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 266 THE DECLINE AND FALL and their departure for the Holy Land was fixed to the festival of the Assumption, the fifteenth of August, of the ensuing year.'^'^ Justice of the So familiar, and as it were so natural, to man is the practice of violence that our indulgence allows the slightest provocation, the most disputable right, as a sufficient ground of national hostility. But the name and nature of an hu/ij war demands a more rigorous scrutiny ; nor can % e hastily believe that the servants of the Prince of Peace would unsheath the sword of destruction, unless the motives Avere pure, the quarrel legiti- mate, and the necessity inevitable. The policy of an action may be determined from the tardy lessons of experience : but, before we act, our conscience should be satisfied of the justice and propriety of our enterprise. In the age of the crusades, the Christians, both of the East and West, were pei'suaded of their lawfulness and merit ; their arguments are clouded by the per- petual abuse of scripture and rhetoric ; but they seem to insist on the right of natural and religious defence, their peculiar title to the Holy Land, and the impiety of their Pagan and Mahometan foes.-^ L The right of a just defence may fairly include our civil and spiritual allies : it depends on the existence of danger ; and that danger must be estimated by the tAvofold 2'' Bongarsius, who has published the original writers of the crusades, adopts, with much complacency, the fanatic title of Guibertus, Gesta Dei per Francos ; though some critics propose to read Gesta Diaboli per Francos (Hanovire, 1611, two vols, in folio). I shall briefly enumerate, as they stand in this collection [superseded by the Recueil des historiens des Croisades ; Historiens occid^ntaux, vols. 1-5, 1841-1895], the authors whom I have used for the first crusade. I. Gesta Francorum [Recueil, 3, p. ^ix sqq. II. Robertus Monachus [/-^. 3, p. 717 sqqX III. Baldricus ib. 4, p. i sqq. IV. Raimundus de Agiles ib. 3, p. 235 sqq V. Albertus Aquensis ib. 4, p. 265 sqq. VI. Fulcherius Carnotensis Jb. 3, p. 311 j^(/.]. VII. Guibertus [«^. 4, p. 113 .f^^^.]. VIII. Willielmus Tyriensis [?7 i, No. 3]. Muratori has given us, IX. Radulphus Cadomensis de Gestis Tancredi (Script. Rer. Ital. torn. v. p. 28!;-333 [Recueil, 3, p. 603 j^^.]), and X. Bernardus Thesaurarius de Acquisitione Terras .Sanctfe (torn. vii. p. 664-848 ib. 2, p. 483 sqq.^. The last of these was unknown to a late French historian, '^vho has given a large and critical list of the writers of the crusades (Esprit des Croisades, torn. i. p. 13-141), and most of whose judgments my own experience will allow me to ratify. It was late before I could obtain a sight of the French historians collected by Duchesne. I. Petri Tudebodi Sacerdotis Sivracensis [of SiTai in Poitou : flor. c. a.d. hoc] Historia de Hierosolymitano Itinere (tom. iv. p. 773-815 [Recueil, 3, p. i sqq. ; French translation by S. de Goy, 1878]) has been transfused into the first anony- mous writer of Bongarsius [rather, the Gesta Francorum were incorporated and augmented by Peter. So Sybel ; but otherwise Klein in his monograph Raimund von Aguilers, 1892]. II. The Metrical History of the First Crusade, in vii. books (p. 890-912), is of small value or account. 21 If the reader will turn to the first scene of the First Part of Henry IV., he will see in the text of Shakespeare the natural feelings of enthusiasm ; and in the notes of Dr. Johnson the workings of a bigoted though vigorous mind, greedy of every pretence to hate and persecute those who dissent from his creed.