Micaiah, prayed the archbishop to instruct them in the ele ments of the Christian faith. The bishop did so; and then both the rabbin and the rest of them professed Christianity, and were baptized by the bishop and by his clergy. But Micaiah alone persevered in his profession: the rest apostatized a year afterwards.

A. 1097. The emperor Alexis was terrified at this inun, dation of Franks, and thought that their design was to seize on his dominions. He therefore treated their leaders with much respect, but was resolved to do them all the hurt that he could. And, to say the truth, they gave him too much cause for it. Their troops encamped near Constantinople, demolished all the best houses in the country, and unroofed the churches, and sold the lead that covered them to the Greeks themselves. They acted no better in Asia, pillaging and burning houses and churches".

A. 1098. The croisez took Antioch; and one of their ecclesiastics found there, by revelation as he pretended, the spear with which Christ was pierced. Some time after, some of the croisez called the genuineness of the spear in question; and a dispute arising, Peter Bartholomew, for he was the finder, offered to justify himself by the fiery trial. A large fire was made, and he, holding the spear in his hand, passed through it unhurt, as it was thought. But though he had been in good health before, he died a few days after, Thus the credit of this holy relique remained dubious.

A. 1099. The croisez took Jerusalem by storm, and massacred all the infidels that they found there, in number about twenty thousand. Immediately after this inhuman and bloody work, they repaired to the holy sepulchre with most astonishing zeal and devotion".

A Discourse on the Ecclesiastical History from the Year 600 to the Year 1100. By Fleury.

THE fair days of the church are passed away: but God hath not rejected his people, nor forgotten his promises,

Let us view with a religious fear the temptations with which he permitted his church to be exercised during the five ages which followed the six first; and let us consider with gratitude the methods which his Providence made use of to support it. They are subjects worthy of our attention.

• Rome Pagan, spotted with so many crimes, and drunk with the blood of so many martyrs, was to be punished, and the divine vengance was to be manifested upon her in the sight of all nations. Accordingly, in due time, Rome ceased to be the capital of the empire, when Constantine had transferred the seat of power to Byzantium; and after the division of the empire, the emperors of the West resided at Ravenna, at Milan, and in any place except Rome. Thus she lost by degrees her splendor, her riches, her numbers. We have seen the deplorable representation of her condition, as made by St. Gregory. Yet was she taken and pillaged by the Barbarians, who ravaged and ruined the western empire. This inundation of Barbarians I count for the first external temptation befalling the church since the persecutions of the Pagan emperors. For these savages, in the beginning of their irruptions, filled all places with slaughter, burned whole cities, massacred the inhabitants, or led them away captives, and spread terror and desolation all around them. The most cruel persecutions under Rome Pagan were neither continual nor universal. The Pagans had the same language with their countrymen the Christians; they often listened to the doctrines of the Christians, and were daily converted. But where no rational creatures are to be found, there are no churches; and how was it possible to instruct and convert brutish ruffians, always in arms, always plundering, and speaking a strange language?

'Moreover the Barbarians, who ruined the Roman em pire, were either Pagans or Heretics; so that after their first fury was somewhat allayed, and they were so far humanized as to converse with those whom they had invaded, they still detested the Romans, on account of the diversity of religion. You have seen the cruel persecutions carried on by the Vandals in Afric.

'These Barbarians, it is true, became orthodox Christians, some sooner, some later; in whose conversion God showed forth his mercy, as in the punishment of the Romans he

had signalized his justice. But these Barbarians, by becom ing Christians, did not totally quit their former manners. They still remained for the most part fickle, changeable, vio lent, impetuous, acting more by passion than by reason. You may have observed what sort of Christians were Clovis and his children. These people continued despisers of arts and literature, busied only in hunting or in fighting. Thence ensued gross ignorance even among their Roman subjects; for the manners of the ruling nation will always predo minate; and studies languish, unless supported by honours and emoluments.

ances.

'We see the declension of literature in Gaul, from the end of the sixth century, and about a hundred years after the establishment of the Franks. We have a sensible example of it in Gregory of Tours, who owns that he had not much applied himself to grammar and humanities. And if he had not said it, he shows it sufficiently by his performYet the least of his defects in his writings is that of style. There is in them neither choice nor method. It is a confused jumble of ecclesiastical and secular history; facts of no importance, accompanied with frivolous circumstances unworthy to find a place in serious history, together with an excessive credulity about miracles. These defects I ascribe rather to a bad education than to a bad disposition; else we must suppose that for many ages together there was not a man born who had naturally good sense and sound judg ment. But the best dispositions easily follow the preju dices of education and of vulgar opinions, when men have not cultivated the art of reasoning, and copied after good models. Learned studies did not entirely sink with the Roman empire: religion preserved them; but the only stu dents were ecclesiastics, and their studies were extremely im perfect. I speak of human sciences; for as to the doctrines of religion, in those they followed the certain authority of scripture and tradition. Pope Agatho testifies it in a letter which he transmitted by his two legates to the sixth council. We send them not to you, says he, for any reliance that we place in their abilities and erudition. For how should per fect science be found amongst people who live surrounded with Barbarians, and with labour earn their bread by the

work of their hands? Only with pious simplicity of heart

we preserve the faith which our ancestors have transmitted

to us.

In the following ages, the most enlightened men, as Bede, Alcuin, Hincmar, Gerbert, felt the contagion of the times. Endeavouring to embrace the whole circle of sciences, they mastered none, and knew nothing exactly. What they most wanted was critical skill to distinguish false from genuine tracts. For even then many works were fabriciated, and ascribed to illustrious names, not only by Heretics, but by Catholics, and with an honest intention. Thus Vigilius of Thapsus owns himself that he borrowed the name of St. Athanasius, with a view to obtain a hearing from the Arian Vandals. In like manner, when they had not the acts of a martyr to read publicly on his holy day, they composed acts the most probable, or rather the most marvellous that they could devise; and by these means they thought they could best keep up the piety of the common people. These false legends were principally composed on occasions of the translations of reliques, so frequent in the ninth century. They also made deeds and records, either to supply the place of true ones which were lost, or absolutely fictitious; as the famous donation of Constantine, which was received without the least doubt in France, in the ninth century. But of all the spurious pieces, the most pernicious were the Decretals ascribed to the popes of the four first centuries, which have given an incurable wound to ecclesiastical discipline, by the introduction of new maxims concerning the judg ments of bishops, and the authority of the pope. Hincmar, though a considerable canonist, could never clear up this point. He knew well that these Decretals were unknown to the preceding ages, and it is he who informs us when they first made their appearance: but he was not critic enough to discern the proofs of the forgery, plain and strong as they were; and he himself cites the Decretals when they favour him.

'Another effect of ignorance is to make men credulous and superstitious, for want of certain principles of belief, and an exact knowledge of the duties of religion. God is omnipotent, and his saints have great prevalence with him. These are truths which no Catholic will contest. Therefore I ought to believe all the miracles which are ascribed to the

intercession of saints. This inference is not just. The proofs of these miracles must be examined; and so much the more accurately as the facts are more incredible and important. For to attest a false miracle is no less than what St. Paul calls bearing false witness against God, as Damianus judiciously remarks. So far therefore is piety from inducing us lightly to give credit to them, that it obligeth us to sift them with the utmost rigour. The same holds true as to revelations, apparitions of spirits, operations of the devil by the ministry of sorcerers, or otherways; in a word, all supernatural facts. Every sensible and religious person ought to be extremely reserved in giving credit to them.

And for this cause I have mentioned very few out of innumerable miracles related by the writers of these darker ages. It hath appeared to me that amongst them the taste for the marvellous was far more predominant than the love of truth; and I would not warrant that sometimes there were not at the bottom certain self-interested motives, either to attract profitable oblations from the belief of miraculous cures, or to secure the goods of the church by spreading the fear of divine judgments. To these purposes tend most of the stories related in the Collections of the Miracles of St. Martin, St. Benedict, and other famous saints. As if they who be came saints by despising riches upon earth, were become fond of them after they were in heaven, and employed their credit with God to revenge themselves on those who plun dered the treasures of their churches! I can discern the pernicious motive which induced them so zealously to sup port such pretended miracles. They thought to restrain at least by the fear of temporal judgments those who were little moved by the dread of future punishments. But they did not perceive that this was introducing a dangerous error, by reasoning upon a false principle, that God usually punisheth the wicked in this life. This was to bring the Gospel back to the state of the old law, wherein the promises and threaten ings were of the temporal kind: this was, to expose the au thority of religion to contempt, by grounding these menaces upon it, since they were often confuted by experience; the usurpers of the revenues of the church might be seen every day enjoying impunity, and passing their lives in health and prosperity.

and