induced A.D. 841. , . ; . them to give way to the pressing instances of the French lords, who were desirous of a final partition ; and at Verdun, the empire of the Franks was A. D. 843. finally dismembered. Lothaire, the eldest son of Lewis, on whom the imperial crown devolved, obtained Italy, from the possession of which that crown appeared inseparable, together with a long row of baronies between Germany and France, by which, according to the ordinance of his father and grand- father, he was placed in the vicinity of both his brothers, no UNIVERSAL HISTORY. but was in reality the weakest of the three. The kingdom of Lotharingia extended from Italy, and advancing through the countries of Valais, the Pays de Vaud, Varaschken, Sco- dingen on the Jura, and Rhaetia, became narrower on the Rhine, and following the Moselle and the Maese, lost itself in the Low Countries. It was exposed to the enter- prises of the Arabs of Sicily and Spain, of the Greeks in lower Italy, of the kings of Germany and France, of the restless Saxons, and the piratical Normans. In Germany, Bavaria was the chief seat of the dominion of Lewis, whose kingdom comprehended the Allemanni and the Saxons, and bordered on the brave Avari, the Moravians, and the Tchechi in Bohemia, the Sorbes, Linones, and Wends, who concealed in marshy forests, or behind lofty chains of mountains, their restless independ- ence, and often unexpected enterprises. Hence the king was obliged to observe perpetual vigilance, and to maintain a military spirit among his people ; and he was forced to leave to the dukes and margraves on the menaced con- fines a sufficient power for adopting measures of defence in sudden emergencies. The same methods indeed were necessary for preserving authority in the interior ; for the Saxons and Allemanni bore unwillingly a yoke which held them in subjection by severe laws. Charles the Bald was king of Carlingia; for so the kingdom was termed to which the greater name of France was now limited. Pepin, nephew of the king, still in- herited Aquitaine, the territory of his early deceased father; but he was soon despoiled of it by Charles. The treaty of Verdun is the key to a great part of the history of these and the succeeding times. The kingdom of Lotharingia, which on this side of the Alps having no natural boundaries, was subject to frequent changes, gave rise to a series of wars and pretensions, which are not yet decided between the Germans and French, whose in- stitutions, manners, and languages, seem accidentally to UNIVERSAL HISTORY. Ill pass into each other on these confines. The power which the king of Germany was obliged to leave in the hands of his nobles was the source of their independence and unlimited authority over the people. France might have formed its monarchy with greater consistence and stability, but it was degraded by a series of weak kings from the time of Charlemain, without any new mayor of the palace to maintain the unity of the nation. SECTION XIV. THE KINGDOM OF LOTHARINGIA. The kingdom of Lotharingia came to an end in the course of the first generation. The Emperor Lotha ire, as if pursued by the shade of his father, against whom he had been the first to raise a rebellious hand, found no peace until he had given up all his possessions, and had taken _ refuge in a cloister, where he died before he had A.D. 855. ° . . ' reached his sixtieth year. Wars were carried on among his sons, until by the con- . _ vention of Orbe, in the Pavs de Vaud, Lewis A.D. 859. . . J 9 obtained for his share the imperial crown, together with Italy, and its bulwark Rhaetia ; Lothaire the Second, Burgundy on this side the Jura, Alsace, and Lor- raine; and Charles, the old Gallic Provence, and the country reaching to the confluence of the Saone and the Rhone. Neither of these princes transmitted his dominion to his posterity. Lothaire the Second, the victim of criminal love, a per- jured and unfortunate prince, died without any lawful heir, and his uncles, Lewis and Charles, to the J\.L)t 868. exclusion of his brother the emperor, entered into a treaty for the partition of his dominions, which in the course of a few years terminated, as it often happens A D 879 W ^ SUC ^ P roceecun gs, t0 tne advantage of the most powerful party, viz. the king of Germany. 112 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. The dominion of Charles of Provence had been previ- A D 86" ous ^ divided, a ^ ter tne demise of that prince without heirs, between Lothairethe Second and the Emperor Lewis the Second. On the death of the latter the elder branch of the Carlovingian house became extinct, and the King of Germany possessed himself of the Rhaetian A D 875 terr ^ or y ; ^ ut Italy and the Imperial crown, which lawfully devolved on him, were snatched from him by the craft and violence of his younger brother, the French king Charles. This prince was in all other respects his inferior, but had the advantage over him in power, and in the capability of adopting any measures that might lead him to the ends of his ambition. SECTION XV. THE CARLOVINGIANS BEGIN TO LOSE THE EMPIRE. When both the brothers were dead, and the German princes were preparing themselves for the invasion of Italy, Lewis the Stammerer, son of Charles of France, by his great generosity in bestowing earldoms and abbacies, obtained the inheritance of his A D 877. father. He held it half a year, and died, not without a suspicion cast on those lords whom he had neglected to conciliate ; or who were discontented with possessing their long exercised power in any other name than their own. The empire of the Carlovingians from that time fell into departments which, as they before belonged to brothers, now came into the possession of foreigners. Lewis the Stam- merer died in April; and in October, twenty-three Bur- gundian bishops and archbishops assembled at Mautaille in the territory of Vienne. Doubts were entertained concern- ing the legitimacy, and on more secure grounds concern- ing the capacity of the son of the late monarch. Pope John UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 113 the Eighth, who four years before, by his own arbitrary counsel, had presumed to crown king Charles emperor, who had no claim by birthright, began now to decide the election of a bishop at Geneva without consulting the arch- bishop of the same church, who resided at Vienne. Appre- hensions were also expressed respecting the restless Bernhard, count of the Goths or of Languedoc, as well as the power of count Conrad of Upper Burgundy and of the Arabs and Normans. In this conjuncture, after the usual council of the nobles had met, the prelates invited Boson, count of Vienne, a cousin of kings, and brother of duke Richard of Bur- gundy, a generous and popular nobleman and a friend of the church, and introduced him with the title of king, as their " upright 'patrician and protector ; their accessible, beneficent, and prudent lord." It is said, indeed, that Irmengard, daughter of the emperor Lewis the Second, whom Boson had carried off, had prevailed upon him to elevate her to the throne; and that he had in part forced and in part won over the bishops to further his project. He assumed, like an able master, the appearance of irresolution; but after being entreated for three days, and after every impor- tant member of the assembly had been induced to declare his opinion, he assented to become ? by the grace of God, and for the advantage of his church, king of the Burgun- A D s"9 ( ^ ans; " * n wft ^ cn quality he was afterwards crowned by the bishop of Lyons. Nine hundred years have since elapsed, and a part of the Burgundian kingdom, whicli has been united to France 345 years, has never from the time of Boson been incor- porated into the body of the French monarchy. Italy, or the Lombard kingdom, vacillated between the German and French Carlovingians, and fell into long con- tinued disorder. The imperial authority had so fallen, that a duke of Benevento dared to take Lewis II. prisoner ; and the Romans refused to ask any ratification for their newly- elected popes. VOL. II. j 114 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. A D 880 Charles the Fat, son of Lewis the German, succeeded indeed in uniting the imperial crown and the Lombard kingdom with the dominion which, after his brother's death, he had inherited from his father : and the same prince, after the demise of the eldest son of Lewis the A D 8 Stammerer, became king of the French during the minority of his infant brother, Charles the Simple. It was from him that Boson received A. D. 885. bis kingdom as a fief. But without the aid of Eudes, count of Paris, and Gosselin its bishop, that capital would have fallen a prey to the piratical Normans, against whom Charles was as little able to protect the Low Coun- tries, as he was to prevent the Arabs from disturbing Italy. The slave of factions in his court, Charles gave unequivocal signs of periodical insanity, and was deprived of his faculties by violent headaches. From the throne of Charlemain, on ^ which he was the last prince who sat, he was ■deposed by the powerful individuals of his empire ; and was maintained by the charit}' of a monastery and the indulgence of his successor. With him was lost, ■ entirely and irrecoverably, the unity of the em- pire of the Franks. Arnolf, the illegitimate son of Carlomann, the brother of Charles, ascended the throne of Germany. Eudes of Paris, sprung from a house which some deduce from the Saxon Wittekind, but more certainly the son of Robert, for whom an heroic defence of his country against the Normans had obtained the surname of the Strong, was declared king by a great part of France. After Boson's death, two kings arose in Burgundy : Lewis the son of Boson, and Rudolf, son of the powerful Count Conrad, who had assumed the crown at St. Maurice among the mountains, and was ac- knowledged on both sides of the Jura and in Savoy. As Boson had severed Burgundy from France, so it now be- came divided internally, and the nation was neyer again united under one head. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 115 In Italy, Duke Guy of Spoleto, who bad even turned his ambitious projects towards France, contended with Duke Berengar of Friul for the restoration of the throne of Lom- bardy. That country became incapable of freedom and subordination ; the Pope, too weak to unite it, could only hinder its union under another head ; and Italy was divided into a number of baronies, the more powerful of which took the weaker under their protection. An heroic age like that described by Homer, the same popular manners, a similar authority in the priesthood, the same prevalence oX passions and rude simplicity, again displayed themselves. The throne fell gradually into ruins ; a new movement among nations shook the political fabric, which had scarcely been raised on the recent foundations of civil order. Such, it would seem, was the destination of Providence. Neither Guy of Spoleto was wanting in courage, nor his son, the excellent Lambert, in virtue; nor did Berengar fail in any qualification that was likely to unite under his sway the best and greatest of his nation; and on Arnolf rested the heroic spirit of the first Carlovingians. But a premature death carried off the princes of Spoleto: the duke of Friul contended fruitlessly against factions : Arnolf left to a child seven years old a doubtful sovereignty over the restless nobles of Germany ; while, after the crown of France had descended from Eudes to its legitimate and in- competent heir Charles the Simple, that country also became the prey of anarchy and all its evils. SECTION XVI. THE HUNGARIANS. While the Arabs were laying waste the southern coasts, and the Normans infesting all the western shores, a nomadic nation from the mountain-plains between the Volga and the Don, strangers to the civilization of Europe, forced its way into the interior. The Utzes in southern Siberia had forced i 2 lib UNIVERSAL HISTORY. the Petcbenegers to abandon their ancient abodes on the Ouralian chain ; and the Petchenegers had expelled their neighbours the Madshares, and driven them across the great rivers of the East. These hordes wandered from the banks of the Don as far as Kiow, and turning to the south-west, their progress in the former direction being opposed by the Russians, passed at length over the Carpathian chain, and descending in the vicinity of the mining towns, arrived in the plains of Pannonia, which were inhabited by the rem- nants of many nations. Some tribes of the Avari went over to them, and others abandoned the country. These new inmates in Europe were called Ugres, Ungres, or Hunga- rians; a term which means foreigners. They still main- tained among themselves the name of Madshares. Scarcely had their princes of the house of Arpad divided ^ among them the newly conquered land, when Arnolf, monarch of the Germans, demanded their aid against the king of the Moravians, who was master of western Hungary, and molested the eastern quarters of Germany. Their friendship was courted by many nations. They were the object of dread among all civilized communities, and they forced the Germans under Lewis the Fourth, the child of Arnolf, to pay them tribute. The Carlovingians lost sight of Italy and A.D.912. were deprived of the crown of Germany. At the demise of their infant king, the German princes aban- doned the house of Charlemain, in order to elect a monarch who might protect the growing civilization of their country against the inroads of barbarous hordes. With this view they united, as far as the times permitted, an adherence to the old custom of confining their choice to the relatives of the royal house ; accordingly, not only Conrad, who was elected at this conjuncture, but almost all the German monarchs, down to the middle of the thirteenth century. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 117 have been in some manner related on the female side to the family of Charles the Great. In the mean time, Otho duke of Saxony, a warrior of rare talents and address, reduced Thuringia under his ad- ministration, and extended his power on the Elbe, where his son Henry founded Meissen. Conrad found it difficult to maintain the royal authority over the last named prince, and over Arnulf the duke of Bavaria. At the same time, Upper Germany was infested by the Hungarians, who plundered the country to the borders of Lorraine, and advanced almost far enough to meet the Normans. The latter oppressed the sea-coasts, while Saxony was threatened by Slavonian hordes, who advanced from the north-east, under the name of Wends. SECTION XVII. THE AGE OF HENRY I., KING OF THE GERMANS. Conrad, before his death, perceived that A.D. 919—936. . ■ n . the skill and valour 01 an able prince were required to protect his country against the hordes of bar- barians who threatened it; and patriotism overcame his attachment to his own family. Instead of his own brother, the duke of Saxony was elected, by his advice, to the throne of Germany. King Henry delivered the empire from its Hungarian and Slavonian invaders ; and was the author of regu- lations by means of which the country obtained security for the future, and became animated in all its parts with a new principle of life. At the same period, the north of Italy was subject, as far as the spirit of faction permitted, to King Berengar. The nobles, unable to endure the restraints which the great talents of this prince opposed to their authority, called in the aid of Rudolf the Second, king of Burgundy. The latter was defeated on the Larda, but he renewed the i 3 118 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. _ stratagem practised eleven centuries before by A.D.923. . . Hannibal in the same countries. While the victorious army was on the pursuit, it was surprised by Boniface of Spoleto, nephew of Rudolf, who fell upon it from an ambuscade: at the same time the king of Bur- gundy, returning to the encounter, defeated Berengar : and the latter was soon after assassinated by a traitor who owed him the greatest obligations. His allies the A.D.924. . & & Hungarians took revenge on Burgundy ; they passed the Jura and spread themselves as far as the Gothic districts near Toulouse. The Romans disposed of the pontifical chair according to the will of the powerful counts of Toscanella and Spo- leto. Political intrigues, and the passions of women, placed each fortunate competitor on the sacred throne: youths and even boys ascended it ; the sons of popes became their successors, while others suffered death by the most atro- cious violence. All respect for civil order seemed totally lost ; yet licentiousness did not occasion so many discon- tents as the political errors of some of the popes. In the meantime, the pious zeal of ecclesiastics scattered the seeds of religious faith among the barbarians who were devas- tating Europe, to the farthest limits of the north. The flourishing dukedom of Benevento suffered internal disturbances in consequence of a partition, and was reduced to a state of great weakness ; of which, however, no ad- vantage was taken, the adjoining Grecian province being still more exhausted, and the commotions in other countries producing calamities not less depressing to their power. In France the name of Charles the Simple yet appeared for a time at the head of all decrees : his kingdom was di- minished by the new royalties of Boson and Rudolf ; and his throne, shaken at the same time that it was upheld, by Richard of Burgundy, Alain the great, duke or king of Britaxmy, the bold and crafty count Fulco of Anjou, and Count Baldwin of Flanders, who wholly disregarded the 1 1 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 119 temper of the times in which he lived; it was brought into the most imminent peril by the conquests of the Normans. SECTION XVIII. THE NORMANS AND RUSSIA. Harold Haarfager had become sole chieftain on the Norwegian coast. While the Finns obtained permission, by paying; a tribute of hides, feathers, and cordage, to pursue the chace, and to fish in the furthest regions of the north ; the inhabitants of the morasses collected their strength at the feet of the Norwegian mountains, to defend their freedom and their herds against the people of Ewen- aland.* The chieftains of the coast, weary of wretched- ness and servitude, migrated to seek liberty and opulence by adventurous exploits in distant lands. One of these adventurers founded the Russian empire. The Russians had proceeded from the countries bordering on the Black Sea, and had lost themselves in the Scythian forests ; they had driven out or subdued the Finnish tribes, and founded the great and flourishing cities of Kiow and Novgorod. To the southward they waged war with the Chazares, a Turkish tribe on the Black Sea, and on the coasts of the Baltic, against the Waraegers, a Norman nation. In the interior of their country factions prevailed, and the government of the laws was too refined for their manners. Accordingly Gostomysl, the governor of the town of Novgorod, counselled them to seek men from abroad, who might be capable of maintaining order in their state. They sent to a tribe of Waraegers, and invited Rurick, Sinaus, and Truvor, three heroic brothers ; to A D 862 w ^ om Kiow, already pressed by the Chazares, soon submitted itself. Scarcely had the war- The northern district of Sweden. I 4 120 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. like hordes of Russians become united among themselves, when they gave laws to the Esthonians and Livonians. To the south they were not contented with defeating the Cha- zares, but, by their powerful fleets, inspired terror into the Byzantine emperor. These were the exploits of Rurick, Igor and his house. In the meantime his countryman Ingulf founded, in the distant Iceland, a republic, which continued to be go- verned by twelve lagmans, or judges, and to enjoy liberty regulated by laws. Meanwhile the king of all England, now united under one head, was unable to defend his coasts against these pirates. They often burnt the rising town of Hamburg, and carried devastation up the Rhine, the Seine, and the .Loire, into the heart of France. Italy was in doubt w hether she had more to fear from the enterprises of the Normans or of the Arabs. One of their leaders, Rollo, son of Rainwold, count of Sondmbr, marched into the interior, and conquered the fertile territory of Neustria. Charles the Simple thought himself fortunate that this chieftain was contented with such an acquisition, and deigned, under the title of duke, to receive Normnndy as a fief from the French crown. SECTION XIX. KING HENRY I. AND HIS SON OTHO. The nations of Europe were in this situation when Henry duke of Saxony ascended the throne of Germany. He paid the tribute to the Hungarians, but he surrounded the hamlets of the Germans with walls and ditches, and enacted that the tenth man of every village should remove into the neighbouring town; that a third part of the produce of the vicinity should be protected in these positions; that the royal courts should be held there ; that certain trades should UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 121 be appropriated to the burgesses, and that honours and iiefs should be attainable by them. Asylums were thus established for the protection of the useful arts, and the work of European civilization, which Charles the Great had begun by the influence of religion, was completed by as- sembling the people into towns. Greece would have reckoned the Saxon Henry among her gods. Henry did not abandon the plan of Charles, which was singularly adapted for promoting the civilization of bar- barous nations. He founded bishopricks on the borders of the Slavonians. Corporations and the authority of priests were an useful bulwark for the growing civilization of the people; and no intelligent prince makes regulations with the intention that they shall last longer than the existing circumstances. To the same monarch, as good institutions of unknown origin are often connected with celebrated names, the margravates at Pechlarn in Austria, and those in Stiria, in Lausitz, at Meissen and Brandenburg, are commonly attributed. Names and families became henceforward better known. Henry is said to have given to the equestrian games of the Arabs the form of the celebrated tournament. The virtues of this prince confirmed his power; and ex- cited emulation as the only way to obtain his favour. Being fully prepared in his plans, he waited till the Hun - garians, after the expiration of the truce, demanded their tribute with arms, and he defeated them. His son and successor, Otho, obtained a still more important victory. The invaders were reduced to the necessity of conquering from nature, what the wise provisions of Henry had with- held from their arms : some years of peace followed, and agriculture began to appear among them. _ At the death of Henry, the lords and the free A.D.936. J men of Germany assembled themselves at Aix- k-Chapelle, a favourite place of Charles the Great, which UNIVERSAL HISTORY. that prince had rendered one of the chief cities of the North. Here the chiefs elected Otho, the 1 son of the late king; the people held up their hands and testified their consent. After Otho had defeated his rivals among the nobility, the authority of a powerful monarch was felt through all Germany. He gave Saxon}-, the land of his fathers, which required the presence of a chief, to the brave warrior Her- man, of the house of Billungen ; and bestowed on his own relations several provinces of the interior. His son Wil- liam became archbishop of Mentz; Bruno, his brother, archbishop of Cologne; his brother Henry, and a son of the latter, who b.ore the same name, were dukes of Ba- varia; Ludolf, the eldest son of the emperor, was duke of Swabia; Conrad, son in-law of the same monarch, became duke of Franconia and Lorraine; and it is said that the government of Thuringia was also confided to the above- mentioned William of Mentz. Thus the principal arch- bishoprics, and the four great duchies, were partly in the house of Otho, and partly in the possession of men on whose fidelity he could more securely confide than in that of his nearest relations : for the latter often employed him in sup- pressing their plans of independent government. The whole activity of the king, and the counsels of his second consort, Adelaide of Burgundy, were scarcely sufficient to maintain good order in this monarchy, by far the most powerful of Christendom. SECTION XX. THE IMPERIAL CROWN DEVOLVES ON THE KINGS OF GERMANY. Otho obtained the imperial crown, which from his time has remained constantly in the possession of the Germans. Even when circumstances have rendered the pilgrimage to Italy and Rome impracticable to the German monarchy the empire has never been bestowed on any foreign prince. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 123 Rudolf, king of Burgundy and Italy, had acquired by faction, and soon lost, the crown of the latter kingdom. Count Hugo, of Provence, had completely driven the descendant of Boson from the king- dom of Aries. This nobleman was a crafty enterprising man, who revered the priesthood, and gave himself up with- out reserve to the pursuits of pleasure and ambition. He had made himself master of Italy: the nobles who had as- AD g sisted him, surrounded with spies, and speedily and severely punished for every act of disobe- dience, soon felt how much their condition was altered for the worse. Rudolf, satisfied with the surrender of the re- mains of the Arclatensian sovereignty, which Hugo had agreed to yield to him, gave himself no further concern for the crown of Italy : and the latter chief reimied A.D.931. "•' . i .-.j over that country sixteen years against the will of the nation. After his death, Berengar the Second, sprung from the house of the counts of Ivrea, obtained pos- session of the empire, and exercised a still more tyran- nical government. Such were the circumstances A.D. 945. which induced Adelaide, widow of Lothaire, the son of Hugo, supported by the house of Este, to invite Otho to her assistance. The king of Germany A.D. 952. . . , . & rr i married her, and received the crown or Italy. The pope found himself exposed to dangers which ren- dered the aid of the German monarch not less necessary to him, Romanus Lacopenus, a man of great talents, who had by fraud and perjury ascended the imperial throne of Constantinople ; had wholly abandoned the remains of tho Greek dominion in lower Italy to the Arabs, who extended their incursions to the suburbs of Rome itself. Count Al- bert, of Toscanella, with the assistance of the people, Was scarcely able to defend the city against their enterprises. At this conjuncture, the remembrance of ancient liberty surviving still among the Roman people, they established, under the protection of the count, a consulate, which was 124? UNIVERSAL HISTORY. intrusted to the patricians, while the praetorship was ad- ministered by plebeians, and twelve noblemen possessed of riches and authority were named senators. Yet the spirit of faction was too powerful, and Berengar entered Rome. John the Twelfth, or Gctavian, the son of Alberich, now invited the king of Germany, the most powerful sovereign whom the church could choose as her protector. This monarch already held the chief sway in Burgundy, under the weak administration of Conrad, son of Rudolf ; he gave princes to the Tchechi in Bohemia, and dukes to Poland ; he maintained the tottering throne of Lewis the Fourth in France, and received the homage of the king of Denmark. Otho marched into Italy; the Lombards placed upon his head their crown : how indeed could they have A.D.961. ... . r withheld it: J. he eyes ot Berengar were put out, and he was led across the Alps. Albert, his son, fled to Fresne, and sought protection among the Arabs. The Germans marched down through Italy, and the people, as in the time of the Cimbri, admired their high stature, their strength and intrepidity; even the harsh tones of their lan- guage inspired terror. Otho was received at Rome as Charlemain had been, and accepted the imperial crown. When John perceived the great power of this monarch, he regretted that he had delivered his country into the hands of the Germans. He accordingly applied to Albert, and sent an embassy to the Greek emperor, the young and ef- feminate Romanus ; he appointed one of his friends bishop, and sent him, with the pretence of preaching religion to the Hungarians, but in reality to excite a renewal of the war against Germany. John had no reluctance to engage in the war himself, but he was too much devoted to the beau- tiful Raynera. The solemn visits to the graves of the Apostles were an odious ceremony to jealous husbands, When Otho was informed of these proceedings, he sent the bishops of Naumburg and Cremona to Rome, and UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 125 while these ecclesiastics upbraided the Romans with their want of fidelity, many German knights declared themselves ready to maintain, by fair combat, that the Emperor Otho had never given any just reason for such a defection. John, who saw that his schemes were detected, received Albert into Rome, but a strong faction declared itself in favour of the most powerful party. The city was besieged, and the pope, together with Albert, sought safety in flight ; but the people bound themselves to the emperor by an oath never ^ ^ to receive any pope without the knowledge and consent of himself and his successors in the German empire. After three days the emperor summoned the bishops and lords, and heard the accusations against John, " that he had sold bishopricks, performed the inaugu- ration of a priest in a stable, castrated a bishop, appeared with cuirass, helm, and sword, drunk to the health of the devil, invoked Venus, and lain with the concubine of his father." On these weighty charges the emperor confirmed the deposition of John, and the election of a successor, who was named Leo the Eighth. The deposed pontiff made it known that the treasures of the church were in his hands, and that he was ready to re- ward those who now showed themselves faithful to his A D 64 cause * ^ stron S P art y declared in favour of John, and the Germans, outnumbered, sought security in the ruins of the ancient city. The women, who felt an attachment to the dignity and freedom of Rome, per- suaded the nobles to drive out Leo, and many of his partisans lost their fingers, noses, or tongues. But Otho marched a se- cond time towards the city, and an injured husband freed him from his troublesome rival. The defence was vain, and hunger soon forced the people to surrender. " So long as I or my successors," said Otho to the Romans, " shall wield this sword, so long must you reverence your Pope Leo." Such was the beginning of the protection exercised by the German emperors over the church at Rome. 126 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. From that time Otho, and his son of the same name, at- tempted to unite Italy under their sway. The Greek Em- peror Nicephoriis Phocas, an excellent warrior, gave to Otho the Second, who espoused Theophano, his step- daughter, ail the rights and claims of the empire in lower Italy. The negotiation on this subject furnished Bishop Luit- brand of Pavia some anecdotes, which are interesting, as relating to the history of manners: " In July," he writes, " we arrived at Constantinople. They immediately pre- sented us with an honorary guard, so that we could not make a single step without their knowledge. We could not drink the wine mixed with gypsum and pitch, (an old African custom which is still preserved in Spain). On the second day after our arrival we rode to the audience. The emperor is a short fat man, so brown that any person would be frightened who met him in a forest. He said, f he was sorry our master bad been so audacious as to take possession of Rome, and put to death Berengar and Albert, who were worthy men ; after which he had carried fire and sword even into the Grecian countries. He knew well that we had advised our master to these proceeding.-*.' We re- plied, that i our sovereign, the emperor, had freed Rome from tyrants and whores, and had come for that purpose to Italy, from the ends of the earth; seeing that other princes sleeping on their thrones had nojt deigned to think such disorders worthy of their notice : that there were knights among us who would at any time maintain the right and virtue of our lord, in a fair single combat ; but that we came with friendly views, and to demand the princess The- ophano/ The emperor said, 6 It is now time to go to the parade.' His soldiers were the towns-people: no halbards were to be seen. The emperor passed slowly, clpthed in a long mantle, between two rows pf soldiers, amidst in- cessant acclamations. At the table he chose to blame our manner of fighting : he said our arms were too heavy, and UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 127 thought the Germans were brave only after they had drunk wine, and that the true Romans were at Constantinople. Hereupon he made a sign with his hand that I should hold my peace, and then began to talk of matters relating to the church. I said, 6 we Germans know nothing of sects: the wars of the pen are not our affairs.' He is surrounded by flatterers, and the whole city is filled with voluptuous- ness. Even on holidays there are public spectacles. Their dominion does not depend upon their own strength, but on hired soldiers from Amalfi and Venice, and on Russian seamen." Notwithstanding this degeneracy of manners, Theophano became the consort of Otho the Second, and introduced innovations into her simple German court. She or her suite contributed on the other hand to kindle the love of learning, in which at the same time missionaries and in- structors from Scotland performed their share. The attempt to unite Italy became abortive; the south- ern people have ever maintained themselves by craft, or the influence of their climate, against the arms of the north. When, through deficiency in the power of resist- ance, or by turning to advantage factious dissensions, con^ quests have been obtained, generations have passed away before the vengeance of the usurped country has ceased from displaying its effects. Otho the Second, in an unfor- tunate seafight, narrowly escaped falling into the hands of the Arabs. Before he had prepared for a new campaign he died ; after putting to death several of the chief citizens A D 93' °^ ^k^ 111 ^ °^ wnose independent principles he was afraid. From the time of the grandfather and father of Otho the JSecond, until ninety years after his death, the German kings remained the chief sovereigns of the Christian world. The princes of the empire had not yet rendered their offices and feudal possessions hereditary, but continued to be great and powerful vassals, while the royal house enjoyed J 28 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. the preponderating power. The Othos and their successors, who were men of energy and good talents, protected Ger- many from the anarchy which laid waste the other parts of Europe. SECTION XXI. THE FRENCH CROWN DEVOLVES ON THE FAMILY OF CAPET. France was reduced to such a state of anarchy, that neither the innocent administration of Charles the Simple, nor the nobler qualities of Lewis the Fourth and Lothaire, were sufficient to maintain the public tranquillity. Scarcely any thing beyond the county of Laon remained to the Carlovingian princes ; Hugh, duke of France, Orleans, and Burgundy, grandson of Robert the Strong, held the kings in such humiliation, that even the ceremony of the field of May, in which the Merovingians had in past times received the homage of the nation, was no longer cele- brated to their honour. When Lewis the Fifth, A.D.987. _ . _ . _ , . a weak young man, had attained his twenty-first year, and had terminated a life embittered by his political in- significance and by domestic animosities ; his uncle, Charles duke of Lorraine, attempted to succeed him on the throne. The nation had sworn in ihe election of kings to confine themselves to the house of Pepin. But Hugh Capet, son of the great Hugh, and brother of Henry duke of Burgundy, a nobleman in the vigour of life, opulent, and possessed of distinguished talents, obtained the advantage. He was elected king, and Charles was defeated and made prisoner. The house of Charles the Great, without a revolution, sunk unobserved into obscurity, as the family of Clovis had sunk before, not in consequence of tyrannical government, but through the weakness of its last representatives. Hugh secretly prepared the way for a more important re- volution, viz. for converting the elective into an hereditary monarchy. In order to effect his object lie caused his son 12 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. \29 Robert to be crowned during his own life, and thus con- trived to make his own authority come in aid of the feeble pretensions which the young prince could offer to the throne. The succeeding kings imitated this example; until, in the time of Philip Augustus, the royal power seemed so securely established inj the hands of the reigning dynasty, that the precaution was henceforth superfluous. Where the laws govern, elective monarchy is not necessary ; and where they want influence, it is a dangerous and ruinous institution. The sovereigns of Germany sought to follow the plan of the first kings of the house of Capet, but with very unequal success. When the royal authority in France had became a mere shadow, the kings sought to increase their resources by ter- ritorial inheritances ; and instead of re-establishing the old Frankish form of government, they retained the possession of their acquisitions like other lords. Accordingly, the steps which they made towards the restoration of their power, were not accomplished by bringing back the original constitution, in which the king had been the president of the nation, and the executor of the national decrees; but by uniting many subordinate dominions under one head, who governed with all the rights of which the terri^ torial lords had contrived to possess themselves. TEe old national government was wholly lost sight of. The French kings would sooner have accomplished their design, if they had not, like the emperors, bestowed many domains which had fallen into their possession on younger branches of the royal house, instead of uniting them to the crown. Their desire of increasing their power was, in- deed, more allied to vulgar ambition than to any prede- termined scheme of policy or enlightened care for the good of the monarchy. The most favourable opportunities that befell them had neither been prepared by their foresight, nor were they turned to the greatest possible advantage ; but VOL. II. K 130 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. were for the most part the contingent effect of circum- stances. So humiliating is history to the pride of the po- litician ! SECTION XXII. NORMANDY. Among the nobles of France, the duke of Normandy was the first. He was even more powerful than the king himself, and for a long time opposed the greatest obstacles to the progress of the royal sway. The chief sources of his greatness were the excellent nature of the country of Normandy, that chivalrous spirit of his nobles which was la/oured by the Norman law, and the genuine character of the northern people, which, among his subjects, was long A D 1066 P reservet ^ una ^ ere ^* The conquest of Eng- land by William was advantageous to the throne of France : for when the duke became a foreign o potentate, the French nobles adhered more closely to their own king, from whom they had less to fear ; while the Nor- man princes, since the acquisition of their new kingdom, were unable to maintain so careful an interest in their affairs. SECTION XXIII. Of THE KINGDOM OF BURGUNDY AND THE HOUSE OF SAVOY. What the Normans had effected in the north-west was accomplished by the Burgundian houses in the south-east. The descendants of Rudolf adhered to the German mo- narchs. At Dijon, Robert, son of the king of the same name, erected the seat of a dukedom, which was powerful during three hundred years. The courts of Vienne ex- tended their authority over Allobrogia ; and in the interior of this country, at the feet of the mountains covered with UNIVERSAL HI TORY. perpetual winter, we discover the obscure origin of the house of Savoy. It happened that the kingdom of Aries, united to Bur- gundy by Rudolf the Second ; became, together with the other states of that prince, separated from France. For Rudolf the Third having despoiled a land-owner of estates, which, according to the law or the opinion of the nobles, belonged to him of right ; the latter took arms against a king who had attempted to raise himself above the laws. Thenceforward Rudolf adhered to Henry the Se- cond, and Conrad the Second, the successors of Otho, A D 1032 k rou 8 nt over to tnem tne crown of Bur- gundy. He concluded a long and odious reign without leaving any legitimate heir; and Conrad having gained a victory, was acknowledged as king at Petterling, in the Pays de Vaud, and crowned at Geneva. It is not clear whether he grounded his right chiefly on re- lationship, or on the claims of the Carlovingian monarchy which had devolved on the German emperors; for we ob- served above that Boson had received the kingdom of Aries as a fief from Charles the Fat. Certain it is the* the Transjurane territory and Savoy became from thpt time completely alienated from the French monarchy. The new sovereign of Burgundy intrusted Count Hum- bert the White-handed with the government of some districts of the Arelatensian kingdom, as Rudolf had confided it to Berald the father of that nobleman. These counts were the ancestors of the house of Savoy. Their oldest possessions were on the lakes of Annecy, Bourget, and Geneva, in the circuit of the Roman colony of Nion, and in the lower Valais from St. Maurice to the fortress of Chillon, situate on the lake. Afterwards Count Odo married Adelaide, heiress of Ivrea, the Italian countess, who in the gate cf Turin administered the affairs of a number of scattered tribes. From these parents Amadeus inherited, together with Savoy, the valley of Aosta, the country of the Piecl^ K % 132 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. montese, and a number of fortresses reaching to the Medi- terranean sea. As in the dawn of the morning we distinguish, from a lofty summit of the Alps, first the inferior mountains., then the lakes, fortresses, towns, hills and plains: so, in the eleventh century, we first gain sight of the great reigning dynasties of Europe; soon afterwards we discern particular nobles and illustrious families, and at length the associations of burgesses which gradually elevate themselves from among the enslaved multitude. From Otho William, also of Ivrea, landgrave (for so he called himself) of the Jura, in Waraschken and in Franche ^ ^ ^ Comte, is deduced a series of lords of Upper Burgundy, who were powerful protectors of their people and of their own independence. They defended the former against arbitrary exactions, and the latter against the usurpations of the neighbouring monarchs. From a younger branch of the house of Upper Burgundy are descended the lords of Chalons, afterwards heirs of the prince of Orange, not less opulent than the landgrave, and ancestors of the illustrious heiress who brought all the estates of the Chalons- Orange family into the house of Nassau. Hence these names become important in the history of the human race. SECTION XXIV. HOUSES OF HAPSBURG AND OF LORRAINE. The Emperor Henry the Third, son of Conrad the Second, gave to Albert, count of Alsace, and Gerhard his A D 1 44 k rotner ' tne dukedom on the Moselle, termed the Upper Lorraine. The lineage of these A D l 47 counts 1S deduced from the dukes of the old Allemanni ; and from Ethico, royal commissary in this nation in the time of the Merovingians. Ethico had two sons, from one of whom the house of Lorraine, and from the other the counts of Hapsburg, are descended. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 133 Their estates lay in the country of Alsace, extending widely to the feet of the Alps, and in the neighbouring districts of the Allemanni on the Aare, and in Swabia. Great misfortunes befell this house when Luitfried, duke of the Allemanni, waged an unsuccessful war against the father of Charlemain, by which he lost the ducal dignity ; and when Count Guntram assisted the rebellious A. D. 955. son of Otho the First, then duke of Swabia, against his father. In consequence of these imprudent measures, that branch of the house that gives origin to the princes of Hapsburg lost their feudal domains, and pre- served with difficulty their hereditary estates. Hapsburg was founded soon after this mis- A.D.1020. nS,. nil i • t r» fortune. The heirs of that house which Pro- vidence destined to rule over the countries on the Aluta, the Danube, the Po, to inherit Burgundy and Spain, and to be successors of the Peruvian Incas ; first occur to our notice in the deeds of monasteries and among the numerous attendants of the campaigns of the emperors. The house of Lorraine arose more splendidly : for at the same time Gerhard became duke of Lorraine, and Bruno his kinsman, under the name of Leo the Ninth, was one of the most powerful Roman pontiffs. SECTION XXV. THE NETHERLANDS. The counts of the Flamings in Flanders, and the lords of the Netherlands, are distinguished from the nobles and people of all other countries. These districts were more difficult to defend against the waves of the northern sea and against pirates, than in a contest with the arms of the neighbouring people : whence the nobles of the Low Coun- tries were obliged, by immunities which rendered the abode desirable, to entice settlers who might clear away the forests, drain the morasses, secure the unstable coasts with dams, k 3 134 LMVLR5AL H13T0KY. and gain conquests over the sea. Thus an uncommonly numerous population was soon formed, and industry brought the arts of peace to a far earlier maturity than elsewhere. As the dukes of Normandy bestowed honours on valiant knights v/ho fought with renown under their banners: so the counts of Fianders and Holland conferred distinction on useful burgesses and husbandmen. SECTION XXVI. ENGLAND. In this manner the English kings, especially Alfred and Athelstan, had set the counts remarkable examples. After ^ ^ the former prince had delivered his country from the Danish adventurers, who every year plundered the coast or levied contributions on its inhabi- tants, civil order, industry, commerce, and maritime power, became the chief objects of his attention, and of that of his son and grandson, Edward and Athelstan. These were the first princes in the middle ages who discovered that more than one road to fame is open to peaceful men. Alfred possessed a combination of qualities which are to be desired in all the magistrates of free nations, and were scarcely to be expected from the philosophers of his age. He and his successors, with more comprehensive minds than any of the conquerors possessed, gave to commerce such a degree of activity, such consistency of power to the maritime forces, such a spirit to legislation, and afforded such splendid en- couragement to science; Other and Wulfstan, under the direction of Alfred, made such successful voyages of dis- covery in the unknown northern seas ; that we observe with surprise how early the English nation displayed its natural bent, and prepared itself for the part which it was destined to act in later ages. A hundred years after Alfred, under the A. D. 078. weak kings Ethelred and Edmund, the crimes 3t UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 135 of an ambitious woman having stained the throne with the innocent blood of Edward the Second, the fortune and the authority of the royal house abandoned it. Sweno, king of the Danes, availed himself of the dissensions and weakness of the English state ; and he and his son Ca- nute the Great ascended the Anglo- Saxon A. D. 1014. , & throne, In no other age was the Norman name so illustrious. Denmark and England obeyed Canute : on the north- western coast of France, Richard the Good and Richard the Proud, a father and son, reigned as dukes of Normandy. They possessed the greater ascendancy as they preserved their connection with Norway and Sweden. In the same age, twelve sons of a Norman nobleman, Lord Tancred of Hauteville, founded the kingdom of Naples and Sicily. In Britain, the laws and customs of the English were preserved. They were the same as those of Denmark, but had attained to a more complete form. SECTION XXVII. SCANDINAVIA. Since Charlemain had introduced Christianity among the Saxons, and since Anschar, a monk of Corvey, had promulgated this faith among the Danes and Swedes ; the old worship of Woden, and the barbarous simplicity of the north, had contended in Denmark against the religion and the manners of the south. The Danes and Normans were the most powerful of the Scandinavian nations, for they were the first who consented to revere the supreme power concentrated in a single chief : the Goths and Swedes re- mained longer separate, and were scarcely able with divided power to maintain themselves in independence. Finland and Ewenaland were also distinct principalities. The best kings of the Goths and Swedes were those who brought , agriculture into use, and derived from the fisheries in the K 4 136 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. four great seas, and from the produce of the ancient mines, resources which enabled them to promote the civilization of their people. SECTION XXVIII. ICELAND. Iceland was distinguished from the countries above- mentioned in this respect, that a scarcely cultivated island, in a cold climate, and widely separated from the rest of Europe, required the greater exertion in order to overcome its natural disadvantages. Twelve lagmans administered the laws of this people, brought by their ancestors from the continent : in the beginning of the eleventh century, Chris- tianity was introduced ; and after the legal code of the great Canute, there is no more ancient monument of northern legislation than the ecclesiastical right by which the Ice- landic bishops, Thorlak, Runolf, and Ketill Thorstan, united themselves with the spiritual and temporal land- A D 112 0wners ' Soon after this, Are Polyhistor and Saemund Sigfusson wrote the history of the country. A century later, Snorro Sturlaeson, a judge in Iceland, collected in the Edda the materials of _ northern poetry — the traditions of the former A. D. 1241. . r J time. Already Erich, son of Thorwald, setting out from Ice- land, had planted a colony in the remote Greenland ; from Permia a regular commerce was carried on by these people on the White Sea of the north ; and young Icelanders passed by sea and land through a hundred nations to seek gains, knowledge, and adventures in Greece and the Holy Land ; whence they had returned in their old age to amuse the long nights of the Iceland winters with the relation of the wonders they had seen, and the sagas of the gods or heroes. The Edda is a compilation of such tales, intended to per- petuate the remembrance of them, and encourage a spirit of enterprise in succeeding generations. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 13? SECTION XXIX. RUSSIA. But it was the Christian religion, that point of union among nations, whose history is as ancient as the world, as well as among the more civilized people of Europe, that like the electric spark roused the nations of the north from their long sleep of ignorance. When Olga, the female sovereign of Russia, and Vladi- mir the Great, had adopted the faith of the more enlight- ened nations, an acquaintance with the necessities and the advantages of civil order was introduced among the tribes A D 955 °^ t ^ G ^ r em P* re * estaDnsne( i roads, erected bridges, promoted communication among dif- ferent hordes, and facilitated the progress of merchants. After Vladimir had received the rite of baptism, A.D. 980. . r he married Anna of Constantinople, sister of Theophano, empress of Germany. From his court ambas- sadors were sent to the western and to the Greek emperor, and to the Moslem commanders of the Faithful at Bagdad. He established schools, and opened a path for commercial enterprise by means of the Volga, which pours itself into the Caspian sea; and his powerful hand protected the market of Permia. This warrior, who slept under the open heaven, who knew not the use of any but wooden instru- ments, and had taken to his bed eight hundred and five wives, was a Peter the Great of the tenth century. Nature already revealed that she had placed in Russia a mass of strength which only required to be awakened ; and that the vast and comprehensive was to be the character of this empire. The Greeks and Germans worked together in promoting its culture, and its relations became immediately interesting to all large states. Yaroslaf, the son of Vladimir, became the legislator A D 1015 °^ N° v g or °d; ne subdued the Livonian coast, and founded the town of Dorpt in the con- 138 UNIVERSAL HISTOKY. quered country. His ordinances, as all regulations ought to be, were consonant with the character of the nation; thus, whoever pulled a hair out of the beard of any man, underwent a punishment four times more severe than if he had cut off one of his lingers. Yaroslaf omitted nothing in order to render his people, so superior to others in power, equal to them in knowledge. He encouraged translations of Greek books; he brought the Russians into relations with all the civilized nations; he gave Anna, his daughter, to King Henry the First of France, and from her are de- scended all the French kings. With the German emperors he concluded alliances against the wild Hungarians, as against common enemies. The pope already sought occa- sion to become known to, and revered by, the Russians. Alexius Comnenus, one of the most illustrious emperors of Constantinople, bestowed upon Vladimir Monomachus, son of Usevolod and grandson of Yaroslaf, the insignia of the imperial dignity; and Kyow, the Russian capital, swore, in the election of the czar, to confine their choice to the house of Vladimir. In his time lived in Peczera, one of the most venerable monasteries of Kyow, Nestor, the first historian of the Rus- sian empire, who is distinguished by a simple and instruc- tive style, and by many proofs of sound judgment and uncommon learning. One circumstance retarded the progress of Russia in commerce, knowledge, and political influence: this was the division which Vladimir made of his empire between his twelve sons, which, by the disquiet and the feuds it occa- sioned, brought back the rudeness of uncivilized manners, which were scarcely beginning to be softened. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 139 SECTION XXX. CONSTANTINOPLE. The empire of the Greeks afforded, during this interval, an asylum to the remains of literature and culture, pre- served from the ages of antiquity. The Emperor Theophilus, son of Michael the Stammerer, who incurred the vehement hatred of the wor- A. D 829. shippers of images, was an upright prince, a friend to his people, and a patron of the arts. It is true, that during the minority of Michael the Third, the Empress Theo- dora, as Irene had formerly done, induced by AD.842. 5 . . „ , * , , superstition or policy, restored the images, and the attempt to abolish their use was for ever abandoned. It is true that Michael himself was occupied exclusively with satisfying his own impure lusts, and was always sur- rounded with favourites, who had no other pretension than their beauty; but Caesar Bardas kept the state in order, and feeling that learning alone could distinguish and give weight to his authority, sought to support the ne- glected cause of literature. He raised the learned Photius to the patriarchate of Constantinople ; a man who, in the tumult of intrigues, of which he became the victim, and in the possession of the highest spiritual dignity, consecrated to literature hours which another would have wasted in attendance on the court, and expended in its pursuit sums which by any of his contemporaries would have been differently bestowed. ^ ^ Basilius, the murderer of Michael and of his uncle, ascended a throne which he adorned with talents that were worthy of a more legitimate claim : and such a title he earned by a meritorious administration. It was he who instituted the code of the imperial law. He had equity enough to cause justice to be done during his administration to Photius, who had owed his dignity to Bardas. 140 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. ^ ^ ^ After an active and prudent reign, he left the empire to his son Leo, the disciple and the per- secutor of Photius ; a learned prince, but the victim of violent passions. After Leo had amplified the legal code of his father, the tutelage of the infant Constantine Porphy- A D 91 1 ro £ ennetes devolved first on his uncle Alexander, a slave of pleasure, and afterwards to the em- press Zoe. A female arm was found too feeble to A.D.912. r . V «. * "', i.,. restram the efforts ol ambition ; and in this con- A D 919 J uncture R° manus Lacopenus acquired the sove- reign power by perjury, which he exercised with dignity and prudence. Constantine devoted himself to the works of the ancients, and to the study of the constitution and political relations of the empire ; on which subjects he has left valuable writings. He appeared to be entirely given up to books and wine ; yet contrived to destroy the crafty statesman who had usurped the chief power by means of his own sons, for whose fortune Romanus had still further abandoned the maxims of morality. The sons soon be- came the victims of their folly, and Constantine at length gained possession of his empire. A D 959 After nmi Romanus the Second, with diffi- culty and without glory, obtained the throne, and devoted his power to the gratification of sensual pas- sions. Nicephorus Phocas, singular as he and his court appeared to the bishop of Pavia, was the restorer of the Roman power by his own exploits in Crete, and A.D. 964. ; . 1.11,. i : % 1 by victories obtained by his generals against the Saracens and the Buyides in Lesser Asia and Syria. The empire was maintained in a more severe contest by John Tzimices against the armies of the Russian Swaroslaf, son of Olga, and father of Vladimir. This prince, as well as Nicephorus, had held the sovereignty, without incurring the censure of usurpation, during the mi- nority of the sons of Romanus ; as the talents of the best generals were required by the exigencies of the times. Ba- UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 141 silius the Second, and Constantine the Eighth, A. D. 975. ascen j e( j tne throne together ; and so shared it between them, that all the labours of government fell to the lot of the first, and its enjoyments to his associate. Under these princes the empire obtained a period of good fortune not less glorious than the two former reigns. Basilius broke the power of the Bulgarians, which had long been formidable, in several great battles and sieges, and subdued them from the mouths of the Danube to the borders of the old Epirus. After a reign of fifty years, distinguished by every imperial virtue, Basilius left the sole possession of the throne to his brother. The latter governed without capacity, and with a seve- rity which was the effect of fear. He bequeathed the empire, with his daughter Zoe, on the patrician Roman us Argyrus ; a virtuous prince, who suffered from the Sara- cens a defeat near Aleppo, which was only to A. D. 1028. . - . . , , , ,i be ascribed to his want or local knowledge. Zoe was attracted by the beauty of a more youthful lover ; and her passion cost her husband his life and ruined her own fortunes : for scarcely had the adulterer obtained the AD 1054 crown unc ^ er ^ e name °f Michael the Fourth, when his mind, not wholly abandoned by virtue, became agitated by remorse, which destroyed the vigour of his nerves, and rendered him a prey to disease. Incapable of consolation so long as the fruit of his crime remained in his possession, he finally abandoned his palace, and sought to appease the stings of conscience by immuring himself in a cloister. The empress raised his cousin, Michael Calaphates, to the throne. She wished to be regarded as his mother, but he was un- grateful to all those to whom he owed his elevation, and soon merited dethronement. Zoe would have spared him . _ the loss of his eyes, which he suffered from the A. D. 1042. n , . mi vengeance ol her sister, lhe empress was fn 142 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. glad to espouse Constantinus Monomachus, a nobleman who had suffered from her former attachment to him ; and she consented that Sclerana, who had by self-devotion me- rited his affection, should reside in the imperial palace. She afterwards enjoyed a tranquil old age, and the empire an administration which had the appearance of good order . _ and decorum. After Constantine had con- A.D.1054. ' . eluded a reign devoted to pleasure, Theodora, the ambitious sister of Zoe, who was already dead, suc- ceeded to the throne, and governed for a short time with wisdom and courage. AD 1056 ^i tn ner tne imperial family, descended from the first Basilius, became extinct. Her ministers of state raised to the throne Michael the Sixth, a warrior, by whose military talents they hoped to acquire for the empire respect abroad, while they retained the power at home in their own hands. Michael soon showed how difficult it is for a man who has spent a long course of years in a subordinate rank, so to administer the royal authority that sovereignty shall not appear to be unnaturally disposed of in his hands. The great, whom he had offended, de- A D 1057 stro y ec * by tne a id of Isaac Comnenus, who reigned after him for a short time, with prudence and other praise-worthy qualities, and laid down the sceptre when sickness had rendered him less capable of wielding it. Constantinus Ducas ruled equi- tably, but he wanted military talents ; and it was fortunate that the barbarous Utzes, who penetrated from northern Asia across the Danube, were destroyed by contingent misfortunes and by their own fault. Romanus Diogenes, whom the widow of Ducas elevated to the throne and to her bed, possessed magna- nimity and military virtues which would have enabled him better to resist the rising power of the Seljukian Turks, if the jealousy of his nobles had not prevented. He fell, UNIVERSAL HISTORY. A.D. 1078. through their treachery, into the power of the sultan Alp Arslan. Happy would he have been had fate ' 1071 ' cast his lot among these generous barbarians ! He was liberated ; and found in his empire treason, defec- tion, and a cruel assassination. The weak son of Ducas, Michael the Seventh, who devoted himself to the frivolous study of grammatical subtleties, and was the slave of a bad minister, found at length an asylum and honours in the church. Nicephorus Botoniates, who, as a soldier, was worthy of the empire, but de- ficient in the virtues of a sovereign, yielded to the fortunes of the Comneni, with whose accession a new A.D. 1081. sera opens. We may observe, in a survey of the ninth, tenth, and eleventh centuries, that several of the emperors, either by their own virtues, or by the choice of good ministers, ap- peared to be worthy successors of the best of the old Caesars. To maintain the luxurious empire against the Bulgarians, Russians, and the nations of the east, to the latter of whom every new revolution at Bagdad communicated a new im- pulse, was a most arduous task. In Constantinople a fund of literature was preserved during these times, which was destined to employ the labour of later ages, SECTION XXXI. CONCLUSION. From the whole delineation of the two hundred and sixty years which followed the reign of Charlemain, it ap- pears evident by what means, after the dismemberment of his empire, Henry, king of the Germans, contrived to build his throne on the firmest foundations, and acquire for this nation the preponderance among all the states which rose from the ruins of that monarchy. Spain was divided ; short was the duration of Alfred's wise policy among the English ; scarcely is the shadow of royal power to be dis- 144 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. cerned in the kingdom of the Capets ; Burgundy and Italy were subjected to the Germans; Denmark, Poland, and Hungary, were beginning, by the influence of Christianity, to attain to civilization ; the adventures of the Normans were destitute of plan ; and in Russia unwise czars aban- doned the principles of Vladimir, and ruined their empire by intestine broils. The Othos indeed, and their successors, followed salu- tary maxims of government ; they encouraged the progress of a humanizing religion, and the arts of civilized life: they only wanted power in their vast empire, from the Eida to Capua, to hold in peace and good order the multitude of nobles. To the latter they were under the necessity of confiding too much authority in their domains, by which the chieftains were enabled to form for themselves parties, and lay the foundations of independent rule. A D 1002 When > after 0tll ° the Th ird > Henry the Second had assumed the imperial crown, he was obliged, although descended from the first Henry, to con- tend against factions. He conquered ; and prepared the ac- quisition of Burgundy for his excellent successor Conrad, sprung from a family related to the imperial A.D.1032. / & ^ a J . . . i , j house. Conrad caused his son to be elected during his own life, and Henry the Third fol- A.D.1039. _ _ & . _ . , ; „ , . „ . lowed m this respect the example of his lather. The times of Conrad and Henry were the most flourishing period of the German monarchy : the minority A.D.1056. _ _ _. _ . _ _ J r . . ' ol Henry the fourth, and the feminine go- vernment of his mother, Agnes of Guienne, were but too favourable to the wishes of the great. A contingent mis- fortune might have brought the imperial throne into a de- pendent state ; and such a misfortune at length befell it, in the increase of the papal power, { 145 ) BOOK XV. THE AGE IN WHICH THE POLITICAL INFLUENCE OF THE PAPACY WAS ESTABLISHED. FROM A.D. 1073 TO 1177. SECTION I. THE NORMANS IN ITALY. JLandulf, the old duke of Benevento, and the neighbour- ing Catapan, or viceroy of the Greek Emperor, had entered into a treaty with adventurers from Normandy, that the latter should give them assistance in overturning the growing power of the Arabs in the south of Italy, and should receive pay and estates in the conquered land as a recompense. The foreigners accomplished their under- taking, and soon experienced the ingratitude of the Greeks. The Normans, conscious of their own superiority, resolved, few as they were, to take vengeance on the disorderly multi- tudes of their treacherous allies. The beauty of the country attracted them ; they brought over reinforcements of their valiant countrymen from Normandy, and every where ob- tained the advantage over the Greeks, and over the princes of Benevento and Salerno, who were weakened by factions and effeminate manners. From Amalfi, their earliest conquest of importance, they sent out armies and subdued the Liborian and Beneventan territory, and most of the cities of the Catapan. The papal chair, which became more and more agitated by disputes with the Greek church, and by disquietude on account of the increasing power of the Germans, was guided by wise counsels, when it favoured the party of the Normans. They VOL. 11. h 146 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. * consented to receive their conquests as fiefs from the head of the Christian church, to whose dignity they testified their veneration, by falling at the feet of Leo the Ninth, after they had taken him prisoner in a battle. This compact was confirmed in the time of A. D. 1057. . Robert Guiscard, of Hauteville, who combined with the warlike valour of his brethren the more artful cha- racter of a politician, and wa% endowed with all the quali- ^ ties which are requisite in the founder of a state. Pope Nicholas the Second, a Burgundian, (who endeavoured by his regulations concerning the papal elec- tions to secure the future independence of the holy see ; and by the acquisition of various estates in the vicinity of Rome, to found its temporal principality,) was the pontiff who more especially contributed to establish this alliance be- tween the pontifical chair and Robert Guiscard. SECTION II. OF THE PAPACY. After the schism which was healed by the emperor Henry the Third, the papal chair had been filled by Leo and Stephen, two natives of Lorraine, each the ninth pope of his name: they were both men of noble birth and ex* perience in the conduct of public affairs ; and had adorned their office with more than its former dignity. Accordingly after the death of Nicholas, Alexander the Se- cond, the bishop of Lucca, a Milanese, was elected to the papacy without the influence of the imperial court, and was able to maintain his station. The bishops, abbots, priests, and deacons, the clergy of the churches in the vicinity of Rome, who were named cardinals, resolved in the synod, held in the church of St. John, in Lateran, " that since the sacred chair had been put to sale by laymen, in a most opprobrious manner, and many sacred privileges had ii UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 147 been suppressed by lay influence, the cardinals should al- ways assemble after the demise of a pope, and with the as- sistance of the chancellor of Lombardy, and preserving inviolate all the privileges of Henry, king of Germany, or of any other monarch who might have been crowned em- peror by a pope in Rome, should proceed immediately to the election." The people was asked, Is our choice agree- able to you ? and answered," It is agreeable to us. — Will you receive him ? We will receive him. — Do you approve him ? We do approve him. A D 10 ^ U manner, after the decease of Alex- ander, Cardinal Hildebrand, a Tuscan, who in the preceding reigns had possessed a leading influence, was elected to the papacy under the title of Pope Gregory the Seventh. Either through affected moderation, or because the reality of power was more agreeable to him than its ex- terior, he opposed many objections to his nomination, and entreated King Henry to refuse his assent. The king, who knew him to be a man of learning and great intelligence., and skilful in the management of affairs, immediately dis- patched George Bishop of Vercelli to the chancellor of Lombardy to confirm the nomination. Gregory had been acquainted during many years with the court of the German king, and had spent a considerable time in the respectable monastery of Clugny, in France. The people reverenced him as a great spiritual orator. He was animated by the zeal of a prophet, and united the pli- ability of a party leader with the stedfastness of the old Roman patriot. He was the great man of his age. The most discerning prelates, the monks, from whose rank he had raised himself felt the dignity which such a pope would reflect on each of them. The princes of the German em- pire were determinately bent on the degradation of the royal authority ; and to many of them it was not unwelcome that the dogma should be spread abroad, " that the Chris- tian world looked only to Christ, and since the Lord had 148 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. departed from before the eyes of men, to the right hand of the throne of God, it regarded the successor of the first of his witnesses, on whom and on whose testimony, as on a rock^ the Church was founded, as its only paternal and sacred head ; that the laws of nations, the dictates of eternal wis- dom, derived in an especial manner their force, their inter- pretation, and their application, from the vice-gerent of Christ, who authorized emperors and kings ; and that since Jesus named Peter as the fundamental rock of his church, the apostle and his successors alone possessed substantial power, eternal as the power of the Father, and the might -of Jesus Christ, the judge of all the earth." Gregory perceived the impression produced by such re- presentations, and discerned the advantage which would arise from setting the spiritual servants of the church free from all dependence on temporal princes. He accordingly took occasion, in a controversy which had lately been re- newed concerning spiritual perfection, to forbid marriage to the clergy. It could not escape his knowledge of mankind, that in the war which was to be declared against nature, the passions would seek and would find more than one way of retribution, and he had to apprehend many degrading scan- dals : yet experience has taught us that Gregory did not erroneously estimate the influence of habit and of pious restraint over some, the resources of prudence and circum- spection with others, and the impression of an exalted pre- cept, which more than counterbalances the defective exercise. This institution has been retained seven hundred years in Catholic Christendom ; and in the Protestant countries it has fallen together with the power of the priesthood. Gregory likewise forbad to receive the investiture of spi- ritual benefices from temporal hands ; and exalted the im- portance, not without specious reasons on his side, of that authority which a Christian teacher receives for the exercise of his function, from those who are best acquainted with the extent of his duties. With this authority was connected '3 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 149 the participation in those temporal advantages which pious or political munificence had conjoined with its possession. Henry the Fourth, king of the Germans, was engaged in a war against the Saxons ; whose duke, Magnus, of the house of Billungen, followed the national opinion, when he maintained that the monarch had violated the con- stitution. At the same time Rudolf of Rheinfeld, duke of Svvabia, and Bertold of Zsering, duke of Carinthia, had united their arms against him. The pope having in vain demanded of him that he should publish and observe the ordinances of the church throughout the German empire, some of which, especially those relating to celibacy, expe- rienced much opposition, a dispute took place between the emperor and the pontiff. The people, influenced by monks, who were animated by the zeal of new institutions, and who by castration, fasting, silence, and strict obedience to their orders, had attained a high degree of popular veneration, were for the most part determined in favour of the pope. In vain the great prelates declared themselves on the side of the prince, and sought to induce the pontiff to submission. The kinff, at a diet at Worms, ventured \ D 1076 on the deposition of the pope. When the bishops made this known in Rome, the knights and the people of that city, always ready to embrace the side of those who exalted the cause of Rome, took arms under the prefect of the town, but the pope represented to them that spiritual arms alone must gain the victory in this contest. He as- sembled a hundred and ten bishops, and put under the bann Siegfried, archbishop of Mentz, the disturber of the German empire, together with all the bishops and abbots who had been present at the diet at Worms ; lastly, he ex- tended the same penalty to the king, declaring that he who had violated the honours of the church, had more than de- served to lose his own. In vain the bishops, fearing for the consequences, in vain the more equitable of the prelates, L 3 150 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. made icmunstrunces, observing that Henry liad only acted conformably with established enstom. " I will give him peace*" said Gregory, " when he shall seek peace with God," meaning with himself. " I cannot lind that when the Lord confided to the apostle the keys of heaven and hell, he made any exception in favour of kings." Gregory knew that on the south he was protected by the power of the Normans, and in the neighbourhood of Koine and as far as the Alps, by Matilda, great coun- tess of Este, who was devoted to his cause. The rumours of calumny have less probability in accounting for this at- tachment than the remembrance of the injuries which her house, in the time of her youth, had suffered from the father of the emperor, and the conviction that her depend- ence on the pope would be the most secure guarantee for the maintenance of her power. In Germany, Guelph, duke of Bavaria, Bertold, and Rudolf consulted together, and gave occasion to the summoning of a diet, in which they urged the king, since those who for a year and a day remained under the bann forfeited their honours and estates, to oblige the pope to come to Germany. The emperor, ap- prehensive of the consequences that might ensue, if the pope should make his appearance on this side the Alps, preferred to go and seek absolution in Italy. He ap- proached the Alps through the Transjurane Burgundy-: the bishop of Lausanne, Burcard of Ottigen, a married man* brave, and versed in policy, an enemy of duke Rudolf, brought the king to Vevay ; the chancellor of Burgundy, Hermanfred, bishop of Sitten, waited for him, with Ade- laide, countess of Savoy. Thus was the passage of the Alps facilitated to the monarch, and to the few nobles who accompanied him. He found Gregory at Canossa, a strong fortress belonging to Matilda, which had been formed by nature and art as a secure asylum. After the king had for three days and nights entreated pardon, UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 151 with lamentation, in penitential garments, and with naked feet, Gregory gave him absolution, under an engagement, that lie should, within a limited time, and according to the good pleasure of the pope, reconcile himself with the Ger- man princes and their party. While the majesty of the imperial crown was thus humili- ated, the Lombards went over to the most powerful party; and when the king, observing the impression which these pro- ceedings had made, was incited to attempt new measures, his enemies in the empire declared duke Rudolf king of the Germans. The fortune of arms was on the side of A. D. 1080. TT , • , tt Henry ; the rival king was slain, and Herman of Luxemburg, his successor, fell through his own pusil- lanimity. The pope was expelled from Rome, yet the public sentiment destroyed the effect of the emperor's victories. The altar afforded an asylum against the exertion of the royal power, and the privileges of particular ranks be- gan to display an influence, which in the sequel became,, in an unforeseen manner, beneficial to the interests of hu- manity. The king's enemies were in his own house : his eldest born, who had revolted, was scarcely dead, when his second son Henry, imitating the former, raised a rebellious hand against the declining strength of his father, who had already fought sixty-five battles : the sons of the monarch were ever ready to enter into litigation against the privileges of the crown so long as they had it not in their possession. _ In the fiftieth vear of his reign. King Henry A.D.1106. ." • _ , " r V ■ n the Fourth was reduced to the necessity of yielding the insignia of monarchy into the hands of his son. Grief and vexation shortened his days; and after his death his body remained five years above ground, in a little chapel, in the cathedral at Spires, until released from the bann, it at length obtained rest in a consecrated grave. Henry the Fifth renewed the war against the pretensions of the papal chair, in which his father had fallen a victim l 4 152 UNIVERSAL HISTORY* A D 1111 t0 ^ e am ^^ 0n °^ tne P°P e * PaschaJis the Second, in the midst of a solemn assembly in the metropolitan church of the Christian world, was seized and made captive by this emperor. But so powerful was the voice of public opinion, and so certain it is that the knowledge of this is the foundation of true policy, that no victory, no rival pope, no calumnious or even just re- proaches were sufficiently powerful to secure to the emperor a decisive advantage. Guy, of the house of Upper Bur- gundy, archbishop of Vienne, having ascended the papal throne under the name of Callistus the Second, the only pope since the time of Alexander that had not been a monk, compromised the dispute concerning investitures with Henry the Fifth on just principles, but not on those which A D 1192 ^ laC ^ ^ tnerto been in vogue : " That the election should be left to the Capitularies : the spiritual investiture should be performed by the pope with a ring and staff, and that of the temporalities by the emperor with the sceptre; that a privilege should also be reserved to the emperor to be present, either in person or by his commis- saries, at the election and consecration ; and in the case of any difference of opinion, to support the pretensions of the better party." At the time when the popes, in their difficult contest against Henry the Fourth and Fifth, sought A.D. 1096. & J protection at one time irom the JNormans, and at another from the French, and scarcely held out in Italy against the arms and pretensions of their powerful rivals; the Christian people of the west were induced by Pope Urban the Second, to suspend their feuds and the cultivation of their land, to abandon their native coun- tries, where each baron ruled as a king ; and to go to the east in order to set free Palestine and Jerusalem from the yoke of the Egyptian sultans. While Urbanus by the crusade, to which he seems to have given the impulse without any deep political designs* UNIVERSAL HT STORY. removed from their countries the great land-owners and oc- casioned their ruin ; lie laid the foundation, contrary to his intention, of an increase of the authority of the kings, who were enabled to give laws to his successors. He expected to extend his power over Zion, and made use of means which brought about its degradation even in Rome. SECTION III. THE HOHENSTAUFENS AND THE GUELPHS. About the same period the two great families of the Hohenstaufens and the Guelphs raised themselves to politi- cal importance : the latter by the influence of Frederick, a son-in-law of Henry the Fourth, who after Rudolf's rebel- lion confided to him the dukedom of Swabia; the former in consequence of the marriage of Kunigonda of Guelph, heiress of an ancient Upper Swa- bian family, with the Marquis Azzo d'Este in Italy, to whom she bore that Guelph who in the time of Henry the Fourth was one of the most powerful princes of the empire, and became the ancestor of the illustrious house which now governs Brunswick, the sea, the British isles, and the re- mote possessions of Britain in all quarters of the world. For when the house of Billungen had become extinct with ^ ^ the death of duke Magnus, Henry the Black, second son of Guelph, inherited the allodial estates of their family, one of which was Liineburg, a ter- ritory conquered from the Wends. His son, Henry the Proud, married Gertrude, only daughter of the count of Supplingenburg, who was not only heiress by her mother's side of the margraves of Saxony, and particularly of the domains of Brunswick, but was also daughter of Lothaire, AD 11^5 succeec ^ Henry the Fifth on the throne of Germany. This prince confirmed the power of his son-in-law, as well in Saxony, the dukedom of which had been confided to his father, as in Bavaria, which the 154 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. latter had obtained after the demise of his elder brother, and in the hereditary lands of Brunswick. Brunswick was a very ancient Saxon town, consisting of five villages, which Since the tenth century had become a city. Henry the Proud, and his valiant son Henry the Lion, extended their conquests between the Weser and the Elbe, and beyond the latter to the Baltic, over Slavonian tribes, to whom they communicated the benefits of a regular government and the rudiments of civilization. SECTION IV. CONSTITUTION OF THE GERMAN EMPIRE. The last-mentioned emperor of the house of Suppling- enburg, a wise and equitable prince, felt himself not so se- cure in his authority that he might venture on the attempt A D 11 "8 t0 excDan £ e tne name f° r tne reality of power. This prince and Conrad of Hohenstaufen, who was maternal grandson of Henry the Fourth, were afraid to oppose the prevailing opinion with respect to the authority of the Roman see, from the influence of which their own consciences were not free. Talents and courage only could give personal weight to the sovereign in these times, winch circumstances refused to the title of his rank. The kings, indeed, could neither bestow vacated fiefs without the con- sent of the states, nor reward their friends, or increase the domains of their families, without gaining the consent of the great .by similar largesses, and thereby maintaining the equipoise of power. Without the good will of the states they could neither alienate any part of their domanial pro- perty, nor give back seigniories which had been forfeited to their old possessors ; for they might thus have been enabled to form arrangements dangerous to the constitution. The domanial estates of the emperors were situated chiefly on the Rhine, and were the territories conquered of old by the Romans from the Germans, of which in later times the UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 155 Romans had been dispossessed by the Allemanni, and the latter by the Franks. The Count Palatine of the Rhine, who governed these demesnes, acquired at length the secure possession of them. The emperors received an irregular income from Lom- bardy and Italy, and a still more uncertain tribute from the Bohemian, Polish, and other Slavonian tribes. Hence they found themselves interested in extending the boundaries of the empire. Imposts and coinage, as matters which were of importance to the commonwealth, and required regularity and unity of plan, were naturally referred to the common sovereign of the empire. The princes appointed extraordi- nary taxes according to the , determination of the nobles, and depending on particular circumstances. The princes and nobles were too nearly on an equality in power to be willing instruments in subjecting each other to a yoke. The fief, even when united, was not an indivisible dominion ; its separation was possible, and the right of primogeniture was little in practice, while the division of property was a common usage. The German empire was a great confederacy against the rise of arbitrary power, and a certain common spirit governed the whole bodj\ As the princes sought to maintain themselves in their great fiefs against the king or emperor, so the lords and knights de- fended their domains against the oppression of the princes. The progressive culture of estates and the growth of arts, enriched the husbandmen and artificers, and a new interest was thus formed in opposition to the powerful nobility. This third state adhered to the monarch and the great lords, from whom it obtained liberties which gave it security. The people of this class gradually flocked to cities which afforded them the safety founded upon union ; and several cities often formed alliances with each other. Already, under the house of Henry the First and Conrad the Second, the rights of the cities of Soest, Cologne, Magdeburg, and 156 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. Lubeck, became examples to other places, and the * towns founded by the dukes of Zaering soon showed that free men can do nothing better to secure their independence than to assemble themselves in numerous communities. SECTION V. FREDERICK BARBAROSSA. The affairs of the empire were in this situation when, at the death of Conrad the Third, his nephew Frederick, sur- named from his red beard, in the flower of his age, and already illustrious by military exploits, became emperor of Germany. The beginning of his administration had been distin- guished by praise-worthy enterprises and fortunate events ; and Rome had already experienced what Frederick was capable of effecting against or in favour of the papac}', ^ ^ ^ when at the demise of Hadrian the Fourth the cardinals found themselves unable to agree in the choice of a successor. The emperor then wrote to them, declaring that he would summon a general assembly of all Christendom. The cardinals maintained that such an undertaking belonged only to the spiritual head of the church; and they for the most part united their endeavours in favour of Alexander the Third, a prelate of distinguished courage and experience, to whom others opposed the more gentle Octavius, who assumed the name of Victor the Fourth. A synod, held by the emperor in Pavia, declared in favour of the latter. Alexander pronounced the bann of the church against his opponent; declared the emperor to have forfeited the crown ; and endeavoured to rouse in his own cause all the Christian courts. But the army of the emperor, at the head of which fought Christian and Rein- * Viz. Freiburg in the Breisgau, and Freiburg and Bern in Switzerland UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 137 hold, archbishops of Mentz and of Cologne, marched to- wards Rome, and Alexander fled to Montpellier. Lewis the Seventh, king of France, mediated an inter- view at Dijon. With Frederick appeared Waldemar king of Denmark, Vladislaf king of Bohemia, both of whom had to thank the emperor for their crowns, together with the princes of the empire and a multitude of knights and lords. The king of France absented himself, and, together w ith Henry of England, declared in favour of Alexander, while Stephen the Third, in Hungary, took arms in his cause, and fell on the neighbouring provinces of the empire. The emperor confirmed the deposition of Alexander, and maintained that in affairs relating to the papal chair the decision depended exclusively on the bishops of the empire. In the mean time the greatest and strongest towns of Lombardy had formed a combination for establishing a free republic, and a similar spirit began anew to display itself in Rome. The cities embraced the cause of Alexander from apprehension of the imperial power; and the two great factions of the Guelphs, who favoured the papacy, and the Ghibellines, in opposition to it, were now A. D. 1162. formed. The emperor entered Italy, burnt Crema, the strongly fortified Tortona, and particularly Milan, the greatest and finest town of Lombardy, adorned with splendid remains of the magnificence of the Caesars. He ordered salt to be spread over the place where Milan had stood, and commanded that fields and meadows should be formed on the site of its ancient palaces. The neigh- bouring towns had been faithful to him till they saw this rival of their greatness completely destroyed, and from that time they began to walk in her footsteps. The emperor then gave the fortresses into the hands of Ghibelline lords, and sought to subdue the courage of the citizens by means of German soldiery. Verona at this time became the capital of the Lombard confederacy. At that period those mystical representations of religion 158 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. were known which from remote times had been preserved in the vallies of the Alps, and spread themselves from Switz- erland, from the Pays de Vaud, from the Waldeiisic villages and the Cevennes. They were formed in the same spirit as the simple and independent congregations of the primi- tive Christians, but gnostic prejudices against the corporeal organization had led the communities to an overstrained ri- gidity of morals. It might be conjectured that the emperor would have availed himself of the aid of these people against the influence of Rome ; but he joined his efforts with those of the church in opposition to them. Their notions of liberty were not compatible with his system of government, which coincided with the plans of the old Caesars. He ordered Arnold of Brescia, an enterprising teacher of these doc- trines, to be burnt, because he had favoured the attempt of the nobles, with the assistance of the people, to restore the freedom of Rome. The spirit of Arnold survived, and fanned the flame of civil liberty which was now kindling on all sides. The emperor sought to possess himself of the priestly power by the less stormy way, which the scholastic philo- sophy and a more accurate acquaintance with the primitive records of the Christian faith opened to him ; but Latin literature was without influence on the mass of the people, and the German language was but now beginning to receive its earliest culture. Long and severe was the struggle of the emperor against Alexander and the Lombard towns. The wars of the Ro- man people at this period were carried on in the same spirit as those ancient conflicts which had followed the reign of Romulus ; but military tactics and discipline were want- ing. From this defect arose the unfortunate events of their campaigns against Tusculum and Alba : the German forces obliged the ill-commanded multitude to take flight, in which scarcely a third part of them escaped the sword. After these victories the emperor UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 159 appeared, with the aid of his partisans, before the fortress of St. Angelo. The townsmen, formed into a militia, ex- erted themselves valiantly in its defence ; but the battering ram shook the halls of St. Peter's, and the metropolitan church of Christendom was taken by storm. Already the flames had melted the iron portal of our Lady of the Tower. The pope, with his cardinals, fled to the fortified houses of the noble Frangepani, in the neighbourhood of the Coliseum. At this moment the emperor offered peace, on the condition that both the popes should resign their pre- tensions, and that a free election should unite the Christian church. When Alexander observed the impression which this proposal produced, he disappeared ; on the third day after he was seen by the side of a fountain near Circello. The pope had fled, and the emperor made his A.D. 1167. „ ^ , entry into Rome. But the intemperance of the conquerors, and the influence of a climate to which they were unused, destroyed in a short time the dukes of Swabia and Bavaria, the archbishop of Cologne, the lords of Nassau and of Lippe, and almost all the princes of the army : so that the victory most desired was to escape the pestilence, and to obtain refuge in the Appennines from the troops of the Lombard towns. The latter restored Milan, and built Alex- A.D. ii6». 11,,. andria as a bulwark to that city. In a fertile district, surrounded by three rivers and by deep morasses, Milan became, in the space of a year, the abode of 15,000 warriors. In vain the emperor now dispatched the bishop of Bam- berg to treat with Alexander alone, in order to render him suspected by the cities and to excite divisions. The pope, warned of the design, declared, in the conference at Veroli, that " he would ente* into no discussion except in the presence of the cardinals and all the deputies of the Lom- bard towns." In the meantime, while Alexander was carry- ing on this contest with one of the most powerful of the £G0 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. emperors, he forced one of the greatest of the English monarchs to submit to receive stripes on the tomb of an archbishop of Canterbury, whose well-merited death had been ascribed to the hatred of the king. Frederick had again recourse to arms, in which he was accustomed to victory; he marched over mount Cenis, \ D 1174 ^ urn ^ ^uze, conquered Asti, and laid siege to Alexandria. Rainy weather had rendered the marshy soil unfit to support machines, and mining was im- possible. During four months the emperor lay before this town : his army had even penetrated it by a subterranean way, when suddenly a powerful multitude of armed towns- men, from all the Lombard cities, well provided with im- plements, appeared before his encampment. At the same time the citizens drove out the soldiers who had entered the town, and rushed upon the camp of the besiegers ; and the emperor was obliged to make his escape after setting it on fire. After this calamity, a convention was appointed at Pavia to negociate a treaty. The cardinal of Ostia appeared in the name of Alex- A D 1175 an ^ er * ^ n account °f tne bann he omitted to salute the emperor, declared his concern thereat, while he testified his admiration of that monarch's great qualities. The emperor, who expected an army from Rhaetia, beyond Como, sought to protract the negotiations for peace, and the Pavians prepared for taking revenge on their enemies ; but as the prudence of the latter, and the dignity of Alexander, was worthy of the ancient Romans, their vigilance also was not inferior. When these proceeding came to their know- A.D. 1176. . ledge, they offered, near Lignano, a decisive battle to the emperor, under the banners of St. Ambrose of Milan. Frederick distinguished himself wherever valour or wise counsel was required. The Milanese, under the Guelphs, fought furiously to revenge their country. Fre- derick was at length wounded. All the citizens of Como^ UNIVERSAL HISTORY, irritated against the Milanese by the remembrance of long feuds, remained dead on the field of battle ; and the Ger- mans were at length compelled to take flight. The emperor afterwards sued for peace, and Alexander declared, that nothing was more desirable to him than to obtain peace from the greatest warrior of the Christian world: he only entreated one thing, viz. that the emperor would impart it also to the Lombards, into whose country AD 1177 he would retire. The journey of the pope from Vieste to Venice was a triumphal march : the doge Sebastiano Ziani, and the nobles of Venice, in splendid gondolas, conducted him into the town. As he performed high mass in the church of St. Mark, he is said to have bestowed upon the Venetians the empire over their sea, by presenting them with a consecrated rose. They were in- deed already in possession of it, and the times of their greatness had begun. The emperor was not so much humiliated by the power of his enemies as by the defection of his friend, Henry the Lion, duke of Saxony and Bavaria. Henry was a brave warrior and an able statesman, and by far the most powerful prince of the empire ; he owed every thing to Frederick, the predecessor of this duke having forfeited his domains to the former emperor. Henry seized a decisive moment when the monarch was suffering the pressure of calamity, in order to desert him, neglecting all the personal remonstrances of his sovereign. In the 18th year of the schism Frederick was reconciled with Pope Alexander, in the great portal of the metro- politan church at Venice. The former kissed the feet of the pontiff, who hastened to embrace him and conduct him to the altar. His engaging modesty and gentleness secured the respect which the emperor entertained towards him. The cities were confirmed, for a certain period, in the rights of which they had possessed themselves ; a limitation VOL. II. M UNIVERSAL HlbTOliY. which was in reality an evasion in favour of the imperial authority. Alexander made a triumphal entry into Rome, which the old consuls might have envied him. This Tuscan pre- late (for Alexander, as well as Gregory the Seventh, was a native of Tuscany) was the father of the Italian republics : he employed his power in moderating or abolishing per- sonal servitude, under which a great part of their popu- lation groaned. Frederick was the greatest monarch of the Germans since the time of Henry the First; his great qualities gave him a personal authority, before which all forms are lost sight of. He respected them, however, and testified a constitutional regard for the states ; while he restrained their dissensions and supported the burgesses against the nobility. By his second marriage Frederick united the free* country of Upper Burgundy with his hereditary domains. He spared the enemies of his house, the dukes of Zasring, whose territory was important to him, on account of the pass into Italy ; but he protected, against the aggressions of those chieftains, Arducius the bishop of Geneva, and enabled him to maintain possession of his city, which was valuable on account of its situation. When Frederick, in the commencement of his reign, had reinstated Henry the Lion in the estates of his father, he separated the margraviate of Austria, which had for- merly been under a subordinate alliance with Bavaria, and formed of it a separate dukedom, the possessor of which he raised above all the princes of the empire who had not been from remote times of the rank of electors. He renewed the privileges of this chief, or bestowed new powers on his duchy, of which Austria stood in greater need than the other provinces of the empire, on account of its situation on dangerous boundaries. It was thus enabled to acquire * Now Franche Comte. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. J GS a degree of power capable of supporting itself, and advan- tageous even to the other states, to which it served as a bul- wark against the barbarians. In the following book it will be related how the punish- ment of Henry the Lion became, in the secjuel, the source whence the power of other great houses was derived. Frederick expected many advantageous effects for his own interest in the dissemination of the old Roman juris- prudence, which in the time of his youth was introduced anew to the knowledge of the western people. The Lom- bards opposed to it the feudal law, which Obert of Orto, a Milanese senator, had compiled. The emperor sought to found his authority on a secure footing, by a law which he enacted on the plains of Roncale, in conjunction with the nobles and the cities ; and was well pleased to observe that the teachers in the newly erected university of Bologna, applied maxims deduced from the situation of affairs under the first Caesars, to his own empire and his imperial rights, He retained, notwithstanding his calamity at Lignano, such an ascendancy ; and his son Henry the Sixth, who, during his father's life, was elected king of the Romans, became afterwards so much more powerful ; that the ideas of the Boiognese professors appeared to be something more important than mere dreams or words of adulation. SECTION VI. OF THE ABBOT SUGER AND THE KINGDOM OF FRANCE. A monk of humble station and of unattractive exterior, the abbot Suger, of St. Denys, who was minister of the French kings Lewis the Fat and Lewis the Younger, during the first years of Frederick Barbarossa, laid, by his wise counsels and unobserved measures, a firm foundation for the subsequent developement of the French nation, and the aggrandizement of their kings. m 2 164 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. Lewis the Sixth had not that character which alarms the jealousy of the great, but he possessed enough penetration to understand the designs of Suger. The nation had per- ceived, in the wars against the English and against the em- peror Henry the Fifth, that a greater power in the hands of the kings was desirable for the public welfare : but this idea penetrated more deeply into their minds when the mo- narch had undertak n in earnest the protection of justice in his courts, the administration of which had often suf- fered from the ignorance or the passions of rude and im- petuous barons. The best preparation for introducing al- terations into the government of a country, is to direct the attention to those institutions which are defective in it, or which are most tardy in their performance. The king of- fered himself as the protector of the helpless, of freedmen, and of those who wished to become free ; of the burgesses assembled in towns, who sought only security for their per- sons and estates, and did not, like the nobles, aim at placing themselves on an equality with the king. Lewis the Seventh had been so conscien- A. D. 1137. . . . . .. tious as to restore Lruienne, the hereditary estate of his wife Eleanor of Guienne, when A.D. 1152. _ j , r he repudiated her on account or an intrigue with a young Turk, in which she had been detected, while she accompanied the king in his crusade. After a few weeks she married Henry Plantagenet of Anjou, who soon afterwards became king of England. From that time the French nobles were more jealous of Henry than of their own monarch, who was in reality less powerful ; so that the latter might venture upon any measures in opposition to the English, and his plans for the increase of his own power appeared necessary for the good of the nation. The plan adopted by the king, of collecting the free men in towns, became advantageous also to the subjects of the nobility; for the latter found themselves under the necessity of imitating the example. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 165 The establishment of towns occasioned an increase of trades, by which the commonalty became rich, and were enabled to contribute to the support of the king ; and they received so much the greater share of the royal favour. Hence arose the states general of the nation, which w r ere not the old national assemblies of the Franks, but were sub- stituted in the place of them. But these political alterations took place at a later period : Lewis the Sixth only admi- nistered the affairs of his own dukedom, in which he was often interrupted by the nobles of France. SECTION VII. ENGLAND LOSES HER CONSTITUTION. The English availed themselves of the A. D. 1042. ,° anarchy which ensued after the sons of Canute had died without issue, in order to restore the Anglo-Saxon dynasty ; and they had the good fortune to obtain, through the care of Edward the Third, a compilation of their na- A D 1066 t * ona ^ ^ aws : k ut a ^ ter ^ 3 decease disturbances arose, which inflicted w T ounds on the liberty and constitution of England, that were not healed for several centuries. William, duke of Normandy, conquered England; after defeating King Harold, who had been elected by the last Anglo-Saxon Wittenagemote, or national assembly. The conqueror exacted feudal ser~ vice even for allodial estates which the English had ob- tained, not from the crown, but by the arms of their forefathers. Hence they were degraded from the rank of comrades of the king into that of subjects. William took care that they should be sensibly reminded of this depend- ence. At their marriages he became the protector of their children : and received, during the minority of the latter, the revenues of their estates, of which he prevented the free alienation by the feudal laws. His legal code contained m 3 166 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. a mixture of feudal observances, which he had chosen to adopt, with the reasons of state in which a conqueror finds motives or excuses for his actions. From that time forward wars were no longer carried on by the resolutions of the Wittenagemote : Englishmen were under an obligation to serve in every war of the king, at least during forty days ; and the mode of reckoning to be adopted depended on the will of the monarch. The whole of England, with relation to its military constitution, was divided into sixty thousand fiefs, each appropriated to the support of a knight. The whole aspect of society was new ; a foreign and unknown law governed the country. Wood and water were regal possessions, and these assumed rights were used by the first kings, without moderation, and in a manner too obtrusive. After the powerful tyranny of the conqueror, and the ^ ^ formidable caprices of his son William had ceased ; Henry the First, who ascended the throne in the place of his elder brother, found himself un- der the necessity of seeking to gain the affection of the nation : and thus the yoke, which would otherwise have depressed its character, was at length rendered more easy. Equally advantageous in its effects was the A.D.1135. r , contest lor the succession, which ensued be- tween Stephen of Boulogne, the nephew of the last king, and his grandson, Henry of Anjou ; as well as the humiliating misfortunes to which the latter, a prince of un- A.D.1154. . , 1 TT , ^ common talents, was reduced. Henry the Se- cond had to contend now against the contumacy, now against the vehement avengers, of the insolent archbishop Thomas a Becket ; and afterwards to sustaiu the more afflicting dis- sensions which his consort, the heiress of Guienne, had fomented among his sons. Henry adopted one measure which, was likely to restrain the barons from restoring the freedom of the Anglo-Saxon UNIVERSAL HISTORY. government: he damped their military ardour by per- mitting them to purchase exemption from personal service in warfare. In the time of Stephen, the levying of mer- cenary soldiers had been attempted by William of Ypres : the hired troops were termed Rottieri; and Brabanzons, from the country by whose superabundant population they were furnished. Hence, with the aid of the sums paid by the nobles for exemption, armies were formed, which served the monarch unconditionally, and enabled him to acquire greater power over the nation. The English were restrained from attempting to recover their liberty, by the Normans, to whom the Conqueror had granted extensive fiefs. The latter, who were accus- tomed to be treated as vassals and as warriors, according to military principles, felt that their fortunes depended on maintaining the power of the throne. They stood in the same relation to the former, and adhered to it as the soldiers of Sylla to the party of the true republicans. The parliament was for a long time a body without a soul, until the contests for the succession to the throne gave weight to the voices of the vassals. " Friends and liege subjects," said Henry the First, " it is known to you, that God had called my brother to become king of Jerusalem, and that he has not accounted himself to be worthy of that honour." (Robert was present at the first crusade, and probably received this offer after the taking of Jerusa- lem). " Cruelty," he continued, " is his delight, and you (addressing the barons) he despises as a company of idle profligates. I, whom you know to be just, and fond of peace, and of approved fidelity in all my proceedings, pledge myself to you, both my foreign and home-born subjects, if you will stand by me, to respect your liberties, and patiently listen to your prudent counsels. Whenever you desire it, I swear to observe the laws which King Edward, of pious memory, not without the help of God, has established in these realms. Lend your aid, brethren, if 4 16*8 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. and English courage shall put the boasting foreigners to shame."* This prince indeed suppressed the burdensome feudal imposts, and the law of the curfew, which obliged every householder to extinguish his fires and lights at the tolling of a bell ; ordinances which were found intolerable to the English. A D 1154 Henry the Second, after the example of the French kings, and with greater effect, sought to gain respect for the crown by an equitable ad- ministration of justice. He divided England into six dis- tricts, over which he appointed as many judges, who were ordered to traverse them at fixed times, and take cogni- zance of all complaints, which had arisen from ignorance or partiality in the inferior courts. He favoured the towns, and encouraged trade and the productive arts. The market of London was already the resort of many foreign merchants. Sixty thousand men formed the infantry, and twenty thousand cavalry completed the military force of the country. Montgomery, and other frontier towns, restrained the ancient Britons in Wales, from sudden incursions into England. At Chester, Pembroke, Durham, and Huxham, counts palatine were stationed, armed with full powers for suppressing sudden disturbances. Ireland, the theatre of factious disputes be- A.D.1171. i . p . „ , , tween numerous chieftains, afforded an easy conquest to the arms of Henry the Second. At the coun- cil of Lismore, he abolished the old country law, according to which the Breones had judged the Irish, and which might be reckoned an institution for barbarism and dis- order : but the people conceived such a hatred against the laws of a foreign ruler, that they became estranged from all the regulations of civil order, and remained the longer in a state of wild and unsocial independence. * See Matthew Paris. Edit. Watts, p. 62, UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 16'9 Richard the First, son of Henry, during his abode in the island of Oleron, promulgated the first maritime law. Witli respect to the history of the Scots, who had visited Caledonia in early times, but according to some writers first made a final settlement there in the ninth century ; we have only to remark, that their kings were constantly employed in maintaining their independence against the Normans and English. What information the old sagas of this people have preserved concerning their internal history, has not as yet been sufficiently investi- gated. Many memorials of the old time were destroyed by the English King Edward the First, when that prince attempted to rob the Scottish nation of its independence. SECTION VIII. THE NORTHERN NATIONS. The Norman people became more illustrious in the coun- tries they had conquered, than the kings of Norway among the sovereign potentates of Europe. The Swedes and Goths united themselves under one mo- narchy, in which a Goth of Swercher's house, and a Swede of the family of Erich, alternately held the throne. These princes would have attained a higher degree of power if A D 11 t ^ lC * m P at * ent desire of reigning had not brought most of them to an untimely death ; in consequence of which the cultivation of social habits was impeded, while all authority depended on physical strength, and enterprising princes were restrained by no law. The violence of faction was so great, that after all the house of Woden, the Heraclidse of Sweden, had become extinct, foreigners were invited to assume the crown. The Danes harassed the northern coasts of Germany : it was not to them that this rude country could look for the benefit of religion and civil order. Otho, bishop of Bam- berg, sprung from the house of the counts of Andechs, 1/0 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. and in his earlier years known to the duke of Poland, un- dertook the conversion of the Pomeranians. His learning, his zeaL, and the influence of the Christian states, which pressed hard on every side of Pomerania; overcame the worship of Swandevvid, the all-seeing, and gave an easy en trance to the religion of the Christians, against which the Pomeranian town of Julin in vain opposed its arms. The victorious banners of Henry the Lion completed this work, and brought the princes of the Wends, at Mecklenburgh, into the faith of Christendom and the league of the German empire. From that time their duke Pribislaf reigned peace- ably with the assistance of his four counts. Long before the period at which the history of these countries opens itself to our view, Wineta had been a centre of communication, where the productions of a pastoral coun- try, and of the few and imperfect arts which then existed, were bartered for the wares of merchants who visited these seas. On a sudden the soil gave way, and the city sunk into the sea ; the great Wineta vanished, and its ruins are hidden shoals, where marble and alabaster at the bottom of the sea bear testimony to its splendour in former times. Julin afterwards became the seat of the opulence and trade of Pomerania. This town was not so magnificent, though it was more extensive than Wineta. Julin rejected the doctrine of Christianity. Lightning set fire to the wooden houses in its narrow streets, and the whole city fell a prey to the flames. Thenceforward the plain of Pomerania was divided among smaller towns : Lubeck, Stettin and Dantzic attained to the highest rank on the whole south coast of the Baltic sea. Poland was divided among hereditary princes, who by intestine wars maintained indeed the love of arms among their subjects, but could not uphold the independence of the nation against the united power of the Germans. The influence of the latter with that of the Christian missionaries, to whom Mstislaw at length gave ear, brought the bar- M UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 1/1 barians of Sarmatia nearer to the culture of social li e. Lithuania still maintained its gods and unpolished manners. This country was at that time disjoined from Poland, while Silesia was included in it. The country of the Samoiedes, Curland, and A.D.1158. . • - J 7 Livonia, became more accurately known to the western Europeans, by means of some merchants from Bremen who were thrown by a storm upon the inhospitable coast. The shipwrecked persons were attacked by the people of the country ; but the latter were softened by the sight of the merchandize in the hands of the foreigners. The Bremeners, in order to explore the country, went up the Dwina: they built a wooden warehouse where Herkuil now stands, and introduced missionaries into the country in order to civilizs the Livonians. In the Russian empire Novgorod was exten- A.D. 1147. s / , f , , sive, flourishing, and attached to freedom more than all the other cities. By slow degrees there arose on the banks of the Moskwa, in which the czar George Dol- gorukoi delighted, a city that was destined one day to eclipse the fame of Novgorod. A wooden dwelling, where the czar devoted his secret hours to an unlawful attachment, gave the first occasion to the building of Moscow. His son Andreas Bogolubskoi, czar at Susdal and Rostow, (the empire being now divided,) conquered on the shores of the Volga the countries of the barbarous Tcheremisses, Tschuvasches, and Merdwines, three tribes of Tartars. The Merdwines still worship the gods of their ances- tors, and next to them St. Nicholas ; their prayer is a short invocation, " Give food, Oh God, to every country !' 7 Among the Tschuvasches, Tor has yet his worshippers ; and that people still dread the evil spirit that dwells in the waters. Witches are much reverenced among them, and horse-flesh is their favourite food. The same czar, Andreas Bogolubskoi, conquered the old seats of the Bulgarians; whence, in the seventh century, 172 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. innumerable hordes bad emigrated to ancient Mysia and to lo er Italy. They now ruled with great power on the bank? of the Kuma, and were enriched by commerce. SECTION IX. CONSTANTINOPLE. Alexius Comnenus, a prince of great ex- A. D. 1081. . . , penence and uncommon endowments, gave, during a reign of thirty-seven years, to the imperial throne of the Greeks, a degree of stability which the external cir- cumstances of the empire had never more urgently required. For on one side the power of the Seljukian Turks was ad- vancing with the rapid fortune peculiar to a newly founded dynasty; on the other, Robert Guiscard pushed his enter- prizes against Durazzo and ventured even to Larissa; while all the provinces of the empire were convulsed by the crusade, and the Russians pressed on its northern frontiers. Alexius, with the art of a statesman and with successful exertions, withstood every foe. He found an historian, who raised herself above the character of her age, in his daughter Anna Comnena; who possessed a genius worthy of her father, and employed hours, which against her inclination rihe was obliged to spend far from the affairs of government, in composing a history of his life. At the same period the old book of Indian philosophy, termed Bidpai", was translated at Constantinople; some dis- tinguished persons of the house of Seth having at this time endeavoured to penetrate into the hidden treasures of ori- ental learning. Knowledge was sought by many as the path to dignity and fame. John the Fair, son of Alexius, and Manuel, son of John, found in Cinnamus, who lived in intimacy with these emperors, a biographer whose work is very interesting, though too full of panegyric. The courtier Zonaras, who was driven into a life of seclusion by a mind broken by misfortunes, composed in his retirement an his- UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 173 torical book in which he has handed down many facts which would have been otherwise unknown. Shortly before the fall of the Comnene dynasty, Nicetas of Chone enjoyed the highest honours of the court : his very instructive history is equally valuable for its honest veracity, and attractive by the warm attachment of the author to his sinking country. In the West the office of the historian fell for the most part to the lot of monks and abbots ; among whom Otho, bishop of Freysing, sprung from the princely house of Austria, was less honourably distinguished by his illustrious rank than by enlightened learning, a sound judgment, and an impartiality which exceeds expectation. The new modes of representation in theology and philosophy flourished more than all other sciences. Although the way of observation and experience, though the discrimination of self-evident truth and moral rectitude by the consenting voice of the human understanding in its sound state, belongs as little to the style of philosophy practised in that age as the pursuit of public utility ; yet we cannot fail to discover, in the works of Anselm of Canterbury and Peter Abelard, the marks of profound reflection and comprehensive genius. The latter of these writers is distinguished by the eloquence of the heart, as the Abbot Bernhard of Clairvaux by the richness of his imagination. The influence of Bernhard on the cha- racter of his age, renders the study of his manner important for those who would discriminate the genius of nations. The Emperor John, son of *Alexius, main- A.D.1H8. tamed with heroic valour and consummate prudence the boundaries of the empire, which were threat- ened on every side. Manuel, his son, fought A. D. 1143. ... J . ' * like a brave warrior rather than a cautious general: yet his politic administration enabled him to transmit the empire with undiminished glory and extent to his posterity. 174 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. SECTION X. OF THE COMMANDERS OF THE FAITHFUL. The pristine strength of the Seljukian Turks, who had ruled with a powerful sway in the empire of the Arabs, had declined from the effect of internal divisions and relaxation of manners. Between the sultans of this dynasty, who held their residence at Iconium, and the emperors of the Com- nene house, wars were carried on with alternations of for- tune. In Bagdad the commander of the Faithful, Moktafi Ebn Mostadher, emancipated himself from the A. D. 1155. power of the sultan, and deemed himself happy to be the sovereign of his own palace. Benjamin, a Jew of Tudela in Spain, visited Bagdad at this era, A D. 1 171. and has left us a valuable narrative, which is only in a few places deformed or completely spoilt by the excessive partiality of the author for his own people. In eastern Asia, the dynasty which ruled at Gasna and over Hindustan, fell before the arms of Alaeddin Hossain, sultan of Ghaur. This prince con- quered Multan and made himself master of Delhi. In the treasury of the Gasnevide sultan he found three thousand pounds weight of diamonds. Soon, however, his generals rendered themselves inde- pendent of the sovereigns of his house : and the weakened empire fell a prey to the sultans of Choresmia, who were lords of a great part of Persia. From the confines of their country to Iconium, the Turks ruled under the posterity of Kutlumish, son of Arslaw Yapgu, the son of Seljuk. Syria and Egypt acknowledged the sway of the Fatimide sultans of Kahira. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 175 SECTION XI. THE FIRST CRUSADE. In the wars which the Fatimide princes carried on with the Seljukian Turks, the visier of the Egyptian sultan, Abul Kasem Mostali, had recently defended the sovereignty of his master over Jerusalem, when the nations of Europe suddenly spread themselves over Asia. Pope Urban, at the synod of Clermont, stirred up the people of Christendom, already prepared by the preach- ing of Peter the Hermit, to deliver the holy sepulchre from the possession of infidels. This enthusiasm seized upon old men, women, and children. The promise of pardon for sins, holy reverence, and the influence of curiosity; the spirit of adventures, the hope of gaining thrones and domi- nions, and the certain expectation of sitting in the next world as judges over the infidels; were the moving causes which incited mortals of all descriptions, without distinction of rank or age, to rush by hundreds of thousands to this achievement. In the mean time the wars of the Europeans among themselves were laid aside. Three brothers, named Godfrey, Eustace, and Baldwin, the eldest of whom was duke of Lower Lorraine and Bra- bant, and, on his mother's side, heir of Bouillon; Robert duke of Normandy, son of William the Conqueror ; Hugh of France, brother of Philip the First; Raymond of St. Giles, count of Toulouse, with a vast multitude of lords and knights; the noble Walter of the town of Limoges, accompanied by his lion, which he had saved from the fangs of a serpent, and which never deserted his deliverer; and a thousand high-born chieftains from all the countries of western Christendom, followed by their vassals, bondsmen, and comrades, rushed forth in the 1096th year of the Christian era, without a king or any acknowledged leader of their hosts, and hastened by sea and land, from the furthest 1/6 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. shores of the ocean to Jerusalem, to fight and to pray ©n those sacred spots which the Son of God had honoured by his presence and sufferings. After having by their want of order and temperance ex- posed the emperor Alexius to imminent perils, from which his own presence of mind could alone extricate him, the crusaders possessed themselves of the city of Nicaea, which not many years before had fallen into the hands of Sultan Suleyman, son of Kutlumish the Seljuk prince. They con- quered also Laodicasa : but, incapable of giving effect to the exploits of valour by prudent measures, they left their conquests exposed to the aggravated vengeance of the Turks; who sacrificed to their fury ten thousand of the in- habitants of Smyrna. During the siege of Antioch, many of the crusaders separated themselves to return home or go in quest of new adventures. Boemond, the son of Robert Guiscard, equal to his father in good and evil actions, a valiant but base man, became prince of Antioch ; and Bald- win of Edessa, and Bertrand, son of Raymond of St. Giles, count of Tripoli. While the fruitful fields of Cilicia and Syria supported the crusaders with provisions, the archbishop Adimbert of Pisa arrived with a reinforcement of a hundred and twenty ships. Pisa was the mistress of the Tuscan sea, of Sardinia and the Balearic islands; and often ventured to oppose its power to the Neapolitan Normans. The coasts of Syria were conquered ; and at Tyre the forces were united which had sepa- rated from the siege of Antioch. The crusaders approached Jerusalem. Thirty-nine days they lay before the walls : on the seventh of June they mounted them ; but the height on which the Temple had stood still held out. Every thing, however, yielded to rage and fanaticism, and seventy thou- sand persons were sacrificed by the victorious crusaders, who burnt all the Jews in their own synagogue. After the city had been purified, duke Godfrey was elected by the UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 177 troops to be king of Palestine; who governed, however, with the concurrence of a council of the chieftains, and gave to his new kingdom assizes according to the customs and constitution of the French. In vain the Fatimide Mostali drew out his forces to op- pose the crusaders in the field of Ascalon ; and in vain the general of the Seljuke Turks withstood them at Antioch. Religious enthusiasm incited them to almost supernatural exploits. Three orders of religious knighthood had their origin at Jerusalem, two of which still flourish. Already, before the crusade, many persons had associated themselves in a fra- ternity for the care of the infirm pilgrims in the hospital of St. John: they were formed into an order of the Knights Hospitallers of St. John by Baldwin, brother and successor A D 1120 °^ ^* oc ^ re y king °f Jerusalem? and Raymond du Puy, or de Podio, was the first grand master. Hugh des Pay ens, of the house of the counts of Champagne, Godfrey of St. Adhemar, and seven other A. D. 1122. J brothers, formed the Knights Templars, who vowed to the patriarch of Jerusalem to protect pilgrims against robbers, to live in celibacy, in obedience to their superiors, and without private possessions. The king, the chiefs, and barons of France, solicited Bernhard of Clair- vaux to prescribe them a formal rule. It was a part of their vow to be the first in battle and the last in the retreat. The Teutonic order was established at a later period. The power of the Franks extended from the mountains of A D 1144 J ^ Lrmen * a *° * ne Egyptian confines ; but upwards of forty years after the conquest of Jerusalem, Edessa was retaken by Atabek of Mausel. The fear of the progress of the infidels roused the zeal of the pious abbot of Clairvaux, who persuaded the princes to undertake a second AD U47 crusa( k* ^ ne em P er P r Conrad, eager for war- like fame, king Lewis the Seventh, and many nobles from both kingdoms, and from the Netherlands and VOL. II. N 17* UNIVERSAL HISTORY. England, took the cross. Many of those who went by sr. completed in their way the laudable exploit of liberating Lisbon, the capital of Portugal, from the Moslemic yoke. The emperor came by land by way of Constantinople, whence he made his entry, after many disasters, into Asia Minor. The siege of the Seljuke capital, Iconium, the sultan of which had entered into a league with the Greek emperor against the invaders, reduced the German army to a complete dispersion. The French king was not more fortunate, against whose troops Mogireddin Abek defended Damascus with the secret connivance of the Franks of Palestine. National jealousies, irregularities of all kind?, famine, and diseases, destroyed the multitude: the knight? of Palestine feared the arrogance of their countrymen ; the enterprise was frustrated, and the kingdom of Jerusalem began to declint. SECTION XII. THE MOWAHEDDINS. About the same time the dominion of the Zeiridae, in the countries around Tunis, came to its con- clusion. These monarchs had lost Sicily through the valour and ability of two Norman princes who bore the name of Roger, the elder of whom was a warrior of the house of Hauteville, and founded a domain in Sicily: the latter, his son, united the w hole island under A.D.1154. .'. _ ; . . • ' his sceptre and wise legislation. As the Morabethes, who from the time of Yussuf had ruled Maroco and Arabian Spain, had been indebted for the rapid progress of their confederation to the zeal of newly kindled fanaticism ; so their greatest calamities were inflicted upon them by the enthusiasm of a prophet: Mahdi Mohammed, son of Abdullah, son of Ibn Tumrot, a preacher of the purest Islam, having been exiled from Maroco, founded, with the aid of Abd-eU UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 179 Mu men, at powerful man of Telemsan, the confederation of the Mowaheddins, or fi< worshippers of the only true God." This party undertook to avenge his cause; they jointly erected a city on the coast, and gained victories over the subjects of the Morabethe princes. They were invited by the Zei'ridae of Tunis to assist them against the power of Roger king of Sicily, and they gave effectual succour. Flushed with this success, Abd-el-Mumen ventured to lay siege to Maroco. The Morabethes de- fended their capital with that zeal to which they had been indebted for all their victories ; and the siege cost Abd-el- Mumen a hundred thousand men. His perseverance at length triumphed after the strength of the besieged was exhausted. After reducing Maroco, the Mowaheddins ex- tended their sway along the northern coast of A D 1147 Africa from Egypt to the Strait, which they passed, ami afterward conquered Algarva, Seville, Grenada, and Murcia. They maintained their acquisitions against the humbled Morabethes, and against the arms of the Nor- mans and the Spaniards, who were in the full career of victory. SECTION XIII. SPAIN. In Spain, the siege of Toledo was an enterprise highly interesting to all the nations of southern Europe. Alfonso, king of Leon, had been driven from his country by his brother Sancho, king of Castile. The Arabian prince of Toledo had given him such a reception as the laws and customs of the Arabs enjoined them to afford strangers, especially when in want of succour. When, after the death of his brother, Alfonso returned home to assume the crowns of Castile and Leon, he vowed to the Arabs an inviolable friendship. But Almamun and his son at length died; his 180 UNIVERSAL HiSTORY. grandson Yahia-el-Kabir Billah had rendered himself the object of hatred and contempt, and Alfonso then conducted the most illustrious knights of Christendom to assault To- ledo. The Tagus on three sides surrounds the city, which is situated on rocks : the access to it was excellently forti- fied ; the defence was heroical, but victory was the reward of Castilian perseverance. Thus the old capital of the ^ ^ Visigoths fell again into the power of the Christians. SECTION XIV. PORTUGAL. A remark able fate attended Henry, a knight who dis- tinguished himself before Toledo, sprung from the house of the counts of Upper Burgundy. Alfonso, in order to con- ciliate this valiant youth to his service, gave him the com- mand over the conquests which the kings of Leon had made in the mountains on the western coast towards the mouths of the Tagus and the Duero. Henry married Theresa Guzman, the daughter of the king, born, as it is said, out of lawful wedlock. Urraca, the heiress of the king, espoused Raymond, the kinsman of Henry, From that time forward Count Henry held his abode at Guimaraens, in the country between the Duero and the Minho : he took the city of Porto, which gave its name to a district, and continued, during his life, to wage wars with the unbelievers. When the king, his father-in-law, died ; the domain over which he AD mo ruled became his own, with the royal dignity which he inherited by his consort. When his son, Count Alfonso, arrived at adult age, he continued the warlike career of his father, and conquered the beautiful plains of Alentejo. The leaders of the Arabs united their strength, and fought against him, near Ourique. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. with superior forces. The count sought en- couragement in remembering the wonderful things which the Lord had done by Gibeon, with far in- ferior numbers, for the deliverance of Israel. Wearied with exertion he fell asleep, and beheld in a dream a ve- nerable old man. In the morning a hermit, like the form he had seen in the night, came to the camp, and entreated the count to visit him on the following evening in his cell. The count repaired thither. He beheld a shining figure which appeared in the east, approached and eclipsed the splendour of the starry heavens. " I am the Lord Jesus," said the apparition ; " thy arms, Alfonso, are blessed. I set thee as a king over thy people: for sixteen generations my favour shall not depart from thy house ; .and even further than this it shall descend." Alfonso, in- flamed by the power of his imagination, or instructed by the crafty hermit, infused his own confidence among his war- riors, and gained the victory. On the field of battle he was saluted by his army king of Portugal. He merited the surname of the Conqueror: he reigned A. D. 1112 — 1185. . . . , . , , & , , victoriously and with honour to an old age, and transmitted his kingdom, with peculiar laws of descent, to his posterity. The succession to the throne was thus settled at the council of the kingdom at Lamego: " That every king should be succeeded by his son ; by his daughter, if he had no son; or by his brother, if his daughter was married into foreign lands?' SECTION XV. CONCLUSION. Thus during the 11th and 12th centuries the civilized world became divided into a number of states of small or moderate extent, while the progress of agriculture and of trade began to elevate the class of citizens. Civilized na- tions acknowledged either the pope, or the patriarch of n 3 1SJ UNIVERSAL HISTORY. Constantinople, or the em i r- el-mum en im at Bagdad, or the fatimide chalif at Kahira, as their spiritual chief. But the antiquated power of the chalifs was approaching its dis- solution, and the patriarch was under the power of the emperor ; while the papacy alone was yet in the full vigour of newly established power. ( 183 ) BOOK XVI. THE AGE IN WHICH THE PAPAL ASCENDANCY AT- TAINED ITS HIGHEST PITCH. FROM A. D. 1177, TO 1269. SECTION L THE EMPIRE OF GERMANY '. BAVARIA. "T he Emperor Frederick Barbarossa was, with the excep- tion of the pope, whose dominion was of a peculiar nature, the most powerful of the princes of Christen- A.D. 1180. tt i i ii dom. He took ample revenge on duke Henry the Lion, by degrading him from his honours, and declaring him an outlaw. The German princes of the neighbouring states enriched themselves, at the expense of Henry ; who, in the end, retained nothing but his allodial possessions of Brunswick and Luneburg. At this conjuncture the house of Wittelsbach rose to dis- tinction in Bavaria: this family deduced its origin from the old Agilulfian princes of the Bavarians, and in later times had possessed, under the title of counts palatine, a Scheyer, a territorial dominion, which could not be compared with that of the Guelphs. Otho became, on this occasion, duke of Bavaria, of which Munich, the capital, had recently been built by the unfortunate duke Henry. The Emperor Frederick the Second afterwards gave to duke Lewis, heir of Otho, the pa annate of the A. D. 1215. . , , _ _ . . 1 rT Rhine, which had been intrusted to Henry, son of Henry the Lion. Here, as in a royal domain, the counts palatine, in the capacity of representatives of the monarch, exercised civil and judicial prerogatives, such as N 4 184 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. belonged to no other chief: hence their power in these scattered territories is not limited, as among the Bavarian people, by the rights of the provincial states. Their par- ticular patronage of the order of the knights of St. John, their privilege of seizing strange persons, their participa- tion with the principal dukes in the election of the monarch, their administration of his powers during a vacation of the throne ; all these, and other prerogatives, emanated from the particular relation which the counts palatine bore to the monarch. It may, however, also be observed, that as the kings, from ancients times, disposed arbitrarily of terri- tories, and especially conferred many grants on the church, the palatinate county on the Rhine is broken by a number of domains, which are chiefly ecclesiastical possessions» The present state of these governments has derived its origin from the ancient tenure and constitution of the office of count palatine. Under the succeeding dukes Bavaria was separated from the palatinate by one of those divisions of territory and do- minion which were so fashionable in those times, and half a century elapsed before they became re-united» Further divisions, misfortunes, and political errors, deprived the dukes of their participation in the imperial elections, and the house of Wittelsbach was prevented, by its own faults, from attaining to that degree of power which the excellence of its territory seemed to promise it. - SECTION II. AUSTRIA. A D 1186 About tne same time the dukes of Austria, descendants of Leopold count of Babensberg, a line of valiant princes, gained possession of the Mark of Stiria, by the bequest of Ottocar, who governed it with the ducal title ; and while the king of Bohemia, after the house of Babensberg, held the dominion of Austria with UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 185 the willing or forced consent of the states, the duchy of Carinthia, in the old Slavonian territory, came to be united with the above-mentioned inhe- ritance. Military talents had laid the foundation of the Austrian power : the wise and gentle conduct of the margrave Leo- pold, who, after the death of his first consort, married the daughter of the emperor Henry the Fourth, the mother of the Hohenstaufens, bestowed on his house a degree of splendid distinction which acquired the ducal crown for his D 1156 S ° n ^ e mar S rave > Henry Jasomirgott, and obtained for himself an alliance with the im- _ perial house of the Comneni. This high dis- A.D. 1190. \ . . a . . , | j | tinction was maintained by Leopold, who performed the crusade, by his personal exploits ; and by his son, who bore the same name, by the softer glory of a be- A D 12 ne fi cent an( l wise administration. With Fre- derick, a prince who had the virtues and faults AD 1246 of a warrior, the house became extinct , where- upon, after a long interval of anarchy, Otto- car, king of Bohemia, as we have above mentioned, gained possession of Austria and Stiria, and governed them with vigour and with highly meritorious services. SECTION III. BRANDENBURG. On the ruins of the power of Henry the Lion, the house of Anhalt laid the foundation of its future greatness. When Henry's father had been outlawed, and Bavaria given up AD n tC> J ^ ustr * a, Conrad the Third had intrusted the duchy of Saxony to Albert the Bear; and when, on the restoration of the son, Austria was de- clared independent of Bavaria, Albert, on surrendering Saxony, had stipulated that his hereditary domains in that 186' UNIVERSAL HISTORY. , _ country should be erected into a marcraviatc A. D.l 142. . J 53 independent of the duchy, and invested with sovereign power. Albert was a son of Otho of Ballenstett and Ascher- sleben, to whom his consort Eilico, daughter of the last Billungian duke of Saxony, had brought Soltwedel and Brandenburg, allodial possessions of the Billungen. This mark was the germ of that power which is now tinder the sway of a royal dynasty. Brandenburg was an ancient town on the Havel, and the surrounding territory an ex- tensive sandy waste, and at Soltwedel the court was held. But Albert conquered the middle-mark, as well as that which lies on the lake of Uker, together with Prigniss, in the war in which he assisted Henry the Lion against Ni- colas of Mecklenburg, prince of the Wends. He availed himself of the numerous population of Flanders, in order to supply his mark with industrious husbandmen and ar- tificers. About the same period, when the first duke of Austria laid the foundation of Vienna, in the site of the ancient ^ ^ Vindobona, the first independent margrave of Brandenburg gave a beginning to Berlin. SECTION IV. SAXONY. While Otho, the first-born son of Albert, governed the margraviate, the duchy of Saxony was given by Frederick, after the misfortunes of Henry the Lion, to Bernard the second son. That duchy retained now only the shadow of its former greatness : for it com- prehended little more than the electoral circle around Wit- tenberg, and the plains around Lauenburg, upon the Elbe, beyond the domains of Brunswick Luneburg. Afterwards the sons of Bernard divided their possessions, 14 I UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 187 so that Albert, the eldest, became lord of the A.D. 1212. „ -.11 TT Saxon territories, and the younger, Henry, of the old territory of Anhalt. On the demise of Albert, the dukedom in the vicinity of Wittenberg devolved on his son of the same name, and Lauenburg to Duke Hauns : for the appellation of duke was in this house a family-title. In this manner every possession was particularized : and if the connecting authority of the supreme head of the empire had remained unimpaired, these approaches to the original relations of families could not fail to have recommended themselves by their manifest advantages. SECTION V. BRUNSWICK. The allodial domains of Brunswick and Luneburg re- mained to the heirs of Henry the Lion ; comprising a terri- tory, at that time but little cultivated and in many place:- scarcely susceptible of much improvement, which was coi> demned to revere, in the possession of strangers, the for- feited honours of its native dukes. Otho, son of William, son of Henry the Lion, emancipated himself A. D. 1235. J from this dependence. At a diet held at Mentz, he surrendered to the emperor Frederick his allo- dial possessions, and received them, with the title of duke, as a princely fief which was hereditary even on the daughter's side. His ancestor, Henry the Proud, had been ruined by the disfavour of the emperor Conrad the Third: his grand- father, Henry the Lion, by the revenge of Frederick the First : his uncle Otho, who bore the imperial crown, suf- fered by the enmity of Frederick the Second, which also destroyed Henry, his other uncle, the count palatine on the Rhine. Otho remained faithful to the emperor, and obtained the above-mentioned and other important benefits; 188 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. and transmitted his domains to his posterity, of whose pos- sessions, in all parts of the world, they now form only an insignificant part. SECTION VI. THURINGIA, MEISSEN, AND HESSIA. The landgraves of Thuringia, an ancient and illustrious family, had nourished since the time of that Henry who- was raised to the imperial dignity by the enemies of the em- peror Frederick the Second. On his demise, his domains were divided among his nephews. Henry of A. D. 1247. . . Brabant, son of Sophia, daughter of his elder brother, became lord of Lower Hessia ; and Henry, mar- grave of Meissen, son of his sister, landgrave of Thuringia. The margrave of Meissen had sprung from a house which seems to have deduced its origin from the old leaders of the Saxons. This family was greatly enriched by the discovery of the mines in the Erzgebiirge : from that time forwards they availed themselves of the advantage of ruling over the confines of civilized and barbarous nations, and of the natural faculties of their subjects, who were for the most part Slavonians, in order to encourage the growth of industry and commerce. They endowed the market of Leipzig with privileges which enticed citizens A. D. 1157. foreign merchants. Thither Bohemia sent her arms and iron wares ; the wines of France were transported through Leipzig to the northern countries, and thither the barbarians resorted to purchase cloth. Under the same margrave who obtained possession of Thuringia, the mines were so productive that that nobleman was com- monly supposed to be rich enough to purchase the kingdom of Bohemia. At the splendid tournament A.D. \2o6. ^Ynsfa he held at Nordhausen, a massive tree of silver was seen with golden apples. Henry besides un r derstood so well the interests of commerce, that the mex> UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 189 chants even of hostile countries obtained safe conduct and protection when they resorted to the market of Leipzig. With so many pretensions to fame, he combined a poetic genius, which he possessed in an eminent degree. We have thus shown in what situation the disgrace of Henry the Lion placed Bavaria and Saxony, and what illustrious houses arose in those districts. A few years af- ter this event, the Emperor Frederick the First, on the following occasion, undertook the third crusade. SECTION VII. THE SULTAN SALAHEDDIN. The power of the Fatimide Sultans of Kahira, which had suffered much from the loss of Palestine and Syria ; sustained the last blow from Nureddin Mohammed, Atabek of Mausel, whom a weak vizier had invited to the support of the Fatimides, and whom the commander of the Faithful, after he had already gained possession of Syria, invested with the sovereignty of Egypt. In vain the kings of Je- rusalem, as the house of David had formerly done, sought to preserve a balance of power : the strength of their king- dom fell with the heroic King Amaure. The A D 1171 Turks under Shirakah, the son of Sadi, con- quered Egypt. Salaeddin Joseph, whom we name Saladin, son of Nadjweddin Eyub, the son of Sadi, was saluted by the army and confirmed by the sultan, who loved him but at length sacrificed him to jealousy, as governor of that country, over which he finally ruled as sultan, with the name of Malek-en-Nasr. This warrior of Kurdistan re- stored the religious authority of the commanders of the faithful, and seated himself in the throne of Aded-ledin- Allah, the last Fatimide, who died in this conjuncture. Marching out from Egypt, he conquered Syria from the house of Nureddin ; he took Arabia Felix out of the hands of its weak governors, and Tripoli and Tunis from the 190 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. Mowaheddins. He claimed for himself the Honourable patronage of the prophetic city, and in the following man- ner subverted the kingdom of Jerusalem. So weakened was this state in consequence of the dis- astrous event of the last crusade, and since the time of King Amauri, or Almerich, that its overthrow might have happened at an earlier period, had it not been delayed by the internal feuds between the Atabeks, the Fatimides, and the Eyubites. The sceptre was now held by Guy of Lu- signan ; who had obtained it by poisoning his step-son Baldwin the Fifth. The Sultan Saladin having invaded the country, and laid siege to Tiberias, on the sea of Galilasa, Guy marched against him with the templars and all the nobles. The Christians were still consulting, when the sultan fell upon them by surprise. He had chosen for the battle the heat of the day, and a situation in which the sun shone with full splendour in the faces of his enemies. Then nearly all the templars and hospitallers were slain ; Guy fell into the hands of the infidels, and those who had counselled him to break the truce with Saladin were put to death. Most of the towns surrendered, and the favour of the conqueror was the reward of submission : all the inhabitants were per- mitted either to remain or to leave the country. Proces- sions and fasts were held in Jerusalem : but after the sultan had taken Ascalon, he turned his arms against the capital. He lay nine days on the Mount of Olives ; after which he shook the walls on the northern side, and on the fourteenth day conquered Jerusalem. Saladin made A. D. 1188. . / . . . . . , . his entry with paternal clemency : he lelt m the possession of the Christians the sepulchre of Christ; no person suffered violence, but all had the choice of a safe retreat. The patriarch Heraclius, the ecclesiastics, and military orders, either departed into the west, or sought refuge in the few cities on the coast, which yet remained faithful to UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 191 them. William, bishop of Tyre, the historian of these times, bore the sad tidings to Rome, where Pope Urban the Third died of terror and chagrin. Thence letters full of lamentation were sent to summon the princes of the west, to recover the holy sepulchre. Accordingly all the knights templars and hospitallers # , who wer3 scattered through Europe, immediately embarked ; the Italians as- sembled under the archbishops of Ravenna and Pisa ; the flower of the Norman warriors took arms ; fifty ships sailed from Denmark and Friesland, and thirty-seven from Flanders; Richard, the lion-hearted king of England, Philip Augustus of France, and greater than all, Frederick Barbarossa, whom his age compared to Charlemainf, set out, accompanied by the princes of the German empire. The emperor marched through Hungary, spread terror among the Greeks, defeated the army of the Seljukes, and arrived at the frontier of Syria. Not far from the place where Alexander the Great incurred the risk of death from a similar accident, the emperor perished, by bathing _ in the cold stream of the Saleph. His second AD. 1190. ] f son, 01 the same name, conducted the army to the Holy Land. The French, under the greatest monarch who had reigned over them for ages ; the English under the bravest knight of Europe, Henry count of Champagne ; Thibaut of Blois, Stephen of Sancerre, Philip of Flanders, with many zealous prelates, and the flower of the European no- bility, conducted their splendid armaments by sea. They sought in Calabria to confirm their hopes by the predic- tions of the soothsaying abbot Joachim; but he testified to them that the hour of deliverance was not yet come. The king of England conquered the Isle of Cyprus; which Isaac, of the house of the Comneni, had held under his usurped and tyrannical government. This island was sold * " Ingens motio per mare et terras." f Post Carolum Magnum gestorura magnificentia vix habuit parem. 1.92 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. to Guy, the exiled king of Jerusalem ; and the house of Lu* signan, and their heirs of Poictiers reigned there three hun- dred years. In the Holy Land, Acre, or Ptolemais, was taken after a difficult and memorable siege ; but all further progress was prevented by divisions among the chiefs. The king of France hastened home, and fell upon Richard's possessions in Normandy ; and the latter on his return was taken prisoner, and confined at Erdberg, near Vienna, by the duke of Austria. From this third crusade is derived the order of Teutonic knights. Merchants of Lubeck and Bremen had founded a German house for sick pilgrims at Jerusalem : the insti- tution was brought into celebrity by knights and ecclesias- ^ tics ; and when Frederick, the son of the em- peror, lay before Acre, he obtained from his brother, Henry the Sixth, that the Pope Ccelestinus the Third should be induced to grant to this fraternity the care of hospitals, as it had been given to the order of St. John, and the honour of knighthood, which the templars had obtained. Henry Walpode, of a distinguished family, in the neighbourhood of Mentz, was accordingly named the first grand-master. The great Sultan Saladin, the terror of his foes, but to all other men, and even to his ene- mies when they were subdued, kind and open-hearted, bene- ficent, modest, and dignified; died in the 57th year of his age, in the citadel of Damascus. His sons, his kinsmen, and his brother, shared his domains among them. SECTION VIII. NAPLES AND SICILY. The emperor Henry the Sixth became more powerful in Italy than any of his predecessors. The acquisitions of the Normans, founded on the valour of the Hautevilles, and the wisdom of king Roger, and more recently con- 12 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 193 firmed by the prudent administration of William the Good, devolved on the imperial house. When A. D. 1166. on the death of William, an illegitimate prince. TancrecL and after him his infant A. D. 1 189. son, William the Third, had been placed on the throne by the nobles, who feared the power and the A D n 4 cnaracter °f Henry, the emperor passed into Sicily, and, aided by the skilful tactics of Marshal Markward, of Anwyler, defeated all his enemies, and led the young king prisoner with his family into Ger- A.D 119 man y' Another Tancred being opposed to him, he caused the latter, with all his accom- plices, to lose their eyes. He ordered some to be seated on stools of red hot iron, and crowns of the same material to be placed upon their heads. By these severities he infused such a terror into his enemies, that they yielded obsequi- A D 1197 ous ty not on ^ to n * s own g overnment 3 Dut after his death to that of his newly- born son. The emperor Henry founded his power on arms : his armies were supported by money ; and in order to fill hh treasury he spared no means. He obliged the duke of Austria to deliver king Richard into his hands, and would not release that prince until after he had purchased his ransom with seventy thousand marks of silver. He laid claim to the mines of Saxony, which were now becoming celebrated, as belonging to the crown, and forced the pos- sessors to give up at least one-third part of the revenue. The Cyprian king of the house of Lusignan, and Leo, king of the neighbouring Armenia, or properly Cilicia, acknowledged his power, which was greater than any other prince in Christendom possessed. He had persuaded a great proportion of the princes of the empire to assent that the throne of Germany should be declared hereditary ; but was prevented from carrying this important plan into execu- tion, by death, when he had only attained his 32d year. vol. II, o 194 UNIVERSAL HISTORY, A D 1198 ^ C P rmces now mac * e choice not of liis son Frederick, who was but three years old, but of his brother Philip, to whom others, from disaffection or apprehensions for their liberties, opposed Otho the Fourth, the son of Henry the Lion. SECTION IX. INNOCENT THE THIRD. While these rivals threw the empire into disorder, Na- ples and Sicily acknowledged the young Frederick, who was not yet baptized. He was supported by Innocent the Third, of the house of the counts of Segni, who in the 37 th A D 1198 °^ a & e na( * ODtame d *he papacy with ge- neral approbation : a person of great attain- ments in practical knowledge, eloquent in the Latin and Italian tongues, kind and engaging in his manners, of great constancy, simple and frugal in his own person, and ge- nerous even to profusion in acts of beneficence. He dis- charged his office of protector to Frederick with the ability of a great prince, and with the honour of a knight ; and he decided the dispute between the rival claimants of the Ger- man and imperial crown. He had the good fortune to be acknowledged, even at Constantinople, as supreme head of the Christian church ; and it was under his command that the important council of St. John di Lateran was held. In his time, and under his patronage, Francis of Assisi, and Dominick of Osma, founders of the orders of Fran- ciscans and Dominicans, renovated the decaying piety of Christendom, by their voluntary poverty and popular preachings ; and the same Dominick laid the foundation of the Catholic inquisition. Innocent lived to place the im- perial crown on the head of his pupil Frederick, and died in the nineteenth year of a glorious pontificate. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 195 SECTION X. CONSTANTINOPLE TAKEN BY THE CRUSADERS. After the Comneni had reigned at Constantinople more than a hundred years, with greater glory' than any preceding dynasty, they gave occasion for their own ruin, and the subversion of the state. Andronicus, sprung from a branch nearly allied to the imperial stem, a prince of great talents, but turbulent, and impelled alternately by lust and ambi- tion to the most criminal pursuits, put to death the young Alexius, son 01 the emperor Ma- nuel, and enjoyed a reign of two years, which was pro- ductive of the wisest arrangements and the basest deeds, and was as inconsistent with itself as the whole character of this prince. After he had became the object of general AD 5 ^ eaF * ^ G WaS ^ et ^ rone ^ ky Isaac Angelus, who consigned him to a most cruel death. Isaac, a prince, who in other particulars showed gentle dispositions and effeminate manners, was deprived of his empire, and of his eyes, by his own brother, A, D, 1 194. . Alexius the Third. His son Alexius fled to Venice, and sought for aid ; the West was at A.D. 1203. . . , , TT . . _ that time preparing a crusade, and Venice had undertaken to convey the armies into Asia. Arrigo Dandolo, an old man, upwards of ninety years of age, who had almost entirely lost his sight, but whose mental eyes penetrated the more deeply into political in- trigues, was doge of Venice, and the soul of the enter- prise. He persuaded the crusaders to conquer Zara, a Dalmatian city, for the Venetians. The events which fol- lowed at Constantinople, appear from the following narra- tive, which was transmitted to the pope : « As we could not but apprehend that we should by our great multitude be burdensome to the Holy Land, and as we learnt that the citizens of Constantinople wished to re- o 2 CN1VERSAL HISTORY. tarn under the dominion of their lawful emperor, we thought it expedient to settle the disquiets that existed there, in order to secure for ourselves the necessary supplies and as- sistance for our future proceedings. We found the city of Constantinople uncommonly strong, the citizens in arms, 60,000 cavalry, and all the implements necessary for de- fence. The unlawful emperor had told the people that we designed to subdue them, and reduce their church in obe- dience to your holiness. Being only stocked with provi- sions for fourteen days, we were obliged to repeat our at- tacks without intermission. On the eighth day we broke into the city. The emperor flying with a few of his people, we seated Alexius the Fourth on the throne of his father, after setting free the latter from his dungeon. The new emperor promised us 200,000 marks of silver, provisions for a year, and his assistance in recovering the holy se- pulchre. He only desired us, on account of the Greeks, to remain in our camp without the city. Soon after this he suffered himself to be persuaded by his father to fall upon us by surprise, and set fire to our fleet. The project was discovered : the people, afraid of our vengeance, cried out for a sovereign. The emperor, in order to appease us and them, sent to the discontented his kins- A.D. 1204. man Murtzulph, (Alexius the Fifth). The latter betrayed and murdered the emperor and his father, and closed the gates of the city against us. There is, holy father, in the whole west, no city like Constantinople ; the walls are lofty and wide, consisting of squared stones : at every interval of five hundred paces is a stone tower, supporting another of wood, six stories high ; between the towers are bridges, full of arms and bowmen : double and very wide fosses allowed no play to our machines. Often during the night they sent fire-ships out against us. Our land forces alarmed Murtzulph, but he preferred to die rather than surrender. He had killed the young emperor with a club, and he gave out that Alexius had died from 14 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. other causes. He obtained advantages over us, but at length the ships Paradin and Pilgrim, under the command of the bishops of Troyes and Soissons, effected a landing- When the Greeks saw that the whole forces of the Franks were pressing into the haven, and into the streets, their courage forsook them. Not far from us the emperor took flight, with all the nobles, and sought refuge in the palace. We put the people to the sword in the streets, until night came on. At length our foot-soldiers, without orders, rushed with irresistible force to storm the imperial resi- dence, and made themselves masters of it ; whereupon *dl Constantinople submitted. Most holy father, the quantity of gold, silver, precious stones, and other costly things which we have found, far exceeds all that could be collected in the city of Rome, and in all our Christendom. Six Venetian no- blemen, with the bishops of Troyes, Soissons, Halberstadt, and Ptolemais, assembled with the legates of your holiness ; and, after celebrating high mass and public prayers, with the counsel and assistance of the high and mighty lord, Henry Dandolo, doge of Venice, elected Baldwin, count of Flanders, to be emperor of Constantinople. The fourth part of the em- pire was left to him ; the remainder we divided among our- selves. We will endeavour to maintain possession of this fine land, full of corn, wine, oil, wood, and pasturage, and share it out in fiefs to the noble knights, who will join their arms to ours. As we have read in histories, and understood from learned men, that in old times the predecessors of your ho- liness came even to Constantinople, we entreat your holi- ness to do the same, and here to hold a council." Pope Innocent knew too well what became his character not to publish the bann against crusaders, who, instead of conquering the infidels, deposed Christian emperors from their thrones: yet, on considering the circumstances, as he said, he again absolved them. For the rest, he knew them too well to predict any long duration of their power, and he declined visiting Constantinople. o 3 198 UNIVERSAL HISTORY* Venice took possession of the islands of the Grecian sea ; French noblemen divided ancient Greece among them; Ville-hardouin, the historian of these events, became lord of Achaia ; and Otho de la Roche, a Burgundian, duke of Athens. Three principalities were founded by the Greeks ; one by Theodorus Lascaris, son-in-law of the emperor Alexius the Third, a man of enterprising genius, at Nicaea, in Bithynia: this sovereignty governed Asia Minor under the imperial name. Two other states were founded by princes of the Comnene house ; one of them was Lacia, on the eastern shore of the Black Sea, where politeness and barbarism were in a wonderful manner combined, in a short space ; Trapezus, or Trebisond, was the capital of this state, and its princes subsequently assumed the title of emperors : the second dominion was founded by a prince of the house of Angelo, in Acarnania and CEtolia, which extended over the Chimaera and Albania, as far as Prilap. The latter was termed the Despotate. . _ Baldwin, of Flanders, became, in the first A.D. 1205. _ • , . * year ol his reign, a sacrifice to the greatness he had acquired : he was insidiously slain by Johannicius, king of the Bulgarians who about twenty years before had recovered their lost freedom. Baldwin appears to have suffered a cruel death ; whereupon the kingdom de- volved on his able' and hitherto successful brother Henry; from the latter to his brother-in-law, Peter of Courtenay, grandson of Lewis the Sixth, from whom it descended to his sons. It was ever on the decrease. The customs of the Latins were not in harmony with the manners of the native people, and their power obtained no internal consolidation. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. SECTION XI. THE EMPEROR FREDERICK THE SECOND. Philip was scarcely acknowledged sovereign of the western empire when he fell by the hand of an assassin ; and his successor, Otho the Fourth, immediately after his election, rushed precipitately into the same measures which had involved his predecessors in so many conflicts with the Roman see. Innocent was enraged, and the princes of the empire abandoned him for Frederick, son of A.D.1212. . . Henry the Sixth* Frederick was animated by an heroic spirit ; he was equal to the bravest of the ancient Caesars, and in intelligence superior to most of them. He conceived the same partiality for the poetrv of the Provencals, which his father and his son Conrad, with many other princes and lords of those times, had entertained for that of the Germans : tenderness, ani- mation, and euphony pervade the works of this prince and his noble relatives. Love and virtue were not their only themes; the corruptions of the age were reprehended in their verses, and the exploits of Richard and Saladin cele- brated : their muse often took a lofty flight, and availed it- self of all the resources of language ; the lyre resounded with the praises of God, the beauties of the firmament and of all nature, and with the imaginary scenes of romance. The emperor excelled all his competitors in that powerful glance with which he surveyed the follies of his age, and penetrated the most important truths. With all his sublimity he was full of grace and gentleness; in his exterior he was en- gaging, because in every individual, of whatever rank, nation, or faith he might be, the emperor only saw human nature in different garbs : the love of pleasure contributed to ren- der him popular. He possessed immovable firmness, and a greatness of individual character, the impression of which, long survived his death. o 4 200 ITNIVEhSAL HISTORY. The popes, in order to keep Frederick employed in dis- tant countries, compelled him to enter into a vow to deliver the holy sepulchre: in vain he endeavoured to defer the en- terprise, which often seemed to be merely a pretext for raising tributes. When he could not longer delay* he marched to Syria, and concluded a treaty with A.D. 1229. Malek-el-Kamel, or Meledin, sultan of Egypt, according to which the latter gave up to him the sovereignty of Jerusalem, Bethlehem, Nazareth, and other holy places, without resorting to arms. His enemies excited disorders in Italy, but he returned and defeated them. Gregory the Ninth had ascended the papal chair in the 85th year of his age, and held it fourteen years, in perpetual contention with the emperor. He and his successor Innocent the Fourth, of the house of the Genoese Fieschi, counts of Lavagna, frustrated all the projects which Frederick was anxious to complete, and em- bittered his reign. Innocent, in order to lessen the impres- sion which the introduction of the Roman law produced in favour of the imperial power, opposed to it the decretals, a compilation of papal ordinances, which Raymond of Pennaforte, a Dominican friar, had prepared at his com- mand : a worthy counterpart of the old compilations, which was falsely ascribed to Bishop Isidore, of Seville* and in the beginning of the ninth century was promulgated among the Germans, by Richulf, archbishop of Mentz. Gra- tian's system of decrees was from that time in the highest authority, and the pope ordered students, and their in- structors, to abide by the new compilation. In the employment of spiritual arms the use of other weapons was not lost sight of, but the former were now wielded with more than usual energy by both parties. The emperor himself fought with arguments, and availed him- self of his talent of ridicule in opposition to the solemn gravity of the priests ; and he spared no resource that might tend to bring contempt upon his enemies. But the UNIVERSAL HJSTOBY. 201 hour for effecting a revolution was not yet come. He paid so little respect to immunities, that he suffered priests to be castrated, hanged, and burnt, and employed the church plate for common kitchen furniture. He built a city for the Moslem and dwelt among them. Ezzelino di Romano, his administrator in Lombardy, sought to subdue the spirit of opposition which displayed itself in the cities of that pro- vince, by severities which affright the imagination. The emperor took possession of all the territories which belonged to the papacy, and had a strong party even in Rome. A D l 44 I nnocent tne Fourth retired to France, and summoned a council of the church at Lyons, which was attended by deputies from France, Spain, Eng- land, and many German princes, counts, and other noble- men. The emperor was accused of a design to extirpate the Christian religion, of the most flagitious vices, and of many horrible crimes. Accordingly, after adducing former precedents, the pope, at the head of the council, published the bann against him, and declared him to have forfeited his crown. Germany remained faithful to Frederick, until Henry, his eldest son, deserted him. Although this unfortunate youth fell a sacrifice to his levity, the allegiance of the em- peror's subjects from that time declined. In consequence of the sentence of the council, the landgrave of Thuringia, and after his speedy death, William count of Holland, a noble and enterprising youth, were opposed to the con- i _ demned Frederick with the imperial title. The A. D. 1247. . r latter resisted with unshaken fortitude, until fortune was unfaithful to him in every region of his empire. The public opinion, under the guidance of his bitterest . enemies, was the occasion of his ruin, and he A. D. \ 252. 5 died a prey to chagrin and disappointment. 202 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. SECTION XII. THE INTERREGNUM. Neither Conrad, the son of Frederick* A.D. 1254. who fell in the defence of his hereditary pos- sessions; nor William, who perished prematurely by a dif- ^ ^ ferent fate; nor the duke of Cornwall, brother of the English king, who was elected by some A D 257 °^ ^ G P rmceS} an ^ on ty knew how to sell pri- vileges in order to reimburse himself for the sums they had cost him ; nor Alphonso of Castile, to whom others confided the crown ; nor any other prince in Christendom, found himself in a situation, or possessed of the power requisite for restoring the royal authority in Ger- many, and the imperial dignity in Europe, to that degree of eminence which they had maintained during the three preceding centuries. The supreme magistracy of the Eu- ropean commonwealth fell into such a state of impotency, that the three-and-twenty years which followed the death of Frederick are termed by many an interregnum, or a period of vacation of the throne ; and we may so consider them without doing injustice to the character of this age. At this time Walpode, a chief citizen of A.D. 1255. . _ _ . . ' TT ^ Mentz, united the cities oi Upper Germany and the Rhine, from the feet of the Alps to the efflux of the Maine, in a league for the common defence of their manu- factures and commerce against usury, unlawful imposts, and robbery by land and water. . - Shortly before this combination, the ex- A.D. 1241. J ample of Hamburg and Lubeck had occa- sioned the confederation of all the lower German and northern commercial towns in the great Hanseatic league. The combinations of the towns, by which burgesses and traders rendered themselves of political importance, dis- pleased the great. Factious disputes between Guelphs and 8 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 203 Ghibellines, nobles and citizens, prevailed in every com- munity : trading corporations were formed, and gradually assumed the chief direction of affairs. Vienna, A D 1234 Turin, Rome, and Paris, were dangerous places of residence. We saw the downfall of the house of Ba- A. D. 1246. 1^^^ j n Austria, which happened shortly before the death of Frederick. Vienna had often contended for her liberty against the last duke, who fell at length in battle against the Hungarians. The occasion of his death remained in uncertainty. As the emperor had now less leisure than ever to provide for the protection of this boun- dary, and the succession to the dukedom was disputed be- tween Herrmann, margrave of Baden, husband of the niece of duke Frederick, and his two sisters Constantia and Margaretha, the provincial states resolved, on the death of Herrmann, to confide the government of their A. D. 1250. , TT country to the margrave Henry of Meissen, husband of Constantia. This resolution was prevented from taking effect by the fair promises and weighty argu- ments which Wenceslaf, king of Bohemia, addressed to the deputies of the states. SECTION XIII. BOHEMIA. The kingdom of Bohemia is a fertile valley, enclosed between Saxony, Thuringia, Franconia, Bavaria, Austria, Moravia, and Silesia, and surrounded by chains of moun- tains, which have in some parts a great elevation. The surface is computed at 900 square miles.* There are passes between the hills, which the nature of their situation renders very important. We shall not stay to detail from Dalemil and Cosmus what those authors relate concerning * Equal to 18,000 English square miles. 204 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. prince Tchech, the enchantress Libassa, the wars of damsels at Dewin, and the dukes and duchesses whom the evil spirit has carried away or the earth swallowed up. The Tchechi, for such is the national appellation, taking possession of Bohemia, or the home of the Boii 9 after the latter people had abandoned it, were governed by Tchechish princes, in the series of whom Przemysl was the founder of a dynasty which long held the sovereign power. The Tchechi suffered many evils inflicted upon them by the German kings, and were often obliged to pay them tribute. It was also pre- judicial to their independence that they attained the know- ledge of Christianity by the preaching of Greek and Ro- man missionaries, the latter of whom brought them under the influence of the pope ; and that many Germans, either of their own accord, or invited by the Bohemian princes, sought settlements in their country. To the latter the Tchechi were indebted for the blessings of civilization, which would scarcely have displayed itself, or have attained per- fection in a Slavonian horde, without the aid of foreign in- fluence. The states hoped to preclude all the evil effects that were to be apprehended from these circumstances, by the ordinances which they established under Sobieslaf, after the death of the emperor Henry the Fifth. It was enacted that no stranger should govern in Bohemia, or hold any office in the administration ; that on the death of a duke the burgomasters of Prague should assemble the country de- puties, in the space of three days, to elect a successor, with the counsel and assistance of the magistracy of that town ; that the latter should immediately bind himself by oath to observe the liberties of his people, for the main- tenance of which the nobles were directed continually to watch. Yet Bohemia continued to be dependent on the Swabian emperors, until duke Przemysl Ottocar, during ^ ^ the divisions which arose after the reign of Henry the Sixth, had the good fortune to se- cure the royal dignity* not only for himself, but for all his UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 203 successors. This king Przemysl was father of that Wen* ceslaf who detained the deputies of the Austrians. He held under his sway not only Bohemia but Moravia also. This ancient seat of the Marcomanni had become in later times the centre of an extensive sovereignty, which terminated on the conquest of Pannonia by the Madjars, or Hungarians. For after the death of King Swadbog, or Swatopulk, there was no chief capable of holding under his sway the tribes, who were for the most part barbarous, or of maintaining the sceptre of Moravia; and from that time forwards the Moravian people adhered sometimes to the Polish, but more often to the Bohemian dukes, who at length obtained a permanent sway over their country. Wenceslaf persuaded the Austrian deputies to recom- mend his son Przemysl Ottocar, a warlike and enterprising youth, to the Austrians as their duke, and to Margaret, sister of Constantia, as her husband. The barons of Kuenring, a house which had formerly migrated from the Rhine to Austria, supported his pretensions the more will- ingly, as they hoped to derive advantages from the favour of the prince who was enamoured of their sister. Bohemia, Moravia, Austria, Stiria, and Carniola, the acquisition of A D 1253 t ^ 16 ^k 6 * now became united. We have mentioned above that the new prince added also Carinthia to his possessions. The wise margrave of Meissen, content with the acqui- sition of Thuringia, laid aside his further pretensions ; and Frederick, the prince of Baden, son of Herrmann, was as yet a minor. SECTION XIV. EXTINCTION OF THE HOHENSTAUFENS. The last mentioned prince allied himself closely to Con- rad, called Conradin on account of his tender years, duke of Swabia, grandson of the emperor Frederick by his son 206 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. Conrad the Fourth. These princes were of the same age, and experienced similar fortunes. Conradin was at length invited by the Italians to take possession of his hereditary dominions, the Norman kingdom. Charles of A. D. 1268. & Anjou, brother of St. Lewis, king of France, had made himself master of this territory by the aid of the pope ; but his administration was unpopular. When Con- radin, accompanied by Frederick, the friend of his youth, arrived in Italy, he was welcomed by the allies of his house, and by many who pitied his unworthy fate. At Rome he was met by the senator Prince Henry of Castile, brother of King Alfonso, and by many of the nobles. Sicily declared for him, and many Neapolitan barons reinforced his army. A battle was fought near Tagliacozzo, which was for some time doubtful, until fortune declared herself inimical to the young princes, who were both taken prisoners. Charles of Anjou, in his whole conduct brutal and unjust, hesitated not to order Conradin of Hohenstaufen, the descendant of three illustrious emperors, who had come to take possession of his paternal inheritance, to be publicly beheaded in the city of Naples with his friend Frederick; and the pope justified the act. It seemed as if the shades of the Norman barons, whom his ancestor Henry the Sixth had cruelly put to death, demanded retribution in the innocent blood of his descendant. His calamity secured the dominion of Przemysl Ottocar, which in a contrary turn of affairs might have been disturbed by Frederick. These events seem to have prepared the way for the vigorous defence by which this boundary of the empire was maintained against the disturbances that had arisen shortly before in Hungary, and seemed likely to be renewed. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 207 SECTION XV. OF THE HUNGARIANS. After the Hungarians had possessed themselves of their country under a prince of the house of Arpad, and had continued for a century to be the terror of western Europe, they began under Geysa to acquire a taste for agriculture and civilized life. The power of the German kings, the hereditary margraviate in Austria, and the warlike spirit of other adjoining nations, had forced them to desist from their predatory enterprises. Stephen, the son of Geysa, intro- duced, at the same time, Christianity and the A.D.1000. ' . , royal dignity. Although the former was secured by the establishment of a hierarchy, and the latter by a constitution, yet the popu- lar preference for heathenish manners, and the circumstance A D 1057 ^ te P^ en no successor 5 occasioned great disturbances after his death. The variety of nations who had settled in Hungary together with, and before the Madjares, and who were for the most part bar- barous in their habits, rendered a common legislation, and the encouragement of uniform manners, a very difficult undertaking. Hence ensued a period of weakness in the government, of which the emperor Henry the Third and other German monarchs availed themselves in order to de- prive Hungary of her independence. The greater the decline which now presented itself in the circumstances of the nation, when compared with the glory of former ages, the more odious the recently adopted habits became to the people, who now lived in slavery, and remembered with regret those ancient times when they were not bound to the labours of agriculture, or to the irksome service of their oppressors. To these impediments the wisest of their kings opposed, with various degrees of success, the influence of social ordinances and the powers of religion ; but they could 208 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. not maintain civilization among the Hungarians until almost all the neighbouring nations had already attained it, and it A D 1196 k ecame absolutely necessary. Bela the Third possessed himself of Halicz and Vladimir, cities which sometimes had belonged to the Poles, at others to the Russians, and extended his sway over Dalmatia. This prince allied himself by marriage to the Comneni, and gave the Hungarians a code of laws : and his son A.D.1236. » • 11 ,v . Andrew settled more completely the consti- tution. Thus the king of Hungary established his power over a people whose predilection was for arms, but who began to accommodate themselves to civil order; while Croats, Slavonia, and from the time of Vladislaf the First, who married the sister of Saromir, Dalmatia also, were in consequence of internal disquiets and the influence of the Krals, or petty kings of Servia, alternately in the possession of the Greek emperor and the Venetians; but more fre- quently subject to the former, to which Erdeel or Transyl- vania was more closely connected. SECTION XVI. OP THE TATARS OR MONGOLES, In the thirteenth century revolutions occurred in the ancient country of the Hiongnu,. which unexpectedly and fearfully disturbed the order of affairs in this and other kingdoms of the west and north. A great chan, who ruled over thirty thousand families on the banks of the Selinga, died before his son Temudsin had attained to man's estate, The horde was consequently divided under different heads, and only thirteen families persevered in their allegiance, while many who had beheld with invidious eyes the splendour and opulence of the father, now attempted to seize upon the possessions of the son. The latter, as soon as he grew up, displayed a penetrating and aspiring genius. He defeated his enemies and acquired UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 209 renown. Ho divided the booty among his comrades, whose attachment he valued more than riches. He treated them with fraternal kindness, and filled the whole country with the love and veneration of his name. The nation held a convention on the banks of the Selinga. A khodsha or sage, revered for his age and virtues, rose up in the assembly, and said, " Brethren, I have seen a vision. The great God of Heaven, on his flaming throne, sur- rounded by the spirits on high, sat in judgment on the nations of the earth : sentence was pronounced, and he gave the dominion of the world to our chief Temudsin, whom he appointed Ginghis Khan or Universal Sovereign." The Mongoles then held up their hands and swore to fol- low Temudsin, the Ginghis Khan, in all his A. D. 1206. . to enterprises. The latter, resolved to traverse the whole earth, and only to give peace to the conquered, broke forth from the cold and savage wilderness, invaded China, overcame the dynasty of Sum, conquered the capital Yen-king, over-ran the peninsula of Corea, marched westward through the moun- tains, subdued Tibet, proceeded to Cashmire, and appeared on the confines of the mighty sultan of Chowaresmia, who had overcome the dynasty of Ghaur, and ruled over a great part of Hindustan and nearly the whole of Persia. With four hundred thousand warriors Ala-ed-din Mohammed, the son of Takas, marched against Ginghis Khan : he was defeated and his kingdom conquered. His heroic son, Gelaleddin Mankbarn, in a long and adventurous course, was driven from India to the Tigris, and terminated (it is uncertain when) his unmerited sufferings in a violent death. The banks of the Caspian were as soon subdued as dis- covered by the conqueror. The czar of the neighbouring Russia set out on the Kalca with great forces; he fought, and was forced to seek a hasty flight. Ginghis Khan died . , in the sixty-fourth year of his age, after he had A.D. 1227. ... filled Asia with his renown and the terror of vol. n. v 210 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. his name, and had given laws and military ordinances to the Mongoles. Oktay, Dushi, Tuli, and Jagatay, his sons, and Guyuch, Batu, Hulaku, and Koblay, his grandsons; continued his enterprises. In vain the Sum attempted to resist; in vain ^ ^ the Russian grand-prince Alexander Nevvski, the conqueror of Livonia, tried the chance of war; and in vain the commander of the Faithful Moslem. From the eastern ocean, which washes the coasts of China and Japan, to the Silesian Oder, the world was in oom- motion, in anxious expectation of the Mongolian arms. The successor of the czar Alexander Nevvski fled through the forests of Lithuania to the king of Poland. The throne of Rurik, which more than three hundred and eighty years had been the greatest in these northern regions, fell into such a state of dependence on the Mongoles, that the khan of the golden horde received tribute from the czar during two hundred and twenty years, and was arbiter of his honour, life, and fortune. Batu, son of Dushi, having completed this conquest, marched at the head of a countless multitude to the con- fines of western Christendom, at the time when the empe- ror Frederick the Second was involved in his most vehement quarrels with the pope. In France, Lewis the Ninth sat on a neglected throne; the papal chair was vacant; in the north, Erich king of Denmark governed a state which was weakened by the misfortunes of his father ; Erich of Sweden ruled a nation which was consuming its powers by internal strife ; and in Poland, Poleslaf could scarcely maintain his kingdom against his uncle, the duke of Masovia. Batu accordingly burnt Cracow without resistance: Bela the Fourth, king of Hungary, son of Andrew, a wise and courageous prince, impeded in his useful pursuits by the seditions of his country, had received the Romanians from the neighbourhood of the Moldau, to people the scarcely inhabited plains on the river Theiss. This prince was de- UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 211 feated in a decisive battle against the invading Mongoles, who in Europe were termed Tartars; after which he fled to the islands of Liburnia, and the enemy laid waste his coun- try with fire and sword. Their hordes marched out of Poland, burnt Breslau, and were expected at Berlin and Meissen. On this sudden emergency the emperor and the cardinals entreated the nations to lend their aid to the Silesian princes. Many barons and knights, with their vassals, came to the assistance of duke Henry, who, descended from Polish Piasts, was governor of Lower Silesia. A battle was fought near Wollstadt. not far from Ligness, which A. D. 1242. 7 • , was one ol the most destructive that was ever lost in the contests with eastern barbarians. ■ The people of all the neighbouring countries sought refuge in their mountains. The enemy made no farther progress : he was unskilled in besieging towns, and he found no treasures in the West which repaid him for his hard contests with many valiant princes. Koblai, son of Tuli, the Mogul, found the con- quest of China an easier enterprise, and Japan was only protected by the sea. SECTION XVII. FALL OF THE CHALIFAT OF BAGDAD. At this era Mostasem, son of Mostauser, sat on the venerable throne of the commanders of the Faithful of the house of Abbas : he was destitute of those qualities which excite the reverence of the people : the power of Bagdad was lost ; but its splendour was great, for this city was still the point of union among all the Moslem of the Sunite sect. The science of the Arabs also maintained its celebrity, and boasted of the astronomer and geographer Nasir-Eddin 3 who afterwards became president of the academies under the Moguls. He lived at Maraga in the land of Aderbeijau, p 2 212 U N J V E ESAL HISTORY. observed the stars, and wrote on the duties of men. Self- denial was not in his system the first of virtues. This man dedicated a book to the ignorant Mostasem. The chalif, prejudiced against the author because he was a native of Chorasan, treated with contempt the learned labour of the philosopher; and from that time Nasir-Eddin sought an opportunity of effecting his ruin. He prevailed upon Ibn Ab Alkami, the confidential minister of the chalif, to weaken the state by internal factions; and, in the mean time, persuaded Hulaku, grandson of Ginghis Khan, that the destruction of the chalifat would be an enterprise worthy of his arm.-, and would repay the toil of his barbarians. Hulaku accordingly sought a quarrel with the chalif, and since a pretext is never difficult to find for the powerful, he soon besieged and conquered Bagdad. In the 656th year of the Mohammedan hegira, the fifty-sixth successor of the great prophet was trodden to pieces by horses, amid the tumult of the sacking of his capital. Forty days the Moguls plundered the ancient seat of Arabian splendour ; and their swords deprived two hundred thousand of its inhabitants of their lives. The Moguls then proceeded with increased forces to the Mediterranean sea, and the Italian cities apprehended the destruction of their commerce on the Arabian gulf. Haleb quickly fell before their arms: they took Damascus, and entered the Holy Land. But Malek-el-Modaffar Seif- ed-din Kothuz, sultan of the Mamlukes in A.D. 1260. _ i p i , • i i, ^ Egypt, defeated their troops near the well or Goliah : and his successor, Malek-ed-Daher Abulfath Bi- bars Bondoktari, deprived them of their Syrian conquests. To this prince, Hakem Beamrillah Achmed Mostaser, of the house of the chalifs, fled in the garb A.D.1262. . rmZ w , ol mourning. 1 he sultan reverently granted him an asylum at Kahira, and a competent income; and the refugee gave him in return the sanction of the prophet's name. During two centuries and a half the titular em- 14 UNIVER8AL HISTORV. 213 perors 6f the world continued to live on the charity of the Marrilukes. SECTION XVIII. THE MAMLUKES. Sa&adin the Great had divided his empire among his sons, and had given a sultan to each of the capital cities, Haleb, Hamath, Damascus, Bassora, and Kahira. His successors were weakened by mutual jealousies. In seven years two sons and a grandson of Salad in had reigned in Egypt; his brother, Malek-el-Adel Seif-ed-din Abu Bekr, with his posterity, reigned fifty years : the succession was settled by no certain law; it was acquired by genius and courage, and could only be maintained by severe vigilance. About the middle of the thirteenth century, Lewis the Ninth, king of France, according to the genius of his age, undertook a crusade against the Mohammedans in Egypt, similar to that which his father had carried on with still greater injustice against the unfortunate Albigenses. The spirit of the times seduced him; even boys were so pos- . . sessed by it, that in the beginning of this A. D. 1210. J 9 . ° B L „ century, near ninety thousand youths, irom different countries, left their parents and schoolmasters, in order to betake themselves to the Holy Land. They came in great troops to Marseilles and Brindisi, and fell a prey for the most part to cold, hunger, and distempers. The good king, perhaps well pleased to employ his turbulent nobles in a foreign enterprise, -believed, with that simplicity of heart, which in his character was singularly connected with sound wisdom, that he was performing a work merito- rious in the sight of God, and exemplary to the whole world. A D i o i k e S an > as Andrew king of Hungary, Duke Leopold of Austria, and other prudent p 3 214 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. crusaders, had done some years before, by conquering Da ~ mietta, which commanded the frontier of Egypt, in order to secure an adequate supply of provisions from the fruitful stores of that country, and to prevent the sending of suc- cours to Jerusalem. Damietta was also an important city for the commerce carried on with India. His brother Ro- bert, count of Artois, misled by the templars, proceeded further into the interior, and took the newly fortified city of Mansura. For the former of these conquests the cru- saders were indebted to the absence, for the latter to the mortal sickness, of the Sultan Malek-es-Saleh Eyub. Soon after, the French having given themselves up to plunder and debauchery, their enemy conducted the waters of the Nile into their camp, and cut off their retreat, at a time when they were already weakened by diseases. In this emergency, the king, fighting with heroic valour, was taken prisoner; his brother was never again found. Lewis was forced to give a prodigious sum for his ransom, and to restore to his enemy the conquered A.D. 1249. J ^ towns. The capitulation which the Sultan Malek-el-Moattam Turan-Sha granted to the French king, excited the rage of the Bahrite Mamlukes. This soldiery, levied in the Cau- casus, and introduced into Egypt by Saleh, were so con- scious of their preponderance over the effeminate Egyptians, that it seemed an insult to their commanders, to transact any important affair without consulting them, A. D. 1250. _/ f . . -_ , Iney slew the sultan, possessed themselves or the sovereignty under their courageous leader, Malek-el- Moezz Az-ed-din Ibek Gashnekir, and gave him the beau- tiful Shagr-ed-dorr, stepmother of the last sultan, for hi& consort. The country whence the Mamlukes came, abounding in men of the greatest strength and beauty, renewed their number annually by new reinforcements. Under the mo- dern empire of the Ottomans, this species of soldiery holds UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 215 the chief power in Egypt. At that time, after having im- posed upon the country a sufficient tribute to support them luxuriously at its expense, they arranged the government* and ordained that the sultan and his vizier should consult their captains in all affairs of importance; that a great cadi should administer justice ; and that each of the four sects who differ in their interpretation of the Koran, should have their own cadi, but that all should be nominated by the sultan. For more than two hundred and fifty years the Mamlukes were governed through forty-eight revolutions by their sultans. The prince was seldom succeeded by his son, but commonly by a favourite slave or a. valiant soldier. Their life was a military one; they were seldom involved in do- mestic relations : always renewed by reinforcements of vigo- rous youths from Caucasus, the Mamlukes maintained their strength without becoming enervated by the influence of a warm climate. Lewis having purchased his liberty, betook himself to Ptolemais, or Acre, a fortified town in the Holy Land, which still belonged to the crusaders. He redeemed many captive Christians by his gold, and remained four years an inhabitant of Palestine. SECTION XIX. THE DRUSES. In these times the power and the faith of the Druses, who still dwell under their emirs in Mount Lebanon, were ex- tended beyond their former limits. A Persian, named Mo- hammed Ebn Ismael, who had lived more than two centuries before the age we are now surveying, was the founder of this sect, whose religious doctrine affirmed " that God had revealed himself to mankind four times in all ages ; once in the time of Jesus, once in that of Mohammed, and lastly through Hakem, a Fatimide prince, who had been sultai\ p 4 :i6 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. of Egypt ; that Hakem was the most faithful interpreter of his will ; for Jesus had been abandoned by God and given up to an ignominious death, Mohammed had been pos- sessed by an evil spirit, but Hakem was God himself; that the Druses should ever serve him, always in secret places, but that it was permitted to them to frequent al- ternately mosques and churches." For the rest, they kept themselves free from all rules which limit the enjoyment of pleasure. Every Friday they read their religious books and ate some bread with dried raisins, and they are said to worship an idol made of iron. They recognize each other by a single question ; and they keep their secret so securely, that it is only two years since we first began to have some probable ground for conjecture on this subject. SECTION XX, THE FRENCH MONARCHY. After an abode of six years in the east, Lewis the Ninth returned to his kingdom, and re-established there the authority of the laws. His grandfather, Philip Augustus, had greatly aug- mented the power of the crown. We have seen that the dukes of Normandy, both before and since they acquired possession of the English throne, maintained, by their power and talents, an equal weight with the kings in the affairs of France. Philip availed himself of the wild adventures of king Richard, in order to shake the preponderance of these formidable vassals, and he carried on his attempt with unexpected success in the reign of John, the weak and un- fortunate successor of that prince. The latter having murdered his own nephew Arthur, Philip declared the fief of Normandy, for the possession of AD 2 4 wn * cn tne y nac * disputed, to be forfeited, and soon after made himself master of it. The &iflit of three centuries of war and political intrigue was UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 21? lost to the house of Normandy. John was too base and too contemptible to obtain aid : the English rejoiced in his hu- miliation, which afforded them facilities for restoring their freedom ; and Philip was too wise to excite envy by an ostentatious display of his power. From that time forward the power of the monarchy increased in France, and in England the freedom of the people. As Philip extended his dominions in the north-west, Lewis the Ninth was equally fortunate in the south, in uniting to the Crown the territory of the counts of Toulouse, which Philip and Lewis the Eighth had in vain attempted to effect. He gave indeed the government of the province, together with the heiress, to his brother Alfonso ; but the latter dying without issue, it devolved upon the A. D. 1271. a . crown. The kings had already acquired pos- session, by purchase, of the domains which Simon of Mont- fort had acquired in the mountains of Languedoc, in the course of his crusade against the Albigenses, and which Montfort FAmaury found himself unable to maintain. Lewis the Ninth obtained by purchase the A.D. 1258. . e ,, TT71 ., important county or Macon. While this king was yet a minor, his prudent mother had a.d. 1226. . r A ~. given assistance to the count 01 Champagne against his powerful enemies, on the condition that he should surrender to the crown the counties of Blois and Chartres. Thus the domains of the French king became every where extended in the vicinity of the most powerful vassals, so that it was henceforward as difficult for them to make any effort against him individually, as to unite their forces in any common attempt to resist the royal authority. In order to confirm this authority still further, he en- deavoured to render it respectable by a strict admini- stration of justice. The royal protection was not only the most desirable to the subject, because it was the most pow- erful, and the king did not so often stand in need of op- J18 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. pressive exactions as the inferior lords, but it was also connected with a better regulated judicial system. Four great bailiffs, as early as the reign of Philip Augustus, in Vermandois, at Sens, Macon, and St. Pierre le Moustier, received the appeals from the courts of the nobles. The desire of a judicature accessible to the people, and of re- gular laws, was too general, for the nobles to venture upon any opposition to it- The king was the acknowledged protector of public justice ; and every man who was refused his right, was sure to obtain it from the royal bailiff. As supreme feudal lord, he took cognizance of all complaints which might have any relation to feudal services ; and the obscure, corrupted, and indefinite expression of the feudal grants, was found to favour the interpretation of the most powerful party. When the Roman jurisprudence came into vogue, the inferior judges were bewildered in the mul- titude and contradictions of so many laws : the appeals were multiplied, and the judges were only acquainted with established usages. Thus the authority of these courts was on the wane from the time of Philip. Lewis the Ninth endeared himself to his subjects by the simplicity of his manners. After a fair held upon the sod, he seated himself under an oak, in the forest of Vin- cennes, and gave hearing and redress to every Frenchman. This monarch, so much revered for the sanctity of his life, to whose upright judgment foreign princes confided, with- out suspicion, the arbitration of their disputes, who, in his council, uttered maxims of wisdom, who appeared as a father and a shepherd among his people, established laws *, the violation of which seemed to be an act of im- piety. The cases presented for the royal decision f were multiplied; for what Frenchman would not gladly receive judgment from St. Lewis ? Formerly the monarchy was founded on the force of arms, but now the royal authority was established on the virtues of the sovereign. * Etablissemcns. f Cas Royaux, UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 219 SECTION XXL TUNIS AND MAROCO. Sixteen years after bis return from Palestine, Lewis undertook a second crusade against the Abuhafidae at Tunis. Fifty years had not elapsed since the deatli of Abdel- mumen, the chief of the Mowaheddin, who conquered the Morabeths, when the coast of Africa submitted to new so- vereigns. Before the supreme power had fallen in this country into the liands of a soldiery who continually re- newed their own numbers, the maintenance of authority depended always on the warlike and energetic talents of the founder of each dynasty, whose posterity soon slept in lux- urious repose on their insecure throne. At Tunis, the house of Abuhaf Omar held now a short-lived sway : the Meri- nides ruled at Maroco, descendants of Abu Bekr, son of Abdul Hakk, son of Mahbu, son of Hamama. The former molested the navigators of the Mediterranean sea. Lewis defeated them, and laid siege to their capital, but his army was weakened by diseases, which brought the mo- narch himself to his grave. As it seemed neither an easy matter to conquer Tunis, nor probable that the possession of it could be maintained, the French commanders -were contented with a treaty, by which it was agreed that the ex- pences of the war should be paid, some monasteries erected, and a tribute secured to Charles, the king of Sicily, bro- ther of St. Lewis. The Abuhafidse and Merinides received no further mo- lestation from the Europeans. Literature was honoured in their country : annually, at the birth-day of the great prophet, poets contended at Fez for the prize of the sublimest song; a fleet horse, a beautiful slave, an em- broidered robe, and the precedence before all the bards 220 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. of the same year. The land was populous, well cultivated, and gaily ornamented with cities and magnificent palaces. Never had the Jews in the time of their dispersion boasted of so splendid a period of literature : here Averroes develo, cd the genius of the most intelligent of their teach- ers, Rabbi Moses Ben Maimon, who has illustrated their law witii such luminous conception, and such an authori- tative judgment, that he holds the highest 1 unk among those who have exerted their faculties on it, since the time of the first Moses. Hii principles have continued to this day to govern the opinions of a great part of his nation, and have excited the admiration of philosophers. The numberless heights and vallies of Daran, or Mount Atlas, became more and more occupied by pastoral tribes. The negro kingdoms beyond the sandy desert, became known by the journies of caravans ; camels traversed the pathless solitude ; and wherever springs issued forth from the arid surface, pastoral stations were established. The courts of Africa were not only the granaries of southern Europe, but were also enriched by the export of cattle, cotton manufactures, tapestry, works of glass, and various kinds of honey and resin. These productions were conveyed from the warehouses of Algiers, Tolometta, Biserte, and from the great market of Alexandria. Al- Gazayari, which we call Algiers, was founded in this age. The towns were surrounded by beautiful gardens and mea- dows, and necessity had instructed the people in the method of irrigating them. For the rest, the cities of Africa abounded in every pleasure to which the climate incited, and the law of Islam imposed few troublesome restraints. Ceuta w;b fortified in the vicinity of the strait; further in the country, in the midst of villages and populous ham- lets, on a river a Inch gave movement to three thousand mills, arose Telemsan, and on the confines of the unin- habitable region, the Vandalic Odegast; but Tunis was most splendidly decorated, from the ruins of old Carthage, UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 221 with the remains of Roman sculpture, and the works of the Aolabites, and other illustrious sultans and emirs. Flourish- es 7 ing towns were scattered in the ample plains of the Date- country, or Belad-al-jerid, through which sheiks wandered in freedom with their hordes, who revered, in the sultan of Tunis or Maroco, their protector and supreme judge. Such was northern Africa : its people were as brave as the ancient Carthaginians, and full of the inventive sagacity of Numidia. Every youth was instructed from his cradle in the use of arms : rocks, deserts, and ramparts secured their towns; and the use of gunpowder was known to them long before Europe became acquainted with it. The chiefs lived on the produce of their lands; and public expendi- tures were provided for by tributes from the herds and other property. SECTION XXII. SPAIN. On the 16 th of July, in the 1210th year of our era, the superiority of the Christians over the Arabs or Moors in Spain, was finally decided. On that day Alfonso the Eighth, king of Castile, assisted by the princes of his own faith, fought on the field of Las Navas de Tolosa, near Ubida, in the kingdom of Jaen, against the countless hosts of Mulek-en-Nasr Mohammed, the Mowaheddish sultan of Maroco. The Christian monarch obtained a complete victory. . _ The only son of Alfonso died without heirs ; A.D. 1230. _ _ . J _ t _ . _ _ . _ and JBerdinand, the son of his daughter, united . ~ Castile and Leon. Having thus become more A D 1236 powerful than the former kings, he conquered . _ Baeza and Cordova, and after a difficult siege A. D. 1248=, of eighteen months, made himself master of the magnificent Seville. Ferdinand fixed his residence in the Kasr, or palace of the Arabian princes, which is yet 222 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. befell surrounded with labyrinths of myrtle and with finely \ D 1 'o watere0 - g al *dens. Setting out thence he gained possession of Cadiz : in vain the mountains of Jaens opposed themselves to his career : the coasts no longer allowed reinforcements to arrive from Africa to the Arabian Spaniards, and Grenada was henceforward their chief pos- session. While the power of Castile was established by Ferdi- nand, who was nephew to the mother of St. Lewis, himself a hero and a saint, the county of Catalonia, with Roussillon, in the Pyrenees, was united to the kingdom of ADil6° Alfonso the Second, of Arragon, by the more ^ ^ peaceful way of inheritance. The crowns of Castile and Arragon soon shared between them the finest and strongest provinces, whose inhabitants were valiant warriors bv sea and land. In the reign A. D. 1238. _ _ * _. w _ oi King layme the Jbirst, Valencia was con- quered. This achievement was obtained by Rodrigo Diaz, the Cid of Vivar, in Old Castile, the noble champion of liberty and the faith. Already the same king had driven the last of the Zeirides, of the house which formerly held the sovereignty of Tunis, out of their ancient A. D. 1229. Pelver in the Balearic islands ; and in order that the power of the infidels might be broken by a double warfare, a school for the Arabian language was founded for Franciscan missionaries on the island Foradada. SECTION XXIII. PORTUGAL AND CASTILE. On the other side of the Spanish peninsula, A I) 1 185 Sancho el Poplador, king of Portugal, ad- vanced with heroic steps in the path marked out for him by his father the first king. He had to contend with famine, war, and pestilence, yet secured prosperity for his king- dom. Crusaders from England, Friesland, and Holland, 8 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 223 assisted him in conquering Sylves, the capital of Algarve. Although Abu Yussuf Yakub, and his son A. D. 1 189. Malek-en-Nasr Mohammed, chief of the Mo- waheddin, forced Sancho to relinquish this acquisition ; yet a part of Algarve remained to him, and its capital yielded to the good fortune of his grandson Alfonso the Third, whose conquests would have been more extensive if he had not been impeded by the jealousy of Castile. The enthusiasm of the Arabs of Spain had been at first irresistible ; but victory at length crowned their more per- severing antagonists. Alfonso the Wise, king of Leon and Castile, -whose fame had induced some of the electors of Germany to invite him A D 1257 t0 * m P er * a ^ tnrone 5 gave his people written laws *, and was celebrated as a learned astro- nomer. This monarch forced Alfonso-el- Restaurador to swear to support him in his wars with fifty lances, for the privilege of retaining his Algarvian con- A.D.1279 — 1525. F 8 _ , , 8 & quests. JDenis, however, crown-prince of Portugal, whose reign of almost fifty years was long named as the happiest era of that kingdom, prevailed on the Castilian monarch, in his old age, to withdraw this badge of the dependence of his house. For the rest, the kings were obliged, by their frequent wars, to solicit aids of their subjects, and always stood in need of the arms of the nobles. On these necessities were founded the liberties of the states ; and the Spaniards fought with the greater energy, as they contended in the cause of freedom. The royal power was more or less predominant, according to the personal character of the sovereign. The A D 1245 VODT P tuous Sancho-el-Cupolo was deposed from his throne by the Portuguese, who were A D 1279 su PP orte d m tn i s attempt by the spiritual father of Christendom : his wiser nephew, the famous Denis, father of his country, found no limits to his power. * Las Partidas. 2M UNIVERSAL HISTORY. The king sought to render himself the most powerful lord in the kingdom, and thus to become independent of the will of the states; but this design did not escape the notice of the great vassals. When Alfonso the Second enacted a law, that the princes who had received appanages should respect the sovereign power of the first-born, he wanted influence to carry it into effect. In other kingdoms of the peninsula the nobles, in Por- tugal the church, made the most formidable opposition to the crown. From the time when the first Alfonso, wishing to secure in his favour the influence of the pope over the crusaders, consigned his kingdom to the apostles Peter and Paul, and sent annually four ounces of gold to Rome as an acknowledgement of feudal dependence, the pope was ac- customed to regard Portugal as his own possession. Inno- cent the Third once attempted to increase the tribute; but the country was neither sufficiently rich, nor Sancho-el- Poplador weak enough, for the success of this project. When Alfonso the Third sought the aid of Innocent the Fourth in deposing his brother, the pope availed himself of this opportunity to establish on record the tributary state of Portugal.* There were, besides, not a few disputes be- tween the kings and the bishops concerning the pretensions urged by the latter to a complete immunity from all con- tributions to the maintenance of the armies, concerning the number of estates in mortmain, and the resort of the young clergymen to the university of Paris. In Spain the church favoured the regal power; she as- sisted, indeed, to deprive bold and enterprising kings of their thrones and their lives, but the foundations of kingly authority were maintained. The princes of the Visigoths had distinguished themselves by the titles of " catholic, right- believing, most christian kings, and friends of God:" so their successors appeared most willingly as leaders in the + Maxime cum regnura sit Romanae ecclesiae censuale. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 22.0 holy war for the church and the faith. The throne and the altar gave each other mutual support in other designs, in which their union was not so salutary : Quo fonte derivata clades In patriam, populumque fluxit : for in consequence of this union the national liberty was lost. After the time of Alfonso the Fifth, there is no trace of the right of election formerly exercised by the states of Leon. The church assisted the kings in confounding their own authority, limited by the ancient customs of their na- tion, with the despotic power of the old Caesars; and se- veral Spanish kings even assumed the title of Jmperatores. The church laboured for centuries in establishing the royal power : in return it availed itself of this power, ac- cording to its pleasure ; and in Spain its designs have been carried into effect. Thus the Christian kingdoms obtained the preponder- ance in the Spanish peninsula. The kings of Castile were the most powerful on account of the situation of their states : Arragon was more opulent, while Portugal was as yet in its infancy. The counts of Champagne, heirs of the royal house of Vigorre, governed Navarre, The vicinity of Ar- ragon, and the scattered situation of its territories, pre- sented the increase of the latter state. SECTION XXIV. PROGRESS OF THE FRENCH MONARCHY. In the time of Frederick the Second, the king of France v as, next to the emperor, the most powerful monarch in all ( hristendom. The state of affairs was greatly changed since, in the reign of Lewis the Seventh, imperial ministers wrote on the part of " their most serene and august lord to his excellence the king of France," as to a subordinate prince. The French kings aimed not at that universal vol. ii. o 226 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. power, by the pursuit of which the emperors had been kd into great calamities. They established for themselves a more secure sway, by gradually connecting, under their sceptre, the provinces of their own fruitful country. Philip Augustus, who had won Normandy, brought into the possession of the crown the territory of Artois, through his marriage with Isabella of Honnegau; and after the . _ house of Vermandois became extinct, con- A.D.1I80. _ _ r _ quered the ancient county of that name, to- A.D. 1185. gether with Amiens. The great vassals long maintained that independence, in consequence of which Hugh duke of Burgundy thought himself justified in concluding a treaty with the emperor Henry the Sixth, stipulating, that in the wars between the emperor and the French king, Hugh should always op- pose his arms to the aggressor, though it. should be his own feudal sovereign. Thus the cotrtfT^of Savoy, who pos- sessed many estates in France, formed a close alliance with England. In the same interest Hugh of Lusignan, count of La Marche, bore arms against Lewis the Ninth. The latter, however, understood better than any other king the true interests of his throne. He refused the offer of the imperial crown, and sought no acquisition beyond the Pyrenees. He caused Bezeirs and Carcas- sone to be relinquished to him, subdued count Roger de Foix, Peter Mauclerc duke of Brittany, the count of La Marche and Angouleme, and confirmed the liberties of Toulouse, which restrained the power of the counts. He married the eldest daughter of Raymond count of Provence, and yet suffered that nobleman to make his fourth daughter his heiress, whose husband was Charles the king's brother. By the marriage of Robert of Clermont with Beatrice of Bourbon, whose mother had brought to her consort prince John of Burgundy, the domain of Bourbon, that territory* and the name attached to it, devolved on the royal house* UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 227 SECTION XXV. FOUNDATION OF ENGLISH LIBERTY. These aggrandizements of the French monarchy were .facilitated by disturbances in England. The despotic power of the kings ceased in the reign of John, the same prince who lost the possession of Normandy. The barons of England forced him to promulgate the A. D. 1214. ° Magna Charta, the fundamental charter of British freedom. The Magna Charta contains the principles of the con- stitution, the application of which has been regulated by late enactments : the former declares the intention of the law ; the latter define the means by which powerful indi- viduals are to be held in obedience to its decrees. The abuses of the feudal law are not abolished in a very definite manner by this charter : it was, however, the first of those ordinances by which they have been finally suppressed. It ordains that the judicial court shall be fixed in one place, and no longer be moved to and fro with the king, in order that it may appear that the law rules without ex- ternal impulsion. It was now that the important point was settled, that no Englishman can be deprived of his liberty, fortune, country, or life, without a trial according to the common law of the land, before sworn arbiters, selected from his own rank. The laws relating to property were defined in a most accurate manner; no man can be hin- dered in the disposition of his fortune ; and their property is secured to foreign merchants in the case of war having been declared against their nations. Already the weights and measures were the same throughout the British empire. The rights of the ecclesiastics were confirmed, in order that every rank might be interested in maintaining the consti- • tution and the freedom of elections, as every other privilege became a national law. It was reserved, indeed, for the king to refuse his confirmation to an election ; but he was 2 2 228 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. obliged to assign his reasons. Provision was made that too many estates should not fall into mortmain, which would have been prejudicial to the interests of the country. But the source of all political freedom, was the law that no im- post could be levied by the king without the consent of the archbishops, bishops, earls, and great barons of the em- pire personally assembled, and of the inferior vassals who held immediately of the crown, summoned according to districts by the sheriffs or bailiffs. These traces of a representative constitution, and of the participation of the states in the public councils, are the first that occur in English history since the time of the old Anglo-Saxon kings : under the weak administration of Henry the Third they multiply, and the British parliament begins to rise out of obscurity and insignificance. In pro- portion as the kings alienated the crown lands, in conse- quence of their necessities or imbecility, and as the lower ranks enriched themselves by industry and commerce, the third state, or the commoners, became more important in the country. They retained the spirit of freedom more constantly than either of the other classes ; so that even powerful kings were obliged to court their favour. The name of the third state first appears in the history of Henry the Third's reign. Their rights were more ancient, but had been suppressed by the first Norman kings. The city of London, fortified by high walls and numer- ous towers, was situated in a tract of country beautifully diversified by woods, meadows, and gardens. Adjoining to it, on the Thames, was the fortress of the kings. Lon- don was already a much frequented commercial town, whither Arabs from Spain imported spiceries and purple from the east and south ; the Normans, iron and arms ; and the Russians, peltry. The Sundays were devoted to martial exercises among the younger citizens, and holidays were often celebrated by the representation of a sea-fight. Com- bats of bears, falcons, and cocks, were the chief delight of the citizens ; and among the laws which restored to them UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 229 their lost freedom, they were most pleased with that which permitted them to engage in the chase. The laws of foreign nations were the favourite objects of their study. London joined its arms to those of Simon de Monfort earl of Leicester, and the other barons, in the cause, as it supposed, of liberty, against Henry the Third and the royal house. The brave prince Edward propped up indeed the tottering throne ; and Lewis the Ninth, with the help of the pope, mediated a pacification: but it was only the splendid qualities of the succeeding monarch that prevented the monarchy from falling into immediate ruin. The Kymri, descended from the ancient inhabitants of Britain, still maintained, in the mountains of Wales, their independence and their hereditary hatred against the English. The latter had not yet obtained that decisive superiority over the Scots, which Edward, availing himself of the dis- putes concerning the succession to the Scottish A.D.X292. \ 6 _ throne, shortly atterwards acquired. SECTION XXVI. THE NETHERLANDS. On the Continent, the provinces of the Low Countries and the cities of Lower Germany were alone worthy to be compared with England in industry and the love of free- dom. The towns in Brabant and Flanders obtained the municipal rights about the middle of the twelfth century, and those in Holland in the beginning of the thirteenth. They were as yet too weak to entertain thoughts of free- dom ; but the spirit of independence existed in the governors of the country. The counts of Holland, the bishops and barons of Utrecht, acknowledged no proper superior ; and between the counts of Flanders and the kings of France, contests were carried on with alternations of success, and with resources not very unequal. In Friesland there existed such an attachment to freedom, S 3 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. that nations, who at the present day are scarcely named, supported their struggle against great armies with an heroism that reminds us of the valour of the Swiss. With equal activity they fought against the inroads of the sea and the aggressions of spiritual and temporal lords, when they inter- fered with their privileges. Friesland remained under elec- tive magistrates. It required nothing less than a crusade to ^ ^ subdue the people of Steding; and the greater number of them, after taking beforehand a severe revenge, fell, overcome by superior numbers. A longer resistance was made by Ditmarsch; the natural strength of which assisted in maintaining its freedom against the power of Denmark and the counts of Nordalbing. As soon as the defeat of Bornhbvede had broken the strength of king Waldemar, the people of Ditmarsch drove out the nobility, declared themselves against all the attempts of their neighbours, and against all innovations in their an- cient customs, became powerful by land and sea, and were often appealed to, to settle the disputes of more powerful nations. SECTION XXVII. THE POWER OF DENMARK. All the courts of northern Germany, in the twelfth and the beginning of the thirteenth century, dreaded the pre- ponderance of the Danish power. Since the time of Canute, the conqueror of England, no count had governed the united domain of Nordalbing. The inhabitants, divided among petty lords, lived, like the Normans, on piracy; and, at home, their pastures supported numerous herds. The governing power was gradually accumulated in the hands of Adolphus of the house of Schaumburg, whom the duke of Saxony had appointed count of Holstein, and in those of his descendants. At the dismemberment of the sovereignty of Henry the Lion, Adolphus the Third rendered himself UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 231 independent; and that prince and his posterity carried on many bloody wars against Henry and the kings of Den- mark. Mecklenburg was a fief of the Danish kings, and was even acknowledged as such by the emperor. Pomerania, according to the fortunes and talents of its dukes, was some- times subject to the Danes ; at others, the most powerful principality between the Elbe and the Vistula. It is well known that the Wendish Breslau was indebted to a Danish adventurer, lieutenant of a Polish duke, for its A.D. 1253. . i , , • . r • , ! increase and the beginning ot its splendour. Peter Vlast, for such was the name of this count, founded in that district seventy-seven churches. Thus the Danes, who had supported the idolatry of the Saxons against Charlemain, now communicated civilization and the Chris- tian faith to the Slavonian hordes. SECTION XXVIII. CULTIVATION OF SWEDEN. In Sweden also, culture was extended notwithstanding the disturbances which shook the state ; and workmen from Germany completed the opening of the ancient mine-: of Dalecarlia. The pope commanded an university * to be founded at Skenning, and schools + to be A. D. 1219. . 8 1 erected in all the great churches ; and the monastery of Wadstena attained the same rank in Sweden which Bangor held among the Britons, and St. Galle among the Germans. The monks of Wadstena had collected more than two thousand manuscripts. * Studium generate. f Trivialia. 232 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. SECTION XXIX. LIVONIA AND PRUSSIA. About the same em Christian missionaries prepared Livonia and Esthonia, by their simple exhortations, for the reception of the Gospel : whereupon Albert, bishop of Riga, under the authority of pope Innocent the Third, formed the soldiers of Christ, knights of the sword and A. D. 1201. . fo cross, into the pastors, conquerors, and law- givers of this country. This institution seemed to the Polish duke of Masovia, so available for restraining the restless ferocity of his neigh- bours the Prussians; that as the Teutonic knights were no longer employed with the wars of Syria, he invited to his court the grand master, Herrmann of Salza, A.D. 1227. & with his whole order. In the course of fifty- six years, which elapsed before Burkard of Schwauden became grand-master, the knights had completed the con- quest and conversion of Prussia, fromMasovia to the borders of Courland and Livonia, and the order formed a coalition with the champions who ruled the latter province. SECTION XXX. POLAND AND SILESIA. The civilization of the adjoining parts of Germany pro* duced an effect on Poland itself: it gave new power to the dukedom, and enabled the Polish Piast, named Przemysl, to assume the royal dignity. Yet Poland was molested on one side by Russians or Tatars, on the other A D 1295 by other Slavonian tribes; and the power of this kingdom was slowly established, until in later times the junction of Lithuania, and favourable conjunctures, gave it a great increase. A kindred branch of the house of the Piasts, descendants UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 233 of Vladislaf, being banished from Poland, . 18* aC q U j re j p OSSess i on f Silesia, and founded principalities, which attained to a far higher degree of splen- dour and prosperity than their mother country. The house of Vladislaf governed this fortunate province more than five hundred years. SECTION XXXI. RUSSIA. We have mentioned above how the czar became tributary to the leaders of the Golden horde. Of aH the Russian cities, Novgorod was the most independent and powerful ; industry and opulence following as the natural consequences of freedom. The revolution of Livonia opened to Russia a communication with the north-west of Europe, and Lubeck established commercial alliances with Novgorod and Ples- koff. But, in the interior, these first-fruits of good policy and prosperous circumstances soon declined. Money be- came so scarce, that cities ransomed themselves from plunder with five rix dollars. Russia possessed no coinage of money before the fifteenth century ; and in the seventeenth, mixed metals w r ere first used. The skins of a species of squirrel were used for small currency ; and these animals were given in tribute to the chan. Such, at least, is the interpretation assigned by some to a passage in the old chronicles, from which others understand that a certain number of Russian virgins were annually surrendered to the barbarians. SECTION XXXII. CONSTANTINOPLE. » ^ Constantinople, where the power of the A. D. 1261. r western conquerors never obtained any secure footing, was retaken in one night by a general of the Ni- c«an emperor, Michael Palseologus, without the knowledge 234 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. of his sovereign, without any planned or regular siege, by a secret understanding with Kutrizak, a private citizen. Michael, through perjury, and by depriving the young em- peror, John Lascaris, of his eyes, had made for himself a way to the throne, which John Vatazes Lascaris, grand- father of his unfortunate victim, had established. His ad* ministration was disturbed ; and a pious patriarch refused him absolution from a crime of which he continued to enjoy the fruits. Yet his great talents, notwithstanding numerous schisms, maintained tranquillity abroad, and some appear- ance of imperial authority. SECTION XXXIII. LITERATURE. This period of the Grecian empire was recorded by the pens of statesmen ; but the treasures of ancient literature were now inaccessible to the Greeks, and the western peo- ple made no use of them as long as the libraries, together with the capital, continued in their possession. Yet in George the Acropolite, and in Gregorius Pachymeres, some remaining tincture of eloquence is perceptible, when we compare their works with those of the western states- men. Among the scholars of the west, we discern the growing spirit of freedom, the source of elevated thoughts. The historian Otho, bishop of Freysingen, an Austrian prince, Giinther, Albert of Stade, Conrad of Lichtenau, abbot of Ursperg, and others, deserve to be compared with the Greeks, and in some respects excel them : yet we are willing to avow, that no stranger has painted with such a pencil the barbarism of manners, the crimes and ignorance of the clergy, as the learned and spirited John of Salisbury; that in veracity and liberality no Greek historian can be compared to the British Matthew Paris ; and that in spite of a thousand impediments, the wonderful genius of Roger UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 235 Bacon threw aside the shackles of prejudice, and at the ex- pense of external prosperity and personal liberty, opened to itself, in the thirteenth century, a new path, into which, in the seventeenth, the name-sake of this philosopher found it difficult to recall the thoughts of mankind. He pene- trated so deeply into the secrets of nature, that the germ of the greatest discoveries is to be found in his works; and it may be esteemed an instance of good fortune, that super- stition, whose empire he alarmed, did not sacrifice him to her safety. ' -We may remember that he lived but shortly before that Parisian synod, which ordered the metaphysics of Aristotle to be burnt, because it was foretold that Anti- christ would avail himself of them at the end of time, in order to bring trouble upon simple-hearted Christians. The emperor Frederick the Second would have best ap- preciated the merits of Bacon. He caused Aristotle to be translated from the Arabic ; he recommended the study of the Hippocrates, the teacher of the true art of healing ; he ordered that a public dissection should be performed every five years, and forbad any physician to profess the practice of his art who was unskilled in anatomy. Yet Ebn Sina, or Avicenna, maintained his authority in the schools : his ingenious subtilty pleased better than the dry intellect of the profound Aristotle : false ideas, which were be- lieved to be Aristotelian, but which originated from the translators of that philosopher, perplexed anew the minds of reflecting persons. The progress of the western Euro- peans, in science, was the more tardy, as their genius was not developed by its own powers, but depended on foreign culture. Paris and Bologna were the chief universities. Philoso- phy struggled here to raise her head : here the Roman law was interpreted, not learnedly, (for history and antiquity were but little known,) but with acuteness and ingenuity. Salerno, celebrated for the rules of diet prescribed by John of Milan, was a seat of the sciences under the duke^ 236 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. of the ninth century. Frederick now decreed that no phy- sician, who had not pursued his studies there, should be permitted to take a doctor's degree. At the same time schools were founded at Naples, and in the Austrian Vienna ; and Prague, under Przemysl Ottocar, contained the first school of grammar, logic, and physics, for the in- struction of the Slavonian tribes. Toulouse and other French cities profited by a disturb- ance which broke out in Paris soon after the reign of Philip Augustus, which put the students at that univer- sity under the necessity of dispersing. In general the spirit of independence was the occasion of such turmoils. The university-privileges endowed the professors with a certain political authority, which was necessary for main- taining discipline, but excited in their disciples a love of freedom which, in the age of the passions, easily dege- nerated into licentiousness. A war between Bologna and Forli . gave occasion to the establishment of the high school of Padua, where philosophy and theology were soon taught with celebrity. Some wise admonitions on the method of study are found in the works of the abbot Engelbert of Admont, written during this interval, which in other respects display much talent: " that the soul of labour is regularity: that the best means of doing every thing well, is the principle of never attempting to advance until we have made our- selves masters of the previous steps; and that we must never look upon ourselves as complete scholars, but con- tinue ever to learn." SECTION XXXIV. RECAPITULATION. We have thus surveyed the age of the powerful emperor Frederick the Second, and his struggle against the pa- pacy. We observe the eastern people remain ever like UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 237 themselves; we have seen dynasties formed as rapidly as those of Nebuchadnezzar and Cyrus ; and as easily, like the empires of Sardanapalus, Xerxes, and the Ptolemies, be- come enervated by luxury, fall into confusion and vanish. The south and the west of Asia were overwhelmed by Moguls, as irresistible as in the time of Cyaxares, who were as speedily swept away, the power of their hordes being lost in dispersion. In Europe we have remarked, after the long movements of the stormy north had subsided, and after the transitory dominion with which his per- sonal qualities had invested Charlemain, had passed away, how one nation imposed restraints on the power of another, and how they mutually forced each other to seek from agriculture and commerce what their ancestors had acquired by the sword. Hence not only civilization arose, but even among that class of men who were kept by our ancestors in the bonds of slavery, a consciousness of their • powers, and the love of freedom, sprang up. Some even elevated themselves to the study of nature, the investiga- tion of religious doctrine, and the exposition of the rights of men. In the east, where the feelings of men are warmer, and the imagination takes a nobler flight, all the forms of reli- gion had their origin. These sensible representations as- sumed in the west a speculative character. In the east, heroes and lawgivers availed themselves of them : with us, they contribute to civilization and social order. In Europe, there was more art and perseverance in plans : in Asia, every thing yielded to an energy which instantly over- whelmed. Hence the more lasting superiority remains with us, and the more polished and enlightened each nation of Europe has become, the greater has been its power. ( 238 ) BOOK XVII. GRADUAL TRANSITION FROM THE SOCIAL ORDER OF THE MIDDLE AGES, TO THAT OF MODERN TIMES. A.D. 1273—1453. SECTION I. INTERREGNUM. U pwards of sixty towns, situated between the Alps and Cologne along the course of the Rhine, had formed the Rhenish confederacy, which held its regular sessions at Mayence, Worms, and Strasburg. In the north, eighty commercial cities, of which Bremen, Hamburg, Lubeck, Brunswick, Erfurt, and Dantzick were the principal, and with which London, Bruges, Bergen, and Novgorod were associated, formed the Hanseatic union. These combina- tions were both founded on commercial interests, and dif- fered in that respect from the Swiss confederacy, the only object of which was freedom. As the more powerful electors refused to acknowledge the monarchs w r ho were chosen by some of their brethren after the decease of Frederick, it appears that the German empire possessed no point of union, by the influence of which it might have been able to maintain its former ascendancy in the European commonwealth. From this time the empire contained many powerful and flourishing principalities, while the whole body was feeble and disjointed : hence the national feeling underwent a change, and public spirit diminished in proportion as the several states became separate and distinct. The interest of their families w r as the chief object of the princes ; who not only provided for T 5 UNIVERSAL I IT STORY. 239 the transference of their fiefs as heritable property, but con- cluded compacts of inheritance, by which the succession was secured to distant relatives or friends. No longer fearing the ascendancy of the emperor, they cast a jealous eye on the privileges of the inferior nobles, to whom each petty prince stood in the same relation which the emperor had formerly held with respect to his own ancestors. Even the form of ancient freedom remained only in those pro- vinces the princes of which had acquired but little power, as Franconia, Swabia, and the Rhenish territories. The ducal authority in Franconia and Swabia ceased at the extinction of the family of Hohenstaufen : and from this time the knights of the empire, for their own security, began to enter into the confederacy which still exists under their name. It is easy to conceive the unsettled state of affairs, when there was no emperor, no duke of Swabia, Fran- conia, or Austria, and no landgrave of Thuringia : the roads, the navigable waters, and indeed the whole face of the country, was exposed to the predatory excursions of the lawless knights and nobles, who inhabited innumerable fortresses ; and the princes of the empire began to wish for a monarch, who should have sufficient authority and pru- dence to restore order, but not power enough to render him dangerous to their private interests. SECTION II. RUDOLPH OF HABSBURG. At this period count Rudolph, of the house of Habs- burg, had acquired by his talents, boldness, and popular manners, the esteem of the higher ranks ; as well as of the citizens, whom he had frequently protected against the op- pressions of the barbarous and despotic lords in their vi- cinity: he had long been the declared protector and chiel of the cities of Zurich and Strasburg, and of the fores.; cantons w r hich are situated at tKe entrance of the Alps of 240 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. St. Gothard. His hereditary power was inconsiderable: but as be bad been richly endowed by nature, he found resources which insured him success, in his great capacity and military talents. His manners displayed the frankness and sincerity which distinguish a great man. Such was the chief whom the princes of Germany placed A.D.1273. ... _ _ h . on the throne or the empire. Rudolph conducted the affairs of his government with paternal dignity, and with the benevolence which he had been accustomed to exercise toward the meanest of his people. He made no display of external magnificence, but founded his authority entirely on his merit; and continued, in great engagements, to evince as much contempt of death, as when he had no crown to lose. He contributed to the prosperity of the empire in many respects, and particularly to the restoration of its internal peace ; and he laid the foundation of the future greatness of his own house. Ru- dolph compelled Przemysl Ottocar, king of Bohemia and duke of Austria, to acknowledge his feudal subordination : but the latter renewed the war, at the instigation of his consort ; and the emperor, on the Marchfeld A.D.127S. . 4 . . ^ m Austria, obtained a decisive victory. 1 he king was betrayed by some of his people, whom he had irritated by many tyrannical proceedings, and was put to death, in his flight, by two noblemen of Stiria. A D 17* Rudolph concluded a peace with the young king Wenceslaf, whom he left in possession of his hereditary dominions, and married to his daughter, a princess of great beauty. Austria, Stiria, Carinthia, and Carniola, were confiscated as vacant fiefs, and remained for four years under the immediate tutelage of the crown. . • After having obtained the consent of the elec- A.D.1282. £ tors at the diet of Augsburg, the emperor in- vested his two sons, counts Albert and Rudolph, with the duchy of Austria, Stiria, Windismark, and Carniola, as fiefs of the empire. To the landgrave Meinhard of Tyrol, of 1 1 UNIVERSAL HISTORY, J41 the house of the counts of Goritz, who had always been hia faithful friend, and whose daughter was married to count Albert, he gave the duchy of Carinthia. Such was the beginning of the dominion of the house of Habsburg over its more considerable hereditary terri- tories within the empire. The landgraviate in Upper Al- sace devolved upon it by inheritance, together with estates in Suabia, to which king Rudolf added his mother's in- heritance, the county of Kiburg, including Baden and Lenzburg; together with the possession of Lucern, Frei- burg, the protectorship of Sekingen, and some insulated estates, which he acquired by various compacts. SECTION III. ADOLF AND ALBERT, KINGS OF THE GERMANS. A D 1291 Rudolf died in advanced age, after having confirmed the power of his own family, and conferred the greatest benefits on the empire by the restoi- ation of public order and tranquillity. The electors, partly from dislike, and partly through jealousy of his son Albert, raised count Adolf, of the house of Nassau, to A. D. 1292. _ the throne. The family of Nassau is descended from Otho, the brother of that Conrad who had obtained the crown of Germany at the extinction of the Carlovingian dynasty. This Otho was a count, and resided at Laurenburg, on the Lahn : his fa- mily became divided into several branches, from one of which, viz. from the house of Weilburg, Adolf was de- scended. The revenues attached to the royal office had been di- minished, by a third part, since the death of Ferdinand II. : several of them had been bestowed by Rudolf on nobles of different ranks. This decline obliged those kings, who possessed but moderate hereditary wealth, to contrive ex- traordinary means of supporting their authority, and Adolf VOL. II. . R 242 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. cast bis eye on Thuringia. The margrave Albert, of Meissen, sovereign of that country, who was possessed with an unnatural hatred against his legitimate sons, sold Thuringia to Adolf, to the exclusion of them, and in fa- vour of a bastard son. Partly in order to obtain the money necessary for this purchase, Adolf entered into a subsidiary treaty against France with Edward king of England. Mean- while Albert of Austria took advantage of this, and of other circumstances adverse to the influence of the king, formed a strong party against him, and procured himself to be elected in his stead. Adolf, who was a valiant commander, contended unsuccessfully for his dignity, and A.D. 1298. ... . . fell, as it is said, by the hand of his rival. King Albert was one of the first princes who, in the ad- ministration of their governments, brought into practice the principles of the present monarchies. The privileges of the nobles and the rights of the people, were the objects of his detestation because they continually opposed obstacles to his will. He endeavoured to carry his arbitrary designs into execution, in every possible mode, by military force : and, in order to maintain the power of his arms in sufficient vigour, he found it necessary to extend his territories, as the countries already subjected to his sway were not able to furnish resources commensurate with his ambitious projects. He also endeavoured to aggrandise himself at the ex- pense of the margraves of Meissen ; and after many dissen- sions with his brother-in-law Wenceslaf, which procured him no advantage, he availed himself of an opportunity A D 1306 a ^ orc * ec ^ ky the death of that nobleman's heir, in whom the royal family of Bohemia became extinct, in order to compel the states to elevate his own son to the throne. On the failure of the house of Vlaarding in the person of John, grandson of William count of Hol- land and Zealand, who had formerly been elected king of the Germans, he attempted to appropriate those sovereign- ties, and at the same time alarmed the petty tribes in the Alps UNIVERSAL HISTORY. '243 which bordered on his hereditary dominions. He subdued Rudolf, archbishop of Salzburg, and oppressed his successor Conrad : he contended against the opposition which began to manifest itself in Stiria, and infringed upon the liberties of Vienna. This active prince attained the proposed object of almost all his enterprises. He humbled the states, but drew upon himself so much detestation on that account, that his neighbours entered into a confederacy against him : his activity enabled him to dissipate their immature plans, but he obtained no further advantage from his good fortune. In Bohemia, Hungary, and Bavaria, the admi- nistration of affairs was in disorder, and the authority of the sovereign in a precarious state; but the general aversion to Albert sufficed to preserve all these countries from sub- jection to his sway. He was assassinated, not without the concurrence, as is supposed, of several princes, by his nephew John, of whose inheritance he unjustly A. D. 1508. . , . .... / _ : retained possession; and his house was excluded, during four generations, from the throne of Germany. This was the event of the administration of a prince who possessed many good and great qualities, but who neglected to deserve and acquire the affection and confidence of his people. SECTION IV. THE HOUSE OF LUXEMBURG. Henry, count of Luxemburg, who was recommended only by his personal merit, succeeded to the throne of Ger- many. He took advantage of the hatred of the Bohemian nobles to the family of Albert, and of the need in which they stood of his authority for their protection, in order to induce them to bestow their crown upon his son John : and thus the sceptre of Bohemia, after the death of the mis- guided Wenceslaf, the last descendant of the ancient kings, R 2 244 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. and after the short reign of Rudolf of Austria, and the weak administration of Henry of Carinthia, came into the hands of the counts of Luxemburg. John, who married the princess Elizabeth, sister of Wenceslaf^ was an ener- getic and courageous prince. He and his successors opposed not less resistance to the rising greatness of the house of Habsburg, than the latter, in modern times, have main- tained against the growing power of Prussia. SECTION V. NAPLES AND SICILY. It will be necessary, before we relate the expedition of king Henry VII. into Italy, to take a view of the state of that country since the time when Clement IV. and Charles of Anjou had extirpated the family of Hohenstaufen. The latter prince was king of Naples and Sicily, and had been invested with the chief temporal dignity in Rome, under the title of Senator : he was justly hated for his ava- rice, inhumanity, and haughtiness; and was besides a foreigner, and of a nation whose manners were in many respects opposite to those of the Italians. But Rudolf, king of the Germans, was so far from forming a powerful party in Italy, that he sold privileges to many of the cities, which became the foundation of their liberties. The nobles were also animated by a desire of independent power ; and it was in this spirit that John Orsini, who succeeded to the chair of St. Peter, under the name of Nicholas III., en- ^ ^ deavoured to erect principalities for his family in Lombardy and in Tuscany, and was ac- cordingly the more anxious to find occupation at home for his troublesome neighbour Charles. With this view he fomented discontents among the sub- jects of that prince, which were augmented by the establish- ment of the Inquisition. The more they suffered from the vexations and oppressions of Charles and his French fa- 13 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 245 vourites, the more they were inclined to listen to the pro- posals of Constantia of Hohenstaufen, queen of Arragon, who vehemently urged her husband Peter, and her sons, to revenge her family, and to raise themselves to a higher degree of power and splendour. The pope, however, who favoured these plans, died, and was succeeded by Martin IV., a French cardinal, who was guided by totally different in- tentions ; but designs, which are projected in genuine ac- cordance with the public feeling, often produce their effect after their authors have ceased to direct their execution. The astronomer Brunetti, in Romagna, and the phy- ^ sician John Procida, in Sicily, communicated on the same day the signal for the universal massacre of the French. Peter of Arragon, soon after this occurrence, was called to the throne of Sicily : Charles in vain had recourse to arms, and in vain the pope launched his maledictions : the former died of vexation for his loss,, and the descendants of the grand-daughter of the Emperor Frederick maintained, for centuries, the dominion which they owed, in this instance, to the will of the Sicilians. The house of Anjou retained the kingdom of Naples, the terri- tory in the vicinity of Rome, and the marquisate of Ancona. Princes of commanding talent, descended from this family, acquired the crowns of Hungary, Dalmatia, Sla- vonia, Croatia, and Poland. No royal French family had possessed more extensive territories since the time of Charle- main : and if their dominions had been united under one head, or had been capable of forming a whole, it would have become even in that age the greatest power in Europe, SECTION VI. THE POPE. After the popes had succeeded in subjecting all the princes and people of the western world to their spiritual authority, they began to acquire temporal dominion in Italy j. r 3 246 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. by the terrors of religion as well as by earthly weapons, for the holy see, and frequently for their own relatives* The artifices which it was necessary to practise in order to attain these objects, involved the court of Rome in projects, in the pursuit of which the foundations of its greatness were utterly neglected ; for its reputation diminished in propor- tion as it approached to the character and principles dis- played in the courts of temporal princes. The obscurity also in which the truth had hitherto been enveloped, speedily began to be dissipated ; and the papacy had never sustained a severer shock than that which it received in the course of the contests between Boniface the Eighth, and Philip the Fair of France. Cardinals of the family of Colonna flying from the per- secution of the pope, who, whether justly or unjustly, was excessively enraged against them, sought refuge in the court of France. The king w r as now engaged in a quarrel with Rome, in which he had involved himself by venturing to displace and imprison a bishop, and by imposing a tax of a tenth on the estates of the church ; and he was therefore in- clined to give the exiles a favourable reception. Boniface asserted the principle of the universal and supreme authority of his chair, over all spiritual and temporal powers ; and reminded the king that he reigned only by delegation from himself. Philip caused this bull to be burnt in the pre- sence of an assembly of the ecclesiastical and temporal lords, and summoned the states-general of his kingdom. He represented to this assembly, that Boniface, by means of fraud and violence, had caused himself to be illegally elevated to the pontifical dignity ; and that he was now en- deavouring to rob him (the king) of the authority which had been conferred upon him by God : he appealed to the judgment of the next general council of the church; and until that should take place, he forbade all communication with the Kornish see. The king, understanding at the same time that Boniface 1 1 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 247 was endeavouring to excite Albert, the German monarch, to war against him, sent the banished Sciarra Colonna into Italy, together with William Nogaret, a French com- mander, who was hostile to the forms of the Romish ritual. These emissaries found the pope in the little town of Anagni, without any means of defence, but clothed in the insignia of his dignity, and resolved rather to die than to yield. They treated, him with contumely, and shut him up in that place; until at length some of the noblemen of the vicinity taking up arms in order to procure his li- beration, his persecutors quitted Anagni on the third day. The consequence of this transaction was, that Boniface, than whom no pope since the days of Gregory the Seventh A D 1303 ^ ac * a hig ner feeling of his dignity, died, in the space of thirty-five days, of grief and vehe- ment indignation. His measures had been consonant with ancient precedent, and were justified by the existing regula- tions; but he was not aware of the character of his oppo- nent, or of the alteration which had taken place in the spirit of the age: and this negligence in observing the progress of the prevailing ideas continued to accelerate the decline of the papal power. A D 1305 Ph ]U P received the pardon of his offences from Benedict the Ninth; and when Clement the Fifth, archbishop of Bourdeaux, with the consent of the king, ascended the papal chair, he continued to reside in France, and chiefly at Avignon : his six immediate suc- cessors, all of whom were of French descent, in this re- spect followed his example. But the holy see, at this period, had to contend with no Henrys or Hohenstaufens ; nor did the daring spirit of Philip descend on any of his successors : established usage, mendicant friars, and the Inquisition, rendered the papacy apparently invincible ; but the popes, while they resided in a foreign country, were no longer the advocates of the free- dom of Italy and of Europe ; and there existed at that pe- lt 4 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. riod no apprehension of an universal monarchy. The sovereigns, on the other hand, had now established their power on more lasting foundations, on the influence of gold and arms : they acquired a more extensive influence over their people, and beheld with indignation the magnitude of those sums which were incessantly transmitted to the pope. The pursuits of scholastic learning furnished an exercise for reflection ; and what was of far greater importance, pa- triotic citizens, possessed of talent and courage, began to write with freedom in their native language; and the bold- ness, the ironical style, and the happy representations which their works contained, acquired the approbation of the higher and most influential classes. SECTION VII. THE ITALIAN REPUBLICS. The rising republics of Italy had originally attached themselves to the party of the Guelphs, through apprehen- sion of the Germans : during the latter days of the em- peror Frederick, and subsequently to his death, the young Ezelino di Romano was at the head of the Ghibellines. One of his ancestors, who was a German, had received from the emperor Conrad the Second the fiefs of Onara and St. Romano, in the dominions of Padua and Asole, as a reward for his services; and under Frederick Barbarossa, one of his family, (also named Ezelino,) had fought in the cause of freedom, as commander of the towns of Trevigi and Vicenza, and afterwards of the confederacy of Lom- bardy. Frederick the Second gave his illegitimate daughter in marriage to young Ezelino, who in return put the em- peror in possession of the towns of Trevigi and Padua, and received the appointment of general of the imperial arms in Italy. Ezelino was laid under the great bann by Innocent the Fourth, as a disturber of the peace of the country, and on account of his unprecedented cruelties; UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 249 and Padua was taken from him by Fontana, archbishop of Ravenna : but he soon began to exert himself, and com- menced his revengeful operations against Padua, which had deserted his cause, by enclosing ] 2,000 of the citizens of that place in the ancient Roman amphitheatre at Ve- rona, part of whom he destroyed by fire, and the rest by depriving them of food : he razed Vicenza to its founda- tions, conquered Mantua, took possession of Tuscany, and defeated the forces of the Milanese. At length he fell into the hands of his enemies, and died of his wounds ; but his brother Alberigo, and his whole family, were put to death by the most dreadful tortures. All the cities reco- vered their freedom, and purchased from king Rudolf the right of exercising those privileges which had hitherto been reserved for the empire. From this time forward republics began to appear in Italy. Government was intrusted to the ancient families ;. but the remains of factions still produced so much insecu- rity, that even in the towns the houses of the great were surrounded with strong towers and battlements, and fre- quently with fosses. The most trifling occurrence pro- duced skirmishes in the streets ; and the victor in these con- tests frequently became the tyrant of his native city, until his rivals, as powerful and ambitious as himself, boldly availed themselves of his unguarded moments, and de- stroyed his power ; or until the oppressed citizens secretly invited some fortunate adventurer, or one of the princes of France or Naples, to assist them in regaining freedom. Treachery, conspiracy, and assassination by poison and by the dagger, came at last to be considered as neces- sary means of personal security ; and all the transactions of civil life were often for a long time interrupted. From the midst of these disorders the light of knowledge began to dawn, and virtues to display themselves, worthy of the ancient Greeks and Romans. As the life of nature is maintained by the action and re-action of opposing 250 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. powers ; and as religion is not designed to afford continual repose in this state of existence, but to fortify us for the struggles of life ; so the human faculties and the energy of the soul stand in need of great exertions, and of impedi- ments which appear at first sight insurmountable, in order that, by re-acting upon themselves, they may awaken, de- velope, and exalt those powers with which the Creator has endowed us. SECTION VIII. FLORENCE. Florence was governed by the descendants of those no- bles who had founded the city on the ruins of Fiesole, at the foot of a mountain, on the smiling shores of the Arno : they had gradually increased its extent, protected its infant population, and purchased privileges for its benefit. The Buondelmonti, the Amidei. the Donati, and the Uberti, were the chief families of the city. It happened in the thirteenth century, that a widow of the family of the Donati wished to marry her only daughter, a lady of great beauty, to one of the Buondelmonti. The young knight, who was ignorant of her intentions, had given his promise to a daughter of the house of Amidei ; but as he was on some occasion passing the house of the Donati, the mother appeared at the door, entered into con- versation with him, and pressed him to recall his promise to the Amidei. Buondelmonti, influenced by the wealth and power of the Donati, as well as by the uncommon beauty of the young lady, consented to the proposal. When the Amidei were informed of this affair, they entered into a confederacy with their relations, the Uberti, and resolved to put Buondelmonti to death : some of the family hesi- tated, lest the stability of the republic should be endangered by the result of the contest; but they were determined to proceed by the impetuosity of Moscha Lamberti, who ex- UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 251 claimed, " The man who is always calculating results never ventures to act !" Accordingly, at the festival of Easter, they posted four resolute men in the castle of the Amidei, which was situated close by the bridge over the Arno ; and when the knight, who was easily recognized at a distance by his snow-white horse, passed it according to his custom, they sallied forth and killed him at the foot of a statue of Mars which stood near the spot. The great families divided themselves thenceforward into parties, fortified themselves against each other, and aug- mented their own power by all possible means. The em- peror Frederick declaring himself on the side of the Uberti, their adversaries were compelled to quit the city and retire to their estates; but when, after the decease of the emperor, Ezelino had fallen, and the Ghibellines had become dis- persed, Sylvester de' Medici availed himself of this oppor- tunity, and with the assistance of a powerful party among the citizens, banished the Uberti in their turn, and intro- duced a regular form of government. Florence was now divided into six districts, from each of which two anziani? or elders, were annually elected : the head man of the peo- ple, and the criminal judge, in whose hands the supreme authority in all political, civil, and criminal affairs was en- trusted, were chosen during the short period of their ad- ministration, from the other Italian cities, in order that they might be the less exposed to the temptation of par- tiality. The citizens capable of bearing arms were ar- ranged under twenty city banners, and the peasants under seventy-six country standards ; and for each of these com- panies a captain was annually elected at Whitsuntide, The point of union in every battle was a large chariot hung with red cloth, and drawn by oxen, and bearing the great banner, which, at the commencement of every cam- - paign, was delivered with great solemnity to the city com- mander, by the whole body of citizens assembled in the new market. The sound of the great bell, Martinella, 252 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. which was incessantly tolled for a month previous to the commencement of the expedition, served to announce the feud, and to summon the military power of the country : it was carried with the army into the field, and was em- ployed to give the signal for every enterprise ; for it was held dishonourable to attack the enemy by surprise. Florence soon became the most powerful city in Tus- cany, and reckoned Pistoja, Arezzo, and Siena, among the number of its allies. Volterra was destroyed, and her citizens, as well as the inhabitants of several fortresses on the Roman side, incorporated with the population of Flo- rence; which became so populous, that after the plague, which has been incomparably described by Boccacio, had swept away 96,000 persons, it still remained sufficiently powerful for the defence of its freedom and dominion. The Ghibellines, who had been either banished or ex- cluded from all share in the administration of public affairs, omitted no opportunity of disturbing the internal tranquil- lity of the state; and the contests thus excited frequently produced changes, more or less important, in the form of the constitution, but uniformly to the disadvantage of the ancient families : for as the people became accustomed to arms, it was found the more difficult to refuse to the de- fenders of their country equal rights and powers with the superior classes. Affairs were in this state when Geri Cancellieri, of a good family in Pistoja, received a severe wound in a tour- nament, from his kinsman Lore. When Lore went, by his father's command, to beg pardon of the father of his wounded relative, the latter replied, " The wounds inflicted by iron are to be healed by iron, and not by words," and caused the hand of the unfortunate youth to be cut off. All Pistoja was now divided into parties, the different fa- milies flew to arms, and the Donati of Florence declared themselves on one side, and the Cerchi on the other. As the young men of the house of the Donati rode out with. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 253 their friends, during the festivals of May, to see the dances of the country people, the Cerchi rushed forcibly through their ranks and provoked a battle: From that time arose the factions of the black and the whice; the former of which colours was adopted by the Guelphs, while the Ghi- bellines chiefly associated themselves to the latter. The Ghibellines, together with their illustrious poet, Dante Allighieri, a chief magistrate of the commonwealth, were overcome by the superior power of the Guelphs, and ba- nished from the city. Florence was continually improving, notwithstanding all these disturbances, in population and magnificence. The tower of Robert, one of the earliest masterpieces of archi- tecture, was raised during this period by the skilful hand of Giotto. Universal prosperity was diffused by commerce, while some particular families had the good fortune to ac- quire great wealth, and obtained accordingly the highest -distinction in the commonwealth. SECTION IX. VENICE. The constitution of Venice was also formed during the 13th century. It had long been the policy of this city to attach itself to that party on the continent which appeared to promise the most powerful protection for its liberty. Its maritime commerce imparted to its citizens a growing spirit of enterprise, which was roused into new activity by the conquest of the Venetians in Dalmatia, and by the ac- quisition of several islands which fell into their hands after the occupation of Constantinople by the crusaders. The Venetians possessed no territory on the continent of Italy, but laid the foundation of their power on the sea. Each of the four islands on which the city is built had, in the beginning, its separate government : the offices of government were few, and seldom the objects of ambition. 254 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. The several islands united themselves only in time of war under a common leader, until Paulutius Anafestus ob- ' ■ tamed the supreme power for life, under the A.D. 709. 1 1 name of Doge. The power of this officer was regulated by the laws ; and instead of being hereditary, it was conferred by the com- munity, when it became vacant by death, on some person nominated by the other magistrates- The multiplication of affairs, to which few could apply themselves without inter- ruption to their necessary business, afterwards gave occa- sion to the formal ion of a regular council, consisting of 240 members, and chosen from the nobles and the citizens. One department of this body administered the financial, and another the judicial affairs of the state. The elections were made from the whole body of the citizens. In the period which succeeded the tall of the imperial house of Hohenstaufen, during which the cities of Italy were oppressed by a multitude of petty tyrants, it appeared dangerous to allow free access to the deliberations of the council ; not only because secrecy and a more circumscribed interest were necessary to the safety of the state, but also because the effect of such enterprises as might be resolved upon seemed in great measure to depend on the same circumstances. The first experiment was made on such of the members as were vassals of the king of Cyprus: these were excluded from all such deliberations as had re- ference to that kingdom. The prohibition was soon after- wards extended to all who were vassals of the continental princes of Italy in the territory of Ferrara and Treviso. It was further extended so as to include all the kinsmen of the persons above described. These were excluded from the great council, and from the civil tribunal ; or at least from governing their decisions, or bearing the votes which were given in those assemblies. When the rulers had thus proved by experiment that they might venture on setting limits to the eligibility of candidates, in the eighth year of UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 255 the administration of the tlogc Petro Gradenigo, they effected the great $e?ratura del co?ishdio, by A.D. 1297. . ° ' J which all those who had not sat in the great council within that year, or the four years preceding, as well as their descendants, were for ever deprived of the pri- vilege of being elected to that assembly. The senators had taken the precaution, before this last measure was proposed, to cause all the most powerful indi- viduals of the different districts to be elected to the council : they had also given to the whole body of citizens, the unlimited right of fishing and fowling • to the Pieveoratins, the privilege of dining annually with the doge, and of em- bracing him on that occasion ; to the Nicolotti they had granted the distinction of binding the felucca of their dis- trict to the magnificent Bucentaur which annually conveyed the doge, when he went out on the festival of the ascension^ to perform the ceremony of throwing the wedding-ring into the sea ; and they had entitled the inhabitants of the isle of St. Maria Formosa to receive a yearly visit from the doge, and the signori or chief lords. Numerous theatrical entertainments had also been appointed, and great activity communicated to commercial enterprise. The ultimate de- signs were so carefully concealed, that when the gastaldo of the Nicolotti wished to be released from the presidency of the tribunal of property {del proprio), which belonged to him by ancient custom, the government refused consent, until that officer extorted it by many solicitations, and by engaging to pay to the doge and themselves an annual tri- bute of a thousand pounds of salt fish, as a recompense for the trouble which they undertook. The senators were de- nominated the " pregadi," or the w much entreated," on account of the labour attached to their office, which it was supposed that none would willingly undertake. A D 1510 ^ n ^ e ^ aSt ^ eai ^ Ut one °^ ^ e iei S n °f tne same doge, Bajamonte Tiepolo, Basseggi and an dolo reigned as doge, it was declared perpetual, under the name of the council of ten. The province of this body is to watch over all popular movements " tending to a breach of the peace," and over all such abuses of power as may give occasion to such disturbances. SECTION X. MILAN. A D 1311 ^ year had elapsed after this event, when Henry VII., king of the Germans, entered Italy. He found Milan divided between the family della Torre, who were chiefly Guelphs, and the Visconti, who belonged to the faction of the Ghibel lines. Guidotto della Torre, commander of the city, and Matteo Visconti, an old and experienced nobleman, appeared to have laid aside the animosity of their respective parties ; but the Germans excited discontent among the citizens. The artful Matteo seemed to have forgotten, from affection to the cause of his country, his former attachment to the imperial party, and secretly contributed to excite the daring spirit which had animated the ancient Milanese against the Fredericks : at length an insurrection broke out; and no sooner had the nobles of the Torre taken up arms for the purpose of quell- ing it 5 than Matteo ran to the palace, declaimed against UNIVERSAL HISTORY. the ever hostile dispositions of that house, and against a design which he imputed to them of obtaining possession of the person of king Henry, in a tumult excited by them- selves : this project, as he said, could only be defeated by himself, with the assistance of the German troops. The latter, inflamed with rage, marched under the guidance of Matteo against Guidotto, who was compelled to resist in his own defence. Visconti, by the assistance of the Ger- mans, killed the greater part of the house of Torre ; the rest were banished, and their property confiscated; and Matteo was shortly afterwards appointed vicar-general of the empire : he assumed, after a few years, A.D.1517. . ~ _ . lip / the title or sovereign lord ot Milan, the go- vernment of which continued in his house. SECTION XL SAVOY. During the wars of the emperors, the counts of Savoy had availed themselves of the advantages of their situation ; which enabled them to attack an army either at its entrance into the passes of the Alps, or when it issued, disabled by fatigue, from the recesses of the mountains. Hence all parties sought their alliance ; and the emperors, in particular, be- stowed upon them a very extensive vicar-generalship in the empire. The noblemen who inhabited the vicinity either sought protection in voluntary submission, or were subdued by force of arms : and the more they were divided among themselves, the greater was the influence of the count, who subjected to his power the lords of Tarantaise, and tamed the haughty independence of Turin and AstL While the count of Savoy on one side opened the passes of the Alps to the imperial arms, he formed at the same time a league of amity with the kings of England, who were also powerful in France, where the count possessed terri- tories in Dauphine and in other provinces: it was to his VOL. II. s 258 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. connection with England that Peter of Savoy owed the ex- tension of the power of his family in the Pays de Vaud. The latter country was divided among several powerful chiefs and a great number of inferior ones; and it was doubtful whether the influence of the Upper Burgundy, of the empire, or of Savoy, would acquire the superiority. When, after the death of Frederick of Hohenstaufen, Richard of Cornwall brother of the king of England, was invited among other princes, by some of the electors, to the vacant throne, Savoy immediately recognized his title. At this period the count reduced under his sway the towns and fortresses of Moudon, Romont, Murten, and Iverdun, the latter of which made a vigorous resistance : and Richard, on his AD 126~ ^ art ' con fi rme d tne possession of the Pays de Vaud to the house of Savoy. The terri- tories of this family now extended from the waters of Nice to the Aar. The counts took no very deep interest in the contests of the Ghibellines and Guelphs; but occasionally aggrandized themselves at the expense of both parties. Such also was the policy which Amadeus advised king Henry to pursue ; when the latter, as he emerged from the mountains at Susa and contemplated the magnificent pro- spect which Italy presented to his view, shed tears as he reflected on the factions by which it was torn. This mo- narch, however, endeavoured to restore the salutary influ- ence of an universal sovereignty in Italy : but his arrival excited the anxiety of all those states which had rendered themselves independent. Florence hastily concluded an alliance with Robert king of Naples, notwithstanding that the latter was se dangerous an enemy of the freedom of Tuscany,* and in order to conciliate the domestic factions of that state, a part of the banished citizens were recalled : the Orsini also, the most powerful family in Rome, attached themselves at this conjuncture to the party of king Robert. Henry was preparing the means of a vigorous resistance to so many enemies, when he unexpectedly died at Pisa, de- UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 259 _ stroyed, as it was supposed, by poison. Hia A.D. 1515. . . son John, who found sufficient occupation in confirming the basis of his power in Bohemia, interested himself but little either in the affairs of Italy or in those of the imperial crown. SECTION XIL LEWIS OF BAVARIA. The last-mentioned prince, however, favoured the pre- A D 1 14 * ens * ons °f ^ ew ^ s °f Bavaria, who was chosen king by one party of the electors, while the votes of the remainder fell on Frederick, duke of Austria. This division produced disturbances in the empire which lasted four years, and were at last decided, on the field of Muhldorf, in favour of Lewis, who gave battle A. D. 1522, . & to Frederick before the latter could receive the reinforcement which his brother Leopold was bringing to his assistance. The victory was decided chiefly by the un- expected arrival of the Burgrave of Nurnberg, of whose approach the enemy was ignorant : the latter took king Frederick prisoner, together with many of the nobles of Austria ; some of whom, as the price of their ransom, ac- knowledged themselves as the vassals of the Burgrave, whose family from that time possessed in Austria a feudal judicature. Henry, duke of Carinthia, was also made pri- soner by king John, with whom he had formerly con- tended for the crown of Bohemia. Lewis, how ever, dreaded the jealousy of the princes of the empire and the influence of the pope, who was hostile to his interests ; and his views were directed toward Italy, where John of Bohemia was already endeavouring to stir up enemies against him among the Lombards : all these circumstances induced him to t _ consent to a peace, which was honourable even A. D. 1525. _ . ; , , r ' to Frederick. Lewis, following the example of his four predecessors, s 2 260 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. endeavoured to consolidate the power of his family, whicfc was divided into two branches : accordingly, at the extinc- tion of the reigning branch of the house of Anhalt in Bran- A D 1322 ^enburg, ne obUuned the sovereignty of that country for his eldest son, Lewis; and King John, whose consent was necessary to this arrangement? was rewarded with Kgra and the Lausitz. Soon after the conclusion of the treaty in which he had acknowledged Frederick as co-regent, Lewis took a journey into Italy. The pope, who resided at Avignon, was in- duced to oppose him by the influence of the court of France ; and the measures of the court of Rome were sup- ported by the policy of Robert, king of Naples. This opposition on the part of France was owing to the alliance of Lewis with England, who had married the sister of the king of that country, and had acquired great influence in the Netherlands by this connection. But we prefer to take another opportunity of discussing the consequences of these relations, rather than interrupt the history of the German emperors with the narrative of Italian affairs. Lewis long found an enemy in Germany in the person of his brother Rudolf, the elector palatine. Such were the intestine divisions which ever prevented the house of Wit- telsbach from attaining that power which the extent of its territories seemed to promise it. The policy of the house of Luxemburg and the influence of the pope, effectually destroyed the peace of King Lewis and of his family : and before the period of his death, which took place suddenly at the close of a laborious reign, some . . of the electors were already occupied in choos- A. D. 1347. . J 1 ing a successor. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. SECTION XIII. CHARLES THE FOURTH. The imperial crown neither reverted to the house of Nassau, although count Gerlach was now elector of May- ence, nor to that of Habsburg, though duke Albert was highly celebrated for his wisdom. After Edward, king of England, had refused to accept it, and Frederick of Meissen had waived his pretensions for a sum of money, count Giinther of Schwartzburg having at length yielded and closed his long opposition by a suspicious death, Charles of Luxemburg, son and successor of king John, was univer- sally acknowledged emperor. He had given ten thousand marks to the margrave of Meissen, and twenty-two thou- sand to count Giinther ; and had bestowed many presents and privileges on the other electors. It appeared to be the chief object of Charles, during an administration of thirty years, to increase the power and splendour of his house, by obtaining from the alienable domains and privileges the greatest possible amount of money and other advantages. He was, besides; careful to maintain such a degree of pomp as should support in public the majesty of the imperial crown and an appearance of consistency. He raised Mecklenburg and Eilwangen to the dignity of principalities of the empire : he bestowed hereditary offices on the margrave of Meissen, and on the count of Schwarz- burg: and gave the title of duke to his brother Wence- slaf, count of Luxemburg, to the count of Bar, and to the margrave of Juliers. On his journey into Italy, he sold freedom to some of the towns, and independent power to the tyrants who oppressed other parts of that country : but, on the other hand, he promised not to visit it again withou consent of the pope, and not to pass a night in Rome. He promulgated that fundamental law of the empire, s 3 UNIVERSAL HISTORY, called the golden bull, which regulates the election of the German monarchs, and some other points of the constitu- tion ; and on this occasion he adopted the language of the ancient sovereigns of the world. In imitation of the policy of his father, who had con- trived to sever Silesia from its connection with Poland, and to annex it to his own dominions; Charles availed himself of the unprincely disposition of his 3on-in-law Otho, son of king Lewis, in order to bring the sovereignty of the marks of Brandenburg into his own A D 13 3 ^ am ^* nerec ft tar y dominions now ex- tended from the boundaries of Austria to those of Pomerania; and there was no prince in all Germany who equalled him in riches, or who surpassed him in power, or in acquaintance with the interests of his house. When Charles perceived that the conclusion of his life was approaching, he abandoned the customs levied on the Rhine to the electors, and gained the members of that body by different measures suited to their diverse inclinations and circumstances. One of these methods was a present of an hundred thousand florins, by which he secured the election of his son Wenceslaf to the title of king of the Germans, during his own life: for the emperor had derived too much assistance, in pursuit of the increase and confirm- ation of his power, from the imperial dignity, not to wish that his son might obtain it : for in that' age it was found that it might be made, by good management, to repay the expenses it had cost. SECTION XIV. WENCESLAF. Wenceslaf too early and too decidedly evinced prin- ciples which were disagreeable both to the clergy and to the nobles. He allowed the former to retain no considerable share of influence ; he even proceeded to appoint Przemsyl, UNIVERSAL HISTORY. duke of Teschen, a lay prince, to the office of vice-chan- cellor of the empire ; and endeavoured to arrogate to him- self the privilege of deciding on the claims and the conduct of the cardinals who were contending for the papacy. He appeared to encourage the resistance made by the Rhenish and Swabian towns against the noble members of the societies of St. George and of the Golden Lion : but when that confederacy, consisting of eighty cities, became too powerful in consequence of its alliance with Switzerland, he seemed to view without displeasure its dissolution. In order to promote this change, he favoured the establishment of the constitution of circles ; for as the circles consisted of spiritual and temporal principalities and of towns, and as the knights had considerable influence in some of them, there was but little danger of their being brought to unite in one project against the emperor. The nobles of Bohemia who thought him too partial to the people, made him a prisoner, under pre- A.D.1594. c . , , . , * j tence or violent and immoral conduct, and put him into the safe custody of the dukes of Austria. He made his escape: but six years afterwards, on the most shallow pretences, was deposed by the spiritual A.D.1400. , , , . , . , \ , electors, and by the count palatine who shortly afterwards became his successor. Frankfort and Aix-la- Chapelle refused to take any part in this transaction. Wenceslaf was so little like other men, that the crown appeared not to be necessary to his happiness : he chose rather to content himself with his government of Bohemia, than to retain the imperial title without the power of pur- suing those principles which he thought just and necessary ; and hence he did not long hesitate to execute the instru- ment of resignation that was demanded of him. 26 i UNIVERSAL HISTORY, SECTION XV. SIGISMUND. Frederick, duke of Brunswick, was elected in the place of Wenceslaf, but was murdered on his return by a private enemy. Rupert, count palatine of the Rhine, a prince of prudent and upright intentions, next obtained the crown* After his death it was bestowed on Jodochus of Luxem- burg, margrave of Moravia, a nephew of A. D. i4io. &' 6 » r Charles the Fourth. On the decease of this monarch, which soon followed his election, Sigismund, king of Hungary, brother of Wenceslaf, was unanimously chosen. Wenceslaf, w T ho was still living, enjoyed his dominion of Bohemia, and beheld with secret satisfaction the origin of the Hussites, who shook the power of the aristocracy which he hated and despised. Few princes have united a greater number of crowns than Sigismund: he became possessor in his early youth, of Hungary, Dalmatia, and Bosnia, by his marriage with his first wife, Mary of Anjou : eight years after his election as king of the Germans, he succeeded to the throne of Bohe- mia, vacant by the death of his brother; he received the imperial crown from the pope; and to all these dignities he united the sovereignty of Moravia, Lausitz, Silesia, and Brandenburg. But having suffered his royal safe conduct, which had been granted to John Huss, to be broken, in consequence of which this honest and zealous declaimer against the abuses of the church was burned A. D. 1414. ° . alive at Constance, Sigismund became so much the object of popular hatred, that he was obliged to maintain a war of eighteen years' duration against Ziska, Procopius, and other leaders of the Hussites ; and only a few months before his death attained to the quiet possession of the Bohemian crown. This prince narrowly escaped UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 265 captivity or death, by the arms of the Turks, in the battle of Nicopolis : and after the termination of the dismal im- prisonment in which he was kept by the nobles of Hungary, he reigned in that country peacefully, but without perform- ing any deeds of fame against the Ottoman power. The loss of almost the whole revenue of the German empire, and the turbulent disposition of the people, were impe- diments almost insurmountable by the greatest talents. Sigismund was so destitute of money, that he was obliged to sell the electorate of Brandenburg for 400,000 marks, to the wise and valiant j count of Nurnberg, Frederick of Hohenzollern. He received the sum of 100,000 marks from Frederick, margrave of Meissen, as the price of the electoral hat of Saxony, which he bestowed on the latter at the extinc- A. D. 1422. tion of the electoral branch of the family of Anhaltj without regard to the claims of that branch which resided at Lauenburg. He also alienated for a sum of money the hereditary estates of the family of Habsburg, AD 4 5 °^ w ^* cn tne S w * ss > by n * 5 order, had taken possession on behalf of the empire. Notwith- standing all these occurrences, Sigismund was so active in the restoration of order in the church, and in Other salu- tary reforms, that he was evidently prevented from achiev- ing great and laudable enterprises by the want of power and not by defect of inclination. SECTION XVI. AUSTRIAN EMPERORS. The imperial power, debased by weak or unfortunate princes or by defective policy, did not recover its splendour after the death of Sigismund. Albert, duke of Austria, a prince endowed with many estimable qualities, was son- in-law to the late emperor; and the Hungarians at his coronation, stipulated that he should not accept the 266 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. crown of Germany ; for the affairs of the empire had too frequently deprived them of the presence of their former sovereign, and had prevented him from giving any attention to the progress of the Turkish arms. Albert was also com- pelled to submit to a capitulation in Bohemia. But after the electors had in vain invited the margrave of Branden- burg to accept the crown, it was at length placed, with the consent of the Hungarians, on the head of A D 1438. Albert, who however died when he had scarcely found time to shew the Turks that he designed to guard the boundaries of Christendom with A. D. 1439. 8 . greater vigilance. His posthumous som Ladislaf, succeeded A. D. 1440. , . . _ . _ ,. . . to his portion ot the hereditary dominions m Germany, and to his claim of election to the kingdoms of Hungary and Bohemia. But the Hungarians, who stood in need of a powerful chief for the support of their totter- ing throne, elected Vladislaf king of Poland, during La- dislaf 's minority ; and in Bohemia, George Podiebradsky, one of the most intelligent and enterprising noblemen of that country, united the wishes of the prevailing faction, and of the impartial and honest part of the community. The imperial crown was offered to Frederick, duke of Austria, who was obliged to give up a considerable portion of that half of the hereditary German dominions which be- longed to his house. His power was so much diminished by this division, that nothing but the name of his family, and the public estimation of his character, could have re- commended him to this highest dignity. The powerful house of Luxemburg, which had been perceptibly enfeebled under the latter reigns, was now extinct : and it was the object of the electors to choose a sovereign who should not be sufficiently powerful to compel obedience. The electors of the palatinates of Saxony and of Brandenburg, were either too enterprising or too much dreaded for their power, to unite the votes in favour of their claims. 7 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 267 SECTION XVII. NAPLES AND SICILY. Robert of Anjou, king of Naples, was one of the great- est princes who have reigned in Italy since the destruction of its imperial power ; but after his death, the greatness of his family fell into decay through the passions of its chiefs. His grandchild and successor Johanna caused her husband Andrew, who was of the Hungarian branch of her family, to be put to death ; and by this measure drew on herself and on her kingdom, the vengeance of his brother, Lewis the Great of France. In vain she sought protection in the power of two other husbands whom she successively mar- ried, and in the authority of the papal court : the ven- geance of blood overtook her through the arms of her cousin Charles, duke of Durazzo, who put her to death and took possession of her kingdom. Charles was murdered in his turn a few A. D. 1386. years afterwards, on account of his efforts to place himself on the throne of Hungary : after which Lewis of Anjou, brother of Charles the Wise king of France, and adopted son of the unfortunate Johanna, laid claim to the kingdom of Naples. His pretensions were vain ; for Lancelot, son of Charles of Durazzo, displayed such heroic qualities, that he not only left to Lewis (a cun- ning and voluptuous prince) the bare title to the kingdom, but seemed almost to have secured the union of all Italy. But in the midst of his victorious career, and before he had attained the fortieth year of his age, Lancelot, enamoured, during the siege of Perugia, of the daughter of a physician of that place, gave peace to her country for her sake, and was rewarded by poison, which his mistress administered to him on the first opportunity. 26$ UNIVERSAL HISTORY, . • His sister and successor, the second Jo- A.D. 1414. hanna, was an encourage r of learning and a votary of every species of enjoyment. Her intercourse with Pandolfello A) op, a youth of low birth, exciting scandal and jealousy, she was compelled to choose a hus- band, and gave her hand to Jaques de la Marche, a French prince, who had scarcely made himself acquainted with the military chiefs of the country, when, in confidence of their A D 1415 su PP ort > ^ e cause d himself to be proclaimed king. The insulted princess committed the revenge of her injuries to Jacob Sforza of Cotignuola„ a man who had been raised by his courage, good fortune, and enterprising spirit, from the condition of a peasant to* that of condottiere, or leader of a numerous band, wholly devoted to his service. He expelled the count de la Marche, and afterwards, in order to make himself of greater im- portance, quitted the service of the queen ; who, instead of buying him at the price which he expected, appointed Alfonso king of Arragon and Sicily, who deserved the surname of Wise, as heir to her posses- A.D. 1420. . sions. The opposition of the titular kings of the family of An- jou, was too feeble to make any effectual impression; their exertions were sufficient only to preserve their contiguous dominion of Provence. Alfonso, who was well aware how probable it was that the views of the unstable court of Na- ples might undergo a change, endeavoured to secure the fortresses which commanded the city and the bay : but when Johanna perceived his intentions, she reconciled herself AD 24 W ^ Sforza, expelled the Arragonese, and recalled the titular king Lewis. Alfonso, however, again acquired her favour, and after A.D.1425. i £" *i i • • j i • • . her death forcibly maintained his claims. Naples and Sicily thus became re-united, after a separation of one hundred and seventy-three years. The independ>- ent spirit of the ancient Normans still existed among UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 2G9 the powerful towns and the barons, who maintained their privilege of preventing the king from imposing any taxes without the consent of the parliament : in later times, how- ever, the representation of the municipal towns was trans- ferred to the capital. The imposts were granted only for a limited period, and were at first raised only upon the pro- duce of estates; but they were afterwards extended to houses, and at length to articles of consumption, especially to bread, meat, cheese, and oil. SECTION XVIII. THE POPES. The popes who resided at Avignon, appeared, for their own benefit, to favour the division of power in Italy; for by this method they obtained adherents in opposition to the influence of the emperor, none of whom were alone sufficiently powerful to become formidable to themselves. With these views Benedict XII., who was a prudent and in many respects an excellent pontiff, confirmed the au- thority of the chiefs who had usurped the supreme power in some of the large cities : and the emperor Lewis, of the house of Bavaria, could think of no better way of revenging himself, than by affording the same protection to those who had made similar attempts in the papal towns. These two sovereigns, in reality, only suffered a change to take place which they could not have prevented ; for even the autho- rity of Lewis was not capable of re-establishing supreme power in Italy : he would in vain have attempted to effect any considerable measure in Lombardy without the concur- rence of the Visconti ; or in Tuscany, without that of Cas- truccio Castracani, the hero of Lucca. Italy became continually more and more divided into small and independent states: the house of Este, which even yet continues to reign, established its authority at Mo- dena ; that of Gonzaga, at Mantua ; the family of Scala, 270 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. at Verona and Parma; and that of Carrara, at Padua. The confusion* was augmented by the interference of John king of Bohemia, who took Brescia and Bergamo, and whose design was to deprive the arms of Lewis of the supe- riority which dexterity or good fortune might have con- ferred upon him. Pesaro and Rimini, two noblemen of the house of Ma- latesta, made themselves sovereigns of Fano: and the territory of Ancona was subject to the Montefeltro. It would occupy too much time to describe the characters of the Manfredi, the Alidosi, the Ordelaffi, and the Polenta, the heads of which families were in those ages sometimes the fathers and sometimes the oppressors of their country : while it not unfrequently happened that the same person assumed both these characters in succession. While the pre-eminence in Rome was the object of con- tention between the Colonna and the Orsini, Nicholas Rienzi, a man of plebeian origin, who was inflamed by the enthusiasm of the ancients, endeavoured to restore freedom to his native city by erecting a tribunate of the people. The people of Rome took up arms in favour of this cherished name ; they gained possession of the capitol, and drove out the enemies of freedom. Rienzi was a man of courage and integrity, and the revival of the virtues of ancient Rome was expected from his influence, when sud- denly, as if exhausted by his exertions or oppressed by the greatness of his own designs, he took flight ; but was made prisoner by Charles IV. and sent in that character to the pope. Francesco Baroncegli endeavoured to carry on his project ; and the papal court, in order to prevent the suc- cess of his plans, sent back Rienzi himself, who soon caused Baroncegli to be put to death, and immediately afterwards met his own fate, during an insurrection, from the hands of the Colonna. The city was now in the utmost confu- sion ; and Clement VI. sent four cardinals for the purpose of restoring order : this they speedily effected ; for the year UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 271 of jubilee was approaching, and the people were inclined to submit to any conditions, rather than lose the profits of that festival by suffering it to be transferred to Avignon in con- sequence of their disorders. , After the jubilee, the rulers of the towns and fortresses continued to prosecute their feuds ; the manners of the people became altogether barbarous, and every sentiment was immersed in the prevailing devotion to sensual plea- sures : neither justice nor humanity had any influence, when opposed to the desire of wealth. It was common among the chiefs to cause the rivals of their power to be put to death at the most confidential entertainments, by the sword or by poison ; or to pursue with dogs the enemies of their family or the powerful citizens. Barnaba Visconti was accompanied by these ferocious beasts when he went through the streets of Milan to seize one of the Ugolini, and shut him up, with his whole family, in gloomy towers where they were suffered to die of hunger and to be de- voured by worms. This was an heroic age, like that of the Atridae. The science of finance consisted in robbery, and the policy of the rulers in perjury. The open exercise of arms gave place to the dexterity of the executioner ; and all Italy longed for the presence of a pope whose humane influence might put an end to such terrible excesses. These A D 1 76 cn ' cumstances induced the beneficent Gre- gory IX., the nephew of Clement VI., to fix his residence at Rome. The evil destiny which pursued the papacy during the whole of the 14th century, shortly AD 13-8 a ^ erwar( ^ s decreed the death of Gregory; and the cardinals were unable to decide whether the vacant dignity should be bestowed on an- Italian, in compliance with the wishes of the people, or on a French- man, agreeably to the choice of the majority of the electors. Two cardinals refused to accept of the perilous honour ; but a third, Donato, of Venice, already far advanced in years, was shown to the people under the title of Urban VI. 2J2 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. It is said that he had previously engaged to resign the papal crown in a few days after his election, but that he had never- theless determined to reign in opposition to the will of the most powerful cardinals, whom, consistently with the se- verity and ambition of his character, he oppressed and ir- ritated by every species of insult. This conduct occasioned a conspiracy, which afforded him a welcome pretence for imprisoning all the cardinals, bishops, and other prelates whom he suspected. Those who had the good fortune to escape assembled at Fondi ; where, on the authority of Ni- colo Spinelli a Neapolitan jurist, they proceeded to a new election and made choice of cardinal Robert, the last descendant of the ancient counts of Genevois. The latter assumed the name of Clement VII. and repaired to Avignon ; which city had been for seventy years the residence of the popes, and was now become their property by purchase. Urban put the imprisoned cardinals to the most dreadful tortures, and caused the greater part of them to be executed. The western part of the Christian world was now divided between two factions, the chiefs of which were employed in mutually anathematizing each other, and in delivering over the followers of the opposite party to the flames of hell. The most upright and intelligent individuals raised their voices for a long time, but in vain, against the corruptions of the church. Henry of Langenstein, a native of Hesse and a teacher at Vienna, was one of the earliest of those who proposed an universal council as a remedy for these evils. The acute and honest Pierre d'Ailly flourished at the same time, as well as the eloquent and courageous Gerson, who was banished from France because his sense of justice was too rigid to bend before the powerful ; and the ingenious and benevolent Nicholas de Clcmangis, worthy of a better age. It frequently happened that the two popes nominated different individuals to the same benefice; and every crime was readily forgiven, on condi- tion that the perpetrator should acknowledge the authority UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 216 of the one or of the other. At this period Giovanni Ga- leazzo Visconti murdered his uncle at Milan, and his own son, Giovanni Maria, fell by a conspiracy : we have already seen how Johanna was put to death at Naples. All Italy fell a prey to leaders of banditti of French, German, English, and Italian origin. SECTION XIX. THE COUNCILS. These scandalous and destructive proceed- A.D. 1409. . . , .. a mgs at length gave occasion to the council ot Pisa, which deposed both the popes, and raised the prelate Filardi, a native of Crete, under the title of Alexander V., to the papal throne. This election was chiefly the conse- quence of the intrigues of the Neapolitan cardinal Bal- dassare Cossa, whose genius and energy rendered him capable of the greatest as well as of the most mischievous enterprises. The two former popes refused to submit to the decision of the council of Pisa, and the general anarchy was now augmented by the pretensions of three contemporary pon- tiffs. Alexander, however, died within a year from his election, and was succeeded by the cardinal A.D. 1410. ' # Cossa before mentioned, under the name of John XXIII. John was compelled, by the numerous and well commanded troops of king Lancelot, to fly from Rome : pursued by his enemies, and rejected by a great part of the church, he had recourse to Sigismund, king of the Germans. An interview took place between them at Mantua, in which they resolved upon the council, which was immediately afterwards summoned at Con- A.D. 1414. J stance, and from which John hoped, to obtain peace and the confirmation of his title. His ally Frederick, duke of the lower Austrian provinces, afforded him pro- tection in his journies. Throughout all Italy, Germany, VOL. II. T 274 UNIVERSAL HISTOKY. France, England, the north of Europe, Poland, Bohemia Hungary, and at Constantinople, representatives of the church, and ambassadors of the emperors, kings, nobles, cities, and universities, were appointed in great numbers to the universal assembly of Christendom that was about to be convened. Soon after the deliberations of the council had com- menced, it became evident that an union of the church was impossible, unless all the three popes would lay down their dignity, when a new arid free election might take place. Neither of them, however, chose to be the first to take this step. Corrari, or Gregory XII., was at Rimini; and Luna, or Benedict XIII., in Spain ; but the situation of John was the most perplexing, who assisted at the coun- cil, and became more and more convinced of the serious and spiritual view in which this business was contemplated by the northern prelates, whom he had expected to be able to gain over to his interest by means of bribery and per- suasion. He knew that the most solemn assurances would probably be sacrificed to the pretence or to the principle of the public good; and therefore resolved to withdraw. The assembly appeared, from its numbers, liable to those im- • petuous movements which lead a crowd into acts of violence ; the cardinals, archbishops, and bishops present at the council were estimated at 346; the prelates, teachers, and masters of different universities and of the liberal arts, at 564; and the multitude of princes, counts, nobles, and . knights, at 1600. Under these circumstances John took the opportunity of privately absconding, when the whole city was occupied in attending a tournament, and retiring to Schaffhausen, an Austrian town, whither he was followed in the evening by the duke. The terror of the council, which feared that its objects might be frustrated by this movement, was equalled by the rage of the people ; and in the night all the Italians and Austrians took flight. Ambassadors were dispatched to the UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 275 pope and the duke ; but as they refused to return, the coun- cil declared that its decisions did not fail, on that account, to represent the voice of the church which they were in- tended to unite and to reform. The sentence of excommu- nication was pronounced against the duke, and the monarch proclaimed him an outlaw. Frederick was now declared to have forfeited all his do- minions, and all claim to the performance of duties or ob- ligations of every kind : he was deserted on every side ; and Frederick, the burgrave of NUrnberg, (the ancestor of the kings of Prussia,) placed himself at the head of a small imperial army of execution, while the emperor contrived, by means of the influence of Bern, to excite the Swiss against him, by which means he lost his hereditary estates in the Thurgau and Aargau. Such an opportunity of put- ting an end to the power of the house of Habsburg in this country, with the concurrence and at the reiterated com- mands of the supreme head of the empire and of the church, seemed too favourable to be overlooked : and the duke was compelled to submit. John, who was publicly reproached with contempt of all religion, with unbounded licentiousness, and crimes of every kind, was deposed, and committed to the custody of the elector-palatine: some years afterwards, however, he regained his liberty, obtained a cardinal's hat from his successor, and at length died at Florence. Gregory the Twelfth, in the meantime, submitted ; and as Benedict, whose obstinacy was invincible, was deposed by a decree of the council, Otho Colonna, a prelate of great wisdom, ascended the sacred chair under the name of Martin the Fifth. This pontiff found means to evade, ^ ^ under specious pretences, almost every regula- tion which the assembled church had adopted for the limitation of the papal power ; but the constitution of the church, which had hitherto been patriarchal, if not monarchical, appeared, by the introduction of regular 276 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. councils, one of which was to be held every ten years, to have assumed an aristocratical form. Martin contrived, during his life, to render the effect of this alteration imperceptible. Condulmere, or Eugenius the Fourth, having entered into a contest with the council of Basle, the latter set up another pope against him, in the person of the first duke of Savoy, who had quitted his go- vernment and was living in a delightful solitude at Ripaille on the lake of Geneva, and who took the name A.D. 1439. of Felix the Fifth. Eugenius opposed to the fathers of Basle the authority of the council, which first assembled at Ferrara, and afterwards at Florence, and espe- A D 143 c * a % ms own P ers °nal merits; for while the former had been deposing him, he had effected, at a great expense, the union of the Greek with the Romish church. John Palaeologus, emperor of Constantinople, who with many of his clergy was at Florence, gave his consent to the arrangement; and from that time a party lias existed in the western countries, which is attached to the Greek church and is called the " United." The council of Basle was compelled, by the disturbances of war, to remove to Lausanne, as the emperor had withdrawn from it the protection of his authority. Under, Sarzano, or Nicholas the Fifth, the schism was healed by A.D. 1449. the moderation of his opponent Felix, who AD 14 51 as ^ e ^ e P a P a l dignity* an d died in the character of deacon of the college of cardinals. From this time the councils were disused ; but the impres- sions which they had made to the disadvantage of Rome, remained and gradually developed themselves. All the popes, with one exception, were henceforward chosen from among the Italians ; they were accordingly better acquainted with the policy of their country, and they founded a tem- poral power in the territory of the state ; but the people of foreign countries became more estranged from them. UNIVERSAL HrSTORY. 277 SECTION XX. FLORENCE. We have already seen that in Florence the class of citizens obtained a superiority over the nobles, which was continually increasing: the jealousy of the parties rose at length to such a height, that it appeared necessary to the safety of the state to intrust the administration to a fo- reigner ; and the choice fell upon Walter, a member of the French family of Brienne, which, during the misfortunes of the Greek empire, had acquired the sove- A.D. 1342. . A 1 TT7 ! «. 1 reign ty ol Athens. Walter soon suffered himself to be persuaded, that if he could succeed in de- pressing the families of the powerful citizens, such as the Altoviti and Kuccellai, it would be possible for him to acquire an absolute power. The people were at first pleased with the oppression of these objects of their envy ; but they soon discovered their mistake, and repented of having called in the foreigner. They now begaTi to flatter the nobles, and many even placed the escutcheons of illustrious families over their doors, as if to acknowledge themselves among the number of their clients ; and when the nobles rode abroad they were greeted with acclamations, which reminded them of their ancestors the founders of Florentine liberty. While people were in this disposition, the duke demanded to be invested with unlimited authority; but the government represented to him, " that such preten- sions were unknown in Florence, where the name of liberty. was cherished and honoured; that no length of time or ex- tent of power was capable of extinguishing this sentiment ; nor could the merit of any individual, however great, render it safe to intrust an authority of that description in his hands : that the remembrance of their freedom was renewed by every public place, by the courts of justice, the standards and banners of their troops ; and that he who might wish t 3 L'/8 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. to rule against the will of the people, would not long retain his power." The duke replied, " that freedom cannot possibly exist where faction rules ; and that no condition is more unhappy than a state of public disquiet." The com- munities were now called together, and the government proposed to them to confer absolute power on the duke for one year ; but the people, whose great aim it was to hu- miliate the governing families, exclaimed, " Be it so for ever !" The palace of the state was now delivered over to the duke, whose arms were every where displayed instead of those of the city : he forbade the wearing of arms, under pretence of preventing the excesses of faction ; and imme- diately proceeded to augment the imposts. Places of profit and honour were conferred on people of low condition, while persons of greater importance were punished for trifling errors with haughtiness and severity: a number of French- men were admitted to the privileges of citizenship ; the customs of that nation began to predominate, and the duke surrounded himself with a body guard. The nobles and the citizens of ancient families twice conspired to restore the former constitution : the mechanics, who were suffering from the diminution of demand for labour, once entered into a combination for the same purpose; and the arch- bishop Acciajouli, who had at first been a friend of the duke, became a party to these undertakings. These de- signs, either from fear or avarice, were betrayed : upon which the duke summoned three hundred of the most con- siderable persons in the city under pretence of holding a council, but in reality in order to secure their persons while he was assembling his guards: but they, aware of their danger, admonished each other " to die gloriously, with arms in their hands, for the cause of Florence." The nobles, citizens, and artificers, assembled in a body; at nine in the mornirvr, some ran into the great place, ex- claiming, " To arms for freedom !" The population of all UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 2/9 the quarters hastened to their accustomed posts ; the French, who were running towards the palace, were put to death in the streets; and the duke, after having lost the best part of his adherents, was compelled to capitulate with one of the Medici, who commanded the party of his adversaries. This capitulation took place under the mediation of the ambassadors of Siena, and other strangers, who were ac- cidentally present. William of Scesi, who had been the instrument of the duke's oppressions, was delivered up, and executed, together with his son: and while the mob was engaged in insulting their remains in the most horrible manner, the nobles consented to allow the duke immedi- ately to quit the city in security. The administrators endeavoured to fortify, by the spirit of liberty, the constitution which had now been restored by the popular detestation of slavery; and the newly acquired freedom was proclaimed in city and country. A third part of the high offices of the state and the half of the inferior posts, were reserved for the ancient families; and Florence might nowhave become a happy republic, if the latter had been capable of imbibing the genuine spirit of republican equality: they however soon manifested by their conduct so little regard for the other classes, that the whole body of citizens, conceiving themselves deceived, flew to arms, de- stroyed the great citadels, and took exclusive possession of the government. From this period, whoever aspired to public offices was obliged to adopt a popular manner of life, and the love of arms and the lofty feeling of self- esteem were lost. Those citizens who had enriched themselves by industry and commerce had scarcely possessed themselves of the the sovereignty by these means, when the common people were inspired by some ambitious individuals with the idea, that the numbers and courage of the multitude are able to command power, riches, and every good thing. Hence arose insurrections, in which the houses of opulent mdi- t 4 280 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. viduais were frequently plundered. As, in the conduct of life, one bad action is often the cause of another; so it was here found necessary to subvert the constitution, in or- der that those who had been thus injured might not have it in their power to take revenge. The common people were willing to incur any risk, because they had nothing to lose : individuals who had been educated in the peaceful arts, when they were called to conduct the government mani- fested less courage than the former rulers of the state, but were more anxious for the acquisition of money and for the conveniences of life. It was through the operation of such causes, that the sovereign power in Florence came into the hands of the people. When the nobles, by force of arms under wise conduct, expelled the Ghibellines, the state was at open war: when the citizens of illustrious families undertook the government, the arts of peace flourished ; and now when the common people domineered, every thing was venal; and the mean yet proud rulers of Florence endeavoured, by an expendi- ture above their means, to procure that splendour which was denied to them by their birth. SECTION XXI. COSMO DE* MEDICI. While the affairs of the republic were in this state, a private citizen who was distinguished by his liberality, guided at his pleasure the actions of the multitude. Cosmo de' Medici was descended from an ancient family, which is said to have flourished in Greece at the period when the Latin emperors governed in Constantinople, and which, by a series of illustrious heads, acquired an honourable name in Florence. John, the father of Cosmo, a man of a mild and prudent character, had been gonfaloniere of the republic in the war against Filippo, duke of Milan; during which, the state had in three years incurred a debt of three UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 281 million six hundred thousand scudi. This was a sura which in that age it appeared scarcely possible for a small state to discharge; and John de' Medici proposed a tax which should be levied on the interest of capital, and which would con- sequently fall on himself and on the rest of the wealthy citizens. This sacrifice procured him the love of the people, together with the jealousy of his equals; but he remained at a distance from all such offices as could have given him the appearance of peculiar authority and influence At the ap- proach of death he said to his two sons, " I leave you a name universally honoured and beloved, together with an honestly acquired fortune : keep yourselves at a distance from all those dignities of the state, in which it might be supposed that your power or property could pervert the course of justice: accept such offices as may be offered to you, without seeking them ; and beware of taking any share in the intrigues of factions." John died at the age of sixty- eight; and his sons, Cosmo and Lorenzo, were accompanied to his funeral by twenty-six persons of the family of Medici, by all the members of the government, and by all the ambas- sadors of foreign states who were at that time in Florence. Cosmo was the richest private person in Italy; and 128 commercial houses in Europe, Asia, and Africa, were esta- blished under his name. He was not distinguished by ex- ternal pomp; but he maintained an hospitable table; his house was open to the needy and unfortunate, and was the residence of the learned as well as of the most polished society. He supported almost all the members of the admi- nistration with his wealth, and frequently before they desired it : but he kept these transactions so secret, that his son discovered them only after his death. He pleased the priesthood by founding or endowing churches, altars, and convents ; and gained over the mechanics by the ad- vantages which he allowed them to derive from the building of his palace and of four elegant pleasure-houses, which cost him seven hundred thousand scudi. The whole Chris- 282 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. tian world was filled with the fame of his beneficence, in building an hospital at Jerusalem for the reception of the pilgrims who visited the holy sepulchre ; and all the learned venerated the individual who had established a library that was regarded as an admirable one even for the university of Padua. While Cosmo was thus conciliating the popular esteem, Rinaldo degli Albizi was incessantly employed in the in- vention of means to ruin him. He paid the debts which had hitherto prevented Cosmo's enemy, Bernardo Gua- dagni, from becoming gonfaloniere ; and as soon as he had thus elevated the latter to that dignity, earnestly entreated him to deliver their country from a citizen who, as he said, was in reality cheating it of its freedom. Cosmo was cited, under various pretences, to appear before the government, and arrested as soon as he arrived in the state palace: the party of Rinaldo called the people together in a tumultuary manner, and having terrified them with false alarms, per- suaded them to appoint two hundred reformers of the state. Th.e enemies of Cosmo were not agreed whether to banish or to put him to death; but he, concluding from the alarm bells, the noise of weapons and other sounds, that there was a powerful party in his favour, was more apprehensive of poison than of being put to death by violence, and there- fore refrained from food during four whole days. Francesco Maltevolti, to whose custody he was confided, was frequently requested by his enemies, in the name of the government, to deliver Florence from the perils which menaced it, and the prisoner from his fear, by a strong draught of poison : but he replied, " I am a nobleman of Siena, and incapable of a dishonourable act." He went to Cosmo, whom he found exhausted and distressed ; reminded him that he was the nephew of his friend the pious Orlando; assured him that he was equally incapable of the base action which had been proposed to him, and of fearing the menaces of those who would have incited him to perpetrate it; and he persuaded i4 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 285 his prisoner to eat. A facetious man, a relation of the gonfaloniere, afterwards obtained permission to dine with Cosmo and Maltevolti : Cosmo gave the latter a sign that he should leave him alone with this person, whom he gained over by magnificent promises, and by a present of eleven hundred scudi made to him on the spot. The gonfaloniere called the people together: Cosmo was delivered from dan- ger of his life; but, with all the family of Medici, was sentenced to banishment for a certain number of years. The gonfaloniere was rewarded by both parties. Cosmo was received at Venice with greater respect than Alcibiades had formerly experienced at Lacedsemon, and. was consulted by the senate on the most important affairs. Many of the princes of Italy offered to restore him to his country : but he refused ; declaring, that he forgave every thing to his fellow-citizens: and when he was recalled, he manifested as much generosity as Metellus had shown under similar circumstances. A year after his banishment, Rinaldo Albizi, who had been summoned to give an account of the abuses of Iris power, filled the great square with armed men, and com- pelled the government to adopt defensive measures. Pope Eugenius the Fourth, who was present, mediated a ces- sation of hostilities; and in the mean time the govern- ment summoned to their assistance the people of the PIs- tolese mountains, who came into the city by night. The communities were now assembled ; and the government^ amidst the loudest acclamations, proposed the recall of Cosmo. All his enemies were banished ; he received from his fellow- citizens the appellation of father of his country; and from the rest of Italy and from posterity, that of Cosmo the Great. From this time his conduct was in all respects more cautious than before : he was master of Flo- rence, while he appeared to be only one of her citizens ; and while foreign princes were suitors for his daughters, Ik 2S4 UNIVERSAL HISTORY, married them to citizens of his own country. Such was the origin of the influence of the Medici at Florence. SECTION XXII. LITERATURE. The genius" of the Medici and of their fellow-citizens, was beneficial to all nations ; and a small republic now gave a new proof that the admiration of virtue, science, and the fine arts, may impart a splendour to the most unimportant city, which eclipses the fame of powerful monarchies. The arts and sciences have come to us from the south. The countries of Germany were still enveloped in darkness in the age of the Othos, when monks and certain persons of greater temporal importance brought the classical authors over the Alps ; but the din of arms soon silenced the voice of the muses. Italy at this time possessed the anonymous author who celebrated the first Berengar; and, subse- quently, Domnizo who sang the praises of the countess Mathildis, with several other respectable Latin poets. When the republics rose upon the ruins of the imperial power, and the paths to the highest offices were open to every one possessed of wisdom and eloquence, Italy exhi- bited the first example of an harmonious national dialect. The pursuit of knowledge was attempted in two different ways: some devoted themselves to the cultivation of the abstract sciences ; and if we are to estimate genius, not by the direction which the circumstances c>f the times may in- duce it to assume, but by its intrinsic merits, we cannot refuse our admiration to the powerful mind of Thomas Aquinas, who was the wonder of his age and has been the preceptor of many succeeding generations. Natural phi- losophy and chemistry were as yet expounded in a manner almost as mysterious as magic : Albertus Magnus of Lau- ingen on the Danube, who was for tome time bishop of 13 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 285 Ratisbon, and the contemporary of Roger Bacon, was the first person in Germany who turned the attention of men to subjects of this nature. Peter of Apone soon afterwards astonished all Italy by his pretensions : he was said to have been instructed in the seven liberal arts by seven spirits, whom he detained spell-bound in a certain crystal : what- ever money he disbursed, found its way back again into his pocket ; and this miracle we need not dispute, since he re- ceived one hundred and fifty pounds for every visit which he made as a physician without the city, and four hundred ducats per diem iox his attendance during the illness of pope Honorius the Fourth. His figurative language and strange conceits were unintelligible to the greater part of his con- temporaries ; and he would have been seized by the Inqui- sition, if his death had not opportunely deprived that tribunal of its prey : the holy office, however 3 caused him to be burned in effigy ; while his mistress caused his body to be privately interred. While the profound thinkers were engaged in exploring uncertain paths through these obscure regions, the wiser Florentines employed themselves in the cultivation of the Italian language. In the 14th century, Dante, of the noble family of Alighieri, wrote the " Divina Commedia a work which displays all the majesty and boldness that excite our admiration in the ancients and in Milton : it abounds with the fervour of genius, with patriotism, and genuine love of virtue; and is the earliest production of modern literature which we may venture to compare with the works of the ancients. Dante is not always equal to himself: he frequently offends against the precepts of good taste, and bears traces of barbarous rudeness; but he is never common or low, and loses himself only in the lofty flights of his imagination. Dante survived his banishment AD 1321 ^ r ° m ^ or ^ nce twent y years, and died at Ra- venna at the age of sixty-six. His fellow-citizen, Francesco Petrarca, was already in- 286 U N I VE US AL II I STO R Y. spired by the perusal of the ancients and the charms of Laura. In vain his father, incensed against him, burned his copies of the ancient poets and orators : he was destined to impart to the language of his country the most perfect refinement, and to furnish readers of sensibility, in all suc- ceeding ages, with the most elegant gratification. He be- came an orator in consequence of the misfortunes of the times, the perception of which had deeply penetrated his mind ; and he was made a poet by Laura, a daughter of the knight of Noves and the wife of Hugo of Sade, whom Petrarch has immortalised by his admirable sonnets, written in his lonely dwelling near a rivulet in the valley of Vaucluse. After he had celebrated the conqueror of Carthage, Rome and Paris rivalled each other in testifying their lively sense of his merits. In the 37th year of his age he was crowned with laurel in the capitol. The emperor Charles the Fourth found him at Mantua, and invited him to accompany him in his journey to Rome. " It is not sufficient," said Charles, " that I am going to see Rome ; I wish to see it with your eyes." The Florentines, by whose turbulent proceedings his family had been banished, sent information to him by Boccacio, that the republic had restored his confiscated property. He died at the age of *J4. Giovanni Boccacio was also the son of a Florentine merchant ; his relations intended to educate him for a merchant, or a teacher of ecclesiastical law; but nature destined him to be the scourge of human follies. He also began to compose in verse; but when he met with the poetry of Petrarch, he destroyed his own compositions, and afterwards wrote in prose in a style of as much simplicity and liveliness as the best works of the Greeks; it might be said that he brought the muses down from Parnassus into the circle of social life. He is copious, and sometimes licentious ; but his Decamerone must always be considered a masterpiece. Boccacio was, in comparison with the Gre- cian authors, what Petrarch was if we compare him to the UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 287 'Roman ; and Constantinus Lascaris says, with justice, that he is second in eloquence to none of the Greeks ; and that his hundred tales outweigh the works of A.D.1575. . & an hundred poets. During a century and a half immediately succeeding the age of these great men, the best authors and orators were the secretaries of state of Florence, or of the pope; or the tutors and friends of the Medici. Among them were Co- luccio, a Florentine secretary of state, of whom the duke of Milan complained, that he had done him more injury with his pen than fifteen hundred Florentine knights ; Leo- nardo Bruni, the first of the house of Aretino, who wrote in Greek and Latin like one of the ancients, and who was one of the earliest good historians of Italy ; his successor, Charles ; Francesco Poggio, was the author of a history, but especially of some excellent letters which abound with antique wisdom ; and he was one of the most distinguished restorers of good taste. The knight Accialotti was denomi- nated the prince of juridical subtleties, and in his old age quitted his professor's chair at Siena with sorrow, because he happened to have only forty hearers. In Barzizio, Cicero seemed to live again. The learned Francesco Barbaro de- fended Brescia for the Venetians against the arms of Milan, in the midst of pestilence and insurrection ; but the most illustrious of all was iEneas Sylvius Piccolomini, who was banished in his youth, with the rest of the nobility, from Siena : he devoted himself to the first of the arts, to agri- culture ; was secretary to several cardinal legates, to the council of Basle, and to the emperor Frederick III. ; be- came afterwards a cardinal, and at length pope, by the title of Pius II. : his writings display a lively and agreeable spirit, and are ornamented with the graces of antiquity. While the dawn of good taste began to appear in these great men, the Greeks, who were obliged to fly from Con- stantinople with their treasures of ancient literature, found a welcome reception under the roof t)f Cosmo de' Medici. 288 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. The knight Manuel Chrysoloras, now instructed the Flo- rentines in reading and comprehending those writings of the ancient Greeks whom Boccacio had taught them to admire; and John Argyropulus afterwards instructed the son and grandson of Cosmo. Argyropulus was ennobled by a series of illustrious ancestors; he carried his ideas of morality almost too far, when he destroyed his translation of Plato in order that it might do no injury to that of his friend Theodorus of Gaza, which was not so well executed as his own. Theodorus was also one of those who loved knowledge for its own sake, and not from interest or vanity. The learned men above mentioned, with Calli. ; tus the teacher of Reuchlin ; Demetrius Chalcocondylas, who su- perintended the printing of Homer; John Lascaris, who was sent by the house of Medici to collect literary treasures ; Constantinus Lascaris, Hermonymus the Lacedaemonian, and many others, were engaged in grammatical pursuits; and many were excellent caligraphers. The first attempts in the art of printing, which is called in the contract of Guttenberg with the citizens of Stras- A D 1439 k ur &' " tne wonderful secret," were feeble and slow. Guttenberg, who was a nobleman of Mayence, injured his fortune in the pursuit ; and as he was defrauded during his life by his associates, posterity also, for a long time, did him the injustice to attribute his invention to another. SECTION XXIII. VENICE. When the Venetians had brought a long war against the Genoese to a victorious conclusion, they began to erect a sovereignty on the continent, which brought their re- public into the greatest difficulties ; but which in the sequel was the only part of their splendid acquisitions that re- mained permanently their own. The nobles and free cities UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 289 m their vicinity, apprehending that they might become as powerful by land as they were by sea, imbibed the utmost jealousy against the Venetians. Such was the occasion of the long wars of the family of Visconti : of a hundred years of incessant commotion, and of two centuries of timid po- licy. But when recent discoveries opened new channels of trade, and when it was no longer possible to maintain their possessions in the Levant against the arms of the Turks, the Venetians retained scarcely any thing except their ac- quisitions on the continent. The foundation of this dominion was the A.D. 1403. _ . p _ _ capture or the town ot Padua, in consequence of which the city of Verona, terrified at the enterprises of Francesco Carrara, sent their standard to Venice by the hands of Antonio Maffei. Hereupon the thirteen commu- nities (comuni) submitted, and suffered their privileges to be confirmed to them by the Venetians. (These people are of German origin : they live between the Adige and Brenta, under their own laws, and are governed by their great council of thirty-nine, and their smaller council of thirteen.) Since the time when Dalmatian Zara was brought, by the arms of the crusaders, under the sovereignty of the Ve- netians, several cities on the coast had also placed them- selves under their protection : Sebenigo had been induced to take that step through fear of the power of Hungary; and Lesina had been transferred to Venice by the last of its sovereigns. It was not long before the powerful city of Pisa, which was exhausted by its enterprises, and threatened by Tus- cany, sought in vain for better means of security. The Ve- netians were aware what danger they incurred of entailing a heavy burden on their state, by receiving this great town under their protection ; and the question was put sixty-one times in the senate, before the majority of votes decided ac- cording to their wishes. VOL. II. u 290 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. Although the forms of the constitution of Venice Were neither introduced upon any one occasion, nor were uni- versally so ancient as this age, it will yet be proper to de- scribe them in this place, before we go on to consider the more important affairs of Europe in later times. We shall then find it impossible to bestow sufficient attention on the internal administration of any single commonwealth. In the period which immediately succeeded the serratura del consiglio, or the limitation of eligibility to a certain number of families, a few additional members, as Mainotto Pulci and Nicolo di Scrovigno, of Padova, A. D. 1301. • mi were associated with these aristocrats. The addition which was made to their numbers at the period of A D 13 tfie ^ ast struggle with Geneva, was more consi- derable ; notwithstanding that the exclusion of all foreign vassals had been renewed in 1320, and that the newly-admitted citizens were obliged to make a previous renunciation or limitation of their claims to places in the government. But the ancient families became extinct in? the course of time, and their dignities were inherited by new houses. We shall observe the most ancient names and trace a spirit of obstinate discontent, among the Bura- nelli, Nicolotti, and Poggiotti. The election of the doge soon ceased to be confirmed by the people : he threw money to them, and the senate en- deavoured to regulate their choice by the opinion of the public. When Sagredo and Foscarini were suspected of avarice and interested conduct in their administrations, the electors were changed, and the people were contented : but when the real ground of this prejudice became known, Fos- carini was, on another occasion, elected by acclamation. The supreme power resides, at Venice, in the great coun- cil, in which the nobles have seats by hereditary privilege when they have attained their twenty-fifth year : from the number of those who are between the ages of twenty-one and twenty-five, thirty are annually chosen, as members of UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 2.91 this assembly, by lot. The right of introducing subjects for discussion resides in the doge, the six superior counsellors, the president of the criminal tribunal, and the advocates of the community ; and it sometimes happens that the senate makes a communication. The legislative function, the power of pardon, and the disposal of offices, reside in the great council. A place is not unfrequently rather a sort of ostracism than a reward : the expensive and unproductive dignities are readily bestowed on wealthy nobles, who are notwithstanding willing to receive them, because they open the way to still higher posts : and a mean office is often a punishment to the nobleman on whom it is imposed; be- cause they are not all of the same character with Epami- nondas, to whom his fellow-citizens intrusted the clearing of the public shores. Extraordinary places, which depend on the mutable condition of external relations, are at the disposal of the senate. The elections are conducted in the following manner: In a bag, which contains as many balls as there are members in the council, sixty are of gold : those who happen to get the latter, draw lots a second time, in such a manner as to reduce their number to thirty-six : these are the electors, and divide themselves into four colleges, each of which con- tains nine members. During the time of election, nine offices are conferred every day : in every college, each one of the nine members names a candidate for one of these offices, the nomination to which falls to the proposer by lot : thus four candidates are nominated by the four col- leges for every office ; and the election is at length made by a majority of votes in the great council. None of those who seek an office on the same day, no relations of any of the electors, nor any persons who are debtors to the state, are allowed to vote ; nor is more than one . vote received from each name and family. The senate consisted of only sixty members ; but it was usual, as among the Swiss democracies, to double and U 2 1M UNIVERSAL HISTORY. even to treble its numbers in extraordinary cases. These additions became afterwards incorporated: and the chief counsellors, the wise men (savi), the criminal judges, the council of ten, the administrators of St. Mark, the trea- surer, the director of the arsenal and fortresses, and prin- cipal officers of Bergamo, were by degrees added to the number, in order that the senate might be assisted by their knowledge of business, as well as that the good will of these officers might be conciliated. The number of senators, which is not always the same, may amount to about three hundred. Every affair that comes before the senate, is prepared and introduced by the college, which consists of the doge, the three chiefs of the criminal tribunal, and the sixteen savi : the college is guided by the six great savi. And thus affairs of all kinds are retained in the hands of a few, until they are matured for a conclusion. The great savi are in possession of the secrets and the maxims of the state, and are the persons in whom the greatest confidence is reposed. The Venetians perhaps learned this institution from the Carthaginians ; unless they adopted it, without reference to an} r example, from the suggestions of reason. Domenico Molinos, a savi, merited the memorable accusation of Marco of Trevigi, " that he had filled all Europe with the fame of his wisdom, and gained as many admirers as there were statesmen." The constitution of Venice has this excel- lent peculiarity ; that while those individuals^who are formed by nature for rulers, and whose numbers are in all ages and countries very small, have every resource in their power -'hich can contribute to the preservation of the laws, they e wholly destitute of the means which might enable them overturn the government. The business of the state is kept so secret, that when the Avogadori have administered the oath of secrecy respecting any affair, to every senator, it must not be mentioned even by the members of the senate in their private meetings in any other place. The UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 203 power of declaring war, of making treaties of peace and of alliance, and of administering the resources of the republic, is within the province of the senate : but though that body had the power of abandoning the whole continental terri- tory of the state, it could not make the most trifling alter- ations in the laws, without the concurrence of the great council. The monarchical dignity was vested in his most serene highness the doge ; the aristocracy in the senate ; and the democracy in the great council : no class is in possession of the whole sovereignty, which belongs to the laws alone. All affairs are conducted by the senate ; but whatever comes before that body, is previously examined by the savi. The senate can confer no official employment ; but it appoints inspectors of the administration, and represses the passions of individuals by the laws : it protects the subjects of the republic against the numerous inferior nobility, without op- pressing the latter; because it is necessary to prevent the aristocracy from becoming formidable, as well as to take care that its privileges shall not be confined to too small a number. The senate, with admirable prudence, controlled Venice by means of fear and hope, and contrived, in its ex- ternal relations, to keep the impetuous passions of the more powerful states in check, and to maintain the dignity of the republic towards foreign potentates. When Venice de- clared herself on the side of any state, it was more a matter of honour than of military importance, and conferred an appearance of solidity in the opinion of the public. Another excellent maxim was, to live on good terms with their neighbours, but to maintain the closest connection with those states that were by one degree further distant. The council of ten is the protector of the people against the great, and of the state against the spirit of faction : and since it has to watch over the incalculable caprices and artifices of passion, it is not bound by the ordinary forms of law, but is subject only to the " reason of state." Hence u 3 294 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. it exercises less severity toward offences against morality,, than toward political crimes. The Venetians have been re- proached with being so entirely occupied with the endeavour to preserve their present condition, as to have omitted even the necessary attention to the maintenance of public morals : those political virtues however, by means of which alone it was possible for the citizens (who were merely members of the government) to distinguish themselves, have flourished among the Venetians, in as great a degree as in any other state. Immorality is indeed regarded, in persons of a cer- tain class, without disapprobation, because these individuals by that means diminish their own influence with the people, which might otherwise become too great; while, on the other hand, a person who has betrayed a secret of state, is pu- nished without appeal, and without knowing his accusers. The three state inquisitors are to the council of ten, what that college is to the senate : they are superior to all the citizens, even to the doge himself: when unanimous, they have the power of inflicting punishment, but not of capitally condemning without the concurrence of the ten. The autho- rity of the council of ten is independent of the senate : the latter has indeed sometimes interceded with them, at the re- quest of some foreign prince, but in vain ; and this is even advantageous to the senate, which, standing as it does at the head of affairs, ought not to be exposed to the ill will of foreigners. The ten employ, as their spies, a crowd of monks, prostitutes, watermen, or gondolieri, and lacqueys. We must however judge of the power of this body from its beneficial influence on the whole community, as we ought indeed to decide on the merits of the republic, rather from the principles of its administration than from the letter of its laws. If we survey it in this point of view, we shall find that the council often is the main pillar of the state, and the chief bulwark of freedom : its powers would otherwise have been long ago circumscribed by the periodically elected correct- ors ot the laws {correttori delli leggi). Some senators, indeed. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 295 with upright intentions, endeavoured about A. D. 1761. 1 & , , , c twenty years ago to introduce alterations ot this tendency ; but the voice of the people was in favour of the ten : and while the power of the state inquisitors was diminished, the ten retained their criminal jurisdiction over the nobility in its whole extent. The enforcement of rigid discipline was a task recommended to both bodies : and in every circumstance regarding public peace, the dignity of the republic, the care of its subjects at home, and its splen- dour abroad ; that high authority, the stedfast exercise of which had for so many centuries preserved Venice, was fully confirmed to the council of ten. The three judicial courts of forty, consist of as many no- bles, who must be above the age of thirty, and of whom not more than two of the same name and family can sit in the same court. The ancient civil quarantia determines re- specting appeals from the city tribunals, and the criminal decisions of the provincial judges, when these have been pro- nounced without the concurrence of the council of ten ; and gives judgment in cases, the decision of which, on account of the power of one of the parties, would be hazardous to the inferior offices. The most ancient families usually sit in this court, the spirit of which was a constant object of ap- prehension, because it is older than the other parts of the political system, and was always jealous of those institu- tions : but the opposition of two courts, which are never indulgent one to another, is advantageous to the subjects ; for without some principle of opposition, no republic can long maintain its vigour. The new civil quarantia deter- mines appeals from the continent of Italy and from Dal- matia; and the objects of the criminal quarantia are sufficiently explained by its name. When the doge dies, all the members of the great coun- cil, who are above thirty years old, draw balls out of a bag, which contains thirty of gold : from these thirty, nine are chosen by lot; of these nine, four nominate five electors u 4 206 UNIVERSAL HISTORY/ each ; and five four each, making in the whole forty elector-. Out of these forty, twelve are chosen by lot, each of whom nominates two electors, except the first, who appoints three ; these make in all twenty-five. From these twenty- five, nine are again chosen by lot, each of whom names five, viz. the whole number forty-five. From this number the lot separates eleven, eight of whom nominates each four, and each of the remaining three appoints three; so that the whole number is forty-one. From these forty-one, who are confirmed by the great council, the doge is elected by a majority, consisting of not less than twenty-five. This form of election was appointed in the age of a. d. i25o. _ ., ■ . ■ r rr. the doge Marino Morosini. The sons, brothers, and nephews of the new doge, im- mediately quit the government during his life; and his own authority has been so circumscribed by the correttori delta pcrmissione, that he is nothing more than president of the college and the councils. He has the privilege of intro- ducing the subjects of deliberation, and may clothe them in whatever form he prefers ; but when he has once given his opinion, he is not even permitted to support it, as such a proceeding would be contrary to his dignity ; and it now becomes the province of the advocate of the community to speak in his behalf. He superintends the arsenal, the docks, and the church of St. Mark. He gives, in the course of the year, five entertainments, which consume two-thirds of his income, and thus reduce his recompence to the mere dignity of his office. The procurators of St. Mark have seats for life in the senate, together with the superintendance of affairs relating to testaments, guardianships, and debts : the business of the office is transacted by nine of their number, and the other members are merely titular. Great care has been taken to leave very little power in the hands of officers whose ap- pointment is for life. The six superior counsellors constitute the cabinet, and UNIVERSAL HISTORY- 297 lire also the ephori of the doge, whose proceedings they have continually under their inspection : when four of their number are unanimous, they may make a proposition to the counsel, even without his concurrence. These persons are the presidents of the criminal quarantia. Of the power of the censors, nothing remains but the name, as their office now consists only in the superintend- ance of the livery servants of the republic: they have, how- ever, during their official existence of forty months, a seat and vote in the senate ; they assist at the criminal tribunals, and succeed to posts in the council of ten, or in the number of the six superior counsellors. The three advocates of the community are acquainted with the most secret affairs ; they have the privilege of en- tering uncalled, and as often as they choose, into the as- sembly of the council, which they can compel to postpone the execution of its resolutions, or even to alter them : they can make no arrangements, but watch over all abuses. Any one of the three possesses the authority of the whole number : and their power is so great that Scarpi advised that it should never be conferred on a man of spotless cha- racter, lest he should become dangerous. The senators must at least have attained their 25th, and the ten and the six superior counsellors, at least their 40th year. In ancient times, distinguished ability in maritime affairs was the most powerful recommendation. When it was desirable, which frequently happened, to place an office in the hands of a dependent man, poverty was the decisive qualification ; and riches were necessary for those posts which were at the same time expensive and unpro- ductive. It was designed that the richest should be the most powerful, and therefore the marriages of the reigning nobles with the daughters of wealthy citizens were never forbidden. All the corporations possessing independent privileges, which confer a jurisdiction not emanating from the supreme power, are abolished. Many laws have been 208 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. enacted, since the thirteenth century, against the abuses of ecclesiastical power; and the court of Rome usually gave way to them without contest, under the specious pre- tence, that such matters were allowable and customary. The government, on the same grounds, cherished the spirit of faction among the provincial nobility, and supported the peasants against the power of the towns. As the offices in the military service were not distributed by the commanders, the general had no party attached to his interests, and could therefore at any time be safely dismissed or made prisoner. The command of the land forces was generally conferred on foreigners, while that of the fleet was bestowed on noble Venetians ; for the sea is the element, the foundation, and the security of Venice : her territorial dominions are of subordinate importance. The government incurred but little hazard of being over- turned by the nobles, who were in no country of so great importance as at Venice. The commons are also in every respect unfettered, except that they are forbidden to inter- fere in politics ; for the ten state inquisitors are not formi- dable to persons of this class, but to the most powerful of the nobles, and to ambitious ecclesiastics. The history of the states of Italy is in general disfigured with massacres; but it has seldom happened in Venice that one nobleman has been put to death by another, because many prejudices on which the notion of honour is usually founded, are here overcome by maxims of state. The founders of the constitution of Venice, like the ancient Lacedaemonians, made the preservation of their institutions the exclusive object of their solicitude, and, like them, founded freedom upon obedience. They were unwilling to confer power in perpetuity ; and preferred that all officers should be kept in continual dependence, and that those to whom the su- preme authority was intrusted, should be incessantly de- pendent on each other. They overlooked the private frailties of men without sanctioning them, as they . wished 8 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 299 that the government should be at the same time the object of awe and of affection. The power of Venice is but small, but her perseverance in established maxims is worthy of our veneration. SECTION XXIV. GENOA. Genoa was aggrandized by its maritime commerce. The emperors of Constantinople have been insulted in the harbour of their capital by Genoese ships ; and sultans have sought their favour, as the means of acquiring a footing in Europe. Phocaea, Chios, Lesbos, Lemnos, and Samo- thracia, were once the dominions of Genoese nobles; and the fertile Crimea, with many scattered places in the Black and Grecian seas, were their gold mines. This republic not only maintained a contest for the islands of Sardinia and Corsica, but early acquired power on the Continent, by which her interests were brought into collision with those of Milan and Piedmont. The same inconstancy was still perceptible in the Ge- noese, which the Romans had remarked in their ancestors the Ligurians: and in consequence of this trait in their character, the government of Genoa never became re- spectable by its adherence to permanent maxims, but was exposed to perpetual disturbances. The people knew as little how to govern as to obey : equality was insupportable to the nobles at home, and they governed their subjects with extreme severity, while they rendered even their ty- ranny contemptible, by combining it with avarice. Neither the laws, nor any separate party in Genoa, were sufficiently powerful to maintain a preponderating autho- rity; and therefore the republic was frequently obliged to accept, and even to seek protection, by submitting to some foreign power : but as obedience was intolerable to the Ge- noese, they often became burdensome, and not unfre- 300 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. quently treacherous, to their protectors. This republic a£ length forfeited the esteem and affection of its confederates, and its remote possessions easily fell into other hands. SECTION XXV. RAGUSA. Even Ragusa preserved her independence longer than Genoa. The territory of this republic is a line of coast extending scarcely forty Italian miles in length, and from two to three miles in breadth, yet its history deserves a place in the memorials of Europe. In the transactions of the greater states, we are liable to lose sight of many traits of character ; but in those of small republics, individuals are presented more distinctly to our view. The ancient Epidaurus was destroyed by a horde of Slavonians ; and a number of the fugitives built, on a neigh- bouring peninsula, the town of Ragusa. The new com- monwealth was attacked in its infancy by that barbarous race : but the priesthood found means, on this occasion, to mitigate the fury of the enemy, who contented themselves with levying a contribution. The numbers of the com- munity were now increased by many fugitives from the ruins of Salona, and the mountains of Illyrium ; and the as- A D 690 sem ^ ec * mmt i tu( ^ e DuHt a new Ragusa, better constructed than the former, which was situated on a rock in the bottom of a small bay, and strengthened by a citadel placed upon the eminence. The community elected magistrates : on important occasions the people were summoned : ambition was unknown, as it was the common and exclusive wish of all to preserve their freedom. The surrounding country possessed but little fertility: under circumstances nearly similar, the Romans became the con- querors of the world, and the Ragusans a people remark- able for their industry. Ragusa was the market for the superfluous productions of Bosnia: manufactures weie UNIVERSAL HISTORY* establibhed, the operations of which imparted an increase of value to the goods which were to be exported ; and by these means the city was provided with the necessaries of life, and in process of time became opulent. ^ ^ The Ragusans were equally remarkable for their valour in the defence of their city, which was besieged in vain for a whole year by the Moors of Africa, whom they pursued across the Adriatic into Italy, as far as Benevento and Capua. They purchased from a prince of Bosnia their territory, which was almost entirely a forest, but which they converted into a garden. The Ragusans were disturbed by the confusion which took place after the decline of the regal power in Bosnia : but they attached themselves to the Greek emperors, who had it in their power to protect, but could not easily oppress, their commonwealth. At this period a tower, at the entrance of the haven, be- longing to a Rascian nobleman, threatened both the freedom and the subsistence of Ragusa : the commanders of this for- tress were gained over to the republic, by being admitted into the government, and they surrendered the tower. The government was now in the hands of the nobles ; the assem- blies of the people had fallen into disuse ; and the rulers consisted of the descendants of the founders, and of noble Bosnians. The surrender of the above-mentioned tower was celebrated by an annual festival ; for trifling affairs are important to such small republics. A prince of Chelm pre- sented the Ragusans with the neighbouring island of Me- Ieda ; and they inherited Breno from its last possessors. The affairs of the city were now in a prosperous state, when a tyrant made his appearance on the stage : Damiano, one of the rettori, whose power lasted two years, wished to prolong the period of his authority ; and as the senate could undertake no business without the concurrence of the ret- tori, it was impossible, according to the established forms, to proceed to a new election : these honest citizens, it must 302 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. be confessed, paid by far too much regard to established forms, in suffering the laws to be subverted on their ac- count. Damiano ordered the noble youths of the house of Bobali, who were zealous supporters of freedom, to be made prisoners : but they had the good fortune to escape. After this abuse of usurped authority, Peter Benessa, the son-in- law of the tyrant, who preferred the freedom of his country to the splendour of his family, secretly assembled the se- nators ; and it was resolved to apply to Venice for a com- missioner, who should restore the authority of the laws* The Venetians, in pursuance of this request, dispatched two gallies, under pretence of conveying presents for the emperor Henry to Constantinople : Da- AboutA.D. 1210. . / . , . f , miano entertained the captain of the ves- sels, and accepted an invitation to return the visit on the following day ; but as soon as he arrived on board, Benessa summoned the citizens to arms in the cause of freedom, while the Venetians weighed anchor, and carried off Da- miano as a prisoner : the latter, unable to endure his situ- ation, killed himself, by striking his head against the side of the galley. While the people were engaged in plun- dering the palace, the senate, under the direction of Ve- nice, elected Lorenzo Querini as count of the city; but stipulated that he should undertake no measure contrary to the laws, without the concurrence of the great council. Dandolo, the successor of Lorenzo, conducted himself in such a manner as to make the Ragusans sufficiently sen- sible of the loss of their independence ; and during the dis- content which arose from his measures, a Genoese fleet made its appearance, but the fac- ii^as were too powerful to allow the citizens to send home the Venetian count on board of it. The Venetians en- couraged the spirit of faction in Ragusa, restored the as- semblies of the communities, in order to turn the attention of the people from the senate, and augmented the numbers of the latter by new appointments, in order that it might UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 303 Contain a number of members, who should owe their dig- nity to the influence of Venice. Some of the nobles at length applied for assistance to Lewis king of Hungary, who delivered the city from the yoke of the Venetians. The influence of this protector appeared to be attended with the less danger to the liberty of the state, as Lewis had no son : and it was absolutely necessary to have recourse to some power for assistance, particularly on account of the navigation of Ragusa, which, since the emperor Andro- nicus II. had ceased to maintain a fleet, had become ex- tremely hazardous in the seas of Greece; while Genoa, Venice, and the tyrants of the islands, alternately exercised all kinds of violence. The senate of Ragusa turned its at- tention to the power of Orchan, the son of Osman, whose authority was already so great on the Asiatic coasts, on the Hellespont, Propontis, and at the entrance of the Black Sea, that all commercial nations were obliged to conciliate his favour. In order to reconcile the people to an alliance with the Turks, a nun was induced to declare, that this measure had been revealed to her as the will of God. A _ compact was formed, by which the Ra- About A. D. 1530. i ^ , gusans engaged to pay to Orchan the yearly sum of five hundred sequins : this tribute, together with presents for the nobles, is still annually sent to the great sultan ; in return for which, Ragusa is taken under his protection, and its commodities are exempt from tolls. The government of Ragusa consists of the great council, the senate, and the smaller council. All the nobles above the age of eighteen years have the privilege of a seat in the greater council, which enacts the laws, elects the magis- trates, and exercises the power of pardon. Forty-five pre- gadi, who must all be more than forty years old, constitute the senate, which prepares the business to be laid before the greater council, has the power of declaring war and of forming alliances, and is the court of appeal in the last re- sort. Twelve persons are chosen from among the members 304 UNIVERSAL HISTORY* of the greater council, one of whom, on the death of each senator, is appointed to fill up his place : and when this body is reduced to the number of four, it is again com- pleted. The smaller council consists of seven senators, and possesses the executive power. The head of the common- wealth is an officer called a rettore, without whose concur- rence nothing can take place : but his authority lasts only four weeks. He never stirs abroad, except on popular fes- tivals, and at the letting of certain branches of the revenue ; and on these occasions is adorned with a mantle of red damask, with red stockings and shoes, which were insignia of the supreme power in the Grecian empire, and with the more modern ornament of a prodigiously long periwig : he is preceded by a band of musicians, accompanied by the smaller council and the secretaries, and followed by a body guard of twelve unarmed men. Three senators are annually appointed proveditori of the city, whose offices it is to w r atch over the execution of the laws, and to see that they keep the strong in subjection, and maintain in security the rights of the weak. No al- teration can take place in the laws, without the concurrence of seven-eighths of the votes in the greater council ; but the operation of a law maybe suspended, on some particular occasions, by the concurrence of three-fourths of those votes. It sometimes happens that, in periods of danger to the state, one of the members of the council makes a speech in Latin : and on such occasions the orator is congratulated by the nobility, and presented by the state with a pair of capons. The rewards bestowed by a republic on a citizen are usually not very splendid ; but they are the free gift of his own country, and thence incalculably valuable. Trea- surers are elected every five years from among the eldest of the senators, who have the superintendance of the finances. They have the privilege of distributing twelve hundred pounds in secret alms, and of portioning the daughters of poor noblemen : for it is the interest of the government to UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 305 acquire the affection of the people; and it will not allow the nobles to become so needy as to render them desperate. Four judges conduct criminal processes ; but they cannot condemn to death without the concurrence of the senate : and four judges have the direction of the civil tribunal. The suits of the poor, of widows and orphans, are con- ducted gratuitously by young noblemen, who wish to obtain the esteem and love of their fellow-citizens; others take care that the city is properly supplied with provisions, guard against the introduction of foreign wines, and watch over the management of the hospitals, the conduits, the armoury and other public buildings, the streets, the com- xnerce in salt, the citadel, and the territory. The senate is thus relieved from a number of troublesome details, and the youth are occupied, and acquire the means of honourable distinction, by the industrious exercise of their talents. Three physicians and two surgeons are in the pay of the republic, in order that the poorest individual may easily, obtain medical assistance, especially when the plague rages in the neighbouring provinces of Turkey. The population of Ragusa is divided into five classes : Fifst, the clergy are dependent on the archbishop, who is chosen by the pope from two individuals nominated by the senate : this body advances the necessary sum of money for ihe expenses of the bulls, and by this means keeps the pre- late in a state of dependence. Secondly, the nobility are styled illustrious, are held in great reverence, and kept under excellent order : the government is entirely in the hands of this class ; the archbishop and the cathedral chap- ter are elected from among its members, and, in order that the persons of the rulers may be held inviolable, a noble- man can be only conducted to prison by one of his peers or equals. Rousseau says, that if a law has been enacted, ordaining that whoever enters into the council must place his right foot in the room before his left, even this regu- lation must be religiously obeyed : thus, in Ragusa, die VOL. II. x 306 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. length of the counsellors' robes is so accurately determined, that when Tuberone Cerva came into the council with a longer garment than was permitted, the superfluous length was cut off'; and this disgrace affected him so violently, that he quitted public life, and entered into a monastery. Thirdly, the citizens are the descendants of families which are frequently of considerable antiquity ; or of the children of noblemen, either r>f illegitimate birth, or the fruit of marriages with persons of a lower rank : they are eligible to the inferior offices. Fourthly, the people, consisting of tradesmen, artisans, seamen, Greeks, Bosnians, and Jews, are the clients of the noble families. Fifthly, the peasants cultivate the ground for the proprietor, and receive a part of the produce as their recompense: they are brave as well as industrious, and have often lost their lives in defence of their masters, against the predatory Montenegrins. SECTION XXVI. MILAN. The Visconti, who governed Milan, domineered most cruelly over the citizens, oppressed their neighbours, and were incessantly embroiled with their own family. John Galeazzo, who had poisoned his uncle Barnaba, and re- ^ ceived the title of duke from Wenceslaf, king of the Germans, entertained plans for the sub- jection of all Italy, and died in the midst of a splendid career of victory. His son, John Maria Angelo, imprisoned his own mother ; and irritated the people to such a degree by his cruelty and avarice, that he was put to death: his brother Philip was A.D. 1412. r 1 expelled, and freedom restored. About this time Fantino Cane, lord of Vercelle, Alex- andria, Tortona, and Novara, left all these dominions to his widow, Beatrix of Tende : the latter married the banished Philip; collected a military force, conquered Milan, and 6 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 307 caused the demagogues to be executed. A few years after- wards, Philip beheaded Beatrix under pretence A.D.1418. e , ■ mt* A i or adultery. This duke carried on wars in Lombardy, by means of able generals, for his own aggran- dizement, while he remained at Milan, abandoned to volup- tuous pleasures. He left, at his death, only A.D. 1447. ... . . , . ** ' . an illegitimate daughter; and the senate and people again restored the freedom of the city. The military power of Italy was chiefly in the hands of condottieri or leaders of banditti, who were ambitious or depraved, or overwhelmed with debts. Their followers consisted of people who neither had nor wished for any honest means of maintaining themselves; who were in danger of punishment for their crimes, or had been reduced to poverty by misfortune : they lived on the . pay which they received from their chief, or more commonly on the plunder which they obtained from the enemies of the princes or cities into whose service they had entered. We have already seen, in the history of Johanna the Second of Naples, the part which was acted by Jacob Sforza, the valiant peasant of Cotignuola. His son Francesco, who possessed many good qualities, married Blanca, the illegi- timate daughter of the last duke Visconti; and the con- fidence of the Milanese raised him to the command of the army of the republic. He afterwards took occasion to quarrel with the admini- strators of the public affairs; made himself A.D. 1451. . _ \ . , , , sovereign ; and, having assumed the title of . ^ duke, erected a citadel. He died in advanced A.D. 1467. age, crowned with glory and fortune ; and left to the house of the Sforza the dominions which he had ac- quired, which comprehended not only the state of Milan in its present extent, but the considerable districts which have since been severed from it by the Venetians, the Orisons, the Swiss, and the dukes of Savoy and Parma. x 2 308 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. SECTION XXVII. SAVOY. The dignity as well as the power of the counts of Savoy ? was now increasing. Amadeus, called, from A. D. 1365. ... . . 6 , ^ ' ^ his favourite colour, " the Green Count, re- ceived from the emperor Charles the Fourth, a vicegerency of the empire, comprised in twelve dioceses, and so ex- tensive in authority, that not only the ultimate decision of the appeals brought before the imperial tribunals belonged to him, but he had also the power of restoring, at all times, and at his own pleasure, the validity of all the obsolete privileges of the empire. His descendant, Amadeus the Eighth, received the title of duke from Sieis- A.D. 1416. fo b mund, son of Charles the Fourth. The importance of rounding and filling up the vacant spaces in the boundaries of a state, which consisted of distinct and separate sovereignties, and the necessity of diminishing the authority of the nobles who were suffi- ciently powerful to oppose the duke, were the means of training the princes of this family to an unusual degree of activity and vigilance. They took part in all the wars of the neighbouring countries; sometimes they allied them- selves with the feeble, in opposition to states dangerous by their superior power, and sometimes in conjunction with a more powerful ally, when they hoped by such means to aggrandize themselves. They flattered the vanity and took advantage of the poverty and other difficulties of the em- perors, in order to obtain privileges which added weight to their authority. It was a fortunate circumstance for their views, that their neighbours were either feeble in them- selves, or jealous of each other: they did not, however, found their power upon these variable circumstances ; but turned their attention to military affairs with so much suc- cess, that they obtained greater advantages with their own UNIVERSAL HISTORX- troops than others gained by their mercenaries. Almost all the ruling princes of this family fought at the head of their own armies. With all their valour, however, they did not neglect po- licy. They usually supported the cause of the citizens against the great barons, in the hope that both parties would become enfeebled in the contest, and might thus be rendered more subservient. They took the part of the Greek princes who reigned in Montserrat, against the mar- quises of Saluzzo, who, from their situation, were the most formidable to them ; and in consequence of this interfer- ence the latter were compelled to become their vassals. At the same period, they caused the privileges of the emperor over his territory to be transferred to them, as well as the feudal superiority of the bishops of Ivrea over Montserrat which the ancient counts of that country had presented to the tutelary saint of their church. They afterwards formed matrimonial connexions with the Greek prince Palaeologus, who was of imperial family, and had become by marriage count of Montserrat ; and thus secured the succession to themselves. During the wars of the Genoese and Vene- tians, they attached themselves to the party of the latter ; because they entertained hopes of aggrandizing themselves at the expense of the former : but as soon as Genoa was van- quished, and Venice was establishing her dominion on the Continent, the green count hastened to mediate a peace, before the latter should become too powerful. In the mid- dle of the 15th century, they established, as a family law, the right of primogeniture and the indivisibility of their dominions, which had hitherto suffered in consequence of partition. SECTION XXVIII. SWITZERLAND. About the same period which gave birth to the common- wealth of Venice, occurrences took place in the mountains x 3 310 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. of St. Gothard, which in the end gave origin to the well- known confederacy of Switzerland. The history of William Tell and the men of the three cantons, is not the commencement of Swiss liberty, but is a circumstance which serves to confirm the existence and the more ancient freedom of the old confederacy of (Jri, Schwyz, and Unterwalden. The internal government of these forest cantons is also more ancient, and bears the original stamp of nature. The whole population of each of these vallies, exercises the supreme power under the su- perintendance of their landamman, and intrusts its execu- tion to a council and to judges, appointed without any regard to nobility, and without a treasury or any other authority than that which is conferred by the will of the public. Unterwalden was at that period divided by the forest of Kernwald into two communities, one of which has carried on wars and made conquests, without the concur- rence of the other. These vallies were under the immediate guardianship of the empire ; but king Albert of Habsburg, whose father had been their protector in turbulent times, proposed that they should place themselves under the hereditary protec- tion of his family, which was near, and very powerful ; but they, being systematically averse to change, and regard- ing this king, who was feared by his other neighbours, with distrust, refused to accept his proposal. The king, therefore, the more readily allowed the governors whom he appointed over the hereditary states of Habsburg in these countries, to be invested with all the authority of the empire ; which they exercised without moderation over the mountaineers, whom the king, through ignorance of their character, held in contempt. The people, ever undaunted in a just cause, banished the governors, and demolished A.D.1308. . • i • , . i , . the fortresses ; but neither violated the private estates of the house of Habsburg, nor committed any bloodshed except in the well-known instance of William UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 311 Tell, who avenged his own injuries on the governor, Herr- mann Gessler. Before the king had time to adopt any mea- sures in consequence of this affair, which was not considered of importance enough to deserve much attention, he was murdered by his nephew; and his successor, Henry the Seventh, confirmed the ancient constitution of A. D. 1309. the forest cantons. After the death of Henry, Frederick the son of Albert and Lewis of Bavaria were elected ; and the Swiss de- clared in favour of the latter. Leopold, the brother of Frederick, therefore seized the opportunity presented by a feud which had arisen between the canton of Schwyz and the monastery in the Einsideln, of which he was protector, to lead an army against these forest cantons ; and a battle took place in the narrow pass of Morgarten, between the mount Sattel and the lake of Aegeri, in which the Swiss made so good use of the advantages which local situation gave them over their imprudent enemy, that the latter was totally defeated. Count Otho of Strasberg made an ir- ruption on the same day into Unterwalden, and suffered a similar discomfiture. These warlike deeds were the first achievements which rendered the Swiss celebrated in foreign countries, and gave respectability to the union among their neighbours. The confederacy neither made any alteration in its duties as a portion of the empire, nor in the private relations of the estates or people belonging to the family of Habsburg in the forest cantons ; but contented itself with di- recting the exertions of the community to the simple object of maintaining its established constitution. By this mo- derate proceeding, it claimed the esteem even of its enemies. The Austrian city of Lucern, lying on the lake which bears the same name, and surrounded by the other forest cantons, was seventeen years afterwards received into A D 133° ^ e con ^ ec ^ erac y' ^ tne same spirit of mo- deration. The union of all the territories surrounding that lake, was of great importance : the social x 4 812 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. spirit of the citizens of Lucern, encouraged by the suc- cessful example of their neighbours, induced them to accede to the union ; but their object and intention in taking that step, was not the overthrow of their government, but the maintenance of their legal rights and relations. Berchtold Yon Zaringen, who governed under the Swabian emperors the territory of Burgundy, (situated at the feet of the Alps and in mount Jura,) had founded the i , city of Bern as an asylum for the nobility A, D. 1191. J - J J and commoners of the neighbouring coun- try, who, from ancient times, had lived as freemen under the imperial protection, but had been exposed to ma- nifold oppressions from the greater provincial nobility. The citizens of Bern early manifested a noble and enter- prising spirit, not only in defending their own freedom, which was subject to frequent attacks, but in communi- cating similar advantages to the neighbouring people, who were in the same situation. Bern at length appeared de- sirous of adding dominion to her independence, and re- ceived the city of Laupen in pledge from the emperor Lewis ; accordingly the nobles of the country united in a league for effecting her destruction. In this perilous situation, they received from the forest cantons, who were not under any obligation to help them, A D 1 ^ e most ma g nan ^ mous assistance ; and under the conduct of Rudolf von Erlach, gained by their courage and military skill, an important victory. From this time forth they remained members of the Swiss Confederacy, in which relation they were soon A. D. 1353. _ " 1 afterwards confirmed by a perpetual league. Bern formed, besides, a particular federal republic on the western frontier of the cantons, which was partly established by confederacies with Solothurn, Biel, Freiburg, and Va- lais, which had separate rights of their own, which they were desirous of maintaining ; and partly by receiving the inhabitants of the valley of Hasli, the nobles of the upper *3 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 313 district, and many other noblemen and peasants, under their protection, and admitting them to the rights of ci- tizenship. The community annually elected a mayor, officers who presided under him over the quarters of the city, and a council, which originally consisted of twelve but was af- terwards doubled. As the residences of the citizens of Bern were dispersed over a considerable extent of country, it was ordained at an early period, that a selection of two hundred persons should represent the community in import- ant affairs ; and in order to preclude the necessity of too frequently calling this large body together, four out of every town-district were nominated, to take provisionally into their consideration all measures that might be ne- cessary. Zurich was a place of great antiquity, which, by the natural advantages of its situation, had gradually recovered from the effects of the disasters that accompanied the de- struction of the western empire, and had subsequently risen to considerable importance by the influence of its two ecclesiastical establishments, and of many privileges which had been conferred on it by kings and emperors of Ger- many. It was governed by a body of nobles and citizens, consisting of thirty-six members ; and the executive govern- ment was committed to one-third of this number, of which eight were citizens and four nobles or knights, who held their authority during only four months : the number twelve was indeed most commonly adopted at the foundation of German municipalities. The statutes were enacted, the counsellors elected, and all measures of general importance were resolved on, in the assemblies of the community.. Party spirit at length shook this constitution ; and Rudolf Brun took advantage of the abuses to which a long-con- tinued administration is usually liable, in order to represent a change as absolutely necessary, and to introduce a new form of government. The former rulers, who were eithei 314 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. conscious of some delinquency, or wished to obtain assist- ance from abroad, or believed that their presence would be willingly dispensed with, withdrew into foreign countries. The office of burgomaster was now created, and was bestowed for life, together with extraordinary powers, on Rudolf Brum The municipality was distri- A.D. 1336. _. , . \ J buted into companies, in such a manner that all the noble and wealthy citizens might constitute one body with the title of constables, out of which the new burgomaster and a few others should choose the half of the council ; while the remainder of that body was elected by the rest of the citizens, who were divided into thirteen companies, with the title of masters of the guilds. These companies, or guilds, were at the same time societies of artisans. The expelled rulers, with the nobles of the vicinity, en- tered into a conspiracy against the new institution. At their head was count Hanns, of the family of Habsburg, lord of Rapperswyl, a town which is also situated on the lake of Zurich : this enterprise was, however, unfortunate ; the count was made prisoner, and Rapperswyl destroyed. This occurrence excited the indignation of the other princes of Habsburg, especially of Albert duke of Austria, whose reputation as a politic ruler was very great; and Rudolf Brun, seeing himself in danger of being involved in a war with this prince, proposed to the Swiss to A.D.U51. _ . _ . \ , admit his city as a member ot the perpetual league. His application was accepted; and Zurich thus acquired the assurance of support, and Switzerland ob- tained a bulwark and a market in a friendly country. It was also agreed, that the constitution of Zurich should not be destroyed by force ; but that every state might remain at liberty to effect peaceably any alteration which it might think fit to adopt. The Alps of St. Gothard, and the rivers Thur and Aar, were fixed as the boundaries of the country which the confederacy was bound to protect. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 315 The expected war broke out; but as the duke was now too much enfeebled by age and disease to prosecute it with vigour, it was many times interrupted by negociations. The people of Glaris, among the other subjects of Austria, were summoned to lend their assistance against Zurich. Glaris lies on the rivers which form the lake of Zurich, and had been bestowed, some centuries before these events, as an estate, on the monastery of Sekingen, of which the duke was protector. But the people of Glaris, who, like all the Alpine tribes, possessed certain privileges, and whose rights had been infringed by some late innovations, refused to take any part in this war, killed the governor Stadion, who endeavoured to compel their A. D. 1552. , . . , J, services; and, with exceptions in favour of the privileges of Sekingen, took an oath of allegiance to the Swiss confederacy. They were accounted excellent combatants ; and like most races of shepherds, accustomed to endure fatigue and the inclemencies of the seasons, were much better adapted for the defence of a country, than to form the infantry of a regular army. The Swiss afterwards took possession of Zug, a city which had been inherited by the house of Habsburg from the counts of Lenzburg and Kiburg. But the confederates were desirous of incorporated brethren, and not of subjects ; and therefore the three original forest cantons, together with Lucern, Bern, Zurich, Glaris, and Zug, form the eight ancient states of the confederacy. In affairs, how- ever, in which Bern, being more distantly situated, takes no part, only seven states are enumerated. Duke Albert laid siege to Zurich with a A. D. 1354. . , , fe . much larger army than it was possible to maintain in such a country. He afterwards induced Charles the Fourth to declare an imperial war against the confeder- ates; but the latter found means to convince the Germans, that no methods of defence against superior power are attended with less inconvenience than confederacies, which 316 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. demand no sacrifices from their members. The emperor was unable to counteract the force of public opinion for any considerable time ; and the campaign, which had been opened with great parade, was feebly conducted and pro- duced no important consequences. From that time, the animosity of the house of Habsburg against the Swiss, was suspended for thirty years. The three forest cantons formed the centre of the league, around which all the new confederates attached themselves ; they retained their own intimate connection, and have fre- quently acted for themselves, without reference to the rest of the cantons. Their union depends, not on a common chief or a senate, but on the general sentiment, the love of liberty : every separate state, therefore, retained its own separate and peculiar capabilities ; while, with regard to the interest of their common country, they have but one soul. There is this difference between the Swiss and the ancient Greeks, that the latter w r ere of an impetuous character, while the former were remarkably calm and sedate; that among the confederates, the commanding quality was sound- ness of understanding; among the ancients, a rich exuber- ance of ideas. Though Athens and Sparta, accordingly, attained to a degree of importance which was never ascribed to Zurich or to Bern, the freedom of the Greeks was lost by the faults of that nation, in a very short time after they had attained the highest glory ; while the confederacy yet exists, and will continue until revolutions, external to its constitution, shall swallow up this peaceable government, together with other states of inferior power. Whenever that event shall take place, the integrity, industry, and sedateness of the national character, will either gain the esteem of the conqueror, and await a favourable change of circumstances at home, or it will induce the people to seek a new country beyond the ocean, or in other distant regions of the earth. Soon after the wars of which we have been speaking, Gcr- UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 31? sail, a village which had purchased its freedom, entered into a treatv of mutual defence with the forest can- A. D. 1359. ■ _ . . . . , , c . tons; and though it contained only lour hun- dred men, retained its liberty as long and as inviolably as the powerful state of Bern. This prosperous spot is go- verned by a landamman and a council of nine ; each of whom, in important cases, associates with himself one or two of the country people. The peace of the country was disturbed by A.D.1375. F i . i | . . r a numerous and irregular host, consisting of English and of the vassals of French noblemen : this body had been collected by Enguerrand, lord of Coucy, for the purpose of compelling the dukes of Austria to pay the marriage portion of his mother, who was also their aunt. The confederates situated on the borders, rendered themselves formidable by the successful attacks of their wandering parties ; and at length the army of Coucy, having received some satisfaction from the dukes, was dissolved. The power of the family of Habsburg was divided, and in the hands of princes who possessed a chivalrous spirit, though they were destitute of systematic policy, and of the qualifications necessary to rulers. Hence arose disorders, oppression on the part of the public officers, and exasper- ation on that of their subjects and neighbours : and hence, at length, that war was occasioned in the upper frontier countries, which was entirely conducted by the nobles against the democracy. It must be observed, that the citizens and peasants had arisen to a greater degree of affluence, while the nobles had been dissipating their patri- monial wealth in a variety of follies. This war was decided AD 1386 ^ ^ e v ^ ctor y g ame ^ DV tne f° ur f° res t canton? at Sempach, and by the advantages which the people of Glaris obtained at Nafels. The ex- A.D.1388. , . - , , , ploits ot these days were equal to the most brilliant of ancient history, and left to the nation the bless- 318 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. ing of freedom, together with splendid examples of valour : they are still celebrated, and with good reason ; for the lot of this people would still be enviable, if they only knew how to die like their ancestors ! The object of the succeeding wars was not so much the acquisition or defence of liberty, as of their dominions. The continual exercise of their arms save the Swiss in- fantry so decided a superiority, that, until the introduction of modern tactics, it was too formidable to dread any fresh attacks. The Swiss were never overcome in their own country: and even their defeats at Basil and Marignano were not less honourable than victories. The example of aggrandisement was chiefly displayed by Bern, which took advantage of the financial difficulties of the neighbouring nobles to purchase their dominions, and of the perplexity to which other states had reduced the house of Habsburg, in order to make conquests. They contributed principally, in the favourable moment of the ^ ^ council of Constance, to overthrow the power of that house in the Aargau : the representa- tives of western Christendom had summoned them to this achievement; the emperor and the church dissolved the compact of peace which subsisted between the house of Habsburg and the forest cantons, and which had hitherto been religiously observed; and, at length, the hereditary estates of that family, in the vallies of Switzerland, were confiscated. These common acquisitions were, and still continue to be, governed by magistrates chosen alternately from the victorious cantons ; and their annual accounts, to- gether with the complaints of their subjects, are examined by deputies appointed by all the participating cities and states. These common domains form an additional bond of union between the latter; but their administration is ac- cused of many gross abuses, and of a perpetual conspiracy of the provincial governors with the deputies, especially with those of the democracies which expose that office to UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 319 sale, to the prejudice of the interests of their subjects. Complaints are, in fact, renewed, similar to those which were brought against the Athenians and Lacedemonians during the period of their domination. The sums, how- ever, which are given for offices in the democratic states, preclude the entrusting of power to men wholly destitute of property, who would scarcely be restrained by the rules of propriety. At the death of Frederick, the last count of Tokenburg, a civil war took place between Zurich and Schwyz ; both which states earnestly wished either to take the subjects of the late nobleman under their protection, or entirely to connect and incorporate them with their own country ; and offered them the rights of citizenship in perpetuity, as well as a share in the privileges of their late master. Schwyz was the eldest, but Zurich at that time the most powerful, of those states whom the founders of the liberties of the 'country, occupied with affairs of greater importance, had allowed to hold the first rank. The war took a turn un- favourable to the interests of Zurich, against which all the confederates declared themselves. That state, therefore, concluded an alliance with Austria: but the contest was carried on unsuccessfully on her part; for the city itself was divided by factions, and neither the negociations for peace, nor the operations of war, could be carried on unanimously. After some bloody battles had been fought, Zurich was again left to herself; and at length agreed to the same pro- posals which had been made to her before she A.D.1450. | - • "i i c r had tried the late ol arms. SECTION XXIX. AUSTRIA. All the different branches of the house of Habsburg became extinct about the same period. They were all de- scended from Albert, who, in the year 1352, had besieged 320 UNIVERSAL HISTORY, Zurich. Rudolf his eldest son, who first assumed the title of archduke and was a ruler of great talents, had acquired the county of Tirol. Margaret, the former sovereign of the country, had intended to declare Stephen, duke of Ba- varia, her heir; but while the latter neglected the op- portunky afforded bv this favourable moment, A.D. 1365. and was amusing himself with entertainments, Rudolf was not deterred by the severity of the season, from undertaking a journey to the residence of Margaret, whom he succeeded in persuading to change her intentions. The M • archduke died however in the bloom of vouth, A.D. 1365. . J without heirs; and his brothers, Albert and Leopold, divided his territories. The former inherited A D 13 Austria ; and the latter, who had many sons, obtained all the remainder. Albert the Third restored peace and order to the state, which had been kept in perpetual alarms by the predatory nobles. For this purpose it was necessary to levy a land- tax, the produce of which amounted to a hundred thousand pounds. His pious son, Albert the Fourth, undertook a pilgrimage to the Holy Land ; while his servants, with the AD 1395 ^ tne c * er g v > tne c ^i zens 5 an d the Jews, were engaged in carrying on the war against the domestic robbers, many of whom were publicly hanged, while such of them as were noblemen of very high rank, were executed in the night, by drowning them in the ^ Danube. This duke caused one hundred he- retics to be burned to death in Stiria. He was the father of Albert the Fifth, to whom the last em- peror of the house of Luxemburg gave his daughter, and who succeeded to his father-in-law in the empire, and A D 1438 * n ^ e kingdoms °f Bohemia and Hungary : but he seemed to have inherited these three ^ crowns, only to adorn his passage to the tomb. His posthumous son, Ladislaf, a mild and UNIVERSAL IIISTOTtY. 321 beautiful youth, was acknowledged by his ' 14j8 people as king, only a short time before his death; and with him expired that branch of the house of Habsburg, which was descended from Albert the Third. Leopold, who had fought bravely against the Venetians, and the cities of the Rhenish confederacy, lost the battle of Sempach, together with his life, in a con- test with the Swiss. He left behind him the reputation of a hero ; and his family owes to him the ac- quisition of Freiburg, in the Breisgau, which delivered itself, with his assistance, from the tyranny of Egon, count of Fiirstenberg. Leopold left four sons, one A. D. 1568. e ■ . w . n . * ot whom, named William, an active and amiable prince, gained the affection of the heiress of Po- land : that princess was however obliged, by political con- siderations, to marry Jagel, grand prince of Lithuania, by the addition of whose territory Poland was raised to the rank of a powerful monarchy. Of Leopold the Long, the brother of William, we only know that he re- A.D. 1411. . . * 'T . ". pressed, by very severe measures, the spirit of liberty in the inhabitants of Vienna. Ernest and Frede- rick transmitted the hereditary dominions of Leopold to their descendants. Frederick, the unfortunate friend of pope John the Twenty-third, was deprived of the family estates in the Aargau, by the fathers assembled at Constance. His son A D 146 Sigismund, during his long administration, lost the Thurgau to the Swiss ; and, as he died childless, left Tirol and all the remaining frontier territories, to Ernest, the onlv surviving arch- A.D. 1495. • , . . .. " s duke. Ernest had two sons: one of these was the emperor Frederick, and the other the chivalrous archduke Albert. The former outlived his brother, and Ladislaf A.D. 1424. the son of Albert, and saw his son Maximilian VOL. II. Y 322 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. elected king of the Germans, appointed heir to his cousin of Tirol, and married to the heiress of the dukes of Bur- gundy. SECTION XXX. BOHEMIA. Prague and Bohemia had attained, under the kings of the house of Luxemburg, to a high degree of prosperity and civilization. We have already spoken of king John, who first compelled the nobles, after many years of confusion, to respect order. He retained the Silesian principality of Glogau, and by such means acquired pretensions to the Polish cities of Posen and Kalisch. Casimir of Teschen, whom he invested with the fief of Glogau, together with the dukes of Oppeln, Sagan, Oels and Wolau, Steinau, Brieg and Lignitz, Munsterberg and Ratibon, and at length the whole body of Silesian princes, most of whom were jealous of Poland, placed themselves under the pro- tection of king John : Casimir, king of the Poles, renounced all share in these proceed- A. D. 1535. ings. A. D. 1346. Charles, the fourth emperor of that name, was, as a sovereign, worthy of John his father. He had received in the university of Paris, and at the court of France, an education superior to that of most princes of the age. He began his reign by relieving the people from a part of their burdens : and though his neces- sities were so great, as to compell him to borrow in the city of Spires a sum of one thousand pounds, which he ob- tained with difficulty, and under humiliating conditions, he seized with such vigilance every opportunity of enriching himself, that in the end he succeeded in amassing a con- siderable treasure. He now founded an university in Prague, for the four nations of Bohemians, Poles, Saxons, andBavarians, whom he arranged in the above-mentioned J 3 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 323 order : and without oppressing his own country, he pur- chased the Upper Palatinate and Brandenburg, The Upper Palatinate, in the mountains which extend from the north of Bavaria to the forest of Bohemia, had been mortgaged by the last princes of the family of Ho- henstaufen to the dukes of Bavaria. Rupert, a count pa- latine of that family, sold his claims to the emperor Charles, who was his father-in-law, for twenty thousand marks. Charles suffered a small part of this territory to remain under the dominion of the duke of Bavaria, in consider- ation of a sum of money ; but the princes of Bavaria con- tinued to maintain that dukedom to be inalienable; and during the disturbances which accompanied the reign of Wenceslaf, they rendered their declaration valid by the good fortune of their arms. The marks of Brandenburg, the count of which territory held the hereditary office of arch-chamberlain, were go- verned gloriously by the family of Anhalt. Berlin flourished under their sway, in the enjoyment of exemption from foreign judicature and arbitrary decisions ; the rivers were rendered navigable, and Stendal and Soltwedel became com- mercial towns, whose names were famous in the Hanseatic league, and in the havens of the Baltic. John of Anhalt died without heirs ; and the emperor Lewis, without regard to the rights of the nation, under the pretence that the feudal claim to Brandenburg belonged only to that branch of the house of Anhalt, which was now extinct, resumed the marks as a reverted fief of the empire, and bestowed them - in that character on his son Lewis. The lat- ter fixed his residence at Berlin, the in- habitants of which were animated by an enterprising spirit, directed to the improvement of their country and the preservation of liberty. The encroachments of the ecclesiastics were repressed by many popular commotion and the magistrates were compelled to observe the law-. y 2 324 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. After the' death of this emperor, the dukes of Bataria found an indefatigable enemy in Charles the Fourth. He invested Rudolf of Anhalt, elector of Saxony, with jthe fief of the old mark; he relinquished his feudal claims over Stargard ; and raised the princes of Mecklenburg? who had received Stargard from Brandenburg, to the rank of independent dukes. While Charles was surrounding the electorate with rivals and enemies, an occurrence, suitable to the romantic spirit of the age, took place, which presented an opportunity of interfering with its internal constitution. A miller named Rehbok, declared himself to be the elector Woldemar, (who had been many years dead,) pretending that he had returned from pilgrimage, after having spent a long time in penance. The emperor encouraged this adventurer, procured a party to advocate his pretensions, and called him his brother-in-law : he was besides supported with an armed force by Rudolf of Saxony. Lewis of Bavaria was accordingly compelled to seek a full reconciliation with Charles, upon which the adventurer was recognised as an impostor. Otho, the son of Lewis, afterwards sold the electorate of Brandenburg to Charles, in order to be able to devote ^ ^ himself, without interruption, to pleasure. But the electors possessed large demesne estates in the marks, and the tolls afforded a revenue of 160,000 dollars : the country was cultivated by a numerous pea- santry, distributed in far more numerous villages than at present ; and the value of estates, compared with that of our own times, was in the proportion of one to ten. Charles the Fourth united under his hereditary sceptre, Bohemia, Moravia, Silesia, the Lausitz, and Brandenburg : but previous to the introduction of regularly disciplined standing armies, every popular commotion was sufficient to overthrow such a power as his. This became manifest under his sons. UNIVERSAL HISTORY* 325 This emperor, by the advice of the electors, promul- gated the golden bull, which was framed by his counsellor Bartolus ; to whom, as the latter was not a nobleman, he A. D. 1356. presented the arms of Bohemia. The imperial A. D. 1538. elections were thus regulated, eighteen years after the diet of the electors at Rense, by which the empire had been declared independent of the will of the pope. This prince was also the legislator of Bohemia: but, although he, on the one hand, aimed at the extirpation of many abuses, and, among others, of the judicial combat; and, on the other, paid so much respect to the ancient rights of his subjects, that he demanded military service from them only during four weeks without pay ; yet his laws, probably on account of the neglect of some estab- lished forms, were not confirmed by the states. He suc- ceeded, however, in circumscribing, in a certain degree, the power of the nobles; and, in cases of wounding or maiming, established the Mosaic law of retaliation. The spirit of investigation which had been A.D.1378. . * * i ' • l excited at Prague by the studies which were there pursued, developed itself under the reign of Wenceslaf. The difference of opinion, which was prosecuted with ex- treme rancour, at first regarded only the metaphysical subtilties of the reality, or the mere nominality of universal ideas. The division was afterwards increased by national antipathy, the Bohemians demanding three voices in the academical senate, in which the votes were given according- to the three nations. The other three nations, therefore, returned their records, insignia, and matriculations to the . ' king ; and many thousand students, with their A.D. 1409. T -i teachers and masters, quitted Prague. This twofold fermentation was augmented by religious differences. John Huss, rector of the university, a man who was distinguished from his colleagues not more by his knowledge of the original languages of the holy scriptures, Y 3 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. than by his eminent, virtues, zealously opposed the abuses which, during a long period of ignorance and forbearance, had been introduced into the church. When the council of Constance assembled, king Sigismund sent Henry of Leffo to Prague, to invite Huss and his learned friend Je- rome, under the assurance of a safe convoy, to appear be- fore that assembly. The prelates hated the moral censor, and hoped to be able to repress the growth of the spirit of free inquiry ; and Sigismund was induced to second their purposes. Huss was condemned, although the Bohemians in vain appealed to the royal promise for his security : he was delivered by the bishops to the secular arm, and his soul given to the devil ; " and I," he replied, " give up my spirit into the hand of my God and Saviour." He was A D 414 turned anve J an d continued to pray in the midst of the flames. His friend Jerome suffered the same punishment, which was justly esteemed by Poggio, the Florentine, to be preferable to that which was inflicted upon Socrates. The base compliance of Sigismund cost him the crown of Bohemia, which he in vain endeavoured to j\. D 1418 govern after the death of Wenceslaf. With the firmness which belongs to a good cause, Ziska and Pro- copius, the leaders of the Hussites, maintained the rights of their country and of outraged humanity. Their arms were the terror of Austria, Franconia, and Saxony ; and their speeches before the councils, the voice of conviction, of good sense, and of the unconquerable mind : they were at length divided by the artifices of their ene- mies, and Sigismund was acknowledged a few months before his decease. The short reign of Albert was followed by A D. 1439. . the long minority of Ladislaf : and after the premature death of the latter, George Podie- bradsky, a Bohemian nobleman, and a Hussite, at first without a title, and afterwards with the royal dig- UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 327 nitv, administered the government of the A.D.H57. J I . ° . . . _ country according to the principles ot equity, and with extraordinary wisdom and vigour. The people were in a state of agitation, the joint effect of the spirit of inquiry and the tyranny of persecution ; and as they were destitute of guidance, a multitude of parties arose: the Calixtines, however, reunited themselves to the church, as the latter admitted them to the communion. The high-spirited Taborites resolved themselves into the peaceable communities of the Moravian brethren : their directors received consecration from Stephen, a bishop of the Waldenses, and Fulneck became the chief seat of their union, which possessed two hundred churches. The Abra- hamides, who contented themselves with the simple worship practised by that patriarch ; and the Deists, who held the employment of human reason to be the only safe source of religious doctrine, kept themselves more carefully concealed. SECTION XXXI. BRANDENBURG. The house of Luxemburg, the male line of which ex- pired with Sigismund, had previously been deprived of Brandenburg. This country, under the late feeble admi- nistrations, had been agitated by terrible disorders: the roads were insecure, even to the deputies of the provincial assemblies ; and the lakes and rivers were infested by rob- bers, until Frederick, burgrave of Nurnberg, undertook, for the sum of one hundred thousand Hungarian florins, to tranquilize the marches. He drove the violent Wikard, of Rochow, from Potsdam, defeated Dietrich of Quitzow, the chief of the nobles who had conspired against the peace of the country, and demolished the oppressive fortresses. Frederick was descended from a younger branch of the fa- mily of Hohenzollern, (of whom the eldest had perhaps twelve thousand subjects, and a revenue of seventy thousand y 4 328 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. florins,) which was descended from Thassflo of Altorf, of the race of the Guelphs. Eiselfriedrich, a descendant of this count, probably acquired the burgraviate of NUrnberg by marriage with an heiress of Vohburg. This family ag- grandized itself at the extinction of the dukes of Meran, who had dominions in Franconia, Tyrol, and Upper Bur- gundy : and king Rudolf, who was brother-in-law to the burgrave Conrad, favoured the enterprises of his son Fre- derick. The principality, which was afterwards governed by two lords of Anspach and Baireuth, was thus formed around the fortress of Nurnberg. Frederick A.D.1417. & purchased the mark of Brandenburg from Sigismund. Frederick and his successors were possessed of so many distinguished qualities, of so great activity, prudence, and perseverance, that the nobles of the marks were kept in order ; the insurrections in Berlin appeased ; and the state, as it were, created anew, became of importance to all the powers of the vicinity. The son of the first Frederick, who bore his father's name, took advantage of the difficulties ^ ^ ^ into which the Teutonic order which governed Prussia had fallen, and obtained the new mark, claimed Pomerania, and laid the foundation A. D. 1464. . . . _ | _ i*i oi those pretensions to Poland, which were rendered valid after the lapse of three hundred years. The emperor Sigismund, who was unable to impart vigour either to the execution of the laws, or to his own word and will, thus founded the authority of the house of Hohenzollern, in Brandenburg, while his own daughter brought crowns into the family of Austria. Both these families were descended from the ancient count Albert, of Habsburg ; the Austrian branch being derived from his son Rudolf, and that of the burgrave from his daughter dementia; and both, as we have just seen, acquired at the same period a new degree of splendour. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 329 SECTION XXXII. THE ELECTORATE OF SAXONY. The electorate of Saxony fell, about the same time, to the margraves of Meissen. As the electorate of Branden- burg was attached to the possession of the city of that name, so was that of Saxony, by the authority of the golden bull of Charles IV., to the town of Wittenberg. The electors of Saxony of the family of Anhalt, who had held that dignity ever since the fall of Henry the Lion, became extinct, just at the time when Sigismund, who was engaged in his war against the Hussites, stood in the utmost need of the aid of Frederick, the martial and powerful margrave of Meissen and landgrave of Thuringia. The duke of Lauenburg, and the new elector of Branden- burg, were also joint competitors for the electorate of Saxony. Henry the Lion had taken the territory of Lauenburg from the Slavonians ; and one of his sons bestowed it, as a fief, on the count of Holstein : the latter, who was taken prisoner by Woldemar, king of Denmark, gave this district for his ransom ; and Woldemar transferred it to his son-in- law, the count of Orlamunde. Orlamu'nde being made prisoner by the count of Schwerin, Lauenburg again served as a ransom : and Schwerin, who had been supported in a war which he had carried on by the electors of Saxony of the house of Anhalt, gave it to them as a remuneration for their expences. From that time forth it was governed by a younger branch of that family, who expected to succeed to the electorate on the extinction of the elder : and the imperial protonotary Michel von Priest, provost of Bunz- lau, either with or without the concurrence of the em- peror, had prepared a deed of reversion for the duke of Lauenburg. On receiving intelligence that the electorate of Saxony had become vacant, the elector of Brandenburg, Seken- 330 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. dorf, sent to the emperor, and begged to be invested with that fief: but it was now discovered that the mar- grave of Meissen was also provided with a deed of rever- sion, prepared by the same protonotary. The profusion of the emperor himself, and the pleasures of his consort Barbara, of Cilley, who was another Messalina, rendered poverty the common condition of his court : and the war against the Hussites proved to be the " reason of state " which decided in favour of the margrave. The elector of Brandenburg concluded a paternal treaty of succession with the new electoral house, by which that family which shpuld first become extinct, left all its possessions to A. D. 1435. . . r its survivors. SECTION XXXIII. HESSE. A more ancient compact of inheritance, with regard to ^ the estates in Thuringia, already existed be- tween the family of Meissen and that of Hesse. A D 1^48 ^ uc ^ tn? tne e ^ est si ster of the last landgrave of Thuringia, was the ancestor of the family of Meissen ; and the landgraves of Hesse are descended from her niece Sophia. The parents of the latter occupy a dis- tinguished place in the list of saints ; and her husband was Henry the Magnanimous, duke of Brabant, whose family is traced backwards to the Carlovingians. After the death of her husband, Sophia conquered the dominion of Hesse from the Thuringian inheritance, on behalf of her minor son Henry, who transferred it to the empire as a fief; in AD 1292 conse( l uence °f which he became a prince of the empire, under the title of landgrave, which had been retained from Thuringia. The possession of Ziegenhayn was afterwards acquired ; but the chief foundation of the power of this family was laid by another Henry in his marriage with Anna of Catzeneln- UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 88 bogen. This heiress of powerful counts brought the true old Cattenland, situated at the mountain of Mclibog, and all that had been added to it in a long course * of centuries, into the house of Hesse, which now reigned from the shores of the Dymel to the fertile and beautiful district called the Bergstrasse, where the archi- episcopal estates of Mayence border on the dominions of the Palatinate. SECTION XXXIV. THE PALATINATE AND BAVARIA. After the extinction of the princes of Luxemburg, and when the houses of Hohenzollern and Meissen were ad- vancing toward their more recent splendour, the family of Wittenbach, which ruled in Bavaria and in the palatinate of the Rhine, might easily have become the most powerful in Germany, had not its prosperity been prevented both by errors and misfortunes. The dominions of this family had been di- A.D. 1255. ._ . . _ _ / video in an early age ; and the treaty which AD i~°9 WaS conc ^ uc * e ^ at ^ avm Dv tne emperor Lewis, duke of Bavaria, with his nephew Rudolf, prince palatine, seemed to complete the separation, which now became evident in all affairs of state. At the contested imperial election, the father of Rudolf was opposed to his own brother ; as was Maximilian of Bavaria, in the seven- teenth century, to the count palatine Frederick, when the latter was elected king of Bohemia. The countries were separated by many foreign dominions : and the emperors of the family of Luxemburg oppressed the house of Lewis. Lewis himself, who had at length succeeded in uniting the whole of Bavaria under his sway, contributed to en- feeble his family by dividing that country among four sons. Stephen at length remained sole duke of Upper Bavaria at Munich ; and Albert, of Lower Bavaria, at Straubingen. 332 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. The princes of this hoube have always had the singular fortune to reign in widely distant countries. We have al- ready seen that Brandenburg was governed by the sons , of Lewis, who bequeathed to the lower Bavarian branch of his family, whose revenue in that country did not exceed twenty-eight thousand florins, the earldoms of Holland, Zealand and Hennegau, and the hereditary possessions of his wife Margaret, heiress of the house of Avesnes. The dukes of Lower Bavaria reigned in both dominions for eighty years, until the princess Jacqueline inherited the Netherlands in conformity with the law of that country. That portion w r as left by her, notwithstanding the oppo- sition of the emperor Sigismund, whose power was insuf- ficient to support his objections, to the duke of Burgundy ; and Lower Bavaria became united to the upper division of that country, from the ruling family of which, other branches had sprung. This union, however, was not effected with- A. D. 1424. . 9 out great misunderstandings. JSigismuml de- clared Lower Bavaria to be a reverted imperial fief, and entrusted its administration to Albert of Austria, his ne- phew : while the four princes of Upper Bavaria were con- testing the question, whether Lower Bavaria should be inherited by the first-born or by all the four. The states, who best understood the constitution of the country, and were probably the best judges of what would be advan- tageous to its interests, decided that Lower Bavaria reverted to the collective family of Upper Bavaria; but that, until a new arrangement should be agreed upon, the former dis- trict should be administered in common by a deputy and receiver. The duke of Austria was at length induced to give up his claim, and the emperor confirmed the suc- cession to the family of Wittelsbach ; which gradually arose to great importance without any reunion of the power of its different branches. The house of the electoral palatinate of the Rhine, how- UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 333 ever, under active and intelligent princes, attained to a much greater degree of splendour : among these we must reckon Rupert, the original founder of the A, D. 1346. . . ' T . n . \ . i university of Heidelberg; his second successor, . 1400. ^ ^ e samc name, who mounted the throne A. D. 14*9. o £ t ^ e Q erman empire; the judicious elector Lewis; and especially that Frederick who is justly styled the Victorious, who gained the battle of Seken- A.D. 14G2. . . _ , pi- , henn, and was the most powerful prince on the Rhine, and the father of his country., The family of Lowen- stein, at Wertheim, is descended from the unequal marriage of this latter prince with Clara of Tettingen. In all other European countries, as well as in the empire, the superiority was acquired by great vassals: and even where they were not sufficiently powerful to establish inde- pendent dominion, they were at least able to prevent the monarch from obtaining absolute power. SECTION XXXV. SPAIN. The possessions of the Moors, or Arabs, in Spain, whose sovereign held his residence at Grenada, were confined to the province of Andalusia: and the Christian part of the peninsula was governed by the four kings of Navarre, of Arragon, of Castile and Leon, and of Portugal. That the sense of common danger was scarcely capable of uniting their power in puYsuft of one object, was suffi- ciently demonstrated when Abu Haf, the Merinide prince of Morocco, united the whole power of the Moors for the relief of Algezira. This town, situated on a hill in a strong and very advantageous position on the shore of the straits, had risen to the rank of one of the most important cities of Spain : it was defended with gunpowder, and held out three years against king Alfonso the Eleventh ; but its fate was de- 3S4 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. A D 1340 C ^ ec * ky tne ^ e ^ eat which the powerful army of Abu Haf sustained near Tariffa, on the banks of the Salado, from the united forces of Castile and Portugal. The chief of the Merinides had made his entry into Spain with the pride of Xerxes ; and, like that Persian in his ad- versity, fled dismayed in a fishing-boat. He owed this defeat to the military skill of the Spaniards, which had begun to approach perfection. Algezira was demolished ; and the plough now passes over her magnificent streets. The progress of the kingdom of Castile was retarded by the internal commotions, which were excited chiefly by the clergy, against Pedro, the son of Alfonso, justly or unjustly surnamed the Cruel ; and which terminated, after a violent A D 1-6 contest, in the murder of that prince, and in the reign of his spurious brother, Henry of Transtamara. From this period the throne of Castile be- came firmly established; and its dominion was extended over Biscay, where the Cusculdunas exult in their descent from the aborigines of Spain. Pedro, king of Arragon, son of the conqueror of the ^ Baleares, acquired, by means of the Sicilian vespers, as fine a kingdom as that which the arms of the Cid had bestowed on his ancestors. Jayme the Second, his son, united Sardinia to the domi- A.D.1326. . . . nions ot Arragon. Pisa and Genoa had long endeavoured, with variable fortune, to obtain possession of this island, which was go- verned, in a state of independence, by four judges; and would have preserved its freedom if the government had possessed prudence equal to its courage : but the victory of the king was facilitated by internal disturbances. Navarre continued to be the smallest of the kingdoms of Spain, because the succession of females often transferred it to foreign princes : it descended from the A. D. 1234. o f gig 0rre to counts of Champagne, A D. 1284. fiom laUer to the kings of jr rancc . UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 335 AD i~28 ^ onanna °^ France, who was excluded by the Salic law from the succession to the crown of her native country, conferred Navarre, the kingdom of her grand- mother, on Philip, count of Evreux ; and in like manner, the daughter of her descendant brought it into the family of ^ ^ y Arragon. The king of Arragon had children 'by another wife; and the daughter of the princess of Navarre conveyed her inheritance to the family of the counts de Foix. Her descendant, Francis Phoebus, dying without heirs, his surviving sister brought the estate to her husband, John of Albret, who . 1485. deprived of more than the half of that ter- ritory by the arms of Arragon, and whose only grand- A D 555 ^ au S n * er occasioned the transferring of Lower Navarre to the house of Bourbon. Navarre seemed indeed to exist in the vicinity of France, for the purpose of affording a perpetual example of the advantages of that law which excludes females from the succession to the crown. In the kingdoms of Spain, where religious enthusiasm contributed in so great a degree to political events, the clergy enjoyed an extraordinary share of authority. The bishops of this country had from early ages been elected by the elders of the church, who con- stituted the chapter ; but as the king influenced these elections, and the archbishops consecrated those who, in fact, had been chosen by his recommendation, the court had but little to fear from the power of the bishops, which was in reality identified with its own. The popes afterwards arrogated to themselves the privilege of nomi- nation ; and the clergy made no objection to this inno- vation, as it increased their collective importance, by uniting them as an independent body under one ecclesiastical chief : the kings, however, lost by these means the disposal of the immense estates which had been bestowed on the church by their pious or artful predecessors. For this reason Don Pedro, king of Castile, forbade the pope, for the future, from 336 UNIVERSAL HISTORY*' bestowing any bishopric or benefice in his dominions ; and it was probably on account of this prohibition that he obtained the surname of " The Gruel but the people listened to the voice of the supreme shepherd. Scarcely any kind of knowledge was cultivated except such as related to ecclesiastical affairs. Don Inigo Lopez de Mendoza, and Fernando Perez de Gusman, were the tirst protectors of profane literature, at the court of John the Second, king of Arragon. The character of public morals, consistently with the spirit of the times, was chi- valrous, grave, and dignified, if not severe. Gaming cards were invented in Spain, but the use of them was ibrbidden to the knights of Castile. s SECTION XXXVI. PORTUGAL. Don Pedro, kin** of Portugal, endeavoured A.D.1357. . . , . . ° , . r , to obtain by justice and wisdom, that autho- rity which his grandfather Denis had acquired by his per- sonal merits. Pedro, though frugal with regard to himself, was persevering and vigilant, and beneficent to others ; but so severe, that he was more feared than loved ; and it has been said of him, that he should either have reigned for ever, or not at all, as he had acquired a degree of power which was in danger of being abused by a less benevolent prince. He had improved the condition of the citizens, and protected them against the oppressions of the nobility ; and he wished, in common with republican legislators and despots, to reduce all classes to an equality of privileges. A prebendary having murdered a shoemaker, was only con- demned by the ecclesiastical power to be excluded from the choir during one year : the son of the shoemaker having revenged his father's death on the priest, was ordered by the king to abstain from making shoes for a like period. Ferdinand, the son of Pedro, who was a less vigorous UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 337 A D '36 P r * nce > ^ not P rosecute his father's plans; and as he left only a daughter, who married ^ John, king of Castile, Portugal was in great danger of losing its independence. The queen dowager, Leonora Tellez de Meneses, ad- ministered the regency, in which the interest of count Ourem predominated. The latter, who was suspected by the states of the kingdom, and detested by the people, was the object of a conspiracy, into which a great number of nobles and citizens entered, who disliked the Castilian yoke, John, the natural son of king Pedro, and grand-master of the ecclesiastical and military order of A viz,* placed himself at the head of the malcontents : the conspirators rushed into the fortress, and penetrated into the chamber of the queen, where Ourem was put to death before the eyes of that prin- cess, by Don Ruy Pereyra. In the meanwhile the gates were closed ; and in order to try the temper of the people, a report was spread, that the grand-master had fallen by the arm of count Ourem. The people immediately began to storm the palace in the utmost fury ; but when John shewed himself at a window, they set up a shout of joy, mixed with execrations against the Castilians. The bishop of Lisbon, who was in the interest of the latter, was hunted from the tower of the cathedral, and dogs licked his blood on the banks of the Tagus. In this emergency it was not difficult to persuade the queen to take flight; and her party, and that of her daughter, was immediately abandoned as the weakest. The grand- master, in order to accelerate the at- tainment of his object, gave out that he was about to re- pair to England, from fear of the Castilians ; upon which the nation conferred on him the regency, and the supreme command of the whole power of Portugal. The king of Castile approached Portugal with a large army ; and the states of the country, who were assembled at Coimbra, declared him to have forfeited his right by this proceeding; as it was his duty to have promised not to in- vol. 11. z 338 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. troduce any foreign force into the kingdom. These mea- sures appeared to some of the assembly to be too hostile ; but while they were deliberating on the subject, Don Alva- rez Pereyra stood up, gave it as his opinion that the grand- master should be chosen king, and declared, that if any man, either in that assembly, or elsewhere, was inclined to dispute it, he was ready to maintain his own opinion, and the grand-master's right, in judicial combat, before judges and witnesses. The greater part of the nobles were inclined to the party of the Castilians; but as the citizens were decidedly in favour of John and of the national inde- pendence, he was proclaimed king. In the plains of Al- • > jubarotta, under the command of Don Ruy A. D. 1385. "L _ ' , / Pereyra, 7,000 Portuguese, animated by the cause of their country, obtained the victory over 30,000 Castilians. The reign of Don John, which lasted forty-eight years, was distinguished by a degree of splendour and happiness, of which Portugal had never before seen an example. His sons, under the command of Pereyra, not A. P. 1415. _ . only conquered, at the head ot his whole knighthood, the great and strong town of Ceuta, beyond the straits, but the third of these princes named Henry, by his discoveries, gave the first impulse which led to the esta- blishment of a new order of things throughout the world. Henry resided on the coasts of the ocean, surrounded with virtuous friends ; (for to devote his life to the disco- very of truth, is virtuous in every man, however situated ; and how much more virtuous in a prince of the middle ages!) There he pursued the path which was indicated by the remarks of ancient geographers, and by a few- obscure vestiges. Zareo discovered Madeira, on which AD 1419 * s ^ anc * an Englishman, named Machem, was found, who had been driven thither, and cast away in a storm, and had become savage in the solitude of its forests. Don Gonsalez Velho Cabral discovered the UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 339 wo Azorean islands, which are dedicated to the Holy Virgin and St. Michael. Terceira was soon added to their number; and Fayal was descried by some young adven- turers. While Alfonso the Fifth, the grandson of Don John, in the holy war against the Moors of Fez, conquered the Al- cassar of Cegu and Arzilla, and while Tan- A.D. 1459. . r?. .7 . giers opened its gates to him m terror, other heroes were en gaffed in exploring the paths of A. D. 1471. . . the Carthaginians, the Pharaohs, and the Pto- lemies. St. Thomas was discovered in the time of Henry ; a settlement was made on the gold coast ; and Diego Cane had sailed to the south as far as Congo. The king ob- tained charts even from the Venetians, of the importance of which they had no conception : the southern ocean ap- peared to them to be too perilous ever to become the path of commerce, and the stormy Cape seemed to bar up the en- trance to the countries of the east. But the more adven- turous hero of Portugal, Vasco de Gama, called this promontory the Cape of Good Hope, sailed round it, ar- rived in the East Indies, and thus opened an untried and a noble field for thecommsree of Europe, and for extensive civilization. No nation in that age was superior to the Portuguese. SECTION XXXVII. FRANCE. The authority of the crown in France, during the reign of Philip the Fair, the grandson of St. Lewis, was no longer increased by patriarchal wisdom and virtues, but by all the methods which the circumstances of the age per- mitted an enterprising prince to undertake. Philip aug- A D 1285 mentec * tne kingdom by his marriage with the heiress of Champagne and Navarre. He or- dained that such dominions as were given to princes of the blood as a portion, should not be inherited by females ; z 2 340 UNIVE RS AL HISTO RY. by which regulation the consolidation of France, as an un- divided country, was greatly promoted. It had frequently happened, under preceding reigns, that the king, on the acquisition of a new dominion, had received the investment of fiefs from the superior lords, who were at the same time his own vassals : and in order to put an end to the ab- surdity and inconvenience of this practice, Philip enacted, that in such cases the lord paramount should receive a com- pensation in lieu of his claim of superiority, but that the king should never be held a vassal on account of any of his possessions. The inalienable tenure of the royal estates became gradually established as a fundamental maxim. The power of the nobles had been augmented by the as- sumption of authority, in every possible way; and the kings, when they undertook to curtail that power, com- menced their operations by introducing distinctions, in consequence of which certain cases (cas royaux) were re- served for their own decision. They afterwards spread abroad an opinion, that they were the especial defenders of all good old usages, derived from the Franks; and, in the character of the heads of the commonwealth, the natural judges in all matters of national concern. This latter pre- tence was capable, under a dexterous and intelligent prince, of receiving a most extensive application ; for the most trifling affairs may be shewn to have some relation to the interests of the whole community. Cases of high treason, murder, rape, counterfeiting of the coin^ of breaches of the peace, and of convoys, were especially reserved to the supreme national judge. The king was at the same time the greatest proprietor of land, and could therefore render his tribunals less expensive than any other : in other in- stances it might be truly said, respecting the lord of the court, as well as the litigating parties, " that judgment and justice often cost more than they were worth ;" hence the judges were willing to pass over such causes as they found it difficult to determine ; appeals were continually on the UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 341, increase, and the royal court became the most extensive in. its jurisdiction. The parliament held its sittings at such times and places as the king chose to appoint; and Philip now ordered that, for the future, a parliament should annually sit at Paris for two months, after Easter and All-Saints' day. Scarcely fifty years afterwards, Charles the Wise caused it to be enacted, in an assembly of the states-general, that the par- liament should sit during the whole year; and at another time, he chose that it should never separate until the members of the succeeding assembly should have been chosen. This was the origin of the parliament, which was tire council of the supreme royal judicature, and the imme- diate representative of the king himself. The votes were taken, not according to the majority, but to the importance of the voting counsellors, by the presidents, who, during the vacations, were the only judges. Prelates sat in this assembly until Philip the Long, son of Philip the Fair, con- fined the sphere of their operations to ecclesiastical affairs. The judging counsellors (conseillers jugeurs) were chosen from among the nobles, and the reporting counsellors from the jurists: their number was indeterminate, and the elec- tion was made by the chancellor, the three presidents, and the ten royal deputies. Care was taken to choose the counr sellors out of the different provinces, that the assembly might be better able to observe the usages of all. But the election soon became nothing but a fresh confirmation in office ; as it was enacted, that no office could be vacated, except by the free will, or the decease, or the formal dis- placement of its possessor. Justice was never administered free of expence,. because the fees of the courts everywhere contributed to. defray the expences of the tribunals: and upon this principle even St. Lewis was not ashamed to farm out the bailiwicks. From this time the decisions of the parliament served to fill up the deficiencies of the obsolete and defective laws : z 3 342 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. the olim, or most ancient records, were collected by Jean de Monti uc. The kings magnified the authority of the parliament as their own, and readily permitted them pub- licly to place themselves, in their wisdom, beyond the reach of missive letters, and all appearance of foreign influence, just as the best of the emperors honoured the senate, whose power was entirely dependent on themselves. The great statesmen, Macchiavelli and Sarpi, justly considered the parliament as the fundamental security of the French con- stitution ; because this institution prevented the master of the military force and revenue of the country from appear- ing to be also master of the laws. With respect to the public administration of justice, Philip followed the system of his ancestors ; but he took greater liberties with the property of his subjects than they had done. Besides the produce of his demesne lands, he had inherited the tolls, the feudal acknowledgments, espe- cially those which were paid at the sale of a fief, or its trans- ference to a collateral family, the revenues of the tribunals, and the price of manumissions. He willingly exchanged the obligations of villeinage for a tribute ; and even com- pelled the villeins of the crown estates to purchase their freedom, or to pay an annual tax. This principle was fol- lowed by his eldest son and successor, Lewis X. who caused it to be announced, " that every man in the whole kingdom of the Franks should be free ; that therefore, in the name of the king, and by the advice of his counsellors, freedom was now proclaimed throughout the country, and was to be obtained on reasonable conditions." When Philip was about to pay his debts, he altered the intrinsic value of the coin : and when the fraud was dis- covered, he pretended that this operation was the effect of a mistake, and assured his subjects, upon his honour, that he would indemnify all the sufferers, and would pledge the crown revenues for that purpose. Under pretence that this was an affair which concerned the whole nation, he ap- 8 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 343 pointed, in every one of the thirty mints of his kingdom, an overseer of the business of exchanging, and of the small coin. These persons compelled the barons to buy or to sell silver at the most inconvenient times that they could select: a refusal was certain to be followed by a legal process ; and the vexation became so great, that they preferred to abandon altogether their privilege of coining: in consequence of which the king's money became the only specie in circula- tion ; and this was so frequently altered in its value, as to be productive of universal confusion* * Philip the Long imposed a tax on salt, which was in- creased by Philip de Valois during the wars with England ; and though the wars at last ceased, the augmented impost remained. The Jews were compelled to purchase an in- complete security, by the payment of large sums to the king. The ecclesiastics were obliged to contribute a tenth part of their revenues : for the popes, who now resided at Avignon, were in the power of the crown, and were there- fore obliged to allow it at least a joint share : and the infe- rior orders of the clergy were fleeced by the avarice of the superior prelates. The contributions of the citizens were the source of their modern influence in affairs; and the court had rendered itself deserving of them, by the en- couragement which it gave to the endeavours of that class. At this period the spiritual and temporal lords and repre- sentatives of the cities were summoned under the title of the states-general ; not with the intention of restoring the ancient national assemblies of the Franks, but because ex- traordinary sacrifices were necessary for the preservation of the country. The foundation of the national assemblies of the Merovingians was the legislative power which belonged to the nation ; while that of the states-general was merely the public exigencies of the moment. Philip, in order to attach the citizens to his interests, began to declare them * N'etoit homme, qui en juste payement de monnoye se put con- noitre de jour aujour. z 4 344 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. exempt from the odious and unjust exactions of power ; from the forced loans and military services to which they had been subjected. He recommended his deputies to the cities to conceal the extent of their power, and to make report to him of those who were most obstinate in their refusal to pay the impost, declaring " that he intended to gain over such persons by gentle methods, in order that no disaster might be incurred." Every town sent two or three deputies, furnished with the.proper instructions and powers : the king negociated with each class separately, and gave the most positive assur- ances that he would accept their grant as a favour, and not build upon it any new pretence of right; he adduced the state of public affairs as the motive which obliged him to take the present step, and furnished the assembly with in- formation upon those subjects, in order that each individual might perceive the necessity for the supplies which he was about to vote. In consequence of the powers thus acquired, this assembly proceeded, after his death, to assume the power of calling ministers to account, and even of punish- ing them ; of nominating the supreme governor of the finances, and of rejecting or confirming treaties. They hanged, beheaded, and burned ministers, as in the instances of Enguerrand de Marigny, who had filled the office of viceroy under the reign of Philip the Fair, and Pierre des Essarts, grand governor-general of finance. From this time the operations of debasing the coin, of raising forced loans, and of confiscating of estates, were more sedulously pursued. The three sons of Philip were overwhelmed with debt, and their successors involved in such disastrous wars against England, that the necessities of the state were con- tinually increasing, and at length the taille was declared perpetual. The prosperity of the citizens had a considerable influ- ence on the mode of conducting war, chiefly by bringing infantry into use : every city had its captain, and every pro- vince a district captain. Arsenals were established in the UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 345 cities, and private feuds among noblemen forbidden, on the penalty of forfeiting their domains. The cities also laid the foundation of the art of fortification. As nobility was dis- tinguished by exclusive privileges, and was itself conferred by the profession of arms, many of the youth devoted themselves to war, collected needy or disorderly persons, and formed banditti, which were the terror of the enemy, and not unfrequently the scourge of their own countrymen. One of the most remarkable acts of Philip the Fair, was the abolition of the order of knights-templars. A trea- cherous brother, who lay in prison with a citizen of Baziers, related to the latter a number of ungodly and scandalous practices which existed among them: this relation came to the ears of the king; and as the order was extremely opu- lent, a secret command was dispatched to all the king's officers, to imprison all the knights throughout the whole kingdom on the same night: pardon was promised to all those who should make a circumstantial confession ; but the more obstinate were put to the rack, with such cruelty, that many died from the torture. Their property, which was probably their chief crime, was confiscated. It is certain, that after the Holy Land had been re-con- quered by the infidels, the knights-templars entered into treaties with the latter, by which they were able to afford the pilgrims more effectual assistance than by an idle display of indignation : but it was less probable that they denied Christ, of whose sepulchre they were the guardians, than that ignorant and partial judges misinterpreted certain expressions or customs which the knights might have learned from some mystical sect in the east: nor is it likely that they worshipped a picture of Mohammed, whom the Arabians themselves do not adore under any sensible re- presentation. But their fraternal kindness, their decorous exterior, and their charities, were imputed to hypocrisy, and considered as crimes. In consequence of these accusations, the pope, who re- 346 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. sided at Avignon, and was under essential obligations to the king, formally abolished the order in the coim- A. JD. 1312. cii of Vienne. The most distinguished com- manders and masters of the order, together with sixty-eight of the knights, were burnt alive : they died protesting their innocence, and invoking the supreme Judge of all the earth. The grand-master, in particular, summoned Philip the Fair before the judgment-seat of God ; and it was remarked, that the king died within the same year, after having confiscated the greater part of the estates which the council had recognized as the property of the order of St. John. In Arragon the knights-templars resisted the attempts made to destroy them ; in Castile they were set at liberty : and in Portugal they transferred themselves to the order of Christ, of which Castro- Marin, in Aigarve, was the prin- cipal seat, and the abbot of Alcacova the visitor. At May- ence, Hugo Wildgraf suddenly made his appearance in the chamber of the synod, accompanied by twenty knights in complete armour; made a protest and appeal, and none of the members of the assembly were hardy enough to con- demn them. Philip the Fair and Pope Clement the Fifth, both died shortly after this criminal transaction ; and the throne of France was successively filled by the three sons of the former, who were all insignificant princes and unfortunate husbands, Lewis the Tenth caused Margaret of Burgundy, his con- sort, who was convicted of infidelity, to be strangled; Philip the Long was not more happy with Johanna of Bur- gundy; nor Charles the Fair with Blanca, a princess of the same family. The house of Philip the Fair, which had been strengthened by three sons, thus became extinct within thirteen years after his death. Philip de Valois, son of his brother, succeeded to the throne; but Isabella, daughter of Philip the A.D.1327. _ . ' .. . _ f i i i Jbair, the atrocious murderer ot her husband, the king of England, gave rise, by her pretensions to the UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 347 throne of France, to a war which lasted one hundred years, and which entirely arrested the progress of civil order and of legislation. The first prince of the house of Valois, had, however, the merit of increasing the royal power of France, by ob- taining Dauphine from Humbert de la Tour du Pin, who was weary of the cares of business and of life, A. D. 1549. • : 1 and sought to end his days in retirement and repose. The heir-apparent to the crown of France ob- tained the appellation of Dauphin, from this province, which had been acquired two hundred years before, by a hero named Wigo, for that family from which Humbert w v as descended in the female line. A treaty of demarcation was concluded with Savoy. Philip of Valois was in other respects better calculated for a good king in peaceable times, than to maintain the security and the military reputation of his kingdom, during A D storms wn ^ cn Edward of England raised against him. He lost the great battle of Crecy ; ^ ^ ^ and his calamities were renewed by the still more unfortunate day of Poitiers, where king John fell into the hands of the English ; and France was in extreme danger of falling into utter anarchy, but for the interposition of the dauphin Charles. Charles, who was one of the greatest princes in the house of Valois, inventive in wise measures, unshaken in adversity, and accustomed to contemplate occurrences in their true colours, while others were led away by the im- pulse of the moment, was the preserver of the kingdom. Charles put an end, on the one hand, to deeply rooted abuses, and on the other, set bounds to the fury of the de- magogues : he enlivened the periods of calamity by diver- sions ; and was so economical, that after having, by his prudence, overcome the English, without a battle, he brought the treasury into so flourishing a condition, that a part of the imposts could be remitted as unnecessary. He 348 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. disapproved of cards and dice, because he perceived thai: they were in danger of becoming prejudicial to the practice of military exercises. His generous disposition prevented him from opposing his father in his project of founding the power of the house A D 1361 ° f Bm 'g und y- Tne last duke of that family AD i~6~ WaS ^ ea ^' anc * k" m S John, who was his heir, immediately invested his son Philip, who had been his companion in captivity in England, with that duchy : the latter married Margaret, the sovereign of Franche Comte, in Burgundj', which, according to the custom of that country, descended to females. She was the daughter of Lewis of Mechlin, count of Flanders, Artois, Mechlin, and Antwerp : and as her brother died without issue, inherited his territories. Philip became the ancestor of a family, which for eighty years maintained a counterpoise to the power of the crown, and carried on a succession of severe contests ; and even at its destruction, became the occasion of still more extensive wars, which lasted for centuries. Charles the Wise was succeeded at too early a period by his son, Charles the Sixth, who, at his father's decease was a minor, and passed the greater part of his mature age in a state of insanity. Both these causes of weakness tempted the ambition of the princes of the blood, espe- cially of Lewis of Orleans, and John the son of Philip of Burgundy. Valentina Visconti, wife of the former, whose pretensions to Milan gave rise a century later, to wars of sixty years' duration, contributed especially to in- A D 4 4 ^ ame ^ e ammos ^y °f tn ^se parties. The duke of Orleans was murdered ; and fifteen years afterwards, Charles obtained revenue on the A.D.1419. _ . . . P V ■, V. Burgundians, by the assistance or the dauphin. But an alliance was formed between Philip the Second of Burgundy and Henry the Fifth of England, against Charles the Seventh, who had succeeded to his father* UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 349 Henry having gained a splendid victory over the French, in the field ol Agincourt, was proclaimed king of France, in Paris, with the consent of the old king; and the dauphin, to whom, on his accession, nothing remained but Orleans, wandered about like an outlaw. SECTION XXXVIII. BURGUNDY. The first duke of Burgundy, at his death, was possessed ^ of the most extensive dominions ; but so des- titute of money, that his widow, according to the custom of the country, laid his keys, purse, and girdle, upon his grave, in the first twenty-four hours, as a token that she renounced that portion of his territories, which was neither a fief nor a part of her own inheritance. Her son John, who distinguished himself by his undaunted valour in the Turkish wars, and who would have been a great man if he could have controlled his passions, mar- ried Margaret of Bavaria; and by that connection con- ferred on his family pretensions which were afterwards employed for the acquisition of Holland, Zealand, and Hennegau. With the exception of Italy, the Netherlands at this period surpassed all the other countries of Europe in in- dustry, population, and opulence : Lyons alone contained 150,000 manufacturers. The source of this prosperity was freedom : the sovereign of the country levied certain fixed imposts from the people and estates; and the proportion of each individual was settled anew every fourth year. The states were allowed to grant extraordinary subsidies on oc- casions of emergency; and the prince frequently paid a visit to the cities previously to such demands, in order to incline the inhabitants to his wishes. The taxes were soon imposed on articles of consumption, or on property, in 350 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. land or money. The people of the Netherlands united to their commercial spirit the love and the practice of arms : a bloody battle took place between Ypres and Poperinguen, because the people of the latter imitated the cloths made in the former; and a civil war was carried on in the streets of Ghent, in which the cloth-makers, James Artavelle, and Gerhard Dionisy, defeated the fullers and dyers, who fought under John Bacon. Dendermond fought against Ghent, which destroyed its manufactories. Artavelle, by his alliance with Edward king of England, contributed to excite the hundred years' war with France ; and his son Philip, at the head of the citizens, fought in the field against Charles the Sixth, and Philip the First of Bur- gundy. The power of Burgundy was never more considerable A D 1419 t ^ an unc * ei Ph* n P tne Good, son of John, who was duke of Burgundy, lord of Franche Comte, count of Artois and Flanders, margrave of An- twerp, and lord of the town of Mechlin. He purchased the county of Namur ; became duke of Lothier, Brabant, and Limburg, by the death of a prince of his own name; he partly inherited from his mother, and partly purchased the earldoms of Holland, Zealand, and Hennegau ; and acquired the duchy of Luxemburg by compact. For many years he carried on, with ability, as well as courage, a contest against Charles the Seventh, in revenge for the death of his father ; and as soon as he quitted the alliance of the English, France was saved. Charles was glad to ^ purchase peace, by mortgaging to him the towns situated on the Somme; and Philip perceived tint it would conduce more to his interest to govern his own dominions in tranquillity, than to persevere in an alliance which was odious to the nation. Charles of Orleans, son of the hereditary enemy of Burgundy, was a prisoner in his hands; and Philip ge- nerously restored him to freedom, and gave him his own UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 351 niece in marriage. In like manner he set at liberty Re- natus of Anjou, the titular king of Naples and count of Provence, almost without ransom. Philip founded his authority on good order and the happiness of his people. He instituted a well-organised government : he was a beneficent patron of intelligent men ; acquired the love of the citizens by his popular manners ; surrounded himself with an imposing magnificence; for- gave insurrections because he did not fear them ; exercised the nobles in military practices, and treated them with due respect, while he kept them under strict discipline. He would not allow them to intermarry with the citizens, be- cause such a practice might have produced consequences dangerous to princely power : the noble families were arranged in catalogues; and heralds at arms watched over trifling circumstances, which he knew how to render of im- portance to his government. He at the same time endea- voured, by the introduction of rules of politeness, to civilize the knights, and to inspire them with reverence for their lords : he raised the most distinguished to a rank that placed them nearer to himself, by the order of the golden fleece; but he caused the valiant and powerful John of Granson to be put to death, on learning that he had acted in a manner incompatible with his duty. The court of Philip was the most brilliant in the west of Europe; his rank was next to the royal dignity; he was revered by all princes, and by the eastern nations as the " great duke of the west." After an administration of nearly fifty years, he left a state such as we may imagine the land of promise to have been in its happiest period. His vessels of silver and of gold were valued at upwards of two millions. Charles the Seventh succeeded in restoring the monarchy of France. The English, who wished to appropriate that dignity to themselves, forfeited the prize of their victories. Talbot was driven out of Guienne; the proud and restless spirit of the family of Britanny was subdued; and Lor- 352 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. raine, the dukes of which were on all sides most threatened by those of Burgundy, attached themselves to the party of the king. Charles prepared the way for the improvement of all the arts of peace and of war, which are the genuine sources whence national greatness springs. SECTION XXXIX. ENGLAND. The love of freedom had so much increased in England, AD 1272 unc ^ er tne f ee °I e administrations of John and of Henry the Third, that their more active successor, Edward the First, was scarcely able to keep it within bounds: this king confirmed his authority in Ire- land, defeated and subjected the Britons of Wales, and was the terror of the Scots. His son, Edward the Second, who was too much de- voted to his favourites, became the victim of his own . _ weakness, and of the crueltv of his perfidious A. D. 1307. . " 1 wile. The latter was the mother of Edward the A.D. 1327. Third, the conqueror of France. His con- quests, however, were not permanent : and the valour and lofty spirit with which his good fortune inspired the Eng- lish, was the noblest fruit of his victories. If that nation had possessed a sufficiently perfect system of laws, their valour would have been formidable only to their enemies : but Richard the Second, son of the Black A.D. 1377. _ . . . _ . . a ■«-« . . rrince, who gained the victory ot roitiers, and who died before his father, w r as unable to keep them within the bounds of obedience; and lost his throne and life through the rebellion of Henry of Bolingbroke. ^ ^ This Henry, the son of John of Gaunt, who was the third son of Edward, did not succeed to the crown in his father's right ; because Edward Mortimer, earl of March, and husband of Philippa of Cla- UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 353 rence, would have taken precedence of him in that line; but deduced his title from his mother, and, through her, from Edmund of Lancaster, who was the son of Henry the Third, and elder than Edward the First. From these claims arose a contest, which lasted upwards of eighty years, between the rival families of York and Lancaster, the partisans of which were distinguished by the white and the red rose, as their respective emblems. The flame of discord, sometimes almost smothered, and at others break- ing out with new fury, brought destruction upon the royal family, and on almost the whole of the nobility of higher rank. The national freedom was not infringed upon by the great Edwards ; who depended, for support in their splendid enterprises, on the affection and contributions of the people. The industry of the citizens was the chief source of reve- nue ; the king, who was master of the coasts and havens, exacted a toll on the export of the staple commodities, wool and hides, and the third penny for every pound of foreign goods, while strangers were obliged to pay a still heavier tax at the chief custom-house. The imposts which the nation granted, were the twelfth penny from such objects of com- merce as were not staple commodities, or a fifteenth from the revenues of the towns, which might amount to about thirty thousand pounds sterling. There was an addition of two shillings upon every cask of wine imported, the greater part of which was from France. The tax on every hydage of land, and the impost on the towns and villages, were de- nominated the great subsidy ; and produced, at the rate of four shillings on land, and two shillings and six-pence on movables, seventy thousand pounds sterling: this tax, on land only, produces in our times two millions annually; and as the quantity of gold and silver in circulation is not more than ten times as great as in those days, 1,300,000/. of the above sum have been produced by the improvement of the country. The annual export, soon after the battle of vol. II. A A 854 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. Crecy, amounted to 294,184/.; of which 189,900/. con- sisted of unmanufactured wool, and only 9,548/. of coarse cloths : on the other hand, the value of the goods imported was 38,9/0/., of which 10,900/. consisted of fine cloths. The Flemings were the people who enriched themselves at the expense of their ignorant neighbours. The taxes were voted by the representatives of the cities and other com- munities, with the concurrence of the barons, and (by suf- ferance of the other houses) of an assembly of ecclesiastics. A parliament was held every year : the districts and boroughs allowed their representatives stipends: for which reason the sessions were probably shorter. There was no duke in the upper house, until the time of the hero of Poitiers, to whom his father gave the title of duke of Corn- wall : before Edward the Third, the kings themselves bore the ducal title of Normandy ; but that king dropped the claim to the duchy on account of his pretension to the sovereignty of France. All titles referred either to terri- torial possessions or to dignity: as a seat in the upper house was conferred not by birth but by the possession of an estate, the constitution of parliament was entirely repre- sentative: but this part of the institution was soon altered when the citizens began to acquire possession, by their wealth, of the seats of noblemen. The importance of the parliament of England, like that of the states-general of France, was owing to the public necessities. The maxim was now traced, that the king is under the law; because, by it, he sits on the throne to impart to the law that which he receives from it, viz. authority and effec- tive power. The judicial office was divided, under Edward the First, into three branches: first, the eldest tribunal, or court of King's Bench ; second, the Norman tribunal, or court of Exchequer, for the affairs of the crown estates; and, third, the court of Common Pleas, which had been restored by the Magna Charta, and in which, since the beginning of the reign of Edward the Second, all trans- UNIVERSAL HISTORY* 355 actions are recorded and published. The English jurist, rescued the nation from the yoke of the civil and ecclesiasti- cal laws of Rome; and even the provincial synods, and the decrees of papal legates, were not allowed to invalidate the legal customs of the country. The heavier the taxes which the people are able to pay, the greater the resources of the king for enterprises : and, on this principle, the chief object of policy with the Ed- wards was to increase the prosperity of the nation. They encouraged industry, and removed the obstacles to its pro- gress ; facilitated the transfer, and secured the possession of property. Even in the thirteenth century, they attempted to induce industrious strangers to settle in the country; and in the fourteenth, the products of foreign lands could be dispensed with : the importation of cloths manufactured abroad was prohibited ; and, according to the testimony of learned historians, Edward the Third forbade the export of unmanufactured wool, in order to confine its manufacture to the English. The spirit of the navigation act is apparent in the regulation of Richard the Second, that English ships should at least be preferred. The magnificence of this sovereign, and of his barons, is a proof that the kingdom contained a great quantity of gold and silver plate: their opulence was in fact greater than their knowledge of the manifold uses to which wealth can be applied. This was altogether a happy period for England, since the nation was as free as was necessary to its prosperity, and was as much devoted to industry and commerce as was compatible with the military spirit connected with its secu- rity, and magnanimity of character. The princes of the house of Valois were scarcely able to support their tottering throne; and the haughty chiefs who ruled behind their lofty Snowdon, over the descendants of the ancient Kymri, bent their hitherto unconquered necks to the yoke of the victorious Edward, who ordered the bards to be extirpated, that they might no longer remind their countrymen of their A A 2 356 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. ancient independence; and that the patriotic songs of Merlin and Taliessin might be buried in oblivion : but he left the people in possession of their civil rights. Edward also de- stroyed, as far as was in his power, the historical monu- ments of the Scots, which fostered their desire of national independence. SECTION XL. SCOTLAND. The crown of Scotland was contested by Robert Bruce and John Baliol, the latter of whom placed himself under the protection of Edward. The noble Wallace summoned the peasants of Clydesdale: and his enthusiasm soon suc- ceeded in assembling the warriors of the vallies and islands in the cause of king Robert and of Scotland, which became victorious ; though not till after the death of Edward. From this period the names of the heroes of Scotland, which hitherto had remained hidden in the mists of their native hills, begin to shine in history. Among them we remark James Douglass, the friend of Robert Bruce, and the ancestor of an heroic race, who had a parliament in his own dominions, bestowed knighthood, and fought at the head of two thousand men in a family feud against the Percys, and defended his country against England ; Gilbert Hamilton, who insulted the pride of Le Despencer, the favourite of Edward the Second, in that monarch's pre- sence; James Mount Stewart, the son of king Robert; and the Campbells and Macaulys. The Hebrides, a short time before, had been partly conquered and partly purchased from the kings of Norway : the Mac Dougals of Lorn, first-born of Argyle, were lords of Argyle, Mull, and the northern islands; and the Mac Donalds were their younger brothers. The great Mac Donald, the lord of the isles, who governed Sodor, or the southern islands, resided in Iona : he received the UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 357 homage of his vassals, seated on a rock in the lake of Hay; and thirteen judges under his authority decided the suits of the people at Na Corlle, and were rewarded with a tax amounting to a tenth of the disputed sum. The great Mac Donald rendered himself independent in Sodor ; and joined the party of the English against the Scots. AD °2 The fifteenth century brought with it in the British isles, as the fourteenth had done in France, an interruption to the progress of national pro- sperity, through the rage of factions. Even the history of these periods is less to be relied on : every thing is more or less enveloped in obscurity. We shall only observe, that after Henry the Fourth had seated the family of Lancaster on the throne, and Henry the Fifth, by his victory at Agin- court, and by the advantage which he took of the dissensions of France, had raised his people to the pinnacle of military glory, the country was abandoned, under the protracted administration of the gentle Henry the Sixth, to the most dreadful excesses of faction, until its reputation A. D. 1461. , , " , _ , . , abroad and good order at home were utterly destroyed, and the imbecile monarch forfeited A.D.1471. . . . . , , both his throne and lire. SECTION XLI. SCANDINAVIA. The race of Woden became extinct in Sweden in the twelfth century ; and in the fourteenth, the houses of the deified heroes of Denmark and Norway expired in the per- sons of Woldemar and Olaf. Margaret, who was daughter of the former, mother of the latter, and heiress of both, defeated Albert of Mecklenburg, king of Sweden, compelled him to abandon his crown, and united the A. D. 1598. . ' _. . . three kingdoms of Scandinavia by the league of Calmar. Had she been capable of conquering national A a 3 358 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. prejudices as well as armies, her dominions would have con- stituted a great and powerful monarchy. But the passions of her people were too powerful for her policy : and it was perhaps better that these three nations should remain in the tranquil possession of freedom, than that they should become formidable to the inhabitants of southern Europe. Margaret died without issue : her cousin and successor Erich, of the family of the dukes of Ponie- AD 143 ran * a > was expelled from the three kingdoms ; upon which Denmark invited Christopher, a duke of Bavaria, who was also acknowledged by Sweden and Norway. . _ After the death of Christopher, the crown A. D. 1448. r of Denmark and Norway fell into the pos- session of that family which still retains the sovereignty. The title of count or earl was introduced into Amerland and Rustringia in the time of the emperor Frederick Bar- barossa : King Harold of Denmark had abandoned this district to the son of Charlemain : Laringia, in which Del- menhorst is situated, was conquered from the Friezelanders : Sibbet Papinga, and other district chiefs, placed themselves voluntarily under the protection of the earls, of whose domi- nion Oldenburg was the seat. Earl Gerhard intoxicated Hajo, its feudal lord, and obtained by artifice the do- main of Barel. Earl Dietrich united Delmenhorst and Oldenburg by inheritance : this nobleman had two sons by Hedwig, sister of the last earl of Holstein, one of whom, Gerhard, succeeded him in Holstein, anfl the other, Christian, became king of Denmark, and contended with Charles Knutson and Steno Sture for the crown of Sweden. This was the origin of the house of Oldenburg, which now governs a large portion of the earth : the descendants of that venerable race, which formerly considered it a great conquest to rescue from the waves, by means of dykes, a tract of land on the shores of the sea of Oldenburg; and which in those days held the reins of a gentle government UNIVERSAL HIST0RV. 359 over a free people, now domineers over all Scandinavia, and from the frontiers of Holland to those of China. The counts of Holstcin, of the house of Schaumburg, bequeathed their fertile country, in which agriculture and pasturage is advantageously alternated on the same spot, to the sons of the princess Hedwig. The states of the country declared in favour of Christian, who promised to bestow the fiefs on native nob'emen : he confirmed the clergy and the knights in their exemption from tolls and taxes: he promised to leave the country, whenever he should be absent in Denmark or elsewhere, under the administration of the bishops of Lubeck and Sleswick, with the assistance of a council of five respectable landholders. In his reign, Holstein became a dukedom. SECTION XLII. POLAND* Poland, which had become a kingdom since Przemysli after the extinction of the dukes of Dantzic, had felt himself strong enough to wear a crown, was engaged in war with the kings of Bohemia, who laid claim to the feudal superiority of Cracow, with the dukes of Stettin, who wished to inherit the domains of t lie Dantzic branch, with the electors of Brandenburg, who asserted themselves to be lords paramount of Pomeiania, against the ambitious views of the Teutonic knights in Prussia; and, finally, in a severe contest with the restless spirit of the nobles at home. Dantzic was preserved, and AD 11 at ^ G extmct ^ on °* tne rova l f amily of Bo- hemia, Cracow remained to Poland ; but Si- lesia was abandoned to the house of Luxemburg. The race of the Piasts, who in the course of five hundred years had raised Poland to a certain degree of civilization and to considerable power, expired with Casimir A, D. 1370. _ _ r > r the Ureat, who was a conqueror and a legis- a a 4 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. lator, and the founder of the university of Cracow. He was succeeded in his dignity by his sister's son, Lewis of Anjou, king of Hungary, who was also justly surnamed the Great, and whose father had given up Red Russia to Po- land for the prospect of the succession. Lewis, however, had no sons: the husband A. D. 1382. . ot his eldest daughter Maria, Was Sigismund of Luxemburg, who obtained the kingdom of Hungary ; and Hedwig, or the Poles, neglected to insist on the com- pact by which king Lewis endeavoured to secure the per- manent union of his crowns. Hedwig not only retained the sovereignty of Poland, together with that of Volhynia and Red Russia, but also gave her hand to Jagel, the grand ^ ^ prince of Lithuania, who, together with all his people, adopted the Christian faith ; and from that period the kingdom of Poland arose to the greatest importance. Dantzig usually freighted three hundred ships with corn for England, the Netherlands, and France ; and even Con- stantinople frequently received supplies from Poland. Dantzig owed its elevation chiefly to the change which had taken place in the Vistula ; for the bed of that stream be- came gradually choked up to such a degree, that the towns which were situated farther inland, not excepting Culm, the original seat of the commerce of that river, were obliged to yield the palm to Dantzig, which lay nearer to the sea. King Wladislaf Jagel, in the battle of Tanere- A.D.1410. i , V ,7 berg, gave the nrst blow to the power 01 the Teutonic knights. In other respects, uniformity of religion appeared, to this newly converted prince, to be necessary to his power ; and hence he proceeded with the utmost se- verity against pagans and heretics: he enacted, however, that no man should be included in this number without investigation. ^ ^ His son, Vladislaf, was elected king by the people of Hungary, in consequence of which UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 361 that kingdom and Poland became again united under one head : but this young prince lost his life when scarcely more than twenty years old, in the battle of A. D. 1444. . Varna, against sultan Morad. Casimir, the brother of the younger Vladislaf, and his successor on the throne of Poland, was one of the greatest princes of his age, and was frequently invited by the Hun- garians and Bohemians to become their sovereign. He ^ jy aggrandized Poland in a long contest with the Teutonic knights, in the course of which he acquired Polish Prussia, and the feudal superiority over the rest of the Prussian territory. The latter countries were extremely flourishing in that age : but the Teutonic knights disregarding the rights of their own subjects, and insulting the neighbouring princes by their arrogance, their con- duct excited internal discontent, and facilitated the enter- prise of Casimir. Polish Prussia retained its own diets, its accustomed laws, judicial forms, and coinage; and the de- puties of this country gave their vote in the regal elections. The mighty Casimir reigned nearly half a century, and saw Vladislaf, one of his sons, seated on the thrones of Bohemia and Hungary. SECTION XLIII. HUNGARY. In the commencement of the fourteenth century, the family of Arpad, the chieftain who four hundred years be- fore, had first conducted the Hungarians into the country ^ which they now occupied, expired in the per- son of Andrew III. Several parties endea- voured to introduce different princes to the sovereignty ; and the throne remained for many years in a tottering state, until Charles Robert of Anjou, of the royal family of Naples, imparted a new splendour to the kingdom by the 362 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. A D 1310 w ' sc ^ oni anc ^ vigour of his long administration, and prepared for his son Lewis an era of dis- A.D. 1343. tinguished good fortune and glory. Lewis . _ died, after a reign of forty years, iust at the A. D. 1382. ' - , i i era when the arms of the Ottomans began to menace the frontiers ; and Hungary had now the misfortune to become again the prey of raging factions, and at last to A D l obtain, hi Sigismund, an enterprising king* who was a foreigner and a lawless tyrant. Si- gismund maintained his throne during half a century, but rather by compliance than vigour: and though he was de- feated by the Turks in the battle of Nicopolis, yet Hungary remained untouched, because the neighbouring government of Turkey was rendered more peaceable; at first by mis- fortunes, and afterwards by the pacific character of less ambitious sultans. We have already seen that the reign of Albert of Austria A.D. 1437. was very short, and that after his death, and A. D. 1439. during Ladislaf's feeble minority, king Vladislaf governed both Poland and Hungary, until the fatal day of Varna. The courage and in- telligence of John Hunyad, the administrator of the royal power, now became the safeguard of Hungary, and the bulwark of western Christendom. That noble- man died shortly after he had acquired im- A.D. 1456. . . n V'S . , mortal fame at Belgrade, against the conqueror of Constantinople: and the government, which was con- ducted in the name of Ladislaf, had scarcely time to dis- play its perfidy and ingratitude toward the house of Hunyad, when that family became extinct by the death A.D. 1458. . J or the young prince. The voice of the nation now called Matthias, the son of the hero John Hunyad, to the throne. Matthias surpassed all the sovereigns of his age in wisdom as in good fortune : but it is to be regretted that he did not, like his father, turn 14 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 363 his victorious arms against the barbarians, rather than against Bohemia and Austria. On the death A.D. 1490. r , . . . _, . . T71 _. . _ ot this great king, Hungary elected Vladislai, the son of Casimir of Poland, who was already king of Bohemia. SECTION XLIV. THE TURKS. The Turks are descended from an ancient race of people, who were long accustomed to wander through the eastern regions beyond the Caspian, and frequently poured their swarms over the south of Asia. The Scythians, who had held Asia in subjection twenty-eight years before Cyrus, inhabited this region. Here the Massagetac also withstood the arms of the Persians; here Arschah raised the martial bands, which for five hundred years upheld the throne of the Parthian s ; and here, in the fifth and sixth centuries, powerful Chans reigned, who were alternately flattered by the Romans and by the Persians. It was hence, after Turkestan submitted to the creed and the laws of the com- mander of the faithful, that those valiant youths descended, who were the ornament and security, and afterwards the im- perious masters, of the dynasty of Bagdad ; who severed pro- vinces from its dominion, and rendered the successors of Mohammed slaves in their own palace. From these Turks A D io 5 P rocee( ^ e ^ tne h° use °f Seljuk, who conquered Asia from the confines of Persia and India to those of Phrygia. The Seljuk sultans in Lesser Asia car- ried on wars, during two hundred years, against the western crusaders and the Greek emperors; and* the power of the Mogols alone destroyed the throne of Iconium. At this period Solyman, accompanied by fifty thousand men, partly of his own race, and partly of the tribe of the Oghuzi, quitted the country of his ancestors on the Gihore, in order to escape subjection to the yoke of the Mogols. 364 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. He proceeded through Media ; and, continually followed by the conquerors of Asia, pursued his way to the confines of Syria, where he was drowned in the vicinity of Haleb. While one division of his horde endeavoured, by various roads, to find its way back again to the northern Steppe, others followed his son Erdogrul toward Lesser Asia. The Sultan Ala-ed-din Kai Kobad, who reigned at Iconium, gladly received this warrior; but vainly hoped that his own power would be supported by the twelve troops which ac- companied his march : they consisted only of twenty-five thousand men, and were too feeble to withstand the five hundred thousand which composed the Mogolic swarm. Yajat-ed-din Kai Chosru, the succeeding sultan, fled ; and his kingdom, which was enfeebled by the insensate ani- mosity of his sons, Rokn-ed-din-Kilig Arslan and Azz-ed- din-Kai Kawns, was entirely destroyed under the reigns of Masud, son of the last-mentioned prince, and of Ala-ed- din-Kai Kawus, the nephew of Masud. The Turkish fol- lowers of Erdogrul dispersed themselves in the meanwhile, in those districts of the Taurus which in remote periods had protected the savage freedom of the Isauri, in the moun- tains of Phrygian Ida, and in other hilly tracts of Lesser Asia. They showed themselves not disinclined to adopt order and civilization from Alexius Philanthropicus, and the few intelligent statesmen of the declining empire : but the first Palaeologus who reigned in Constantinople, for the sake of economy, discontinued the pay of the frontier garrisons; and under his son Andronicus, good com- manders were the objects of dread to the timid court, and finally became its victims. The early valour of Osman, son of Erdogrul, was de- veloped at that period among the Turks: it is said to have been first displayed in the vicinity of Troy. It is sup- posed that he quitted that territory when, after A.D. 1299. _ \. , ' . A - the reign of Cazan, the son or Argun, the torrent of the Mogols gradually retired from the country, UNIVERSAL HISTORY. which they left in the utmost confusion. Osman inspired his army with heroic valour and religious en- A.D.1504. ... , r . • it i i thusiasm : the pleasures 01 this lire, and the joys of paradise, were equally expected by the banditti assembled around the standard which he pretended to have received from the last of the Seljukides. He was accompanied by holy dervises, whose exterior was as severe as that of the anchorites of the fourth century, but who were elevated, by the effects of opium, to visions which led to active enterprises, instead of the quietude of contemplative life : they were men of firm and heroic cha- racter. The kingdom of Osman was erected in the interior of Bithynia: and Prusa, at the foot of the A. D. 1505. m , .'• Vu- Mysian Olympus, became his capital. In the time of his son Orchan, almost the whole of Lesser Asia was already subjected, partly by A.D.152C. /-v» , , T , the Ottoman troops, and partly by other Turkish tribes. A very small number of towns remained under the Greek empire; a portion of Cilicia was subject to the sultan of Egypt ; and fortresses in possession of the western powers here and there commanded an island, or a small extent of coast. But even Greece and her islands experienced the irresistible power of the Turks. The court of Constantinople accelerated its downfal by internal divisions, which were never more destructive than when the friends of Andronicus the younger, in the hope of ob- taining the government under his name, induced him to undertake a civil war against his grandfather, who was already seventy years old: and when, after the death of both the former, John Kantakuzenus, the most powerful individual in the empire, was removed from the regency by the hatred of the courtiers, and compelled to take up arms in his own defence. Within six years after this occurrence, Thrace and Macedonia were nearly reduced to a desert, and became the prey of the Servians and Turks, whose assistance was sought by both parties. Kantakuzenus, in- S66 UNIVERSAL HISTORY". deed, ascended the throne ; but the empire was so exhausted, that he was unable to maintain it: he retired into the agreeable solitude of Mount Athos, and left the empire to John Palaeologus, who was immersed in sensuality. , _ During these disturbances, the Turks took A.D. 1360. . , . . . . . Adnanople, which, in magnitude, was the third city in the Greek empire, and the key of Bulgaria and Servia. Morad, the son of Orchan, or his elder brother Solyman, completed this enterprise without much resist- ance. Adrianople was soon adorned with mosques, hung within with magnificent tapestries, ornamented with marble, and covered with roofs of copper, which glittered far over the surrounding plains; it became, from that time forth, the seat of a western power, which in the course of time formed the great monarchy of European Turkey. This Morad, the sultan of the Ottoman Turks, formed a regular corps of twelve thousand captive Christian youths, called Janissaries, whose arms obtained, during two hundred years, an almost uninterrupted succession of victories; and who, upwards of two hundred years longer, have protected the Turkish empire against the military science of the European s, which, during the latter period, has become greatly superior to their own. Morad designed and trained them to the know- ledge and love of no other employment but arms, and taught them to devote their whole life to his interests and to war- fare: they depended on him for their sustenance, clothing, and pay ; he bestowed great rewards on them, distributed them in barracks, and forbade them to marry* No insti- tution similar to this existed among the Europeans: the courage of the Germans disdained to submit to the restraints of discipline; and the great bands of France and Italy were more formidable to their own country and friends than to their enemies. The principal object of attention in these armies, was to form an impenetrable array : a good infantry was only to be found in the Alps and in the mountainous districts of Spain, among tribes who were too poor to pro- UNIVERSAL HISTORY. .167 cure a costly suit of defensive armour, and were therefore obliged to supply its place by their courage and dexterity. The irresistible progress of the Ottoman Turks, arose from very natural causes. They took the great city of Philippopolis from the Greeks ; but these towns were now considerable in no respect but in circumference, as the greater part of the houses were empty and falling to decay. Morad had more difficulty in conquering the martial Bul- garians and Servians; and was killed by a youth of the latter nation, near Cossowa. His son Bajessid, A.D. 1389. _ 1 7 . 7 • i ■ n i surnamed JJshilderun, or Lightnings rekindled, in a more terrible manner, the fury of the Ottomans. Against this warrior, Hungary, Germany, and France assembled an army of an hundred thousand men, which was conducted from Ofen by king Sigismund : six thousand cavalry and four thousand infantry followed the undaunted John, prince of Burgundy, the illustrious vassals of En- guerrands de Coucy, the last lord of Montfaucon Mumpel- gard, and the flower of the nobility. The advanced guard was under the command of the king of Hungary; Bur- gundy came next ; and the Hungarians and Bohemians displayed their force under the banner of St. George. Coucy, at the head of five hundred French, a thousand English, and a thousand Hungarian archers, had obtained a slight advantage, when, on a sudden, the sultan Bajessid, with two hundred and fifty thousand men, endeavoured to surround the Christian army on all sides. The duke of Burgundy, who, though he heard and saw the danger, was ignorant of its extent, advanced with his whole force, but without concert with the rest of the army ; while Sigismund and Coucy in vain endeavoured to restrain him. The count of Artois exclaimed among the French troops, " Montjoy and St. Denys ! will ye leave the fame of this day to the Germans?" and these troops joined in the attack. Bajessid, having arranged his army in a crescent, and stationed the cavalry of the Spahi, arranged in the manner of the Janis- 368 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. saries, made a stand. The French soon saw themselves surrounded, and fought with ineffectual valour for life and liberty : their fate spread an universal panic throughout the army ; subordination was entirely destroyed, and each sought his own safety in flight. Sigismund escaped, ac- companied by five knights, to the Danube, reached Con- stantinople, and at length arrived in his own country by sea. Coucy, Artois, Burgundy, La Tremouille, and all the most powerful barons, were taken prisoners, and the former died in captivity. Bosnia was afterwards subjected; and Manuel Palaeologus was compelled to resign his throne to his nephew, who was patronized by the sultan. SECTION XLV. THE MOGOLS/ After the battle of Nicopolis, there appeared no com- petent rival of the power of the Ottomans, in Europe ; when a revolution took place, to the eastward of the Caspian sea, which entirely changed the relations of power. The king- dom of Balkh, situated in that part of Asia, comprises regions which may well contest the prize of fertility with the plains of Andalusia and Damascus: and in the midst of Sogdiana, in a beautiful and well-watered valley, eight or nine days' journey in length, stands Sarmacand, the ancient seat of power and literature. The country of Sogdiana is overlooked by the mountains of Ferguna, which are rich in gold, silver, copper, and precious stones, and inhabited by an independent pastoral nation of the Turkish race : in the magnificent and extensive city of Kesch, not far from Sar- macand, Timur was viceroy of many fertile and populous districts belonging to the Mogolic chan of Jagatai, who, like himself, was descended from Jengis Chan. The present chan had given himself up to repose, on the throne of his fathers; but he still retained the name of sovereign, which remains with his family to this day. Timur, who was UNIVERSAL HISTORY. a great warrior and an artful man, persuaded the chan to appoint him nowia?i, or prime minister. Under the pretence of forcing some faithless viceroys, who had declared themselves independent sultans or chans, to submit to their legitimate sovereign, Timur proceeded to re-establish the Mogolic power, in the same manner as Cyrus fought at first in the cause of his uncle Cyaxares. Persia was quickly subdued. Timur next excited divisions among the golden horde, which held Astrachan, Casan, and the Crimea under its sway, and reigned over the Rus- sians. Nothing was able to withstand the terrors of artil- lery, which he employed, for the first time, in these regions. Timur penetrated on one side toward the west, and pro- mised protection to the princes of Lesser Asia, who had been oppressed by the sultans ; while his grandson, Pir Moham- med Jehan Ghir, on the other, over-ran the country of Hindostan from the northern mountains; and the Greek emperor found an unexpected deliverance from the Mogol arms. Timur obtained a decisive victory near Ancyra, in the plains of Galatia, over the sultan. Bajessid himself, worthy of his fathers and of his former greatness, fought A D l W ^ t ^ 6 ^ Ur ^ °^ ^ es P a * r ' ^ or f ree d° m or tne death of a hero ; but the Mogols, throwing a mantle over him, took him alive, and brought him igno- miniously before the conqueror, whom he despised. The unfortunate sultan, consumed by grief, was despatched by Timur to the graves of the Ottomans. The whole of Lesser Asia was plundered and laid waste : the knights of St. John in vain opposed a resistance of fifteen days, in the citadel of St. Peter near Smyrna : the Mogols filled the harbour ; only a small part of the order escaped ; and Timur erected a tower as a monument of his victory, consisting of an equal number of stones and human heads. A t He now turned his course toward the east A.D. 1401. and north-east ; and all the Ulusses of the VOL. II. B B 370 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. golden horde, on receiving information of this movement, raised their kibitkas, mounted their Tatar horses, and re- treated into the steppes beyond the Wolga and the Uralsk : the terrors of God came upon them in the night; they saw the Mogols in imagination, and began to slay one another. Hence arose family feuds which demanded revenge of blood ; of which Ivan, czar of the Russians, took advantage, to restore the independence of his country. Timur also vanquished the Egyptian mamelukes ; and on his return to his own country, sent an army of two hundred thousand men against the dynasty of Sing, which at that time reigned in China. He died in the seventy-first AD 1406 ^ 6ar °^ a S e > anc * ^ e thirty-sixth of his reign. SECTION XLVL CONTINUATION OF THE TURKISH HISTORY. The tottering empire of the Ottoman Turks was still farther weakened by the effeminate Solyman, the restless Issem, and the perfidious and cruel Musa, sons of Bajessid ; and by their disobedient pashas : and was scarcely restored A D 1413 ^ tne m ^ an( ^ P ru< ^ ent administration of Mohammed the First, and his noble visier Bajessid. None of the European powers were able to pre- vent its returning prosperity : Sigismund, who had revenged his wife on some of the nobles of Hungary, was thrown into a dungeon eighty feet below the surface of the earth ; and when he regained his liberty, his attention was occu- pied by the affairs of the west. Morad, the worthy son of Mohammed, re- A.D. 1420. . stored the janissaries to their former fame : he was heroic, and at the same time gentle; and a just esti- mator of the vanity of external greatness, to which he pre- ferred the real enjoyment of life, as often as his regal duties would permit. He did not take Constantinople, though UNIVERSAL HISTORY. the expiring empire scarcely breathed under John the . Eighth. This emperor made a journey to Italy, the expenses of which were defrayed by the pope, in order to promote the union of the Greek and Romish churches; a measure to which he subscribed, be- cause he expected by means of it to obtain assistance. After his return from Florence, the division became A. D. 1438. .„.,,',-•, , still wider than before; because even those who had been dearly paid for their concurrence, now execrated the compact they had made. The inhabitants of Constan- tinople were chiefly engaged in theological controversies; and the city, with its immediate neighbourhood, contained three hundred convents; while the whole military power did not amount to five thousand men. The sultan Morad maintained peace with Hungary. Car- dinal Julian, the papal legate, released the Hungarians from their oath; and as Morad was enjoying his pleasures in Magnesia, they thought it a good opportunity to attack his kingdom both by sea and land. King Vladislaf, accom- panied by Hunyad, advanced to the shores of the Black sea, and Morad once more arose to vindicate the fame of _ the Ottoman arms. The battle of Varna en- A.D. 1444. sued, in which the victory for a long time inclined to Hunyad : Morad called on God to avenge the perjury of the Christian ; and at this moment, the youthful king, against the wishes and counsels of Hunyad, broke into the ranks of the janissaries : his head was soon struck o:f£ and carried about on the point of a spear; and the sight of it inspired his own army with such terror, that Morad gained the victory. \ D 1451 S ° n ' ^ onamme ^ tne Second, inherited all his father's virtues except his moderation ; and combined with them a more enterprising spirit. From the commencement of his administration, the destruction of the eastern empire was his ruling passion : and in the b b 2 572 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. , - 1123d year from the building of Constanti- A.D. 1455. _ ii* ii nople, he besieged that city with the utmost exertion of his power. The emperor Constantine, the Genoese hero Giustiniani, the grand duke Lucas Notaras, and every individual who was interested for the last re- mains of the empire, and for the religion of their fathers, were not less active in its defence. The sultan lay fifty days before the city, and shook its massy walls with machines of unexampled power. The Turks entered on one side by a neglected postern, just at the moment when their comrades had scaled it in another quarter. Constantine fell as he was fighting valiantly on the wall : the multitude, relying on prophecies, took refuge in the church of St. Sophia ; but the city was plundered, and its inhabitants enslaved. The great duke and logothete Lucas Notaras, whose life had been spared, was executed, together with his sons, be- cause he refused an infamous request of the sultan; and Mohammed, for a similar reason, put to death, with his own hand, the son of Phranzes, the protovestiary. Thus ended the Roman empire, fifteen hundred years after the battle of Pharsalia. The imperial name, however, still existed in the family of the Comneni at Trebizond, on the Black sea, which, together with the surrounding country, sub- A.D.1462. ? _ * _ mitted at the appearance ot Mohammed. I he emperor, David Comnenus, was put to death at Constan- tinople. The Palaeologi still retained the greater part of the an- cient Peloponnesus ; but Mohammed found means to terrify Thomas, one of the princes of that district, to such a degree, that he took refuge in Italy ; and the former having gained Demetrius over to his interest, took possession of the country, and led the prince into Thrace. Italy now trembled for its safety : Nicholas the Fifth, and after him Pius the Second, sent the most urgent entreaties *3 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 878 A.D. 1467. to all the western Christians : Pius even determined to animate this new crusade by his own presence ; but he was A D 1464 P revente ^ D ) r death from executing his pur- pose. Alexander, or, as he was called by the Turks, Scan- derbeg, of the noble race of the Castriotes, preserved, during his life, the freedom of Coroja in Albania. The great battle fought by Hunyad, at Belgrade, saved Hungary : the impression which it pro- duced on the sultan, remained to the day of his death, and induced him to content himself with the complete sub- jection of Servia. The Vayvodes of Moldavia defended themselves with so much valour, that he was A. D. 1465. , . • satisfied with their apparent submission. Mohammed adorned Constantinople with new magnifi- cence, and introduced the pomp of a regular court. He is said to have been fond of translations from the works of the ancients, particularly respecting the achievements of Alexander : he caused his own history to be written by Angiolello, a Vicentine slave belonging to his son Mustafa, and patronized the art of painting. It was especially fortunate for the Christian nations of the west, that Hassan el Tawil, (who is called Usong by Haller) by his prudence and distinguished talents, imparted an extraordinary vigour to the kingdom of Persia, which had been in a state of great disorder ever since the death of Abu Said, the Mogolic chan; he endeavoured, both by embassies and correspondence, to convince the duke of Burgundy, the republic of Venice, the Medici, and other western princes, how important his kingdom was to their welfare. This prince has found in Haller a biographer who deserves to be compared with the author of the Cyropaedia. The mamelukes in Egypt, and the houses of Merin, and Abu Haf, in Tunis and Morocco, retained their so- vereignties until the sixth century. b b 3 374 UNIVERSAL HISTORY". SECTION XLVII. THE GREAT MOGOL. The great Mogol of the family of Timur, confirmed his sway in the East Indies. Myrsa Pir Moham- A.D. 1598. - • _ ' • J ,,'-"■*, med, the founder of that empire, had found the successors of the ancient sultans of Ghaur, in that state of weakness into which the dynasties of the east usually sink, in the course of a few generations, from the combined effects of the climate and of despotism. When Timur himself marched across the northern mountains into Hin- dostan, Shu Mahmud, under the walls of Delhi, fought a decisive battle against his troops, which were inspired by religion, avarice, and ambition. Timur was - accom- panied by the garrisons of all the places which he had sub- jected in his progress ; and their number was become so great, that he was apprehensive lest they should set them- selves at liberty during the battle; he therefore caused them all to be put to death, and afterward defeated the Sha, and plundered his deserted capital. Timur pursued the defenders of Hindostan to the passes of Kupeli, where the Ganges issues from the mountains* and in this sacred region obtained his second victory: he completed the conquest of the mountainous district, and a AD 4 ^ art °^ armv subdued the country to the southward. After his death, and the murder of Pir Mohammed, his kingdom, like that of Alexander, was divided. But the great sultan Borbr, preserved the dominion of the opulent and powerful country of Hin- dostan in hi* family, which was the reigning dynasty at the time when the Portuguese came, (as Marai Ben Joseph says,) from the dark unknown ocean beyond Negroland, and landed in the East Indies. The discovery of the East Indies and of America ; the union of the kingdoms of Spain under Ferdinand; the UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 375 accession of power which the kings of France received by the incorporation of Burgundy ; the termination of the civil wars of England; the actions of Gustavus Vasa in Sweden, and of Ivan Vasilievitsch in Russia; the alter- ations in the constitution of the German empire, arising partly from the power of Austria, and partly from the re- formation ; produced new arrangements in the political frame of Europe, gave rise to new interests, opinions, and manners, and new institutions, both in military affairs and in commerce. b B 4 ( m ) BOOK XVIII. OF THOSE REVOLUTIONS WHICH ESPECIALLY CON- TRIBUTED TO PEVELOPE THE NEW ORDER OF POLITICAL AFFAIRS. — A. D. 1453 — 1519- SECTION I. LEWIS THE ELEVENTH. Charles the Seventh, king of France, was succeeded by his son, Lewis the Eleventh, in the sovereignty of his kingdom, which had been rescued from the yoke of the English by the good fortune of the former, A.D.1461. ? _ . . 7 and which now began to assume, among the nations of Europe, a rank in some degree proportionate to its power. The judgment which we form of statesmen, is often decided rather by the consequences of their measures, than by an impartial estimation of their character: and it has accordingly happened, that the enemies of the king- dom, whose importance was so much augmented by Lewis the Eleventh, have frequently refused to do justice to his talents. He said with truth, that his council was in his own head ; and it would, in fact, have been difficult for the most accomplished minister to point out a better method of turning to account the circumstances of his age, than that which he adopted. The exorbitant power of the nobility appeared to him the greatest obstacle to that unity in the administration of affairs, which imparts energy and rapidity of execution to the enterprises of a government : and he was so entirely occupied in diminishing the privileges of that class, tbat even his intemperate passions were incapable of diverting UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 377 his attention from the prosecution of his views. He was too well acquainted with the real extent of his power, to engage unnecessarily in foreign quarrels; and conceived that the most important benefits which he could confer on his successors, would be to render them masters of their own dominions: but even in this respect he refrained from a premature display of his authority, by which the nobles might have been alarmed, and perhaps induced to enter into a combination against his designs. He appeared to follow the course of events, while in reality he frequently guided them. His enemies were as powerful, and more opulent, than himself: accordingly he op- posed them not by force, but by cunning, in which he hoped to be superior to them, because they were numerous, and had different and frequently conflicting views, while his own will was uniform and undivided, and his attention constantly directed to the opportunities which their weaknesses or mis- fortunes might offer to his advantage. He not only misled his enemies to their ruin, but gave to his administration a de~ gree of reputation for order and justice, in affairs of a pri- vate nature, in which that of his adversaries was defective. He resembled Augustus in the simplicity of his manner of life, in his power of dissimulation, and in the readiness to perpetrate any crime that could contribute to his interests ; and like Augustus, he was greater in the cabinet than in the field : for both these sovereigns possessed a degree of timidity in the midst of their ambitious plans, which was the origin of the extraordinary caution of their measures, and proved to be a source of torment to themselves, which avenged the misfortunes they inflicted on their enemies. Philip the Good, duke of Burgundy, during the life of Charles the Seventh, who was generally at variance with his son Lewis, had given the young prince an asylum at A ^ his court. Philip left a son named Charles, A.D. 1467. . r , ■ 9 who was as ambitious as the king, while his passions were more impetuous, and his character far more 378 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. noble and exalted : his pride contemned the employment of artifice, and his feelings were so vehement as entirely to de- prive him of self-control. The finest countries on this side the Alps, the two Burgundies, and almost the whole of Belgium, were his property : to these he added the duchy of Gelders and the county of Ziitphen, which he bought of Arnold of Egmont, duke of Gelders, having delivered that nobleman from the imprisonment in which he had been held by his own son. Sigismund, lord of the disjoined provinces of Austria, who was in want of money to support a war against the Swiss, had already mortgaged to the duke the A.D. 1469. O & county of Pfirt, and many towns in Alsace and Swabia. Charles besides entertained hopes, that Renatus of Anjou, the titular king of Naples, whom Lewis had offended, would bequeath to him the county of Provence. Lorraine was not capable of resisting the power of Burgundy ; and it appeared to be in the power of Charles to erect a kingdom of Austrasia, or of Lorraine, and thus for ever to separate France from Germany and Italy. The king had reason to be anxious for the safety of Dauphine and Lyons ; for his sister, the regent of Savoy, is said to have entertained an attachment to the duke ; and the emperor Frederick was inclined to present him with a regal crown, if he would consent to betroth his daughter and heiress to the archduke Maximilian. Against this powerful sovereign of the most populous and wealthy countries, no military enterprise of the king was suc- cessful : the only weapon remaining was artifice, by which he endeavoured to entangle his rival in foreign quarrels ; and Charles facilitated these designs of his enemy, by preten- sions and undertakings which alarmed the empire, and irritated the Swiss, who generally contemplated all external changes with indifference. The king, who had already found an opportunity in his youth, of appreciating the character of this nation, .led UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 379 A. D. 1452. forty thousand men to disperse the council of Basel, and to make a diversion in favour of the war, in which Austria was engaged with them. No victorious body of troops had ever made so strong an impression on him as the fifteen ^ hundred Swiss produced, who at St. James on the Birs, after having killed four times their own number, suffered themselves to be cut off to a man, by the superior numbers of their enemy, while not a single individual offered to surrender. From that time France sought their friendship and alliance; and Lewis contrived to make friends at Bern, and in other towns, by means of bribes: for the poverty of these mountaineers rendered gold the most valuable thing among them, next to freedom. Nicholas von Diesbach of Bern, a man whose reputation, eloquence, and popular manners, rendered him the most important individual in that canton ; Jost von Sillinen, provost of Beronmunster ; Hanns Wald- man, the best knight and the greatest man at Zurich ; many of the confessors, and the warlike youth ; were espe- cially devoted to the king. Charles at the same period offended the emperor by his pride, and by his oppressive treatment of the territories he held under mortgage in Alsace, in such a manner, that the house of Austria was eager to accede to any alliance, by which this insulting and injurious conduct might be punished. _ In this state of affairs the king mediated a A. D. 1474. . M ' , f 8 " perpetual adjustment of the ancient ani- mosity of the house of Austria against the confederates, and advanced a sum of money to Sigismund for the ransom of his territories, between whom and Switzerland a treaty- was concluded. The bishops of Strasburg and Basel; Renatus, the young duke of Lorraine, and the most con- siderable cities of Alsace, took the part of the confederates, Bern promised its assistance to the king against the duke ; every thing was managed according to the wishes of the friends of Lewis ; and Hadrian von Bubenberg, the chief 380 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. magistrate, their opponent in all these affairs, who pos- sessed in an extraordinary degree the veneration of his con- temporaries, was excluded from the assemblies of the council, Charles, however, refused to accept the ransom which was offered by Sigismund, in consequence of which the latter had recourse to forcible measures ; and by the decision and advice of the Swiss ambassadors, caused Peter von Ha- genbach, the tyrannical magistrate to whom Charles had confided the government of the mortgaged fiefs in Alsace, to be beheaded. This proceeding was probably instigated by the king, whose interest it was to render the animosity irreconcilable : the duke swore to revenge his officer ; and Lewis seized this moment to propose an alliance with the Swiss, and to offer assistance, and a supply of provisions to the towns of the lower confederacy : an hereditary alli- ance w r as concluded with Austria, and the emperor Fre- derick summoned the Swiss to their duty as members of tlie empire. Charles, on the other hand, armed the force of Burgundy, some Italian mercenaries, and the Savoyard population of the neighbouring Pays de Vaud. The canton of Bern, undaunted by these preparations, sent the high provosts, Petermann von Wabern and Nicholas von Scharnacthal, with three thousand men, over mount Jura, against Tranche Comte ; and all the confederates concurred in a declaration of war at the diet at Lucern. This was the beginning of the Burgundian war, which had so important a share in new-modelling the political system of Europe. The duchy was laid waste ; but at the approach of Charles, the Swiss retreated to the eastern side of Jura, where they took possession of the dominions of prince William of Orange-Chateau Guyon, who com- manded in the service of Burgundy: terror accompanied their march, as they neither gave nor demanded quarter. The Swiss troops were better adapted for fighting than for sustaining the fatigues of long-continued warfare. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 381 The aids sent by their confederates arrived but slowly; partly because these good allies would have been glad to see their power, as well as that of Burgundy, exhausted in the contest; and partly because they were desirous of discern- ing the probable issue of the contest before they took any active part. Meanwhile the troops of Bern conquered the Pays de Vaud, where James de Romont, of the house of Savoy, endeavoured to obstruct their passage. These wars really deserved the name of journies, which was commonly applied to them ; for few instances occurred of resistance on the part of the fortresses. The duke of Burgundy extended his force out of the middle passes of the Jura, towards the lake of Neufchatel. Here he besieged and took the fortress of Granson, which was occupied by a Swiss garrison, whom he caused to be hanged, probably with the design of terrifying their coun- trymen. This injury, however, only served to inflame AD H76 tne * r na ti° na l P r ide; and they soon took re- venge in the battle which the duke, through his impetuosity, suffered himself to be compelled to fight in a narrow defile, where his superiority of numbers was of no avail. His army no sooner perceived the unexpected firmness of the despised enemy, than they took flight ; and his camp, which resembled the most splendid court, to- gether with upwards of four hundred pieces of artillery, and six hundred colours and standards, fell into the hands of the victors. The duke, not dispirited by this disaster, appeared in a few months before Murten, a small town, which was de- fended with heroic valour by Hadrian von Bubenberg, who now manifested himself a true patriot, when the defence of his country was at stake. The confederates assembled slowly : the duke of Lorraine, who had been driven out of his own country, came to the assistance of the common cause, with only two hundred faithful knights and four counts of Leiningen. The people of Bern, and of all 282 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. Switzerland, were left by the authorities to their own will ; and they exerted their powers with redoubled vigour in the plains and on the heights of Murten against the enemy, who, on this occasion, had chosen a field which allowed him more room for the display of his forces than in the former battle, and which was much nearer to their own country. The victory was decided by Hanns von Hallwyl, a knight, and commander of the advanced troops and ar- tillery, who infused his own ardent spirit into all around him. The duke was obliged, by an astonishing display of vigour on the part of the Swiss, to abandon his camp and artillery with great loss, and to save his own life by a pre- cipitate flight. The affrighted Pays de Vaud once more submitted to the conquerors. This misfortune seemed to have deprived the duke of all his presence of mind, in consequence of which his army, having suffered greatly in the engagement, was dispersed and still more enfeebled. The duchess of Savoy now displeased even Charles, who sent her a prisoner into his own dominions. The house of Savoy with difficulty obtained a peace from the conquerors, by the sacrifice of Murten and other places on the frontiers. Renatus shortly afterwards entreated the Swiss, in the most earnest manner, to re-occupy and defend Lorraine, as Charles was besieging his capital city, Nancy : eight thou- sand of their troops joyfully obeyed the summons, and marched, in the midst of a severe winter, across the moun- tainous tract of the Wasgau. The battle of A. D. 1477. Nancy took place on the 6th of January, in which the Swiss took advantage of the broken ground, and got into the rear of the enemy's position : the troops of Burgundy fled, and the duke lost his life by means of an Italian condottiere, who betrayed him. With him expired the male line of the house of Burgundy. Lewis hereupon took possession, agreeably to the laws, of the vacant duchy ; partly as a forfeited, and partly as a UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 333 reverted fief. Burgundy remained in possession of Maria, the daughter and heiress of the late duke, who now, at the desire of the states of the country, married the archduke Maximilian. The influence of the citizens was now much greater than usual, because the flower of the nobility had fallen in the late battles ; and the former, who were careful of their liberties, preferred the mild and popular son of the A D 147 distant em P eror to tne dauphin. Maria died, after having borne a son named Philip ; and her dominions were governed by Maximilian, as adminis- trator, on behalf of the infant. During his regency, the people, who suspected him of designs against their rights, A.D. 1482. made him prisoner at Bruges: but even these A. D. 1487. Netherlanders, who prescribed such rigid bounds to the authority of their ruler, maintained his cause against France. Lewis acquired as much as he could ob- tain without exertion ; but his character was not such as to induce him to aim at the subjugation of the Netherlands by the power of the French monarchy. He gained over Fourbin, the minister of Charles of Anjou, nephew and heir of the titular king Renatus, count of Provence, who declared the king his heir. After the union A.D. 1481. _ _ . .° . . oi Provence with the crown, the only remain- ing great vassal, who was capable of controlling the power of the king, was Francis II. duke of Brittany, who had no son. SECTION II. MAXIMILIAN. Maximilian, who had acquired the duchy of Burgundy and the Netherlands, chiefly because he was little the object of apprehension, inherited also from his cousin, the arch- duke Sigismund, the disjoined provinces of Austria. The four sovereignties of Bregence, Pludence, Feldkirch, and Sonnenberg, in the vicinity of Arlenberg, which had for- 334 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. merly been under the dominion of the house of Montfort, were now transferred to that of Austria, together with the Swabian bailiwick at Altorf, theinheritar.ee of the Guelphs, a remnant of the power of the ducal house of Swabia; the county of Nellenburg, in the Hegau, bordering on Zurich and Schaf hausen ; the county of Goritz, and the Italian districts bordering on Venice, along the confines of the bishoprics of Trent and Brixen ; with the Tyrol ese. The state of the Austrian finances under Frederic III. was so far from flourishing in proportion to this extent of terri- tory, that the emperor was obliged to allow king Matthias to hold the reigns of government in Vienna for some years, in lieu of the payment of a sum of one hundred and twenty thousand ducats : and Maximilian forgave the people of Bruges the insult offered to his majesty by his imprison- ment, in consideration of five hundred thousand ducats; and made the receipt of five hundred thousand florins an essential condition of his marriage with Blanca Maria Sforza. The states of the empire also showed more incli- nation to grant him a supply of men than any pecuniary aid, towards his war against the Turks. This prince, after the death* of his first wife, was on the point of a marriage with the heiress of Brittany; which, if it had taken place, would have thrown the monarchy of France into greater difficulties than the power of Burgundy had already occasioned it. French artifice, however, pre- vented this misfortune ; and Anne gave her hand to Charles the Eighth. The states of Britannv deter- A.D.1491. . , , . , " . . mined that, in the event ot her bearing two sons, the second of them should inherit the dukedom ; but neither Charles, nor Lewis the Twelfth, who succeeded him on the throne, and who married his widow, left any male issue : and Francis the First undertook, on this conjunc- ture, to incorporate Brittany with the dominions of the crown ; to which it was henceforward inseparably attached. At the same time a regulation was established, by which UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 385 every province should be considered as incor- porated, which the king had governed during ten successive years. But this most extensive and fertile of the European kingdoms would have attained its predo- minant influence, and the ancient boundaries of Gaul would have been restored, at a much earlier period, if these results had not been prevented by an administration destitute of any fixed principles : for while the house of Maximilian was establishing its power in the Netherlands, France was exhausting its resources in a contest of fifty years, for the acquisition of a precarious dominion, separated from its own territory by the Alpine barrier. SECTION III. ITALY. We have already seen, in the seventeenth A. D. 1450. . book, that Francesco Sforza acquired the do- minion of the Visconti at Milan, by the success of his arms ; and that he confirmed his authority by his A. D. 1467. . wise measures. His son Galeazzo was mur- dered by some youths, who were inspired with the desire of imitating Brutus and Cassius, and restoring the free- dom of the republic ; but his widow, Bona of Savoy, by the _ assistance which she derived from the posses- A.D. 1478. sion of the citadel, preserved the ducal power for her son John Galeazzo, who was yet a minor. Ludo- vico Moro, the brother of the murdered prince, a sagacious A D 1494 an( ^ enter P r * sm S man, destroyed his nephew by means of slow poison, and assumed the government: but as lie stood in fear of the king of Naples, whose daughter was the widow of the unfortunate John Galeazzo, he sent the cardinal Ascanio Sforza to the court of France, commanding him to represent to Charles the Eighth, that if the latter wished to prosecute Ihose claims on the kingdom of Naples which he had inherited from the VOL. II. C C 3S6 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. house of Anjou, he and some others of the Italian power? were inclined to support his pretensions. The kingdom, however, (as the Italians denominate Naples,) was under the sway of a collateral branch of the house of Arragon. Alfonso the Wise, king of Arragon and Sicily, who had deposed queen Johanna the Second, died without legal heirs ; in consequence of which Arragon A D 1458 ^ evo ^ ve( ^ on brother ; but Alfonso had be- queathed Sicily and Naples to Don Ferrando, his natural son. The reign of this prince was long and vigorous; but while he appeared to imitate the mildness of Caesar, he found either pretences or secret methods for re- moving out of his way many of the noblemen whose influ- ence was formidable to his authority : he also excited the enmity of the lower classes by his burdensome imposts. The notorious qualities of his eldest son, Don Alfonso, were such as to promise nothing but undisguised tyranny. At this period, the chair of St. Peter was filled, after a succession of some excellent pontiffs, and others whose character was in no respect above mediocrity, by Alexander the Sixth, of the Spanish family of Borgia. The inclina- tions of this high-priest of Christendom were not dissimilar to those by which Caligula and Nero have acquired so dis- tinguished a place in the annals of voluptuousness : in other respects, his favourite project was to acquire a considerable power in Italy for Caesar, the most enterprising of his sons. Caesar Borgia was a man of a remarkably active mind, and of great strength of character. Neither his father nor himself was deficient in the boldness necessary for system- atic villainy ; and Caesar acquired, by means of treachery and assassination, the sovereignty of many Italian cities, which he afterwards governed with clemency and justice. The rulers of Italy were in general men more remarkable for imagination and eloquence, than for good sense and real knowledge: the restraints of all laws, divine and human, were despised ; and scarcely an age can be mentioned in *5. - * UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 387 which contempt of religion, and crimes of every species, have been more openly displayed. SECTION IV. FLORENCE. Cosmo de' Medici, the father of his country, died at Florence in the seventy-fifth vear of his aee. A. D. 1464. * . * ° The emperor, king Lewis the Eleventh, the pope, and all the neighbouring princes and cities, sent embassies to the Florentines, expressive of their sympathy, on account of the loss of such a citizen. His son, Pedro de' Medici, was a man of sound intellect and refined man- ners ; but as the infirm state of his health prevented him from exerting great activity in business, it became evident that the power of the Medici was only personal: and Luca Pitti did not hesitate to declare, that many things which had been tolerated in so old and so great a man as Cosmo, could not be allowed in Pedro. The latter had, besides, offended several of those who were indebted to him, by demanding payments. _ Pedro left two sons; the elder of whom, A. D. 1472. _ . , _ _ _ . _ Lorenzo, acquired the surname or " r atner or the Muses," by his splendid talents, and by his love of polite literature. Julian, his brother, was a youth whose character was not less estimable. There existed at that time, in Florence, a law, by which the daughters were excluded from inheritance, when there was no especial testamentary disposition in their favour. In consequence of this regulation, a lady who had married into the family of the Pazzi was deprived of the hereditary estates of her family. The Pazzi believed that the Medici might by their influence have procured a different termination to the affair, they entered into a conspiracy with Francesco Salviati, archbishop of Pisa, and some of the nobles of Florence, to destr oy this family on the 26th of c c 2 S88 UNIVERSAL HJSIORV. April, when the cardinal Riario, nephew of A. D. H78. ~. . ^ r pope bixtus the Fourth, was about to make his entry into the city. For this purpose they went early to the church of St. Riparata, in which the brothers were accus- tomed to attend divine service : and at the moment of the elevation of the host, Francesco Pazzi, as had been con- certed, accosted the youngest, threw his arms in a familiar manner around him, in order to ascertain whether he had armour under his clothes, and inquired concerning his health. As the young men were entirely unconscious of their danger, the conspirators found it an easy matter to put Julian to death ; and Lorenzo was wounded, but was saved by the concourse of priests, who hastened to the spot, and conveyed him into the sacristy. While the church was filled with the tumult of arms, the archbishop of Pisa, accompanied? as was usual among the great, by an armed suite, came, as if to pay a visit of ceremony, into the state palace, at the moment when the magistrates were at dinner : while he was speaking to them, his attendants occupied the steps and doors of the building, broke into the saloon, and got possession of the palace ; while the terrified members of the government saved themselves by flight. Pazzi ran into the square, exclaiming, " Long live the people, long live the freedom of Florence !" In less than an hour, the whole population was assembled in arms around the palace; but, contrary to the expectation of the conspirators, they appeared as defenders of the rulers and of the Medici : they laid fire to the doors, took the palace, and hung Pazzi, the archbishop, and many others, out of the window of the great saloon. Bandini, one of the conspirators, who had fled to Constantinople, was delivered up by the sultan Mo- hammed, out of regard for Lorenzo. The son of Julian, supposed to be illegitimate, mounted the papal chair forty- five years afterwards, under the name of Clement the Seventh. The preservation of Lorenzo was a fortunate cireum- 1 1 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 289 stance for Italy : princes and republics were kept in peace by his prudent measures; and it is asserted of him, that he never said or did any thing relative to public affairs, that was not laudable and worthy of his high reputation. P6pe Sixtus laid the city under excommunication, on account of the death of the archbishop of Pisa, and appointed duke Alfonso of Calabria, the son of Don Ferrando of Naples, executor of the decree. As Alfonso demanded that the Medici should be banished from Florence, a%. a preliminary condition of peace, Lorenzo declared that he was far from wishing to preserve his importance or his life at the hazard of his country ; and that he would take a de- cided step in favour of the latter, at the risk of all his own interests : he immediately retired to Naples, to the court of that very prince who had endeavoured to procure his ruin ; and so completely gained the confidence of Don Ferrando, that the latter was ever after a steadfast friend of Florence. Lorenzo gained many powerful friends by his magnanimous conduct; and the days of the pope were shortened by envy and chagrin. From that time Lorenzo the Magnificent,- reigned in the greatest splendour, though without a title : he aban- doned all commercial pursuits; adorned the city and his own estates with noble edifices, and assembled around him the most ingenious and learned persons of the age. Lo- renzo engaged Angelo Puliziano as the teacher of his chil- dren. The celebrated prince Pico of Mirandola, who was a prodigy of early learning and extensive knowledge, took up his residence at Florence ; Lorenzo employed John Lascaris, at his own expense, to collect the writings of the ancients in Greece and Asia ; he encouraged Marsiglio Ficini to un- dertake the translation of Plato ; and he founded an univer- sity at Pisa. He was himself a good poet, and employed his leisure hours with music, or with the works of statuaries, painters, and architects. He possessed a penetrating genius and a sound understanding ; uncommon activity and .firm- c c 3 390 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. ness, together with an engaging gracefulness of manner, and an agreeable wit. Like almost every individual of his family, he was devoted to pleasure. Lewis the Eleventh endeavoured to obtain his friendship, through the mediation of the historian Philip de Comines; pope Innocent the Eighth was happy to obtain his daughter in marriage for his nephew, prince Cibo ; Matthias Hun- yad applied to him for counsel ; the sultan of Egypt ho- noured him with presents; and the grand signor of the Ottomans with proofs of his esteem. His A.D. 1492. , . death, which happened in the 44th year of his age, was a great misfortune to Italy ; for his son Pedro, who inherited all his father's possessions, was destitute of his talents. SECTION V. VENICE. Venice, a short time before this period, had acquired pos- session of a kingdom. Charlotte, heiress of the family of Poitiers Lusignan, which was in possession of the sove- reignty of Cyprus, was involved in war with her illegitimate brother James, on account of the succession. The latter, in order to strengthen his party, married Catharine Cornaro, the daughter of a senator of Venice : his am- A.D. 1471. . , . , , bassadors chose her from among seventy-two young noble ladies, who were presented before them in the state palace; and the republic declared her its daughter. After the death of the king, her title to the throne was maintained by the family of Davila (to which the great historian of that name belonged), by the vice- A.D. 1473. . , . _ . J . tl roy ot the house or Constanzi, and especially by the Venetian admiral Piero Mocenigo, and by the high reputation of her mother country. The Cypriots, excited by letters from Rome, which accused Catharine of poison- ing the king, broke into the palace, and put the physician UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 391 and two noble Venetians to death, in her presence : but before the king of Naples could give support to this re- bellion, it was quelled by the valiant commanders, Corio- lano and Sorenzo. James the Third, whom Catharine bore after the death of the king, died in early infancy : and the anxiety attendant on a war with Turkey, afforded the republic a pretext for sending Giorgio Cornaro, a brother of the queen, to Cy- ^ prus, and for persuading her to fix her resi- dence at Venice. The standard of the republic was erected in the great place of the capital city Famagosla ; and Catharine was received on board the Bucentaur by the dogeAgostin Barbarigo, and by a numerous suite of senators and noble ladies; and was afterwards conducted, with great pomp, to the church of St. Mark, at the high altar of which she formally transferred the kingdom of Cyprus to the republic of Venice. She lived twenty-four years after this transaction, revered by her fellow-citizens, and in her splendid villas enjoyed pleasures which she preferred to the pursuits of ambition. The illegitimate sons of her hus- band were honourably supported at Padua. The expelled queen Charlotte died in poverty at Rome, after having transferred her title to the family of Savoy. Duke Lewis of Savoy had already acquired a claim to the sovereignty of Cyprus, by his marriage with Anna of Lusignan, daughter of king James; and his descendants, to this day, call themselves kings of Cyprus and Jeru- salem. Cyprus, however, remained under the dominion of Ve- nice, which was the principal state in Italy. The most con* siderable commerce with the east, before the discoveries of the Portuguese, was carried on by the Venetians, by way of Alexandria, and was favoured by the sultans of the mame- Jukes. The city was not only very opulent, but its military force was much superior to that of the other Italian states. c c 4 392 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. SECTION VI. THE LESSER ITALIAN PRINCES. The princes of the house of Este, as vassals, partly of the empire, and partly of the church, for centuries governed Ferrara, Modena, and Reggio, with the title of marquis : , i but Borso had obtained the rank of duke from A. D. 1452. the emperor Frederick the Third; and his successors had preserved that title. In a similar manner, the descendants of Lewis Gonzaga, who had expelled the powerful Buonaccolsi from Mantua, had a short time before acquired the title of marquis from • _ the emperor Sigismund, in return for some A. D. 1433. . P . 6 _ service rendered to him by John rrancis. Mirandola, at that time a fortified town, was the resi- dence of the princes Pico : the Malespina reigned at Massa ; the Grimaldi at Monaco ; and the young Guidone Ubaldo di Montefeltro maintained his power with difficulty at Urbino. The dukes of Savoy for a considerable time had ob- tained the character of mild rather than of great or fortu- nate princes ; and their power had been much diminished by short reigns and frequent minorities. SECTION VII. THE FRENCH IN ITALY. The situation of Italy was such as we have above de- scribed, when the negociations of the duke of Milan excited the king of France to a campaign against Naples. Nothing was capable of resisting the overpowering impetuosity of the French troops, and the immovable firmness of the Swiss, of whom Charles had a strong body in his army. - Don Ferrando was lately dead, his life having A. D. 1495. , , ° been shortened, as it was believed, by a dread UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 393 of these preparations; and Alfonso, in terror, abandoned the government which he had scarcely assumed, and retired into the solitude of monastic life, whither he was said to be followed by revengeful spirits, the ghosts of the murdered nobles. In a few days after the accession of his son, Don Ferrando, twenty thousand French, and six thousand Swiss troops completed the conquest of Naples. Charles over- ran Italy, which was afterwards plundered by his successor, Lewis: but the Spaniard Ferdinand obtained a permanent conquest, while the Swiss despised the acquisition. The manners of the French were displeasing to the Nea- politans : even the character of the king was deficient in the greatness which commands obedience, while he mani- fested a degree of insolent vanity, which provoked the in- dignation of people of all ranks. It was therefore not long before a league was formed between pope Alexander ; the emperor Maximilian, who had just succeeded to his father; Ferdinand, king of Arragon and Castile, and the Venetians, against the French ; in which Ludovico Moro, the original source of all these evils, participated. In a part of the Parmesan territory, near Foronovo, and on the banks of the Tanaro, the allies awaited the approach of the king, who was marching back with his weakened force, intending to attack him, when his army should gradually descend from the passes of the Apennines. His advanced guard, consisting of the Swiss troops, cut a passage through the lines of the enemy, who were three times more numerous; and the king lost only two hundred men, in a battle which cost his adversaries three thousand. From this time until the reign of Lewis the Fourteenth, the artillery of the French armies was always protected by Swiss troops. Since the period when the descendants of Charlemagne divided his empire, and subsequently to the decay of the family of Hohenstaufen, scarcely any political connection had subsisted between the different states of Europe, while the princes contented themselves with confirming their au- 394 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. tliority in their own dominions: but the undertaking of Charles in Italy awaked the jealousy of Austria and Spain ; and by degrees the idea of a balance of power necessary to the preservation of universal security was developed. The interest which all states took in the transactions of others became greater, and partitions among the people themselves more frequent. Thus the characters of the dif- ferent nations became more polished, and knowledge soon began to spread itself more widely. One of the first consequences of this more intimate con- nection was the propagation of the venereal disease, the first remarkable effects of which were displayed during the Italian war. Christopher Columbus was not yet returned from his second voyage to America, whence it is commonly supposed that the Spaniards brought it ; nor had the latter yet landed at Naples, when the disease made its appearance in that country among the French troops. It is highly probable that this infection, like that of the small-pox, is a native of the hot climate of Africa ; and that it was brought to Europe from the coast of Guinea. The terror inspired by its first ravages was so great, that it is recorded by all the historians of that age : it was even supposed to be the angel of death mentioned in the apocalypse, which should destroy the third part of the human race. Those who were attacked by this disease were abandoned and separated from mankind, until it found its way to the inhabitants of palaces, and to the heads of the Christian world, among whom it met with better treatment. So great a schism arose among the medical professors of Leipsic about the method of cure, that they separated from each other, fol- lowed by a number of students, and thus gave occasion to the foundation of the university of Wittenberg, and that of Frankfort on the Oder. After the death of Charles the Eighth, Lewis the Twelfth endeavoured to act the same part toward Milan which his predecessor had supported with regard to Naples. It is, UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 395 however, necessary to explain the manner in which the relations of power were changed in favour of Austria : Philip the Fair, son of Maximilian by Maria ofBurgundy , and heir of Austria, the Netherlands, and Upper Bur- gundy, married the heiress of Arragon, Castile, Leon, and all the other dominions of the catholic sovereigns Ferdinand and Isabella. SECTION VIII. FERDINAND THE CATHOLIC. Ferdinand, the first prince who resumed the ancient title of " the catholic," was the son of Don Juan the Second, who had inherited the kingdom of Arragon and Valencia, the incorporated earldom of Catalonia, the Balearic isles, and A D 14-1 ®* c *ty' fr° m n * s Drotner Alfonso the Wise. Isabella, the wife of Ferdinand, was sister to Henry the Fourth, the last king of Castile. It was declared, by the contrivance of Carillo, arch- bishop of Toledo, and Don Ferrando Gonzalez de Men- doza, that Henry was incapable of procreation ; and that his reputed daughter, Johanna, was the fruit of an adul- terous intercourse which had taken place, with the king's consent, between the queen and Bernard- of Cueva, count of Ledesma, and first duke of Albuquerque. The mar- quis de Villena, indeed, endeavoured to secure the title of the princess, and attempted, with that view, to procure a marriage between her and Alfonso the Fifth, king of Portu- gal : but the Portuguese troops were defeated; Truxillo, the capital of Villena, was taken ; and the partv A. D. 1474. p T . ii ii., . ot Isabella supported her m the succession to the throne. The extensive kingdom of Castile had been augmented, during the preceding reign, by the acquisition of the strong fortress of Gibraltar, which had been taken from the Moors by the dukes of Medina Sidonia and Arcos, and the grand master of the order of Alcantara. The Moorish kingdom of Grenada 396 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. was all that remained of the empire of the Arabs in Spain ; and this state was shattered by the factions of the Zegri and the Abencerrages, which were inflamed to the utmost pitch of exasperation by the fate of an innocent queen, who had been calumniated and unjustly executed. The bravest knights of the family of the Abencerrages lost their lives in a tumult, to which this affair gave occasion. The throne was now the object of contention between Mohammed el Zagal, and his nephew Abn Abdallah : and these circum- stances were improved to their own advantage by the so- vereigns of Castile: for Isabella had now declared her husband co-regent. The noble spirit of the Moorish knights enabled them, however, to prolong their resistance for ten years; and Ferdinand lost twenty thousand men before Zagal could be compelled to give up Baeza. But when Ferdinand had thus become master of the moun- tains of Alpujarra, he terrified the Moors by building the city of Santa Fe, which manifested his intention of keeping Grenada in a state of perpetual siege. This capital of their dominions was at length given up ; and the inhabitants stipulated for that freedom in religion which their fathers had formerly allowed to the Spaniards. Several of the nobles, however, abandoned the profession of Islam for that of Christianity : and while the posterity of Zagal still remains in the African Telem- san, the family of the Abencerrages flourish in Spain, under the title of marquis Campohejar. Thus ended, in its seven hundred and seventy-ninth year, the empire of the Mohammedans in Spain. When Charles the Eighth, subsequently to this conquest, began his preparations for his Italian expedition, he restored to Ferdinand the Pyrenean regions of Cerdagne and Rou- sillon, which Don Juan the Second had mortgaged to the king of France. The popular right of election in Spain had fallen, in the lapse of time, into oblivion. The people were content UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 397 with maintaining their privileges, the most important of which belonged to the inhabitants of Arragon and Cata- lonia, who with justice retained their participation in those national rights, which had been restored by a state of war- fare, that lasted seven hundred years. Ferdinand attached himself to the ecclesiastical party, as the means of securing his domination ; for he was well aware in how great a de- gree that party had contributed to the misfortunes of the last king of Castile, who had imprudently offended them by refusing to permit the pope to nominate Torremada to the archbishopric of Leon. Ferdinand accordingly took care to preserve a perfect cordiality with the court of Rome, and thus to make the head of the church a tool for the go- vernment of her body. The zeal which he manifested as defender of the faith, w r as in exact proportion to the ob- tuseness of his moral sense. He assumed, in this latter character, the grand master- ship of the ecclesiastical orders of knights of St. Jago, Ca- latrava, and Alcantara, which had been founded and very richly endowed, during the ancient religious wars, by pious superstition. The fraternity of St. Jago had received the dignity of Knighthood from Ferdinand the Second, king of Leon ; the order of Julian dePereyro had acquired riches and fame by the conquest of Alcantara ; and that of Calatrava had been founded by Sancho the Third of Castile. During the late religious war, and subsequent to the battle of Zamora, Isabella induced the knights of St. Jago to elect the king for their grand-master : their example was followed by the other orders ; and thus that important dignity was inse- parably united to the crown. The court by these means acquired the most powerful influence among all the noble families whose sons aspired to promotion in the orders; together with the distribution of twenty-seven dignified posts, of one hundred and seventy-two benefices, and the control over a revenue of four millions five hundred thou- sand reals de vello : at the same time it precluded the pos- 398 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. sibiiity of any person in Spain, except the king, becoming head of a military union. Ferdinand afterwards erected a council of the orders. Before the conquest of the Moors was completed, Men- doza, a minister of state, and Alfonso de Salez, bishop of Cadiz, sketched, during a residence at Seville, the plan of an inquisition of the faith; an institution which had already, during more than two centuries and a half, depressed the mental vigour of many of the nations of Europe. Its first exploit in Spain was the confiscation of property, and mur- der of a great number of the citizens of Seville, descended from Jewish ancestors, and who were accused of an incli- nation to the faith of their fathers. Brother Francis Ximenes de Cisneros, commissary- general of the Franciscans, and confessor to the queen, gained over the latter to this project. The church of Castile, in which all affairs had hitherto been conducted by the arch- bishop of Toledo and the synod, under the superintend- ance of the pope, resisted the introduction of the plan ; and Sixtus the Fourth, who foresaw the power which this institution would give to the court, even over the clergy, for a long time refused his concurrence. At length, how- ever, the latter consented; and brother Thomas, of Tor- quemada, a dominican and prior of the holy cross at Segovia, became the first inquisitor: he employed two hun- dred familiars, and had a personal guard of fifty horsemen. A D 1481 ^ n ^ G ^ rSt ^ Gar °^ on< * ce ' seventeen thou- sand persons, who were either denounced by others, or who accused themselves under extreme terrors because this was made a point of conscience, under- went examination. Two thousand were in a short time burned alive ; and with the property of these victims, Tor- quemada founded the convent of St. Thomas at Avila, into which no person was admitted whose ancestors had been either of Moorish or Jewish race. The Jews, who, during the dominion of the Moors in UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 399 Spain, had generally been suffered quietly to pursue their successful occupations, afterwards received orders to quit the kingdom within six months : they were allowed to take with them their silver, gold, and jewels; but all their pro- perty of other kinds was confiscated ; and all Christians were forbidden, on pain of excommunication, to give bread or water to any of that devoted nation. Of the Jews residing in the territory of Castile, who were eighty thou- sand in number, many fled to Portugal, and many to Mau- ritania; and those who inhabited Arragon, retired into Navarre : the emigration amounted in the whole to one hundred and seventy thousand families. While Mendoza, the successor of Carillo in the arch- bishopric of Toledo, was compelling the Castilians to re- ceive the inquisition, Arragon in vain offered Ferdinand a large sum of money for the privilege of remaining exempt from this cruel scourge ; and vain were the mediatorial re- presentations of the Justizia, the constitutional preserver of the freedom of the country. These peaceable methods having failed, Peter of Arbues, first inquisitor-general in Arragon, was killed in a tumult of the people, on his appear- ance in the cathedral church of Saragossa : Teruel revolted ; and the king, who, like Lewis the Eleventh, was artful in the highest degree, but deficient in that greatness of soul which controls the minds of the people, hesitated when he saw money on one side and opposition on the other. During this state of irresolution, Torquemada entered the chamber in which Ferdinand and Isabella were sitting, with a crucifix concealed under his mantle : he held it before their eyes, exclaiming, " he whom your majesties behold was sold for thirty pieces of silver : will you again betray him ? he will find means to revenge himself." The priest left the crucifix standing, and went away: it was now re- solved to introduce the inquisition into Arragon by force of arms. Leon, Valencia, and Sicily resisted to a still later period, but with an equally unfortunate result. 400 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. Although the Moors had given up the sovereignty of Grenada under the express condition of freedom for their religious profession, they were now ordered to submit either to baptism or banishment : the ecclesiastics and lawyers, in an assembly over which the archbishops of Toledo and Gre- nada presided, having declared their opinion " that Ferdi- nand and Isabella were not obliged to keep their promise with these infidels." On this occasion much blood was shed; many were deprived of their liberty, and many of their property. Ximenes extended his fury to the literature of the Arabs, and ordered their books to be destroyed. The vigour of these proceedings was renew r ed under the reign of Charles the Fifth. In no country was the inquisition more destructive in its effects, or the conspiracy of the throne and altar against the spirit and character of the people more dreadfully suc- cessful, than in Spain. The Spanish soldiers at that period possessed a superiority which is only to be attained by a long course of experience in wars carried on chiefly by in- fantry : none but the troops of Switzerland and the janis- saries were to be compared with them. Domanial territories and subsidies were the sources of the revenue. The crown lands which had been alienated by the last king of Castile, were revoked by a A.D. 1480. J 8 J decision extorted from the cortes of Toledo, by means of a commission the president of which was a Hieronymite friar. One branch of the domanial revenue of Arragon, had been rendered peculiarly productive by Don Pedro the Fourth. Even in the times of the Romans, the wool of the Spanish sheep had been improved by the introduction of Arabian rams. This ancient example was followed by Pedro with great success ; and the management introduced by him was imitated in Castile by Ximenes, who, as minister, suc- ceeded to Mendoza. From this time, Spain has been annually traversed by five millions of slieep, which are UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 401 conducted by twenty-five thousand shepherds : ten thousand compose a flock, and each flock is divided into ten stocks. The annual produce of each sheep is estimated at twenty- four reals, the fourth-part of which sum belongs to the king: all the flocks were originally his property : the last was sold by Philip the Second ; but the laws and the coun- cil of the great royal flock still subsist. The sheep travel every year, in forty days, from the sources of the Duoro and Ebro, four hundred miles, into the southern districts ; and through this whole route, which lies through corn fields, gardens, and vineyards, a path of at least ninety feet wide is everywhere open to them. This migration pro- ceeds, as in the Alps, from the impulse of nature; and if deprived of the guidance of their shepherds, the sheep would still wander forth and find their favourite pastures. During the war which Alfonso the Eleventh, king of Castile and Leon, carried on at Algesiras, against Abu Hafo, a prince of the dynasty of the Merinides, the alca- vala, or great tax on all purchases, was first raised, with the consent of the states of the kingdom. This impost is levied upon all the products of the earth and of human art, and is reckoned at ten per cent. The collection of this revenue employs a countless multitude of officers, and gives occasion to frequent searches, which are in the highest degree oppres- sive to domestic life. One branch of the alcavala is the trade in salt, of which commodity every village is compelled to purchase a certain quantity : the people are not allowed to sell any portion which they may be unable to consume ; and in order to enhance the price of this article, some of the salt works have been destroyed, and the approaches to others are secured by a guard of soldiers. TOL. II. D T) 402 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. SECTION IX. AMERICA. The discovery of the New World opened to the catholic kings unexpected sources of wealth. Men of great genius and extraordinary acquirements had been occupied, for a century preceding this period, in investigating the ocean, in the hope of finding a more expeditious or convenient pas- sage to the East Indies than through Egypt. A tradition existed, that when the Moors inundated Spain, seven hun- dred years before this time, a Portuguese archbishop, ac- companied by seven bishops and a great body of Christians, had found refuge with their flocks in an island beyond the great ocean, called Antilia or Septemtirade : it was known that a country called Wine-land had been discovered be- yond the ocean by the Normans ; a ship which had been carried far out to sea by a storm in the fifteenth century, was reported to have visited such a country. Marine charts at Venice, and the remarks of Behaimb, an inha- bitant of Nuremberg, who constructed a globe, contributed to strengthen the conjectures of enterprising individuals. Christopher Columbo, a native of Genoa, in order to ascertain the foundation of these opinions, after tedious solicitations and delays, at length succeeded in procuring assistance from Ferdinand and Isabella. He obtained about two hundred and fifty ounces of gold in heavy masses, from the inhabitants of the Antilles and St. Domingo, and ob- served some of them to be possessed of ornaments of the same metal : avarice was excited by these circumstances, to prosecute the new discoveries with greater zeal; but the adventurers were subjected to a tax for the royal treasury, amounting to the half of the silver, and a third of the gold, which they should acquire in St. Domingo and Cuba. It was soon found that this impost was out of all reasonable proportion to the expenditure of the adventurers ; and the UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 403 court was therefore obliged to lower its demands to a fifth of the silver and a twentieth of the gold. Romano Pane, however, a Spanish missionary, who discovered tobacco in St. Domingo, contributed essentially to improve the revenue from this quarter : for that weed became not less productive than the gold mines to the royal treasury. America, for a long time, seemed an inexhaustible source of riches : in the earliest period, when only the mines of the Antilles, of comparatively trifling value, were known, tfce amount appeared incalculable; and yet the influx of the precious metals, from the New World into Europe, continued progressively to increase during an hundred and forty years. Newfoundland and the neighbouring continent were dis- covered about this time by John Cabot, an Englishman, and by the French : but the search was carried on with the great- est activity before the discovery which the Spaniards made of those remarkably profitable mines, the produce of which was so abundant, as to render it impossible any longer to work such as had been previously known, with an adequate return. After the lapse of an hundred and fifty years, America acquired a new and more noble source of interest. Such were the dominions and the prospects of Ferdinand and Isabella. Their only son died before his parents, and without heirs ; and the prize of the exploits of so many he- rpes and of ancient and modern policy, fell consequently, by the marriage of their eldest daughter, Johanna, to the archduke Philip ; who was the only son of Maximilian and Maria of Burgundy. SECTION X. MILAN AND SWITZERLAND. In the same year in which Charles the Fifth, A. D. 1500. . . son of Philip, was born, Lewis the Twelfth, king of France, acquired the dukedom of Milan. Valen- tina Viseonti, wife of Lewis of Orleans, (who was the nnco^- D D 2 404 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. tor of Lewis, brother of Charles the Wise), had given rise, during her life, to many calamities ; and the title derived from her name gave occasion to the Milanese war, which was undertaken in order lo expell the family of Sforza. Both the king and the duke calculated especially on the assistance of the Swiss. AD 1499 ^ wisS Were at this time en g a g ed in tne last war against Austria, which had been ex- cited chiefly by the interests of the Grisons. The Rhsetians, inhabitants of that territory, were a free and active people, and had by degrees united themselves into confederacies, in imitation of the Swiss: like the latter, these republicans were moderate enough to content themselves A. D. 1424. ■ ° with such a degree of freedom as was consistent with the established privileges of the barons. Austria re- tained its ancient rights of sovereignty over the greater part of the league of ten jurisdictions, until the middle of the preceding century, at which time its claims were alienated by a peaceable contract : and it still possesses Razun, and exercises the constitutional privilege of that sovereignty, De- nominating, every third year, the judge of the upper country of the Grisons. The freedom of these people was at that time an object of apprehension to their neighbours, who dreaded lest they should extend their territory into the country of Tyrol, and the whole eastern district of the Alps. In addition to this, the nobility of Swabia hated the Swiss on account of the events of ancient wars, and despised them for their democratic simplicity, while the citizens an^ peasants of that country envied their freedom : and in pro- portion as the Swiss showed themselves disposed to cultivate a good understanding with France, they became obnoxious to the displeasure of Maximilian, who entertained a per- sonal as well as a political animosity against the French. The Swiss and the Grisons having formed a A. D. 1495. , „. , ' . , mutual alliance, a war broke out against the confederates, in which all the adherents of Austria, in Upper UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 405 Germany, took part. This contest, the theatre of which extended from the boundary of Tyrol to Basel, A. D. 1499. , . , . . t . . , 4 lasted ten months : during that time, eight battles were fought, in all of which the advantage was decidedly in favour of the Swiss ; nearly two thousand citadels and villages were destroyed, and twenty thousand men lost their lives. This war ended in a treaty, which was concluded at Basel, and which was zealously promoted, for their own purposes, by France and Milan. The king, indeed, by means of a large sum of money, procured a renewal of his alliance with the republic ; but both he and the duke obtained soldiers against the will of the magistrates, so that both the hostile armies contained Swiss troops. The duke was betrayed near Novara, by Turnean, a native of Uri ; who was afterwards executed for his treachery to his native country. Milan continued twelve years under the yoke of the French. SECTION XL ITALIAN WARS. Lewis the Twelfth had no sooner completed this con- quest, than he concluded a treaty for the partition of the kingdom of Naples, with Ferdinand, king of Spain. Fre- derick, the son of the first Don Ferrando, had nothing but his rights to oppose to these acts of oppression ; and was ^ consequently obliged to submit. But the army of Lewis was soon reduced by an extraordinary mortality ; the joint effect of the climate, to which the French were unaccustomed, and of their licentious conduct: the Italians were also offended by their domineering manners and their neglect of decorum. The Spaniards were free from all these disadvantages ; and, therefore, when the par- titioning powers disagreed about the prize of their injustice, the superiority was on their side. Ferdinand had, besides, in Gonsalvo de Cordova, a skilful genera) for his army, d d 3 40G universal History. which was itself under excellent discipline, A, D. 1505. I he French were again driven from their conquests, which remained in the possession of their oppo- nent and of his family. Lewis afterwards formed a league, at Cambray, against the Venetians, with his enemies, the emperor and the king of Spain, and with pope Julius the Second. A.D. 1509. . . . Ihe senate, in this emergency, opposed the superior power of its enemies with great firmness : its gene- rals displayed courage and skill ; and its subjects an invin- cible attachment to the cause of the republic. An oppor- tunity soon occurred which rendered it practicable for the perseverance of the Venetians to effect the disunion of a coalition between courts of such different interests; and Lewis now perceived that the emperor, the pope, and the king of Spain, had combined with the Venetians, and the Swiss whose pride he had imprudently offended, to expell A D 1512 fr° m I ta ty' They effected their purpose; and Maximilian Sforza, son of the imprisoned Lodovico Moro, was restored to his dignity. The Swiss gained a victory at Novara, which not only completed the conquest of this duchy, but encouraged them to make an irruption into France; and the king was obliged to con- clude a peace at Dijon, which, though he did A.D. 1515. , . ' ' . * e _ . , not observe it, manifested the difficulties that surrounded him. After his death, Francis commenced his warlike reign A D 1515 ^ a P assa g e across the Alps, which has been not unjustly compared to that of Hannibal. He effected a division among the Swiss ; defeated in the battle of Marignano, which lasted three days, that party which remained firm in its attachment to duke Sforza; re- gained possession of the dukedom of Milan ; and renewed treaties of alliance with the Swiss and the Venetians. Loredano, doge of Venice, who was now nearly eighty years old, had thus the satisfaction of seeing the storm UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 407 which had so fearfully threatened the destruction of the re- public, pass away without any important ill effects. The ^ Swiss concluded a peace with Francis the First, which subsists between themselves and the French to this day ; and a treaty of alli- A.D.1521. . . . _ . J . J , ance, which has been seven times renewed. That great problem, which of the great powers should acquire the preponderance over all others by the con- quest of Italy, the solution of which had been contested for twenty years, remained undecided : the Spaniards domineered at Naples, and the French at Milan. SECTION XII. CHARLES THE FIFTH. The battle of Marignano was soon followed A D 1516 by the death of Ferdinand the Catholic, who had already survived his queen and his son-in-law Philip, and had lately augmented his power by the acquisition of Upper Navarre. John of Albret governed the kingdom of Navarre in right of his wife, Catherine de Foix ; and had taken part in the wars of the greater powers with Lewis the Twelfth. On this latter account he was excommuni- A D 1512 cate ^ ky the pope, and was expelled by that obedient son of the church, the catholic king : he kept possession, however, of the lower districts and of Beam. Charles of Austria, the son of Philip, grandson of the emperor, and heir of the hereditary sovereignties of Austria and Burgundy, succeeded, in the sixteenth year of his age, to all the power of Ferdinand in Spain, Italy, and America. His mother Johanna, the daughter of Ferdinand, had lost her husband, Philip the Fair, in the twenty-sixth year of his age ; and her grief on this occasion was so excessive as to deprive her of reason, in which condition she survived nearly fifty years. Three years after the death of Ferdi- d d 4 408 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. nand, Charles succeeded his grandfather Maximilian in the imperial dignity. Fortunate adventurers conquered, for his advantage, the extensive, populous, and wealthy empire of America, and subjected the powerful Navatlaks of Mexico, and the peaceful and magnificent sovereignty of the children of the sun, the Incas of Peru. Charles pos- sessed great power on the coast of Africa, and drove the French from Milan; and his brother acquired the kingdoms of Hungary and Bohemia. The house of Austria had arrived at this pitch of greatness only a little more than thirty years after that period, when Frederick the Third had found himself unable to maintain his authority in Vienna. SECTION XIII. PORTUGAL. Manoel, king of Portugal, whose reign is justly called the golden age of tnat nation, closed his a.d. 1521. & . . . ... life about this time. During his administra- tion, Vasco de Gama had landed at Calcutta, on the coast of the East Indies, after a voyage of ten months; and Amerigo Vespucci, the fortunate Florentine, who has given his name to the world which was found by Columbus, shortly afterwards discovered the rich country of Brazil. Pearo Alvarez de Cabral also sailed thence to the country of the Zamorin of Calecut, while Gama and his successors explored the whole coast of Mosambique, Sofala, and the East Indies; and Albuquerque soon rendered Goa the seat of a Portuguese empire. The Hindoos were at this time particularly unable to withstand the Portuguese, because they were oppressed by the Mogul sultan Babr, the conqueror of Bengal and Guzurat. Every fresh expedition brought new constellations, fo- reign manners, strange animals and plants, and unknown appearances of nature and of man, within the limits of European knowledge. UNIVERSAL HISTORY, 409 Iii the internal administration of Portugal, principles were adopted similar to those which had been introduced in Spain : the kings of the former country appropriated to themselves the grand-mastership of the ecclesiastical knight- hoods of Aviz, Christi, and St. James, and thus acquired the patronage of six hundred and seventy-six benefices. These privileges, together with the pensions which they had always been accustomed to assign out of the produce of the crown lands, to the descendants of those heroes by whose assistance the kingdom was founded, was sufficient to render the nobility dependent on the court ; especially as the eccle- siastical knights were not in Portugal, as in other coun- tries, absolutely prohibited from marrying. Hence the families of the nobles were more numerous but less inde- pendent; and hence the nobility, as a body, were less pow- erful in this kingdom than in others, while the authority of the clergy was greater here than in almost any other country. The states of the kingdom were still powerful; and they suffered the brother of king Edward, and of the noble prince Henry, to die a captive in the hands of the Me- rinides, rather than consent to ransom them, by restoring the fortress of Ceuta. They exercised the legislative au- thority, in conjunction with the king ; but Don Joan the First favoured the Roman jurisprudence, which affords support to absolute power. The laws of the country were arranged in the reign of Manoel, in five books. SECTION XIV. FRANCE. No king of France, since the age of Philip the Fourth, had more zealously contributed to the importance of the parliaments than Lewis the Eleventh. This prince esta- blished a parliament at Grenoble, while yet only dauphin : as soon as he succeeded to the sovereignty, he divided the district to which the jurisdiction of the parliament 410 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. of Toulouse extended, and erected a new court at Bor- deaux, for the country beyond the Garonne; and after the re-union of the duchy of Burgundy, he introduced the parliament at Dijon. He caused writings relative to treaties of peace and financial regulations, to be prepared in that of Paris, because he found that it was necessary to allow the nation to retain the appearance of some partici- pation in public affairs ; and that magistrates, who owed their official existence to his favour, were more accommo- dating than the nobles and states-general. The parliament was gained over by these means to the court party, and seldom or never raised its voice in favour of the rights of the ancient national assemblies, In like manner, during the evil times of the fourteenth and the beginning of the fifteenth centuries, when the court and the different fac- tions endeavoured in all possible ways to strengthen their power, even the universities had been allowed to assume political influence. Lewis the Eleventh rendered himself more and more in- dependent : the crown estates were considerably augmented during his reign. The nation, during that of his father, had allowed the tattle to be rendered perpetual; and he ob- served the most exact economy, as well with regard to re- ceipt as expenditure. His own inclinations were so far from expensive, that his manner of life was such as would hardly be thought suitable to a private man of good for- tune. His annual revenue amounted to 4,700,000 pounds ; a sum which, according to the computation of Henault, would have been equal to 23,000,000 in the money of the age of Lewis the Fifteenth. He formed the principal instrument of the power of the kingdom, which was a standing army, consisting chiefly of foreign mercenaries, dependent on himself. A body of seven thousand Scots had been commanded by Douglas, one of their own countrymen, under marshal de la Fayette, in the last English war, out of whom Charles the Seventh UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 411 formed a Scottish body guard. The kings of Scotland were, from their situation, the natural allies of the French. Lewis the Eleventh concluded the first subsidiary treaty with the Swiss, by which the kings of France acquired the privilege, with the concurrence of the Swiss magistrates, of recruiting their armies in the cantons. It has been calcu- lated that 500,000 Swiss have entered the French service within three centuries. The national army, properly so called, or gens d'armerie, consisted of forty-five appointed companies, each of which contained one hundred men at arm£; and every man had six horses. A militia, called Frank-archers, served among the light cavalry as well as with the infantry; but Lewis changed their constitution, and formed them into a better organised body of 10,000 infan- try: in their former state they lay dispersed throughout the whole kingdom ; but he now kept them collected in more considerable bodies, ready to execute any sudden command. Their only employment was the use of their arms, ma- noeuvres and tactics. The mode of conducting war acquired a new appearance ; and it was no longer in the power of the vassals, with their contemptible banditti, to withstand the troops of the king. The power of the monarchy was thus increased by the vigilant use which the court made of favourable occur- rences; while the states-general, who were seldom as- sembled, and consequently had opportunities of becoming acquainted with public affairs only at distant intervals, proceeded unsystematically. If, as there is reason to be- lieve, the weakness of the intermediate power is destructive of the interests of a monarchy, the parliaments deserve to be severely censured ; for they continued their sessions unin- terruptedly, and had therefore the opportunity of forming and pursuing a system of political maxims, but they paid more regard to the interests of their own college, than to those of the commonwealth. There remained at length only the three following fun- 412 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. damental maxims of policy in France : " That the royal authority can never descend to a female ; that the crown lands are unalienable ; and that the minority of the king ceases at the expiration of his thirteenth year." The first is an ancient civil law, founded upon the military habits of the Salic Pranks, and might, perhaps, have been universally introduced with advantage : the second may be modified by imperious calls of state necessity ; and the third, an institution of Philip the Third and Charles the Wise, is scarcely conformable to nature, which rarely renders a child thirteen years and one day old, capable of managing all the interests of a nation consisting of 25,000,000 people. The chancellor, or officer to whom state affairs were re- ferred, was anciently the king's deputy in matters of busi- ness : the secretaries were under his direction ; and all affairs were expedited by the notaries. At the conclusion of the fifteenth century, the royal council of state was formed, which consisted of the above-mentioned officers, and of an indeterminate number of counsellors; it was the common point in which the conduct and direction of all public bu- siness centered. Charles the Eighth declared this body to be a supreme court of judicature, (cour souveraine) and thus rendered it a fit instrument for keeping the parliaments in order. Since the introduction of regular standing armies, the financial department was become much more important to the prosperity of the state; and the title of secretary of finance, ever since Florimond de Robortet had filled the office in the time of Charles the Eighth, had been ex- changed for that of secretary of state. The only ground of a claim to the dignity of counsellor of state, was the will of the king ; and Lewis the Eleventh used to prefer persons of no original importance, whose greatness was entirely owing to his favour ; who had no peculiar pri- vileges which they were anxious to protect ; and who ex- UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 413 isted exclusively for him and for the execution of his purposes. A preponderating authority was conferred in succeeding reigns, sometimes on an individual minister, and sometimes on several, according to the caprice of the regent, or to the circumstances of the age : but even under the most feeble administrations, the error of the Merovin- gian race, that of suffering power to remain hereditary . in a family, was avoided : the competition for such dignities indeed, rendered such a mistake hardly possible. In those provinces which possessed written laws, justice was administered according to the Roman code, while in others the judicial decisions were founded on two hundred and eighty different laws of precedent; and were in all points influenced by the royal ordinances. The trial by or- deal, so common among the ancient Franks, had been abolished by St. Lewis ; and the appeals to judicial combat were circumscribed by Philip the Fair. After the death of Lewis the Eleventh, the parliament of Rouen was formed from the echiquier, or district list of the ancient dukes of Normandy : Lewis the Twelfth erected another for Provence at Aix; and Francis had scarcely secured himself in his dukedom of Milan, when he pro- vided that state with a similar court. But it was not in this instance alone that the maxims of Lewis the Eleventh were adopted by his successors : the military force of the kingdom, as it was the chief instrument in the maintenance of their power, continued to be the principal object of their solicitude. They had inherited from him a code of military law, improved artillery, and a body of Swiss infantry : Charles the Eighth augmented the latter description of force, and surrounded his person with the body guard of one hundred Swiss. The German infantry, and the black bands alone, which constituted a body of six thousand troops, originally formed in the Netherlands, were equally celebrated in the wars of that age. Francis the First, probably incited to this attempt by the 414 UNIVERSAL HISTORY, excellent treatise of Macchiavelli, endeavoured to reduce the militia of France to the form of the Roman legions ; but his undertaking was unsuccessful, only because he confined his attention too exclusively to the form. SECTION XV. SWITZERLAND. Switzerland, after the war with Burgundy, was torn to pieces by foreign and domestic factions ; especially by the jealousies which had subsisted, from a very early period, between the inhabitants of the country and those of the towns; and which were augmented to the highest degree, when Bern endeavoured to introduce Soluturn and Freiburg into the perpetual confederacy. Freiburg had been founded, like Bern, by the dukes of Zaringen; but on their own hereditary do* A. D. 1178. . i-i • r* i mams, and not on the territory oi the empire : hence this city descended by inheritance to the counts of A.D. 1277. Kiburg, who sold it to the family of Habs- A. D. 1452. burg-Austria; from whom it passed, in a si- milar manner, to the dukes of Savoy. Freiburg, however, from time to time, purchased immunities, and at length obtained independence : but a system of policy was re- quisite, in order to place her on an equality A.D.1478. \ ' , * . 1 \ / with Bern, as the attention oi many ot the directors of her affairs was turned rather to foreign powers than to the real interests of the state : the noble families, besides, intermixed far less with those of the citizens than at Bern ; and it was impossible to produce an uniformity of manners and principles, in a community in which the classes inhabiting the upper and lower streets could never be brought to speak the same language. Soluturn was originally more independent than Freiburg, and had to defend itself chiefly against the encroachments of the cathedral of St. Ursus. Austria pretended to no 6 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 415 rights over this city, and only twice attempted (once by force of arms, and once by secret intelligence) to obtain possession of the town. The citizens had the advantage, in the first attempt, by their magnanimity : the enemy having fallen into the Aar by the breaking of the bridge, they rescued them as they were carried down by the current, supplied their wants, and then set them free. The other design, that of A. D. 1382. , . _ . _? scalmg the city by surprise, was discovered by a faithful rustic. Freiburg was frequently engaged ift inveterate wars against Bern, while the latter had been, from ancient times, in alliance with Soluturn. After the Burgundian war, Bern endeavoured to introduce both these cities, which had faith- fully adhered to her during the contest, into the Swiss confederacy ; but the inhabitants of the country were so jealous of the designs of the citizens, that a conspiracy ^ broke out at Lucern, the object of which was the destruction of the town walls, and the in- troduction of unlimited democracy. This division so in- flamed the animosity of the two classes, that there was reason to apprehend danger for the stability of the union. There resided at this period, in a lonely part of the can- ton of Underwalden, a man named Nicolaus von der Flue, descended from an ancient and respectable family, who in his youth had been a warrior in the service of his country, but since his fiftieth year had devoted himself exclusively to the contemplation of God and of nature, and who was ac- customed to communicate his precepts of wisdom, simpli- city, and patriotism, to all who visited him. When brother Claus (as he was now usually called) became aware of the impending danger, he repaired to Stanz, where the confe- derates were assembled : the tall spare figure of the hoary- headed man filled them with veneration: he told them " that God, who had bestowed freedom and victory on the ancient Swiss, had revealed to him, that unanimity was 416 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. the only method by which those blessings could be main- tained, and that immoderate desires are the most formidable enemies : that Freiburg and Sol u turn deserved to be received without distrust; and that it should be established as a fun- damental maxim, that no state in the union should aggran- dize itself at the expense of another, or endeavour by force to introduce changes in its constitution." His advice was followed in both respects ; and it was enacted, that in the event of any internal commotion, Freiburg and Soluturn (to which Basel, Schafhausen, and Appenzell were after- wards added) should use their influence solely for the pur- pose of mediation, instead of increasing the disturbance by taking the side of either party. Basel and Schafhausen, which were received A.D.1501. . . _ _ p into the conlederacy twenty years afterwards, had both established themselves in the neighbourhood, and under the protection of ecclesiastical foundations; some noble families were at the head of their constitution, until they were either destroyed or reduced to poverty in private quarrels, and in the wars against the Swiss ; after which the supreme power devolved on the tribes into which the citizens were divided. The constitution of the two states afterwards continued to differ in this respect; that while at Basel the nobles were entirely excluded from public affairs, at Schafhausen they retained one or two associations, after the manner of tribes, which like those of the other classes, take their share in the administration. Appenzell is a very elevated region in the Alpine district, which has formed itself around the mountain called Hohen- Sentis. This desert at first afforded pasturage to roving shepherds, who depended on the abbot of St. Gall for pro- tection and the rites of worship ; but having increased in numbers and wealth, and finding themselves oppressed by the governors appointed by the abbot, they joined in an ^ ^ insurrection against him; displayed, in many engagements and campaigns, a degree of va- UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 4\f lour which appeared almost romantic ; and became the terror of the nobles, from the Thur to the Tirol. At length they compelled the abbot to acknowledge their rights. These circumstances, together with other difficulties into which the abbot fell, in common with the city of St. Gall which arose in the vicinity of his monastery, induced him to con- AD 1451 c * uc * e a r 'S nt °f citizenship or a defensive league, with Zurich, Lucern, Schwyz, and Glaris; which from that time elected alternately, out of their own body, a head-man or district-chief over his terri- tory. Under these circumstances, the town of St. Gall and the district of Appenzell thought it necessary to ren- der their ancient connections with the Swiss stronger and closer. From that time the privileges of the prelates and the liberties of the people were for the greater part defined with mildness and equity, and agreeably to the laws : those privileges were however, by degrees, entirely purchased, and both Appenzell and St. Gall became independent; the former becoming at length the thirteenth canton of the league, and the city, with its abbot, holding the first rank among those which, by various compacts, have been confederated with the Swiss. The " Lower Union" with the Alsacian and Rhenish towns, was dissolved soon after their common quarrel with Burgundy ; the city of Mulhausen alone remaining in alli- ance with the Swiss, and preserving by their aid an in- dependent political existence, even when the other places were compelled, by the power of Lewis the Fourteenth, to exchange their privileges as imperial cities for the condi- tion of provincial towns of France. The connection of the Swiss with Rothwyl, which is situated in the midst of Swabia, subsisted also a hundred years after this period ; until it became impossible, during the thirty years' war, to maintain the neutral system of the confederate^ in a place so distant. vol. n. E E 418 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. Biel, which in the first ages of the republic of Bern, connected itself with that city for the sake of protection, and which became a Swiss town chiefly through its means, remained closely and firmly united with the confederates. Though situated on the border of the German empire, and in some respects subject to an imperial prince, the bishop of Basel, Biel, and the neighbouring country maintained a constitution which was extremely complicated, but accu- rately (Jefined by positive laws. The various mutual relations of the counts, princes, and people of Neufchatel, gave occasion, in a similar manner, to different connections with Bern, Freiburg, Soluturn, and Lucern. An ancient race of counts, during the middle ages, had cultivated and governed the country on the shores of the lakes of Biel and Neufchatel, and other estates which extended far up toward the Alps; and Rudolf of Habsburg, when king, had bestowed the feudal superiority to the lords of Chalons, ancestors of the princes of Orange, The county of Neufchatel (for all the rest had been pre- viously lost by wars and misfortunes) descended from the family of the first sovereigns, to heirs whose claims were founded on marriages : these were the counts of Freiburg in Swabia, the margraves of Baden, and the dukes of Longueville. The lord paramount in vain asserted that the succession belonged to himself: the people of Neuf- chatel, Bern, and other Swiss cantons, opposed his pre- tensions. Before the line of the dukes of Longueville ex- pired, the upper Burgundian family of Chalons-Orange became extinct, as well as the principal branch of the house of Nassau itself, which, by the right of an heiress, had acquired Orange, together with the remaining claims belonging to that house. These claims, as far as they a£ A D 16 fected Neufchatel, were transferred by William of Orange, king of England, to Frederick king of Prussia. When, after the extinction of the &mily UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 419 of Longueville, the succession became an object of conten- A D 1 o" amon S man V distinguished personages, the states of the country declared for the king, who assumed the title of count, with the dignity of a sovereign prince. Neufchatel, amidst all its changes of A.D. 1708. F _ . . . ' , - 1 . l B administration, had gradually acquired a con- stitution as perfect as could reasonably be desired : all the departments of the government were happily balanced ; the decision of disputable points was entrusted to Bern, and the security of the whole constitution to the four can- tons which had the privilege of citizenship. The seven Ceuts, which constitute the territory of the Upper Valais, were distinguished from an early period of history by their love of freedom and democracy. The noble families of Thurn, of Gestelenburg, and of Raron, when they became too powerful in the estimation, of the people, w r ere expelled by a tumultuary ostracism, and their fortresses demolished. The bishop of Sitten, who had transferred to the king the ancient earldom, or presidency of the country, was obliged to submit himself to the will of the multitude. None of their other neighbours were so formidable to the people of Valais, as the count of Savoy ; who, partly in right of his office as beadle of the ancient monastery of St Maurice, domineered over the Lower Valais and the neighbouring districts. This country there- fore endeavoured, at an early period, to obtain the friendship of Bern and of the Swiss democracies ; and was protected by the former against Savoy, and by the latter against any usurpations that Bern might have been inclined to make. Lower Valais was at length taken from the house of Savoy by force of arms. Matthaeus Schyner, bishop of Sitten and a cardinal, during the Italian wars, in which he took part, rendered himself and his country important to the contending powers : and he exercised such influence in all the affairs of Switzerland, by his distinguished talents as a popular leader, that his friendship was courted by kings E E 2 420 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. and emperors. The prize which the confederates gained in these wars, consisted in some districts of Milanese terri- _ tory lying at the foot of St. Gothard, which A.D. 1512. J J f ... are to this day governed by bailiffs appointed alternately by twelve of the cantons. At a still earlier pe- riod, during the sovereignty of the Visconti, the three cantons nearest Milan had taken possession of A.D. 1403. . r . the whole valley of Leventina, which is sur- rounded by mountains, and of the pass of Bellinzona: A D 151 anC ^ t0 ^ ese were now ao "ded the fortress of Locarno, the flourishing districts of Lugano, and some other vallies: there were other places, during these calamitous times, destitute of protection and of a magistracy, which, of their ow n accord, acknowledged the government of Switzerland. The Rhaetians confirmed their authority in the moun- tains of Bormio, in the opulent Valtellin, and at Chia- tfenna, situated at the entrance of their passes. Hence the Swiss could always take their choice, whether they would await the approach of enemies, coming from the houth, in their own mountains or at the entrance of that district : and these pastoral tribes, attached to freedom, found means, in these beautiful regions, to obtain compensation for the want of many luxuries. ' The day of Marignano was the last occa- sion on which the confederacy displayed its military strength against foreign armies. The pope, duke Sforza, the army of Ferdinand the Catholic, which was lying on the Po, the emperor, and Henry the Eighth, king of England, who were all in confederacy with the Swiss and the Venetians, awaited the conclusion of this action as the signal for joining one party or the other. The giant battle, as it was called by marshal Trivulzi, lasted three days ; whence, after losing many thousand men, the remainder of the Swiss force withdrew into the Alps in such compact and regular order, that their enemies were UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 421 aii aid to pursue them; and from that day forward they remained undisturbed in their own country. SECTION XVI. THE TURKS. Greece and the whole of western Asia obeyed the peaceable Bajessid, son of Mohammed, the conqueror of Constantinople. His kingdom was as yet so pre-eminent in wealth, unity, and military science, that if he had been endowed with the talents and activity necessary to the em- ployment and increase of the advantages which he already possessed, no power in Christendom would have been able to set bounds to his progress. But this opportunity once neglected, was irretrievably lost : for, in the time of Selim and Solyman, the bravest and most illustrious of all the sul- tans, a more connected system of defence was developed conong the states of Europe. Of all the rulers of the Turkish power, next to Mohammed the Second, Selim the First was the greatest. He completed, in the time . of Bogdan the Third, the subjection of Moldavia, which had hitherto maintained a valiant resistance under the command of Stephen. The Bojars still retained the privilege of choosing their prince, of which they were afterwards de- prived by the effects of their own factious spirit. .His grandfather had already rendered the chans of the Crimea, who were the descendants of Jenghis, his vassals and allies ; and that dignity was now filled by Sahib Guerai. Asia was the theatre of his heroic achievements. Ismael, an Arab who was revered by his troops as a prophet and a victorious commander, had dethroned the family of Usong in Persia, restored the faith of the sect of Ali, and established a formidable empire. He fought against the janissaries near Tabriz, and contrived to inter- cept their supplies. Selim blamed the sultan of the Egyp- tian mamelukes for this disaster ; asserted that he had e e 3 422 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. wilfully delayed the business of collecting provisions; and would listen to no representations on his part. The ma- melukes were no contemptible militia : the sultans of Ka- hira were on friendly terms with Venice and other western powers ; they were opulent ; and the throne was not un- frequently adorned by a prince of great and amiable quali- ties, and beneficent and favourable to the sciences, such as they exist in that country. Their territory was the residence of the prince of the faithful, the successor of the great prophet, and the supreme head of the followers of Islam. The reigning sultan, Malek el Ashraf Abul Nasr Seif-ed- din Kausul Gauri, was a chief who preserved order at home, and was respected abroad by the princes of India, the Imam of Yemen, the Nubians, the people of Habesh, and the Europeans : he was possessed of a fleet, and be- loved by the mamelukes, to whom he granted unbounded license in all respects not injurious to the so- A.D. 1516. . , pi l vereignty. This sultan fought a battle with Selim in the plains of Dabek, northward of Damascus, and in the beginning of the action took the Turkish camp ; but the effect of the artillery, in which his enemy was greatly superior to him, and the treachery of two of his principal commanders, at length compelled him to retreat ; and he was killed in his flight by the falling of his horse. Damascus and Jerusalem now surrendered, and Selim became Chadim al Haramaim, or keeper of the sacred places. Malek el Ashraf Tuman Bey, the nephew and successor of Kausul Gauri, lost his kingdom in a decisive battle which took place near his capital, Kahira : he fought va- liantly in person ; but the Turks obtained the victory in this instance also by means of their artillery. The traitors, who dreaded their master even in captivity, obtained per- - mission from the victor to cause him to be put to death ; but Selim's joy was damped by the death of his visier, Joseph Sinan, who fell in the battle. The chalif Motawakkel Mohammed, to whom his father, UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 423 the old Mostamser Abul Sabr Jakub, had transferred that dignity, sent Selim toward Constantinople : and Sinai, with all the Arabian vallies in the vicinity, submitted at his ap- proach. Just at this time, an admiral returned from an expedition on which he had been sent by the sultan Gauri, at the request of the Venetians, to destroy the new Portu- guese settlements in the East Indies: Selim caused this officer to be thrown into the Red Sea, and refused to re- new the treaties of commerce with Venice, intending to take possession of all the islands and coasts which that re- public possessed in his seas. The destruction of the sultan of Kahira, was a greater disadvantage to them than the league which the European powers had concluded at Cambray. . Selim was succeeded, after an enterprising A.D. 1520. . ' , . . , , reign or eight years, by his son Solyman, who received from the Turks the surname of El Kanuni, or people, by the economy of his administration : and the projects which he commenced, were prosecuted by the A D 1 09 ener &y °^ impetuous son, Henry the Eighth. England, her insular situation considered, had her share of influence in the wars of Europe ; but her autho- rity was by no means preponderant. SECTION XX. THE EMPIRE OF THE GERMANS. The empire of the Germans was constituted in a mosi extraordinary manner : it w T as a federal republic ; but its members were so diverse, with regard to form, character, and power, that it was extremely difficult to introduce universal laws, or to unite the whole nation in measures of mutual interest. The patriotic emperor Maximilian the First, endeavoured to remedy this defect, the whole danger of which became apparent in proportion to the advancement of the neigh- bouring power of France. All the territories not comprised in the dominions of one or other of the electorates, were distributed into the six circles of Bavaria, Swabia, the Rhine, Westphalia, Lower Saxony, and Franconia. In the course of the combinations which took place among the powers cf Europe, the necessity of order and of vigour in 428 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. which Germany stood, became continually more manifest ; and Maximilian, accordingly, caused these ancient circles to be augmented by the four new ones : viz. the electoral circle, which comprises the four electorates which lie near the Rhine ; Upper Saxony, containing Saxony and Bran- denburg; the Austrian circle, comprehending the here- ditary dominions of the emperor; and the Burgundian, including the territories which his family had acquired by his marriage. Each division of the empire was superin- tended by a chief magistrate. It was designed that the constitution of each circle should be a representation in miniature of the whole empire; and that each should pos- sess its separate president, assemblies, and regulations. This was an excellent design; but it was impeded in its execution by the religious dissensions which arose soon after this period. These differences created a party, which exerted a power separate from that of their common coun- try ; it acquired leaders of its own, whose projects were generally in opposition to the measures of the supreme head of the empire : and thus, contrary to the ordinary progress of national power, prepared the way for the de- struction of unity and national feeling. It afterwards hap- pened, that extensive countries, such as Bohemia and the provinces incorporated with it, though they became more germanized, did not acquire the constitution of the circles : while in many of the circles, one of the ranks obtained the whole power, or at least so decided a superiority, that the observance of the laws was endangered in various ways, and the diets were discontinued : other circles, which re- tained their ancient forms, forfeited a part of their political importance. In former times, the contentions between the princes and people of Germany were decided by judges, who usually took the imperial court for their guide; but when the em- perors became too much occupied in prosecuting their Italian wars to attend to the concerns of their own country. UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 429 they delegated the care of administering justice, to courts and provincial tribunals. The decisions of these courts, how- ever, were respected only by those who had neither power nor connections sufficient to ensure the execution of their decrees: and hence, especially after the decline of the im- perial authority, incessant feuds were carried on, under the savage maxim that " might gives right ;" and the progress of the national prosperity wa 3 necessarily impeded. Maxi- milian, together with untold of Henneberg, elector of Mayence, and other benevolent princes, long sought for a remedy : and it was finally enacted, that a supreme court of justice, for the adjudication of all causes between the members of the empire, should be erected in A.D. 1495. . . r • • l * ™ perpetuity in some tree imperial city. The members of this tribunal were at first elected by the diet of the empire: afterwards, the emperor chose two assessors as representatives of the circles which belonged A. D. 1507. \. , ' . _ _ . ° to him : all the electors followed his example ; and eight assessors were chosen by the six elder circles. A perpetual internal peace was now proclaimed ; all feuds were prohibited; and an imperial regency was instituted, which, whenever Flanders or Italy should require the em- peror's presence, might always remain at the head of affairs, in order to guard against sudden emergencies. The alterations which had taken place in the manner of conducting war, had a considerable influence on the affairs of Germany ; as the emperors, instead of the ancient mili- tary services, henceforward required proportionate pecuniary contributions, by means of which they procured infantry: and George of Frundsberg quickly organized this force accord- ing to the best maxims of the military art of those times. The. election of Charles the Fifth, the first emperor to whom conditions were formally prescribed, appears a suit- able occasion for taking a brief survey of the electors, as well as of the imperial powers. • The monarchs of Germany were nominated in the be- 430 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. ginning by the previous agreement of the prelate* and dukes, and proposed to the people, who were assembled m great multitudes : they were accepted by the latter, and enthroned on the ancient royal seat near Rense on the Rhine ; or at Aix-la-Chapelle, the residence of Charlemain ; or at Frankfort, which in that age was situated nearly in the middle of the empire; or in any other place which cir- cumstances rendered expedient. A greater or smaller number of princes was summoned, according to the cir- cumstances of the times In which each election took place ; until by degrees, though without any positive law, it be- came established, that the three archchancellors of the Ger- man, the Italian, and the Burgundian territories, the latter of which had been acquired in the eleventh century ; the elector palatine of the Rhine, as the emperor's original representative ; the duke of Saxony, who of all the dukes of ancient Germany was the only one that retained sufficient power; together with the margrave of Brandenburg, and the king of Bohemia, who were the most powerful princes on the frontiers, where the Teutonic and Slavonic tribes were intermixed ; were alone necessary to the election of the emperor. This institution was rather the effect of accidental cir- cumstances, than the result of a plan of national represent- ation; unless we consider Swabia, Franconia, and other important countries, to have been represented by the arch- bishops in whose metropolitan dioceses they were included: and even in this respect, no provision was made for the people of Bavaria, Austria, and other countries. In reality, the dukes of Bavaria and of Austria were not even men- tioned in the golden bull : the former, on account of the minute divisions of their territory, and of the prejudice which Charles the Fourth entertained against them; and the latter, because their power was originally too incon- siderable, and because the elder branch of their family had become extinct at the death of the emperor Frederick the UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 431 Second; while the younger, under Albert the First, had rendered itself the object of general hatred, and afterwards fell into divisions. This law of Charles the Fourth professed to introduce no new regulation, but merely to record the established practice ; it was, however, like other human performances, not untiuctured with the personal relations of its authors. The spirit of the age, and the character of Charles, might induce us to seek for the ground of this institution in a superstitious veneration for the number seven ; or in the hereditary offices, the greater part of which were merely conducive to the splendour of the imperial court : such a research would, however, be vain; because the reasons which attached hereditary offices to particular dignities, must themselves be sought in considerations of a similar kind. The manner of the imperial elections, as it was described by the law of Charles the Fourth, and determined by cus- tom, is as follows: as soon as the death of an emperor is announced to the elector of Mayence, as archchancellor of Germany, he invites all the electors to a convention at a specified time, which must be within one month, and is usually held at Frankfort on the Maine. The election itself must take place within three months ; and it is com- pleted by such electors as are personally present, and by representatives of the absentees. On the day of the elec- tion, they ride, in their electoral habits, from the council- house of the city to the cathedral church of St. Bartholo- mew : here they hear mass ; and having afterwards taken the oath, proceed to the election in secret conclave. When they have decided, either by a majority of votes or unani- mously, the new emperor is proclaimed to the people from a platform in front of the choir. The imperial insignia consist of a golden crown; a sceptre; a globe called the imperial apple* equally the emblem of universal dominion, and of the emptiness of all earthly things (in reference to 132 UNIVERSAL HISTORY. which latter object, it was in the Greek empire filled with earth); the sword of Charlemain ; the copy of the gospels which was found in his grave; and a mantle which had been presented by an Arabian prince to one of the emperors, and was at that time of great value. The emperor takes an oath to maintain the profession of the catholic faith ; to protect the church and the admini- stration of justice ; to restore all the rights belonging to the empire ; and to observe a faithful deference to the pope and to the church of Rome. The bystanders then declare, that, " conformably to the apostolic command, which or- dains that every soul be subject to the higher powers, they will obey this emperor." The order of this ceremony is an abbreviation of that practised at Byzantium. The emperor now usually creates a few knights ; and lastly, repairs again to the senate-house clothed with all his trappings, where he devours a meal fit for an emperor, and is waited on by the electors, who fulfil their hereditary offices with the utmost pomp. The coronation was formerly performed at Aix-Ia-Cha- pelle : but this custom has been discontinued, both on ac- count of the loss of time and the increase of expense with which it was attended. The emperors no longer re- ceive the crown of Lombardy at Monza, or that of the empire from the pope. Since the time of Maximilian, they assume the title of emperor without undergoing the papal solemnity. The electors are, by their birth, the privy counsellors of the emperor: they ought, in the phraseology of Charles the Fourth, " to enlighten the holy empire, as seven shining lights, in the unity of the sevenfold spirit ;" and according to the same monarch, are the " most honourable members of the imperial body." The rights which the emperor can legally exercise without their consent ; those which he can exert with their concurrence, but without that of the other states of the empire ; and those which belong only to an 13 !: UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 433 universal decision of the empire, have been very variously determined. It is decided that all affairs relating to the enacting of new, or to doubtful interpretations of the ancient laws, to wars, taxes, levies of men, fortifications, treaties of peace and of alliance, shall be determined by the concurrent voice of the electors, princes and states. But as the form of the constitution was more accurately defined at the peace of Westphalia, we shall find a better opportunity to treat of it in the twenty-first book. At the period of the election which followed the death of Maximilian, Albert of Brandenburg, a nobleman of sound understanding and princely manners, was archbishop and elector of Mayence; Richard of GreifFenclau, who had the prosperity of his country sincerely at heart, filled the same offices at Treves ; and count Herman of Wied, a no- bleman whose mind was open to truth and moderate in all respects, at Cologne; Lewis, of the Polish and Lithuanian family of Jagel, had the title of king of Bohemia, which was governed for him by guardians ; the palatinate of the Rhine was administered by Frederick, a nobleman of great talents; the elector of Saxony, of the same name, deserved his title * of the Wise ; and Joachim of Brandenburg was distinguished for his knowledge. Francis the First, king of France, the victor of Marig- nano, who as a hero commanded the admiration, and as a man acquired by his open and noble conduct the affection of all who approached him ; and Charles of Austria, the grandson of Maximilian and king of Spain, were the competitors for the imperial crown. The election was de- cided in favour of the prince who sprang from German blood; for his rival was so powerful, and his domi- nions so near, that the states of the empire would scarcely have been able to maintain their cherished independence under such an emperor. The power of the emperor was defined by an electoral capitulation, which has not only been renewed at every suc- VOL. II. f f 45 i UNIVERSAL HISTORY. ceeding election, but has frequently received essential ad- ditions. It must be allowed that the imperial authority which was formerly but small, was by this instrument re- duced to a shadow ; and that the electors, without the concurrence of the other states, have transformed the con- stitution into an oligarchy. We will now recount the principal points of this law, as it exists at present : the emperor must reside in Germany ; all public affairs must be transacted in German or in Latin. The emperor confirms to the states, all their royalties, pri- vileges, rights and usages : he neither introduces foreign troops into the empire without their consent, nor permits others to do so : the states which submit to the administra- tion of the laws, are liable to no forcible proceedings : the emperor undertakes no wars, and enters into no treaties on behalf of the empire, either within or without its bound- aries, but with the consent of the electors, or at least of the principal among them : he offers no impediments to the assembling of the diets : he respects, in every thing, the legislative authority of the assembled states : he observes all the concordats, or national compacts, with the holy see of Rome : reverted fiefs are to be incorporated with the im- perial territories, and not to be, otherwise, arbitrarily dis- posed of; and even if the emperor himself should hold an imperial fief contrary to the laws, he must give it up at the ^requisition of the electors : he can neither impose new taxes, nor prolong the appointed duration, or increase the amount of those already granted : he cannot oppose the election of a king of the Romans, which, however, can only take place when he may himself become incapable of conducting the operations of government, whether from physical inability or protracted absence : he confirms the confederacy of the electors and that of the Rhine ; and considers the former as the fundamental pillars of the empire, without whose consent he can neither grant a reversion, nor make any al- teration in feudal affairs, nor alienate the imperial revenues, ii UNIVERSAL HISTORY. 435 nor divert them to foreign purposes : he co-operates with them in introducing a new and solemn regulation respecting the coining of money : he supports the electors in their rank, which immediately follows that of crowned heads and dowager queens ; so tjiat even their ambassadors take pre- cedence of mere princes : he can never demand to see the family compacts of any of the vassals of the empire, nor ever give a new interpretation of feudal duties in favour of his own family : he cannot allow the empire to be drained of men, by subsidiary treaties with foreign powers : he ac- knowledges a provisional power to reside in the assembled college of electors : he will promote the constitution of the circles, and never prevent the states from assembling in diet : he undertakes to levy no troops without the concur- rence of the empire ; and the generalship of the empire is bound in duty to the whole body as well as to him : he will never grant assistance to neighbouring powers, in such a manner as to endanger the peace of the empire. Many points however in these obligations, which we have represented in the sense in which they are taken by the party of the states, are of doubtful determination and application ; and from the state of affairs, cannot possibly be literally observed. Hence we can only consider as a general result, that the electors have enfeebled the operations of the supreme imperial power to such a de- gree, (not however in favour of the liberty of the people, but for the acquisition and maintenance of absolute power in their own hands,) that the emperor must either remain inactive, or gain them over to his party, or be constantly at war with them. END OF THE SECOND VOLUME. Printed by A. Strahan, Printers Street, London.