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Histoire des Croisades.

Première Partie contenant l'Histoire

de la première Croisade. Par M. Michaud. Avec une Carte de l'Asie Mineure, les plans d'Antioche, de Jerusalem, &c. 8vo.

[From the Critical Review.]

IF the present circumstances of the French empire are unfavourable to the free and vigorous exertions of native genius, to the exercise of political talent, and the advance of moral and religious philosophy, we should yet be far from the truth were we to infer that the unparalleled restrictions of the liberty of the press had VOL. III. New Series.

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operated to the extinction of all literary power and energy. It re mains to be proved (and we may hope that it is a problem never likely to be solved) how long a continuance of the system pursued by the present ruler of France, will be necessary to put an entire stop to the progress of the human intellect, and drive back a highly cultivated people to their original barbarism; but we have sufficient evidence that no such effect is yet to be contemplated; and the annals of French literature have probably never displayed, within so short a space of time, so great a number of valuable and interesting works in the departments of history and the belles lettres, as during the period that these restrictions have been in force.

Of these productions we have noticed several of late, and need only, to justify our assertions, recall to our readers the works of M. M. Sismondi and Ginguéné, relating to the civil and military history of the middle ages in Italy. That which we now announce, from the portion already executed and at present in our hands, bids fair to rival the works last mentioned in interest and utility. We have not, as yet, possessed any general history of the crusades that can be read with satisfaction and pleasure. The best are short and imperfect summaries, which leave the reader to desire much more information than they are capable of communicating, while, for the knowledge of particulars, he has hitherto been condemned either to have recourse to original authorities, which are almost unattainable, and if attained, scarcely legible, or to dry, tasteless compilations, which repel curiosity and demand attention only on account of the matter they contain, and which is nowhere else to be met with.

With this preface, we sit down, not to add to the list of insipid details, by furnishing an abstract of the contents of the present volume, but to select some passages of the most striking interest, and most ably wrought in description, to enable our readers to judge for themselves of the value which ought to be set upon the work itself. It is just, however, before we look further, to let our author speak for himself as to his view of the task he has undertaken to execute.

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"Those among us who have undertaken subjects of ancient history, had for their guides the historians of Rome and Athens. The bril liant colours of Tacitus, Livy, and Thucydides, were ready for their pencil. For me, I have no models to follow, and am reduced to the necessity of giving a language to those historians of the middle ages whom our era disdains. They have seldom supported me in my labour by the charm of style, and the elegance of narration; but, if they have afforded me no lessons in the art of writing, they at least transmit to me events of an interest sufficiently powerful to redeem all the defects

of their genius and of my own. Perhaps it will be found, in reading this history, that an epoch in which all is prodigious, has nothing to lose by a simple and faithful representation. The frankness of our old historians revives for me the persons and characters they describe; and if I have profited by the lessons they teach me, the age in which they lived shall not be altogether unobservable in my recitals. It would have been easy for me to censure bitterly, as others have done, their ignorance and their credulity; but I respect in them the openness and candour of the times of which they are the interpreters. Without giving faith to all their recitals, I have not disdained the fables which they relate to us, and which were believed by their cotemporaries; for the knowledge of what was believed in those days, serves to bring us acquainted with the manners of our ancestors, and forms an essential part of their history.

"We have no need in these days of any great sagacity to distinguish the fabulous from the real in our ancient chronicles. It is more difficult to reconcile, on certain points, the often contradictory assertions of the Latins, the Greeks, the Saracens, and to disengage, in the history of the crusades, the various impressions derived from religious fanaticism, from human policy, and from human passions. I do not pretend to resolve difficult problems better than others, or to raise myself above my subject, in judging of the times and of the people that will present themselves before me. Without giving myself up to digressions, in which it is always easy to make a display of our acquirements, after having scrupulously examined the historical monuments which remain to us, I shall faithfully speak what I believe to be the truth, and shall abandon dissertations to the learned, and conjectures to the philosopher." Exposition, p. 6-3.

On the question, so often discussed, of the moral and political effects of the crusades, our author does not so far forget the promise contained in his last paragraph, as either to enlarge in argument or to express any positive opinion. It is a question which has, of late, been very ably treated in essays honoured with the rewards of the national institute; but M. Michaud, very sensibly, we think, after leaving the general inference to be drawn by his readers from the facts developed in the progress of his work, describes his own judgment as fluctuating in the middle channel between the currents of the two opposite opinions to which the question has given birth.

"Without believing," says he, "that the holy wars have occasioned all the evil or all the good that has been attributed to them, it must be allowed that they were a source of tears to the generations which saw and took part in them; but, like the evils and the storms of bu

man life, which render man better, and often contribute to the advance of his reasoning faculties, they have served to hasten the experience of nations, and it may be said that after having for a moment shaken, they have subsequently strengthened, the foundations of society. This opinion, stripped of all spirit of exaggeration and system, will perhaps appear the most reasonable: besides, I experience some pleasure in adopting it, because it is consolatory for the age we live in. The present generation, which has witnessed the explosion of so many passions on the political stage, which has suffered so many calamities, will not see without interest that Providence sometimes makes use of great revolutions for the purpose of enlightening mankind, and ensuring in times to come the prosperity of empires." P. 10.

The first of the four books into which the present volume is divided, contains a summary view of the several revolutions of the Holy Land, from the time of Constantine to the period of the first crusade, and an account of the rise and progress of the religious custom of pilgrimages to the sepulchre of Christ at Jerusalem, interspersed with some amusing anecdotes respecting the most illustrious personages who devoted themselves to these pious undertakings. We shall not stop to make any quotations from this preliminary part of the history, and (although for a different reason) shall also abstain from repeating the well-known tale of Peter the Hermit, the Council of Clermont, and the exertions of Pope Urban in the prosecution of the enterprise which the enthusiastic Cœnobite had suggested. The picture of the universal delirium which those exertions and that enthusiasm produced, affords, however, too favourable a specimen of our author's descriptive powers to be passed over in silence.

"From the moment that the spring returned nothing could restrain the impatience of the crusaders; they began their march for the places which were destined for their rendezvous. The greater number went on foot; some horsemen appeared in the midst of the multitude; many travelled in carts, others coasted along the shores in vessels; they were differently clothed, armed with lances, swords, javelins, iron maces, &c. The crowd of crusaders offered a whimsical and confused medley of all ranks and conditions; women appeared in arms among the warriors; prostitution displayed itself amidst all the rigours of penance. Old age was seen by the side of infancy, opulence next to misery; the helmet was confounded with the cowl, the mitre with the sword. In the neighbourhood of towns and fortresses, in plains and on mountains, forts and pavilions raised their heads; everywhere appeared the preparations of war and revelling. Here were heard the noise of war and

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