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 OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE 221 can unite for their common safety, they may rush on the bar- barians with invincible arms. But, if the Saracens, fatigued by a repetition of injuries, should now retire and rebel; if they should occupy the castles of the mountains and sea-coast, the unfortunate Christians, exposed to a double attack, and placed as it were between the hammer and the anvil, must resign them- selves to hopeless and inevitable servitude." ^^^ We must not forget that a priest here prefers his country to his religion ; and that the Moslems, whose alliance he seeks, were still numerous and powerful in the state of Sicily. The hopes, or at least the wishes, of Falcandus were at first conquest of A ^ the Kingdozn gratified bv the free and unanimous election of Tancred, the ofsicuyby 1 r ^ f ^ 1 11 11 11 emperor OTandson of the first kinff, whose birth was illegitimate, but whose Hemyvi. " ^ ^ A.D. 1194 civil and military virtues shone without a blemish. During four years, the term of his life and reign, he stood in arms on the farthest verge of the Apulian frontier, against the powers of Germany ; and the restitution of a roj'al captive, of Constantia herself, without injury or ransom, may appear to surpass the most liberal measm-e of reason. After his decease, the kingdom of his widow and infant son fell without a struggle ; and Henry pursued his victorious march from Capua to Palermo. The poli- tical balance of Italy was destroyed by his success ; and, if the pope and the free cities had consulted their obvious and real interest, they would have combined the powers of earth and heaven to prevent the dangerous union of the German empire with the kingdom of Sicily. But the subtle policy, for which the Vatican has so often been praised or arraigned, was on this occasion blind and inactive ; and, if it were true that Celestine the Third had kicked away the Imperial crown from the head of the prostrate Henry,^^'^ such an act of impotent pride could 155 aj veto, quia difficile est Christianos in tanto rerum turbine, sublato regis timore Saracenos non opprimere, si .Saraceni [. . .] injuriis fatigati ab eis cceperint dissi- dere, et castella forte maritima vel montanas munitiones occupaverint ; ut hinc cum Theutonicis summa [sit] virtute pugnandum illinc Saracenis crebris insultibus occur- rendum, quid putas acturi sunt Siculi inter has depressi angustias, et velut inter malleum et incudem multo cum discrimine constituti? hoc utique agent quod poterunt, ut se Barbaris miserabili conditione dedentes, in eorum se conferant potestatem. O utinam plebis et [ac] procerum, Christianorum et Saracenorum vota conveniant ; ut regem sibi concorditer eligentes, [irruentes] barbaros totis viribus, toto conanime, totisque desideriis proturbare contendant. The Normans and Sicilians appear to be confounded. 156 The testimony of an Englishman, of Roger de Hoveden (p. 689), will lightly weigh against the silence of German and Italian history (Muratori, Annali d'ltalia, torn. X. p. 156). The priests and pilgrims, who returned from Rome, exalted, by every tale, the omnipotence of the holy father.