§rom 1 0e feifitarg of 
 (professor ^antuef (JJttffer 
 m (gtemorg of 
 3ubge ^amuef differ QKrecfttnrtbge 
 
 (presenfeb fig 
 ^amuef (QXtfPer QBrecfttnrtbge £ong 
 to flje fetfirarg of 
 (prtncefon £0eofogtcaf ^emtnarg 
 
 DC 83.3 .S58 1826 
 Sismondi, J.-C.-L. Simonde 
 
 de 1773-1842. 
 History of the crusades 
 
HISTORY 
 
 THE CRUSADE 
 
 THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY, 
 
 0 of mffi$ 
 
 AUG 10 1968 J [ 
 
 FROM THE FRENCH OF 
 
 J. C. L. SIMONDE DE SISMONDI 
 
 HONORARY MEMBER OF THE UNIVERSITY OF WILNA, 
 OF THE ACADEMY AND SOCIETY OF ARTS OF GENEVA, OF THE ITALIAN ACADEMIES OF CEORGOFILI, 
 CAGLIARI, AND PISTOIA, ETC. ETC. 
 
 WITH AN INTRODUCTORY ESSAY BY 
 
 THE TRANSLATOR. 
 
 UBI SOLITUDINEM FACIUNT, PACEM APPELLANT.— T A C I T V S . 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 PUBLISHED BY WIGHTMAN AND CRAMP, 
 
 PATERNOSTER-ROW: S. WILKIN, NORWICH, WAUGH & INNES, EDINBURGH '. 
 AND M.OGLE, GLASGOW. 
 
 1826. 
 
NORWICH: 
 
 PRINTED BY S. WItKIN, UPPER HAYMARKET. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Introductory Essay v 
 
 CHAP. I. 
 
 First Crusade, from 1207 to 1209 1 
 
 CHAP. II. 
 
 Continuation of the Crusade against the Albigenses, to the Battle of 
 Muret, 1210 to 1213 50 
 
 CHAP. III. 
 
 Submission of the Albigenses. Revolt and New War to the death 
 of Simon de Montfort, 1214 to 1218 102 
 
 CHAP. IV. 
 
 Crusade of the French against the Albigenses, from the death of 
 Simon de Montfort to that of Louis VIII, 1218 to 1226 - 135 
 
 CHAP. V. 
 
 Affairs of the Albigenses, from the death of Louis VIII, 1226, to 
 the Peace of Paris, 1229; and its final ratification, 1242 - 202 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2014 
 
 https://archive.org/details/historyofcrusadeOOsism 
 
INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 
 
 The attention of the public has been, of late, 
 much directed to the character and sufferings of 
 the Albigensian Christians, and to the principles 
 and conduct of the church of Rome, through 
 whose instigation, and by whose authority, they 
 were persecuted and destroyed. The outlines of 
 those persecutions are sufficiently known, having 
 been presented in the pages of general history; 
 and even their particular details have been mi- 
 nutely depicted by those who have vindicated the 
 cause of the sufferers, and by others who were 
 the witnesses and agents of their sufferings. Yet 
 a history was still wanted which should trace the 
 rise and progress of these calamitous events with 
 truth and precision, and at the same time give such 
 a view of the shifting scenes by which they were 
 attended, as to cause them to make an indelible 
 impression upon the mind. This object has been 
 accomplished by M. Simonde de Sismondi, who 
 has, in his history of the French people, now in 
 the course of publication at Paris, bestowed much 
 
 b 
 
VI 
 
 pains and research on the subject of the crusades 
 of the Roman church against the Albigenses, and 
 has treated it with so much eloquence and beauty 
 of style, and such a spirit of philosophic (enquiry, 
 as to render it a most interesting episode in that 
 valuable work. The volume here offered to the 
 English reader is an attempt to exhibit that part 
 of M. Sismondi's narrative, with only so much of 
 the general history as may serve for its connex- 
 ion and illustration. Although, therefore, it is 
 only an extract from a larger work, yet it never- 
 theless embraces an entire, and, to a considerable 
 degree, an independent subject ; giving a view of 
 a series of interesting events, issuing in a catas- 
 trophe, of great importance to the cause of civil 
 and religious liberty, and of lasting influence 
 upon the future destinies of Europe and of the 
 world. It commences with the thirteenth centu- 
 ry, and comprises a period of about forty years, 
 detailing the progress in civilization, liberty, and 
 religion, of the fine countries in the south of 
 France, and the destruction of that liberty and 
 civilization, the devastation and ruin of those 
 countries, and the extinction of those early efforts 
 for religious reformation, through the power and 
 policy of the church of Rome. It relates the es- 
 tablishment of the inquisition, and the provisions 
 by which this merciless tribunal was adapted to 
 become, for ages, the grand engine of domination 
 to that ambitious and persecuting power. And 
 
vii 
 
 it marks the complete establishment of civil and 
 ecclesiastical despotism , by the surrender of all 
 those states, with their rights and liberties, to the 
 dominion and controul of the French monarch, 
 under the direction of the Roman pontiff. When 
 therefore the curtain at last falls upon this sad 
 tragedy, it seems as if the night of ignorance and 
 tyranny had closed upon the nations for ever. 
 
 The attentive reader cannot fail to remark, that 
 these events give a very different representation 
 of the principles of the church of Rome, from 
 that which is offered to us by its modern advocates, 
 and especially by that respectable body the Eng- 
 lish catholics. It becomes, therefore, a proper, 
 and even a necessary, subject of enquiry, whether 
 these are the true interpreters of the principles of 
 the church to which they belong, or whether we 
 are to seek for their interpretation in the recorded 
 acts and authentic documents of the church itself. 
 They represent the authority of the church of 
 Rome as merely spiritual, and extending only to 
 its voluntary subjects, and assert that the natural 
 rights of men, and the authority of civil govern- 
 ments, are equally beyond its controul : yet it must 
 be remarked, on the one hand, that the church of 
 Rome allows of no private interpretation of its 
 dogmas, where the church has decided ; and on 
 the other, that the history of its proceedings by 
 no means justifies their representations. The 
 church may not indeed, in future, ever be able to 
 
 b 2 
 
Vlll 
 
 resume that authority by which it has heretofore 
 trampled on the rights both of subjects and their 
 rulers ; but should it ever again be in a situation 
 to act as its own interpreter of its own claims, it 
 is scarcely to be supposed that it would then re- 
 cognize the limits which either individuals or 
 bodies in its communion had attempted to place 
 to the exercise of its sovereign will. We are, 
 therefore, under the necessity^ as far as it may be 
 desirable for us to become acquainted with the 
 claims of the church of Rome, to seek them, not 
 from private opinions, but from its own authori- 
 tative and deliberate acts. 
 
 We are also bound to consider, that the dogmas 
 of the church of Rome are not subjects of mere 
 speculation. She has always claimed a divine 
 right of imposing them on the minds of men, and 
 has, at different times, attained to a power of en- 
 forcing these claims, unexampled in the history 
 of mankind. With those religious dogmas by 
 which she still subjugates the souls of her vota- 
 ries, we, who after two centuries of conflict have 
 withdrawn from her domination, have no concern, 
 any farther than she is amenable for them to the 
 bar of reason and truth ; but, besides the controul 
 which she exercises over those of her own com- 
 munion, she has ever maintained certain rights 
 towards those whom she is pleased to designate 
 as heretics, and has often exercised those rights 
 with a severity, for which no authority is to be 
 
IX 
 
 found, except in her own traditions. We have, 
 therefore, on our part, a right to demand a renun- 
 ciation of those claims, as public and authoritative 
 as the exercise of them has ever been, or to guard 
 ourselves against their repetition, by such pru- 
 dential and cautionary measures, as the circum- 
 stances of the times may require. 
 
 The crusades against the Albigenses seem to 
 present one of those occasions by which the rights, 
 claimed by the Roman church towards heretics, 
 may be most fully and accurately ascertained. 
 They were her exclusive and deliberate act. The 
 church of Rome had been then, according to its 
 own principles, established for nearly twelve hun- 
 dred years. It professed to have been endowed 
 with miraculous powers, and to be guided by the 
 teachings of the infallible spirit of God. All the 
 temporal authorities had submitted to its domina- 
 tion and were ready to execute its orders. If 
 therefore there is any period in which we should 
 seek for its genuine and authentic principles, it 
 must be under the unclouded dominion of Inno- 
 cent III. Nor can the opponents of all reform- 
 ation possibly desire any thing more, than to 
 restore that golden age of the church. Should 
 they say, that, civilization and philosophy having 
 then made but small progress, we are to charge 
 the cruelties which were committed against the 
 heretics to the ignorance and barbarism of the 
 times, we would reply, that all these cruelties were 
 
X 
 
 prompted, encouraged, and sanctioned, by Rome 
 itself, and that an infallible church cannot require 
 the lights of philosophy to instruct her in her 
 duties towards heretics. To an impartial inquirer 
 it would seem rather strange, that under the spi- 
 ritual illumination afforded by this church to the 
 nations, heresies should have arisen which requir- 
 ed such severe measures for their extirpation, and 
 that wich all the powers of heaven and earth on 
 its side, the church could not trust itself in the 
 field of reason and argument against them. But 
 certain it is, that heresies did arise, and that the 
 church of Rome felt itself called upon to shew to 
 that age, and to all succeeding xmes, the full ex- 
 tent of the power, with which it was invested by 
 heaven, for their suppression and extirpation. 
 
 The dogma on which all these transactions were 
 founded is — that the church possesses the right 
 to extirpate heresy, and to use all the means which 
 she may judge necessary for that purpose — and 
 to those who are not acquainted with the subtle 
 distinctions of the Roman casuists, this dogma 
 seems to possess all the claims to authority which 
 the church ever makes necessary for an article of 
 faith. It was on this dogma that Innocent III 
 and his legates preached the crusade against the 
 heretics, and promised to those who engaged in 
 it, the full remission of all sins ; it was on this 
 dogma that they excommunicated the civil powers 
 by whom they were, or supposed to be, protected, 
 
XI 
 
 and disposed of their dominions to those who as- 
 sisted in this spiritual warfare. This dogma was 
 repeatedly avowed by provincial councils, and 
 finally ratified by an oecumenical or general coun- 
 cil, the fourth of Lateran. 1 It was received by 
 the tacit — nay by the cordial and triumphant as- 
 sent of the universal church, and had also the 
 sanction of the civil authorities, who received 
 from the church the spoils of the deposed and 
 persecuted princes. We can therefore conceive 
 of nothing which should be still necessary to con- 
 stitute this dogma an article of faith, and hold 
 ourselves justified in considering the church of 
 Rome to claim, as of divine authority, the right 
 to extirpate heresy, and for that purpose, if she 
 judge it necessary, to exterminate heretics. 
 
 i This council not only determined the spiritual power of the church 
 over heretics, but defined the application of that power to temporal 
 princes. Cap. iii, " Si dominus temporalis requisitus et monitus ab 
 Ecclesia, terram suam purgare neglexerit ab haeretica foeditate, per 
 Metropolitanos et caeteros provinciates Episcopos vinculo excommu- 
 nicationis innodetur; et si satisfacere contempserit infra annum, sig- 
 nificetur hoc Summ. Pontifici, et extunc ipse vassalos ab ejus fidelitate 
 denunciet absolutos, et terram exponet Catholicis occupandam, qui 
 earn, haereticis exterminatis (id est, ex vi vocis expulsis), sine ullo con- 
 tradictione possideant, salva jure Domini principalis, dummodo su- 
 per hoc ipse nullum praestet obstaculum, eadem nihilominus lege ser- 
 vata, circa eos qui non habent Dominos principales." — See Delahogue, 
 Tract, de Ecclesia Christi,p. 202. The author adds, " Nonnulli critici 
 dubitant de authenticate hujus canonis." And well they do; for 
 without this doubt, the cause of the Romish church is lost irrevocably. 
 The count of Toulouse and the Albigenses however felt its authenticity. 
 The parenthesis (vi vocis expulsis) does not belong to the original 
 article, but is a gloss of the learned author, by which he would insin- 
 uate that the heretics were only to be banished : a miserable attempt 
 to pervert the plainest language and the most notorious facts. 
 
XII 
 
 Nor has this principle, which was evidently 
 avowed and acted upon at the period of these 
 Crusades, been ever renounced by any authentic 
 or official act of that church ; on the contrary, 
 the church has, during the six hundred years 
 which followed these events, invariably, as far as 
 occasions have served, avowed the same princi- 
 ples, and perpetrated or stimulated the same 
 deeds. As soon as the wars against the Albigen- 
 ses were terminated, the inquisition was brought 
 into full and constant action, and has alwavs been 
 encouraged and supported by the Romish church, 
 to the utmost of its power, in every place where 
 it could obtain an establishment. The civil au- 
 thorities, finding by experience that some of the 
 claims of the church were more prejudicial than 
 useful to themselves, have denied to it the right 
 of deposing sovereigns, and of freeing subjects 
 from their allegiance : but the church itself has 
 never, generally and explicitly, renounced this 
 claim, and, long after the Reformation in Ger- 
 many, continued to exercise it. And, notwith- 
 standing the professions made by modern catho- 
 lics on this subject, history does not furnish an 
 instance of any body of that profession interpos- 
 ing its protest against the persecution of heretics 
 by the church of Rome. The French govern- 
 ment under the administration of Cardinal Riche- 
 lieu did indeed, for the sake of weakening the 
 power of Austria, support the German free states, 
 
Xlll 
 
 and consequently the protestants, but it joined at 
 the same time with the church in the persecution 
 of the French protestants ; and could it have 
 obtained the ascendancy which it sought for in 
 Germany, would doubtless have exercised the 
 same persecutions there. 
 
 One of the rights the most constantly claimed 
 and exercised by the Roman see, throughout its 
 whole history, is that of dissolving oaths. The 
 history of the Italian Republics in the middle 
 ages, by this same M. de Sismondi, contains 
 instances of this, as a recognized, undisputed, 
 and every-day practice, in almost every pontifi- 
 cate. One instance may serve for an illustration, 
 amongst a multitude of others. There were cer- 
 tain reforms in the pontifical government, which 
 were required by the leading persons of the 
 church, but which they could never obtain from 
 the Popes themselves. The cardinals, therefore, 
 when they were going to elect a new Pope, were 
 accustomed to bind themselves, by the most so- 
 lemn oaths, that whoever of them should be 
 chosen Pope Avould grant those reforms. And, 
 invariably, as soon as the pope was chosen, he 
 released himself from his oath, on the ground of 
 its being contrary to the interests of the church. 
 The power of releasing from the obligation of 
 oaths was also extended, during these crusades 
 especially, to freeing the subjects of heretical 
 princes from their oaths of allegiance : and it 
 
xiv 
 
 was especially sanctioned by the fourth council of 
 Lateran. This practice has, however, become 
 so obnoxious in modern times, that the right has 
 been indignantly disowned by most of the advo- 
 cates of the Roman Catholic church ; and this 
 disavowal forms a part of the liberties of the 
 Gallican church. And yet a public act has been 
 performed in our own times by the Roman pon- 
 tiff, in the face of all Europe, which seems to 
 have had no other foundation than the assump- 
 tion of an absolute power in the church to set 
 aside the most solemn engagements. The case 
 alluded to is the divorce of the empress Joseph- 
 ine, the lawful wife of Napoleon, contrary to the 
 principles of the Christian religion, and the ex- 
 press authoritv of Jesus Christ himself. 
 
 An English statesman 2 has, in a printed work, 
 called upon the English and Irish Catholics to 
 give an explicit statement of their sentiments 
 upon certain points which are, as he supposes, 
 misapprehended by the protestants ; intimating, 
 at the same time, the hopelessness of attempting 
 to draw such a declaration from the authorities 
 of the church. But this would in no respect 
 affect the grand point at issue between the catho- 
 lics and protestants. We are sufficiently informed 
 respecting the opinions of the English and Irish 
 catholics and those of many other private bodies 
 in the church of Rome. Our doubts only regard 
 
 2 Mr. Wilmot Horton, " Letter to the Duke of Norfolk," pp. 45, 46. 
 
XV 
 
 their authority to make such declarations, as 
 members of a church which prohibits the right 
 of private judgment where the church has deter- 
 mined. And all we apprehend is, that should it 
 ever be within the power of the Roman church, 
 and consistent with her policy, to proceed against 
 the English and Irish heretics, the declarations 
 of the respectable bodies we have mentioned, and 
 even the authority of the most eminent individu- 
 als, would not shield us from the fate of the Albi- 
 genses in the thirteenth century. 
 
 In practice, we are doubtless secure from such 
 a revolution ; but to what are we indebted for 
 this security ? — to any change in the principles 
 of the church of Rome, since the times of the 
 crusades against heretics ; or to our own power, 
 and the progress of public opinion ? If to the 
 former, it belongs to the catholics to show us this 
 magna charta of our rights and immunities. If 
 to the latter, we are then obliged to tell them, 
 that we hold our liberties only by the tenure of 
 our power to maintain them ; and that every 
 concession, made to that church, is a voluntary 
 manifestation of our sense of security, arising 
 from our own efforts, against any future attempts 
 at persecution. 
 
 It is also an interesting subject of inquiry, on 
 what grounds modern catholics can justify or 
 palliate the persecutions against the Albigenses ; 
 and they are thus stated by a writer of that per- 
 
xvi 
 
 suasion 5 in a work published in 1793: "The 
 Albigenses avowed the leading principles of the 
 Manicheans, and differed from them only by 
 adopting the principal errors of other heretics 
 who had been condemned in the eleventh and 
 twelfth centuries. These were distinguished by 
 the names of Cathari, Puritani, Paulieians, Pa- 
 tarini, Bulgari, New Manicheans, New Arians, 
 Vaudois, and many other appellations. Pope 
 Innocent III commissioned several ecclesiastics 
 to preach against the Albigenses of Languedoc 
 who were openly protected by Raymond VI, 
 count of Toulouse. Alanus, a cistertian monk, 
 wrote two books against them in the year 1212. 
 Peter de Vaux Cernai has left a history of them. 
 William de Pui Laurent gives an account of them 
 in his chronicle. All these writers, who were 
 not only contemporary but ocular witnesses of 
 what they relate, and Roger de Hoveden, ascribe 
 the following impious and seditious errors to the 
 Albigenses in general: "That there are tw T o Gods, 
 and tw o first principles ; one good, the other bad. 
 That there were two Christs, the one good, the 
 other bad. They united with the other heretics 
 in subverting the hierarchy, by condemning the 
 priesthood, and denying the necessity of ordina- 
 tion ; they despised the Old Testament as the 
 work of the devil. They ridiculed the resurrec- 
 tion of the flesh, and maintained that the soul of 
 
 * Review &c. by a Roman Catholic clergyman, London, 1793. 
 
XVll 
 
 each person was a devil or fallen angel in a state 
 of punishment for his pride, who would return to 
 heaven, after having done penance in seven dif- 
 ferent terrestrial bodies. They thought it an act 
 of religion to burn the images of the cross and 
 destroy altars and churches, and to defile them 
 by converting them into receptacles for the unhap- 
 py votaries of Venus. They condemned all the 
 sacraments, and considered infant baptism in par- 
 ticular as a vain superstitious ceremony. They 
 blasphemed against the dignity and purity of the 
 blessed virgin, by denying the divine maternity; 
 and outraged Jesus Christ himself, sometimes 
 denying his divinity, at other times his humanity, 
 and even his sanctity ; they held marriage to be 
 unlawful without considering chastity as a virtue. 
 They were divided into two classes, the perfect 
 and the believers. The former boasted of their 
 continencv and abstemiousness ; the others were 
 shamefully irregular, and declared their firm as- 
 surance of salvation by the faith of the perfect, 
 and their assurance that none of those Avho re- 
 ceived the imposition of their perfect hands would 
 be damned. Such were the execrable tenets of 
 the Albigenses, which they propagated like Ma- 
 homet, by plunder, rapine, fire, and sword. The 
 blasphemies, seditions, and tumults, of these sects 
 were encouraged by the counts of Foix and Com- 
 minges, by the viscount of Bearne, and other 
 feudatory lords ; but principally by count Ray- 
 
xviii 
 
 mond of Toulouse who held his domains by in- 
 vestiture from the crown of France." 
 
 These are the characters with which the per- 
 secutors seek to brand the victims of their cruelty, 
 and on account of which they would represent 
 themselves as the champions of truth, of purity, 
 and of social order. But there is one other 
 character, with which the God of truth has brand- 
 ed every liar, and that is self-contradiction. It 
 is impossible to escape it ; no tale of falsehood 
 can be so artfully framed, as not to contain within 
 itself its own confutation. This is manifestly the 
 case with the stories fabricated respecting the 
 Albigenses. The catholics had persecuted and 
 destroyed them ; they had also destroyed all 
 their documents, and rendered it utterly impos- 
 sible for them to speak in their own defence. 
 They had excommunicated and dethroned the 
 rulers under whose government they had enjoyed 
 protection, freedom, and happiness ; but though 
 they had done all this, they could not give a 
 consistent justification of their proceedings. The 
 Albigenses were, they say, the most detestable of 
 heretics, — licentious and seditious ; they propa- 
 gated their execrable tenets by fire and sword, 
 rapine and plunder ; they burned the crosses, 
 destroyed the altars and churches, and desecrated 
 the latter by converting them into brothels. Yet 
 their lawful sovereigns, the counts of Toulouse, 
 of Foix, and Cominges, and the viscount of 
 
Bearne, against whom all these deeds of sedition 
 and violence must have been committed, are re- 
 presented as not only enduring, but protecting, 
 such miscreants ; and when the Roman church, 
 in its great goodness, offered to purge the land 
 of these pollutions, they became such advocates 
 of plunder, rapine, fire, sword, blasphemy, and 
 sedition, as not only to make common cause with 
 their subjects, but to endure in their defence 
 every calamity which their enemies could inflict. 
 
 Supposing, however, that the Albigenses had 
 been all that the catholic writers represent, upon 
 what ground could the Roman church make a 
 war of extermination against them ? The sove- 
 reigns of those countries did not seek her aid to 
 suppress the seditions of their subjects, nor even 
 to regulate their faith. The interference was 
 not only without their authority, but absolutely 
 against their consent, and was resisted by them 
 in a war of twenty years continuance. If they 
 refer to the authority of the king of France, as 
 liege lord, he had not, in that capacity, the right 
 of interference with the internal affairs of his feu- 
 datories ; and, as will appear from the following 
 history, he had, in fact, no share in these trans- 
 actions, any farther than to come in at the close 
 of the contest, and reap the fruits of the victory. 
 We are therefore from every point brought to 
 the same conclusion — that the church claims a 
 divine right to extirpate heresy and exterminate 
 
XX 
 
 heretics, with or without the consent of the sove- 
 reigns in whose dominions they may be found. 
 
 The author of the following history observes, 
 p. 6, that " the most ancient historian of the 
 persecution affirms, that Toulouse, whose name, 
 says he, ought rather to have been Tota dolosa, 
 had been scarcely ever exempt, even from its first 
 foundation, from that pest of heresy which the 
 fathers transmitted to their children," and that 
 " their opinions had been transmitted, in Gaul, 
 from generation to generation, almost from the 
 origin of Christianity." That is, in other words 
 — that the pure and original principles of Christ- 
 ianity had been handed down. in Gaul, from the 
 first planting of that religion there — that the 
 people had, as far as their opportunities would 
 allow, resisted the usurpations and corruptions of 
 the church of Rome — and that the Albigenses 
 were the inheritors of those principles, mingled 
 doubtless with various errors, which their slender 
 means of true religious instruction would not 
 allow them to escape. 4 
 
 * The means of religious instruction must, in the early ages of the 
 church, have been very different from what they are in the present. 
 Those churches which used the Greek language, though they had the 
 New Testament scriptures in their original tongue, were still, on ac- 
 count of the great difficulty of procuring manuscripts, able to derive 
 scarcely any advantage from them, except what arose from the public 
 readings in the church. To the Latin Christians, the difficulty was 
 increased by the inferiority of the Latin versions; and when this 
 ceased to be a living language* the people must have been in a state 
 of still greater destitution with regard to scriptural knowledge. As 
 this increased, the corruptions of the church increased in like propor- 
 
XXI 
 
 The corruptions of Christianity did not arrive 
 at that height to which they finally attained on 
 the full establishment of the church of Rome, 
 but by slow and gradual steps, and even some- 
 times by the abuse of what, in its origin and in- 
 tention, was wjse and good. They originated 
 chiefly with the episcopal order. That order 
 became, in the age which immediately followed 
 that of the apostles, to a great degree the depo- 
 sitary, as well as the interpreter, of Christian 
 truth, and the regulator of Christian practice. 
 But there was a constant tendency in the bishops 
 to magnify their office and extend their authority. 
 This tendency belongs to human nature, and its 
 effects were especially foretold, on various occa- 
 sions, by the apostle Paul. 5 Every innovation in 
 
 tion, and when recourse was had to translations into the vulgar tongues, 
 to the difficulty of procuring these was added that of procuring sound 
 and valuable instruction from the regular teachers. It is not there- 
 fore a matter of surprise, that heresies should have existed, of va- 
 rious degrees of extravagance, and yet there is abundant testimony, 
 that the sound principles of scriptural truth generally prevailed. 
 
 : > Paul says to the elders or bishops of the church at Ephesus, Acts 
 \x, 29, u For I know this, that after my departing shall grievous wolves 
 enter in among you, not sparing the flock. Also of your own selves shall 
 men arise speaking perverse things, &c therefore watch — and re- 
 member that by the space of three years I ceased not to warn every 
 one, night and day, with tears." And in his second epistle to the 
 Thessalonians, ch. ii, v. 5, having foretold the rise of the man of sin, 
 be adds, " Remember ye not that when I was yet with you I told you 
 these things? And now you know what withholdeth for the mys- 
 tery of iniquity doth already work ; only he who now letteth will let 
 until he be taken out of the way.'' From a comparison of these two 
 passages it seems probable, that the mystery of iniquity was the ten- 
 dency to selfishness and pride which appeared among the Christian 
 teachers, agaiu^t which the apostle struggled at Ephesus, at Corinth, 
 
XXII 
 
 doctrine, or discipline, or ceremonies, was invari- 
 ably made to bear on this point. The doctrines 
 taught in the second and third centuries, respect- 
 ing* the nature and indispensable necessity of 
 baptism and the eucharist — the secrecy adopted 
 with regard to what were called the Christian 
 mysteries — the effects of excommunication — the 
 right asserted by the councils to determine arti- 
 cles of faith and to condemn heresies — the power 
 of ordination and deposition claimed by the bi- 
 shops — all tended to increase the power of the 
 episcopal order and to give it an influence scarcely 
 to be conceived of in modern times, and especi- 
 ally amongst protestants. 
 
 Whilst, however, this general effort was mak- 
 ing by the episcopal body towards the attainment 
 of antichristian authority, another power was 
 arising within itself which was destined to com- 
 plete the " mystery of iniquity." The rich and 
 the great always rise to supremacy both in the 
 world and the church, and the bishops of Rome 
 had abundant opportunity for the attainment and 
 exercise of both these qualities. With a steady 
 and undeviating purpose they pursued their ob- 
 ject of becoming the head of the christian body. 
 
 and other churches — that he checked its progress during his own life, 
 but foresaw that upon his removal, it would go on with increasing vi- 
 gour till it should terminate in the full establishment of the man of 
 siu, whom he also calls the son of perdition. This process may 
 be clearly shewn, from the time of Ignatius, to the pontificate of 
 Gregdry VII. 
 
XX111 
 
 They boldly advanced the most unfounded claims, 
 encouraged and invited all appeals to themselves, 
 arrogantly interfered in all disputes, asserted the 
 right of excommunication, expended their wealth 
 and exerted their influence, till, after a lapse of 
 ages and variorrs political revolutions which they, 
 with consummate policy, turned to their own 
 advantage, the see of Rome attained to a univer- 
 sal and nearly undisputed authority. And such 
 is the mighty influence of long established pre- 
 judices and habits, that the greater part of the 
 christian world does still, in some form or other, 
 yield obedience to its despotic sway. Against 
 these usurpations the christians in Gaul made, as 
 appears from various indications in history, a 
 long continued struggle. They were at different 
 times assisted by eminent men 6 in their opposi- 
 tion to the Romish innovations ; but when the 
 pope had obtained the victory over the episcopal 
 order, the people were obliged to continue the 
 contest alone, and, under the names of various 
 heresies, given them by their enemies, to main- 
 tain their christian liberty and the purity of the 
 christian profession. The Waldenses and Albi- 
 genses have become celebrated by the boldness 
 of their resistance, and the extent of their suffer- 
 ings. The persecutions which they endured scat- 
 
 g See the account of Irenaeus, Hilary, Vigilantius, and others in the 
 second to the tenth chapters of Allix's History of the ancient churches 
 of the Albigenses; in which the opposition to the bishop of Rome is 
 traced from the 2nd century to the 10th. 
 
 C 2 
 
xxiv 
 
 tered the light of truth more extensively amongst 
 the nations. The reformers of the sixteenth 
 century maintained their cause under happier 
 auspices ; and protestants, freed by their exer- 
 tions from spiritual bondage, are able now to 
 look back upon those long protracted combats, 
 to which, under God, they owe their present 
 peace and security, and apportion to each of the 
 parties its merited reward. 
 
 To fill up and verify this rapid sketch would 
 embody all the principal circumstances* of eccle- 
 siastical history; whilst the object of the present 
 essay is only to give such a view of the origin 
 and character of the Albigenses, as may serve 
 for an introduction to the following history. 
 These have been the subject of many and volu- 
 minous controversies, the result of which is sum- 
 med up by Venema, in his Historia Ecclesiastica, 
 t. vi, § 115 — 126, with so much erudition, judg- 
 ment, and candour, that it seems impossible to give 
 the reader a juster view of the connexion between 
 the Waldenses and Albigenses, their antiquity 
 and opinions, thau by a translation of that por- 
 tion of Venema's history which refers to these 
 sects. The passage is as follows : — 
 
 Concerning the Waldenses we may consult, amongst 
 the ancient writers, 7 although their bitterest enemies : 
 1. Bernard, Abbot of Clair- Vaux of the Praemonstra- 
 tensian order, a writer of this age, who exhibits the heads 
 of the disputations between Bernard, the archbishop of 
 
 7 These were edited by Gretzer, and published in the Bibl. Patrum. 
 
XXV 
 
 Narbonne, and the Waldenses, in the year 1195. Gret- 
 zer edited, together with Ebrard a Fleming, and Er- 
 mengard, both unknown authors, a work against the 
 Waldenses, which is contained in the 24th vol. of the 
 Bibliotheca Patrum, but from which little can be learned. 
 2. Reinier, a monk of Piacentia ; first a leader of the 
 sect, but who having deserted them was attached to the 
 class of preachers, and became inquisitor-general in the 
 13th century. TTiere is still extant a book of his against 
 the Waldenses. Reinier's prolix account of the senti- 
 ments of the Waldenses, was recited 300 years after, in 
 the catalogue of the witnesses of the truth, book xv, 
 where also are exhibited other things pertaining to this 
 subject from the history of Bohemia by iEneas Silvias, 
 and from the collections concerning the city of Toulouse 
 by James de Riberea. 8 3. Peter Pilickdorf in the loth 
 century, who wrote against the errors of the Waldenses, 
 and against the jjoor men of Lyons. 4. The book of 
 the judgments of the inquisition at Toulouse, published 
 by Limborch, in his history of the inquisition. But be- 
 sides these documents transmitted by their adversaries, 
 there are others to be compared with them, and much 
 more worthy of credit, from the Waldenses themselves ; 
 and also confessions, catechisms, dialogues, and other 
 tracts in Leger's history of the Waldenses, booki: to 
 which mav be added the confessions both of the Wal- 
 denses and Albigenses, given by Flacius Illyricus in the 
 15th vol. of the Catalogus testium veritatis, — by the Cen- 
 turiatores Magdeburgenses, centur. xii, — by B. Pictetus, 
 in the continuation of Suerus Sec. ii, who recites the 
 most ancient of all, composed in the year 1 100. Bossuet 
 indeed, in his History of the Variations, &c, contends 
 that these monuments are not genuine ; but they are 
 vindicated by Leger, and by Basnage in his Hist. Eccl. 
 torn. ii. Their antiquity is also confirmed by the lan- 
 guage, and the immemorial tradition of the Waldenses, 
 though it must be confessed that they are not all equal 
 in that respect. Of the modern writers, besides Leger, 
 Perrin, and Peter Gillis, amongst the protestants are to 
 be consulted Usher de successione Ecclesiae &c. and 
 Limborch in the history of the inquisition, 1. i, c. 8. 
 
 » The work of Reinier was more fully edited by Gretzer, and re- 
 published in the 25th volume of the Biblioth. Patrum. 
 
XXVI 
 
 And, amongst the Roman Catholics, Thuanus Hist. I. v, 
 a. 1550, Bossuet Histoire des variations &c, Natalis 
 Alexander, Hist. Eccles. hujus seculi, and others. 
 
 They bore various names, some derived from their 
 teachers, some from their manner of life, some from the 
 places where they dwelt, some from the fate they suf- 
 fered, and some from the good pleasure of their neigh- 
 bours: all these it would be too long and tedious to re- 
 capitulate. That I may just notice that of Waldenses, 
 and some others by which they are principally known, 
 I will, however, observe that they are considered to have 
 been called so from Peter Valdo or Waldo, who is said 
 to be either the founder or the principal promoter of the 
 sect. Waldo was a citizen and rich merchant of Lyons 
 who flourished in the middle of the 12th century about 
 the year 1160. Whilst several of the principal citizens, 
 among whom was Waldo, were conversing together, 
 and one of them was struck with death before their eyes, 
 he is said to have been so impressed with a sense of 
 human frailty and of the divine wrath, that he renounced 
 the world from that moment and gave himself up entirely 
 to meditation upon the word of God, and to the propa- 
 gation of piety. He first began with his own family, and 
 then as his fame increased admitted and instructed others, 
 and also translated the scriptures into the vernacular 
 language of Gaul. That he was not destitute of erudi- 
 tion, as some maintain, Flacius Illyricus asserts from 
 evidence derived from ancient writings. The clergy of 
 Lyons, when these proceedings came to their knowledge, 
 opposed, and prohibited his domestic instructions ; but 
 so far was this from proving an obstacle, that he inquired 
 the more diligently into the opinions of the clergy, and 
 into religious rites and customs, and opposed them the 
 more openly and ardently. Since he taught for four or 
 five years at Lyons, and made many disciples, some think 
 they were from him called Waldenses ; but others sup- 
 pose that the name was derived from Christians of his 
 sect, who had from ancient times inhabited the vallies of 
 Piedmont. The vallies are called Vaux, whence Vaudois; 
 and Peter is said to have borne the name of Waldo be- 
 cause he was a follower of that sect. That the name 
 M as used before his time appears from this, that it is 
 found in a confession brought to light by Pictetus. The 
 
XXV11 
 
 other names, either proper to them, or common to them 
 with the Albigenses, are principally the following. Leon- 
 istae, or poor men of Lyons ; this was given them from 
 the place where they arose, and from the life of poverty 
 which, in the beginning from their dependence on cha- 
 rity and various vexations, they were obliged to lead. 
 As to what respects the name of Sabbatatorum, this 
 came from their wooden shoes, which in the Gallic 
 tongue were caTTed Sabots. 9 They are considered to 
 have been called Patarini, on account of their sufferings, 
 but more justly because they were esteemed heretics; 
 and in a former century the Mediolani were so called 
 who urged the celibacy of the clergy, from whom it was 
 transferred to any other heretics. The same sort of 
 derivation may be given to the epithet Cathari, but those 
 of Picards, Lombards, Bohemians, Bulgarians, Albigen- 
 ses, were given from the countries in which they dwelt. 
 Finally they were principally called Turpelini or Turelu- 
 pini in Flanders and Artois, because of the many miseries 
 to which they were exposed, according to a proverb used 
 in that country, by which children whose fate was un- 
 fortunate, were called Turelupins from one Turelupin 
 ■the father of some children who perished miserably. 1 
 But it may be well to consult Mosheim, who, in his his- 
 tory of the 13th century, contends that the Turlupini 
 were the same as the brethren of the free spirit, fanatics 
 and mystics, and imbued with the errors of the Pantheists. 
 
 I shall enumerate, from the monuments above cited, 
 the chief articles of this heresy, before I shew its origin 
 and fate; they were the following: 1. That the holy 
 Scriptures are the only source of faith and religion, with- 
 out regard to the authority of the Fathers and of tradi- 
 tion ; and although they principally used the New 
 Testament yet as Usher proves from Reinier and others, 
 they regarded the Old also as canonical Scripture. From 
 their greater use of the New Testament however their 
 adversaries took occasion to charge them with despising 
 the Old. 2. They held the entire faith, according to 
 all the articles of the apostles' creed. 3. They rejected 
 all the external rites of the dominant church, excepting 
 baptism and the Lord's supper, as temples, vestures, 
 
 !• See Da Cange Gloss. Lai. Maid aeci in voce. 
 1 Vide Beausobre de Adamitis p. 1. 
 
XXV111 
 
 images, crosses, the religious worship of the holy relics, 
 and the remaining sacraments ; these they considered as 
 inventions of satan and of the flesh, and full of supersti- 
 tion. 4. They rejected purgatory, with masses and 
 prayers for the dead, acknowledging only two termina- 
 tions of the present state, heaven and hell. 5. They 
 admitted no indulgences nor confessions of sin with any 
 of their consequences, excepting mutual confessions of 
 the faithful for instruction and consolation. 6. They 
 held the sacraments of baptism and the eucharist only 
 as signs, denying the corporal presence of Christ in the 
 eucharist ; as we find in the book of this sect concerning 
 antichrist, and as Ebrard de Bethunia accuses them in 
 his book antihccresios. 7. They held only three eccle- 
 siastical orders, bishops, priests, and deacons, and that 
 the remainder were human figments ; that monasticism 
 was a putrid carcase, and vows the inventions of men ; 
 and that the marriage of the clergy was lawful and ne- 
 cessary. According to Reinier tfiey had three or four 
 orders. First the bishop, who had under him two pres- 
 byters, one the elder son the other the younger, who 
 visited the faithful submitted to the bishop, and one 
 deacon. 8. Finally, they asserted the Roman church 
 to be the whore of Babylon, and denied obedience to 
 the pope or bishops, and that the pope had any autho- 
 rity over other churches, or the power of either the 
 civil or ecclesiastical sword. 
 
 Besides these articles, others are attributed to them, 
 though not without controversy, since by some they are 
 denied. 1. Reinier and the inquisition of Toulouse 
 relate, that they reprobated judges and magistrates with 
 all judgments against criminals ; but that this can refer 
 only to capital punishments, is clear from the testimonies 
 themselves. Besides their ancient confessions of faith 
 testify that they did not deny obedience to magistrates. 
 But as in Perrin's Light and Treasure of Faith they 
 do not absolutely condemn capital punishments, it is 
 doubtful how long they had condemned them, and 
 whether this was the opinion of all the Waldenses, or at 
 all times. 2. Nor, as is imputed to them, did they reject 
 infant-baptism, but only held it a thing not necessary as 
 appears from Reinier himself, who only charges them 
 with holding that the baptism of infants was useless. 
 
xxix 
 
 It appears also from their Spiritual Calendar , that in- 
 fants were by them washed in the sacred font. But as 
 their pastors were frequently absent, they rather chose 
 to omit baptism than to commit their children to the 
 priests, esteeming paedobaptism not of so much necessity ; 
 whence might easily arise the suspicion that they rejected 
 the baptism of infants. 3. Reinier asserts that they re- 
 fused to take evjgn lawful oaths, but he adds that this 
 properly relates only to the perfect, who rather chose 
 death than to take an oath; to the others therefore 
 swearing was not prohibited. The Waldenses also tes- 
 tify in their Spiritual Calendar, that oaths were esteemed 
 lawful amongst them. 
 
 In relating the rise and progress of this sect, regard 
 must be had to the singular testimony of Reinier, in 
 which he affirms this sect to be more pernicious than all 
 the rest for three reasons. 1. Because it is more ancient 
 and of longer standing ; adding that some have traced it 
 to the time of Silvester in the 4th century, and others to 
 the times of the apostles. Reinier in summing up, to- 
 wards the end of his work, gives it as their opinion, 
 " that the church of Christ," these are his own words, 
 remained with the bishops and other prelates until B. 
 Silvester, and then fell oft* until they restored it : how- 
 ever they affirm that there were always some who feared 
 God and were saved." 2. Because it is more general; 
 "For indeed," says he, "there is scarcely any country 
 where this sect is not found." 3. Because it has a pure 
 faith in God, and in the articles of the creed, and a great 
 appearance of piety. This testimony proceeding from 
 their adversary, who lived not far from their times, in 
 the middle of the 13th century, is agreable to truth, and 
 worthy of observation. Some of the pontiffs have ac- 
 cused them of various lusts, and other crimes, but this 
 has been done merely from calumny, and according to 
 their accustomed method of charging those who with- 
 draw from their communion with licentiousness as the 
 cause of that separation; and this the more foolishly, 
 because as every kind of licentiousness abounded in the 
 pontifical society, there was not the least cause for with- 
 drawing on this account. Neither the inquisition of Tou- 
 louse, nor Reinier have any charges of this kind against 
 the Waldenses, but, as we have seen, quite the contrary. 
 
XXX 
 
 The anonymous author, who wrote a treatise concerning 
 the heresy of the poor of Lyons, 2 openly says, " as to 
 what is affirmed of them, that they kiss cats and rats, 
 •and see the devil ; or that having extinguished the 
 lights, they commit promiscuous fornication ; I do not 
 think it belongs to this sect, because the Cathari are 
 said to do this, nor have I learned any of these things 
 in such a way as that I could believe them." That the 
 testimony given respecting their antiquity and increase, 
 is perfectly just, will appear from the history of their 
 rise and progress which I am about to relate. 
 
 Concerning the antiquity of this sect, although the 
 testimony of Reinier is sufficient of itself, there are not 
 wanting other documents. That there were persons of 
 this sect before the time of Waldo, is clear from the 
 ancient treatise concerning Antichrist against the Ro- 
 manists, an. 1120, published by Perrin, in his history of 
 the Waldenses ; and also from an epistle of a certain 
 provost, named Steneld, to Bernard, written before the 
 death of Waldo, a fragment of which is exhibited by 
 Usher from Driedo; where it is related, amongst other 
 things, that some of these men were seized by the ex- 
 cessive zeal of the populace, and thrown into the fire, 
 and that they bore the torment not only with patience 
 but joy. They are also described as persons "who do 
 not trust in the intercessions of the dead, or the prayers 
 of the saints, and who maintain that fasts and other 
 afflictions which are practised on account of sin, are not 
 necessary for the righteous ; and who do not allow the 
 fire of purgatory after death ; nor believe that the body 
 of Christ is present on the altar ; and who affirm that 
 the church of Christ is with them, though destitute of 
 lands and possessions." That the sect is more ancient 
 than Waldo, is proved by Harenberg in Otiis sacris 
 observ. 10, from Bernard de Clairvaux; but it cannot 
 with certainty be affirmed, how great that antiquity is. 
 Some writers, quoted by Usher, refer them to the times 
 of Berengarius, others, as Leger 1. i, c. 11, to Claude of 
 Turin, who under Louis the pious, opposed himself to 
 images, and the dominion of the popes. To these times 
 belong also some pious meditations on particular psalms, 
 
 * Sec Martineti Thesaurum Novum, vol. r>. 
 
xxxi 
 
 breathing a spirit of purity and sound doctrine, and 
 agreeing with the state of a separated church. These 
 appear in Biblioth. Bremen. 1. ii. From that time, it is 
 asserted that persons of this description resided, and 
 were concealed, in the Rhetian and Cottian Alps, and 
 in the vallies of those mountains, who were thence called 
 Waldenses, as I have mentioned above. 
 
 The progress q£ this sect was rapid and extensive, 
 since Reinier testifies, that in his time there was no 
 country free from them. He gives (c. 3,) the following- 
 causes of their increase. 1. Vain-glory, they wishing 
 to be honored like the catholic doctors. 2. Their great 
 zeal, since all of them, men and women, by night and 
 by day, never cease from teaching and learning. He 
 adds what I would wish to be particularly noticed, that, 
 amongst their first instructions, they taught their disci- 
 ples to shun slanders and oaths. 3. Because they trans- 
 lated the old and new testament into the vulgar tongues, 
 and spake and taught according to them. He adds, " I 
 have heard and seen a certain unlearned rustic, who 
 recited the book of Job, word by word, and many who 
 perfectly knew the New Testament." 4. Because they 
 communicated their instruction in secret places and 
 times, nor permitted any to be present except believers. 
 5. The scandal arising from the bad example of certain 
 catholics. 6. The insufficient teaching of others, who 
 preach sometimes frivolously and sometimes falsely. 
 " Hence, whatever a doctor of the church teaches," says 
 he, " which he does not prove from the New Testament, 
 they consider it as entirely fabulous, contrary to the au- 
 thority of the church." 7. The want of reverence with 
 which certain ministers perform the sacraments. 8. The 
 hatred which they have against the church. " I have 
 heard," he proceeds, " from the mouth of the heretics, 
 that they intended to reduce the clergy and the monks 
 to the state of labourers, by taking away their tithes and 
 possessions." He afterwards adds, that in all the cities 
 of Lombardy, and in Provence, and in other kingdoms 
 and nations, there were more schools of heretics than of 
 theologians, and more auditors. They disputed public- 
 ly, and summoned the people to those solemn disputa- 
 tions; besides preaching in the markets, the fields, and 
 the houses, &c. " I was frequently present,*' he adds, 
 
" at the inquisition and examination of the heretics, and 
 their schools are reckoned in the diocese of Pavia to 
 amount to forty-one." He reckons up also the churches 
 belonging to the heretics. Having enumerated the errors 
 of the Albigensian Manicheans, the author of the great 
 Belgian chronicle from Caesarius, A. D. 1208, thus pro- 
 ceeds. " The error of the Albigenses prevailed to that 
 degree, that it had infested as much as a thousand 
 cities, and if it had not been repressed by the swords of 
 the faithful, I think that it would have corrupted the 
 whole of Europe." It happened indeed that when the 
 Waldenses were persecuted and banished by the arch- 
 bishop of Lyons, and Waldo and his companions fled to 
 other regions, from that time they were scattered through 
 Gaul, Italy, Germany, England, and Spain. Some fixed 
 themselves in Narbonne Gaul, which contains the pro- 
 vinces of Provence, Dauphiny, and Savoy ; others fled 
 to the Alps and settled colonies in Piedmont and Lom- 
 bardy. 3 Peter Valdo, having left his country, came to 
 Belgium, and in Picardy, as it is now called, obtained 
 many followers ; he afterwards passed into Germany, 
 and having long journeyed through the cities of the 
 Vandals, at last settled in Bohemia. This is confirmed 
 by Dubravius in his history of Bohemia, who relates that 
 he arrived there about 1184. The Waldenses them- 
 selves, in a conference with the Bohemians, declared 
 that they had been dispersed through Lombardy, Cala- 
 bria, Germany, Bohemia, and other regions, ever since 
 the year 1 160. To this belongs a report that about that 
 time two devils entered Bohemia in human form, teach- 
 ing believers to go naked and sin with impunity, whence 
 arose, in the 15th century, the calumny of the nakedness 
 of the Picards. 4 The author of the Catalogus Testium 
 Veritatis, lib. xv, declares that he was in possession of 
 the consultation of the civilians of Avignon, of the arch- 
 bishops of Narbonne, of Aries, and of Aix ; together with 
 the order of the bishop of Alby for the extirpation of 
 the Waldenses, written 340 years before. At the con- 
 clusion of these consultations, it is said, "that it was 
 
 s See Usher, in loc. cit. and also Thuanus. 
 
 * See Beausobre, De Adamiiis, at the end of V En/ant's History of the 
 Hussite War; where lie demonstrates that the Waldenses had penetrated 
 into Bohemia in that century. 
 
XXX111 
 
 known to every one that the condemnation of the Wal- 
 densian heretics, many years since, was as just as it was 
 public and celebrated." 
 
 The Albigenses were so called from the province of 
 Albi and Toulouse, where they principally inhabited. 
 Albia or Albiga, now Albi, a city in the country of Ca- 
 hors, belonging to Toulouse, formerly joined to the 
 greater Aquitaine, a principal part of Nar bonne Gaul, 
 at that time bore the name of Albigesii, whence the 
 Gallic heretics were called by the general name of Albi- 
 genses. They were dispersed through all that tract of 
 Narbonne Gaul, and through the dioceses of Albi, 
 Quercy, Sens, Rhodez, and the neighbourhood. But 
 the learned are not agreed as to what sect or description 
 they were of. The Roman catholic writers, not the re- 
 cent only, but also the ancient, those of the 13th century, 
 (as Peter de Vaux-Cernai, a Cistertian monk, in a his- 
 tory of the Albigenses dedicated to Innocent III ; Caesar 
 of Heistirbach, in a dialogue concerning miracles ; and 
 the Acts of the inquisition at Toulouse, by Limborch,) 
 paint these men in the blackest colours, as not only 
 Manicheans but of the worst lives and manners. They 
 relate for example that they held as to doctrine, "that 
 there were two Gods and Lords, one good, the father of 
 Christ, the author of invisible and incorruptible things, 
 the other malignant, the author of what is visible and 
 corporeal, the one the author of the Old Testament, the 
 other of the New, so that the former was to be rejected 
 except a few things which were transferred to the New. 
 2. That Christ took flesh, not really but only in appear- 
 ance, so that he was not born of a woman, and that 
 Mary, our Lord's mother, was no other than his church, 
 which obeys the commandments of the father. 3. That 
 there was no resurrection of the body, but that the bo- 
 dies would be spiritual. 4. That human souls were 
 spirits, who fell from heaven on account of their sins. 
 
 As to what belongs to their rites and institutes, 1. 
 They not only in common with the Waldenses rejected 
 the sacraments of the church of Rome, and all other ec- 
 clesiastical rites, but also baptism and the eucharist, hav- 
 ing only retained the imposition of hands. They also 
 called the cross, the detestable sign of the devil. 2. 
 They rejected the orders of the Roman church, denying 
 
xxxiv 
 
 to them, as sinners, all power of- binding and loosing. 3. 
 They were distinguished into two kinds ; one of which 
 was called the perfect or comforted, who professed open- 
 ly their faith and religion, amongst whom they had what 
 they denominated magistrates, deacons, and bishops. 
 The perfect were specially named good men. 5 Others, 
 indeed, made a compact with these, which they termed 
 la convenensa, a convention, that they wished to be re- 
 ceived at the end of life into their sect. Their reception, 
 called hcereticatio, was conducted in this manner ; the 
 perfect held the hands of him who was to be received, 
 between his own, and over him a certain book, from 
 which he read the gospel of John, "In the beginning 
 was the word," as far as, "grace and truth came by Jesus 
 Christ." 6 He handed to him, besides, a slender band, 
 with which he was to be girded as a heretic. There was 
 some difference respecting the reception of women, but 
 of small moment. This reception however, for which 
 they were prepared by certain abstinences, was thought 
 to confer salvation, and therefore was called consolation, 
 and even spiritual baptism ; and was generally deferred 
 to the close of life, and was conferred on the sick, to 
 whom, that they might not return to health, it was pre- 
 scribed to put themselves into endura or abstinence, in 
 order to accelerate their death, for which purpose bath- 
 ing and blood-letting were also used. They who refused 
 this oppressive law, still abstained from all intercourse 
 with men, and even with their wives, lest they should 
 relapse. 4. They rejected matrimony as sensual and 
 unlawful, substituting in its stead a spiritual union. 5. 
 I omit the licentiousness and vices of every kind with 
 which they were charged. 
 
 If these are their true colours, and this their true de- 
 scription, they must have approached near to the Mani- 
 cheans, and the writers of the 1 3th century do certainly 
 make a wide distinction between them and the Walden- 
 ses. Peter, the monk of Vaux-Cernai, lately cited, says, 
 expressly, that they differed widely from the Waldenses, 
 who were not so bad, since in many things they agreed 
 with the Roman church, and differed from it only in a 
 
 • r > Concerning these, see CI. Joecher, Professor at Lcipsic, in his Progr. 
 l)t Bonis Hominibus, at the end of Schmidii Hist. Eccles. p. 3- 
 ♦ ; See also, respecting this rite, Ermengardus contra VaUenseSj c. xiv. 
 
XXXV 
 
 few ; and of whom he thus speaks ; ct To omit many ar- 
 ticles of their unbelief, their error consisted principally 
 in four — the wearing of sandals, in imitation of the apo- 
 stles—the rejection of swearing, and capital punishments, 
 on any occasion — but chiefly in asserting, that any of 
 their body might, if they wore sandals, though they had 
 not received episcopal ordination, make the body of 
 Christ." Reinie^also, and the inquisition of Toulouse, 
 distinguish between the Albigenses and the Waldenses. 
 Bossuet also follows their footsteps in his History of Va- 
 riations &c. /. ii. remarking that the Waldenses agreed 
 with the catholics in the principal points, and were there- 
 fore only schismatics. But what have the protestants 
 to do with this? Because the opinion has been gene- 
 rally spread that the Albigenses and Waldenses were the 
 same, and that the charges of Manicheism, Arianism, 
 &c. which have been made against them are pure calum- 
 nies. Leger, in his history of the Waldenses, 1. i, c. 19, 
 has endeavoured to free them from this imputation, and 
 though his testimonies more particularly apply to the 
 Waldenses, yet he has shown that many of the Albigen- 
 ses were the same. See also the author of the book en- 
 titled La Condemnation de JBabilone, against Bossuet, 
 where he treats of the Waldenses and of their antiquity, 
 and vindicates the purity both of them and the Albigen- 
 ses in faith and manners. But from this decision Lim- 
 borch dissents, arguing that the Albigenses cannot be 
 acquitted of Manicheism. Others take a middle course, 
 as Spanheim, and Basnage in his ecclesiastical history, 
 and more at large in the history of the reformed churches, 
 in which he has inserted copious extracts from the acts of 
 the inquisition at Toulouse. Both these writers allow 
 that there were Manicheans and Arians amongst the 
 Albigenses, who had come from the east into these and 
 other western countries ; but they maintain, that much 
 the greater number of them were pure, though con- 
 founded by the Roman writers. 
 
 I should not however attempt to deny, that there were 
 Manicheans spread through these regions in considerable 
 numbers, and that they were marked by the name of 
 Albigenses, concerning which see Usher and Limborch 
 in the places before cited. I also admit that in this and 
 the following century, the Albigenses and Waldenses 
 
xxxvi 
 
 were currently so distinguished,, as that the former were 
 considered to have, if not the grosser, yet a more subtle 
 form of Manicheism, so far at least as to speak of the 
 devil as another God of this world ; they also esteemed 
 the flesh as the seat of sin, so as to abstain from all com- 
 merce with it, as I have before shewn, and as Limborch 
 proves. But I have not the least doubt that those who 
 were truly Waldenses were also called Albigenses ; for 
 example, Peter de Vaux-Cernai says, " that all the here- 
 tics of Narbonne Gaul were called Albigenses, and the 
 least guilty amongst these were the Waldenses." Wil- 
 liam de Podio Laurentii, in the chronicles of the Albi- 
 genses, distinguishes them as Arians, Manicheans, and 
 Waldenses ; which Benedict proves in his history of the 
 Albigenses, from an epistle of the king of Aragon. 
 Bertrand also, a lawyer of Toulouse, in his book de Ges- 
 tis Tolosanorum, clears from Manicheism the count of 
 Toulouse, the patron of the Albigenses. 7 Finally, since 
 the Albigenses, both of the pure* and those of a Mani- 
 chean faith, had this in common, that they ardently op- 
 posed the external rites of the church, the dominion of 
 the church, and the papal see, it could scarcely be other- 
 wise, but that they should all be included as Manicheans 
 without distinction, in order to afford a better pretext 
 for persecution, and that they might be exposed to 
 universal odium ; as history indeed has exhibited to the 
 eyes of all ages, our own not excepted, that it was against 
 such heretics alone that these deeds were perpetrated. 
 
 These heretics were condemned at a council held at 
 Lombez in Gascony under the bishop of Toulouse in 
 1175, by the name of Good Men, to whom the following 
 errors are imputed. 1. That the Old Testament was of 
 no authority. 2. That a confession of faith was not ne- 
 cessary. 3. That infants are not saved by baptism. 
 
 4. That the eucharist may be consecrated by laymen. 
 
 5. That matrimony was unlawful and not consistent with 
 salvation. 6. That the priests have not alone received 
 the power of binding and loosing. But at the same time 
 there is extant, inserted in the acts, a confession of their 
 faith directly opposed to these errors, to which they add 
 that they are ready to acknowledge whatever can be 
 
 7 See Usher, De Success. Eccles. fyc. c. x. also Basnage, in loc. cit. 
 
XXXV11 
 
 shewn to them from the gospels and the writings of the 
 apostles, to their conviction ; but they refused to take 
 any oath as it was forbidden by both. See Hoveden, 
 Annal. p. 2, who improperly stigmatises them as Arians. 
 At this council they were condemned and expelled. The 
 same was done in a synod at Toulouse, 1178, under the 
 presidency of a legate of the holy see, as the same Hove- 
 den testifies. They were also proscribed by the third 
 council of Lateran in 1 179, as we have related in the his- 
 of Alexander III, which sentence was confirmed by 
 Lucius III, as related by Bernard Abbot of Clair-Vaux 
 in the preface to a treatise against this heresy, who adds 
 that they were summoned by Bernard to a disputation at 
 Narbonne, after which they were condemned." 
 
 After the ample testimonies which have been 
 adduced respecting these ancient heretics, chiefly 
 from their persecutors, it will be sufficient to add 
 a few brief and concluding observations. 
 
 1. That it is an undisputed fact, that sects, 
 under the name of Waldenses, who opposed the 
 authority of the church of Rome, are of very high 
 antiquity ; and that the catholic writers them- 
 selves allow this, without imputing to them any 
 material errors in doctrine or practice. 
 
 2. That the Albigenses, or inhabitants of Lan- 
 guedoc, were, many of them at least, of the same 
 description as the Waldenses, though their ene- 
 mies charge others of them with being atrocious 
 heretics, and men of abandoned morals. 
 
 3. That the persecutors nevertheless destroyed 
 them all indiscriminately, depriving them of all 
 power of defending their characters ; and had, 
 therefore, every temptation and every opportunity 
 for calumniating them. 
 
 d 
 
xxxvm 
 
 4. That the Waldenses who inhabited the ral- 
 lies of Piedmont, remained exempt from perse- 
 cution for nearly two hundred years longer, and 
 were thus able to transmit to posterity monuments 
 for their own vindication. 
 
 5. That the supposed superior orthodoxy of 
 the Waldenses, properly so called, did not pre- 
 serve them from like persecutions, at the instiga- 
 tion of the church of Rome. 
 
 Finally, That we are, therefore, warranted in 
 affirming, that the Albigenses were men who had 
 received their christian principles from the first 
 planting of that religion in Gaul ; and that the 
 great cause of their sufferings was not so much 
 their heretical principles as their opposition to 
 the usurpations and corruptions of the Romish 
 church. 
 
 Notwithstanding the melancholy termination 
 of this history, the reader can scarcely close the 
 volume without a sentiment of exultation, when 
 he considers how powerless are all the attempts 
 of bigotry and persecution to impede the progress 
 of knowledge, and prevent the final triumph of 
 truth. The crusades against the Albigenses, and 
 even the establishment of the tribunal of the 
 inquisition, could not hinder the ultimate spread 
 of their principles through the old and new 
 world. The inhabitants of these countries, the 
 descendents of the persecuted Albigenses, have, 
 in this our day, witnessed the downfal of that 
 
xxxix 
 
 arbitrary monarchy which had so long crushed 
 them to the dust, and the humiliation of that 
 church which had so often compelled them to 
 drink, to the very dregs, the cup of human misery. 
 The cause of toleration — the cause in which they 
 suffered unto death — has been ever since making 
 a steady and resistless progress. The protestant 
 nations have, with few exceptions, acknowledged 
 it as their foundation principle. Many members 
 of the Roman catholic church, and especially 
 those who inhabit these realms, have become its 
 public advocates. In France, the theatre of for- 
 mer persecutions, the protestant religion is, under 
 its influence, recognized by the fundamental laws 
 of the state. In the east, it waves its banner over 
 all the nations of India. In the west, it has esta- 
 blished in America a bulwark for universal liber- 
 ty, and an asylum for the persecuted of every 
 country. England has incorporated it with her 
 civil rights, and it forms an immoveable basis for 
 the British throne. She withholds the full effects 
 of it from the catholics, only till their church 
 has publicly recognized its sacred principles. It 
 has spread the triumphs of religion and libertv 
 through the islands of the pacific ocean ; and is 
 fast gaining an establishment amongst the libera- 
 ted nations of South America. There is but one 
 more battle to be fought, and one more victory 
 to be won, before its triumphs shall be universal. 
 It still remains to wrest from the reluctant grasp 
 
xl 
 
 of the Roman church the thunderbolt of divine 
 vengeance against heresy : and when she shall 
 have been compelled, by the resistless force of 
 public opinion, to recognize, by an authentic and 
 irrevocable act, the rights of conscience, the world 
 will be free. 
 
 June 9th, 1826. 
 
HISTORY OF THE CRUSADES. 
 
 CHAP. I. 
 
 First Crusade, from 1207 to 1209. 
 
 France, during the feudal period, instead of 
 forming an entire monarchy, was submitted to the 
 influence of four kings ; to each of whom a num- 
 ber of grand vassals were subordinate : so that 
 the North of France might be considered as Wal- 
 loon, a name afterwards confined to the French 
 Flemings, and which was then given to the lan- 
 guage spoken by Philip Augustus ; towards the 
 West was an English France ; to the East a 
 German France ; and in the South, a Spanish 
 or Aragonese France. Till the reign of Philip 
 Augustus, the first division possessed the least of 
 extent, of riches, or of power. That monarch, by a 
 concourse of fortunate circumstances rather than 
 by his talents, greatly exalted the splendour of 
 his crown, and extended his dominion over a part 
 
of France much more important than his own 
 inheritance. At the beginning of the thirteenth 
 century, the division which has been indicated 
 did, however, still exist. He had conquered more 
 than half of the English France, but Aquitaine 
 still belonged to England. The Germanic France 
 had still the same limits ; except that, of the three 
 kingdoms of which it was composed, those of 
 Lorraine and Burgundy had more intimately than 
 formerly united themselves with the Empire, so 
 that their history was no longer mingled with that 
 of France. On the contrary, the kingdom of Pro- 
 vence had so much relaxed its connexion with 
 the imperial crown, that its N great vassals might 
 be considered absolutely independent, and the 
 most powerful of its states, the countship of Pro- 
 vence, possessed by the King of Aragon, might be 
 justly denominated the Aragonese France. 
 
 The king of Aragon might, as well as the 
 king of England, be considered a French prince. 
 The greater part of his states, even beyond the 
 Pyrenees and as far as the Ebro, were considered 
 to belong to the ancient monarchy of Charlemagne, 
 and owed homage to the crown of France. Like 
 the king of England, the king of Aragon had ac- 
 quired, either by marriages, or by grants of fief, 
 or by treaties of protection, dominion over a 
 great number of French lords; some of whom did 
 homage to the king of France, others to the em- 
 peror; but all of whom, nevertheless, rendered 
 
3 
 
 obedience only to the Spanish monarch. The 
 Counts of Beam, of Armagnac, of Bigorre, of 
 Cominges, of Foix, and of Roussillon, lived under 
 his protection, and served in his armies. The 
 viscounts of Narbonne, of Beziers, and of Carcas- 
 sonne, regarded him as their count. The lord of 
 Montpellier ha<Tsubmitted to him. The power- 
 ful count of Toulouse, surrounded by his states 
 and vassals, maintained, with difficulty, his own 
 independence against him. The countships of 
 Provence and of Forcalquier belonged solely to 
 him, whilst the other vassals of the kingdom of 
 Aries were eager to obtain his protection. 
 
 Languedoc, Provence, Catalonia, and all the 
 surrounding countries which depended on the 
 king of Aragon, were peopled by an industrious 
 arid intelligent race of men, addicted to com- 
 merce and the arts, and still more to poetry. They 
 had formed the proven^al language; which, sepa- 
 rating itself from the Walloon Roman, or French, 
 was distinguished by more harmonious inflexions, 
 by a richer vocabulary, by expressions more pic- 
 turesque, and by greater flexibility. This language, 
 studied by all the genius of the age, consecrated 
 to the innumerable songs of war and of love, ap- 
 peared at that moment destined to become the 
 first and the most elegant of the languages of mo- 
 dern Europe. Those who used it had renounced 
 the name of Frenchmen for that of Provencals ; 
 they had endeavoured, by means of their lan- 
 
 B 2 
 
4 
 
 guage, to form themselves into a nation, and to se- 
 parate themselves absolutely" from the French, to 
 whom they were indeed inferior in the arts of war, 
 but whom they greatly excelled in all the attain- 
 ments of civilization. 
 
 The numerous courts of the small princes 
 amongst whom these countries were divided as- 
 pired to be models of taste and politeness. They 
 lived in festivity; their chief occupation was tour- 
 naments, courts of love, and of poesy, in which 
 questions of gallantry were gravely decided. The 
 cities were numerous and flourishing. Their forms 
 of government were all nearly republican ; they 
 had consuls chosen by the people, and had long 
 possessed the privilege of forming communes, 
 which rendered them nearly equal to the Italian 
 republics with whom they traded. 
 
 In the midst of such growing prosperity was 
 this lovely region delivered to the fury of count- 
 less hordes of fanatics, its cities ruined, its popu- 
 lation consumed by the sword, its commerce des- 
 troyed, its arts thrown back into barbarism, and 
 its dialect degraded, from the rank of a poetic 
 language, to the condition of a vulgar jargon. 
 This horrible revolution was not, in its commence- 
 ment, directed by the French government ; but 
 some of its consequences were, that the Proven- 
 cals ceased to be a nation, — that the influence of 
 the king of Aragon over a large part of the South 
 of France was destroyed, — and that the power of 
 
5 
 
 the kings of France was, at last, extended to the 
 Mediterranean Sea. 
 
 The preaching of a first religious reformation 
 amongst the provencals w as the occasion of the 
 devastation of this beautiful country. Too early 
 enlightened, proceeding too rapidly in the career 
 of civilization, -these people excited the jealousy 
 and hatred of the surrounding barbarians. A 
 struggle began between the lovers of darkness 
 and those of light, between the advocates of des- 
 potism and those of liberty. The party that wish- 
 ed to arrest the progress of the human mind 
 had on its side the pernicious skill of its chiefs, 
 the fanaticism of its agents, and the number of its 
 soldiers. It triumphed; it annihilated its adver- 
 saries ; and with such fury did it profit by its vic- 
 tory, that the conquered party was never able to 
 rise again in the same province, or amongst the 
 same race of men. 
 
 In the countries which used the Provencal 
 tongue the clergy had been enriched by immense 
 dotations ; but the bishoprics were generally re- 
 served for members of powerful families, who led 
 disorderly lives, whilst the curates and inferior 
 priests, taken from the vassals of the nobility, 
 their peasants and slaves, retained the brutality, 
 the ignorance, and the baseness, of their servile 
 origin. The people of these provinces were too 
 enlightened not to feel contempt for the vices of 
 the ecclesiastics ; and so general was this contempt, 
 
6 
 
 that expressions the most offensive to churchmen 
 were become proverbial. / ivould rather be a 
 priest, said they by imprecation, than have done 
 such a thing/ 1 Nevertheless, the disposition of 
 the people was towards religion ; and that devo- 
 tion which they could not find in the church, 
 they sought for amongst the sectaries. These 
 were numerous in the province ; and the most 
 ancient historian of the persecution affirms, that 
 Toulouse, whose name, says he, ought rather to 
 have been Tota dolosa, had been scarcely ever 
 exempt, even from its first foundation, from that 
 pest of heresy which the fathers transmitted to 
 their children. 2 
 
 Those very persons who punished the secta- 
 ries with frightful torments have alone taken upon 
 themselves to make us acquainted with their opi- 
 nions ; allowing, at the same time, that they had 
 been transmitted in Gaul from generation to gene- 
 ration, almost from the origin of Christianity. We 
 cannot, therefore, be astonished if they have repre- 
 sented them to us with all those characters which 
 might render them the most monstrous, mingled 
 with all the fables which would serve to irritate 
 the minds of the people against those who pro- 
 fessed them. Nevertheless, amidst many puerile 
 or calumnious tales, it is still easy to recognize 
 
 ! Prologus Chronici de Podio Laurentii, p. 666. In Duchesne Script. 
 Franc, torn. v. Histoire de Languedoc, lit. xxi, ch. ii, p. 129. 
 
 2 Petri Vallis Cernai Hist. Albhjens.cap. 1. apud Duchesne Script. Franc, 
 torn, v, p. 555. Le meme; tditio Trecensis 1615, 8vo. 
 
7 
 
 the principles of the reformation of the sixteenth 
 century amongst the heretics who are designated 
 by the name of Vaudois, or Albigeois. Nume- 
 rous sects existed at the same time in the pro- 
 vince; and this was the necessary consequence of 
 the liberty of inquiry which formed the essence of 
 their doctrine :^all agreed, however, in regarding 
 the church of Rome as having absolutely pervert- 
 ed Christianity, and in maintaining that it was she 
 who was designated in the Apocalypse by the 
 name of the whore of Babylon. Some, however, 
 who were distinguished by the name of Vaudois, or 
 Waldenses, did not differ from her on the points 
 which are the most important, whilst others had 
 given such license to their imaginations as al- 
 most to destroy the entire system of revelation. 
 They attributed the Old Testament to the princi- 
 ple of evil ; for God was there represented, they 
 said, as a homicide, who destroyed the human 
 race by a deluge, Sodom and Gomorrah by fire, 
 and the Egyptians by the inundation of the Red 
 Sea. 3 
 
 But, with respect to those who opened the ca- 
 reer to the reformers of the sixteenth century, we 
 recognize their teaching by their denial of the real 
 presence in the eucharist. " If the body of Christ," 
 said they, " was as large as our mountains, it 
 must have been destroyed by the number of 
 those whom they pretend to have eaten of it." 
 
 3 Hist. Albigens. cap. ii, p. 556. 
 
8 
 
 They rejected the sacraments of confirmation, of 
 confession, and marriage, as vain and frivolous ; 
 they charged with idolatry the exposure of ima- 
 ges in the churches; and they named the bells, 
 which summoned the people to the adoration of 
 these images, trumpets of demons. Their teach- 
 ers or priests were contented with a black coat, 
 instead of the pompous vestments of the catholic 
 clergy. After they had caused their proselytes 
 to abjure idolatry, they received them into their 
 church by the imposition of hands and the kiss of 
 peace. Whilst their enemies endeavoured to 
 blacken their reputation by charging them with 
 permitting, in their teaching, the most licentious 
 manners, and with practising, in secret, all kinds 
 of disorders, they still allowed that, in appear- 
 ance, they observed an irreproachable chastity ; 
 that, in their abstinence from all animal food, 
 their rigour exceeded that of the severest monks; 
 that, through their regard for truth, they admit- 
 ted on no occasion any excuse for falsehood ; 
 that, in a word, their charity always prepared 
 them to devote themselves to the welfare of 
 others. 4 Several poems of the Vaudois, written 
 in the twelfth century, and recently published, 
 confirm the resemblance between the doctrine 
 and discipline of the early and later reformers. 5 
 
 4 Petri Vallis Cern. Hist. Albig. de diversis hcereticorum sectis, torn, v, 
 556, 557. 
 
 5 Choix des pofoies originates des Troubadours, torn. ii. La nobla leycaon, 
 lo novel Sermon, fyc. 
 
9 
 
 Activity and zeal for proselytism form another 
 relation between the two reformations. Both be- 
 gan at a period when the human mind, eager for 
 instruction, examined all that it had found esta- 
 blished ; demanded a reason for all obedience ; 
 and, at the same time that it overturned ancient 
 civil dominations, to establish new ones, it also 
 interrogated the ecclesiastical powers, to ascer- 
 tain their foundation. The adoption of the re- 
 formed opinion did not immediately announce 
 itself as a heresy ; it was, in the eyes of the initi- 
 ated, only a project of sanctification ; it was an 
 engagement to greater zeal, to severer morals, to 
 higher sacrifices, to a more constant occupation 
 with spiritual things. Since many prelates of the 
 church had given the example of such reform, 
 those who followed them did not consider them- 
 selves as going astray; and Rome herself had 
 sometimes considered the paterins, the catharins, 
 the poor of Lyon, and all those new religious so- 
 cieties, as so many orders of monks who were 
 rousing the fervour of the public, and who never 
 thought of shaking off her yoke. 6 Innocent III, 
 who, ascended the pontifical throne in the vigour 
 of his age, was the first who appeared to feel the 
 importance of that independent spirit which was 
 already degenerating into revolt. His predeces- 
 sors, engaged in a perilous struggle with the two 
 Henrys, and Frederic Barbarossa, thought their 
 
 6 Muratori Antiq. Ital. Dissert. 60, torn, v, p. 83. 
 
10 
 
 entire force not too much to defend them against 
 the emperors; and, in those times, had themselves 
 accepted the name of paterins, which had been 
 given to their most zealous partisans. 7 But Inno- 
 cent III, whose genius at once embraced and 
 governed the universe, was as incapable of tempo- 
 rising as he was of pity. At the same time that he 
 destroyed the political balance of Italy and Ger- 
 many; that he menaced by turns the kings of 
 Spain, of France, and of England ; that he affect- 
 ed the tone of a master with the kings of Bohe- 
 mia, of Hungary, of Bulgaria, of Norway, and of 
 Armenia ; in a word, that he directed or repres- 
 sed at his will the Crusaders, who were occupied 
 in overturning the Greek empire and in establishing 
 that of the Latins at Constantinople ;— Innocent 
 III, as if he had had no other occupation, watched 
 over, attacked, and punished, all opinions differ- 
 ent from those of the Roman church, all independ- 
 ence of mind, every exercise of the faculty of 
 thinking in the affairs of religion. 8 
 
 Though it was in the countries where the pro- 
 venial language was spoken, and especially in 
 Languedoc, that the reformation of the Paterins 
 had made the greatest progress, it had also spread 
 rapidly in other parts of Christendom, in Italy, in 
 
 ^ Arnulphi Hist. Mediol. lib. iv, c. xi, p. 39. Landulphi Senior. Hist. 
 Mediol. Prolog. 57. In Muratori Script. Ital. torn. iv. 
 
 8 See the immense collection of the letters of Innocent III, in 16 books, 
 of which each contains more than 100 letters : A Steph. Balusio edit. 
 '2 vols, in fol. 1082: see also the most important in Raynaldi Annul. Eccles. 
 
11 
 
 Flanders, in Lorraine, 9 in Germany, and in Spain. 
 Innocent III, both from character and policy, 
 judged that the church ought to keep no measures 
 with the sectaries ; that, if it did not crush them, 
 if it did not exterminate their race, and strike 
 Christendom with terror, their example would 
 soon be follower!, and that the fermentation of 
 mind, which was every where manifest, would 
 shortly produce a conflagration throughout the 
 Roman world. Instead therefore of making con- 
 verts, he charged his ministers to burn the leaders, 
 to disperse the flocks, and to confiscate the pro- 
 perty of every one who would not think as he did. 
 At first, he required of those provinces, where the 
 reformation had made but small progress, to give 
 the example of persecution ; and, in reality, many 
 leaders of the new church perished in the flames 
 at Nevers, in 1198 and the following years. 1 The 
 emperor Otho IV, who regarded himself as a crea- 
 ture of Innocent III, granted him an edict for the 
 destruction of the paterins, called also Gazari? in 
 Italy. But there was a certain number of lords 
 and high barons, who had themselves adopted 
 the new opinions, and who, instead of consent- 
 
 9 The Albigenses, about the year 1200, made proselytes at Metz ; and 
 circulated there the sacred Scriptures, translated from the Latin into 
 the Roman language. Calmet, Histoire de Lorraine, torn, ii, liv. xxii, 
 ch. cxxiv, p. 199. 
 
 1 Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxi, p. 130. Pagi critica ad ann. 1179, § vi, 
 p. 656. 
 
 2 Edictum Ferrarice promulgation, 1210; apud Muratorii Antiq. Itul. 
 dissert. \x,p. 89, 90. 
 
12 
 
 ing to persecute, protected the sectaries. Others 
 saw in them only industrious vassals, whom they 
 could not destroy without affecting their own reve- 
 nues and power. Innocent III, therefore, sought 
 to arm a present interest, and brutal avarice, 
 against this calculating economy of the barons. 
 He abandoned to them the confiscation of all the 
 heretics' property, and exhorted them to take 
 possession of it, after they had banished those 
 whom they had plundered, and threatened them 
 with death if they returned to their homes. At 
 the same time, Innocent 111, laid under an anathe- 
 ma those of the lords who should refuse to seize 
 upon the property of the heretics, and placed their 
 dominions uuder an interdict. 3 
 
 The province of Narbonne was more particu- 
 larly the object of Innocent's attention. In the 
 year 1193, the first of his pontificate, he sent 
 into it two monks of Citeaux, brother Guy and 
 brother Regnier, who may be considered as 
 having laid the foundations of the Inquisition. 
 Their commission was to discover and pursue 
 heresy; being invested, for that purpose, with all 
 the authority of the holy See. The following 
 year the pope named brother Regnier his legate 
 in the four provinces of Embrun, Aix, Aries, and 
 Narbonne, and enjoined upon the four archbi- 
 shops, and all the bishops, to execute scrupulously 
 
 a Innocentii III Epistolce, lib. i, epist. 81, 82. 95. 165. Raynaldi Ann. 
 1198. § 36, 37, p. 11. 
 
13 
 
 the orders of this monk. Regnier having fallen 
 sick, Innocent joined to him Peter of Castelnau, 
 archdeacon of Maguelonne, whose zeal, more fu- 
 rious than that of his predecessors, is worthy of 
 those sentiments which the very name of the in- 
 quisition inspires. 4 
 
 The mission 'of the pope's commissaries, or in- 
 quisitors, was not however limited to scrutinizing 
 the consciences of the heretics, confiscating their 
 property, banishing, or sending them to the stake; 
 they traversed the province, accompanied by a 
 number of friars, who arrived successively to their 
 aid ; they preached and disputed against those 
 who had wandered from the faith; and especially, 
 when the lord of the place favoured the new opi- 
 nions, not being able to employ force, they had 
 recourse to the power of their disputations. They 
 caused judges of these intellectual combats, to 
 be named, beforehand, and, if we may believe their 
 own relations, they always came off victorious. 
 Accustomed to the subtilties of the schools, they 
 pressed their adversaries with captious questions, 
 or unlooked for conclusions, and not unfrequent- 
 ly led them to absurd declarations. Diego d'Aze- 
 bez, bishop of Ozma, and his companion St. Domi- 
 nic, under-prior of his cathedral, who, about the 
 year 1204, fixed themselves in the province, to 
 preach against the heretics, had much success in 
 this kind of disputation ; it even appears that 
 
 4 Hist. Gen. de Langtiedoc, lit. xxi, p. 131. 
 
14 
 
 sometimes they were out of patience with their an- 
 tagonists, for being so unskilful. 5 But when the 
 missionaries had embarrassed their adversaries, 
 or had vanquished them according to all the scho- 
 lastic rules, then they said to the inhabitants of 
 the places where they had found them, "Why do 
 you not drive them out? Why do you not exter- 
 minate them?" — " We cannot," they replied to 
 the bishop of Ozma; " we have been brought up 
 with them, we have relations amongst them, and 
 we seethe goodness of their lives. — "Thus," says 
 a contemporary writer, "does the spirit of false- 
 hood, only by the appearance of a pure and spot- 
 less life, lead away these inconsiderate people 
 from the truth." 6 
 
 Another cause, it is true, abated the persecu- 
 tion. The inquisitors had, by their arrogance, 
 offended all classes of society, and had raised 
 up against themselves a cloud of enemies. Some 
 bishops they accused of simony, others of negli- 
 
 5 In a dispute between the bishop of Ozma and some heretics of Ver- 
 feuil, he asked them how they should understand the name Son of Man, 
 which Jesus always gives himself in St. John, and in particular this pas- 
 sage of St. John iii, 13. "Also no one hath ascended up into heaven, but he who 
 descended from heaven, that is the Son of Man who is in heaven." They 
 answered, that Jesus acknowledged himself as the son of a man who was 
 in heaven " But," rejoined the bishop, " the Lord has said in Isaiah, ' the 
 heaven is my throne and the earth is my footstool.'' The legs of that man who 
 is in the heaven must then be as long as the distance which separates the 
 heavens from the earth." " Without doubt," they replied. "The good 
 God curse you," said the holy bishop, "stupid heretics as you are. I 
 thought you had more subtilty than that." Chronica mayistri Guillelmi de 
 Podio Laurentii, cap. viii. Duchesne Scr. Franc, torn, v, p. 672. 
 
 e Guillelmi de Podio Laurentii, cap. viii, p. C72. 
 
15 
 
 gence in the fulfilment of their duties ; and under 
 such pretences deposed the archbishop of Nar- 
 bonne, and the bishops of Toulouse and Viviers. 
 They offended also all the regular clergy ; and at 
 the same time tormented the count of Toulouse, 
 and all the lords of the country, by accusations 
 continually renewed. Thus they deprived them- 
 selves of the means of kindling so many fires as 
 they could have desired. To gain a little popula- 
 rity, therefore, they took great pains to confound 
 the heretics with the routiers, or hireling soldiers. 
 The companies of these, generally composed, in a 
 great measure, of strangers, were still known, in 
 the South, by the name of bands of Catalans, as 
 they were, in the North, by that of Braban^ons. 
 The routiers were lawless banditti; they pillaged 
 the churches and the priests, but had, in truth, no 
 connexion with the heretics, and took no interest 
 in doctrinal questions and controversies. They, 
 however, were offended with the preachings direct- 
 ed against them, and in their turn avenged them- 
 selves against the missionaries and inquisitors. 7 
 
 The count of Toulouse, Raymond VI, who had 
 cultivated the friendship of the routiers, and who 
 had employed their arms in his frequent wars, 
 shared also their resentments. We know but im- 
 perfectly the history of the count of Toulouse be- 
 fore the crusade. Raymond VI, who succeeded 
 
 f Hist. Gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxi, p. 138. Guillelmi de Podio Laurentii 9 
 cap. vi, p. 670. 
 
16 
 
 to his father, Raymond V, in 1124, at the age of 
 thirty-eight, had already, at the head of these rou- 
 tiers, of whom he had made himself captain, made 
 war against many of his neighbours. He had dis- 
 puted with the barons of Baux, and with many of 
 the lords of Languedoc and Provence, as well as 
 with some of his own vassals ; and this was ap- 
 parently the reason of his seeking the alliance of 
 Peter ll, king of Aragon, whilst his father and 
 his ancestors had, on the contrary, endeavoured 
 to repress the ambition of that house. Raymond 
 VI married his fourth wife, Eleanor, sister of 
 Peter II, about the year 1200; and in 1205 he 
 promised his son, afterwards^ Raymond VII, to 
 Sancha, daughter of the same king, who was but 
 just born. 
 
 Raymond VI was, in the spring of 1207, upon 
 the borders of the Rhone, occupied with the war 
 which he was carrying on against the barons of 
 Baux, and other lords of those countries, when 
 the legate, Peter of Castelnau, undertook to make 
 peace between them. He first made application 
 to the barons, and obtained their promise, that 
 if Raymond VI would acquiesce in their preten- 
 sions, they would employ all their assembled 
 forces in the extermination of the heretics. After 
 having agreed with them upon the form of a trea- 
 ty, the legate returned to the count of Toulouse, 
 and required him to sign it. Raymond VI was 
 nowise inclined to purchase, by the renunciation 
 
17 
 
 of his rights, the entrance into his states of a hostile 
 army, who were to pillage or kill all those of his 
 vassals whom the priests should indicate. He 
 therefore refused his consent, and Peter of Cas- 
 telnau, in his wrath, excommunicated him, laid 
 his country under an interdict, and wrote to the 
 pope, to obtainThe confirmation of the sentence. 8 
 Audacious as was the conduct of his legate, 
 Innocent HI was determined to support him. He 
 appears to have sought for an opportunity to com- 
 mence hostilities; being well persuaded, that after 
 the progress which had been made in the public 
 opinion, the executioners were not sufficient to 
 destroy heresy, but that the whole people must 
 be exposed to the sword of the military. To con- 
 firm the sentence of excommunication pronoun- 
 ced by his legate, he wrote himself to count Ray- 
 mond, on the 29th of May, 1207, and his letter 
 began with these words : " If we could open 
 your heart, we should find, and would point out to 
 you, the detestable abominations that you have 
 committed ; but as it is harder than the rock, it is 
 in vain to strike it with the words of salvation: 
 we cannot penetrate it. Pestilential man ! what 
 pride has seized your heart, and what is your folly, 
 to refuse peace with your neighbours, and to brave 
 the divine laws by protecting the enemies of the 
 faith ? If you do not fear eternal flames, ought you 
 
 8 Petri Vallis Cernai Hist. Albigens, cap. iii, p. 559. Innocentii HI, lib. x. 
 ep. lxix. — Histoire de Languedoc, liv. xxi, c/t. xxvii, p. 146. 
 
not to dread the temporal chastisements which 
 
 you have merited by so many crimes? "9 
 
 So insulting a letter, addressed to a sovereign, 
 must have revolted his pride ; nevertheless, the 
 monk, Peter de Vaux Cernay, tells us, " the wars 
 which the nobles of Provence carried on against 
 him, through the industry of that man of God, 
 Peter de Castelnau, and the excommunication 
 which he published in every place against the 
 count, compelled him, at last, to accept the same 
 conditions of peace, and to engage himself by 
 oath to their observance,- but as often as he swore 
 to observe them, so many times he perjured him- 
 self." 1 
 
 Neither Peter de Castelnau, nor the pope, knew 
 any other means of conversion than war, murder, 
 and fire. In this same year, 1207, Innocent III 
 thought, for the first time, of preaching a crusade 
 against the sectaries; and since the princes of the 
 country appeared too slow in exterminating them, 
 he projected the calling in of strangers to accom- 
 plish this work. On the 17th of November, he 
 wrote to Philip Augustus, exhorting him to de- 
 clare war against the heretics, the enemies of God 
 and the church; and promising him, in reward, in 
 this life the confiscation of all their goods, and in 
 the other, the same indulgences as were granted 
 
 9 Innocentii III, lib. x, ep. lxix. — Hist. Gtn. de Languedoc, liv. xxi, ch. 
 xxxiii, p. 150. 
 1 Petri Vallis Cermi Hist. Albig. liv. 159. 
 
to those, who combated the infidels in the holy 
 land. At the same time, he addressed similar 
 letters to the duke of Burgundy, to the counts of 
 Bar, of Nevers, and of Dreux ; to the countesses 
 of Troie, of Vermandois, and of Blois ; and to all 
 the counts, barons, knights, and faithful, of the 
 kingdom of France. 2 Before, however, these let- 
 ters had produced any effect, a bloody catastrophe 
 redoubled the rage of the pope and the bigots, and 
 kindled the sacred war. 
 
 Count Raymond, when he signed the peace 
 with his enemies, had engaged to exterminate the 
 heretics from his states ; but Peter de Castelnau 
 very soon judged, that he did not proceed in the 
 work with adequate zeal. He went to seek him, 
 reproached him to his face with his indulgence, 
 which he termed baseness, treated him as per- 
 jured, as a favorer of heretics, and a tyrant, and 
 again excommunicated him. This violent scene 
 appears to have taken place at St. Gilles, where 
 count Raymond had given a meeting to the two 
 legates. 
 
 1208. This lord, exceedingly provoked, threat- 
 ened to make Castelnau pay for his insolence with 
 his life. The two legates, disregarding this threat, 
 quitted the court of Raymond without a reconcil- 
 iation, and came to sleep, on the night of the 14th 
 of January, 1208, in a little inn by the side of the 
 
 2 tnnocentii III Epistolce, lib. x, ep. cxlix. 
 
20 
 
 Rhone, which river they intended to pass the next 
 day. One of the count's gentlemen happened to 
 meet them there, or perhaps had followed them. 
 On the morning of the 15th, after mass, this gen- 
 tleman entered into a dispute with Peter de Cas- 
 telnau, respecting heresy and its punishment. The 
 legate had never spared the most insulting epi- 
 thets to the advocates of tolerance, the gentleman 
 already irritated by the quarrel with his lord, and 
 now feeling himself personally offended, drew his 
 poignard, struck the legate in the side, and kill- 
 ed him. 3 The intelligence of this murder excited 
 Innocent III to the greatest excess of wrath. Ray- 
 mond VI had by no means so direct a part in the 
 death of Castelnau, whom the church regarded as 
 a martyr, as had Henry II in the death of Thomas 
 a Becket. But Innocent III was more haughty 
 and implacable, than Alexander III had been. 
 He immediately published a bull, addressed to 
 all the counts, barons, and knights of the four 
 provinces of the Southern Gaul, in which he de- 
 clared that it was the devil who had instigated his 
 principal minister, Raymond, count of Toulouse, 
 against the legate of the holy see. He laid under 
 an interdict, all the places which should afford 
 a refuge to the murderers of Castelnau; he de- 
 manded that Raymond of Toulouse should be 
 
 3 Petri Vallis Cern. cup. viii, p. 563. Historia de los grans faicts d'armas 
 et guerras de Tolosa, p. iii. This is a Languedocian chronicle inserted 
 amongst the proofs of the third volume of the history of Languedoc. — 
 Chronol. Roberti Altissiodorensis, torn. xviii,p. 275. 
 
21 
 
 publicly anathematised in all the churches; "and 
 as," added he, " following the canonical sanctions 
 of the holy fathers, we must not observe faith to- 
 wards those who keep not faith towards God, or 
 who are separated from the communion of the 
 faithful, we discharge, by apostolic authority, all 
 those who believe themselves bound towards this 
 count, by any oath either of alliance or of fidelity ; 
 we permit every catholic man, saving the right of 
 his principal lord, to pursue his person, to occupy 
 and retain his territories, especially for the pur- 
 pose of exterminating heresy." 4 
 
 This first bull was speedily followed by other 
 letters equally fulminating, from Innocent III to 
 all who were capable of assisting in the destruc- 
 tion of the count of Toulouse. He addressed Phi- 
 lip Augustus, exhorting him to carry on in person 
 this sacred war of extermination against heretics, 
 (who are, said he, far worse thau the Saracens,) 
 and to strip the count of Toulouse of all his pos- 
 sessions. He wrote, at the same time to the arch- 
 bishops of Lyons and Tours, to the bishops of 
 Paris and Nevers, and to the abbot of Citeaux, to 
 engage their concurrence in this holy enterprise. 5 
 
 Galono, cardinal deacon of Saint Mary dello 
 Portico, whom the pope sent with these letters to 
 France, does not appear to have obtained much 
 credit with King Philip, who was, at that time, 
 
 4 Petri Vdllis Cent. cap. viii,p. 564. 
 
 r> Innocentii 111, Epist. lib. xi, Ep. 27, 28. 30. 32, &c. 
 
22 
 
 more occupied by his rivalry with the King of 
 England, and with Otho of Germany, than with 
 heresy. 6 But the monks of Citeaux, who had, at 
 the same time, received powers from Rome, to 
 preach the crusade amongst the people, gave them- 
 selves to the work with an ardour which had not 
 been equalled even by the hermit Peter, or Foul- 
 ques deNeuilly. Innocent III, impelled by hatred, 
 had offered to those who should take the cross 
 against the Provencals, the utmost extent of in- 
 dulgence which his predecessors had ever grant- 
 ed to those who laboured for the deliverance of 
 the holy land. As soon as these new Crusaders 
 had assumed the sacred sign of the cross, (which, 
 to distinguish themselves from those of the East, 
 they wore on the breast instead of the shoul- 
 ders,) they were instantly placed under the pro- 
 tection of the holy see, freed from the payment of 
 the interest of their debts, and exempted from the 
 jurisdiction of all the tribunals; whilst the war 
 which they were invited to carry on, at their doors, 
 almost without danger or expense, was to expiate 
 all the vices and crimes of a whole life. The be- 
 lief in the power of these indigencies, which we 
 can scarcely comprehend, was not yet abated; 
 the barons of France never doubted, that, whilst 
 fighting in the holy land they had the assurance 
 of paradise. But those distant expeditions had 
 
 e Lettre de Philippe Auguste d Raymond, dans les preuves de VHistoire de 
 lAingnedoc y torn, iii, p. 210. 
 
23 
 
 been attended with so many disasters ; so many 
 hundreds of thousands had perished in Asia, or 
 by the way, from hunger, or misery, or sickness, 
 that others wanted courage to follow them. It 
 was then, with transports of joy, that the faithful 
 received the new pardons which were offered them, 
 and so much the more, that far from regarding the 
 return they were called upon to make, as painful 
 or dangerous, they would willingly have under- 
 taken it for the pleasure alone of doing it. War 
 was their passion, and pity for the vanquished had 
 never troubled their pleasure. The discipline of 
 the holy wars was much less severe than that of 
 the political, whilst the fruits of victory were much 
 more alluring. In them, they might, without re- 
 morse, as well as without restraint from their of- 
 ficers, pillage all the property, massacre all the 
 men, and violate the women and children. The 
 crusaders to the East well knew that the distance 
 was so greaf, as to give them little chance of bring- 
 ing home the booty which they had gained by their 
 swords; but instead of riches, which the faithful 
 were to seek at a distance, and tear from barba- 
 rians, of whose language they were ignorant, they 
 were offered the harvest of a neighbouring field, 
 the spoil of a house which they might carry to 
 their own, and captives, abandoned to their de- 
 sires, who spoke the same language with them- 
 selves. Never therefore had the cross been taken 
 up with a more unanimous consent. The first to 
 
24 
 
 engage, through the commands of their pastors, 
 in this war which was denominated sacred, were 
 Eudes III, duke of Burgundy; Simon de Mont- 
 fort, count of Leicester ; the counts of Nevers, of 
 St. Paul, of Auxerre, of Geneve, and of Forez. 7 
 The abbot of Citeaux, Arnold Amalric, distin- 
 guished himself with his whole congregation, by 
 his zeal in preaching this war of extermination ; 
 the convents of his order (the Bernardins), of 
 which there were already seven or eight hundred 
 in France, Italy, and Germany, appropriated the 
 Crusade against the Albigenses as their special 
 province. In the name of the pope, and of the 
 apostles St. Peter and St. Paul, they promised, 
 to all who should perish in this holy expedition, 
 plenary absolution of all sins, committed from the 
 day of their birth, to that of their death. But 
 whilst the Bernardins were recruiting soldiers for 
 the cross, Innocent III charged a new congrega- 
 tion, (at the head of which he placed the Spaniard, 
 Saint Dominic,) to go on foot, two by two, through 
 the villages, to preach the faith in the midst of 
 them, to enlighten them by controversial dis- 
 cussions, to display to them all the zeal of Christ- 
 ian charity, and to obtain from their confidence, 
 exact information as to the number and dwellings 
 of those who had wandered from the church, in 
 
 7 Rigordus de Gestis Philippi Augusti, p. 62 ct finis. Guillelm. Ar- 
 
 moricus, p. 82. Chroniques de Saint -Denys, p. 394. Hist. gen. de 
 
 Languedoc, liv. xxi, ch. xli, p. 156. Historia de los grans faicts d'armas, 
 
 p. 4. 
 
25 
 
 order to burn them when the opportunity should 
 arrive. Thus began the order of the preaching 
 brethren of St. Dominic, 8 or of the inquisitors, 
 The new bishop of Toulouse, Foulques, or Fou- 
 quet, a native of Marseilles, who had formerly 
 distinguished hisaself as a troubadour, and who, 
 quitting love and poetry, had thrown himself into 
 the ranks of the persecutors, appears to have sug- 
 gested to Innocent III the principal rules of this 
 order, the experiment of which was made for seven 
 years in his diocese, before the pope confirmed it 
 in the council of Lateran. 9 
 
 1208. The crusaders were not ready to march 
 this year, but their immense preparations resound- 
 ed throughout Europe, and filled Languedoc with 
 terror. It was well known that the countries 
 destined to vengeance and extermination, by the 
 monks of Citeaux, as being more particularly the 
 seats of heresy, were the states of Raymond VI, 
 count of Toulouse, and those of his nephew Ray- 
 mond Roger viscount of Alby, Beziers, Carcas- 
 sonne, and Limoux in Rasez. Although Raymond 
 of Toulouse had been a soldier of some distinc- 
 tion, he was mild, feeble, and timid, desirous of 
 saving his subjects from confiscations and punish- 
 ments, but still more desirous of saving himself 
 from persecution. His nephew, on the contrary, 
 
 8 Guillelmi de Podio Laurentii, cap. x, p. C73. 
 
 9 Theodoricus in Vita Sancti Dominici, lib. i, cap. uli. Apud Surium t 
 torn, iv, die 4 Augusii. — Raynaldi Annal. 1215, § xvii,p. 245. 
 
20 
 
 was generous, lofty, and impetuous : he was twen- 
 ty-four years of age ; he had succeeded his father 
 fourteen years before, and during his minority his 
 states had been governed by guardians inclined 
 to the new doctrines. These two princes, having 
 learned that Arnold, abbot of Citeaux, leader of 
 the crusade, had been nominated, by the pope, his 
 legate in those provinces from which he designed 
 to eradicate heresy, and that he had assembled a 
 council of the chiefs of the sacred war, at Aube- 
 naz, in the Vivarais, went thither to avert the 
 storm, if possible. They protested that they were 
 strangers to heresy; that they were innocent of 
 the death of Peter of Castelnan ; and they deman- 
 ded at least to be heard, before they were con- 
 demned. The legate received them with extreme 
 haughtiness, declared that he could do nothing 
 for them, and that, if they wished to obtain any 
 mitigation of the measures adopted against them, 
 they must address themselves to the pope. Ray- 
 mond Roger perceived by this language, that no- 
 thing was to be expected from negotiation, and 
 that there remained no alternative but to place 
 garrisons in all their strong towns, and to prepare 
 valiantly for their defence. But Raymond VI, 
 overwhelmed with terror, declared himself ready 
 to submit to any thing; to be himself the executor 
 of the violence of the ecclesiastics against his own 
 subjects; and to make war against his family, ra- 
 ther than draw the crusaders into his states. The 
 
27 
 
 two relations, not being- able to agree upon the 
 conduct they were to pursue, separated, with re- 
 proaches and menaces. Raymond Roger retired 
 into his states, and immediately put himself into 
 a defensive condition; he even began hostilities 
 against the count- of Toulouse, whose attacks he 
 apprehended: whilst Raymond VI, after having 
 assembled his most faithful servants at Aries, en- 
 gaged the archbishop of Auch, the abbot of Con- 
 dom, the prior of the Hospitalers of Saint Gilles, 
 and Bernard, lord of Rabasteens in Bigorre, to 
 proceed to Rouen, in order to offer his submission 
 to Innocent III, and receive his indulgence. 1 
 
 Raymond VI at the same time applied for the 
 protection of his cousin, Philip Augustus King 
 of France, and that of Otho King of Germany. 
 The former at first received him with fair words, 
 but afterward took occasion from the solicitations 
 of Raymond to his rival, Otho, to refuse him all 
 assistance/ The ambassadors of Raymond to 
 the Pope, were on the contrary, received with 
 apparent indulgence. It was required of them 
 that their master should make common cause 
 with the crusaders ; that he should assist them in 
 exterminating the heretics; and that he should 
 surrender to them seven of his best castles, as a 
 pledge of his intentions. Upon these conditions 
 
 1 Historia de las Annas, p. 4, 5, 6. Hist, de Langiiedoc, liv. xxi, ch. xlii, 
 p. 157. Hist, Albigais. Petri Vallis Cern. c. is., p. 566. 
 
 2 Guillelmi de Podio Laurentii, cap. xiii, p. 674. 
 
the pope not only gave Raymond the hope of 
 absolution, but promised him his entire favour. 3 
 Innocent III was, however, far from having par- 
 doned Raymond in the bottom of his heart. For, 
 at this same epoch, he wrote to the bishops of 
 Riez and Conserans, and to the abbot of Citeaux, 
 " We counsel you, with the apostle Paul, to em- 
 ploy guile with regard to this count, for in this 
 case it ought to be called prudence. We must 
 attack, separately, those who are separated from 
 unity, leave for a time the count of Toulouse, em- 
 ploying towards him a wise dissimulation, that 
 the other heretics may be the more easily defeated, 
 and that afterwards we may crush him when he 
 shall be left alone." 4 We cannot but remark, 
 that whenever ambitious and perfidious priests 
 had any disgraceful orders to communicate, they 
 never failed to pervert, for this purpose, some 
 passages of the holy Scriptures ; one would say 
 that they had only studied the Bible to make 
 sacrilegious applications of it. 
 
 All the fanatics whom the preachings of the 
 monks of Citeaux had engaged to devote them- 
 selves to the sacred war began to move in the 
 spring of the year 1209. The indulgences of the 
 crusade had been offered to them on the lowest 
 terms ; they were required to make a campaign 
 
 3 Historia de losfaicts d'armas,p. 6. Petri Ceriu Hist. Albigens. cap. xi. 
 p. 567. 
 
 4 Innocentii III Epist. lib. xi. Ep. 232. Hist. gSn. de Languedoc, lit. xxi. 
 p. 160. 
 
29 
 
 of only forty flays, (to which the greater part of the 
 vassals were obliged by the service of their fiefs,) 
 in exchange for eternal salvation. The shorter 
 the service was, the better it suited the neighbour- 
 ing provinces. 
 
 It was, in fac*, principally amongst the near 
 neighbours of the Albigenses, that the Bernardins 
 found means to draw after them nearly the whole 
 population. Some authors have spoken of three 
 hundred, or even of five hundred thousand pil- 
 grims or crusaders, who precipitated themselves 
 upon Languedoc ; the abbot of Vaux Cernay reck- 
 ons but fifty thousand in this first campaign, and 
 the smallest number is the most probable, especi- 
 ally in that age when very numerous armies were 
 so seldom seen. We must not, however, include 
 in this calculation the ignorant and fanatical mul- 
 titude which followed each preacher, armed with 
 scythes and clubs, and promised to themselves 
 that if they were not in condition to combat the 
 knights of Languedoc, they might, at least, be able 
 to murder the women and children of the heretics. 
 Several places had been assigned for the assem- 
 bling of the crusaders. Arnold Amalric, abbot of 
 Citeaux, legate of the pope, and chief director 
 of the crusade, collected at Lyons the greatest 
 number of combatants, principally those who had 
 taken arms in the kingdom of Aries, and who 
 were vassals of Otho IV; the archbishop of Bour- 
 deaux had assembled a second body in the Age- 
 
30 
 
 nois ; these were subjects of the king of England ; 
 the bishop of Puy commanded a third body in 
 the Yelay, who were subjects of Philip Augustus. 5 
 
 When count Raymond VI learned that these 
 terrible bands of fanatics were about to move, 
 and that they were all directed towards his states, 
 he hastened to represent to the pope, that the 
 legate Arnold, who conducted them, was his 
 personal enemy, and " it would be unjust" said 
 he " to profit by my submission, to deliver me to 
 the mercy of a man who would listen only to his 
 resentment against me." To take from the count 
 of Toulouse, in appearance, this motive for com- 
 plaint, Innocent III named a new legate, Milon 
 his notary or secretary ; but far from endeavour- 
 ing, by this means, to restrain the hatred of the 
 abbot of Citeaux, his only aim was to deceive 
 Raymond ; " for the lord pope expressly said to 
 this new legate, let the abbot of Citeaux do every 
 thing, and be thou only his organ ; for in fact the 
 count of Toulouse has suspicions concerning him, 
 whilst he does not suspect thee." 6 
 
 The nearer the crusaders approached, the more 
 the count of Toulouse, who had given himself 
 into their power, was struck with terror. On 
 the one hand, he endeavoured to gain the affec- 
 tions of his subjects, by granting new privileges to 
 
 5 Petri Vallis Cern. Hist. Albigens. cap. xvi, p. 571. Historia de losfaicts 
 d'armas, p. 8 et seq. Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxi, ch. liii, p. 167, 168. 
 
 6 Hist. Albigens. Petri Vail. Cern. cap. x, p. 566. 
 
31 
 
 some, and pardoning' the offences of others who 
 had incurred his resentment; 7 on the other hand, 
 he consented to purchase his absolution from the 
 hands of the pope's legate, by the most humiliating 
 concessions. He consigned to the apostolic no- 
 tary seven of his principal castles, as a pledge of 
 his fidelity ; he permitted the consuls of his best 
 cities to engage to abandon him if he should depart 
 from the conditions imposed upon him ; he sub- 
 mitted beforehand, to the judgment which the 
 legate should pronounce upon fifteen accusations 
 which the agents of the persecution had laid 
 against him ; and finally, he suffered himself on 
 the 18th of June to be conducted into the church 
 of St. Gilles, with a cord about his neck and his 
 shoulders naked, and there received the discipline 
 around the altar. After all these humiliations, he 
 was allowed to take the cross against the heretics, 
 and it was by favour that he was permitted to join 
 those who were about to attack his nephew, be- 
 coming their guide for that purpose. 8 
 
 The principal army of the crusaders descended 
 the valley of the Rhone by Lyons, Valence, Mon- 
 telimart and Avignon. The count of Toulouse 
 went to meet it at Valence ; he conducted it to 
 Montpellier where it passed some days. In this 
 city the young Raymond Roger, viscount of Be- 
 
 " Remissio Consulibus et habit at oi^ibus Nemausi: — Preuves de Languedoc, 
 p. 211. 
 
 8 Acta inter Innocentii Epistolas, torn, ii, p. 347, et scq. Hist. Albigens. 
 Petri, cap. xii, p. 568. Hut. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxi, p. 162. 
 
32 
 
 ziers, came also to seek the legate with a view of 
 making his peace. According to the ancient chro- 
 nicle of Toulouse, he told him " that he had done 
 the Church no wrong, and wished to do none ; 
 but that if his people and officers had received 
 and supported any heretics or other persons, in 
 his domain, that he was innocent of it and not to 
 blame : and that those ought to pay and satisfy, 
 and not he, considering his disposition ; and that 
 the said officers had always governed his territory 
 to this hour; praying and supplicating the said 
 legate and council, to receive him to mercy, for 
 he was servant to the church, and for her wished 
 to live and die towards and against everyone." — 
 To which the legate replied that what he had to 
 do was to defend himself the best that he could, 
 for he should shew him no mercy. 9 
 
 Indeed, from that time, the viscount of Beziers 
 thought only of making a vigorous defence. He 
 called to him all his vassals, all his friends and al- 
 lies, and communicated to them the offers which 
 he had made ; he informed them of the manner in 
 which they had been received, and found them as 
 determined as he was, to defend themselves. It 
 was very far from being the case, that all who 
 took arms with him were heretics, but the mass 
 of the crusaders, whose arrival they had beheld, 
 was so disorderly, so eager to shed blood, in 
 
 9 Historia dc los faicts d'arnias dc Tolosa, \k 7 
 
33 
 
 honour of the church, so impatient for action, 
 without asking or receiving any explanation, that 
 no one dared to take the chance of its errors, and 
 that all the barons and knights were eager to shut 
 themselves up in their castles, to summon their 
 peasants, and to provision themselves there, that 
 they might be able to resist the first attack. Some 
 castles, as Servian and Puy-la-roque, were aban- 
 doned at the approach of these fanatics ; others, 
 as Caussadi and St. Antonin, where there was no 
 suspicion of heretics, ransomed themselves by 
 heavy contributions. Yillemur was burned. Chas- 
 seneuil, after a vigorous resistance, capitulated. 
 The garrison obtained permission to retire with 
 what they could carry, but the inhabitants, being 
 suspected of heresy, were abandoned to the mer- 
 cy of the legate. The crusaders regarded their 
 capture as the object and recompense of their en- 
 terprise. Men and women were all precipitated 
 into the flames, amidst the acclamations of their 
 ferocious conquerors : all the wealth found in the 
 castle was afterwards given up to pillage. 1 
 
 But Raymond Roger had chiefly calculated on 
 the defence of his two great cities, Beziers, and 
 Carcassonne ; he had divided between them his 
 most valiant knights, and the routiers who were 
 attached to his fortune. He had first visited Be- 
 ziers to assure himself that this place was provi- 
 
 i Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxi, ch. lvi, p. 168. Historia de los faicts 
 d'urmas f p. 18. 
 
34 
 
 ded with every thing, and to exhort the citizens 
 valiantly to defend their lives. He had then shut 
 himself up in Carcassonne, a city built upon a 
 rock partly surrounded by the river Aude, and 
 whose two suburbs were themselves encircled by 
 walls and ditches. The citizens of Beziers felt 
 themselves intimidated, when they knew that their 
 young viscount quitted them for a place of greater 
 strength; their inquietude redoubled when they 
 saw the crusaders arrive, whose three bodies uni- 
 ted under their walls after the middle of July 
 1209. They had been preceded by Reginald of 
 Montpeyroux bishop of Beziers, who after having 
 visited the legate, and delivered to him a list of 
 those, amongst his flock, whom he suspected of 
 heresy, and whom he wished to see consigned to 
 the flames, returned to his parishioners, to repre- 
 sent the dangers to which they were exposed, and 
 to exhort them to surrender their fellow citizens 
 to the avengers of the faith, rather than to draw 
 upon themselves, and upon their wives and chil- 
 dren, the wrath of heaven and the church. " Tell 
 the legate," replied the citizens, whom he had 
 assembled in the cathedral of St. Nicaise, " that 
 our city is good and strong, that our Lord will 
 not fail to succour us in our great necessities, and 
 that, rather than commit the baseness demanded 
 of us, we would eat our own children." Never- 
 theless, there was no heart so bold as not to 
 tremble, when the pilgrims were encamped under 
 
35 
 
 their walls ; " and so great was the assemblage 
 both of tents and pavilions, that it appeared as if 
 all the world was collected there ; at which those 
 of the city began to be greatly astonished, for 
 they thought they were only fables, what their 
 bishop had come to tell them, and advise them." 2 
 The citizens of Beziers, though astonished, were 
 not discouraged : whilst their enemies were still 
 occupied in tracing their camp, they made a 
 sally, and attacked them at unawares. But the 
 crusaders were still more terrible, compared with 
 the inhabitants of the south, by their fanaticism 
 and boldness, than by their numbers. The infan- 
 try alone sufficed to repulse the citizens with 
 great loss. At this instant, all the battalions of 
 the besiegers, precipitating themselves upon them 
 at the same time, pursued them so eagerly that 
 they entered the gates with them, and found 
 themselves masters of the city before they had 
 even formed their plan of attack. The knights, 
 learning that they had triumphed without fighting, 
 inquired of the legate, Arnold Amalric, abbot of 
 Citeaux, how they should distinguish the catholics 
 from the heretics, who made them this much 
 f celebrated reply: "Kill them all; the JLord ivill 
 know well those ivho are his." 3 
 
 2 Historia de losfaicts de Tolosa, p. 9, 10. Historia Albigens. Petri Val. 
 Cern. cap. xv, p. 570. Prceclara Francor.facinora: apud Duchesne, torn, v, 
 p. 765. Bernardi Guidonis Vita lnnocentii III, p. 481. apud Muratorii, 
 torn. Hi, Script. Ital. 
 
 3 Ccesar Heisterbachiensis, lib. v, cap. 21. In Biblinthcca Patrum Cister- 
 
36 
 
 The fixed population of Beziers did not, per- 
 haps, exceed fifteen thousand persons ; but all 
 the inhabitants of the country, of the open villages, 
 and of the castles which had not been judged 
 capable of defence, had taken refuge in this city, 
 which was regarded as exceedingly strong ; and 
 even those who had remained to guard the strong 
 castles, had, for the most part, sent their wives 
 and children to Beziers. This whole multitude, 
 at the moment when the crusaders became mas- 
 ters of the gates, took refuge in the churches ; the 
 great cathedral of Saint Nicaise contained the 
 greater number; the canons, clothed with their 
 choral habits, surrounded the altar, and sounded 
 the bells as if to express their prayers to the furi- 
 ous assailants ; but these supplications of brass 
 w ere as little heard as those of the human voice. 
 The bells ceased not to sound, till, of that im- 
 mense multitude, which had taken refuge in the 
 church, the last had been massacred. Neither 
 were those spared who had sought an asylum in 
 the other churches ; seven thousand dead bodies 
 were counted in that of the Magdalen alone. 
 When the crusaders had massacred the last living 
 creature in Beziers, and had pillaged the houses 
 of all that they thought worth carrying off, they 
 set fire to the city, in every part at once, and re- 
 duced it to a vast funereal pile. Not a house 
 
 ciensium, torn, ii, p. 139. Raynaldi Annul. Eccles. 1209, § xxii, p. 186. Hist, 
 de Langwedoc, liv. xxi, ch. lvii, p. 169. 
 
37 
 
 remained standing, not one human being alive. 
 Historians differ as to the number of victims. 
 The abbot of Citeaux, feeling some shame for the 
 butchery which he had ordered, in his letter to 
 Innocent III reduces it to fifteen thousand, others 
 make it amount to sixty. 4 
 
 The terror inspired by the massacre at Beziers, 
 caused all the country places to be deserted. 
 None appeared strong enough to resist an army, 
 which, in a single day, had taken and destroyed 
 the capital. The inhabitants preferred taking 
 refuge in the woods and mountains, to waiting 
 for such enemies, within the enclosure of walls, 
 which might serve them for a prison. As there 
 was not a knight in all France whose dwelling 
 was not fortified, the number of castles, in the 
 two dioceses of Beziers and Carcassonne, was 
 immense ; but the crusaders found more than a 
 hundred of them deserted. They still advanced, 
 however, unsatiated with blood, and on the 1st of 
 August arrived before Carcassonne. That city 
 was then entirely built on the right of the Aude; 
 the young viscount had augmented its fortificati- 
 ons, and it was defended by a numerous garrison. 
 On the following day an attack was made upon 
 
 * Hist. gin. de Languedoc, liv. xxi, ch. lvii, p. 169. Historia do losfaicts 
 d'armasde Tolosa,p. 11. Chronicon Guillelmi de Nangis,p. 488. Guillelmus 
 Armoricus, p. 92. Philippidos, lib. viii, p. 220. Innocentii III Epist. lib. xii. 
 Ep. 108. Chron. de St. Denys, p. 403. Roberti Altissiodorens. torn, xviii, 
 p. 276. Bernard Itier of Limoges, a contemporary, makes the number 
 of the slain 38,000 : Chroiiicon, torn, xviii, p. 227, and Alberic, monk of 
 the three fountains, 60,000: Ibid. p. 775. 
 
38 
 
 one of the suburbs, and after a combat of two 
 hours, during- which Raymond Roger on one 
 side, and count Simon de Montfort on the other, 
 gave proofs of extraordinary valour, it was taken. 
 The assailants then proceeded to the attack of 
 the second suburb, but were repulsed with loss. 
 For eight days the besieged continued to defend 
 it with success ; they at last evacuated it, and 
 having set it on fire, they abandoned it to their 
 enemies, and retired into the city. 5 
 
 King Peter II of Aragon, whom the viscount of 
 Beziers had acknowledged as his lord, beheld 
 with chagrin the oppression of that young prince, 
 his nephew. He came to the camp of the crusa- 
 ders, he addressed himself to the count of Tou- 
 louse, his brother-in-law, whom he saw compelled 
 to follow and second the enemies of his country ; 
 he offered himself as mediator between him, the 
 duke of Burgundy, and the legate, on one side, 
 and the viscount on the other. Before they en- 
 tered on any conditions, the abbot Arnold of Ci- 
 teaux, who wished to obtain some information as 
 to the state of the besieged, engaged the King of 
 Aragon to enter himself into the city, to confer 
 with Raymond Roger. The young viscount, after 
 giving his lively thanks, said to him, " If you wish 
 to arrange for me any adjustment, in the form and 
 manner which shall appear to you fitting, I will 
 
 s Historia de losjuicts de Tolosa,p. 12. Petri Vol, Cern. Hist. Albigens. 
 ••tip. xvi, p. 571. Hist. gc'n. de Lunguedoc, Uv. xxi, ch. lxxix, p. 171. 
 
39 
 
 accept and ratify it without any contradiction; for 
 I see clearly, that we cannot maintain ourselves 
 in this city, on account of the multitude of coun- 
 trymen, women, and children, who have taken 
 refuge here. We cannot reckon them, and they 
 die every day in great numbers. But were there 
 only myself and my people here, I swear to you, 
 that I would rather die of famine, than surrender 
 to the legate." When the king of Aragon had re- 
 lated this discourse to the Abbot of Citeaux, he 
 could better judge what sort of propositions he 
 might make to a generous man, with the assur- 
 ance that they would not be accepted ; for whilst 
 he dared not absolutely repel such a mediator as 
 the king of Aragon, yet he wished not to have a 
 peace which should suspend the massacres. He 
 therefore caused the viscount to be informed, that 
 the only terms which could be granted him were, 
 that he might quit the city with twelve others, 
 and that the remainder of the citizens and soldiers 
 should be abandoned to his good pleasure." " Ra- 
 ther than do what the legate demands of me," re- 
 plied Raymond Roger, " I would suffer myself to 
 be flayed alive. He shall not have the least of my 
 company at his mercy, for it is on my account 
 they are in danger." Peter II approved the ge- 
 nerosity of his nephew, and turning towards the 
 knights and citizens of Carcassonne, to whom 
 these conditions had also been announced, he 
 said to them, " You now know what you have to 
 
40 
 
 expect; mind and defend yourselves well, for he 
 who defends himself always finds good mercy at 
 last.' 0 
 
 The king of Aragon was scarcely departed, be- 
 fore the crusaders made an assault upon the walls. 
 They endeavoured to fill the ditches with faggots, 
 which they brought for that purpose, encouraging 
 each other by loud shoutings. But, as soon as 
 they approached the walls, the besieged poured 
 upon them streams of boiling water and oil, they 
 crushed them with stones and projectiles of every 
 kind, and forced them to retire. The attack was 
 prolonged, and many times renewed, but the as- 
 sailants were at last obliged to retreat with great 
 loss. The time was now approaching when the 
 greater part of the crusaders would have finished 
 their forty days' service; they had reckoned upon 
 a miracle in their favour, and already had been 
 repulsed in two assaults. The legate remarked 
 in his army some symptoms of discouragement ; 
 he therefore employed a gentleman related to the 
 viscount, who happened to be with him, to enter 
 into the city and renew the negociations. Ray- 
 mond Roger, on his side, greatly desired an ho- 
 nourable capitulation, for he began to perceive 
 the failure of water in the cisterns of the city, which 
 the extreme heat of the season had dried up. He 
 was so fully satisfied of the rectitude of his pro- 
 ceedings, that he could not but believe, when the 
 
 6 Historia de losfaicts de Tolosa, p. 15. 
 
41 
 
 injustice of which he had been the victim should 
 be known, that it would excite the commiseration 
 of the great lords and the ecclesiastics, whom zeal 
 for Christianity had alone armed against him. He 
 persuaded himself, that if he could gain a hearing- 
 he should be able to remove all the difficulties 
 which he had hitherto encountered, and he only 
 asked of the mediator who presented himself, to 
 procure him a safe conduct, that he might repair 
 to the camp of the crusaders. He obtained, both 
 from the legate and the lords of the army, the 
 most complete guarantee for his safety and liberty, 
 and the promise of the crusaders was confirmed 
 by oaths. He then quitted the city, attended by 
 three hundred knights, and presented himself at 
 the tent of the legate, where all the principal lords 
 of the army were assembled. After having nobly 
 and powerfully defended his conduct, he declared 
 that he submitted, as he had always done, to the 
 orders of the church, and that he awaited the de- 
 cision of the council. 
 
 But the legate was profoundly penetrated with 
 the maxim of Innocent III, that " to keep faith 
 with those ivho have it not, is an offence against the 
 faith" He caused the young viscount to be ar- 
 rested with all the knights who had followed him, 
 and confided him to the care of Simon de Mont- 
 fort. By this treachery, he thought to strike with 
 terror the souls of the inhabitants of Carcassonne; 
 but the effect of it was precisely to withdraw from 
 
42 
 
 his power the victims whom he had destined to 
 the flames. The citizens were acquainted with a 
 secret passage by which they could escape from 
 the town. It was a cavern, three leagues in 
 length, which goes from Carcassonne as far as the 
 towers of Cabardes. During the night they es- 
 caped by this cavern, abandoning all their riches 
 to the avidity of their enemies. The next morn- 
 ing, the besiegers were astonished at not seeing 
 any person on the walls of the city ; but it re- 
 quired a considerable time to convince them that 
 it was entirely deserted.' They then entered, and 
 the legate took possession of the spoil in the name 
 of the church, excommunicating those of the cru- 
 saders who should have appropriated the smallest 
 part. Nevertheless, he thought himself obliged 
 to dissemble the villainy to which he had had re- 
 course, and which had so badly succeeded. He 
 announced that on the 15th of August, the day of 
 the occupation of the city, he had signed a capit- 
 ulation, by which he permitted all the inhabitants 
 to quit it with their lives only. He thought it also 
 proper, for the honour of the holy church, not to 
 let it be supposed that all the heretics had es- 
 caped him. His scouts had collected in the fields 
 a certain number of prisoners, and amongst the 
 fugitives from Carcassonne some had been over- 
 taken and brought to the camp. He had in his 
 hands, besides, the three hundred knights who had 
 accompanied the viscount. Out of all these, he 
 
43 
 
 made choice for execution of four hundred and 
 fifty men and women, who might be suspected of 
 heresy. Four hundred he caused to be burned 
 alive, and the remaining fifty to be hanged. 7 
 
 The principal object of the crusade was now 
 accomplished : the count of Toulouse, who had 
 ieen accused of favouring the heretics, had sub- 
 mitted to the most degrading humiliations to make 
 bis peace. The viscount of Narbonne, to avoid 
 toe visit of the crusaders, had published against 
 :he heretics laws more rigorous than even the 
 :hurch demanded. 8 The viscount of Beziers was 
 i prisoner ; his two strongest cities were destroy- 
 ed, and the greater number of his castles contain- 
 ed not a single inhabitant. The French lords, 
 tvho, to gain the pardons of the church, had 
 marched to the crusade, began to feel some shame 
 •or all the blood which had been shed, and for 
 their word which had been falsified. The knights 
 md soldiers having fulfilled the term of their ser- 
 vice, demanded their dismissal ; but the abbot of 
 
 ' The recitals of the ancient historians are so contradictory respecting 
 the taking of Carcassonne, that we can scarcely recognize the same 
 event. I have followed the history in the provencal tongue, des grands 
 faicts d'armes de Toulouse, p. 16, 17, 18. And I have attributed to the 
 desire of the legate to accredit a recital more honourable for him, the 
 narration of the following, Epistolce Innocentii III, apud Pet rum Vai, Ed. 
 1615,/). 322. Praclara Fruncor facinora, p. 765. Guillelmi de Podio Lau- 
 rentii, cap. xiv, p. 674. Petri. Vol. Cern. Albigens., cap. xvi, p. 571. Phi- 
 lippidos, lib. viii, p. 220. Ccesar Heisterbuchiensis, lib. v, cap. 21. It ap- 
 pears that the authors of I'histoire de Lauguedoc have judged the same, 
 liv. xx'i, chap. lxi. See also Rob. Altissiodor., t. 18, p. 276. 
 
 8 Histoire de Languedoc, liv. xxi, ch. lviii, p. 169. 
 
44 
 
 Citeaux, the legate of the Pope, alone felt that he 
 had not done enough. The sectaries were frozen 
 with terror; they had concealed themselves; they 
 were silent ; they would even be so, long after the 
 departure of the crusaders. But they were not 
 destroyed ; their opinions would secretly circu- 
 late ; resentment for the outrages already suffered 
 would alienate them still more from the church, 
 and the reformation would break forth afresh. To 
 turn back the march of civilization, to obliterate 
 the traces of a mighty progress of the human 
 mind, it was not sufficient to sacrifice, for an ex- 
 ample, some thousands of victims : the nation 
 must be destroyed ; all who had participated in 
 the development of thought and of science must 
 perish, and none must be spared but the lowest 
 rustics, whose intelligence is scarcely superior to 
 the beasts whose labours they share. Such was 
 the object of the abbot Arnold, and he did not 
 deceive himself as to the means of accomplish- 
 ing it. 
 
 Arnold Amalric, chief of the order of Citeaux, 
 and legate of the Pope, having assembled a coun- 
 cil of the crusaders, required them to dispose of 
 the conquests they had made in favour of a prince 
 who would complete the extirpation of heresy ; 
 and he offered at first the viscounties of Beziers 
 and of Carcassonne to Eudes III, duke of Bur- 
 gundy; but he refused, saying, " that he had plen- 
 ty of domains and lordships, without taking that, 
 
45 
 
 to disinherit the said viscount ; and that it appear- 
 ed to him they had done him evil enough without 
 despoiling him of his heritage." This noble re- 
 fusal touched the honour of the other great lords. 
 The count of Nevers, and the count of St. Paul, 
 to whom the legate made the same propositions, 
 held the same language. The abbot of Citeaux, 
 to give more weight to his offers, associated with 
 himself two bishops and four knights, and the 
 council of the crusaders agreed that these seven 
 commissioners should regulate the fate of the con- 
 quered countries. In their name Arnold then of- 
 fered these same sovereignties to Simon de Mont- 
 fort, earl of Leicester. This lord of a castle, ten 
 leagues from Paris, was the head of a house that 
 had been illustrious for two hundred years, and 
 which is traced by some to a natural son of king 
 Robert.' He had possessed the countship of Ev- 
 reux, which, a few years since, he had sold to 
 Philip Augustus ; and his mother, who was an 
 English woman, had left him as an heritage the 
 earldom of Leicester. He had distinguished him- 
 self in the fourth crusade, from which he was re- 
 cently returned. Skilful as a soldier, austere in 
 his carriage, fanatical in his religion, cruel and 
 perfidious, he united every quality which could 
 
 f Prcrfatio Camuratii Tricassini in Petmm Vallis Cern. Mon. Peter de 
 Vaux Cernay, the historian of the crusade, was a Bernardin monk, or of 
 the order of Citeaux ; his convent was situated near to Montfort Amau- 
 ry. He was vassal of his hero, Simon de Montfort, whom he followed 
 to the crusade. 
 
46 
 
 please a monk. He was too ambitious to refuse 
 the offer which was made him of elevating himself 
 to the rank of the grand feudatories ; but he still 
 thought himself obliged to feign a refusal, very 
 sure that they would overcome this pretended re- 
 luctance. He had, indeed, the pleasure of seeing 
 the bishops throw themselves at his feet, to obtain 
 his acceptance of what he the most desired. 1 
 
 Simon de Montfort then took possession of the 
 provinces which the legate offered him as a gift. 
 He received the homage of those of the vassals of 
 the two viscounties of Beziers and of Carcassonne, 
 whom terror had brought to the camp of the cru- 
 saders, and who were eager, at this price, to make 
 their peace with the church. He imposed on his 
 new states an annual rent, payable at the court 
 of Rome, and he published rigorous ordinances 
 against those of his subjects who should not anx- 
 iously endeavour to free themselves from excom- 
 munication. 2 Yet the war was not terminated; 
 many castles, even at the gates of Carcassonne, 
 served as refuges to the heretics, whilst every day 
 numerous bands of crusaders, having finished the 
 time of service for which they were engaged, aban- 
 doned the army. The count of Nevers rejected 
 all the solicitations of the legate, and departed 
 precisely at the termination of his forty days. The 
 
 1 Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 19. Petri Vallis Cern. Hist. Albigens. 
 cup. 17, p. 572. 
 
 2 Preuvcs de Vhiatoirc de Languedoc, p. 213. 
 
47 
 
 count of Toulouse did the same. The duke of 
 Burgundy consented to prolong the campaign a 
 little, and assisted Simon de Montfort to take pos- 
 session of Fanjeaux, Castres, and Lombes, as well 
 as at the attack upon the castle of Gabaret, from 
 which the crusaders were repulsed with loss ; but 
 three days after this affair he returned to his own 
 country. 3 
 
 Notwithstanding the departure of so many of 
 the crusaders, there remained to Simon de Mont- 
 fort soldiers enough to continue the war. Some 
 came from his fiefs, or from those of his wife's fa- 
 mily ; for about the year 1190 he had allied him- 
 self to a powerful house at the gates of Paris, by 
 his marriage to Alice, daughter of Bouchard, of 
 Montmorency. Others attached themselves to a 
 skilful general, who promised them frequent occa- 
 sions of pillage, and perhaps permanent establish- 
 ments in a conquered country. Many also were 
 still influenced by that same fanaticism which had 
 at first led them to the crusade. During the re- 
 mainder of the campaign, Simon de Montfort di- 
 rected their arms against the count of Foix, who, 
 as well as the viscount of Carcassonne, was called 
 Raymond Roger. This count must have been 
 about fifty-five years of age ; he had reigned ever 
 since 1188, and had accompanied Philip Augus- 
 tus to the third crusade. He possessed the great- 
 er part of Albigeois, which was regarded as the 
 
 * Petri Hist. Albigcns. cap, xx, xxv, p. 574, et scq. 
 
48 
 
 seat of the new doctrines ; and he was himself 
 accused of having secretly adopted them. In the 
 first terror spread by the massacre at Beziers, the 
 count of Foix dared not any longer Continue the 
 campaign ; he retired into the most inaccessible 
 part of his states, whilst the catholic clergy of 
 his principal cities rallied round Simon de Mont- 
 fort. This last was received without a combat in- 
 to Pamiers and Albi. The castle of Mirepoix was 
 also delivered to him, and Montfort bestowed it 
 on Guy de Levis, his marshal, in whose posterity 
 this fief has remained, with the title of count. 
 The count of Foix, still troubled by a storm, 
 which nevertheless began to abate from those 
 countries, demanded to treat. Simon de Mont- 
 fort, who perceived his real force diminish each 
 day, and who never suffered his fanaticism to 
 blind him as to his policy, accepted his proposi- 
 tions ; and during some weeks towards the end 
 of the year 1209 the war appeared suspended on 
 that frontier. 4 
 
 In the mean time, Simon de Montfort detained 
 in prison the legitimate sovereign of the states, of 
 which he had taken possession. He could per- 
 ceive, even amongst his companions in arms, that 
 pity towards this prince had already succeeded 
 to fury. His neighbours loved him ; his people 
 regretted him ; his relation and lord, the king of 
 Aragon, might be disposed to resume his protec- 
 
 4 Petrus Vallis Cern. Hist. Albigens. cap. xxv, p. 576. 
 
49 
 
 tion. Simon de Montfort gave the necessary or- 
 ders that Raymond Roger should die of a dysen- 
 tery on the 10th of November, in a tower of the 
 visconntal palace at Carcassonne, where he was 
 carefully guarded. He then took care to display 
 his body to his subjects, and to give him an ho- 
 nourable funeral. Yet, by the public voice he was 
 accused of having poisoned him, and even Inno- 
 cent III acknowledged that he perished by a vio- 
 lent death- 5 
 
 5 Et morit, coma dit es, prisonicr, done folic bruyt per tota la terra, que 
 lo dit conte de Montfort Vacia fait morir. — Historia de los faicis de Tolosa, 
 p. 20. — Guillelmus de Podio Laurentii, cap. xiv, p. 675. — Innocentii III, 
 Epist. Lab. xv, Ep. 212. — Hist, de Lansptedoc, liv. xxi, ch. lxxv, p. 183. 
 
 B 
 
CHAP. II. 
 
 Continuation of the Crusade against the Albigenses, to 
 the Battle of Muret, 1210—1213. 
 
 Those who had marched to the First Crusade 
 against the Albigenses, or who had made the cam- 
 paign of 1209, regarded their object as complete- 
 ly attained, and the war as terminated. Indeed, 
 desolation had been carried into the bosom of 
 the country where the reformation had commen- 
 ced. Two large cities had been destroyed, and 
 thousands of victims had perished by the sword, 
 whilst thousands of others, driven from their burn- 
 ing houses, were wandering in the woods and 
 mountains, and sinking each day under the pres- 
 sure of want. Amongst the princes who had wish- 
 ed to maintain in their dominions a certain liberty 
 of conscience, one had perished in prison, and 
 had been replaced by the most pitiless of perse- 
 cutors. Two others had submitted, and, to make 
 their peace, refused not their tribute to the fires 
 of the inquisition, so that, every day, the church 
 celebrated the sacrifice of numerous human vic- 
 tims. 
 
 The ruin of so fair a country, the contrast be- 
 tween its former opulence and its present desola- 
 
51 
 
 tion, the remembrance of its fetes, of its tourna- 
 ments, of the courts of love assembled in every 
 castle, of the troubadours, the singers, the mins- 
 trels, visiting' by turns the lords and noble ladies, 
 welcomed at their arrival, loaded with presents, 
 at their departure, and the sight of the fires for 
 executions, of deserted villages, of burning houses, 
 would soon have caused the fury of war to have 
 been succeeded by a deep-felt pity, if any other 
 cause than religious fanaticism had armed the 
 hands of the crusaders. 
 
 Those who had committed so many crimes were 
 not, for the greater part, bad men, They came 
 from that part of Burgundy and northern France, 
 where crimes have always been rare, where long 
 contentions, hatred, and vengeance, are passions 
 almost unknown — and where the unhappy are al- 
 ways sure to find compassion and aid. The cru- 
 saders themselves were always ready to afford 
 each other proofs of generosity, of support, and 
 compassion ; but the heretics were, in their eyes, 
 outcasts from the human race. Accustomed to 
 confide their consciences to their priests, to hear 
 the orders of Rome as a voice from heaven, never 
 to submit that which appertained to the faith to the 
 judgment of reason, they congratulated themselves 
 on the horror they felt for the sectaries. The more 
 zealous they were for the glory of God, the more 
 ardently they laboured for the destruction of he- 
 retics, the better Christians they thought them- 
 
52 
 
 selves. And if at any time they felt a movement 
 of pity or terror, whilst assisting at their punish- 
 ment, they thought it a revolt of the flesh, which 
 they confessed at the tribunal of penitence; nor 
 could they get quit of their remorse, till their 
 priests had given them absolution. Woe to the 
 men whose religion is completely perverted ! All 
 their most virtuous sentiments lead them astray. 
 Their zeal is changed into ferocity. Their humi- 
 lity consigns them to the direction of the impos- 
 tors who conduct them. Their very charity be- 
 comes sanguinary; they sacrifice those from whom 
 they fear contagion, and they demand a baptism 
 of blood, to save some elect tQ the Lord. 
 
 Besides, never had more energetic means been 
 employed to confound the understanding, and 
 corrupt the human heart. That is a very super- 
 ficial, and a very false, judgment, which con- 
 demns whole nations for the crimes committed in 
 their bosom. In proportion to the faithfulness of 
 history, are the horrors with which it charges all 
 great societies of men ; and if every thing were 
 known, no nation would have much wherewith 
 to reproach another. Let no one, then, pride it- 
 self because all has not been told concerning it. 
 As to the persecution of the Albigenses, it was 
 not the work of the French alone. The Italian, 
 Innocent III, first gave the signal, and he also 
 bestowed the recompence. He continually sharp- 
 ened the sword of the murderers, by his legates 
 
53 
 
 and missionaries. The two Spaniards, the bishop 
 of Ozma and Saint Dominic, (the founders of the 
 inquisition) first taught the art of seeking out, in 
 the villages, those whom the priests were after- 
 wards to fasten to their stakes. The Germans, 
 invited by their monks, came to take a part in this 
 work, even from the extremities of iVustria; and 
 the English Matthew Paris renders testimony to 
 the zeal of his countrymen in the same cause, and 
 to their triumphant joy at the miracle (for so he 
 called the massacre of Beziers) which had aven- 
 ged the Lord. 6 
 
 But if we are bound to absolve large masses of 
 men from the atrocities committed, in the name 
 of religion, against the Albigenses, it would be to 
 destroy the only responsibility which rests upon 
 the powerful, the only resort for the oppressed 
 upon this earth, not to hold up to public exe- 
 cration the fanatical monks who directed this 
 movement, and the ambitious who profited by it. 
 Amongst the first, the vengeance of public opinion 
 ought not to rest only upon those who accompa- 
 nied the crusaders, in their expeditions, who 
 dragged the reformers to the flames, and who 
 mingled their songs of triumph with the groans 
 of their miserable victims ; these were, at least, 
 blinded by the same mad passion with which 
 they had inspired the combatauts. There was 
 something more personal, more deliberate, more 
 
 e Matth. Paris, Edit. Londin. p. 203. 
 
54 
 
 coldly ferocious, in those clouds of monks who, 
 issuing from all the convents of the order of 
 Citeaux, spread themselves through the states of 
 Europe, occupied all the pulpits, appealed to all 
 the passions to convert them into one, and show- 
 ed how every vice might be expiated by crime, 
 how remorse might be expelled by the flames of 
 their piles, how the soul, polluted with every 
 shameful passion, might become pure and spotless 
 by bathing in the blood of heretics. After the 
 conquest of the suspected country had been ac- 
 complished, after peace had been granted to the 
 princes, and a safeguard to the submissive people, 
 the monks of Citeaux continued, in every church, 
 to preach a war of extermination, because they 
 had done it with success in the preceding year, 
 and because they were unwilling to relinquish the 
 honours and profits of their mission. By conti- 
 nuing to preach the crusade, when there were 
 none to combat, they impelled, each year, waves 
 of new fanatics upon these miserable provinces ; 
 and they compelled their chiefs to recommence 
 the war, in order to profit by the fervour of those 
 who still demanded human victims, and required 
 blood to effect their salvation. 
 
 1209. After the departure of the crusaders, 
 towards the end of the summer of 1209, the 
 count Raymond VI of Toulouse thought himself 
 on the point of being reconciled to the church, to 
 which he had given sureties, and which he had 
 
55 
 
 served in the preceding campaign. The count of 
 Foix had made his peace with Simon de Mont- 
 fort, who was endeavouring to establish himself 
 in the viscounties of Carcassonne and Beziers, at 
 the same time that he was negociating with Don 
 Pedro, king of Aragon, then at Montpellier, to 
 prevail on him to receive his homage. The arrival 
 of new crusaders, conducted by Guy abbot of 
 Vaux-Cernay, of the order of Citeaux, inspired 
 Simon de Montfort with fresh courage. On one 
 hand, he thought it time to throw away the mask 
 with Raymond VI count of Toulouse. He caused 
 him to be excommunicated by the two legates, 
 and laid all his territory under an interdict, after 
 which he began hostilities against him. 7 On the 
 other hand, he caused the abbot of Eaulnes, who 
 had made the peace between him and the count 
 of Foix, to be assassinated ; he then accused the 
 count of this crime, and declared all negociation 
 between them to be at an end. 8 Simon de Mont- 
 fort was, however, too eager in attacking new 
 enemies before he had entirely subjugated the 
 old. The king of Aragon, after amusing him 
 with long negociations, peremptorily refused his 
 homage, and would acknowledge no other vis- 
 
 * Innocentii III, lib. xii, Ep. 106, 107. Histoire de Languedoc, liv. xxi, 
 ch. lxviii, p. 178. 
 
 8 The knights of Toulouse, in a memorial addressed to the king of 
 Aragon, accuse Simon and the crusaders of having given the best recep- 
 tion to the assassins of the abbot of Eaulnes : Preuves de Chistoirc de 
 Languedoc, p. 236. Peter de Vaux-Cernay, on the contrary, accuses the 
 count of Foix of this assassination : cap. xxx, Hist. Albigens. p. 579. 
 
56 
 
 count of Beziers and Carcassonne than Raymond 
 Trencavel, son of the last viscount, two years of 
 age, who was then under the care of the count of 
 Foix. At the same time, he solicited the knights, 
 who held from these two viscounties, to take 
 arms for the son of their lord, promising them 
 powerful succours. Towards the end of Novem- 
 ber, they all revolted, almost at the same time. 
 Many of the French, the creatures of Simon de 
 Montfort, were surprised in the castles which 
 they regarded as their conquest. Some became 
 victims of the resentment excited in the country 
 by the cruelties of the crusaders ; and at the end 
 of the year, the domination of Simon de Montfort 
 in Languedoc w r as reduced to eight cities or 
 castles, whilst it had at first comprised more than 
 two hundred. 9 
 
 Raymond VI, count of Toulouse, would have 
 been afraid of compromising himself still more 
 with the court of Rome, if he had given any ap- 
 pearance of exciting these revolts, or of making 
 common cause with the enemies of Simon de 
 Montfort. Although Montfort had already com- 
 menced hostilities against him, he judged it more 
 expedient to repair first to the court of Philip 
 Augustus, and afterwards to that of the pope, 
 than to remain in his states, and defend them by 
 open force. He arrived at Rome at the com- 
 
 9 Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 21, 22. Hist. Albigens. cap. xxvi, 
 xxvii, p. 577. 
 
57 
 
 mencement of the year 1210, and addressed him- 
 self to the pope to obtain his absolution. He was 
 prepared to make great concessions, that he might 
 avoid the fate of his nephew, the viscount of Be- 
 ziers. He thought no longer of defending his 
 heretical subjects; it was sufficient for him to 
 shelter himself from the ambition of Simon de 
 Montfort, from the hatred of the legate, Arnold, 
 abbot of Citeaux, and from the sanguinary fury of 
 Fouquet, bishop of Toulouse, who would have 
 gladly seen the half of the flock, entrusted to his 
 care, perish on the scaffold. 
 
 1210. Innocent III found himself, at that time, 
 in one of those moments when he felt the power 
 of the resistance he was called upon to conquer, 
 and too much accustomed to despise. He had 
 elevated himself to universal monarchy, and gave 
 laws to the two empires of the east and west. In 
 that same year he scolded the king of Portugal, 
 and encouraged the king of Castille ; he set him- 
 self as judge of the divorce of the king of Bohe- 
 mia, and he incited the king of Denmark to take 
 the cross. He had also just confirmed the rule 
 which St. Francis d'Assise had given to the fra- 
 ternity the most devoted to the holy see of all the 
 orders of monks. 1 But, on the other hand, the 
 emperor Otho IV, whom he regarded as his crea- 
 ture, had just escaped from him, and incurred ex- 
 
 i Raynaldi Amial. Eccles. 1210, § xxviii, p. 19C. Lucas Wadingus Ann. 
 minor ad ann. 1210. 
 
58 
 
 communication by his resistance to the holy see. 
 John, the king of England," lived in open enmity 
 with the church. Philip Augustus had dared to 
 seize upon the temporalities of two bishops. A 
 system of opposition to the pope appeared to be 
 preparing in the Christian world, and, in spite of 
 all his pride, Innocent III was too politic not to 
 temporize when occasion required. 2 
 
 Whether Innocent proposed only to separate 
 Raymond from his partisans, to inspire him with 
 a deceitful confidence, and to gain time, as the 
 most zealous amongst the orthodox writers af- 
 firm, 3 or whether he really felt good will towards 
 the count of Toulouse, and was afterwards pre- 
 vented from pardoning him by his legates, who 
 deceived him, as some writers the most disposed 
 to tolerance have supposed, 4 certain it is that he 
 gave this prince a gracious reception. He released 
 him, provisionally, from the excommunication pro- 
 nounced against him, but referred him, for final 
 absolution, to a council which should assemble in 
 the province three months after the count's return. 
 The purpose of this council was only to judge 
 whether Raymond was, or was not, guilty of he- 
 resy, and whether he had, or had not, prompted 
 the murderer of the legate Peter of Castelnau. 
 These were the two accusations which exposed 
 
 2 Guillelmus Armoricus, p. 84. 
 
 3 Petrus Vallls. Cern. Hist. Albigens cap. xxxiii, p. 580. 
 
 4 Historia de losfaicts de Tolosa, p. 23. Histoire de Languedoc, liv, xxi, 
 c/i. lxxxi, p. 187. 
 
59 
 
 the count to the severest penalties; but, on the 
 other hand, they were those respecting which he 
 felt himself the most innocent, and of which he 
 was the most eager to purge himself. 5 
 
 1210. But the legate Arnold, abbot of Citeaux, 
 joined to the ambitious zeal of the pope an im- 
 placable hatred against count Raymond. He had 
 summoned the council, to which Innocent III had 
 referred the cause of the count, to meet at Saint 
 Gilles, but, before its assembling, new successes of 
 Simon de Montfort against the lords of the cas- 
 tles, who still defended either the independence 
 of their jurisdiction or that of their conscience, 
 and new judicial massacres, had inspired him with 
 more confidence in the cause which he wished 
 to see triumphant. Master Theodise, a canon of 
 Genoa, whom the pope had sent to advise with 
 the legate, had a secret conference with him at 
 Toulouse. " He was," says Peter de Vaux-Cer- 
 nay, " a circumspect man, prudent and very zeal- 
 ous for the affairs of God, and he desired above 
 all things to find some pretext of right to refuse 
 the count that opportunity of justifying himself 
 which Innocent had granted him.'" 6 He agreed, 
 at last, with the abbot of Citeaux and the bishop 
 of Riez, that he should seek some cause of dispute 
 with the count, respecting the accomplishment of 
 some subordinate conditions which the pope had 
 
 6 Innocentil III EpistolcE, lib. xn, 152. 109. 
 * Hist. Albigen. cap. xxxix, p. 585. 
 
enjoined upon him, founding himself upon the 
 words of the bull of Innocent III — We desire that 
 he execute our orders. 1 
 
 When, in fact, Raymond VI presented himself 
 to the council of St. Gilles, to justify himself, and 
 and offered to establish, by indubitable proofs, 
 that he had never participated in heresy, and was 
 a stranger to the murder of the legate, Peter of 
 Castelnau, Master Theodise stopped him, by de- 
 claring that he had not yet destroyed all the here- 
 tics of the county of Toulouse; that he had not 
 yet suppressed all the tolls, whose abolition was 
 demanded by the pope; that he had not yet abo- 
 lished or restored all the collections, which his 
 officers had made upon different convents; and 
 since he had disobeyed the orders of the church 
 in smaller matters, they might conclude that he 
 would, the more certainly, have disobeyed in the 
 two crimes of which he was accused. Thus, the 
 council, to prevent perjury either in himself or 
 his witnesses, refused him the permission to clear 
 himself of these two capital accusations. When 
 the count, who thought himself fully assured that 
 this day would establish his innocence, heard this 
 unexpected declaration, he burst into tears. But 
 Master Theodise remembered a passage of holy 
 Scripture, by which to free himself from feelings 
 of humanity. How great soever be the overflow oj 
 waters, said he, turning his tears into derision, they 
 
 f Petri Vallis Cern. cap. xxxix, p. 585. Concilia gener alia, t. xi,p. 54. 
 
61 
 
 will not reach Unto God; and he fulminated, in the 
 name of the church, an excommunication against 
 the count of Toulouse. 8 The council of St. Gilles 
 did not assemble till the end of September, and 
 its rigour augmented in proportion to the success 
 obtained by Simon de Montfort in the course of 
 this same campaign. During the winter, Mont- 
 fort had been reduced to stand upon the defens- 
 ive, and revolts in every part of the province had 
 sufficiently proved to him how much his yoke 
 was detested. But the monks of Citeaux had re- 
 commenced the preaching of the crusade in the 
 north of France. There was, said they to those 
 ferocious and superstitious warriors, no crime so 
 dark, no vice so deeply rooted in the heart, the 
 very trace of which, a campaign of forty days, in 
 the south of France, would not obliterate. Para- 
 dise, with all its glories, was opened for them, 
 without the necessity of purchasing it by any re- 
 formation in their conduct. Alice of Montmo- 
 rency, Simon de Montfort's wife, undertook the 
 direction of the first army of crusaders, raised by 
 the monks. At the beginning of Lent, her hus- 
 band came to meet her at Pezenas, and no sooner 
 found himself at the head of an imposing force, 
 than he gave full scope to his cruelty." 9 
 
 He attacked, in the first place, the castle of 
 
 s Psalm xxxi, v. 8. Petri Val. Cera. cap. xxxix, 586. Histoire de Lan- 
 guedoc, Uv. xxi, p. 197, et note xvi, p. 561. 
 
 9 Histoire de Languedoc, liv. xxi, ch. lxxxiv, p. 191. 
 
62 
 
 Lauraguais and Minervois. The feudal state of 
 independence had multiplied these fortresses, and 
 the smallest province was covered with citadels. 
 They did not all however appear to their possess- 
 ors capable of sustaining a siege ; the terror which 
 the crusaders inspired caused a great number to 
 be abandoned. Simon de Montfort generally 
 caused all their inhabitants, whom he could lay 
 hands upon, to be hanged upon gibbets. Some 
 castles, calculating too favourably upon their 
 strength, endeavoured to resist him; that of Brom 
 was taken by assault the third day of the siege, 
 and Simon de Montfort chose out more than a 
 hundred of its wretched inhabitants, and having 
 torn out their eyes, and cut off their noses, sent 
 them, in that state, under the guidance of a one- 
 eyed man, to the castle of Cabaret, to announce to 
 the garrison of that fortress the fate which await- 
 ed them. The castle of Alairac was not taken till 
 the eleventh day, and even then a great part of its 
 inhabitants were able to escape from the ferocity 
 of the crusaders. Montfort massacred the re- 
 mainder. Farther on he found castles abandoned 
 and absolutely empty ; and, not being able to reach 
 the men, he sent out his soldiers to destroy the sur- 
 rounding vines and olive-trees. 1 
 
 1210. Montfort afterwards conducted his army 
 to a more important siege, that of the castle of 
 Minerva, situated at a small distance from Nar- 
 
 i Petri Vallis Cemai Histor. Albigens. cap. xxxiv, xxxv, p. 581, 582. 
 
63 
 
 bonne, on a steep rock, surrounded by precipices, 
 and regarded as the strongest place in the Gauls. 
 This castle belonged to Guiraud of Minerva, vas- 
 sal of the viscounts of Carcassonne, and one of 
 the bravest knights of the province. The array of 
 the crusaders appeared before Minerva, at the be- 
 ginning of June; the legate Arnold, and the ca- 
 non Theodise, joined it soon after. The inhabit- 
 ants, among whom were many who had embraced 
 the reform of the Albigenses, defended themselves 
 with great valour for seven weeks ; but when, on 
 account of the heats of summer, the water began 
 to fail in their cisterns, they demanded a capitu- 
 lation. Guiraud came himself to the camp of the 
 crusaders, one day when the legate was absent, 
 and agreed with Simon de Montfort on conditions 
 for the surrender of the place. But, as they were 
 proceeding to execute them, the abbot Arnold re- 
 turned to the camp, and Montfort immediately 
 declared that nothing which they had agreed up- 
 on could be considered as binding, till the legate 
 had given his assent. " At these words," says 
 Peter de Vaux-Cernay, " the abbot was greatly 
 afflicted. In fact, he desired that all the enemies 
 of Christ should be put to death, but he could 
 not take upon himself to condemn them, on ac- 
 count of his quality of monk and priest." He 
 thought, however, that he might stir up some 
 quarrel between the negociation, profit by it to 
 break the capitulation, and cause all the inhabit- 
 
64 
 
 : 
 
 ants to be put to the sword. For this purpose, 
 he required the count on one part, and Guiraud 
 of Minerva on the other, to put into writing, with- 
 out communicating with each other, the condi- 
 tions on which they had agreed. As Arnold had 
 flattered himself, he found some difference in the 
 statements, and Montfort immediately availed 
 himself of it, to declare, in the name of the leg- 
 ate, that the negociation was broken off. But the 
 lord of Minerva instantly replied, that, though he 
 thought himself sure of his memory, yet he accept- 
 ed the capitulation as Simon de Montfort had 
 drawn it up. One of the articles of this capitu- 
 lation provided, that the heretics themselves, if 
 they were converted, might quit the castle, and 
 have their lives saved. When the capitulation was 
 read in the council of war, " Robert of Mauvoisin," 
 says the monk of Vaux-Cernay, " a nobleman, and 
 entirely devoted to the catholic faith, cried, that the 
 pilgrims would never consent to that ; that it was 
 not to shew mercy to the heretics, but to put them 
 to death, they had taken the cross ; but the abbot 
 Arnold replied — fear not, for I believe there will 
 be very few converted." The legate was not de- 
 ceived in this bloody hope. The crusaders took 
 possession of the castle of Minerva the 22nd of 
 July, 1210; they entered, singing Te Deum, and 
 preceded by the cross and the standards of Mont- 
 fort. The heretics were, in the mean time, assem- 
 bled, the men in one house, the women in another, 
 
G5 
 
 and there, on their knees, and resigned to their 
 fate, they prepared themselves, by prayer, for the 
 punishment which awaited them. The abbot, 
 Guy de Vaux-Cernay, to fulfil the capitulation, 
 came, and began to preach to them the catholic 
 faith ; but his auditors interrupted him by a unan- 
 imous cry — " We will have none of your faith," 
 said they, " we have renounced the church of 
 Rome : your labour is in vain ; for neither death 
 nor life will make us renounce the opinions that 
 we have embraced." The abbot of Vaux-Cernay 
 then passed to the assembly of the women, but he 
 found them as resolute, and more enthusiastic still 
 in their declarations. The count of Montfort, in 
 his turn, visited both. Already he had piled up 
 an enormous mass of dry wood : " Be converted 
 to the catholic faith" said he to the assembled Al- 
 bigenses, " or ascend this pile" None were shak- 
 en. They set fire to the pile, which covered the 
 whole square with a tremendous conflagration ; — 
 and the heretics were then conducted to the place. 
 But violence was not necessary to compel them 
 to enter the flames ; they voluntarily precipitated 
 :hemselves into them, to the number of more than 
 )ne hundred and forty, after having commended 
 ;heir souls to that God, in whose cause they suf- 
 fered martyrdom. Three women only, forcibly 
 •etained by the noble dame of Marly, mother of 
 Bouchard, lord of Montmorenci, were saved from 
 he flames ; and terror and consternation succeed- 
 
66 
 
 ing to their enthusiastic fervor, they consented to 
 be converted. 2 
 
 The capture of Minerva was quickly followed 
 by the siege of the castle of Termes, upon the 
 frontiers of Roussillon. This castle was extreme- 
 ly strong, and commanded by a valiant captain, 
 Raymond of Termes. He made a long resist- 
 ance, and tired the patience of the crusaders, who 
 would willingly have granted an advantageous 
 capitulation. As the pilgrims after a service of 
 forty days, which was sufficient to obtain the in- 
 dulgences, quitted the army, Simon de Montfort 
 found himself, on many occasions, left with so 
 small a force, that he was on the point of raising 
 the siege. But all the provinces of the Gauls, 
 excited by the same fanaticism, sent, in their 
 turns, contingents to the sacred war. After the 
 arrival of the bishops of Chartres and Beauvais, 
 who had conducted thither the inhabitants of 
 Orleanais, and the isle of France, and the counts 
 of Dreux and Ponthieu followed by their vassals, 
 there came in succession, Bretons, Germans, and 
 Lorrains. The strength of the besieged sunk at 
 last, after four months combats, under so many 
 
 2 Petri Val. Cern. Hist. Albigens. cap. xxxvii, p. 583, 584. We owe to 
 this historian, monk of Vaux-Cernay, the admirer of his abbot Guy, and 
 of his lord Simon de Montfort, who accompanied both in the crusade, 
 all the detail of the circumstances; but they are confirmed in a more 
 summary manner by the Historia de los fuicts de Tolosa, p. 25. — Chron. 
 Guilt, de Nangis, p. 490. — Prceclura Francorum Facinora, p. 765. — Bernardi 
 Guidonis Vita Innocentii III. Script. Ital. t. iii, p. 481. — Hist. g6n. de Lan- 
 guedoc, liv. xxi, p. 193, 194. 
 
67 
 
 repeated attacks, and so much the more, as, 
 having filled their cisterns a second time from 
 the rains which fell during the great heats, nu- 
 merous dysenteries, from that cause, prevailed 
 amongst them. During the night between the 
 22nd and 23rd of November, they attempted to 
 escape by abandoning the place. They did, in- 
 deed, pass the first entrenchments, and dispersed 
 themselves in the mountains, with the hope of 
 reaching Catalonia ; but the moment their flight 
 was perceived, a general cry arose in the army. 
 The crusaders exhorted each other not to let 
 those, who had cost them so much sweat and 
 blood, escape from punishment. The whole body 
 of the pilgrims followed the fugitives, the greater 
 part of whom were overtaken, and killed on the 
 spot ; others were conducted alive to Simon de 
 Montfort. Of these, he spared Raymond, lord of 
 Termes, and, instead of burning him, confined 
 him at the bottom of a tower in Carcassonne, 
 where he suffered him to languish for many years. 3 
 The taking of two such strong places as Mi- 
 nerva and Termes made all the garrisons of the 
 neighbouring castles lose their courage : they 
 dared no longer trust to their walls, and the 
 irmy advancing into the Albigeois to the left of 
 .he Tarn found all the places deserted. By this 
 means they occupied the castles of Constasse, of 
 ray vert, of Lombers, and a great number of others ; 
 
 3 Petri Vol. Cern. Hist. Albigens. cap, xlii, p. 590, 591. 
 
68 
 
 but the miserable inhabitants were not able to 
 save themselves by flight. They were followed 
 into the woods and mountains ; the greater part 
 perished there by the sword, and those that were 
 brought prisoners to the camp were burned for 
 the edification of the army. 4 
 
 Whatever care the legates had taken, to prevent 
 the count of Toulouse from justifying himself, 
 Innocent III had not yet confirmed the sentence 
 of excommunication, which had been newly ful- 
 minated against him. So powerful a feudatory 
 required to be treated with greater caution than 
 had been used towards the inferior lords, who 
 were, like him, accused of favouring the heretics. 
 Philip Augustus had written to the pope to recom- 
 mend him to his indulgence. Don Pedro, king 
 of Aragon, who had long since given his sister in 
 marriage to Raymond VI, and had afterwards 
 promised his own daughter to his son, having lost 
 that daughter at an early age, had married, in the 
 beginning of the year 1211, another of his sisters, 
 also named Sancha, to the young Raymond VII, 
 and thus strengthened still more the alliance 
 which united him to this house. 5 Simon de 
 Montfort, whose fanaticism never prevented him 
 from managing his temporal interests like a wily 
 politician, undertook to deprive the count of Tou- 
 
 4 Hist. Albig. cap. xlii, p. 592. Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 29. 
 Bernardi Guidonis Vita Innocentii III, p. 482. 
 
 s GuilL de Podio Laurentii, cap. xviii. p. 677. Note 35 & I'Histoire de 
 Languedoc, p. 591. 
 
69 
 
 louse of the support which he found in Spain, 
 and, for this purpose, carefully sought to gain the 
 friendship of the king of Aragon. Pedro thought 
 perhaps that by reconciling himself with Mont- 
 fort, he might afterwards the more easily serve 
 his two brothers-in-law. He began, therefore, by 
 receiving his homage for the two viscounties of 
 Carcassonne, and of Beziers : afterwards he con- 
 sented, by a strange and inexplicable arrange- 
 ment, not only to betroth his son Don Jayme or 
 James, to a daughter of Montfort, but to commit 
 his only son, then three years of age, to that lord 
 whom he disliked and distrusted. When Don 
 Pedro took, in the beginning of the year 1211, 
 this strange resolution, he was impelled perhaps 
 by one of those fits of devotion which in that age 
 deranged all the calculations of policy ; perhaps, 
 he feared, for his French provinces, the attacks of 
 those swarms of crusaders, whom he saw every 
 year arrive, and was willing, at any price, to en- 
 sure the friendship of their chief. 6 
 
 1211. But neither the manoeuvres of Montfort, 
 with regard to the count of Toulouse, nor his al- 
 liance with the king of Aragon, was of long dura- 
 tion. Informed that the preachers of the crusade, 
 instead of growing cool, were inflamed by his last 
 success, and that the crusaders who would join 
 him, during the year, would be more numerous 
 than those of the years preceding, he prepared to 
 
 6 Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxi, ch. xcvi, p. 203. 
 
70 
 
 second the hatred of the abbot of Citeaux and 
 the bishop Fouquet against the count of Tou- 
 louse, in the hope of joining the fine sovereignty 
 of that prince to his former conquests. He wished, 
 however, to profit to the last by the weakness of 
 Raymond, and by his desire to be reconciled to 
 the church, and he awaited the result of a citation 
 of the legates, who had summoned him to appear, 
 about the middle of February, before a provincial 
 council, which they were assembling at Aries. 
 Count Raymond and the king of Aragon attended 
 there together, and were no sooner entered into 
 the city, than they received orders not to quit it 
 without the permission of the council. A note 
 containing thirteen articles was afterwards com- 
 municated to them, on the reception and execu- 
 tion of which, the fathers of the church announced 
 that they would restore to the count of Toulouse, 
 all his territories and lordships, when it should 
 please the count of Montfort and the legate. Never 
 was a more absurd and insulting treaty proposed 
 to a sovereign prince, who was still in full posses- 
 sion of his states. Raymond VI was required to 
 dismiss all the soldiers armed for his defence; to 
 rase all his fortifications; to exclude from the 
 strong cities of his dominions all the knights who 
 might serve for their defence ; to renounce all the 
 customs which formed the greater part of his re- 
 venue; to reduce all the inhabitants of his states, 
 both nobles and plebeians, to wear the dress of 
 
71 
 
 penitence, and submit to an abstinence almost 
 monastical ; to deliver to Simon de Montfort and 
 the legate, at the first demand, all those of their 
 subjects whom they should require, that they 
 might burn them according to their good pleasure; 
 in fine, to proceed himself to the Holy Land, to 
 serve amongst the hospitallers of Saint John of 
 Jerusalem, until he was recalled by the legate. 7 
 The indignation and surprise of count Raymond 
 and the king of Aragon, at reading these de- 
 mands, was proportionable to their insolence. 
 They had been prohibited from quitting Aries, 
 but no precautions had been taken for retaining 
 them in that city They instantly set out, without 
 taking leave of the bishops, who, throwing off all 
 disguise towards the count of Toulouse, excom- 
 municated him afresh, declared him an enemy to 
 the church, and an apostate from the faith, and 
 abandoned his domains to the first occupant. 8 
 
 We may be assured that these churchmen, when 
 they shewed themselves so arrogant and pitiless, 
 were sensible of the augmentation of their forces. 
 In fact, the fanatic Fouquet, bishop of Toulouse, 
 had been preaching the crusade in France with great 
 success. It was at Toulouse, especially, that he 
 wished to kindle the flames ; it was in the flock 
 
 7 Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 30 et suiv. Hisloire de Languedoc, 
 liv. xxi, ch. xcviii, p. 204. 
 
 » Acta Concilii Vauriens, in tomo 2, Epistola Innocentii III, Edit. Baluzii, 
 p. 702. 
 
72 
 
 which God had confided to him that he wished, 
 he said, to separate the sheep from the goats. 
 Many of those who attended on his ministry, who 
 conformed to all the laws of the church, appear- 
 ed to him either too lukewarm in their zeal, or 
 suspicious in their faith, and he wished to purify 
 them by fire. He succeeded in causing the bishop 
 of Paris, Robert de Courtenay, count of Auxerre, 
 Enguerrand de Coucy, Joel de Mayenne, and a 
 great number of other French barons and knights, 
 to take the cross against the Albigenses. These, 
 in the course of the same campaign, were follow- 
 ed by Leopold duke of Austria, Adolphus count 
 of Mons, and William count of Juliers. 9 The 
 Holy Land was nearly abandoned by the western 
 knights, since they could gain the same indulgen- 
 ces by these, as it were, domestic crusades. About 
 the 10th of March, Simon de Montfort found him- 
 self at the head of a very large army, with which 
 he opened the campaign. 
 
 His first attack was directed against the castle 
 of Cabaret, which had hitherto braved all the 
 threats of the crusaders; but long reverses had 
 broken the spirit of the Albigenses. Peter Roger, 
 lord of Cabaret, submitted voluntarily to Mont- 
 fort, and opened to him the gates of his fortress. 
 His example was followed by the lords of many 
 other castles, in the mountains which separate 
 
 9 Petri Vol. Cern. Hist. Albigens. cap. xlviii, p. 59G. — Casar Heisterbach- 
 iensis, lib. v, cap. xxi. 
 
73 
 
 the diocese of Carcassonne from that of Toulouse. 
 It seemed to be the design of Montfort to open 
 to himself these passages, by treating the places 
 with a humanity which he rarely exercised. The 
 crusaders then advanced as far as Lavaur on the 
 Agoiit, live leagues from Toulouse. Lavaur, which 
 was afterwards raised to the rank of an episcopal 
 city, was then only a strong castle. It belonged 
 to a widow named Guiraude, whom her brother, 
 Aimery de Montreal, had joined with eighty 
 knights, after having been despoiled by the cru- 
 saders of his own fiefs. Aimery and Guiraude, 
 as well as many of their defenders, professed the 
 reform of the Albigenses. They had opened an 
 asylum, within their walls, to those of the reform- 
 ed who were persecuted in the other parts of the 
 province ; so that their fortress, which was well 
 stored with provisions, surrounded with strong 
 walls, and girded with deep ditches, was consid- 
 ered as one of the principal seats of heresy. This 
 consideration prevented count Raymond, who still 
 courted the church, from openly sending them as- 
 sistance ; but, he is accused of having caused his 
 seneschal to enter it secretly with a body of 
 knights. During this time, Fouquet returning to 
 Toulouse had communicated his fanaticism to a 
 part of the inhabitants of that city. He told them 
 that their mixture with the heretics rendered them 
 an object of horror to all Christians; and, that 
 they might not be confounded with them, they 
 
74 
 
 should be the first to arm themselves against those 
 of their fellow-citizens who had abandoned the 
 catholic faith. He had enrolled them into a so- 
 ciety which named itself, the White Company, and 
 engaged to destroy the heretics by fire and sword. 
 Having thus inflamed their zeal, he sent five thou- 
 sand of these fanatics to the siege of Lavaur. 1 
 
 Whilst this siege was going on, count Raymond 
 made one more attempt at reconciliation with the 
 legate and Simon de Montfort ; but all his offers 
 having been rejected, he saw, at last, that a more 
 vigourous conduct was his only resource ; and 
 upon this he ought doubtless, long since, to have 
 determined, if so much resolution had belonged 
 to his character. He formed a close alliance with 
 the counts of Cominges, and of Foix ; with Gas- 
 ton, viscount of Beam ; Savary de Mauleon, se- 
 neschal of Aquitaine, and the other lords of those 
 provinces, who were accused of tolerance or of 
 heresy, and whose interests were become one with 
 his own. These lords, informed that the German 
 body of crusaders, from the duke of Austria, and 
 the counts of Mons and Juliers, had advanced as 
 far as Montjoyre, between the Tarn and the Gar- 
 ronne, and that it was marching to the siege of 
 Lavaur, six thousand strong, detached a chosen 
 body of troops, under the command of the count 
 of Foix, of his son, and of Guiraud de Pepieux, 
 
 i Petri Val. Cern. Hist. Albigens. cap. xlix, 1, p. 596. 597. Guil. dePodio 
 Laurentii, cap. xvi, xvii, p. 676. 
 
75 
 
 who laid an ambush for the Germans, and cut 
 them in pieces before Simon de Montfort could 
 come to their assistance. On the other side count 
 Raymond had prohibited all his subjects, from 
 carrying provisions to the camp of the crusaders, 
 who were thereby reduced to great extremities. 
 But they were commanded by a chief, as much 
 superior to the other captains by his skill and 
 prudence, as he outdid the rest of the fanatics by 
 his cold ferocity. Simon de Montfort had profited 
 by all the progress which the art of war had made 
 in that age. He had himself served in the Holy 
 Land, and there were in his camp a great num- 
 ber of knights who had combated against the 
 Turks and the Greeks, and who had, in the East, 
 acquired the knowledge of the attack and defence 
 of fortified places. He employed, therefore, to 
 overthrow the walls, ingenious machines, whose 
 introduction was quite recent amongst the Latins, 
 and which were as yet unknown to the inhabitants 
 of the Pyrenees. 
 
 The most fearful was that which was called the 
 cat. A moveable wooden tower, strongly con- 
 structed, was built out of the reach of the be- 
 sieged. When it was entirely covered with sheep- 
 skins, with the fur outwards to guard it from fire, 
 and provided with soldiers at its openings, and 
 on the platform at its summit, it was moved on 
 rollers to the foot of the wall, Its side then 
 opened, and an immense beam, armed with iron 
 
76 
 
 hooks, projected like the paw of a cat, shook the 
 wall by reiterated strokes, after the manner of the 
 ancient battering ram, and tore out, and pulled 
 down, the stones which it had loosened. Simon 
 de Montfort had constructed a cat, but the wide 
 ditches of Lavaur prevented him from bringing it 
 near enough to the walls. The crusaders, under 
 the orders of Montfort, laboured unceasingly to 
 fill up the ditch, whilst the inhabitants of Lavaur, 
 who could descend into it by subterranean pas- 
 sages, cleared away each night all that had been 
 thrown in during the day. At last Montfort suc- 
 ceeded in filling the mines with flame and smoke, 
 and thereby prevented the inhabitants from pass- 
 ing into them. The ditches were then speedily 
 rilled ; the cat was pushed to the foot of the wall ; 
 and its terrible paw began to open and enlarge the 
 breach. 
 
 On the day of the finding of the holy cross, the 
 3rd of May, 1211, Montfort judged the breach 
 to be practicable. The crusaders prepared for 
 the assault. The bishops, the abbot of Courdieu, 
 who exercised the functions of vice-legate, and 
 all the priests clothed with their pontifical hab- 
 its, giving themselves up to the joy of seeing 
 the carnage begin, sang the hymn Veni Creator. 
 The knights mounted the breach. Resistance 
 was impossible ; and the only care of Simon de 
 Montfort was to prevent the crusaders from in- 
 stantly falling upon the inhabitants, and to be- 
 
77 
 
 seech them rather to make prisoners, that the 
 priests of the living God might not be deprived of 
 their promised joys. "Very soon," continues the 
 monk of Vaux-Cernay, " they dragged out of the 
 castle Aimery, lord of Montreal, and other knights 
 to the number of eighty. The noble count imme- 
 diately ordered them to be hanged upon the gal- 
 lows ; bnt, as soon as Aimery, the stoutest among 
 them, was hanged, the gallows fell ; for, in their 
 great haste, they had not well fixed it in the earth. 
 The count, seeing that this would produce great 
 delay, ordered the rest to be massacred ; and the 
 pilgrims, receiving the order with the greatest 
 avidity, very soon massacred them all upon the 
 spot. The lady of the castle, who was sister of 
 Aimery, and an execrable heretic, was, by the 
 count's order, thrown into a pit, which was filled 
 up with stones ; afterwards, our pilgrims collected 
 the innumerable heretics that the castle contained, 
 and bunted them alive with the utmost joy ." c 
 
 Open hostilities had not yet commenced be- 
 tween Simon de Montfort and the count of Tou- 
 louse, but they followed immediately on the tak- 
 ing of Lavaur. The refusal to send provisions to 
 the besiegers might serve as a pretext, but none 
 was wanted for attacking those who were excom- 
 municated. The castle of Montjoyre was the first 
 
 2 Cum ingenti gaudio. Petri Vol. Cent. Hist. Albigens. c. Hi, p. 59S, 
 599. — Btmardi Guidojiis J'ita Iimocentii III, p. 482. This last informs us 
 that 400 heretics were burnt at Lavaur. GmSL ie Podio ht aueidii , cap. xvii, 
 /). 67G. 
 
78 
 
 place, immediately belonging to the count of Tou- 
 louse, before which the crusaders presented them- 
 selves ; and being abandoned, it was burned and 
 rased from top to bottom by the soldiers of the 
 church. The castle of Cassero afforded them 
 more satisfaction, as it furnished human victims 
 for their sacrifices. It was surrendered on capit- 
 ulation ; and the pilgrims seizing nearly sixty here- 
 tics burned them ivith infinite joy. This is always 
 the phrase employed by the monk, who was the 
 witness and panegyrist of the crusade. A great 
 number of castles were afterwards either surrend- 
 ered to the crusaders or abandoned; and these 
 crusaders finding themselves, about the middle of 
 June, reinforced by a new army from Germany, 
 undertook the siege of Toulouse." 3 
 
 This city was very far from having been con- 
 verted to the reformation of the Albigenses ; the 
 catholics still formed the greater number. But 
 their consuls refused either to renounce their fide- 
 lity to their count, though he had been excom- 
 municated, or to deliver up to punishment those 
 of their citizens who were suspected of inclining 
 towards the new opinions. The bishop Fouquet 
 had succeeded in forming in the city an associa- 
 tion, named the white company, who engaged to 
 pursue the heretics unto death. This company, 
 by its own authority, erected a tribunal, before 
 
 3 Petri Val. Cern. Hist. Albigens. cap. liii, p. GOO. Chron, Guilt, de Po- 
 dio Laur. cap. xviii, p. G70. 
 
79 
 
 which it carried those whose faith it suspected, 
 with those whose conduct it accused, or against 
 whom it alleged usurious loans. It afterwards 
 executed its own judgments by open force, by the 
 destruction and pillage of their houses. The par- 
 tisans of tolerance very soon formed a counter 
 association, which they called the black company; 
 the two troops frequently came to arms in the 
 streets, with ensigns displayed; and many towers, 
 which belonged to one side or the other, were 
 alternately besieged. " Thus," continues master 
 William Puylaurens, (a contemporary historian,) 
 " did our Lord, by the ministry of his servant the 
 bishop, instead of a bad peace, excite amongst 
 them a good war." 4 
 
 But, whilst the bishop was endeavouring to kin- 
 dle war amongst his flock, the count was labour- 
 ing to restore peace amongst his subjects. At the 
 return of the five thousand men of the white com- 
 pany, who had been at the siege of Lavaur, he 
 represented to them that their dissensions would 
 bring ruin on their country; that an attack of the 
 crusaders would involve them all in one common 
 destruction; and that, whatever might be their 
 differences of opinion, they ought to repair their 
 walls, and prepare for their defence, if they would 
 not expose themselves to the hazard of being put 
 to the sword. He succeeded in producing a re- 
 conciliation between the two companies, and the 
 
 4 Chronica Magistri Guillelmi de Podio Laurentii, c. xv, p. 675. 
 
80 
 
 legate took occasion from it to subject all the Tou- 
 lousians to a sentence of excommunication." 5 On 
 his part, the bishop Fouquet recalled his clergy, 
 that he might save his priests from that punish- 
 ment to which he destined the remainder of his 
 flock. All the priests of Toulouse, with the pro- 
 vost of the cathedral at their head, quitted the 
 city, barefoot, carrying the holy sacrament in the 
 procession, and singing litanies. However, the 
 Toulousians did not at that time suffer the fate to 
 which their pastors destined them. Raymond VI, 
 seconded by the counts of Foix and of Cominges, 
 so incommoded the besiegers, by frequent sallies, 
 killed so many of them, and made them so soon 
 endure privations and famine, that Simon de 
 Montfort was obliged to raise the siege on the 
 29th of June, and soon after saw himself abandon- 
 ed by the greater part of the crusaders, whose 
 time of service had expired." 6 
 
 To efface the remembrance of this check, Simon 
 de Montfort extended his ravages into the county 
 of Foix, which he desolated with fire and slaught- 
 er. He then passed into Quercy, the lordship of 
 which he compelled the inhabitants to give him. 
 But at the same time the count of Toulouse, hav- 
 ing collected succours from all his allies, came in 
 his turn to besiege Castelnaudary. He appeared 
 
 5 Guillelmi de Podio Laur. cap. xviii, p. 677. 
 
 6 Petri Vallis Cern. Hist. Albigens. cap. liv, lv, p. 600, 601. Historia de 
 losfaicts de Tolosa, p. 38. Lettre des habitans de Toulouse a Pierre roi d'Ara- 
 gon. Preuves de ilustoire de Languedoc, p. 232 et seq. 
 
81 
 
 before that city towards the end of September, 
 with the counts of Foix. and of Cominges, the 
 viscount of Beam, and Savary de Mauleon. Al- 
 though the crusaders were reduced to an inferi- 
 ority of number, Simon de Montfort did not aban- 
 don the besieged. He shut himself up in their 
 walls, with a chosen troop of his old companions 
 in ai ms, who did not exceed one hundred knights. 
 At the same time he solicited his lieutenants, his 
 vassals, and his wife, to collect all the soldiers 
 who were at their disposal, and march to his 
 deliverance ; but as soon as his fortune began to 
 waver, the hatred, that he had excited through 
 the country, broke out in every part, and those, 
 upon whom he had reckoned the most, declared 
 against him. His mareschal Guy de Levis, and 
 his brother-in-law, Bouchard de Marli, or Mont- 
 morency, succeeded, at last, in collecting a nu- 
 merous body of knights, from the dioceses of 
 Xarbonne, Carcassonne, and Beziers. These 
 were crusaders, who, like Montfort, had gained 
 establishments in the country, and who saw, that, 
 without an effort of valour, their conquests would 
 be lost. The valiant count of Foix intercepted 
 :hem about a league from Castelnaudary, attack- 
 ed and dispersed them two several times, but his 
 roops having broken their ranks, to pillage the 
 vanquished, were attacked anew either by another 
 *)dy of the crusaders, or by Montfort himself, 
 who at the head of sixty knights had sallied from 
 
82 
 
 Castelnaudary, and were in their turn put to the 
 rout. In spite of this success,, in spite of the arrival 
 of Alain de Rouci a French knight, with a fresh 
 body of crusaders, the affairs of Simon de Mont- 
 fort continued to decline to the end of the year. 
 The count of Toulouse reconquered all the strong 
 places of Albigeois, and, in more than fifty cas- 
 tles, the inhabitants eagerly expelled or massacred 
 their French garrisons, to surrender themselves to 
 their ancient lord. 6 
 
 The hatred against the crusaders which seemed 
 rooted in the hearts of all the inhabitants of the 
 country, and of all who spoke the proven^al lan- 
 guage, gave occasion to the legates, the vice-leg- 
 ates, the monks of Citeaux, and to all that eccle- 
 siastical council which hitherto had directed the 
 crusade, to announce that it was time to complete 
 the regeneration of the country, by changing the 
 secular clergy. They had long accused the bish- 
 ops of lukewarmness, or indifference to the tri- 
 umphs of the church, and had solicited their des- 
 titution. This they at last obtained, in the year 
 1212, either from the pope, or from the timidity 
 of the persecuted prelates themselves. Bernard 
 Raymond de Rochefort, bishop of Carcassonne, 
 consented to give in his resignation ; and Guy, 
 abbot of Vaux-Cernay, was invested with his 
 
 6 Petri Vallis Cern. Hist. Albig. c. lvi, lvii, Iviii, p. 604 et seq. Guill. de 
 Podio Laurentii, cap. xix, p. 677. Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 42 et 
 seq. Hist. g6n. de Languedoc, Uv. xxu, chap, viii, ix, x, p. 218 et seq. 
 
83 
 
 bishopric. It is not known whether Berenger, 
 archbishop of Narbonne, escaped by death from 
 the persecutions which he had so long suffered, 
 or whether he was deposed ; but Arnold Amalric, 
 abbot of Citeaux, and chief of all the legations 
 to the Albigenses, took possession of this arch- 
 bishopric. Amongst the bishops of his province, 
 who assisted at his consecration, two others were 
 taken from that order of Citeaux, which had 
 preached and conducted the crusade. The abbot 
 Arnold did not, however, content himself with 
 the spiritual dignity which he acquired, as the 
 fruit of his labours for the extirpation of heresy. 
 To the archiepiscopal throne of Narbonne, and 
 to the rich revenues of that metropolitan see, he 
 resolved also to join the ducal crown. The count 
 of Toulouse bore, at the same time, the title of 
 duke of Narbonne, and the viscount of that same 
 city was his vassal, and owed him homage. The 
 abbot Arnold, in excommunicating Raymond VI, 
 had abandoned his states to the first occupant, 
 i and he had taken care, in consequence, to be the 
 .first to occupy the duchy of Narbonne. He had 
 taken possession of the archbishopric on the 12th 
 •of March, 1212, and on the 13th he demanded 
 homage of the viscount of Narbonne, and an 
 oath of fidelity.s 
 
 The fanaticism and cruelty of a monk were more 
 easily pardoned, in that age, than the cupidity 
 
 s Hist, de Lang. liv. xxm, c/i, xvi, p. 223. Preuves ib. No. 106, p. 236. 
 
 G2 
 
84 
 
 which induced him to seize upon the spoils of him 
 whom he had persecuted. The monks of Citeaux 
 began to sink in the estimation of the people, 
 when it appeared that they had shed so much 
 blood only for the opportunity of gaining posses- 
 sion of those episcopal sees which they coveted. 
 Perhaps the legate, Arnold Amalric, who, by this 
 conduct, had highly offended Simon de Montfort, 
 and had dissolved that intimate union which had 
 hitherto subsisted between those two ferocious 
 men, endeavoured to cause this symptom of am- 
 bition to be forgotten, by rendering new services 
 to the church ; or perhaps he might be drawn, by 
 his enthusiasm alone, to a new crusade, different 
 from that which he had hitherto preached. Be 
 this as it may, he had scarcely taken possession 
 of the archbishopric of Narbonne, before he pass- 
 ed into Spain, to aid the kings of Castille, of Ara- 
 gon, and of Navarre, against Mehemed-el-Nasir, 
 king of Morocco. 9 
 
 This Emir-al-Mumenim had been called in- 
 to Spain by the victories of the Christian kings 
 over the Moors of Andalusia. A mussulman cru- 
 sade had been preached in Africa: innumerable 
 swarms of warriors had crossed the strait of Ca- 
 diz ; and the victory of the Moors at Alarcos, on 
 the 18th of July, 1195, had given them a prodigious 
 ascendency over the Christians. After losing many 
 provinces, Alphonso IX, of Castille, had been 
 
 » Guill. de Podio Laurentii, cap. xx, p. 677. 
 
85 
 
 obliged to demand an armistice ; but this truce 
 expired in 1212. The fanaticism of the Almoha- 
 dans, who had annihilated the African church, 
 gave reason to apprehend the entire extirpation 
 of Christianity from Spain. Innocent III had 
 therefore granted the preaching of a new crusade, 
 to succour the Spaniards. The abbot Arnold, 
 archbishop of Narbonne, was not the only Gallic 
 prelate who passed the Pyrenees ; the archbishop 
 of Bordeaux and the bishop of Nantes arrived 
 also at Toledo, and with them a considerable num- 
 ber of barons, knights, and pilgrims, from Aqui- 
 taine, France, and Italy. This multitude, render- 
 ed ferocious by the war against the Albigenses, 
 distinguished itself, however, only by the massa- 
 cre of the Jews of Toledo, which it effected, not- 
 withstanding the efforts of the noble Castillians to 
 protect them ; and, by its earnestness to put to 
 death the Moorish garrison of Calatrava, in con- 
 tempt of the capitulation. The French crusaders 
 afterwards pretended, that they could no longer 
 support the heat of the Spanish climate, and they 
 retired before the terrible battle of Navas de To- 
 losa, fought on the 16th of July, 1212. This battle 
 saved the Christians of Spain, and overturned the 
 power of the Almohadans. 1 
 
 i Roderici Archiepiscopi Toletani, lib. vm, cap. i, ii, p. 129, et seq. In 
 Hisp. illustratce, t. ii. Roderic of Toledo had himself preached the cru- 
 sade in France and Italy, and he describes, in detail, the events of which 
 he was the principal author. We cannot, however, admit his testimony 
 for the incredible number of combatants, or that of the slain. lo. Ma- 
 riana, lib. xi, cap xxiii, xxiv, p. 548. 
 
86 
 
 The crusade against the Moors of Spain, occa- 
 sioned but a short interruption to that against the 
 Albigenses. During the winter, Simon de Mont- 
 fort had been reduced to the small number of 
 knights attached to his fortunes; but, at the same 
 time, the monks of Citeaux had recommenced 
 their preaching, throughout all Christendom, with 
 more ardour than ever; and the expedition against 
 the Albigenses, to which, according to their as- 
 surances, such high celestial favours were attach- 
 ed, was, nevertheless, so short and so easy, that 
 the army of the crusaders was renewed, four times 
 in the course of the year, by pilgrims, who, after 
 forty days' service, returned td their homes. Guy 
 de Montfort, the count's brother, (who had just 
 returned from the Holy Land), the provost of the 
 church of Cologne, the archbishop of Rouen, the 
 bishop of Laon, the bishop of Toul, and an arch- 
 deacon of Paris, were amongst the principal chiefs 
 who, in the year 1212, came to range themselves 
 under the banners of Montfort. Their hope of 
 contributing to the slaughter and punishment of 
 the Albigenses was not entirely disappointed, but 
 they had. no opportunity of distinguishing them- 
 selves by great achievements in arms. Upon the 
 arrival of these fanatical bands, almost all the cas- 
 tles of the Toulousians were abandoned by their 
 inhabitants, who sought a refuge in the cities of 
 Toulouse and Montauban, almost the only places 
 which they thought proof against a siege. But 
 
87 
 
 the crusade had been preached only for the de- 
 struction of heretics; the indulgences of the church 
 were only promised at this price. All the prelates, 
 who arrived in Albigeois surrounded by bigots 
 to whom they had promised the forgiveness of 
 their sins, would have thought their vow unfulfil- 
 led if they had not avenged God against his re- 
 bels. They were, however, forced to content them- 
 selves with such fugitive peasants as they could 
 surprise in the fields, or some prisoners, taken 
 in the castles which had dared to resist them. 
 Those of Saint Marcel and of Saint Antonin fur- 
 nished them with a considerable number of human 
 victims. But when Simon de Montfort saw that 
 the greater part of the population of the countries, 
 where heresy had prevailed, was exterminated, 
 and that the remainder had placed themselves out 
 of the reach of his attacks, he resolved to take 
 advantage of the zeal of the crusaders, by con- 
 ducting them into Agenois, whose entire popula- 
 tion was catholic, and to make them gain their 
 indulgences at the siege of la Penne, which, after 
 an obstinate resistance, surrendered on the 25th 
 of July. 2 The siege of Boissac, which followed, 
 was remarkable only for the perfidy which Mont- 
 fort compelled its inhabitants to practice. He 
 refused to grant them their lives, till they had 
 consented to sacrifice, with their own hands, three 
 
 2 Petri Fall. Cern. Hist. Albig. cap. lxiii, p. 616. Hist. ge'n. de Langue- 
 docy liv. xxn, ch. xxv, p. 228. Historia de losfaicts de Tolosa, p. 46. 
 
88 
 
 hundred routiern, who formed their garrison, and 
 who had, to that time, valiantly defended them. 
 On this condition, the gates of the city were 
 opened to him on the 8th of September ; and the 
 crusaders, contenting themselves with this car- 
 nage, received from the citizens a sum of money, 
 to save their houses from the flames. 3 Simon con- 
 ducted his army, afterwards, into the counties of 
 Foix and of Cominges, which he ravaged afresh, 
 whilst the count Raymond of Toulouse, despoiled 
 of almost all his states, passed into Aragon, to 
 implore the intercession of his brother-in-law, the 
 king Don Pedro, with the court of Rome. 4 
 
 At the end of November, 1212, Simon de Mont- 
 fort assembled a parliament at Pamiers. Under 
 this title was commonly understood a diet, or 
 conference of lords, who united voluntarily to 
 deliberate and decide upon their own interests. 
 The parliament of Pamiers was composed of 
 archbishops and bishops ; of French knights 
 drawn into the country by the crusades, or at- 
 tached to the fortunes of Montfort ; of certain 
 knights who spoke the provencal language ; and 
 of some inhabitants of the principal cities of the 
 country. The general of the crusade wished them 
 to draw up statutes, for the government of the 
 conquered provinces, and it was necessary that 
 
 3 Petri Vail. Hist. Albigens. cap. lxiii, p. 621. Historiade Tolosa, p. 46. 
 
 4 Hist.Albig. Petri Vail. Cern. cap, lxiv, p. 622. Hist, gtn de Languedoc, 
 liv. xxn, ch. xxx, p. 231. 
 
89 
 
 each order of his new subjects should be repre- 
 sented in his parliament, that he might ensure 
 their obedience. But he had also taken care, 
 beforehand, to ensure to himself a great majority. 
 All the bishops were absolutely devoted to him ; 
 the knights-crusaders had no other interest than 
 his ; the inhabitants of the country were intimi- 
 dated ; and the statutes of Pamiers bear the im- 
 press of their oppression, and of the suspicions of 
 the conqueror. Amongst fifty-one articles, some of 
 which nevertheless are favourable to the peasants 
 and lowest classes of society, we may remark the 
 prohibition to rebuild any of the fortresses which 
 had been destroyed, without the express permis- 
 sion of the count ; the order to all the catholic 
 women, whose husbands were amongst the ene- 
 mies of Montfort, to quit the estates under his 
 dominion; the order to widows, or heiresses of 
 noble fiefs, to marry none but Frenchmen, during 
 the space of ten years. These marriages, joined 
 to the confiscations and new infeodations which 
 Montfort granted to his creatures, multiplied, in 
 the province, the noble families of the north of 
 France, who adopted, in their legislation, the 
 customs of Paris, and caused the extinction of the 
 greater number of ancient families, who prided 
 themselves on descending either from the Romans 
 or the Goths. 5 
 
 5 Mariene Thesaurus Anecdotorum, torn, i, p. 831 seq. Hist. gin. de Lav- 
 guedoc, liv. xxu, ch. xxxiv, p. 233. 
 
It was not in vain that the count of Toulouse 
 look refuge with the king of Aragon, and im- 
 plored his protection at the court of Rome. This 
 king was held in high consideration by Innocent 
 III, and had rendered s;reat services to the church. 
 He could not see, without regret, his two sisters, 
 one married to the count of Toulouse, the other 
 to his son, stripped of their inheritance by Simon 
 de Montfort ; or that all the princes of those pro- 
 vinces, the allies and the vassals of the crown of 
 Aragon, should be ruined ; that Simon should have 
 refused to himself the service which he owed for 
 his viscounties of Beziers and Carcassonne ; and 
 that he had not permitted the other feudatories of 
 the province to render it, even in those moments 
 of danger when Spain appeared on the point of 
 sinking under the invasion of the Almohadans; 
 in a word, that he should destroy that dominion, 
 which Don Pedro himself, and the princes of Ara- 
 gon, his ancestors, had gradually obtained over 
 the south of Gaul. 
 
 The ambassadors of the king, Don Pedro, at 
 the court of Rome, did their utmost therefore to 
 convince the pope that Simon de Montfort was 
 only an ambitious usurper ; that, whilst he invoked 
 the name of religion, he thought of nothing but 
 his own aggrandisement; that he attacked, indif- 
 ferently, catholics and heretics ; and that he had 
 changed a crusade against heresy into a war of 
 extermination against that Provencal nation of 
 
91 
 
 which the king of Aragon prided himself in being 
 the chief. 6 
 
 Whether it was that Innocent III had been con- 
 stantly deceived by his legates, and that the am- 
 bassadors of the king of Aragon shewed him the 
 truth for the first time ; or whether he felt some 
 pity for the princes and people to whom he had 
 already occasioned so much injury ; or whether he 
 at last began to suspect those whom he had ren- 
 dered too powerful, and thought it more conform- 
 able to the policy of the church, to raise from the 
 ground the rival of Simon de Montfort, and op- 
 pose him to his conqueror, than to complete his 
 ruin; he entirely changed his language, in the let- 
 ters, which, at the beginning of the year 1213, he 
 wrote to his legates and to Montfort. 
 
 1213. The first of these letters, dated the 18th 
 of January, is addressed to the legate Arnold, 
 archbishop of Narbonne, to the bishop of Riez, 
 and to master Theodise of Genoa. In this letter 
 Innocent III reproaches them with the murder of 
 the viscount of Beziers, the usurpation of pro- 
 vinces, even where there was no heresy, and with 
 the cupidity they had displayed throughout the 
 whole war. He informs them that Raymond had 
 surrendered himself, with his son and all his 
 states, into the hands of the king of Aragon, de- 
 
 6 Petri Val. Cern. Hist. Albigens. cap. \xx,p. 635. — Hist. gen. de Lan- 
 guedocy liv. xxn, ch. xxxvi, p. 234. — In Mariance Hist. Hisp. lib. xn, 
 cap. ii, p. 557. 
 
claring that he submitted entirely to the sentence 
 of the church ; that this king, in possession of 
 such pledges, announced, on his part, that he was 
 ready to execute the judgment of the church, 
 which he awaited ; that he engaged to provide 
 that the son of the count of Toulouse, who had 
 never been suspected of heresy, should be brought 
 up in all the rigour of the catholic faith ; and he 
 undertook that the father should proceed to the 
 the Holy Land, or to Spain, according as the pope 
 should command, to combat the infidels, for the 
 remainder of his days. Don Pedro, whose letter 
 Innocent III almost entirely copied into his own, 
 only demanded, that they should cease to preach 
 the crusade against a country which had already 
 submitted ; that they should not continue to in- 
 vite the French, by all their spiritual rewards, to 
 exterminate the Languedocians ; that, whatever 
 determination Innocent III should take against 
 the count of Toulouse, they should cease to con- 
 found the innocent with the guilty ; and that, 
 should they even find Raymond VI in fault, they 
 should not, on that account, punish his son, who 
 was not even suspected, or the counts of Foix and 
 of Cominges, and the viscount of Beam, who had 
 been involved in the war only for having fulfilled 
 their feudal duties towards the count of Toulouse, 
 their lord. After having inserted in his letter al- 
 most the entire contents of that of the king of 
 Aragon, Innocent III reproved his legates in a 
 
93 
 
 language which they were not accustomed to hear 
 from him. He reproached them with their cupi- 
 dity and amhition ; he accused them of having 
 shed the blood of the innocent, and of having in- 
 vaded lands where heresy had never penetrated ; 
 he commanded them to restore to the vassals of 
 the king of Aragon, all that they had taken from 
 them, that the king might not be diverted from 
 the war which he was maintaining against the in- 
 fidels. Two following letters, written by the pope 
 to Simon de Montfort, are not less energetic, and 
 shew no less that the atrocities of the war in Al- 
 bis;eois, were at last known at Rome. 7 
 
 The king of Aragon obtained equal success in 
 an embassy that he sent to Philip Augustus. He 
 engaged this king to retain his son Louis, who was 
 ready to set out for the crusade against the Albi- 
 genses ; he, at the same time, announced in the 
 Isle of France, in Champagne and Burgundy, that 
 the pope ceased to encourage this crusade, and 
 exhorted the faithful rather to march to the relief 
 of the Holy Land. The cardinal, Robert de 
 Courcon, legate of the pope in France, declared 
 himself against the continuation of the war ; so 
 that the bishops of Toulouse and of Carcassonne, 
 who were again going through the provinces of 
 the North, to arm them against those of the South, 
 found much difficulty in issuing their indulgences. 
 
 7 Innocentii III Epistolce lib. xv, ep. 212, 213, 214.— Hist. Gen. de Lan- 
 guedoc, liv. xxn, c/i. xxxvi, p. 234. — Duchesne Script, torn, v, p. 730, 731. 
 
94 
 
 At the same time, a new provincial council was 
 called at Lavaur, either to hear the justification 
 of Count Raymond, or to accept the submission 
 promised by the king of Aragon, and to establish 
 peace in the province. 8 
 
 1213. But Simon de Montfort had such zealous 
 partisans in the bishops of the province of Nar- 
 bonne, he had connected his cause so intimately 
 with theirs, he had taken so much care to provide 
 the monks of Citeaux, the principal instigators 
 of the crusade, with all the pontifical sees which 
 had become vacant, that he was sure of gaining 
 his cause before such prejudiced judges as those 
 to whom the pope had referred it. In fact, the 
 authority of the holy see was never more com- 
 pletely set at nought by its agents. Innocent III 
 had repeatedly given positive orders to the bishops 
 of the province, to hear, and to judge of, the justifi- 
 cations of count Raymond ; and the bishops as- 
 sembled at the council of Lavaur, in the month of 
 January, 1213, again explicitly refused to hear 
 him, or to admit any of his justifications. They 
 pretended that the count of Toulouse, by not ex- 
 ecuting all the orders they had given him before, 
 and by causing the murder of nearly a thousand 
 Christians, through the war which he maintained 
 against the crusaders, had lost all right of plead- 
 ing his cause. They even refused to extend the 
 benefits of the pacification to the counts of Foix 
 
 a Petri Vallis, Cern. Hist. Albigens. cap. lxvi, et seq. p. 624. 
 
95 
 
 and of Cominges, and to the viscount of Beam, 
 whom they declared to be supporters of heretics. 
 Above all, they insisted upon the necessity of de- 
 stroying the city of Toulouse, and of exterminat- 
 ing its inhabitants, that they might complete the 
 purification of the province. And, as they had 
 this object more at heart than all the others, the 
 fathers of the council first addressed a common 
 letter to the pope, recommending it to him; and 
 then, each prelate wrote to him separately, ear- 
 nestly to press upon him the entire annihilation of 
 that city, which they compared to Sodom and 
 Gomorrah, and the destruction of all the villains 
 who had taken refuge in it. 9 
 
 The agreement of all these bishops with Simon 
 de Montfort and his numerous friends, the au- 
 thority of the crusaders, of all those who had 
 previously marched to the crusade, and of all 
 who still intended to do so, made an impression 
 upon Innocent III. It was he who had, at first, 
 excited the sanguinary spirits which then lorded 
 it over Europe ; but he was himself, afterwards, 
 the dupe of their concert. It was but too true, 
 that the whole of Christendom then demanded 
 the renewal of those scenes of carnage, that it 
 prided itself on the slaughter of the heretics, and 
 that it was in the name of public opinion that 
 the fathers of Lavaur required new massacres. 
 
 9 Innocentii HI, lib. xvi, Ep. 40, 41, 42. 44, 45. Histoire de Languedoc, 
 lit. xxn, ch. xliii, p. 241. 
 
96 
 
 Those who had contributed to create such a 
 public opinion were, however, on that account, 
 only the more guilty. Innocent III, deceived by 
 the echo of his own voice, thought that he had 
 shewed too much indulgence. He wrote again 
 to the king of Aragon, the 21st of May, 1213, to 
 revoke all the concessions he had made, to ac- 
 cuse him of having taken advantage of the Roman 
 court, by a false statement, and to confirm the 
 excommunication of the counts of Toulouse, of 
 Cominges, of Foix, and of the viscount of Beam. 1 
 These negociations, at the court of Rome, had 
 on neither side suspended the preparations for 
 war; but the number of the French crusaders had 
 diminished, through the pains which the king of 
 Aragon had taken to announce the pacification 
 of the province, and through the declarations of 
 the pope's legate himself. But the two bishops 
 of Orleans and Auxerre, thought it, on this ac- 
 count, much more their duty to proceed to the 
 aid of Simon de Montfort, and they joined him 
 at Carcassonne with many knights from their pro- 
 vince. 2 On the other hand, the king of Aragon, 
 flattering himself that if his brother-in-law could 
 obtain a victory over Montfort, he would, by this 
 means, put an end to the vacillations of the court 
 
 1 Innoccntii III Epist. lib. xvi, Ep. 48. Petri Vol. Cern. Hist. Albigens. 
 cap. lxiv, p. 126 et seq. Concilium Vauriense in Labbei Concilia, t. xi, p. 81, 
 seq. Raynaldi Annul. Eccles. 1213, § xxvi, seq. p. 221. Hist. gen. de Lan~ 
 zuedoc, lit. xxn, ch. li, p. 240. 
 
 2 Petri Vail. Cern. cap. lxix et seq. p. 233. 
 
97 
 
 of Rome, passed the Pyrenees with a thousand 
 knights, and came to join the counts of Toulouse, 
 Foix, and Cominges. Don Pedro was at once a 
 brave warrior, a skilful politician, and an elegant 
 troubadour; he was subject to no other reproach 
 than that of too passionate a love for women. At 
 this very time he wrote to a lady of Toulouse, that 
 it w as for her sake he w as come to combat the 
 French knights, that he should be indebted to her 
 beautiful eyes for the valour which he should show 
 in the battle, and that from them he should expect 
 the recompense of his atchievements. This was 
 the language consecrated to the gallantry of the 
 age ; nor is there any reason to believe, as some 
 moderns have supposed, that the letter was ad- 
 dressed to one of his sisters married to the two 
 Raymonds of Toulouse. It fell, however, into 
 the hands of Simon de Montfort. Our fortune is 
 not doubtful, he exclaimed, God is for us. He has 
 for him only the eyes of his lady. 3 
 
 The king of Aragon, having united his forces 
 with those of the counts his allies, went to lay 
 siege to the little town of Muret, three leagues 
 distant from Toulouse, on the south-west. He 
 arrived before it on the 10th of September. He 
 had joined to his thousand knights of Aragon, 
 those of the counts of Toulouse, of Foix, of Com- 
 inges, and of Gaston de Beam, which might, at 
 most, form a number equal to his own. But the 
 
 » Guillelmus de Podio Laurentii, cap. xxi, p. 078. 
 
 a 
 
98 
 
 cavalry of the Pyrenees could not, any more than 
 that of Spain, be compared with the French ca- 
 valry, either in respect to the weight of the ar- 
 mour, or the strength of the horses. The Span- 
 iards, principally accustomed to contend with the 
 Mussulmans, had acquired their method of fight- 
 ing ; and their squadrons more resembled light 
 cavalry, than the heavy horse of the French. Si- 
 mon de Montfort, who had assembled his troops 
 at Saverdun, in the countship of Foix, had with 
 him about a thousand knights, or Serjeants at arms. 
 These might be regarded as the flower of French 
 knighthood ; they were men enveloped in iron ; 
 and their bodies seemed as iron as their armour. 
 Amongst them was distinguished, William des 
 Barres, uterine brother of Montfort, the ancient 
 rival of Richard Cceur- de-lion, and the most re- 
 nowned of all the warriors of France. Many 
 others, without equalling him in reputation, did 
 not yield to him either in strength or courage. 
 Amongst them all, not a heart could be found 
 susceptible of terror, or accessible to pity. Equal- 
 ly inspired by fanaticism and the love of war, they 
 believed that the sure way to salvation was through 
 the field of carnage. Seven bishops, who follow- 
 ed the army, had blessed their standards and their 
 arms, and would be engaged in prayer for them 
 whilst they were attacking the heretics. Thus did 
 they advance, indifferent whether to victory or 
 martyrdom, certain that either would issue in the 
 
99 
 
 reward which the hand of God himself had des- 
 tined for them. Simon de Montfort, passing the 
 Garonne at their head, entered, without any ob- 
 stacle, into the town of Muret, and prepared for 
 battle on the following day, the 12th of September. 
 
 The cavalry, at that time, formed the only force 
 of armies. A warrior, entirely covered with iron 
 as well as his horse, overturning the infantry, 
 piercing them with his heavy lance, or cutting 
 them down with his sabre, had nothing to fear 
 from the miserable footmen, exposed in every part 
 to his blows, scarcely armed with a wretched 
 sword, and who had neither been exercised to 
 discipline or danger. Nevertheless, it was the 
 custom to summon these also to the armies, either 
 that they might labour at the sieges, or that they 
 might dispatch the vanquished, after a defeat. 
 Simon de Montfort had assembled the militia of 
 the cities which were subject to him ; Raymond, 
 on his part, had caused the levies of the Toulous- 
 ians to march, and these were much the most nu- 
 merous. As it was afterwards attempted to find 
 out something miraculous, both in the dispropor- 
 tion of number, and in the extent of the carnage, 
 the historians of the church affirmed, that the mi- 
 litia, under the orders of the king of Aragon, 
 amounted to sixty thousand men ; they allow, 
 however, that they were not engaged. 
 
 Simon de Montfort, quitting, on the morning of 
 the 12th of September, the gates of Muret, in or- 
 
 H 2 
 
100 
 
 der to seek his enemies, did not march strait to- 
 wards them, but kept along the side of the Ga- 
 ronne, from the eastern gate, so as to make it 
 appear to the king of Aragon and his allies, who 
 were also under arms, that his design was to es- 
 cape. But, all at once, turning sharply upon the 
 army of Don Pedro, he repulsed the count of 
 Foix, who commanded the advanced guard, and 
 encountered the body led by the king of Aragon 
 himself. Two French knights, Alain de Roucy, 
 and Florent de Ville, had agreed, unitedly to at- 
 tack the king, to attach themselves wholly to his 
 person, and to suffer no assailant to divert them 
 from the pursuit, until they had killed him. Pedro 
 of Aragon had changed armour with one of his 
 bravest knights. But, when the two Frenchmen 
 had, at the same time, broken their lances against 
 him who wore the royal armour, Alain, seeing him 
 bend under the stroke, cried out immediately, 
 This is not the king, for he is a better knight. No 
 truli/, that is not he, but here he is, instantly replied 
 Don Pedro, who was near at hand. This bold 
 declaration cost him his life. A band of knights, 
 who were waiting the orders of Alain and Flo- 
 rent, surrounded him immediately, and neither 
 left him, nor suffered him to escape, till they had 
 thrown him lifeless from his horse. As the French 
 had anticipated, the death of the king of Aragon 
 occasioned the rout of his army. Simon, who had 
 remained at the head of the rear-guard of the cru- 
 
101 
 
 saders 3 did not come up with his enemies till the 
 news of this event had already circulated amongst 
 them, and he profited by it to press, more vigor- 
 ously, the three counts, and Gaston de Beam, 
 whom he compelled to flight. Arrived at the 
 place where Don Pedro had fallen, and where his 
 body was already stripped by the infantry of the 
 crusaders, it is said, he could not forbear shed- 
 ding a few tears ; but this apparent compassion 
 was only the signal for new displays of fury. He 
 fell upon the infantry of the Toulousians, who had 
 taken no part in the battle, and who, abandoned 
 by their knights, could make no resistance against 
 a powerful cavalry; and, having first cut off their 
 retreat, he destroyed nearly the whole, either by 
 putting them to the sword, or drowning them in 
 the waters of the Garonne. 4 
 
 4 Petri Vol. Cern. Hist. Albigens. cap. lxxi, et seq. p. 637. lAtterce Prce- 
 latorum qui in exercitu Simonis ercmt, ibid, cap. lxxiii, p. 641. Guillelmi de 
 Podio Laurentii, cap. xxi, xxii, p. 678. Praclara Francor. Facinora, p. 767. 
 Bernardi Guidonis, p. 483. Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 53. Chronic, 
 o Comment, del rey en J acme, cap. viii. Hist. gSn de Languedoc, p. 249, et 
 seq. liv. xxii, ch. lvi. Raynaldi Annul. Eccl. 1213, § 56, seq. p. 227. Joan. 
 Mariana Hist. Hisp. lib. xn, cap. ii, p. 558. 
 
CHAP. III. 
 
 Submission of the Albigenses — Revolt and New War to 
 the Death of Simon de Montfort, 1214—1218. 
 
 1214. The activity of Simon de Montfort always 
 seconded his unmeasurable ambition. He never 
 estimated riches and power any otherwise than 
 as they might promote the acquisition of still 
 greater riches and power. Hevhad never known 
 any other relaxation from his victories than the 
 preparation for new conquests. He had never 
 understood any other way of rendering himself 
 acceptable to God, than by shedding the blood of 
 infidels, nor felt any other religious emotion than 
 the delight of being the spectator of their torments. 
 Nevertheless he gained no extraordinary advan- 
 tages from the battle of Muret. The crusaders, 
 after that great victory, thought their task accom- 
 plished, and their duty towards God fulfilled, so 
 that they, with one consent, hastened to their 
 homes. The court of Rome hesitated, for fear of 
 rendering its creature too powerful. Philip Au- 
 gustus indirectly placed obstacles to the zeal of 
 the crusaders, by publishing an ordinance to limit 
 their privileges. He no longer permitted them to 
 withdraw from the defence of their country, by 
 
103 
 
 abstaining from marching at their lord's summons, 
 though he still left them the choice between ser- 
 vice and payment. He no longer permitted them 
 to decline the jurisdiction of the temporal tribu- 
 nals, either when they were accused of crimes, or 
 when they pleaded for their fief or their manor. 5 
 Besides, the Catalans and the Aragonese were 
 indignant at seeing the son of the king, whom 
 they had lost, under the tutelage of him who had 
 shed his father's blood. They had declared war 
 against Simon de Montfort, and were preparing 
 to attack him on the side of the Pyrenees, whilst 
 their ambassador to Innocent III, was endea- 
 vouring to obtain the interference of the court of 
 Rome, in defence of their independence. And 
 they laboured so effectually, that Innocent III, 
 by his letter of the 23rd of January, 1214, com- 
 manded Simon to restore the young Don Jayme 
 to his subjects ; which order was executed, at 
 Narbonne, in the month of April following. 6 
 
 A new legate, the cardinal Peter of Benevento, 
 had this year come to the province. He had fixed 
 his residence at Narbonne, and all the lords, who 
 had been so ill treated in the last war, had flock- 
 ed to him to obtain, by his intercession, their 
 reconciliation with the church. Much more ac- 
 commodating, at least in appearance, than his 
 
 5 Lauriere, Ordonnances des Rois de France, torn, i, p. ,32. 
 
 6 Innocentii III Epistolce, lib. xvi, wo. 171. Histoire gtn. de Langiiedoc, 
 liv. xxn, ch. lxvii, p. 259. 
 
104 
 
 predecessor, he re-opened, to them all, the door 
 of the sanctuary. During the month of April, 
 the counts of Foix, and of Cominges, were recon- 
 ciled to the church ; the same grace was after- 
 wards extended to Raymond VI, and, at last, to 
 the inhabitants of Narbonne and Toulouse. It is 
 true that by the oath which these lords, and the 
 consuls of the cities, took to the legate, they re- 
 signed their bodies and goods to his disposal, 
 without any guarantee ; they engaged to obey all 
 his orders; opened to him all their castles; re- 
 served no lordship ; nor made any stipulations in 
 their own favour. Raymond, who had previously 
 ceded all his rights to his son, withdrew, at the 
 same time, from the Narbonnese castle, the anci- 
 ent residence of the sovereigns, and went to dwell 
 with his son, as a simple individual, in a private 
 house at Toulouse, waiting the decision of the 
 sovereign pontiff whether he should retire to the 
 king of England, to the Holy Land, or to Rome. 7 
 At the very time when the lords of the Albi- 
 genses were thus submitting themselves to the 
 discretion of the church, a new army of crusaders, 
 conducted by the bishop of Carcassonne and the 
 cardinal Robert de Courcon, arrived at Montpel- 
 lier. " How great was then the mercy of God," 
 cries the monk of Vaux-Cernay, " for every one 
 
 7 Hist. g6n. de Languedoc, liv. xxu, ch. lxix, p. 261. Preuves, nos. cx, 
 cxi, cxii, p. 239 et seq. Petri Val. Cem. Hist. Albigens. cap. lxxvii,p. 647. 
 Guill. de Podio Lfiureniii, cap. xxiv, p. 680. 
 
105 
 
 may see that the pilgrims could have done nothing 
 great without the legate, nor the legate without 
 the pilgrims. In reality the pilgrims would have 
 had but small success, against such numerous 
 enemies, if the legate had not treated with them 
 beforehand. It was then by a dispensation of the 
 divine mercy, that whilst the legate, by a pious 
 fraud, cajoled, and enclosed in his nets, the ene- 
 mies of the faith who were assembled at Nar- 
 bonne, the count of Montfort, and the pilgrims 
 who were arrived from France, could pass into 
 Agenois, there to crush their enemies, or rather 
 those of Christ. O pious fraud of the legate ! O 
 piety full of deceit." 8 
 
 Nevertheless, this treason, which the pious ce- 
 nobite celebrates with such enthusiasm, does not 
 appear to have produced results, proportioned to 
 the admiration with which it inspired him. The 
 campaign was devoted to the besieging and taking 
 of several castles of Quercy and Agenois, some 
 of which made a pretty long resistance, and cost 
 much blood to the crusaders. In the greater 
 part they found no heretics, which reduced the sol- 
 diers of the church to the necessity of mournfully 
 burning the castle, or at the most of only putting 
 the inhabitants to the sword, as in an ordinary 
 war. But at Maurillac they were more happy. 
 " I must not pass it over," says the monk of Ci- 
 teaux, " that we found there seven heretics, of 
 
 8 Petri Vail. Cern. Albig. cap. lxxviii, p. 648. 
 
106 
 
 the sect called Waldenses, who being conducted 
 to the legate, and having confessed their incredu- 
 lity, were seized by our pilgrims, and burned with 
 unspeakable joy." 9 
 
 Simon de Montfort did not trust to his arms 
 alone for making conquests. In 1214 he married 
 his son Amaury, to Beatrice, daughter of Guigue 
 VI dauphin of Viennois, in the hope that she 
 would one day inherit Dauphiny ; for this name 
 had then been given to the heritage of the counts 
 of Albon, which had passed into the house of 
 Burgundy, and held from the kingdom of Aries; 
 whilst those lords had taken the title of dauphins 
 from their armorial bearings. 1 On the other hand, 
 a provincial council, summoned at Montpellier 
 for the month of December, but which did not 
 commence its sittings till the eighth of January, 
 1215, was to determine the fate of the provinces, 
 formerly occupied by the counts of Toulouse, of 
 Beam, and of Cominges, whom the cardinal 
 legate had reconciled to the church, without 
 explaining the conditions that he should impose 
 upon them 2 
 
 1215. The inhabitants of Montpellier did not 
 consider their lordship as one of those which the 
 council, assembled in their city, had the right to 
 
 • 
 
 9 Petri Vail. Genu cap. lxxix, p. 649. 
 
 1 Histoire de Languedoc, liv. xxn, ch. lx, p. 256, and ch. lxxi, p. '262. 
 Histoire de Dauphin^, torn. \, p. 248. 
 
 2 Petri Vol. Cern. Hist, Albigens. cap. lxxxvi, p. 654. 
 
t 
 
 107 
 
 lispose of. The marriage of Mary, daughter of 
 William VIII of Montpellier, with Don Pedro of 
 \ragon, had, in 1204, subjected their city to the 
 dns:, who had been recently killed at Muret. But 
 he inhabitants of Montpellier possessed great pri- 
 vileges and a municipal government. For two 
 centuries, at least, they had obeyed their own 
 ords residing in their city, to whose houses they 
 were strongly attached. Nor was it without re- 
 gret that they saw themselves transferred to a dis- 
 :ant monarch, who goverued them negligently by 
 i subaltern, and who on all occasions sacrificed 
 heir interests to those of his own subjects. When 
 Don Pedro was killed, at the battle of Muret, 
 ;hey considered their connexion with the crown 
 )f Aragon as dissolved, and refused to acknow- 
 edge his son Don Jayme. At first they thought 
 bf forming themselves into a republic, after the 
 example of the Italian cities, with whom they had 
 constant commercial intercourse; but those cities 
 icknowledged in the emperor a supreme lord, 
 whose authority over them had been determined 
 at the peace of Constance. The city of Montpel- 
 lier thought it therefore right to place itself in the 
 same relation to king Philip Augustus, the supreme 
 lord of all France. They regarded him as too 
 distant for them to fear any abuse of authority, 
 whilst they flattered themselves, that his name 
 alone would protect them both against the preten- 
 sions of the Aragonese, and, what was more to be 
 
10a 1 
 
 dreaded, against the ambition of Simon de Mont- 
 fort. Philip Augustus, in fact, consented to take 
 under his safeguard, for five years, the lives of the 
 citizens of Montpellier, their goods, and their city. 
 He made, however, this condition, that his pro- 
 tection should remain only as long as the pope 
 should not give orders to the crusaders to attack 
 them, for he was resolved not to oppose his autho- 
 rity to that of the church. 3 
 
 It appears that the church formed no projects 
 against them, and that there was no ground for 
 regarding them as submitted to the jurisdiction of 
 the crusade ; but, their orthodoxy was not a suffi- 
 cient security against the enterprizes of Simon de 
 Montfort. When all the bishops of the province 
 were assembled in council at Montpellier, to de- 
 cide upon the sovereignty of the countries con- 
 quered by the crusaders, Montfort, who wished 
 to direct that assembly, and who looked to it to 
 legitimate those titles, which he held by perfidy 
 and robbery alone, formed also the project of pro- 
 fiting by the conferences which he might have 
 with the prelates, to obtain possession of the city 
 of Montpellier. The citizens, who suspected his 
 designs, would not permit his entrance into their 
 city, and assigned for these conferences the house 
 of the Templars, situated without their walls. But 
 Peter of Benevento, cardinal legate, abusing the 
 
 3 Hist. g6n. de Languedoc, liv. xxn, ch. lxviii, p. 260. Chartes de Phi- 
 lippe August e, Preuves, p. 238. 
 
109 
 
 respect with which his high dignity inspired the 
 guards of the gates, took Simon de Montfort by 
 the arm, mingled the two sons of that count, and 
 a great number of knights, in his suite, and in this 
 manner entered the city. However, when the 
 citizens of Montpellier saw these knights march- 
 ing, on horseback, through their streets, a univer- 
 sal cry, to take arms and defend their liberties, 
 soon assembled them in crowds. They barrica- 
 doed the streets, and surrounded the church of 
 Notre Dame, where the council was sitting, and 
 Simon de Montfort thought himself happy to es- 
 cape from the city through a by-way/ 
 
 This little check did not prevent Simon de 
 Montfort from succeeding in the principal object 
 of his ambition. The council of Montpellier was 
 composed of five archbishops, of Narbonne, of 
 Auch, of Embrun, of Aries, and of Aix, with the 
 bishops their suffragans, to the number of twenty- 
 eight. These fathers decreed, with a unanimous 
 consent, as the monk of Vaux-Cernay assures us, 
 that Simon de Montfort should occupy Toulouse, 
 and all the other conquests which the Christian 
 crusaders had made, and should govern them in 
 quality of prince and monarch of the country. 5 
 Count Raymond VI, who, before every thing, 
 
 * Petri Vail. Cem. Hist. Albig. cap. lxxxi, p. 654. Hist. gSn. de Lan- 
 guedoc,liv. xxn, ch. lxxvii, p. 266. 
 
 5 Petri Vail. Cern. Albig. cap. lxxxi, p. 654. — Concilia Generalia, torn, xi, 
 p. 103. 
 
110 
 
 and at any price, wished to be reconciled to the 
 church, offered no resistance to this decree. He 
 left to the monarch, his sovereign, the care of pro- 
 testing against so strange an invasion of the secu- 
 lar power. He delivered the Narbonnese castle, 
 the palace of the sovereigns, to the bishop Fou- 
 quet, who came with armed men to take posses- 
 sion of it, and went to lodge, with his son and 
 the two countesses, at the house of a private h> 
 dividual of Toulouse, named David de Roaix. 
 The prelate demanded, at the same time, hosta- 
 ges from the city, and caused to be delivered to 
 him twelve out of the twenty- four consuls, whom 
 he conveyed to Aries. 6 
 
 The conquest of the province appeared to be 
 compleated. The greater part of the Albigenses, 
 with thousands of Catholics, had perished by the 
 executioners. The light of the first reformation 
 was extinguished in blood, and even Simon him- 
 self was much more occupied with governing his 
 conquests, than with exciting new persecutions. 
 But the movement impressed on the minds of the 
 people, by the preachers of the crusade, did not 
 cease with the suppression of heresy. There were 
 no longer any Albigenses to sacrifice, but thou- 
 sands of missionaries still continued to ramble 
 about the towns and villages, stirring up the peo- 
 ple, by promising them the joys of paradise in re- 
 
 e Petri Val. Cernai, Alb. cap. lxxxi. p. 655. — Guil. de Podio Laurentii, 
 cap. xxiv, p. 680. 
 
Ill 
 
 compense for the blood they should shed. This 
 new method of gaining indulgences was so much 
 more easy than the crusade to the holy land ; the 
 expedition might be accomplished with so little 
 fatigue, expence, or danger, that there was not a 
 knight who did not wish to wash away his sins 
 with the blood of the heretics ; and thus each 
 spring produced a new swarm of crusaders. At 
 the commencement of the year 1215, prince Louis, 
 son of Philip Augustus, wished, in his turn, to 
 perform a pilgrimage, and to serve forty days 
 against the Albigenses. He arrived at Lyons 
 the 19th of April, with a much more considerable 
 force than he could have assembled, if he had 
 only been going to combat temporal enemies, 
 such as the Flemings or the English. The bishop 
 of Beauvais, the counts of Saint Paul, of Pon- 
 thieu, of Seez, and of Alencon, the viscount of 
 Melun, the lords of Beaujeu, and of Montmoren- 
 cy had desired to participate, with a great num- 
 ber of knights of less illustrious names, in this 
 work of sanctification ; and immense was the 
 number of citizens, peasants, and adventurers, 
 who had followed his standard, to live for six 
 weeks at discretion in Languedoc, to pillage 
 houses and castles, and to sing, in chorus, the 
 hymn Veni Creator, around the stake at which the 
 heretics were burning. 
 
 When Simon de Montfort and the legate were 
 informed of the approach of this army, which was 
 
112 
 
 marching against them although the war was ter- 
 minated, and which had no country to ravage but 
 that now become their property, they were great- 
 ly alarmed. They feared that Louis, if he once 
 got into the country, would either defend the count 
 of Toulouse, his near relation, or the rights of the 
 crown, usurped by the council of Montpellier. Si- 
 mon de Montfort went to meet him at Vienne, and 
 from that time never quitted him. The legate, on 
 his side, took care to inform the prince royal, that 
 coming, as a crusader and pilgrim, into a country 
 conquered by the crusaders, he neither could nor 
 ought to oppose himself, in any thing, to the ar- 
 rangements which had been made by the eccle- 
 siastics. 7 
 
 But the suspicions of these two ambitious ad- 
 venturers were without foundation. N either prince 
 Louis nor his knights had any political object, but 
 came into the south solely to fulfil their vows. 
 He visited, in company with Simon, the cities of 
 Montpellier, Beziers, Carcassone, and Toulouse ; 
 he permitted the count of Toulouse and his son to 
 go and seek an asylum with the king of England ; 
 and returned by Montauban, at which place it ap- 
 pears that Simon de Montfort took leave of him. 8 
 
 It was now two years since Innocent III had 
 summoned, for the year 1215, an oecumenical or 
 general council, in which the whole church should 
 
 7 Petri Vol. Cern. Hist. Albig. cap. lxxxii, p. 656. 
 
 8 Hist. g6n. de Languedoc, Uv. xxn ; ch. lxxxi— lxxxvii ; p. 268—273. 
 
113 
 
 be called to decide the great interests which were 
 then simultaneously in discussion. This, which 
 was the twelfth of the general councils, and the 
 fourth of those of Lateran, was composed of se- 
 venty-one metropolitans, of four hundred and 
 twelve bishops, and nearly eight hundred abbots. 
 Two of the patriarchs were present, and the two 
 others were represented by their deputies. The 
 two orders of the Franciscans, and the Domini- 
 cans, those terrible soldiers of the pope, received 
 then the sanction of the universal church ; a new 
 expedition, for the defence and recovery of the 
 Holy Land, was resolved upon, which was the 
 fifth crusade ; some heresies were condemned, 
 and some canons established for the discipline of 
 the church ; and amongst them we ought particu- 
 larly to remark the twenty-second, which impos- 
 ed on each Christian, for the first time, the obli- 
 gation of confessing himself once in the year, to 
 receive the communion at Easter, and which trans- 
 formed a habit of devotion into a duty, the observ- 
 ance of which was, from that time, enforced by 
 the heaviest penalties. In fine, the council of 
 Lateran put an end to the preaching of the cru- 
 sade against the Albigenses, and disposed of the 
 countries conquered by the crusaders. 9 
 
 Count Raymond VI, his son Raymond VII, 
 and the counts of Foix and Cominges, had all 
 
 9 Labbc Concilia Generalia, t. xi, p. 117. 240. Raynaldi Ann. Eccksic 
 1215, * i, c. xx, p. 241. 
 
 I 
 
114 
 
 proceeded to Rome to plead their cause before 
 the assembled church, whilst Simon had, on his 
 part, sent his brother Guy de Montfort. The 
 counts presented to the pope a recommendation 
 from the king of England ; they threw themselves 
 at his knees; they exposed the crying injustice 
 which Montfort had committed against them, in 
 contempt of the pontifical authority itself. Ma- 
 ny fathers in the council strenuously defended the 
 persecuted counts ; they spoke, with execration, 
 of the horrors committed in the province, and re- 
 peatedly reproached the bishop Fouquet with hav- 
 ing destroyed more than ten thousand persons, of 
 the flock committed to his care. Innocent III 
 himself appeared touched. He expressed much 
 good-will both to Raymond VI and his son; but 
 the greater number of the fathers were heated by 
 the fanaticism of the crusade, and thought that 
 all disfavour, showed to Montfort, would tend to 
 the discouragement of the faithful ; and they at 
 last agreed with the pope to publish a decree, 
 which gave to Montfort the cities of Toulouse and 
 of Montauban, the countship of Toulouse, and all 
 the countries conquered by the crusaders, reserv- 
 ing to Raymond VII the countship of Venaissin and 
 the marquisate of Provence. The decision respect- 
 ing the countships of Foix and Cominges was ad- 
 journed ; but it appears, that the two counts were 
 provisionably put into possession of their states. 1 
 
 i Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 57, et seq. Petri Vail. Cern. Hist, 
 
115 
 
 We have thus traced the total extinction of the 
 first reformation. The slaughter had been so pro- 
 digious, the massacres so universal, the terror so 
 profound, and of so long duration, that the church 
 appeared to have completely attained her object. 
 The worship of the reformed Albigenses had every 
 where ceased. All teaching was become impos- 
 sible. Almost all the doctors of the new church 
 had perished in a frightful manner ; and the very 
 small number of those who had succeeded in es- 
 caping the crusaders, had sought an asylum in the 
 most distant regions, and were able to avoid new 
 persecutions only by preserving the most absolute 
 silence respecting their doctrines and their ancient 
 destinies. The private believers, who had not pe- 
 rished by the fire and the sword, or who had not 
 withdrawn by flight from the scrutiny of the in- 
 quisition, knew that they could only save their 
 lives by burying their secret in their own bosoms. 
 For them there were no more sermons, no more 
 prayers, no more Christian communion, no more 
 instruction ; even their children were not made 
 acquainted with their secret sentiments. 
 } 1216. The triumph appeared so complete, that 
 !:he persecutors, in the confidence of their victory, 
 oecame divided, made war reciprocally against 
 3ach other, and were ruined. We are about to see 
 
 Albigens. cap. Ixxxiii, p. 658. Guil. de Podio Laurentii, c. xxvi, p. 681. 
 Sententia de terra Albig. Concil. Gen. t. xi, p. 234. Hist. gin. de Lamjue- 
 ioc, liv. xxn, ch. xcvi— c, p. 277. 
 
 12 
 
116 
 
 their errors at the end of the reign of Philip Au- 
 gustus, and, during that of his son, the relaxation 
 of their vigilance, and the apparent resurrection 
 of the sect which they had crushed. But, this 
 momentary interruption to the persecution served 
 only to render it the more destructive. After the 
 extinction of the fire, some scattered sparks were 
 still concealed under the ashes; those who had 
 laboured to extinguish it, by turning off their at- 
 tention, permitted those sparks to kindle a new 
 flame ; and this, having devoured all the combus- 
 tible matter that remained, was then quenched in 
 its turn. The momentary toleration in Albigeois 
 recalled thither the preachers and the sectaries 
 who had escaped the first massacre, and involved 
 them all in the second. 
 
 Thus the reformation, of which the church had 
 so much need, the light which was to illuminate 
 the mind, restore to morals their purity, and to 
 reason its empire, was repelled for three whole 
 centuries ; and even much longer with regard to 
 those nations which spoke the romanesque lan- 
 guages. They had been the first to perceive the 
 necessity of a better economy in the church ; and 
 the light had appeared at the same time in Italy, 
 in France, and in Spain. 2 The Paterins, the Wal- 
 denses, the Albigenses, had spread their instruc- 
 tions through all the countries which had been 
 
 2 On the progress of the reform of the Albigenses, in the kingdom of 
 Leon and Galicia, see Jo. Mariana de rebus Hispan. lib. n, cap. i, p. 550. 
 
117 
 
 comprised in the western empire ; whilst the in- 
 tellect of the Germanic nations was not yet suffi- 
 ciently advanced to admit the new doctrines. But, 
 the greater part of those preachers of a purer mo- 
 rality having perished in the flames of the inqui- 
 sition, the effort which the romanesque race had 
 made for its amelioration having failed, its energy 
 remained long exhausted ; the chains which had 
 been imposed upon it were drawn tighter by the 
 very effort which had been made to break them ; 
 and when the new reformers appeared, in the six- 
 teenth century, the doctrines, which they propos- 
 ed to the people, had lost the attraction of novel- 
 ty, and only awakened the terrors which the an- 
 cient chastisements had left in every soul. 
 
 The two first leaders of the crusade, those who 
 had signalised their devotion by the greatest 
 crimes and atrocities, the count of Montfort and 
 ithe abbot Arnold of Citeaux, quarrelled about 
 'the division of their conquests. Arnold had 
 siezed upon the rich and powerful archbishopric 
 of Narbonne, to which he pretended that sove- 
 reign rights were attached. Simon, in taking 
 possession of the spoils of Raymond VI, had 
 assumed the title of duke of Narbonne as well as 
 'that of count of Toulouse. In this conflict of 
 jurisdictions, the inhabitants of Narbonne inclined 
 towards the archbishop, which was a sufficient 
 reason for Montfort to accuse them of being sus- 
 pected of heresy, and to demand the demolition 
 
118 
 
 of their walls. The archbishop opposed it; Simon 
 entered the city by force, in spite of the opposition 
 of Arnold, and displayed his ducal standard in 
 the viscount's palace. On his part, the archbishop 
 fulminated an excommunication against his anci- 
 ent colleague, against that Simon de Montfort, 
 who had gloried, on all occasions, in being the 
 executioner of the excommunicated. During the 
 time that Montfort remained at Narbonne, Ar- 
 nold placed all the churches of the city under an 
 interdict; a sentence to which Montfort payed 
 no regard. The death of Innocent III, whose 
 support Arnold had implored, and the succession 
 of Honorius III, retarded the decision of this 
 cause, and we know not how it terminated. Si- 
 mon de Montfort continued, however, to bear the 
 title of duke of Narbonne, and he threw down 
 many parts of the wall of that city, into which he 
 wished to have the power of entering at all times. 3 
 Simon de Montfort's other capital, Toulouse, 
 had no less aversion for its new lord. Simon 
 quitted Narbonne to proceed thither, and sum- 
 moned, for the 7th of March, 1216, an assembly 
 of all the inhabitants, in the palace of the counts, 
 to receive their homage and oath of fidelity. In 
 return, he and his son engaged towards them, by 
 an oath sufficiently vague, to observe all their 
 franchises. Nevertheless, he appeared to trust 
 much more to force, than to the affection of the 
 
 3 Hist. gin. de Lcinguedoc, liv. xxn, ch. ci, et seq. p. 281. 
 
119 
 
 inhabitants, for the guarantee of their obedience ; 
 and for this purpose, he laboured with activity, 
 on the one hand, to augment the fortifications of 
 the Narbonnese castle, and on the other, to ruin 
 those of the city and its suburbs. 4 Whilst these 
 two works were going on, he set out, in the month 
 of April, for the court of Philip Augustus, to re- 
 ceive, from that monarch, the investiture of the 
 fiefs which the crusaders had conquered. During 
 all his journey he was received and honoured as 
 the champion of the faith ; the most pious formed 
 processions to meet him, and thought themselves 
 happy if they could touch his garments. Philip, 
 who was then at Pont-de TArche, gave him the 
 most favourable reception, invested him with the 
 dukedom of Narbonne, the countship of Toulouse, 
 and the viscountships of Beziers and Carcassonne, 
 and acknowledged him for his vassal and liege- 
 man. 5 Raymond VI had, however, received the 
 absolution of the church, and was reconciled to it; 
 but though he was cousin-german to the king of 
 France, brother-in-law to the emperor Frederic 
 and the king of England, father-in-law to Sancho 
 king of Navarre, and uncle to the kings of Cas- 
 tille and Aragon, he saw himself abandoned by 
 them all ; or at least, if the king of England con- 
 
 : ± Guill. de Podio Lanr. cap. xxvi, p. 681. Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxn, 
 ch. cii, p. 284. 
 
 5 Petri Val. Cern. Hist. Albigens. cap. lxxxiii, p. 659. Hist, de Langue- 
 doc, liv. xxu, ch. ciii, p. 285. Preuves y ibid. p. 252 seq. 
 
120 
 
 tinued to show him some attachment, he could 
 not render him any assistance. 6 
 
 A part of Provence, which the house of Tou- 
 louse possessed under the title of marquisate, 
 had been reserved by the council of Lateran to 
 Raymond VI and his son. Those two princes, re- 
 turning by Marseilles from that assembly, began 
 by causing the Provencals to acknowledge their 
 authority. They found their ancient subjects much 
 more zealous for their cause, since they had ex- 
 perienced the exactions and arrogance of the count 
 of Montfort and his Frenchmen. The council of 
 Lateran had put an end to the v crusade against the 
 Albigenses. No more indulgences were preached, 
 the pious were no longer invited to repair to the 
 South, in order to massacre heretics already ex- 
 tirpated. Simon de Montfort was reduced to his 
 own forces, or to the mercenaries whom he could 
 enroll. Marseilles, Tarascon, and Avignon, had 
 declared for the two Raymonds, and the younger, 
 on taking leave of Innocent III, had received from 
 this old pope, a sort of acquiescence in his at- 
 tempting to recover his heritage by force. Ray- 
 mond VII, by the aid of the Provencals, formed an 
 army, with which he commenced his operations 
 against Montfort; he began by the taking of Beau- 
 caire, whose inhabitants opened their gates to 
 
 ■ 
 
 e Guill. de Podio Laitr. cap. xxvii, p. 682. Hist. gfai. de Languedoc, 
 Uv. xxm, ch. i, ii, p. 237, 288. 
 
J21 
 
 him, whilst his father passed into Aragon, to seek 
 for new succours. 7 
 
 Raymond VII, though master of the city of 
 Beaucaire, had not possession of the castle, where 
 a French garrison still defended itself. He under- 
 took the siege without suffering himself to be dis- 
 couraged by the approach of Montfort, at the 
 head of considerable forces. He was then only 
 nineteen years of age, and he defended the city 
 into which he had entered against that illustrious 
 captain, whilst, before his eyes, he took the castle 
 which Montfort came to relieve. In this double 
 siege, signalised by actions of great valour, the 
 Provencals made use of Greek fire, the composi- 
 tion of which they had learned in the Holy Land. 8 
 
 Raymond VI had, on his side, raised an army 
 in Aragon and Catalonia, and was approaching 
 Toulouse, which had already declared openly in 
 his favour. But, Simon de Montfort, who was 
 thus attacked on two opposite frontiers, so that 
 his enemies could not communicate together with- 
 out great difficulty and loss of time, profited by 
 this circumstance to conclude a truce with Ray- 
 mond VII, and hastened to the defence of his ca- 
 pital. Raymond VI had not force sufficient to 
 make head against him, and retired towards the 
 
 7 Guill. de Podio Laurentii, cap. xxvii, p. 682. Hist. gtn. de Languedoc, 
 lib. xxiii, ch. i, ii, p. 287,288. 
 
 8 Historiu de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 63 et seq. Petri Vail. Cern. Hist. 
 Albigens. cap. lxxxiii, p. 659. Guill. de Podio, cap. xxviii, p. 682. Hist, 
 de Languedoc, liv. xxiii, p. 291. 
 
122 
 
 mountains. The Toulousiaus, terrified at the at- 
 tachment they had shown to their ancient lord, 
 sought pardon of Montfort. All the lords of the 
 army supported their solicitations ; they advised 
 him to exact the fifth, or the fourth of their move- 
 able goods, and to content himself with this pecu- 
 niary punishment, which would fill his treasury, 
 and give him the power of besieging- Beaucaire 
 anew. But Simon would listen to no other coun- 
 sels than those of the ferocious Fouquet, bishop 
 of Toulouse, a prelate who knew no pleasure but 
 that of shedding the blood of his flock. " And 
 then," says the old historian of Toulouse, " spoke 
 the bishop of Toulouse, and thus he said, and 
 made him to understand, that he should do and 
 finish what he had already determined against the 
 Toulousians, assuring him that they would not 
 love him ever so little except by force, and exhort- 
 ing him to leave them nothing, if once he was 
 within their city, but to take both goods and peo- 
 ple as much as he could have and hold, for know, 
 my lord, added he, that, if you do thus, it will be 
 late before you repent of it." 9 
 
 To preach ferocity, was not all the labour of 
 the bishop Fouquet; he took upon himself, be- 
 sides, to facilitate, by perfidy, the execution of his 
 counsels. He entered the city as a messenger 
 of peace; "In order that 1 may, said he to the 
 count, make all the people come out to meet you, 
 
 o Historia de losfaicts de Tolosa f p. 78. 
 
123 
 
 that you may seize and take them, which you 
 could not do in the city." In fact he solicited his 
 flock to apply, by successive deputations, of men, 
 women, and children, to the count de Montfort, 
 assuring them that this was the only means of ap- 
 peasing him, and disarming his anger. The most 
 considerable persons in the city thought they 
 could not refuse to credit their pastor, who swore 
 by the name of that God whom he was commis- 
 sioned to preach to them, that his ardent charity 
 alone dictated the advice which he had given for 
 their welfare. Nevertheless, as the citizens of 
 Toulouse arrived successively before Simon de 
 Montfort, he loaded them with chains. Already 
 more than eighty of them were in irons, when a 
 citizen, whom they were going to treat in the 
 same way, escaped from their hands and called 
 his fellow-citizens to arms. The crowds who 
 were proceeding from the gates to humble them- 
 selves before the count, fled back to the city; but 
 rage soon succeeded to terror: they armed them- 
 selves, barricaded all the straits, and awaited the 
 attack of Montfort. Already had his soldiers en- 
 tered the less populous parts of the city. " Di- 
 rected by the bishop," says our historian, " they 
 had already pillaged and plundered the greater 
 part of the said city, and violated women and girls 
 in such numbers, that it was sad to see all the ill 
 which the said bishop had done, in so short a 
 time, to Toulouse." But, indignation redoubling 
 
1 
 
 124 
 
 the force of the citizens, the pillagers were driven 
 out with great loss. Three times the count, with 
 his cavalry, charged upon the people, in different 
 quarters of the city, and three times he was re- 
 pulsed, with great slaughter. At last he threat- 
 ened to put to death the eighty prisoners whom 
 he had arrested. Fouquet, associating with him- 
 self, the abbot of Saint Sernin, again entered the 
 City as a mediator. The two prelates demanded 
 of the Toulousians, to surrender their arms and 
 fortresses, engaging, by oath, that on these condi- 
 tions, the count should release their prisoners, and 
 neither touch their persons nor their goods, but 
 protesting, that they had no mercy to expect, if 
 they persisted in their rebellion. The bishop, Fou- 
 quet, and the count Simon appear, by this time, to 
 have been so well known that their word inspired 
 no confidence ; but the fearful danger of the hos- 
 tages, the critical situation of the city, and more 
 than all, the constant repugnance of the people to 
 believe that the Lords and the priests would fal- 
 sify their oaths, determined the Toulousians to 
 submission. Mutual oaths were exchanged ; the 
 arms were given up ; the fortresses were surren- 
 dered to the soldiers of Montfort ; and when the 
 citizens had thus deprived themselves of all means 
 of resistance, Montfort put the most considerable 
 persons amongst them in irons, and sent them, 
 with the prisoners whom he had before seized, in- 
 to the principal castles of the province, where 
 
125 
 
 they all perished, either by want or by a violent 
 death. Then he commanded the rest of the citi- 
 zens to pay him, before the 1st of the following 
 November, the exorbitant sum of thirty thousand 
 marks of silver, in order to ransom their city from 
 the flames, and their persons from a universal 
 carnage. There remained to the Toulousians no 
 resource, and they were obliged to submit to these 
 hard conditions. 1 
 
 1*217. Simon de Montfort, who regarded all 
 that his neighbours retained, as so much taken 
 from himself, renewed the war in the following 
 year, as well with Raymond Roger, count of 
 Foix, with whom he disputed the restitutions he 
 was enjoined to make, by the decisions of the 
 council of Lateran, as with Raymond VII, then 
 reduced to the possession of Provence. He be- 
 sieged the son of the former, Roger Bernard, in 
 Montgrenier, and, after six weeks, obliged him to 
 capitulate. 2 He then engaged with the latter on 
 the Rhone, and hanged all the inhabitants of the 
 castle of Bernis, of which he had rendered him- 
 self master. Nevertheless, the citizens of Beau- 
 caire and of St. Gilles resisted all his attacks, 
 although these two places were part of the con- 
 cessions made to him by the council of Lateran, 
 
 1 Hisloria de losfaicts de Tolosa, p. 78—81. Petri Vul. Ceni. Hist. Albi- 
 gens. cap. lwxiii, p. 661.— Guil. de Podio Laurentii, cup. xxix, p. 6S3. Hint. 
 Gt>n. de Lungueduc, liv. xxm, eh. ix,/>. 292 — 294. 
 
 2 Hist. Albigens. Petri Val. Cern. cap. lxxxiv t p. 661. Hist, de Languc- 
 doc, liv. xxm, ch. xiii,p. 296. 
 
126 
 
 and confirmed by Philip Augustus. He was more 
 fortunate in Valentinois, whither he afterwards 
 carried the war. He had obtained there several 
 advantages, when he learned that the inhabitants 
 of Toulouse, indignant at the cruelty and perfidy 
 with which they had been treated the preceding 
 year, had secretly recalled, from Aragon, their 
 count, Raymond VI, who on the 13th of Septem- 
 ber, had entered into his capital. 3 
 
 The return of count Raymond VI gave occa- 
 sion for a touching manifestation of the national 
 sentiments which were cherished by the inhabitants 
 of the South of France. This descendant of an 
 ancient house, long signalised in the service of 
 the cross in the Holy Land, possessed no quali- 
 ties which could, properly speaking, be regarded 
 as grand or heroic. He had shown neither dis- 
 tinguished talents nor force of character; he had 
 early been induced to consent to what he disap- 
 proved, and to inscribe his name amongst those 
 of the crusaders who came to ravage his country, 
 and who secretly nourished the project of con- 
 quering his heritage. His submission to all the 
 ecclesiastical censures, to all the outrages, to all 
 the injustice, which the legates, the provincial 
 councils, the pope, and the council of Lateran, 
 had accumulated on his head, sufficiently indi- 
 
 3 Hist. Albigens. cap. lxxxiv, lxxxv, p. 662. Guill. de Podio Laurentii, 
 cap. xxx, p 683. Historia de los fuicts de Tolosa, p. 84 et seq. Histoire de 
 Languedoc, liv. xxm, ch. xviii, p. 299. 
 
127 
 
 cated either his weakness, or his superstitious 
 fears; and his retreat from the Narbonnese castle, 
 and then from Toulouse, was perhaps the effect 
 of his timidity. But the people of all the proviuce 
 of Albigeois, did not forget that he had incurred 
 the hatred of his oppressors, only by his indul- 
 gence towards them ; that he had abhorred blood- 
 shed and punishments, and that in spite of his 
 promises, in spite even of the persuasion with 
 which they had succeeded in inspiring him, that 
 his religious duty, as well as his interest, demand- 
 ed these persecutions, he had always checked 
 the zeal of the executioners. His administration 
 had been gentle ; public liberty in the cities, com- 
 merce, manufactures, science, and poetry, had 
 made rapid advances by his assistance and en- 
 couragement. If his civil character wanted force, 
 he had at least given proofs that he possessed the 
 courage of the warrior, and the talents of the ge- 
 neral. His young son, Raymond VII, already 
 rendered illustrious by high exploits before his 
 twentieth year, appeared, with a more experienced 
 constancy, and a loftier character, to promise a 
 happier reign. 
 
 But the two Raymonds became still more clear to 
 the people, by their contrast with Simon de Mont- 
 fort and the crusaders. It was not the zeal of the 
 Albigensian heretics which was awakened for the 
 house of Toulouse ; their church was drow ned in 
 blood, their race had disappeared, their opinions 
 
128 
 
 had ceased to influence .society ; but in their 
 name the other parts of the population had been 
 the objects of martyrdom. Hundreds of villages 
 had seen all their inhabitants massacred, with a 
 blind fury, and without the crusaders giving them- 
 selves the trouble to examine whether they con- 
 tained a single heretic. We cannot tell what cre- 
 dit to give to the numbers assigned for the armies 
 of the cross, nor whether we may believe that in 
 the course of a single year five hundred thousand 
 men were poured into Languedoc. But this we 
 certainly know, that armies, much superior in num- 
 ber, much inferior in discipline, to those which 
 were employed in other wars, had arrived, for 
 seven or eight successive years, almost without 
 interruption, upon this desolated country ; that 
 they entered it without pay, and without maga- 
 zines, that they provided for all their necessities 
 with the sword, that they considered it as their 
 right, to live at the expense of the country, and 
 that all the harvests of the peasants, all the pro- 
 visions and merchandise of the citizens, w 7 ere, on 
 every occasion, seized with a rapacious hand, and 
 divided at discretion, amongst the crusaders* No 
 calculation can ascertain, with any precision, the 
 dissipation of wealth, or the destruction of human 
 life, which were the consequences of the crusade 
 against the Albigenses. There was scarcely a 
 peasant who did not reckon in his family some 
 unhappy one, whose life had been cut off by the 
 
129 
 
 sword of Montfort's soldiers; not one but had 
 repeatedly witnessed the ravaging of his property 
 by them. More than three-quarters of the knights 
 and landed proprietors had been spoiled of their 
 castles and fiefs, to gratify some of the French 
 soldiers — some of Simon de Montfort's creatures. 
 Thus spoiled, they were named Faidits, and had 
 the favour granted them of remaining in the coun- 
 try, provided they were neither heretics, nor ex- 
 communicated, nor suspected of having given an 
 asylum to those who were so ; but they were ne- 
 ver to be permitted to enter a walled city, nor to 
 enjoy the honour of mounting a war-horse. Every 
 species of injustice, all kinds of affronts, perse- 
 cutions of every name, had been heaped on the 
 heads of the unhappy Languedocians, whom, since 
 the crusade, it had been the custom to compre- 
 hend under the general name of Albigenses. Si- 
 mon de Montfort was, to them, the representative 
 of the evil spirit ; the prototype of all the perse- 
 cutions they had endured. The name of Raymond 
 VI, on the contrary, was associated with those 
 happier times, when they enjoyed their posses- 
 sions in peace, and when they could witness the 
 daily increase of knowledge, industry, and liberty. 
 
 The terror which Simon de Montfort had in- 
 spired was, however, too profound to allow of the 
 eception of Raymond VI, at Toulouse, without 
 lesitation. He approached that city at the head 
 )f an army which he had raised in Spain, and 
 
 K 
 
130 
 
 which had been increased by the junction of the 
 counts of Foix and of Cominges. Arrived at 
 Salvetat, four leagues distant from his capital, he 
 had put to flight a body of troops which, under 
 the standards of Montfort, had just pillaged the 
 castle of Mazeres. He continued his march, and 
 on the 13th of September found the gates of Tou- 
 louse open ; but, though he was equally wished 
 for by almost all the inhabitants, the most timid 
 had shut themselves up in the Narbonnese cas- 
 tle, and in different convents, with the wife and 
 daughters-in-law of Simon de Montfort, that they 
 might not be accused of having favoured their 
 ancient master. A new victory, obtained by Ray- 
 mond VI over Guy de Montfort, Simon's brother, 
 on the plains of Montolieu, emboldened the most 
 fearful, and united all the citizens of Toulouse 
 around their count. Soon, all the most valiant 
 knights of Quercy, Albigeois, and Carcasses, who 
 professed an ancient attachment to the house of 
 St. Gilles, were seen entering their city with stand- 
 ards displayed, and trumpets sounding. Amongst 
 them were remarked, Gaspard de la Barthe, Ro- 
 ger de Cominges, Bertrand-Jourdain de Lille, Ge- 
 raud de Gourdon, Lord of Caraman, Bertrand 
 de Montaigu and his brother Gaillard, Bertrand 
 and Guitard de Marniande, Stephen de la Valette 
 and Ay mar his brother, Gerard de la Mothe, Ber- 
 trand de Pestillac, and Geraud d'Amanieu. Each 
 of them was followed by all the serjeants-at-arms, 
 
131 
 
 on horseback, whom he could collect, and the en- 
 try of this brilliant cavalcade into the city was wel- 
 comed with transports of joy ; and even those who 
 had hitherto concealed themselves were now in- 
 spired with resolution. 4 Simon de Montfort, in- 
 formed of this revolution, hastened to conclude a 
 truce with the young count Raymond, to repass 
 the Rhone, and return by forced marches towards 
 Toulouse ; but a part of his army was composed 
 of levies made in that country, and no Langue- 
 docian served him except through fear. As he 
 advanced, and the news from Toulouse was spread 
 amongst his soldiers, he saw himself deserted by 
 all those whose hearts had remained faithful to 
 their country, and their ancient lord. Near to 
 Basiege he met count Guy, his brother, who was 
 coming to join him. The two Montforts agreed 
 to hasten an attack upon Toulouse, before the 
 walls of that city had been rebuilt, and whilst the 
 citizens hesitated between affection and fear. 
 They advanced, therefore, with ladders, as far as 
 the edge of the ditch ; but, at that moment, a dis- 
 charge of cross-bows put them in disorder, and 
 Guy de Montfort, with Guy his nephew, count of 
 Bigorre, both fell, dangerously wounded. Simon 
 iwas then compelled to renounce the project of 
 taking the city by surprise, and he resolved, to- 
 wards the end of September, to undertake a re- 
 
 4 Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 88. Petri Val. Cern. Hist. Albig. 
 cap. lxxxv, p. 663. Guill. de Podio Laur. c. xxx, p. 683. Histoire g£n. 
 de Languedoc, lit. xxiii, ch. xix, p. 299. 
 
132 
 
 gular siege. In consequence* of this resolution, 
 he divided his troops between himself and his son 
 Amaury, in order to attack the city, at the same 
 time, on each side of the river. Nevertheless, he 
 suffered himself to be surprised by the count of 
 Foix, was pursued as far as Muret, and near be- 
 ing drowned at the passage of the Garonne, in the 
 very place which, four years before, had been 
 signalized by his most glorious victory, and was 
 obliged to bring back his troops in front of the 
 Narbonnese castle, where he joined his son.° 
 
 All the other cities of Albigeois appeared rea- 
 dy to follow the example of Toulouse. The re- 
 bellion was, however, extinguished at Montauban, 
 by the seneschal of Agenois, and the bishop of 
 Lectoure, who commanded for Montfort : the city 
 was pillaged and burned ; but this act of severity 
 only served to redouble the hatred of the Langue- 
 docians against the French. Fouquet, bishop of 
 Toulouse, was dispatched into France with James 
 de Vitry, the historian of the last combats of the 
 Holy Land, to preach there a new crusade, whilst 
 the countess of Montfort repaired to the court of 
 Philip Augustus, to solicit his aid. Simon had 
 recourse also to pope Honorius III, who, in fact, 
 wrote to the king of Aragon, to dissuade him from 
 an alliance with the count of Toulouse. 6 But 
 
 5 Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 92. 
 
 6 Houorii III, Ep. 823, 826, 827 ; a pud Ruynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1217, 
 § lviii, p. 2C9. 
 
133 
 
 time was requisite before these different measures 
 could form a new army for the heroes of the cru- 
 sade. The siege, in the mean time, proved very 
 tedious : it was prolonged through the winter, and 
 lasted nearly nine months. The cardinal legate, 
 who shared with Simon the conduct of the army, 
 never ceased reproaching him with his slowness, 
 and attributed his want of success to a failure of 
 zeal or courage. In the mean time, the besieged 
 had the advantage in numbers and boldness over 
 the assailants ; every day they darted from their 
 walls upon the enemy, and caused them great loss. 
 The 4 25th of June, 1218, the Toulousians, in a sor- 
 tie, pushed towards a warlike machine, (a cat) 
 which count Simon had just constructed. This 
 count was at the church when he was informed 
 that the besieged were in possession of his ma- 
 chine, and about to set fire to it. He wished, how- 
 ever, to finish the hearing of the mass before he 
 proceeded to battle ; but, at the moment of the 
 elevation of the host, he cried like Simeon, Let 
 thy servant henceforth depart in peace, for my eyes 
 have seen thy salvation. He called for his arms, 
 put himself at the head of his old warriors, and 
 once more repulsed the Toulousians. He was 
 standing with his battalion, before the wooden 
 tower which he had just reconquered, when an 
 enormous stone, thrown by a machine from the 
 wall of the city, struck him on the head, and ex- 
 tended him lifeless on the ground. The moment 
 
134 
 
 that his death was known by the Toulousians, a 
 cry of joy resounded through the city. All ran 
 to arms, and rushed upon the besiegers with re- 
 doubled fury. They drove them beyond their 
 tents and equipages, took possession of a part of 
 these effects, and destroyed the rest. 7 Amaury de 
 Montfort collected together the scattered soldiers 
 of his father, received the homage of his knights, 
 and their oath of fidelity as successor to Simon 
 in the countship of Toulouse, and for a whole 
 month obstinately persisted in the siege of the ci- 
 ty, to which he endeavoured to set fire. But his 
 army was discouraged, and daily diminished in 
 number, whilst the forces and the ardour of the 
 besieged were augmented. He was at last obliged, 
 on the 25th of July, to determine on raising the 
 siege, and to retire to Carcassonne, where he bu- 
 ried the body of his father. 8 
 
 7 Petri Val. Cern. Hist. Albigens. cap. lxxxvi, et ultim. p. 664. Guil. de 
 Podio, cap. xxx, p. 684. Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 93. Hist, de 
 Languedoc, liv. xxiri, ch. xxviii, p. 303. 
 
 s Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxni, ch. xxix, p. 105. Chronol. Roberti Al- 
 tissiodor. p. 285. 
 
CHAP. IV. 
 
 Crusade of the French against the Albigenses, from the 
 death of Simon de Montfort to the death of Louis VIII, 
 1218—1226. 
 
 The death of Simon de Montfort marks one of 
 those epochs, not unfrequently met with in histo- 
 ry, when the historians all forsake us at once; so 
 that although the events themselves continue their 
 course, it becomes very difficult to exhibit their 
 connexion. Curiosity, it is true, ought at the 
 same time to diminish ; for when all the writers, 
 as if by common consent, lay down their pens, 
 the reason must be that either fatigue or exhaust- 
 ion has reduced the nations, if not to an absolute 
 stagnation, at least to a state of languor, in which 
 nothing strongly excites the mind. 
 
 The reign of Philip Augustus had been, with 
 regard to France, more fertile in historians than 
 that of any of his predecessors. But Rigord, the 
 first of these, does not pursue his recital beyond 
 the year 1209. William TArmorique, the king s 
 chaplain, and perhaps, the best amongst the writ- 
 ers of the age, finishes his chronicle in 1219. 
 Nevertheless he outlived Philip, and in the poem 
 which he wrote also in honour of the same king, 
 
136 
 
 he relates his death and obsequies. Peter de 
 Vaux-Cernay s history of the Albigenses ends 
 with the year 1218, at the death of Montfort; 
 the anonymous author of Toulouse, in 1219 ; and 
 the oriental history of James de Vitry, closes in 
 1220, soon after the taking of Damietta ; so that, 
 in every part, the curtain seemed to have fallen 
 upon t*iat great political drama, which had at- 
 tracted the eyes of Europe. 
 
 1217 — 1221. The fifth crusade, which was com- 
 manded by the council of Lateran, formed, dur- 
 ing several years, the grand subject of interest 
 to Christendom; on the one hand, it attracted to 
 itself the whole crowd of knights and soldiers, 
 who had been accustomed to subsist either by 
 their hire or by pillage, to seek the strong excite- 
 ment of war, and to consider security and repose 
 as a state of suffering ; and on the other, it pro- 
 cured some respite to the count of Toulouse. 
 The warlike dev otion of the French had resumed 
 its first direction towards the east, and the efforts 
 of the bishop Fouquet, to excite new fanatics to 
 the massacre of the Albigenses, remained almost 
 without effect. 
 
 1218. The descent of the crusaders into Egypt 
 was followed by more than a year of bloody 
 combats, in which the Musulmans had obtained, 
 notwithstanding their obstinate resistance, such 
 small success, that they offered to surrender Je- 
 rusalem to the Christians, provided they would 
 
137 
 
 agree to evacuate Egypt. The pride of the legate 
 Pelagius, cardinal of Albano, who had under- 
 taken to conduct the army, led him to reject 
 these propositions. He thought he had made a 
 valuable acquisition when, on the 5th of Novem- 
 ber, 1219, his army entered Damietta, on the walls 
 of which no more defenders were to be seen. 
 The priests, who accompanied the soldiers of the 
 cross, wrote triumphantly to all Christendom, 
 that eighty thousand Musulmans had perished in 
 the city; that there remained ouly three thousand 
 inhabitants when they took possession of it; and 
 that, with the exception of three hundred, whom 
 they had reserved for the ransom of some Christ- 
 ian prisoners, these captives had themselves ceas- 
 ed to live. 9 
 
 1220 — 1221. Nevertheless, if the capture of 
 Damietta delivered incalculable treasures to the 
 cupidity of the Christians, the unburied bodies, 
 which filled all the houses, soon communicated 
 to their soldiers a fearful pestilence. This brilli- 
 ant army rapidly melted away by mortality and 
 desertion. John de Brienne, indignaut at the in- 
 solence of the legate, who had dared to excom- 
 municate him, quitted Egypt to return to St. Jean- 
 d'Acre; and at the same time a great number of 
 the crusaders set out for Europe. The legate 
 Pelagius foolishly took that moment to conduct 
 
 9 Bernardi Thesaur. cap. cc, p. 837. Matt. Par. p. 259. Jacobi de Vi- 
 triaco, lib. iii, p. 1141. Raynaldi Annul. Eccles. 1219 7 § xv, p. 292. 
 
138 
 
 the remainder to the siege of Cairo, and obliged 
 the king of Jerusalem to join him there. The 
 communications of the Christian army with Da- 
 miettawere soon cut off; all the dikes of the Nile 
 were thrown down at the time of the inundation, 
 and the Christians, without provisions, and with 
 the water up to their waists, were indebted to the 
 generosity of Malek-el-Kamel for a capitulation, 
 by which they surrendered Damietta on the 30th 
 of August, 1221, and abandoned Egypt. 1 
 
 1218 — 1219. This crusade, for the recovery of 
 the Holy Land, by affording some respite to the 
 count of Toulouse, enabled him to establish him- 
 self in the government of the provinces of which 
 he had regained possession. The young count 
 Raymond VII, who had joined his father, was 
 received into Agenois with the most lively expres- 
 sions of joy, and he afterwards passed through 
 the greater part of Quercy and Rovergue. In the 
 month of November, 1218, he visited also the city 
 of Nimes. At the same time, count Amaury de 
 Montfort exerted himself to the utmost, to retain 
 his father's conquests. He caused himself to be 
 acknowledged, amongst other places, by Albi, a 
 city which had given its name to these religious 
 wars, and which had nevertheless performed but 
 a small part in them. 2 The court of Rome did 
 
 1 Bernardi Thesaur. cap. ccvi, p. 843. Matt. Par. p. 264. Raynaldi 
 Annal. Eccles. 1220, § l\,p. 309 ; 1221, § x, p. 311. 
 
 2 Hist. Ghi. de Languedoc, liv. xxm, ch xxxv, p. 397. 
 
139 
 
 not see, without regret, the destruction of that 
 work which Innocent III had accomplished at so 
 vast an expence. Hon onus III took count Amau- 
 ry under his most active protection, and, to esta- 
 blish him in his conquests, diverted in his favour 
 the half of the twentieth which had been imposed, 
 in the name of the crusade, upon the clergy of 
 France. 3 
 
 1219. Prince Louis, son of Philip Augustus, 
 did not yield in fanaticism, or in hatred against 
 the heretics, to any of the monks who were his 
 father's subjects. He gladly took upon himself 
 that new expedition against the Albigenses, to 
 which the twentieth had been destined. Peter 
 Mauclerc, duke of Brittany, the count of Saint 
 Paul, thirty other French counts, more than twen- 
 ty bishops, and six hundred knights, took the cross 
 to follow him, accompanied by ten thousand arch- 
 ers. With these forces, Louis joined count Amau- 
 ry de Montfort, before the castle of Marmande 
 which he was besieging, and the defence of which 
 was undertaken by count Centulle d'Astarrac. 4 
 
 The old count Raymond VI had thrown all the 
 cares of war and government upon his son, Ray- 
 mond VII. Worn out with grief, and weakened 
 
 3 Epistolce Honorii III, in Duchesne Scr. torn. v. p. 854, 855. Raynaldi 
 Aimal. 1218, * 54, 55, p. 286. 
 
 4 Guil. de Podio, cap. xxxii, p. 6S5. Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 
 9S, seq. Guil. Armoricus, p. 113. Philippidos, lib. xii, p. 276. Chronicon Tur- 
 onense apud Martene collcctio amplissima, torn, v, p. 106. Chronic. Guil. de 
 Sangis, p. 507. 
 
140 
 
 by superstition, he feared, by resisting the church, 
 to subject himself to anathemas still more terrible 
 than those under which he had so long suffered. 
 Nevertheless, the two counts of Toulouse had en- 
 deavoured in vain to induce Philip Augustus and 
 his son to abandon the support of Montfort, and 
 to accept of them for their feudatories, who were 
 also tbieir near relations and faithful vassals. Per- 
 haps it was to leave the door open to these nego- 
 ciations, that Raymond VII would not, in the 
 first instance, march to the assistance of the cas- 
 tle of Marmande. He preferred extricating the 
 count of Foix, Raymond Roger, from his difficul- 
 ties, who was besieged in Basiege by two of 
 Amaury's lieutenants. Raymond VII, having 
 joined the count of Foix, attacked his enemies in 
 concert with him, and obtained a victory which 
 was attributed to his personal valour. In this 
 victory of Basiege the principal officers of Amaury 
 remained his prisoners. 5 
 
 But, whilst Raymond was vanquishing the cru- 
 saders at Basiege, Louis and Amaury were press- 
 ing the siege of Marmande. They made an assault 
 upon this place, by which they obtained posses- 
 sion of the exterior works, and this induced the 
 besieged to offer to surrender, if their lives and 
 baggage were spared. " I will receive you to 
 mercy, said Louis, and suffer you to go away, car- 
 
 5 Historia de los /aids de Tolosa, p. 96. Hist. Gtn, de Languedoc, liv. 
 xxiii ch. xli, p. 310. 
 
141 
 
 rying only your bodies with you." The besieged 
 accepted these conditions, and presented them- 
 selves immediately at the tent of the king's son, to 
 salute him, and surrender themselves to him. But 
 when the bishop of Saintes saw the count d'As- 
 itarrac and his knights enter the tent of Louis, he 
 said to the latter, " Sire, my advice is, that you 
 immediately kill and burn all these people as he- 
 retics and apostates, and that none of them be 
 left alive ; and then, that you do neither more nor 
 less to those of the city." The count of St. Paul 
 and the duke of Britanny, however, exclaimed 
 against this attempt of the man of God, in his 
 holy zeal, to cause the son of the king of France 
 to violate his word. The archbishop of Auch 
 added, that these prisoners and the inhabitants of 
 Marmande were by no means heretics, any more 
 than count Raymond, and that the church treated 
 ihim very hardly, in not receiving him to mercy, 
 when he submitted to its will. He reminded them, 
 besides, that a great number of high barons and 
 knights were prisoners at Toulouse, and that by 
 violating a capitulation, to which they had sworn, 
 they exposed them to terrible reprisals. " My 
 lords," said prince Louis, " I do not wish to in- 
 jure the church, but neither ought I to do injury 
 to the young count or his people." He then per- 
 mitted the captain Centulle d'Astarrac who had 
 commanded at Marmande, to proceed with his 
 gendarmes wherever he might think proper. But, 
 
142 
 
 during this time, Amanry de Montfort had enter- 
 ed into Marmande, and had given command to 
 execute the work which the bishop of Saintes had 
 recommended in order to procure the blessing of 
 God upon their arms. All the inhabitants, men, 
 women, and children, to the number of five thou- 
 sand, were massacred. Louis, after testifying some 
 displeasure against Amaury, for having thus vio- 
 lated the royal promise, proceeded with him, to- 
 wards Toulouse, to lay siege to that capital. 6 
 
 The news of the massacre at Marmande, instead 
 of damping the courage of the Toulousians, con- 
 vinced them that they had no hope of deliverance, 
 but from the most determined defence. Bertrand, 
 cardinal priest of St. John and Paul, whom Hono- 
 rius had appointed in 1217 his legate in Albigeois, 
 had sworn, " that in the said Toulouse, should 
 remain neither man, woman, boy, nor girl, but 
 that all should be put to death, without sparing 
 any, old or young ; and that, in all the city, there 
 should not remain one stone above another, but 
 all should be demolished and thrown down." 
 This oath had been related to count Raymond, 
 who, on the approach of the crusaders, summoned 
 all his friends and allies to his defence. In fact, 
 a thousand knights, well armed and mounted, en- 
 tered Toulouse to share his fortunes. Each gate, 
 
 c Historia de losfaicts de Tolosa,p. 99. Guil. drmoricus,p. 113. Prce- 
 clara Francorum facinora, p. 773. Histoire gin. de Languedoc, liv. xxiii et 
 xlii, p. 311. 
 
143 
 
 and each barbican, or counterfort, was specially 
 confided to three or four of the most illustrious 
 knights, with their servants at arms. The defence 
 of the seventeen gates was thus provided for, and 
 each chief had sworn " well and truly to defend 
 his post, towards and against all, both for life and 
 death." The capitouls, or magistrates of Tou- 
 louse, on their parts, presented themselves before 
 the young count and his knights, and declared to 
 him, " that henceforth they abandoned all that 
 they had, both bodies and goods, to those who 
 had remained with them to defend their city ; they 
 besought him to spare them in nothing which 
 should be needed, both for strangers, and fami- 
 liars, and friends, and they would expect their 
 wages to be paid according to their will." 7 
 
 1219. These generous preparations for defence, 
 were crowned with entire success. Louis arrived 
 before Toulouse on the 16th of June, with Amau- 
 ry de Montfort and the cardinal Bertrand : he 
 very soon traced a line of circumvallation, and 
 began the attack with vivacity, but found in every 
 part a resistance superior to his means. He lost 
 a great number of men, by the sword of the ene- 
 my and by sickness; very soon divisions crept 
 into his camp, whilst the most zealous cried out 
 treason, as soon as they heard any of the crusaders 
 
 7 Historia de losfaicts de Tolosa, pp. 100, 101. Guil. de Podio, cap. xxxii, 
 p. 685. Prceclara Francorum facinora, p. 773. Hist. gdn. de Langucdoc, 
 Uv. xxni, ch. xliii, p. 312, and note xix, p. 568. 
 
144 
 
 speak of moderation. In* addition to this, the 
 troops of Louis were engaged only for the feudal 
 service of forty days : this term was already ex- 
 pired, and he felt at last the impossibility of re- 
 taining them longer. He, therefore, resolved, on 
 the first of August, to abandon or burn his war- 
 like machines, to raise the siege, and retire with 
 precipitation. 8 
 
 1220. The yoke of the house of Montfort and 
 its lieutenants was become so much the more in- 
 supportable to the people of the South, as the re- 
 ligious zeal of the crusaders preserved them from 
 no crime. The two brothers,, Folcaud and Jean 
 de Brigier, the most celebrated amongst Amaury's 
 Captains, were not less signalized by the infamy 
 of their manners, than by their devotion. In their 
 seraglio were found married women taken from 
 the most respectable persons in the province: 
 they had fixed at a hundred sols d'or the ransom 
 of their prisoners, and they suffered all those who 
 could not pay this exorbitant sum to perish with 
 hunger at the bottom of a tower. Raymond VII 
 had the happiness, in 1220, to take these two 
 monsters prisoners, and he caused their heads to 
 be cut off, as a punishment for so many crimes. 9 
 About the same time the cities of Montauban and 
 Castelnaudari drove out Montfort s garrisons, and 
 raised the standard of Raymond VII. Beziers 
 
 8 Historia de losfaicts de Tolosa, p. 301. Chronic. Guil. de Nangis, p. 507. 
 
 9 Guil. de Podio Law. cap. xxxiii, p. 685, 
 
145 
 
 also, with all its viscountship, returned to its al- 
 legiance to the young Trencavel, son of the an- 
 cient lord of that city, and to the count of Foix, 
 his tutor. To stop the progress of rebellion, 
 Amaury came, at the beginning of July, 1*220, 
 with Guy, his brother, count of Bigorre, to lay 
 siege to Castelnaudari. Guy de Bigorre was kil- 
 led there the 27th of July, and his body was hon- 
 ourably sent to count Montfort, by Raymond VII 
 who had shut himself up in the place. Amaury 
 obstinately persisted, for eight months, in the 
 siege of Castlenaudari, and thus completely ex- 
 hausted himself both of men and money. He was 
 at last compelled to raise the siege in the begin- 
 ning of March 1221, and to retire to Carcassonne, 
 which was almost the only place remaining to him 
 of all his father's conquests. 1 
 
 1221. About the middle of the summer, Amau- 
 ry again took the field, and was with his army 
 it Clermont upon the Garonne, when he was in- 
 brmed that the inhabitants of Agen had entered 
 nto a treaty with the house of Toulouse. He 
 ;ent for their consuls to meet him on the first of 
 August ; he granted them a complete amnesty 
 or all the faults they might have committed ; he 
 :ngaged also, for the future, to grant them the 
 reatest privileges, but could inspire them with 
 
 1 Guil. de Podio, cap. xxxi, p. 684. Prceclara Francor facinora, p. 772. 
 list. Gin. dc Languedoc, Uv. XX ill, ch. xlvii, p. 314. and Note xxi, p. 
 69. 
 
146 
 
 no confidence. The people had learned what 
 this count was capable of, when he was the strong- 
 est, and they regarded this moderation as only a 
 proof of his weakness. Before the end of the 
 month of August, 1221, Agen had opened its 
 gates to Raymond VII. 2 
 
 Cardinal Bertrand felt it a reproach to himself 
 that, during his legation in Albigeois, these provin- 
 ces, where the church had shed so much blood, 
 had all returned to their ancient masters. The 
 faithful appeared disgusted with the crusaders; 
 the bishops could no longer succeed in exciting 
 fanaticism ; the legate therefore endeavoured to 
 establish a body more completely devoted to the 
 destruction of the heretics and the lukewarm. 
 With the authority of pope Honorius III, he in- 
 stituted the order of the holy faith of Jesus Christ, 
 to combat and annihilate those who do not pro- 
 fess an ardent faith for the church and a blind 
 obedience to all the secular powers. We have 
 the letters patent of Peter Savaric, humble and 
 poor master of the militia of the order of the faith 
 of Jesus Christ, dated at Carcassonne, 9th Febru- 
 ary, 1221, by which he professes that the vows of 
 his order are "to promise aid and succour to 
 Amaury de Montfort and his heirs, for the de- 
 fence of his person and domains ; and to engage 
 to discover and destroy heretics, and rebels against 
 
 ■ 
 
 2 Hist. G6n. de Languedoc, liv. xxm, ch. lvi, p, 318, Preuves, p. 271. 
 Privilege de Raymond VII, a la ville d'Agen. 
 
147 
 
 the church, and all others, christians or infidels, 
 who shall make war against that count." 3 In the 
 events of our days, we have seen the Santafe- 
 disti, or knights of the holy faith, figure in Italy 
 and Spain, professing the same doctrines, engag- 
 ed by similar vows, and whose actions, as well as 
 their language, recall to mind the crusade of the 
 Albigenses. 
 
 Honorius III did not depend alone upon the 
 knights of the faith to succour Montfort. He 
 addressed himself afresh to Philip and Louis, to 
 whom he granted, as the price of an expedition 
 against the Albigenses, a new twentieth, to be 
 levied upon the clergy. But Louis having, with 
 this money, collected an army, conducted it into 
 the domains of the king of England in Aquitaine 
 and Poitou, instead of attacking the count of 
 Toulouse. But French and English historians 
 are equally silent with regard to the events of 
 ;his campaign. 4 Honorius also addressed the dif- 
 ferent bishops of France, and particularly the 
 irchbishop of Sens, of Rheims, and of Bourges, 
 engaging them to inquire after, to seize, and burn, 
 hose of the Albigensian heretics, who had sought 
 i refuge in their provinces. 5 This severity obliged 
 
 great number of the unfortunate Languedocians 
 
 3 H4liot y Histoire des ordres religieux^tom. viii,p. 286. et seq. Hist. gtn. 
 e Languedoc, liv. xxin, ch. In, p. 316. Raynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1221 $ xli, 
 . 316. 
 
 * Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxm, ch. liv, p. 317. 
 5 Raynaldi Annal. Eccles. 1221,^ xliii,p. 316. 
 
 l.t 
 
148 
 
 who were dispersed to great distances, to return 
 to their country, in the hope that they should be 
 protected by the same men who, on every side, 
 had risen against the house of Montfort and the 
 church. 
 
 1222. In reality, during the year 1222, the sect- 
 aries, who had been driven out for their faith, 
 found themselves sufficiently numerous in the 
 places where their fathers had suffered, to give 
 them the hope of renewing their instructions, and 
 of organizing their church. If we may credit the 
 registers of the inquisition at Toulouse, about a 
 hundred of the principal Albigenses held a meet- 
 ing at a place named Pieussau in Rasez, and Guil- 
 labert de Castres, one of their ancient preachers, 
 who had escaped the researches of the fanatics, 
 presided. This assembly provided chiefs for the 
 desolated churches the ancient directors of which 
 had perished in the flames. Three new preach- 
 ers, described in these registers by the titles of 
 bishop of Rasez, of elder son, and of younger son, 
 received, from Guillabert de Castres, imposition 
 of hands, and the kiss of peace. The monks of 
 Saint Dominic abandoned, at this moment, by 
 the secular power, were reduced to the necessity 
 of only noting these circumstances in their books, 
 against the day of vengeance. 6 
 
 In the mean time Amaury de Montfort was 
 losing the hope of entering into possession of his 
 
 c Hist. ghi. de Langucdoc, liv. xxiii, ch. lvii, ja. 319. 
 
149 
 
 fathers conquests. The inhabitants of the small 
 number of castles which still remained to him, 
 were watching an opportunity to revolt and sig- 
 nalise their vengeance by the massacre of some of 
 his friends. Montfort could not reckon on the 
 fidelity of any man who spoke the Provencal 
 language, whilst the sword was always suspended 
 over the head of all his servants who used that of 
 the French. His countship of Montfort, and all 
 'his patrimonial possessions were exhausted of 
 men and money ; that fanaticism appeared extinct 
 which had furnished so many recruits to his fa- 
 ther. All the bulls of Honorius III were no 
 longer able to bring a single crusader into Lan- 
 ded oc, and all those who wished to engage in 
 the sacred war, either passed into Egypt or to the 
 Holy Land. Discouraged, disgusted with the 
 par, affrighted at the universal hatred of which 
 me saw himself the object, Amaury sent the bish- 
 ops of Nismes and of Beziers, to Philip Augustus, 
 ';o offer him the cession of all the conquests of the 
 Crusaders in Albigeois ; and at the same time 
 nade application to the pope, for his assistance 
 n obtaining from the king the most favourable 
 conditions. 7 
 
 : Honorius III wrote to Philip Augustus, on the 
 4th of May, 1222, advising him to accept the of- 
 ers of Montfort; and representing to him, that it 
 vas his bounden duty towards Christendom, to 
 
 ' Hist. gfoi. de Languedoc, liv. xxin, ch. lx, p. 320. 
 
150 
 
 extirpate the heresy which was beginning again 
 to spring up in his kingdom ; assuring him at the 
 same time, that if he sent a powerful army into the 
 South, he would be recompensed for the pains he 
 should take to purge the land of these sectaries, by 
 the acquisition of the rich fiefs which were offered 
 to him by the church. 8 But Philip Augustus had 
 at this period lost all the spirit of enterprise and 
 the activity of his youth; he was frozen with age 
 and sickness; he held out the possibility of an 
 approaching war with England, since his truce 
 with Henry III would terminate in 1223, and re- 
 fused to enter into any negociation either with 
 Montfort or the pope. 9 
 
 Whilst these things were going on, Raymond VI 
 was almost suddenly taken from his family by a 
 malady with which he was seized in the month of 
 August, at Toulouse. From the first attack of 
 this unknown disease, he lost the use of his speech. 
 He preserved, however, sufficient recollection 
 to give many signs of contrition; amongst other 
 things, he was frequently seen, during his agony, 
 to kiss the cross upon the mantle of the hospital- 
 ers of St. John, with which he was covered. He 
 had devoted himself to this order, at the time of 
 the persecution of which he had been the object, 
 and all the misfortunes he had experienced had 
 not sufficed to extinguish his devotion. He had 
 
 s Raynaldi Ann. eccles. 1222, § xliv, p. 325. 
 
 y Preuves de VHistoire de Languedoc, no. cxlii, p. 276. 
 
J51 
 
 given abundant alms to the priests and the mon- 
 asteries ; he had shown himself scrupulous in the 
 accomplishment of all the practices of piety; and 
 when he was under excommunication he was seen 
 to remain for a long time on his knees in prayer, 
 at the doors of the churches which he dared not 
 enter. But, the monks reproached him with feel- 
 ing some pity for the heretics ; with taking no de- 
 light in the torments which they inflicted upon 
 them; with having even frequently withdrawn the 
 sectaries from punishment. They persecuted him 
 for his compassion, not only during his life, but 
 even for ages after his death. His son could never 
 obtain the honours of sepulture for his body, but 
 his coffin was deposited near the burial ground 
 of St. John of Toulouse, waiting the permission 
 of the church for its interment. It was still there 
 in the fourteenth century; but, as it was only of 
 iwood, and no one took care for its preservation, 
 it was broken, and his bones dispersed before the 
 sixteenth century. The skull alone of Raymond 
 VI was long preserved in the house of the hospi- 
 talers of St. John of Toulouse. 1 
 1 1223. The death of the count of Toulouse was 
 speedily followed by that of Raymond Roger count 
 of Foix, the bravest of his vassals, and who had 
 perhaps the most contributed to the recovery of 
 
 1 Hist. gin. de Languedoc, liv. xxm, ch. lxiii, p. 322 et seq., et Note 37, 
 p. 593. Guil. de Podio Laur. ch. xxxiv, p. 686. Bernardi Guidonis Vita 
 Honorii Papce III, p. 569. 
 
152 
 
 bis states. The count of Foix had not embraced 
 the faiih of the Albigenses, but it appears that his 
 wife and many persons of his family belonged to 
 this sect, and that he had himself, if we may be- 
 lieve the registers of the inquisition, sometimes 
 assisted at the conventicles of the sectaries, but 
 without making abjuration. He was then, in the 
 eyes of the church, more guilty than the count of 
 Toulouse, but they had, notwithstanding, treated 
 him with more indulgence, because the conquest 
 of his country was judged more difficult. He 
 died in the end of March, or the beginning of 
 April, of the fatigues he had N endured at the siege 
 of Mirepoix, which envenomed an ulcer that had 
 long tormented him. 2 The death of these two 
 counts did not, however, weaken the cause of 
 toleration. Raymond VII was at least twenty- 
 five years old, at his fathers death. He was be- 
 loved by his subjects, whom he had governed for 
 many years; he inherited the talent of his ai.ces- 
 tors for war, and added to it more firmness of cha- 
 racter than his father possessed, and more skill in 
 government. Roger Bernard, who succeeded to 
 the sovereignty of the countship of Foix, had, on 
 his part, signalised himself, for a long time, and 
 on many occasions, against the crusaders, and he 
 showed himself neither less valiant, nor less at- 
 
 2 Hist. G6n. de Languedoc, liv. xxni, eh. lxx, p. 330 Extraits de Var- 
 cTdve de V Inquisition de I arcassonne, Preuves ibid. p. 437 et seq. Bernard i 
 Guidonis Vita Honorii 111, p. 569. 
 
153 
 
 tached to the count of Toulouse, than Raymond 
 Roger. 3 
 
 12*23. These two princes, therefore, having re- 
 solved entirely to drive Amaury de Montfort from 
 the province, besieged^ in the spring of 12*23, la 
 Penne in Agenois, and Verdun upon the Garonne. 
 The pope had sent a new legate into Albigeois, 
 Cardinal Conrad, bishop of Porto, who wrote to 
 all the bishops of France, to demand succours, 
 w hilst Amaury approached la Penne with the hope 
 of intimidating the two counts, but was soon oblig- 
 ed to feel the inferiority of his forces. As his 
 troops were deserting him, and he ran the risk of 
 falling into the hands of his enemy, he made pro- 
 positions of peace. A thought was even entertain- 
 ed of causing Raymond Vll to marry a sister of 
 Amaury, and, upon these overtures, a truce was 
 signed between the two parties. Raymond, as 
 confiding as he was loyal, hesitated not upon this 
 assurance, to put himself into the hands of the 
 hereditary enemy of his family. He entered into 
 Carcassonne, and passed a whole day with count 
 Amaury. Through a pleasantry, which served 
 still to increase his danger, perceiving that his at- 
 tendants were alarmed for his imprudence, he 
 caused them to be informed that he had been ar- 
 rested, during the night, at Carcassonne, and up- 
 on this news, all his guard whom he had left with- 
 out the city took to flight. The two counts only 
 
 a Hist, de Languedoc, lie. xxiii, p. 326—330. 
 
154 
 
 laughed at the terror of these soldiers. They se- 
 parated like men of honour ; but, not being able 
 to accomplish a reconciliation, recommenced hos- 
 tilities at the end of the armistice. 4 
 
 1223. At this same epoch, Cardinal Conrad 
 convoked a provincial council, in the city of Sens, 
 to deliberate on the affairs of the Albigenses ; and 
 one of the motives which he alleged for the church 
 putting itself into a posture of defence against the 
 heretics was, that, according to his statement, they 
 had set up a chief or pope, who had established 
 himself upon the frontiers of Bulgaria, of Dalma- 
 tia, of Croatia, and of Hungary. He added, that 
 a great number of Christians, and even bishops, 
 in those countries, had acknowledged his autho- 
 rity ; that the dispersed Albigenses had resorted 
 to him, and received his decisions as oracles ; and 
 that one of them, Barthelemi de Carcassoue, had 
 returned into his country with the authority of a 
 legate, and arrogated to himself the right of nam- 
 ing new bishops. 5 
 
 There is reason to believe, in fact, that the opi- 
 nions of the Paulicians had been, for the first time, 
 spread in the West, through Bulgaria. The letter 
 of Cardinal Conrad indicates, that there still 
 existed a connection between the sectaries of the 
 two countries, and that those of the Sclavonian 
 
 4 Guil. de Podio Laur. cap. xxxiv, p. 686. 
 
 5 Matt. Paris, p, 267. Martene Thesaur. anccdot. t. i, p. 900. Concilior. 
 Labbei, t. xi, p. 288, et seq, Raynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1223, § xxxix, p. 333. 
 
155 
 
 language, to whom, two centuries later, we are 
 indebted for the reformation of John Huss, and 
 Jerome of Prague, had opened an asylum, and 
 offered succours, to the persecuted Albigenses. 
 But, it is not probable that the sectaries had given 
 themselves the same organization as the church of 
 Rome, which they opposed. The papists could 
 conceive of no church without a pope ; but he, 
 whom they imagined in Bulgaria, and even whose 
 name they do not tell us, disappeared without 
 leaving a successor. 
 
 The chief object which the cardinal legate, and 
 Fouquet, bishop of Toulouse, had proposed to 
 themselves in the convocation of this council was, 
 to alarm the conscience of Philip Augustus, and 
 to determine him to send, at last, a powerful army 
 against the Albigenses, and thus to accept the of- 
 fers of the count of Montfort ; but Philip seemed 
 to have contracted, in the last years of his life, a 
 political timidity, which accorded with the pro- 
 gress of his age, and the decline of his health ; 
 and which caused him to reject every occasion of 
 aggrandizing himself at the expense of his neigh- 
 bours. William de Puy-Laurent assures us, up- 
 on the authority of Fouquet, the atrocious bishop 
 of Toulouse, that Philip said to the bishop — " I 
 know that after my death, the clergy will prevail 
 upon my son Louis to take part in the affairs of 
 the Albigenses; and, as he is weak and delicate, 
 he will not be able to bear the fatigues, and will 
 
156 
 
 die in a little time. Then the kingdom will fall 
 into the hands of women and children, and will 
 be thereby much endangered." This prophecy, 
 nevertheless, which afterwards was often repeat- 
 ed, may have been given after the event. 6 
 
 At the time when the bishop Fouquet was im- 
 pressing, upon Philip Augustus, the necessity of 
 putting all the Toulousians to the sword, it be- 
 came necessary to attend much more to the poli- 
 tics of his successor, than to those of the reign- 
 ing monarch. A quartan fever which had com- 
 menced towards the middle of the summer of 
 1222, was continually reducing the strength of 
 the king. It lasted him during a whole year, but 
 did not prevent him from continuing his short 
 journeys to inspect the works which he had or- 
 dered. Philip Augustus loved architecture, and 
 monuments ; many of the kings his predecessors 
 had built churches, but he was the first to orna- 
 ment France with civil architecture. The com- 
 muneshad, for a long time, surrounded themselves 
 with walls for their own defence ; the lords had, 
 on their part, carefully fortified their dwellings; 
 whilst, on the contrary, the cities, towns, and vil- 
 lages, which belonged to the crown, had been 
 scandalously neglected. Philip undertook to sur- 
 round them all with walls, he did it however with 
 a respect to the rights of individuals, to which 
 they had not been accustomed on the part of the 
 
 6 Guil. de Podio Laur. cap. xxxiv, p. 687. 
 
 ■ 
 
157 
 
 receivers of the revenue ; for he always purchased 
 the houses which it was necessary to pull down, 
 and the land that was wanted for the public ser- 
 vice. He was able, during the forty years of his 
 reign, to finish all these walls, and thus give a 
 guarantee, both to the safety of the state and to 
 the police, which had not been known before this 
 time. 7 
 
 These immense undertakings, did not exhaust 
 the treasures of Philip Augustus. He had estab- 
 lished order in the finances, and as his reign had 
 been the epoch of a prodigious increase in the 
 population, industry, commerce, and agriculture 
 of France, the royal revenues had augmented with 
 that prosperity. But the king's treasure was re- 
 garded as his private and personal property. All 
 that he had economised, all that he had drawn 
 from the people, and had not employed in govern- 
 ing them, belonged so entirely to himself, that far 
 from being obliged to leave it to his country, he 
 did not even feel an obligation to leave it to his 
 children. It is true, that the priests had taken 
 care to inculcate this doctrine, of exclusive pro- 
 perty, into the hearts of kings. They had all 
 agreed to tell them, that if, at any time, princes 
 were guilty of overwhelming with their extortions 
 the poor contributors, of ruining widows and or- 
 phans, or of refusing afterwards to the public ne- 
 cessities the money which they had collected by 
 
 7 Guil. Armorici Philippidos, lib, xii, p. 279. 
 
158 
 
 iniquitous measures, one way of compensation 
 was still offered them, a way which would change 
 all their crimes into so many virtues, and would 
 thus insure their salvation, by the very conse- 
 quences of their evil deeds ; this was to dispose, 
 in favour of the church, of all the money they 
 had thus accumulated. Philip Augustus made 
 his will, upon these principles, 8 in the month of 
 September, 1222. He named for his executors, 
 Guarin, bishop of Senlis, Barthelemy de Roye, 
 and brother Aymard, treasurer of the temple, and 
 assigned to these testamentary executors twenty- 
 five thousand marks of silver, which then equal- 
 led fifty thousand livres, and which, at this day, 
 would amount to twelve hundred thousand, 9 that 
 they might, according to their consciences, make 
 restitution whenever the king had done any injus- 
 tice. Philip Augustus bequeathed to the king of 
 Jerusalem, to the hospitalers and templars, fifty 
 thousand marks of silver each, that this king, and 
 those two military orders, might each maintain, in 
 
 8 Rex cum repletus esset divitiis, says the canon, author of the chronicle 
 of Tours, Christum in his luzredem suum constituens, inaudita munera elargi- 
 vit, t. xviii, p. 303. 
 
 9 Philip says expressly, in this will, that the mark was worth two liv- 
 res, or forty sous of Paris. The livre, of half a mark or four ounces of 
 silver, was then equal to the present louis ; for the crown of six francs 
 weighs an ounce. This was the metallic value, but its value in exchange 
 was much greater since we see, by the same testament, that a priest 
 could be decently maintained for twelve livres of Paris equal to 288 
 francs per year. It is probable that these 288 francs would procure as 
 many enjoyments as we might obtain, at this day, for 600 francs. Tes- 
 tamentem Philippi in Archivio regio, Pluteo i, 503, No 1, annexed in a note 
 to Guilklmus Armoricus, p. 114. 
 
159 
 
 return, for three years, one hundred additional 
 knights in the service of the Holy Sepulchre: he 
 assigned to them also considerable sums to assist 
 in preparing them to pass the sea the year follow- 
 ing. He bequeathed twenty thousand livres to 
 Amaury de Montfort, to be employed in the ex- 
 tirpation of the heresy of the Albigenses ; for it 
 was neither from scruple of conscience, nor from 
 a sentiment of humanity, that he had himself al- 
 ways refused to march against those sectaries. 1 
 He bequeathed to the abbey of Saint Denys, all 
 his crowns and jewels ; to the abbey of Saint Vic- 
 tor, which he had built near the bridge of Char- 
 enton, two thousand livres, and two hundred- and- 
 forty livres annually, which were to suffice for the 
 maintenance of twenty priests; he left twenty-one 
 thousand livres to the poor of Paris, and only ten 
 thousand to Isemburge his wife, and ten thousand 
 to his natural son Philip. The sum which he des- 
 tined to his eldest son remained blank in his will, 
 apparently that he might receive what remained 
 in his treasury after all his other legacies had been 
 paid. 2 
 
 1223. In spite of the king's malady, the council 
 which had been convoked at Sens to instruct him 
 by its advice, assembled there in July, 1223. It 
 was composed of six archbishops, and of twenty 
 
 1 The legacy to Montfort mentioned by Armoricus p. 116 was proba- 
 bly added in a codicil. It is not found in the will, 
 
 2 Guil. Armoricus, p. 114. 
 
160 
 
 bishops, with a great number of abbots. Fouquet 
 bishop of Toulouse was the only one of the Albi- 
 gensian prelates who was present. Philip Augus- 
 tus had promised to be there, but perceiving that 
 his declining health would render the journey 
 dangerous, he very soon demanded that the coun- 
 cil should be transferred to Paris, and set out 
 himself on his return to the capital. The violence 
 of his illness retained him at Mantes, where he 
 died the 14th of July, 1223, in the fifty-eighth 
 year of his age, and the forty-fourth of his reign. 
 The prelates assembled for the council added to 
 the pomp of his obsequies ; the legate and the 
 archbishop of Rheims, being unwilling to cede to 
 each other the supreme rank, officiated at the 
 same time, at two different altars. After this un- 
 usual ceremony Philip Augustus was interred at 
 Saint Denis. 5 
 
 Count Amaury de Montfort profited by the 
 truce which he had recently concluded with the 
 count of Toulouse, to attend the council of Sens, 
 and he was therefore at court at the accession of 
 Louis VIII. Louis, before he set out for Rheims, 
 paid to Amaury ten thousand marks, in part of 
 what his father had bequeathed to that lord, to 
 
 8 Guil. Armor, p. 116 et finis. Philippidos, lib. xii,p. 2S0, usque ad finem j 
 Chrmiiqut de V. Denys, p. 416 Matt. Paris, p. 267, et Hist, de France, 
 p. 75K. Bernardi GuULmu Vita Honorii III. p. 569. Guil de \angis 
 Ckron. p. 513 RaynulUi 4tmal. Eccles. ann 1223, § xxxiii, p. 332. Ra- 
 dulphi Coggeshale ( hron. Am- p 116. Rop. de Hoveden. coiit. p. 187. Ann. 
 IVmerkiens. p. 209. Chrome. Turon. p. 303. 
 
161 
 
 assist in maintaining his garrisons in Albigeois ; 
 and at the same time hinted to him, that he should 
 be disposed to make an exchange with him, for 
 the conquests made by the crusaders, and engag- 
 ed him to break off all negociation with Raymond 
 VII. After having received this subsidy, the 
 count of Montfort set off for Carcassonne. 4 
 
 When he arrived there that city was already 
 attacked by the counts of Toulouse and of Foix, 
 who had brought with them the young Trencavel, 
 then sixteen years of age, the only son of that 
 Raymond Roger, viscount of Beziers and of Car- 
 cassonne, whom Simon had so barbarously put 
 to death. Amaury, having collected an army 
 with the money he had received from Louis VIII, 
 compelled the Languedocian lords to raise the 
 siege : but his money was soon expended, and the 
 mercenaries assembled under his standards, de- 
 clared that their services should cease when their 
 pay was discontinued. In vain did Amaury soli- 
 cit, by turns, the bishops of the province, the citi- 
 zens of Narbonne, and his own knights ; in vain 
 he offered to pledge his French domains, and 
 even his person; he could neither find money, nor 
 retain his soldiers. He was, after a short time, 
 again shut up in Carcassonne, by the counts of 
 Toulouse and of Foix; and losing, at last, all 
 hopes of resistance, he signed, on the 14th of 
 January, 1224, a convention with them, by which 
 
 4 Epistolce Honorii HI ad Ludovicum ; apud Duchesne, torn, v, p. 860. 
 
 II 
 
162 
 
 he engaged to use all his efforts to reconcile the 
 two counts with the church and the king of 
 France. He delivered to them, by this treaty, 
 Carcassonne, Minerva, and Penne d'Agenois ; he 
 stipulated an armistice, of two months, for six 
 small places that still belonged to him in the pro- 
 vince, with a guarantee for the rights of individu- 
 als, acquired during the war, and received ten 
 thousand silver marks for the expences of his 
 journey. The next day, 15th of January, 1224, 
 he set out for the North of France with all the 
 knights devoted to his fortune, abandoning for 
 ever the country where his house had reigned 
 fourteen years. 5 
 
 1224. The young Trencavel, still under the 
 government of the count of Foix, took possession 
 of the four viscountships of Carcassonne, of Bezi- 
 ers, of Rasez, and of Albi, over which his father 
 had reigned. But, at the same time, the archbi- 
 shop of Narbonne, and the bishop of Nismes, oi 
 Usez, of Beziers, and of Agde, retired to Mont- 
 pellier; either fearing the vengeance of those tc 
 whom they had occasioned so much evil, oi 
 wishing to give themselves the appearance o 
 being persecuted. From thence, they wrote, eigh 
 days after, to Louis VIII, begging him not t< 
 confirm the peace which had been negociated 
 " Not to permit the unclean spirit, who had beei 
 
 5 Hist. gin. de Languedoc, lit. xxm, ch. lxxxi, p. 336. Le iraiti an. 
 preuves, no. 148, p. 285 et la lettre de cinque ivequcs an Roi, p. 280. 
 
163 
 
 driven from the province of Narbonne, by the 
 ministry of the roman church and his own, to 
 return, in all his power, with seven spirits more 
 wicked than himself, but rather to employ the 
 power which he had received from God, in ac- 
 quiring the territory which the church had offered 
 him."6 
 
 Louis VIII appeared, indeed, eager to signalize 
 the commencement of his reign, by the conquest 
 of Albigeois. Amaury de Montfort, having ar- 
 rived at Paris, ceded to him, in the month of 
 February, all the privileges, which the church 
 had granted to his father and himself, over the 
 countries conquered by the crusaders. He ex- 
 changed them for the post of constable of France, 
 which Louis promised to Amaury. 7 But this 
 treaty was conditional and was not to have effect 
 unless the roman church should accept the con- 
 ditions which the king had offered by the arch- 
 bishop of Bourges and the bishops of Langres and 
 of Chartres. 8 
 
 The church appeared to desire, with so much 
 ardour, the extirpation of the house of Saint 
 Gilles, and of all who had shewn any tolerance 
 towards the heretics, that Louis had no doubt of 
 obtaining from the pope, if he took the cross, all 
 i he advantages which he demanded for a recom- 
 
 6 Episcoporum Epistolce, Preuves a I' Hist, de Langvedoc, no. 150, p. 2S9. 
 
 7 Guil. de Podio Laur. cap. x\xi\,p. 687. 
 
 * Cessio Amalrici Preitves Lunguedor. no. 152. p. 290. 
 
 M -i 
 
164 
 
 pense. He required that the crusade should be 
 preached anew throughout all France, with the 
 express mention, that the indulgences should be 
 fully equal to those which might be gained by the 
 crusade to the Holy Land. He required, at the 
 same time, that those who would not follow him, 
 from devotion, should be obliged to do it in the 
 fulfilment of their feudal duties, as if the kingdom 
 were subject to a foreign invasion ; for no inva- 
 sion, said he, is more fearful, than that of heresy. 
 Consequently, he demanded that all the French 
 barons who refused, on this occasion, to accom- 
 plish the service of their fief, should be excom- 
 municated, and their lands put under an interdict. 
 To be more sure of the direction of these eccle- 
 siastical thunders, he demanded that the arch- 
 bishop of Bourges should be assigned him as car- 
 dinal legate, with full powers over Albigeois. He 
 required the pope, by letters patent, to deprive, 
 for ever, the count of Toulouse, the viscount of 
 Carcassonne, and of Beziers, and all those who 
 should be allied to them, or should make war in 
 concert with them, of all the fiefs they might have 
 in the kingdom of France, and to invest, with 
 them, for ever, the king and his descendants: 
 lastly, he required that, in order to finish this con- 
 quest, the church should guarantee to him, for 
 ten years, the truce then existing with the king of 
 England, and should, during the same time, pay 
 him sixty thousand livres of Paris each year; de- 
 
165 
 
 claring, that if all these conditions were not ac- 
 cepted, he should consider himself under no ob- 
 ligation to pass into Albigeois. 9 The popes have, 
 in general, preferred the European crusades, which 
 tended directly to extend their authority, to those 
 of the Holy Land, which had rather augmented 
 than diminished the independence of the human 
 mind. Nevertheless, they could not set them- 
 selves in open opposition to the opinion of Chris- 
 tendom ; and besides, they frequently shared the 
 fanaticism which they had tended to excite. At 
 the very moment when Honorins III received the 
 propositions of Louis VIII, he had well-founded 
 hopes of repairing, by a new crusade, those dis- 
 asters of the Holy Land which had so recently 
 tarnished the glory of his pontificate. The em- 
 peror Frederic II had been engaged to Yolande 
 of Jerusalem, daughter of Jean de Brienne, and 
 the kingdom of Judea had been promised for her 
 portion. Frederic, who was sovereign not only 
 of Germany and Upper Italy, but of Sicily and 
 Calabria, could, with more ease than any other 
 European prince, transport the crusaders from his 
 own ports to that of Saint Jean d'Acre. He had 
 embraced with ardour the project of conquering 
 Syria, to add it to his other possessions; and on 
 ,the 5th of March had written to the pope, from 
 Catena, a long letter, both to give him an account 
 
 9 Petitio ad Papam pro reg. Preuves de VHist. de Languedoc, No. 155, 
 p. 292. 
 
166 
 
 of his preparations, and to engage him to remove 
 the obstacles which the situation of France and 
 England interposed to the renewal of the sacred 
 war. " The king of Jerusalem," said Frederic, 
 " has recently written to us from Germany, that 
 he was going to quit that country, seeing that he 
 had there advanced but little the interests of the 
 Holy Land. In truth, the missionaries who preach 
 the cross there are so slandered by every one, both 
 because they are men of the lowest rank, and be- 
 cause they have no authority to grant indulgences, 
 that nobody will listen to them. Other letters, 
 that we have received from different parts of the 
 world, and from the highest and most powerful 
 personages, state, that we are accused, as well as 
 the church, of proceeding with indifference in that 
 affair. The grandees of France and England, as 
 we have been informed by the king of Jerusalem, 
 do not appear desirous of taking the cross, unless 
 a long truce be concluded between the two king- 
 doms, and they are assured of going and coming 
 in peace. Many of the most powerful amongst 
 those that have taken the cross, even pretend that 
 they have dispensations from you from going to 
 the Holy Land."* 
 
 Honorius III had already given his assent to 
 the propositions of Louis VIII, and the prelates 
 who were his ambassadors, had returned to 
 France, when the pope received the letter of 
 
 1 Epist. Frederici II, in Raynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1224, § iv— ix, p. 337 seq. 
 
167 
 
 Frederic II. He could not doubt that the preach- 
 ers of the crusade in Albigeois were those who 
 had traduced the characters of the vendors of in- 
 dulgences, and that the persons whose service in 
 the Holy Land he was reproached for having dis- 
 pensed with, were such as he had encouraged to 
 convert their vows into an expedition of forty 
 days on the banks of the Garonne. How could 
 he, without dishonouring himself, take this mo- 
 ment for publishing, that such a short campaign, 
 without expense, difficulty, or danger, was a work 
 as meritorious as the crusade which the Emperor 
 was preparing to lead against the enemies of 
 Christianity? The extent of the preparations that 
 Louis was making, for the war against the Albi- 
 genses, sufficiently showed, that he w ould not suf- 
 fer a single Frenchman to pass to the Holy Land, 
 if that war continued. Honorius therefore dis- 
 patched the cardinal bishop of Porto, to Louis, 
 recommending him to use the greatest diligence, 
 to communicate the Emperors letter, to withdraw 
 the consent he had given to their treaty, and to 
 inform him that the count of Toulouse, terrified 
 at the preparations of the king of France, had 
 consented to submit, entirely, to the church, by 
 purging his province of heretics, according to the 
 mode which the mercy of the inquisition had 
 adopted. The good of the Holy Land, added 
 the pope, demanded, that he should be contented 
 with these guarantees, and that he should grant 
 
168 
 
 - 
 
 peace to Raymond VII in the hope that he would 
 henceforth act with equal vigour and sincerity. 2 
 
 Louis VIII thought that he had made himself 
 sure of all the support of the church ; he had al- 
 ready written to those communes whose assist- 
 ance he reckoned most upon, to announce to them 
 that he would march with his army three weeks 
 after Easter, and requiring them to support him 
 vigorously. 3 He was, therefore, exceedingly en- 
 raged, when he saw himself thus abandoned by 
 the pope; he wrote to him with much ill humour, 
 and having in his letter recapitulated all that he 
 had done already at the persuasion of the church, 
 he finished with these words ; " We have replied 
 to the cardinal bishop of Porto that since the lord 
 pope would not, at present, attend to our reason- 
 able demands, we considered ourselves discharg- 
 ed from the burden of this business, and we have 
 protested as much publicly, before all the pre- 
 lates and barons of France." 4 
 
 Raymond VII endeavoured to profit by these 
 favourable circumstances, to make his peace with 
 the church. He was earnestly supported at Rome 
 by the ambassadors of the king of England ; and 
 had friends in the college of cardinals, who ad- 
 vised him to pursue his advantages in arms, whilst 
 he negociated with the pope. 5 Whilst, therefore, 
 
 2 Honorii III epist. apud Duchesne, torn. v. No. xvii, p. 895. 
 
 3 Epist. Lud. VIII Narbonnensibus Preuves de Vhistoire de Languedoc, 
 No. cliii, p. 291. 
 
 4 Idem. § civ, p. 294. 
 
 5 Epistola episcop. Lichfieldens. Rymer acta publica torn, i, p. 271. 
 
169 
 
 he took possession of Agde and of several cas- 
 tles, be charged his ambassador at Rome to dis- 
 pense money liberally in the sacred consistory, in 
 order to gain new partisans ; and at the feast of 
 Pentecost, he went to Montpellier, to bold a con- 
 ference with that same Arnold, archbishop of Nar- 
 bonne, who had done so much evil to his fatber, 
 as legate of the first crusade against the Albigen- 
 > ses. 6 
 
 The count of Toulouse felt how important it 
 was to conclude his pacification, whilst they were 
 still willing to negociate with him. He showed 
 himself therefore eager to give way upon every ar- 
 ticle. As he had always been sincerely attached 
 to the faith of the church, it cost him nothing to 
 promise conformity to it in future; but he engaged, 
 besides, to show no mercy to the heretics ; to 
 grant to count Montfort such conditions as might 
 save his honour; to augment the immunities of 
 the churches ; to surrender to them those parts of 
 his domain with which they had been gratified by 
 his enemies ; and even before he had obtained any 
 guarantee, he executed a part of these restitutions. 
 Arnold, embarrassed by this unhesitating compli- 
 ance with all his demands, knew uot how to con- 
 trive to retard a pacification which seemed to be 
 concluded. He adjourned, however, the confer- 
 ences, to the 21st of the following August, de- 
 
 6 Hist. Gen, de Languedoc, liv. xxiii, ch. lxxxix, xc, p. 340. 
 
170 
 
 claring that he must wait for new orders from 
 Rome, to sign the definitive treaty. 7 
 
 Rome, on the reception of his letters, was no 
 longer in the same disposition. Frederic II had 
 retarded his departure in such a manner as to oc- 
 casion doubt to Honorius III, respecting the suc- 
 cess of the crusade to the East. War had broken 
 out between the kings of France and England, 
 and that war presented a still greater obstacle to 
 the impulse which the pope had hoped to give to 
 all Europe. Whilst he was in doubt respecting 
 the turn which all these events might take, the 
 holy father thought it imprudent to accept the 
 submission of a prince, whom he might perhaps 
 soon have a favourable opportunity to crush. By 
 his persuasion, or that of the king of France, 
 Amaury de Montfort sent no one to Montpellier 
 with powers to accept the indemnities offered by 
 the count of Toulouse. Raymond, nevertheless, 
 insisted, that the absence of this envoy could not 
 hinder the conference, agreed upon between him 
 and the archbishop of Narbonne, from taking 
 place. On the 25th of August he renewed, to 
 that prelate, the promises which he had already 
 made to the church; he signed them, and engaged 
 by oath to observe them. After which, Arnold, 
 to gain time, communicated to him an express or- 
 der of the pope, to send those declarations to 
 
 i Gallia Christiana, nova editio, t. vi, p. 336. Hist. gen. de Lavguedoc, 
 liv. xxiii, ch. xc, xci, p. 341. 
 
J71 
 
 Rome by a solemn embassage, and, at the same 
 time, informed him, that Honorius III had mani- 
 fested the most violent wrath at learning that Ray- 
 mond VII had retaken, from the bishop of Viviers, 
 the city of Argentiores, which had belonged to 
 the house of Saint Gilles, but had been taken 
 from his father by the crusaders. 8 
 
 1224. The ambassadors of Raymond arrived 
 at Rome in the month of October. They were 
 admitted to several conferences, and the ambas- 
 sadors of England seconded them with all their 
 power. But the court of Rome was superlatively 
 skilled in the art of spinning out negociations. 
 At the end of the year, they had discussed much 
 and concluded nothiug. In the course of the fol- 
 lowing year, they thought themselves equally oc- 
 cupied with their master's interests, because that 
 every day new explanations were demanded, and 
 every day they removed new difficulties. It was 
 not till 1226 that they found out how they had 
 been tricked, when they were dismissed without 
 any thing being granted them. 9 
 
 1224. The truce between France and England, 
 which Louis VIII had wished to prolong for ten 
 years, expired at Easter, 1224; but Henry III 
 desired its renewal much more sincerely than the 
 king of France. He had given orders to make 
 
 8 Honorii III Epistolce Decano Valentinensi, Preuves Languedociennes, No. 
 clxxxvii, p. 284. 
 
 ,J Histoirc g£n. de Languedoc, liv. xxiii, p. 343. lie. xxiv, p. 345. 
 
172 
 
 compensation for all the damage which had been 
 caused by his subjects to French merchants, and, 
 at the same time, had ordered an inquest, to as- 
 certain also the damage which his subjects had 
 experienced ; for, in those ages of violence, there 
 were but few treaties scrupulously respected. 1 He 
 had also sent ambassadors to the king of France, 
 to demand that the truce, concluded by Philip 
 Augustus, should be prolonged for four years, on 
 the same conditions. 2 Honorius III, on his side, 
 had solicited Louis VIII to conclude a peace with 
 the king of England ; or, at least, to bind himself 
 by a long truce. He represented the advantage 
 this would prove to the Holy Land, by removing 
 an obstacle to the expedition of Frederic II. 3 But, 
 whether Louis, from the displeasure which arose 
 from the ill success of his negociations respecting 
 Albigeois, wished to humble the pope ; or, whe- 
 ther he desired to employ the preparations he had 
 made for the war with Raymond, against another 
 enemy, he announced to Henry III the renewal 
 of hostilities, who, on his side, gave notice of it 
 on the 15th of May, to all the barons of his king- 
 dom, and invited them to be ready for war. 4 
 
 Honorius III, who protected the king of Eng- 
 land, who had quite recently declared him of 
 
 1 
 
 1 Rymer Acta Publico,, t. i, p. 265, 266. 
 
 2 Ibid, p. 270. 
 
 3 Honorii, lib. viii, Epist. No. 380, apud Raynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1224, 
 § xiii, p. 338. 
 
 4 Rymer Acta Publico, t. i, p, 272. 
 
173 
 
 age, and in consequence, had ordered all his 
 counts and barons to restore the towns and for- 
 tresses which they held as a guarantee for their 
 safety, would also have gladly restored him to 
 the full exercise of absolute power, and abolished 
 the great charter. But when he perceived that 
 the nation adhered strenuously to its rights, and 
 I was prepared to defend them, 5 he wrote to Henry 
 III to engage him to observe his oaths, until he 
 should find a more favourable occasion to violate 
 them; " We suggest in particular to his highness, 
 said he, and council him, in good faith, not to 
 bring forward the rights of the crown, just at this 
 time, and not to scandalize his subjects respecting 
 the restitution of his revenues, but prudently to 
 defer to a better opportunity this pretension, and 
 others which might engender scandal." 6 Henry 
 i III, however, did not follow the counsel which 
 > the pope boasted of having giving with such good 
 faith. He entered into disputes with the earl of 
 I Chester and the greater part of his barons ; he 
 I attacked Foulques de Brent, and his brother, in 
 their castles; he hanged the defenders of several 
 : fortresses, and appeared to have some success in 
 his English expeditions ; but his whole army was 
 : occupied in retaining his subjects in their obedi- 
 I ence, and he had no soldiers to send into France. 7 
 
 5 Matt. Paris Hist. Angl. ann. 1223, p. 268. 
 
 6 Honorii III Epist. lib. viii, ep. 355. apud Raynahli, 1224, § xliv. p. 345. 
 • }Jatt. Paris Hist. Aug. p. 270. Radulphi Coggeshale,p. 118. 120. 
 
When Savary de Mauleon,* who was charged to 
 defend Poitou, was informed of the approach of 
 Louis VIII with a numerous army, he in vain 
 demanded reinforcements and subsidies, for the 
 treasury was empty. The counsellors of Henry 
 III judged, however, that they could not dispense 
 with embarking, at the tower of London, boxes 
 apparently filled with money, to inspire the soldi- 
 ers with the confidence that they would very soon 
 be paid ; but when these chests were opened upon 
 their arrival at Rochelle, they were found to be 
 filled with stones and bran. 8 
 
 The campaign of Louis VIII, against the former 
 possessions of the kings of England in France, 
 was speedily terminated, and left him time to 
 meet in the beginning of November, at Vancou- 
 lours, Henry king of the Romans, eldest son of 
 Frederic II. These two princes signed a treaty 
 of alliance, and reciprocally engaged to conclude 
 no arrangement with the king of England without 
 the consent of both. 9 
 
 1225. In the beginning of the year 1225, the 
 cardinal Romano di Sant. Angelo, was sent by 
 the pope to Louis VIII to renew the negociations 
 respecting the Albigenses. The zeal of Frederic 
 II for the conquest of the Holy Land was cooled, 
 or, at least, the difficulties of the undertaking, the 
 
 s Gesta Ludovici, viii, p. 305. Chron. Turon. p, 305. 
 9 Martene collectio amplissima, torn, i, p. 1195. Gesta Ludovici, p. 307. 
 Chron. Turon. p. 306. 
 
175 
 
 revolts which were continually breaking out in 
 Germany and Italy, the need which every part of 
 his states had of reform, and of the inspection of 
 the monarch, made him desire to defer his voyage 
 to a more convenient time. The king of Jerusa- 
 lem had undertaken to obtain from Honorius III 
 that the crusade should be postponed for two 
 years. The state of the Holy Land, where the 
 Christians possessed but two cities, could not 
 suffer from this delay. Honorius consented; he 
 adjourned till August, 1227, the departure of 
 Frederic II ; but at the same time imposed upon 
 him the condition of conducting at that period a 
 determinate number of troops to the Holy Land, 
 and of passing at least two years in Syria. 1 
 
 These two years might suffice to annihilate com- 
 pletely the house of Saint Gilles, to which the 
 church thought it imprudent to pardon the inju- 
 ries she had done it. Raymond Vll refused no 
 sacrifice ; disputed respecting no condition ; he 
 only demanded, for the repose of his conscience, 
 ind for that of his subjects, to be received again 
 into the bosom of the church- He abandoned 
 :he heretics to all the rigours which she desired to 
 exercise towards them; and the learned, the equi- 
 table Benedictine author of the history of Lan- 
 *uedoc, not being able entirely to free himself 
 from the sentiments of his order, repels, as an 
 atrocious calumny, the charge that he demanded 
 
 1 Raynaldi Annal. Eccles. 1225, ch. i, et seq. p. 346. 
 
176 
 
 liberty of conscience for the Albigenses. 2 But 
 no reconciliation was possible, between this prince 
 and those who could only be satisfied with his ab- 
 solute ruin. Raymond at last thought he had re- 
 moved all the difficulties which had been opposed 
 to him, when the cardinal Romano de Sant. An- 
 gelo published against him a bull, to which it was 
 impossible to reply, as it was impossible to un- 
 derstand it. It contained only the miserable con- 
 ceits and witicisms of the Vatican. "The mise- 
 rable state, or rather the established misery of 
 theNarbonnensian province, and of the neighbour- 
 ing regions," said the pope* " has long torment- 
 ed us with anxiety, and suspended us in doubt. 
 In our anxiety, we sought whether we could not 
 find a way and manner to raise the interests of 
 the faith and of peace, which appeared absolutely 
 cast down in these countries ; in our doubt we he- 
 sitated whether this land was not so corrupted, 
 that all labour which we could bestow upon it 
 would be useless. . . .In truth, this land though 
 laboured with much sweat — though sweated with 
 much labour — has been in vain forged by its smith, 
 for all its malice has not been consumed, all its 
 rust has not been removed, even by the fire to 
 
 2 Langlois, Hist, des Albigeois, liv. viii, p. 418, had made this supposi- 
 tion, to justify the rigours of the church ; the Rev. father Vaissette, vic- 
 toriously refutes it, by the arts of the council, liv. xxiv, ch. i, p. 346. 
 But what was then the doctrine of the French clergy in 1737, since at 
 that epoch, one of its most respectable, most virtuous, most eniightened 
 members, regarded as an atrocious calumny, the accusation of tolerance? 
 
177 
 
 which God, by a hidden, yet a just judgment, has 
 delivered the infidelity of the hearts of its inhabi- 
 tants, and the frost of their malice. Neither the 
 fomentations of caresses nor the torments of fla- 
 gellations have been able to soften them. They 
 have so hardened their hearts against God, that, 
 although given up to a multitude of scourges, 
 they have not accepted their discipline. Because 
 they have had some success against the church, 
 they see in it the confirmation of their errors, not 
 considering that the felicity of sinners is the great- 
 est of all infelicities." 3 
 
 The statesman would have blushed, who should 
 have attempted to kindle a temporal war, without 
 giving better reasons for it than such antitheses 
 is these ; but they were quite sufficient to justify 
 i religious war. However, the cardinal of Sant. 
 Angelo, who was employed to persuade Louis 
 HII to a crusade against the Albigenses, was al- 
 o commissioned, not to break off the negotiation 
 vith Raymond VII, until he was sure of success, 
 n consequence, he invited him to repair to a na- 
 lonal council, of all the church of France, to be 
 eld at Bourges on the 29th of November, 1225, 
 pus reserving to'himself all the summer, to treat 
 eforehand with his enemies. 4 
 Although the Albigenses of Languedoc could 
 o longer really give any inquietude to the church 
 
 3 Bull 15, Kal. Martii apud Raynaldum, 1225, § xxviii, xxix, p. 351. 
 
 4 Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. ui,p. 348. 
 
 N 
 
of Rome, yet the intolerance of the pope was 
 awakened by other symptoms of mental agitation 
 which he saw around him. The persecutions of 
 the sectaries, had, by dispersing them, spread the 
 germs of reformation, through all the countries of 
 the romanesque language. The unhappy suffer- 
 ers, who had been treated with such pitiless cru- 
 elty, and who, on account of what they had en- 
 dured, (pati) were designated by the name of 
 Paterins, distinguished themselves by the purity 
 of their conduct, as well as by that of their doc- 
 trine ; the contrast, between their morals and 
 those of the priests, was apparent to all ; they did 
 not profess to separate from the church, but only 
 desired liberty to effect their salvation, as different 
 orders of monks had done, by a greater austerity. 
 They had multiplied in Italy, and especially in 
 Lombardy, and, in this same year, Honorius III 
 charged the bishops of Modena, of Brescia, and 
 of Rimini, to enquire after them, to pull down 
 their houses and destroy their race. 5 
 
 1225. The greatest obstacle to the renewal of 
 the crusade against the Albigenses, was the war in 
 which Louis VI II was engaged with the king of 
 England. Henry III, profiting by the popularity 
 which his youth had still left him, had assembled 
 a parliament at Westminster; he had exposed to 
 his subjects the injustice which had been done him 
 in his continental possessions, and had demanded 
 
 5 Raynaldi Annal. Eccles. 1225, ch. xlvii, p. 355. 
 
179 
 
 their aid to recover the rich provinces of which 
 the crown had been dispossessed. The English, 
 occupied in their island with circumscribing the 
 abuses of the royal authority, did not attach any 
 very great value to the possessions of their king 
 in France, which were not submitted to their laws. 
 They acquiesced, however, in the demands of 
 Henry, and his chief justice, Hubert du Burgh. 
 A fifteenth, upon moveable property, had been 
 judged sufficient subsidy to form a fair army ; this 
 was granted him, on condition that the king should 
 confirm anew the great charter, and the forest 
 charter, which he had repeatedly sworn to ob- 
 serve, and which he had observed always like a 
 king. Henry III submitted to the condition ; he 
 sent express orders into all the counties, to respect 
 the privileges of the people; and, in return, he 
 raised the sums which had been granted him. On 
 Palm-Sunday he dispatched for Bourdeaux his 
 brother Richard, whom he had recently knighted, 
 and to whom he had granted the titles of earl of 
 Cornwall and of Poitou, with only sixty knights. 6 
 William, earl of Salisbury, and Philip d'Aubig- 
 lac, were given him as counsellors ; in a little 
 ime they assembled around him the principal ba- 
 ons of Gascogny : they compelled to submission 
 hose who before rejected his authority, or who 
 lad embraced the French party, and with this 
 
 « Malt. Paris Hist. Aug. p. 272. Avnales Waverlienses, t. xviii, 209. 
 
180 
 
 little army they undertook at last to besiege 
 Reole. 7 
 
 On his side, Louis VIII had held many parlia- 
 ments at Paris, and had occupied the lords who 
 had assembled there, sometimes about the affairs 
 of the Albigenses, and sometimes with the war 
 against England. When he received the news of 
 the landing of the English at Bourdeaux, he ad- 
 vanced as far as Tours, and afterwards to Chinon; 8 
 and the count of Marche engaged in a trifling 
 combat with Richard, lieutenant of his brother 
 Henry II, in Aquitaine. But, on either side the 
 forces were inconsiderable ; the two princes stood 
 equally on the defensive, and both lent an ear to 
 the solicitations of Honorius III, and his legate, 
 the cardinal of Sant. Angelo, who wished either 
 to engage them to conclude a good peace, or, at 
 least, to renew a long truce. 9 
 
 Raymond VII well knew, that his ruin was the 
 ultimate object of all the negociations between 
 the king of France and the church. The 29th of 
 September he had to regret the death of the arch- 
 bishop of Narbonne. This was, nevertheless, that 
 same Arnold, abbot of Citeaux, who had directed 
 the crusade with so much ferocity, as legate of 
 the holy see; but his ambition, and his disputes 
 with the house of Montfort, made him then seek 
 
 7 Matt. Paris, p. 272. Chron. Turon. p. 308. 
 
 8 Honorii III Epist. apud Raynald. 1225, ch. xxx, xxxi, p. 352. 
 
 9 Gesta Ludov. viii, p. 309. Chron. Guill. de Nangis, p. 514. 
 
181 
 
 for support in that of Saint Gilles. 1 Oti the other 
 hand, Henry III had himself solicited the friend- 
 ship of the count of Toulouse, although prudence 
 had compelled him to require that their alliance 
 should, for some time, be kept secret.' Raymond 
 VII, encouraged by the promises of that king, 
 proceeded, at the end of November, to the coun- 
 cil of Bourges. 
 
 1*225. This council proved very numerous ; few 
 partial assemblies of the church had presented a 
 more imposing appearance. There were reckon- 
 ed six archbishops, one hundred and thirteen 
 bishops, and one hundred and fifty abbots ; ano- 
 ther historian makes the number of archbishops 
 to be as high as fourteen. The legate presided, 
 the king of France assisted with his court, and 
 Raymond VII of Saint Gilles, on the one part, 
 Amaury de Montfort, on the other, presented 
 themselves to set forth their claims upon the 
 countship of Toulouse. Amaury displayed the 
 titles of the donations made to his father by the 
 pope and by king Philip, and maintained that 
 Raymond had been irrevocably deprived of his 
 heritage, by the highest authority in the church, 
 that of the 02cumenical council of Lateran. Ray- 
 mond, on his part, declared himself ready to do 
 service for his fiefs, and to acquit himself, both 
 
 1 Hist. gen. de Languedoc, Uv. XXIV, eh. iv, p. 349. 
 
 2 Rymer Acta, t. i, p. 281. Hist. gen. de Languedoc, Uv. xxiv, eh. ii, 
 p. 347. 
 
182 
 
 towards the king and the church of Rome, of all 
 that he owed to them on account of his heritage. 
 44 Would you submit, in this matter," replied 
 Amaury, " to the judgment of the twelve peers 
 of France ? Let the king first receive my homage," 
 replied Raymond, 44 and 1 am ready to submit to 
 it; otherwise, perhaps the peers would not ac- 
 knowladge me as one of their body." The legate 
 was very far from being desirous that the cause 
 of the church should be debated in this public 
 and chivalrous manner. He hastened to close 
 the discussion ; he enjoined on each of the arch- 
 bishops, to assemble his bishpps, and to deliber- 
 ate with them without communication with his 
 brethren; then he demanded of each to transmit 
 to him his opinion in writing, and he fulminated 
 an excommunication, against whoever of the pre- 
 dates should reveal the secret of these partial de- 
 liberations. 3 
 
 Nevertheless, a pretext was wanted for refusing 
 absolution to a prince, who desired to be recon- 
 ciled to the church, and for directing upon him 
 all the forces of Christendom. The legate, there- 
 fore, repeated against the count all the old accus- 
 ations of heresy and revolt; Raymond VII, ad- 
 dressing the legate with the most earnest prayers, 
 then 44 besought him to come in person and visit 
 
 s Matt. Paris, p. 277. Hist. gtn. de Languedoc, lit. xxiv, ch. iii, p. 348. 
 Preuvss, No. clx, p. 299. Chronicon Turon. 31SS. in Labbei Consiliis, t. xi, 
 p. 291. Chron. Turonense, t. xviii, p. 310. 
 
183 
 
 each of the cities of his province, to make inquir- 
 ies of each individual, as to the articles of his faith, 
 and if he found any who differed from the catho- 
 lic belief, he protested that he was ready to inflict 
 upon him the severest punishment, according to 
 the judgment of the holy church. In like manner, 
 if any city was found rebellious, he affirmed that 
 he was ready with all his power to compel it, as 
 well as all its inhabitants, to make satisfaction. 
 As to himself, he offered, if he had sinned in any- 
 thing, (which he did not remember to have done) 
 to make full penitence to God and the holy church, 
 like a faithful Christian; and, if it pleased the le- 
 gate, he was willing equally to suffer the exam- 
 ination of his faith. But the legate despised all 
 these things, and the count, catholic as he was, 
 could obtain no favour, unless he would renounce 
 his heritage, for himself and his heirs !''* 
 
 Some disputes of precedence between the arch- 
 bishops, some demands of the Romish church upon 
 the chapters of the cathedrals, in each of which the 
 pope wished to have two prebends at his disposal, 
 made a diversion of the labours of the council, and 
 gave opportunity to withdraw the affairs of the Al- 
 bigenses from public discussion. The legate pro- 
 fited by this circumstance to conclude the treaty 
 between Louis VIII and the court of Rome. He 
 acceded to all the demands which Louis had for- 
 merly made; he granted to those who should 
 
 * Matt. Paris Hist. Ang. p. 279. 
 
take the cross against the - Albigenses, the most 
 extensive indulgences; and prohibited the king of 
 England, under pain of excommunication, from 
 disquieting the king of France, as long as he should 
 be engaged in the service of God and the church, 
 even respecting the territories which he might un- 
 justly possess. 5 All these measures being taken, 
 the legate dismissed the council, the king returned 
 to Paris, count Raymond into his territories, and 
 the cardinal then declared, that the separate opin- 
 ion which he had received from each archbishop, 
 was, " that Raymond ought, in no case, to be ab- 
 solved on account of the offers he had made; but 
 that the king of the French should be charged by 
 the church with this affair, since no other could, 
 so w ell as he, purge the land from the wickedness 
 of the heretics ; that, in fine, to recompense the 
 king for his expenses, the tenth of all the ecclesi- 
 astical revenues should be assigned to him for five 
 years, if the war lasted so long.'* 6 
 
 1225. In accepting this commission from the 
 church, Louis remembered that he might not sur- 
 vive the war he was about to undertake. He, 
 therefore, made his will, in the month of June, 
 1225; and whilst the kings his predecessors had 
 been contented to distribute, by such acts, their 
 moveable riches for pious purposes, he, for the 
 first time, endeavoured to dispose of the crown 
 
 s Matt. Paris, p. 279. 
 
 6 Instrumentum Romani Cardinalis, Preuves de Languedoc, no. clxxxi, p. 323. 
 
185 
 
 and its fiefs. He called his eldest son to the suc- 
 cession of the throne of France, he destined Ar- 
 tois to the second, Anjou and Maine to the third, 
 Poitou and Auvergne to the fourth, and he order- 
 ed, besides, that the countship of Boulogne, with 
 which his brother was invested, should return to 
 the crown, if this brother died without children. 7 
 The king of the French was very willing to ac- 
 cept the confiscations of the territories belonging 
 to the count of Toulouse, as the avenger of the 
 offended church; but he wished, at the same time, 
 to shield himself against the accusation of cupidity 
 or injustice, by the authority of those who had 
 given him this counsel. In that age kings were 
 not accustomed to take upon themselves alone 
 the responsibility of government. They felt that 
 they were only the chiefs of a confederation of 
 princes. No constitution had, it is true, regulated 
 how these princes should take part in the com- 
 mon deliberations, or had guaranteed their right 
 of suffrage in the national assemblies ; the king, 
 however, knew that it would be nearly impossible 
 to cause the great vassals to execute what they 
 had not previously determined in their diet. He 
 therefore assembled parliaments ; and by this 
 name was then understood conferences of the 
 freest nature with those whom he wished to con- 
 sult, and whom he called to his councils. On the 
 28th of January, 1226, Louis VIII convoked at 
 
 7 Testamentum Ludovici VII I ad calcem gestorum, p. 310. 
 
186 
 
 Paris one of those parliaments or assemblies of 
 notables. It is probable that the lords temporal 
 and spiritual voted in common; nevertheless their 
 acts are come down to us separate. On the one 
 hand, twenty- seven secular lords, on the other, 
 seventeen archbishops or bishops, declared by 
 letters patent, given in that assembly, that they 
 counselled the king to take upon himself the af- 
 fair of the Albigenses, and promised to assist him 
 with all their power; the one as his liege-men, 
 the other by excommunicating all his enemies. 
 Amongst the first were seven counts, those of 
 Boulogne, of Brittany, of Dreux, of Chartres, of 
 Saint Paul, of Rouci, and of Vendome, none of 
 whom ranked amongst the twelve peers of the 
 realm ; there were also many great officers of the 
 crown, and the chiefs of the illustrious houses of 
 Montmorency, of Courtenay, of Nesle, and of 
 Coucy ; these twenty-five lords, however, can by 
 no means be considered as representing the nobi- 
 lity of the kingdom. 8 
 
 Two days after, the 30th of January, the king 
 took the cross with all his barons ; and the legate 
 publicly excommunicated as a condemned heretic 
 Raymond count of Toulouse, with all his associ- 
 ates. Amaury de Montfort, with the approbation 
 of his uncle Guy, ceded to the king all his preten- 
 sions upon the domains of Albigeois, in exchange 
 
 8 Hist. gfoi. de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. v, p. 350, Preuves, no. 161, 162, 
 p. 299, 300. Chron. Turon. Anonym, torn. xviii,p. 311. 
 
187 
 
 for the post of constable of France; the legate 
 granted to Louis one hundred thousand livres 
 annually, to be taken from the tenth of the eccle- 
 siastical possessions of the kingdom, and he sent 
 out missionaries to every part of France, with 
 power to absolve, from all their sins, those who 
 should repair to Bourges, a month after easter, to 
 serve in the army w hich Louis would at that time 
 take under his command. 9 
 
 On the 29th of March, the king assembled a 
 new parliament at Paris, to concert measures for 
 the expedition which had been resolved upon. 
 Some years had already elapsed since the cru- 
 sades had ceased, so that those who had, in the 
 interval, arrived at the age of manhood, and those 
 who, having already served in the sacred wars, 
 remembered only their pleasures, equally desired 
 a fresh opportunity of bathing in the blood of the 
 infidels. The great lords saw, with more of sus- 
 picion, the oppression of one of the first peers of 
 the kingdom, and the union of his vast domains 
 to the crown. They readily perceived that if 
 their king, after having expelled the king of Eng- 
 land from his domains, should also conquer those 
 belonging to the count of Toulouse, the power of 
 an individual would, in France, replace their 
 feudal republic; but the expedition against the 
 Albigenses, had been decreed by the authority of 
 
 9 Matt. Par. Hist. Ang. p. 279 Gestu Ltulov. xiv, f. 309. Cliron Turon, 
 torn, xviii, p. 312. 
 
188 
 
 the realm united with that of the church, so that 
 they were obliged to perform the service of their 
 fiefs under the double penalty of forfeiture and 
 excommunication. Henry III, who would wil- 
 lingly have made a diversion on the side of Gui- 
 enne, received so many summonses from the pope 
 to engage him to remain neuter, 1 that he consent- 
 ed to send deputies on the 22nd of March to the 
 cardinal legate, to renew the truce. 2 James king 
 of Aragon, yielding, in like manner, to the pope's 
 solicitations, prohibited his people from assisting 
 the Albigenses, although he was himself nephew 
 to the count of Toulouse. The count of Roussil- 
 lon took the same part, and was afterwards imi- 
 tated by Raymond Berenger count of Provence 
 and of Forcalquier. Hugues X de Lusignan, 
 count of la Marche, who had caused his son to 
 marry a daughter of Raymond VII, sent her back 
 to him, declaring that after the summons of the 
 king and the church, he broke off all connexion 
 with him. 3 And whilst the unhappy Raymond 
 saw himself deserted by all his allies, with the 
 only exception of the count of Foix, he learned 
 that the army destined to annihilate him, reckon- 
 ed, in knights, squires, and serjeants-at-arms, fifty 
 thousand horsemen. 4 
 
 1 Matt. Paris, p. 279. Raynaldi Annal. Eccles. 1226, § xxxiv, et seq. 
 p. 364. 
 
 2 Rymer Acta Publica, torn, i, p. 285. 
 
 3 Chron. Turon. Anonym, p. 314. 
 
 * Matt. Paris, p. 280. Hist. gtn. de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. xii,p. 354. 
 
189 
 
 None can describe the terror which such a for- 
 midable armament inspired in the country des- 
 tined to experience its fury, and which had al- 
 ready felt all the horrors of religious wars. The 
 people knew that the reformed preaching had en- 
 tirely ceased in their province ; they would proba- 
 bly themselves have sacrificed the heretics, had 
 they known where to find them, from resentment 
 for the ills which the sectaries had already brought 
 upon them, and those with which they were still 
 menaced. Those same inhabitants of the count- 
 ship of Toulouse who saw themselves so cru- 
 elly persecuted by the Roman church, knew in 
 their consciences, that they were nevertheless 
 zealous Roman catholics ; and therefore they were 
 fully persuaded that the crusaders, as they were 
 informed, had engaged to pass through the terri- 
 tory of the count of Toulouse from one extremity 
 to the other, in order to put all the inhabitants to 
 the sword, and people it with another race. 5 
 
 Excessive fear dissolved all the ancient bands 
 of affection, of relationship, and of feudal subjec- 
 tion. Whilst Louis was collecting his army at 
 Bourges, and was traversing the Nivernois, and 
 when he arrived at Lyons on the 28th of May, 
 for the feast of the ascension, he received depu- 
 tations after deputations from all the barons of 
 the states of Raymond or from the cities which 
 
 5 Et sic terrain comitis totam ab initio usque adjinem cum habitatoribus ejus 
 deleri — Matt. Paris. Hist. Ang: p. 280. 
 
190 
 
 were subject to him, to offer* their oath of fidelity, 
 their keys, their hostages, all the guarantees, in 
 a word, of their entire obedience to the kin^ and 
 the church, which the crusaders could desire. 
 The inhabitants of Avignon were amongst the 
 number of those who had long ago offered them- 
 selves to Louis. They placed at his service, the 
 use of their city and of their bridge over the 
 Rhone. It was, in fact, their embassy which de- 
 termined Louis to choose that route for entering 
 the states of Raymond. 6 
 
 Avignon, as well as Aries, Marseilles, and Nice, 
 and all the country situated on the left bank of 
 the Rhone, belonged to the kingdom of Aries, or 
 to the empire, and not to the kingdom of France. 
 But the authority of the emperor over that country 
 was then reduced to an empty name. The grand 
 vassals of Provence were the real sovereigns, and 
 the four cities we have named, having continually 
 been increasing the privileges of their communes, 
 had at last became true republics ; governed 
 upon the model of the cities of Lombardy, by 
 a podestat, with annual consuls and a council 
 of the commune. Avignon had, nevertheless, re- 
 tained a great affection for the house of Saint 
 
 c Hist. Gtn. de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. ix, p. 352. The deputies from 
 Avignon who had met the king at Clermont d'Auvergne, had agreed with 
 him that he should only enter into the city with a hundred knights, and 
 the legate with only the archbishop and the bishops ; but that the in- 
 habitants should furnish to all the rest of the army provisions at an 
 equitable price. Chroncion Turonense, p. 314, torn, xviii des historiens de 
 France. 
 
191 
 
 Gilles ; and this city which had been amongst the 
 first to open its gates to Raymond YH on his re- 
 turn from the council of Lateran, had submitted 
 from love to him, to remain twelve years under 
 an excommunication. The inhabitants of Avig- 
 non did not feel themselves strong enough to sus- 
 tain the first violence of the crusade, nor did they 
 think that count Raymond himself would be able 
 to resist it. They therefore offered to the king 
 provisions and the passage of the Rhone, but they 
 would not receive an army so ill supplied, and ill 
 disciplined, as his, within their walls. In con- 
 formity with this line of conduct, the podestat 
 and consul of the city, representing the commu- 
 nity, 7 took all proper measures for the safety of 
 their republic. They repaired their walls, pro- 
 vided themselves with arms and machines of war, 
 and brought into their city all the provisions of 
 the neighbouring fields. Raymond VII, on whom 
 those lands depended, took no offence at the ad- 
 vances which they had made to his enemy. He 
 did not despair of his safety, but he knew that he 
 could not meet the formidable army which was 
 coming against him, in the open field. He had 
 therefore confined his endeavours to the pro- 
 longation of the war, in the hope that time might 
 procure him some favourable changes. On the 
 one hand, to confirm the affections of his sub- 
 
 -• Boucher Wis*. <!e Provence, liv. ix, sect. 2, t. ii, p. 211. 
 
192 
 
 jects, he granted new privileges to the inhabitants 
 of Toulouse, and new fiefs to Roger Bernard, 
 count of Foix, his only ally. 8 On the other, he 
 concerted with the city of Avignon, after they had 
 supplied themselves, to destroy all the grain and 
 forage which they had not secured, and even took 
 care to break up all the meadows, that the cru- 
 saders might find no green forage. 9 
 
 The bridge which crosses the Rhone from Avig- 
 non to the suburbs now called Ville-Neuve, and 
 formerly Saint- Andre, rests upon a small island, 
 which divides the course of the river. It is of 
 stones, and the city on one side, and the suburb 
 on the other, enclose it like two tetes de pont. But 
 the magistrates had constructed a wooden frame, 
 which began from this island, and terminated 
 above the city. By this bridge of wood, Louis 
 VIII, immediately on his arrival, passed three 
 thousand soldiers : there was no necessity for him 
 to demand any other passage ; and, as the city 
 did not acknowledge him as its lord, either imme- 
 diate or sovereign, he ought to have contented 
 himself with the offer that was made him, to open 
 a passage for his army without the walls, and ho- 
 nourably to admit, into the city, himself and the 
 legate, with the most distinguished persons of the 
 court. But, the legate and the priests wished to 
 punish a city, which had remained twelve years 
 
 s Hist. gtn. de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. xi, p. 354. 
 o Matt. Paris Hist. Ang. p. 280. 
 
193 
 
 in impenitence, under the weight of an excommu- 
 nication : the crusaders were envious of the riches 
 which they expected to find accumulated in it, 
 and the pride of the king was wounded with any 
 opposition made to his authority. He declared 
 to the podestats and consuls of Avignon, that he 
 wished to pass the Rhone by the stone bridge, 
 and for that purpose to traverse their city with his 
 lance on his thigh, at the head of his whole ar- 
 my. The consuls, worthy of the energy of a ris- 
 ing republic, boldly declared that they would not 
 permit it, and immediately shut their gates against 
 him. 1 
 
 Louis VIII had arrived before Avignon, on the 
 6th of June, 1226, the eve of Pentecost; but it 
 was not till the 10th that he commenced the siege. 
 The negociations of the preceding days had been 
 brought so near to a conclusion, that the citizens 
 had restored fifty hostages, who were in their cus- 
 tody. Nevertheless, on the 9th the legate pub- 
 lished a decree, enjoining upon the king to purge 
 the city from heretics ; and the French having, 
 during the truce, made an attempt to surprise one 
 
 Df the gates, blood was spilled on both sides, and 
 
 he conferences were broken oflf. c 
 However, the siege of Avignon was found to be 
 
 1 Matt. Paris Hist. Ang. p. 280. Boucher Hist, de Provence, liv. ix, 
 wet. ii, p. 221. Guil. de Podio Laurentii, cap. xxxv, p. 687. Prceclara 
 Francor. facinora, p. 774. (He copies Puy Laurens.) 
 
 2 Hist. gin. de Langucdoc, liv. xxiv, ch. xiv, p. 350. Ckron. Turon. 
 ?. 315. 
 
 O 
 
194 
 
 a much more difficult enterprise, than the legate 
 and the crusaders had expected. The city was 
 strong, both from its situation, and from a double 
 inclosure of walls ; the population was numerous, 
 and well provided with arms and warlike ma- 
 chines ; they knew all the dangers to which their 
 resistance exposed them; and the fate which 
 awaited them if they should happen to fall. But 
 they relied upon the goodness of their cause, and 
 the protection of the emperor Frederic 11, to whom 
 Louis hastened to write to justify his aggression; 5 
 and the love of liberty redoubled the bravery of 
 its defenders. " They returned," says Matthew 
 Paris, " stones for stones, arrows for arrows, 
 beams for beams, spears for spears, they invented 
 machines to destroy the effect of those of the be- 
 siegers, and they inflicted mortal wounds upon 
 the French." 4 
 
 Although the siege of Avignon lasted three 
 months, we have no other account, than that con- 
 tained in these few words, of the various battles 
 which were fought around the walls of that city. 
 We only know that they were very destructive to 
 the army of the crusaders, and that the two po- 
 destats of Avignon, William Raymond, and Ray-: 
 mond de Rial, who took, at the same time, the i 
 title of bailiffs or representatives of the count of 
 Toulouse, shewed themselves worthy of the con-j 
 
 s Preuves a VHist. de Languedoc, No. 171, p. 310. 
 * Matt. Paris, p. 280. Chronicon Turonense,p. 315. 
 
195 
 
 fidence of the people and the prince. 5 The fall 
 of the wooden bridge, at the time that the crusa- 
 ders were crouded upon it, precipitated a great 
 number into the river; many more were slain in 
 the assaults, or by the sorties of the besiegers; 
 but the greatest loss which the army of Louis ex- 
 perienced, was caused by disease and famine. 
 Provisions, and especially forage, failed, in that 
 burning climate, in the midst of summer, to the 
 most numerous body of cavalry that had ever 
 been assembled in France. Louis was obliged to 
 send foraging parties to a great distance, but they 
 almost all fell into the hands of Raymond VII, 
 who, avoiding a battle, still hovered on the flanks 
 of the besiegers. The camp was soon surround- 
 ed, in every direction, with the carcases of horses 
 which had died either from privation or fatigue. 
 Their stench produced maladies amongst the sol- 
 diers, and it is asserted that the large flies which 
 were nourished by their putrified flesh, and which 
 afterwards attacked the men, propagated the con- 
 tagion by their stings. Guy, count of Saint Paul, 
 the bishop of Limoges, and two hundred knights- 
 bannerets sunk under the destructive fever which 
 attacked the army; and Matthew Paris makes the 
 I lumber of the crusaders, of all ranks, who perish- 
 i ?d in this siege, amount to twenty thousand men. 6 
 
 s Preuves a VHist. de Lanpuedoc, No. clxix, p. 308. 
 « Matt. Paris Hist. Ang. p. 281. Hist. gin. de Languedoc, liv. x\iv, ch. 
 , irii, p. 358. 
 
196 
 
 But the army of the crusaders had not all re- 
 mained under the walls of Avignon ; detached 
 parties, profiting by the terror which they inspired, 
 received the submission of the neighbouring lords, 
 cities, and castles. The city of Nismes planted 
 on its walls, on the 5th of June, 1226, the king's 
 standard, and from that epoch it has remained in 
 the immediate domain of the crown ; those of 
 Puilaurens and of Castres followed the example 
 in the days following. Carcassonne and Albi 
 sent their deputies, after the 16th of June, to the 
 camp before Avignon to deliver the keys of their 
 fortress. The number of the lords who capitu- 
 lated was greater. Raymond VII, though still 
 beloved by his subjects, was abandoned at the 
 same time by the barons and the communes. 
 
 It is true that Louis VIII began also at this 
 time to see some of his vassals withdraw from 
 his army. Thibaud IV, or the Posthumous, count 
 of Champaign, set them the example. This 
 prince, at that time twenty-six years of age, who, 
 was reckoned amongst the best poets of the new 
 French language, who called himself the knight 
 of the queen Blanche, and who pretended to be 
 in love with her, though she was more than forty 
 years of age, was, nevertheless, not so blinded by 
 gallantry, as to be indifferent to the subjugation 
 of the great feudatories. It is believed that he 
 
 7 Hisl.ghu de Langucdoc, liv. xxiv, ch. xiii, p. 355- 358. Preuves, No. 
 174,^. 314. Histoire de Nismes, liv. iii, p. 294. 
 
197 
 
 concerted with Peter Mauclerc, count or duke of 
 Brittany, and with Hugues de Lusignan, count of 
 Marche and Angouleme, to save the count of 
 Toulouse from utter ruin. 8 When he had finished 
 the forty days to which he was bound by his feudal 
 service, he demanded of Louis VIII leave to 
 retire. Louis refused him on the ground that he 
 was in the service of the church, whose laws su- 
 perseded those of the realm. Thibaud was in- 
 censed ; the king threatened to ravage his domains; 
 to this threat the count of Champaign paid no re- 
 gard and quitted him. The altercation between 
 them was, however, so violent, that when Louis 
 died, a short time after, there was a report current, 
 that this great lord, the lover of his wife, had 
 caused him to be poisoned.9 
 
 During these proceedings, the citizens of Avig- 
 non, after having caused infinite loss to the army 
 of the crusaders, consented, at last, on the 12th of 
 September, to capitulate. Matthew Paris relates 
 that they only engaged to receive, within their 
 walls, the legate and the high lords of the army, 
 but that these being introduced into the city with 
 their attendants, took possession of the gates in 
 
 s Histoire de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. xvii, p. 358. Lobineau, Histoire 
 de Bretagne, liv. viii, ch. xlv, p. 218. 
 
 9 Matt. Paris, p. 281. Gesta Ludov. regis, p. 308. Chroniq. de Saint- 
 Deny s, p. 421. 
 
 a Father Lobineau says, it is sufficiently certain that Louis VIII died by 
 poison, but it remains uncertain by whom that poison was given. Hist, de 
 Bretagne, liv. vii, ch. xlviii, p. 219. 
 
198 
 
 contempt of the capitulation. 1 Neither the king 
 nor the legale thought themselves, in conscience, 
 obliged to keep any faith with excommunicated 
 heretics, but they owed some regard to Frederic 
 II, and it was probably on his account that they 
 contented themselves with requiring three hundred 
 hostages, as a guarantee for the submission of the 
 citizens to the commands of the church and the 
 legate ; with imposing on the city a warlike con- 
 tribution; with throwing down parts of its walls 
 and towers; and with putting to the sword the 
 Flemings and the French who were found in the 
 garrison. It is probable that, but for the recom- 
 mendation of the emperor, all the inhabitants 
 would have been put to death. 2 
 
 Louis remained a short time at Avignon with 
 his army. Fifteen days after he had taken the 
 city, a terrible inundation of the Durance covered 
 all the space which had been occupied by the 
 French camp. If the soldiers had not taken their 
 quarters within the walls, they would all have 
 been swept away by the water, with their tents 
 and baggage. At this epoch Louis confided the go- 
 vernment of Beaucaire and of Nismes to a French 
 knight, who, from that time took the title of sene- 
 
 1 Matt. Paris, p. 281. According to the Chronique de Tours, t. xviii, 
 p. 317, the citizens referred themselves to the arbitration of the legate, 
 not expecting so severe a sentence. 
 
 2 Guil. de Podio Laur. cap. xxxv, p. 687. Praclara Francor.facin. p. 774. 
 Bern. Guid. Vit. Honor. Ill, p. 570. Bouche Hist, de Provence, lit. ix, § ii, 
 p. 221. Raynaldi Annal. Eccles. 1226 et 40, p. 365. 
 
199 
 
 schal of the two cities. The king afterwards pass- 
 ed through the province, and arrived within four 
 leagues of Toulouse, magnificently entertained and 
 feasted by the bishop Fouquet, who followed the 
 army; respectfully admitted into their castles by 
 the Languedocian Lords, from whom he success- 
 ively received an oath of fidelity; giving a sene- 
 schal to Carcassonne, as he had done to Beau- 
 caire; rasing the city of Limoux, the capital of 
 Razez, which was situated upon a hill, to rebuild 
 it on a plain; and, in fine, receiving in the month 
 of October, in the city of Pamiers, the submission 
 of all the bishops of the province. 3 
 
 But throughout this whole expedition Louis VIII 
 had not the opportunity of signalizing the bravery 
 of his soldiers, by a single warlike exploit. The 
 counts of Toulouse and of Foix, who had renewed 
 their alliance, under the guarantee of the city of 
 Toulouse, avoided every battle, and every kind of 
 action. They determined to suffer the crusaders 
 to exhaust themselves by their own efforts, sup- 
 posing that if Louis returned into their province in 
 the following year, as he had threatened, he would 
 at least not be followed by so large a body of 
 fanatics; that they would have received a lesson 
 from the mortality and sufferings before Avignon; 
 and that their persecuting zeal would be much 
 abated, by having observed none of these heretics 
 
 s Guil. de Podio Laur. cap. xxxvi, p. 688. Prceclara Francor. f acinar, 
 p. 775. 
 
200 
 
 in the province, of whom so* much had been told 
 them. By the same reasoning, but with a quite 
 contrary interest, the king, the legate, and the 
 bishop Fouquet, earnestly desired to find, in the 
 country where they had made war, some of those 
 enemies of the church, for whose extirpation the 
 whole of France had been put in motion. Nothing 
 was more difficult than this, after fifteen years of 
 persecution, during which they had either been 
 expelled or put to death. It was with the greatest 
 exertions that they at last discovered, at Cannes, 
 in the diocese of Narbonne, an ancient preacher 
 of the Albigenses, named Peter Isarn, who being 
 too old to quit the country, had concealed him- 
 self in the most secret retreats. He was condemn- 
 ed by the archbishop of Narbonne, and burned 
 with great ceremony. After this execution, Louis 
 prepared for his return: he entrusted his con- 
 quests to the government of Humbert de Beanjeu, 
 a knight distinguished both for his birth and val- 
 our, and took the road towards Auvergne in his 
 way to Northern France. 4 
 
 But the germs of that malady, which had caused 
 so many ravages during the siege of Avignon, still 
 remained in the army, and the fatigue, the heat, 
 and the march across an unhealthy country during 
 the feverish season, gave them additional activity. 
 William archbishop of Rheims, the count of Na- 
 mur, and Bouchard de Marli, fell the first victims 
 
 4 Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, eh, xxiii— xxvi, p. 359—362. 
 
201 
 
 to this epidemic. Louis VIII, on his arrival at 
 Montpensier, in Auvergne, on the 29th of October, 
 felt himself attacked in his turn. He was obliged 
 to rest there, and soon discovered that his mala- 
 dy was mortal. On the third of November he 
 called into his chamber the prelates and the prin- 
 cipal lords by whom he had been accompanied, 
 viz. the archbishop of Bourges and of Sens ; the 
 bishops of Beauvais, of Noyon, and of Chartres, 
 Philip his brother, count of Boulogne, the count 
 of Blois, Enguerrand de Coucy, Arehambaud de 
 Bourbon, Jeande Nesle, and Etienne de Sancerre. 
 He commended to them his eldest son, then only 
 twelve years of age, and afterwards celebrated as 
 Saint Louis ; he confided him to the care of his 
 wife, Blanche of Castille ; he demanded of his 
 prelates and barons that they would promise to 
 crown him, without delay, as their lord and king, 
 and pay him their homage; and he made them 
 confirm this promise by a solemn oath. The ma- 
 lady soon reached its last stage, and he expired 
 on the 8th of November, 1226. 5 
 
 s Martene Thesaurus anecdotor. torn, i, p. 937. Guil. de Podio Laurentii, 
 cap. xxxvi,p. 688. Guil. de Nangiaco Vita Ludovici viii, p. 310. In Du- 
 chesne Ludov. 9- Guil. de Nangis Chron. p. 517. Gesta Ludov. viii, p. 310. 
 Chronique de Saint Demjs, p. 422. Abrege anonyme de VHistoire de France. 
 Hist, de France, torn. xvii,p. 432. Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxiv,(7t. xxvii, 
 p. 353. Annales IVaverleienscs Monast. torn, xviii, p. 210, Chron. Turon. 
 p. 317. Andrenses Monast. Chron. torn, xviii, p. 580. Joannis Iperii Chron. 
 sancti Bertini, p. 609. Chronic. Alberici Trium Fontium, p. 796. 
 
CHAP. V. 
 
 Affairs of the Albigenses from the Death of Louis VIII, 
 1226, to the Peace of Paris, 1229; and its final rati- 
 fication, 1242. 
 
 At the death of Louis VIII, the monarchy which 
 had been raised to a high degree of power, by 
 the skill and good fortune of Philip Augustus, 
 appeared in danger of falling into that state of 
 turbulent anarchy from which he had with diffi- 
 culty rescued it. He had obtained great advan- 
 tages over his vassals, which his son, during his 
 short reign, had not had time to lose; but those 
 vassals had still the consciousness of their strength, 
 and the love of that independence of which they 
 had been so recently deprived. To keep them 
 in their obedience a high degree of energy was 
 required in the depositaries of the royal authority, 
 and that authority was confided in a woman and 
 a child. 
 
 Louis VIII had married on the 23rd of May, 
 1200, Blanche, daughter of Alphonso IX of Cas- 
 tille; he had eleven children by her, five of whom 
 survived him. Blanche was born, according to 
 Bollandus, in 1188, 6 and most probably three or 
 
 « Bollandus, 30 Mai, p. 291. 
 
203 
 
 four years sooner, so that she was, at the death 
 of her husband, at least thirty-eight years of age. 
 Louis, the eldest of her sous, born the 25th of 
 April, 1215, was, at that time, eleven years and a 
 half; Robert, the eldest of his other three sons, 
 was ten years; Alphonso, the second, seven; the 
 youngest, Charles, was only six, and the daugh- 
 ter, Elizabeth, was only two years old. 
 
 Blanche was a Spaniard, and possessed of the 
 qualities common to her nation, the qualities pe- 
 culiar to great minds. She was handsome; her 
 heart was ardent and tender; religion partly oc- 
 cupied it, but love was not excluded ; and her 
 deportment, especially towards the king of Nar- 
 varre, and the pope's legate, gave some colour of 
 probability to the reports which her enemies cir- 
 culated against her. Jealous of her authority, 
 jealous of the affections of those whom she loved, 
 even when she married her sons, she was still 
 watchful to prevent their wives obtaining an as- 
 cendancy over them which might interfere with 
 her own ; she had, besides, inspired them with a 
 high idea of her prudence and capacity. She 
 possessed their love, but that love was mingled 
 with fear, and even when she placed them on the 
 throne, she did not accustom them to relax in 
 their obedience. Although she was herself, pro- 
 bably, destitute of a literary education, which 
 was in those times rarely given even to men, she 
 comprehended the advantage of useful studies, 
 
204 
 
 and surrounded her sons with those who were 
 the most capable of teaching them all that was 
 then known. She gave to the masters whom she 
 chose an authority, over the princes, as absolute 
 as they could have had over the children of a 
 citizen ; and as the ferula was then the only sys- 
 tem of education known to the pedants, " so, as 
 the biassed king himself used to say, the afore- 
 said master flogged him many times to teach him 
 things of discipline.'" 7 But above all, Blanche 
 endeavoured to inspire her children with the same 
 religions sentiments by which she herself was 
 actuated ; and the education which she gave 
 them constantly tended to the developement of 
 that piety, and that ardent faith, which was the 
 spring of all their actions. 
 
 1227. Blanche, at the same time that she had to 
 contend with her great barons, for the sovereign 
 authority, and to maintain her relations with the 
 king of England, found herself charged with the 
 war which her husband, according to the exhort- 
 ation of the holy see, had, in the preceding year, 
 carried on against the Albigenses. But, although 
 the army of Louis VIII had been almost destroy- 
 ed there by sickness, the regent had no reason to 
 fear the vengeance of the inhabitants of the count- 
 ship of Toulouse, to whom, under the pretence 
 of their attachment to heresy, so much evil had 
 
 been done. They were crushed under the weight 
 
 i 
 
 7 Vie de St. Louis par le confesseur de la reine Marguerite, ch. ii, p. 301. 
 
205 
 
 of long-protracted calamities, and desired nothing 
 so much as a short season of repose. The cardi- 
 nal, Romano di Sant. Angelo, had full authority 
 from the pope to regulate the ecclesiastical govern- 
 ment of the conquered country. In the beginning 
 of January, he gave judgment upon the demand 
 made by the citizens of Avignon, to be reconciled 
 to the church. He prohibited them from afford- 
 ing any succours to the count of Toulouse, or any 
 asylum to the heretics. He condemned them to 
 a fine of a thousand marks of silver to the church, 
 and of six thousand to the army of the crusaders. 
 He commanded them to demolish their walls, their 
 ramparts, and their towers, without the liberty of 
 rebuilding them, unless they should obtain permis- 
 sion from the king of France and the church. On 
 these conditions he was willing to free them from 
 the excommunication which they had incurred ; 
 but, at the same time, he destined the money that 
 he had extorted from them, to fortifying the castle 
 of Saint Andre, on the other side of the Rhone, 
 which was intended to keep them in obedience. 8 
 During lent, in the same year, Peter, archbishop 
 of Narbonne, presided at a council in his episco- 
 pal city, the canons of which, to the number of 
 twenty, were all intended to redouble the rigours 
 of persecution against the Jews and the heretics, 
 the count of Toulouse, the count of Foix, and the 
 viscount of Beziers, and to augment the authority 
 
 b Hist. g£n. du Langucdoc, xxiv, ch. xxix, p. 364. 
 
206 
 
 of the ecclesiastics. It was "there ordered, that a 
 testament should not be held valid, unless it was 
 signed in the presence of the curate ; and that, in 
 each parish, assistants to the inquisitors, under the 
 name of synodical witnesses, should be instituted 
 for the discovery of those whose faith might be 
 suspected. 9 
 
 In spite of the discouragement of his subjects, 
 the abandonment of his allies, and the accumula- 
 tion of sacerdotal hatred, the count of Toulouse 
 endeavoured to profit by the retreat of the cru- 
 saders, to attack Humbert de Beanjeu, whom 
 Louis VIII had, at his departure, left as his lieu- 
 tenant of the province. He could only take from 
 him the castle of Haute-Rive, four leagues from 
 Toulouse, which he had attacked during the win- 
 ter; 1 but, this event was sufficient to excite the 
 French clergy to make the court of Rome resound 
 with their clamours. They accused the queen of 
 continuing to raise the tenths of the ecclesiastical 
 benefices, granted for five years to her husband, 
 without, at the same time, continuing the war 
 against the heretics, which alone could render this 
 exaction legitimate. They even obtained an or- 
 der from Gregory IX, who had succeeded in the 
 pontificate to Honorius III, to suspend the pay- 
 ment. 2 The cardinal of Sant. Angelo, who was 
 
 a Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxiv. ch. xxxii, p. 365. Concilia generalia 
 Labbei, torn xi, p. 304. 
 
 1 Guilt, de Podio Laurentii, cap. xxxvii, p. 689. 
 
 2 Raynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1227, art. 56. 
 
•207 
 
 entirely devoted to Blanche, found means to re- 
 voke the order; but, at the same time, gave the 
 queen to understand, that it was to her interest to 
 continue the war. She sent some assistance to 
 Humbert de Beaujeu, who, by the help of this re- 
 inforcement, was enabled to lay siege to the castle 
 Becede, in Lauraguais. 3 The archbishop of Nar- 
 bonne, and Fouquet, bishop of Toulouse, when 
 the Albigenses called the bishop of devils, pro- 
 ceeded to this siege. Pons de Villeneuve, and 
 Olivier de Fermes, who commanded in the castle, 
 not being able to prolong their defence, succeeded 
 one night in escaping with part of the garrison ; 
 the rest were either knocked on the head, or put 
 to the sword by the conquerors. Fouquet did, 
 however, save the lives of some women and chil- 
 dren ; and he, in like manner, rescued from the 
 hands of the soldiers, though it was that they 
 might perish in the flames, Girard de la Mote, 
 pastor of the heretics of Becede, and all those 
 who formed his flock. 4 
 
 Thus, the cruelty of the persecutors was not 
 yet satiated ; still it frequently displayed itself by 
 punishments, and during all the period on which 
 we are now entering, the repressive measures, 
 adopted by the councils, acquired each year more 
 severity, and gave to the inquisition an organiza- 
 
 I Guill. Nangii Chronic, in spied, torn, iii, p. 31. 
 
 * Guill. de Podio Laurentii, cap. xxxvii, p. 689. PrtBclara Franc, facin. 
 
208 
 
 tion still more terrible. Nevertheless, that fanati- 
 cism, which had armed the first crusaders against 
 the Albigenses, was abated ; nobody now re- 
 garded Christianity as in danger from the pro- 
 gress of reform, nobody was anxious to save the 
 church from the invasion of thought, and no one 
 longed for the moment when he might rejoice at 
 the burning of the heretics, or bathe himself in 
 their blood. To an outrageous phrensy had suc- 
 ceeded a calm indifference ; yet, toleration had 
 gained nothing by the exchange. Kings, nobles, 
 priests, and people, were all agreed in thinking, 
 that heretics must be destroyed by fire and 
 sword. An injurious name, which recalled the 
 Bulgarian origin of the sect, was given to all who 
 had undertaken to bring back morals to their 
 purity, faith to its spirituality, and the church to 
 its original simplicity. A cold contempt alone 
 was vouchsafed to those beings who had been an- 
 imated by such generous sentiments, and had suf- 
 fered so much affliction, as if they had in them 
 nothing human, nothing capable of feeling, nothing 
 with which the heart of man could sympathise. 
 Their very punishment excited no emotion, not 
 even that of hatred, because it no longer required 
 an effort to crush them. 
 
 Reason, however, began afresh to attempt the 
 examination of religious questions; but it was not 
 to those controversies treated of by the Albigen- 
 ses, that attention was directed. From them the 
 
209 
 
 most undaunted speculators turned, with a well- 
 founded horror. The schools of Paris had been 
 continually acquiring importance; new scholars 
 flocked there, not only from France, but from all 
 Europe, to attend the lessons of celebrated mas- 
 ters. A numerous body of professors, who were 
 indebted for their pecuniary advantages, their rank 
 in society, and their fame, to the exercise of all 
 the faculties of the mind, had raised themselves, 
 still more than they had elevated the youths con- 
 fided to their care. Erudition had made indubi- 
 able progress ; skill in managing both the thoughts 
 and the language in disputes, had increased with 
 exercise; it is not so certain that the understand- 
 ing had gained either in justness or in extent The 
 school of theology at Paris, famed through all 
 Europe for its orthodoxy, placed its glory in main- 
 taining that reputation without spot ; yet, this 
 body of teachers could not help finding itself in 
 opposition to the monastic orders, who also under- 
 took the work of instruction. Their rivalship con- 
 tributed to attach the French theologians to the 
 defence of the independence of their national 
 church ; it was by prescribing the boundaries of 
 the temporal and spiritual powers, by their oppos- 
 tions to the encroachments of the court of Rome, 
 hat they signalised their spirit of reform, and 
 lever in any examination of the doctrine, nor even 
 a that of the discipline of the church. 
 In the midst of the troubles of an agitated re- 
 
210 
 
 gency, with numerous risings and revolts of the 
 barons within the realm, and threatenings and 
 dangers from without, Blanche had the talent to 
 terminate the conquest of the Albigenses, and to 
 gather the fruits of the policy of Philip Augustus, 
 of the zeal of Louis VIII, and of the fanatical fury 
 of their subjects. The rivalship of Philip Hure- 
 pel, the count of Boulogne, and uncle of Louis 
 IX, the enmity and distrust of the barons, and 
 the relationship which connected her with Ray- 
 mond VII, did not divert her from those projects 
 of aggrandisement, which she had formed in con- 
 cert with the cardinal di Sant. Angel o. France 
 has been indebted to her for the acquisition of a 
 noble province, and forgetting at what a price it 
 was purchased, she has viewed with indulgence 
 both her policy and her means of success. It 
 would be unjust to attribute to individuals the 
 errors of their age. Intolerance and persecuting 
 fanaticism were virtues in the eyes of Blanche, and 
 she is not responsible for the instruction of her 
 doctors. But cupidity, cruelty, and want of faith 
 in political transactions, were sanctioned by no 
 religious instruction. We are no more able to ex- 
 culpate from these vices the great of the middle 
 ages, than those of our own days. The frequency 
 of examples cannot justify that which conscience 
 reprobates. Yet the picture of the crimes of for- 
 mer ages does not excite sensations which are alto- 
 gether painful; it shows to what a degree ignor- > 
 
211 
 
 ance is contrary to morality, and how greatly the 
 increase of knowledge has been favourable to the 
 progress of virtue. 
 
 1228. At the commencement of the year 1228, 
 Raymond count of Toulouse again took the field, 
 flattering himself that he should find the royal 
 party discouraged by the civil wars with the ba- 
 rons, and the crusaders weakened by the depar- 
 ture of the most enthusiastic amongst them for 
 the Holy Land. Guy de Montfort, brother of the 
 ferocious Simon, was killed at the siege of Va- 
 reilles. 5 Raymond afterwards toak possession of 
 Castel Sarrazin. In the neighbourhood of that 
 place, he placed an ambush for a body of troops 
 belonging to Humbert de Beaujeu, and, having 
 taken a great number of prisoners, he abandoned 
 .himself to those sentiments of hatred and ven- 
 geance, which the horrors of the war had excited 
 both in his soldiers and himself. The captives 
 were mutilated with an odious cruelty ; a second 
 idvantage caused additional French prisoners to 
 all into his hands, and a second time he treated 
 hem with the same barbarity. 6 Perhaps, also, a 
 nistaken policy made him thus brave the laws of 
 uimanity. Discouragement had seized the hearts 
 »f the Languedocians ; their constancy had been 
 xhausted by such a succession of combats, and 
 
 5 Guill. de Podio Laurentii, ch. xxxvii, p. 689. Praclara Francorum 
 icinora, p. 776 
 
 c Matt. Parisii Hist. Angl. p. 204. 
 
212 
 
 so many sufferings ; and Raymond VII thought 
 that he should render them warlike by permitting 
 them to become ferocious. But, on the contrary, 
 those who had degraded themselves by taking the 
 character of executioners, ceased to merit, in war, 
 the title of soldiers. His success finished with 
 his clemency. 
 
 Humbert de Beaujeu received but little assist- 
 ance from France; the prelates, however, effected 
 for him what the queen could not then undertake. 
 In the middle of June, the archbishops of Auch 
 and Bourdeaux arrived at his camp, with a great 
 number of bishops ; they had been preaching the 
 cross in their respective dioceses, and they brought 
 him a numerous and fanatical army. 7 Fouquet, 
 bishop of Toulouse, had never quitted the crusa- 
 ders, and he exceeded them all in sanguinary zeal. 
 He believed himself called to purify, by fire, his 
 episcopal city, and he determined Beaujeu to 
 draw near to Toulouse. The affrighted citizens 
 shut themselves up within their walls, abandoning 
 the surrounding country, and flattering themselves 
 still to be able by lengthening out the war, to 
 weary the patience of the besiegers. It was their 
 own bishop, Fouquet, who suggested the method 
 of wounding his people in what he knew to be 
 the most sensible part, and of rendering this war 
 for ever fatal to their country. By his advice, the 
 French captains conducted, every morning, their 
 
 7 Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. xxxviii, p. 368. 
 
213 
 
 troops to the gates of Toulouse, and then retiring 
 to the mountains, each day by a different route, 
 they commanded them, through all the space 
 they passed over, to cut down the corn, tear up 
 the vines, destroy the fruit trees, and burn the 
 houses, so that there remained not a vestige of the 
 industry or of the riches of man. Each day the 
 general traced in this manner a new radius, and, 
 during three months, he uninterruptedly continu- 
 ed, thus methodically, to ravage all the adjacent 
 country. At the end of the campaign, the city 
 was only surrounded by a frightful desert, all its 
 richest inhabitants were ruined, and their courage 
 no longer enabled them to brave such a merciless 
 war. 8 Some lords had already abandoned them ; 
 the two brothers Olivier and Bernard de Termes 
 submitted their castles, on the 21st of November, 
 to the archbishop of Narbonne, and to marshal 
 ie Levis, who received it in the name of the king, 
 }f whom the brothers de Termes engaged to hold 
 ill the rest of their lordship. 9 Nearly at the same 
 ime count Raymond listened to the propositions 
 )f peace which were made by the abbot of Grand- 
 elve; on the 10th of December, 1228, he gave 
 ull powers to this abbot to negociate in his name 
 nth the king, the queen mother, and the cardinal 
 i Sant. Angelo, engaging to ratify whatever treaty 
 
 8 Guill. de Podio Laurentii, ch. xxxviii, p. 690. 
 acinora. p. 776. 
 
 9 Preuves de VHist. de Languedoc, t. Hi, p. 325. 
 
 Pr cedar a Franco rum 
 Acte No. 182. 
 
214 
 
 should obtain the consent of his cousin Thibaud 
 count of Champagne, whom he took for arbitrator 
 of his differences with his cousin the queen. The 
 instructions to the abbot of Grandselve 1 shew that 
 Raymond VII, overwhelmed with terror as well 
 as his subjects, no longer preserved any hope of 
 defending himself. It might even be supposed 
 that the victories of his enemies appeared to him 
 a judgment from heaven, and that he thought him- 
 self obliged, in conscience, henceforth to share 
 the persecuting fanaticism against which he so 
 long had struggled. In fact, he demanded neither 
 liberty of conscience for his subjects, nor the pre- 
 servation of his own sovereignty ; he abandoned 
 all thoughts of maintaining, any longer, his inde- 
 pendence; he consented to surrender himself 
 disarmed, and without guarantee, into the hands 
 of his enemies, and to leave to them the disposal 
 of his heritage. He only desired to covenant for 
 the possession of a small part of his states, to 
 secure to himself not a sovereignty, but a revenue, 
 which should cease with his life. 2 
 
 1229. Early in the year 1229 the cardinal legate 
 held two provincial councils, one at Sens, the other 
 at Senlis, to prepare the articles relative to the 
 pacification of Albigeois. He afterwards repaired 
 to Meaux, where the king, the queen Blanche, the 
 
 1 Preuves de Vhist. de Languedoc, t. iii, p. 326. Acte No. 183. 
 
 2 Martene Thesaurus Anecdotor. torn. 1, p. 943. Preuves de I'hist. de Lan- 
 guedoc, § clxxxiii, p. 326. 
 
215 
 
 count Raymond VII, the deputies from Toulouse, 
 the archbishop of Narbonne, and the principal 
 bishops of his province successively arrived. The 
 treaty, which had been concerted between the car- 
 dinal di Sant Angelo, and the abbot of Grand- 
 selve, was afterwards read. It was the most ex- 
 traordinary that any sovereign had ever been re- 
 quired to sign. Each of its articles, says William 
 de Puy Laurens, contained a concession which 
 might alone have sufficed for the ransom of the 
 count of Toulouse, had he been made prisoner in 
 a universal rout of all his army. Raymond, ne- 
 vertheless, did not hesitate to give his consent 
 to it. 3 
 
 The definitive treaty was signed at Paris the 
 12th of April, 1229. By this act, Raymond VII 
 abandoned to the king all that he possessed in 
 the kingdom of France, and to the legate all that 
 he possessed in the kingdom of Aries. After this 
 universal renunciation, the king, as if by favour, 
 granted him, as a fief, for the remainder of his life, 
 a part only of what he had taken from him, 
 namely, a portion of the dioceses of Toulouse, of 
 Albigeois, and of Quercy, with the entire dioceses 
 of Agenois and of Rouergue. These provinces, 
 which the king restored to him, were, moreover, 
 to form the portion of his daughter Jane, then nine 
 years of age, whom he named his sole heiress, 
 
 3 Guill. de Podio Laurentii, ch. xxxix, p, 691. Prceclara Frayiconwt 
 facinora, p. 777. 
 
216 
 
 and whom he engaged to deliver immediately in- 
 to the hands of Blanche, that she might bring her 
 up under her own eyes, and afterwards marry her 
 to one of her sons at her discretion. Blanche des- 
 tined her for Alphonso, the third, who was like- 
 wise but nine years old. In accepting, for her son, 
 the daughter of a prince so long proscribed, and 
 so constantly excommunicated, Blanche sufficient- 
 ly manifested, that she, at least, did not consider 
 him a heretic, that she felt no horror at being allied 
 to him, and that on the part of the court of France, 
 the crusade was rather political than religious. 
 Its real design was to obtain possession of the do- 
 mains belonging to the most powerful of the grand 
 vassals, though its ostensible object was the sup- 
 pression of heresy. 
 
 Toulouse, with all the provinces reserved to 
 Raymond VII, were, after his death, to pass to 
 his daughter, and to the children which she might 
 have by her marriage with one of the king's bro- 
 thers. In failure of these, the fiefs were to revert 
 to the crown, without ever passing to any other 
 children whom Raymond VII might have by a 
 new marriage. On the other hand, the remainder 
 of his states, amounting to nearly two-thirds of 
 the whole, were to be given up to the king, immedi- 
 ately after the treaty of Paris, to be united to the 
 crown; that is the dukedoms of Narbonne, Beziers, 
 Agde, Maguelonne, Usez and Viviers, as well as 
 all that the count possessed or pretended to pos- 
 
217 
 
 sess in Velay, Gevaudan, and the lordship of Lo- 
 deve ; together with the fief of the marshall of 
 Levis in the Touloussain, with the half of the Al- 
 bigeois. 4 
 
 These were but a small part of the sacrifices to 
 which Raymond VII was obliged to submit. He 
 promised to pay twenty thousand marks of silver 
 in four years, half for the benefit of the churches, 
 whilst the remainder should be employed in re- 
 building the fortifications of the places, which he 
 gave up to his enemies ; to restore to all the eccle- 
 siastics the whole of the possessions which had 
 been taken from them during the war ; to rase the 
 walls and fill up the ditches of Toulouse, whilst, 
 at the same time, he should receive a French gar- 
 rison into the Narbonnese castle, which served as 
 a citadel to that great city ; to rase, likewise, the 
 fortifications of thirty others of his cities or for- 
 tresses ; to deliver eight of them into the custody 
 of the king : he also promised never to raise any 
 fortification in any other place in his states ; to 
 dismiss all the routiers, or those soldiers who made 
 a trade of hiring themselves to any who wished 
 to enrol them ; in a word, to oblige all his subjects 
 to swear, not only to observe this treaty, but also 
 that they would turn their arms against him if he 
 should ever depart from it. Even this was not 
 all ; Raymond VII was compelled to promise that 
 
 * Hist. gtn. de Languedoc, Uv. xxiv, ch. xlvi, p. 375. Curita Anales de 
 Aragon. torn, i, lib. II. ch. lxx\v,f. 121. 
 
218 
 
 he would henceforth make war against all those 
 who, to this moment, had remained faithful to 
 him, and especially against the count of Foix ; 
 and that he would pay to every individual who 
 should arrest a heretic, two marks for each of his 
 subjects who might be thus carried before the tri- 
 bunals. It appears, however, that Raymond felt 
 himself so debased by these extorted conditions, 
 that he himself demanded to be retained a pri- 
 soner at the Louvre, whilst they were beginning 
 to execute the treaty ; and that he submitted to 
 the obligation of serving five years in the Holy 
 Land, when he should leave his prison, that he 
 might not be the witness of the entire ruin of his 
 country. 5 Nevertheless, the love of repose, the 
 dread of the humiliations he might have to endure 
 in an army of fanatics, or perhaps some new hopes, 
 engaged him afterwards to free himself from this 
 last condition. 
 
 The union of part of Albigeois to the domain 
 of the crown, and the submission of all the rest 
 to those fanatical priests who had called thither 
 the crusaders, were the forerunners of inexpressi- 
 ble calamities to these provinces. But, that which 
 perhaps exceeded all the others, was the perma- 
 nent establishment of the inquisition. This was 
 principally the work of the council, assembled at 
 Toulouse, in the month of November, 1229, and 
 composed of the archbishops of Narbonne, of 
 
 5 Preuves de VHist. de Languedoc, § clxxxiv, p. 329 et seq. 
 
•219 
 
 Bourdeaux, and of Aueh, with their suffragans. rJ 
 In the ruonth of the preceding April, an ordon- 
 nance of Louis IX had renewed, in the countries 
 which had fallen under his dominion, the severest 
 pursuits against the heretics. 7 
 
 The inquisition was not, at this epoch, aban- 
 doned solely to the Dominicans. It was only by 
 a slow progress, during- all the reign of Saint 
 Louis, that it was brought to that complete and 
 fearful organization, with which a fanatical party 
 desires, at this day, its reestablishment in Spain. 
 The council of 1229, composed chiefly of prelates, 
 had sought to render it subordinate to the episco- 
 pal power. The bishops were to depute, into 
 each province a priest, and two or three laics, to 
 seek after, (having first engaged themselves by 
 oath. N all the heretics and their abettors — t; Let 
 them visit carefully,"' says the first canon, 4i each 
 house in their parish, and the subterranean cham- 
 bers, which any suspicion shall have caused to be 
 remarked : let them examine all the out-houses, 
 the retreats under the roofs, and all the secret 
 places, which we order them, besides, every 
 where to destroy : if they rind there any heretics, 
 or any of their abettors or concealers, let them 
 in the first place provide that they may not escape ; 
 then let them, with all haste, denounce them to 
 
 6 Concilia generalia Labbd, torn, xi, p. 425. 
 
 ' Ordonn. de France, t. i, p. 50. Hist. sin. de Lcmguedoc, t. iii. lie. xxiv, 
 ch. liii, p. 178. 
 
220 
 
 the archbishop, the bishop, the lord of the place 
 or his bailiffs, that they may be punished accord- 
 ing to their deserts." 8 
 
 An instruction as to the manner of proceeding 
 against heretics, was composed before the end of 
 the same century, for the use of the inquisitors. 
 Some extracts from this curious book, published 
 by the fathers Martene and Durand, of the con- 
 gregation of Saint Maur, will give a better under- 
 standing respecting an institution which hencefor- 
 ward exercised so great an influence over the 
 church and people of France. " In this manner," 
 it is said at the beginning, " the inquisitors pro- 
 ceed in the provinces of Carcassonne and Tou- 
 louse. First, the accused or suspected of heresy 
 is cited; when he appears, he is sworn upon the 
 holy Gospels, that he will fully say all that he 
 knows for a truth, respecting the crime of heresy 
 or Vaudoisie, as well concerning himself as others, 
 as well concerning the living, as the dead. If he 
 conceals or denies any thing, he is put in prison, 
 and kept there until he shall have confessed ; but 
 if he says the truth, (that is, if he accuses either 
 others or himself) his confession is diligently writ- 
 ten down by a notary public When a sufficient 
 
 number have confessed to make a sermon" (thus 
 they then called, what we at this day name, from 
 a Portuguese word, auto da ft) " the inquisitors 
 convoke, in a suitable place, some juris-consults, 
 
 8 Concilium Tolosamm, ch. i. p. 428. 
 
221 
 
 minor-brothers, and preachers, and the ordina- 
 ries, (the bishops) without whose counsel, or that 
 of their vicars, no person ought to be condemned. 
 W hen the council is assembled, the inquisitors 
 shall submit to it a short extract from the confes- 
 sion of each person, but suppressing his name. 
 They shall say, for example, a certain person, of 
 such a diocese, has done what follows, after which 
 the counsellors reply, let the inquisitors impose upon 
 him an arbitrary penance, or let this person be im- 
 mured, or in fine, let him be delivered to the secular 
 arm. After which they are all cited for the fol- 
 lowing Sunday. On this day, the inquisitors, in 
 the presence of the prelates, the abbots, the bail- 
 iffs, and all the people, cause those to be first call- 
 ed, who have confessed and persisted in their con- 
 fession ; for, if they retract, they are sent back to 
 prison, and their faults only are recited. 
 
 " They begin with those who are to have arbitra- 
 ry penances : to them they give crosses, they im- 
 pose pilgrimages, greater or smaller according to 
 their faults; to those who have perjured them- 
 selves, thev oive double crosses. All these hav- 
 ing gone out with their crosses, they recite the 
 faults of those who are to be immured, making 
 them rise, one after the other, and each remain 
 standing whilst his confession is read. When it 
 is finished, the inquisitor seats himself, and gives 
 his sentence sitting, first in Latin, then in French. 
 
 Finally they recite the faults of the relapsed, and 
 
222 
 
 the sentence being pronounced, they are deliver- 
 ed Nevertheless, those who are delivered as 
 
 relapsed, are not to be burned the same day they 
 are delivered ; but, ou the contrary, they ought to 
 be engaged to confess themselves, and receive the 
 eucharist, if they require it, and if they give signs 
 of true repentance, for thus wills the lord pope." 9 
 
 But this was only the external form of proced- 
 ure. An inquisitor, of the same period, has given 
 a more detailed instruction to his brethren, respect- 
 ingthe manner of directing the interrogatories. This 
 instruction, also, has been printed by the same 
 two Benedictine fathers, in a collection of religi- 
 ous writings; it is worthy of being placed entire 
 under the eyes of the reader, and it is not w ithout 
 regret, that we confine ourselves to giving short 
 extracts from it. 
 
 " Even he who is the most profoundly plunged 
 in heresy," says the anonymous author, " may 
 sometimes be brought back, by the fear of death, 
 or the hope that he shall be permitted to live, if 
 he confess sincerely the errors which he has learn- 
 ed, and if he denounce any others whom he may 
 know to belong to this sect. If he refuses to do 
 it, let him be shut up in prison, and given to under- 
 stand, that there are witnesses against him, and 
 that if he be once convicted by witnesses, there 
 will be no mercy for him, but he will be delivered 
 to death. At the same time let his food be les- 
 
 9 Dodrina de modo procedendi contra hareticos. Thes. anecdot. t. v. p. 1795. 
 
223 
 
 sened, for such fear and suffering will contribute 
 to humble him. Let none of his accomplices be 
 permitted to approach him, lest they encourage 
 him, or teach him to answer with artifice, and not 
 to betray any one. Let no other approach him, 
 unless it be, from time to time, two adroit believ- 
 ers, who may advise him cautiously, and as if they 
 had compassion upon him, to deliver himself from 
 death, to confess where he has erred and upon 
 what points, and who may promise him that if he 
 do this he shall escape being burned. For the 
 fear of death, and the love of life sometimes soften 
 a heart, which cannot be affected in any other 
 manner Let them speak to him also in an en- 
 couraging manner, saying, Be not afraid to con- 
 fess, if you have given credit to these men when they 
 said such and such things, because you believed 
 them virtuous. If you heard them willingly, if you 
 assisted them with your property, if you confessed 
 yourself to them, it teas because you loved all whom 
 you believed to be good people, and because you knew 
 nothing ill respecting them. The same might hap- 
 pen to men much iviscr than you, who might also be 
 deceived by them. If he begins then to soften, and 
 to grant that he has, in some place, heard these 
 teachers speak concerning the gospels or the epis- 
 tles, you must then ask him, cautiously, if these 
 teachers believed such and such things, for exam- 
 ple, if they denied the existence of purgatory, or 
 the efficacy of prayers for the dead, or if they pre- 
 
•224 
 
 tended that a wicked priest, bound by sin, cannol 
 absolve others, or what they say about the sacra- 
 ments of the church? Afterwards, you must ask 
 them, cautiously, whether they regard this doc- 
 trine as good and true, for he who grants this, has 
 thereby confessed his heresy . . . .Whereas if yon 
 had asked him bluntly whether he believed the 
 same things, he would not have answered, because 
 ne would have suspected that you wished to take 
 advantage of him and accuse him as a heretic 
 These are very subtle foxes, and you can onlj 
 take them by a crafty subtilty. 1 " 
 
 We will add here a last instruction given bj 
 the inquisitor, the author of this work to his bro- 
 ther, drawn from his personal experience, "Note,' 
 says he, " that the inquisitor ought always to sup- 
 pose a fact, without any proof, and only inquire 
 after the circumstances of the fact. For example, 
 he should say, How many times hast thou con- 
 fessed thyself to the heretics ? or, in what chambei 
 have the heretics slept in thy house? or similai 
 things." 
 
 " In like manner the inquisitor may, from time 
 to time, consult a book, as if he had the life o\ 
 the heretic written there, and all the questions 
 that he was to put to him." 
 
 " Likewise, when a heretic confesses himself tc 
 him, he ought to impose upon him the duty o 
 
 J Tractatus de T1a>resi pauperum de Lugduno. Then, Anecdot. i. v, p. 1787 
 
p. . 
 
 225 
 
 accusing his accomplices, otherwise he would not 
 give a sign of true penitence." 
 
 " Likewise, when a heretic either does not fully 
 confess his errors, or does not accuse his accom- 
 plices, you must say to him in order to terrify him, 
 Very well, we see how it is. Think of thy soul, and 
 fully renounce heresy, for thou art about to die, 
 and nothing remains but to receive with true peni- 
 tence all that shall happen to thee. And if he 
 then says : Since I must die, 1 had rather die in 
 my own faith than in that of the church ; then it 
 is certain that his repentance was feigned, and he 
 may be delivered up to justice." 2 
 
 We have thought it our duty to dwell the longer 
 on this new method of procedure against the he- 
 retics, and on the instructions given to the judges 
 |for the examination of consciences, because the 
 i form which was prescribed to them for their inter- 
 rogatories, was soon after introduced into the crim- 
 i inal procedure, w here it produced a revolution in 
 i the state of France. It was by artifices similar 
 to these, by such moral tortures, that it was en- 
 M deavoured to extort confessions from the accused, 
 i as soon as the suppression of the judicial combats 
 d rendered the office of the judge more complicated. 
 The priests, as more skilful, as more accustomed 
 by the confessional to penetrate into the secrets 
 of conscience, gave the example, and in some mea- 
 sure established the theory of interrogatories. Ne- 
 
 2 Traetatus de Hceresi Thes. Anted, torn, v, p. 1793. 
 
 Q 
 
226 
 
 vertheless, it appears that at this period they had 
 not added torture, properly so called, to their other 
 means of investigation. There is no mention made 
 of it in either of the instructions for the inquisi- 
 tors, which we have under our eyes. Half a cen- 
 tury later its use became as frequent as it was atro- 
 cious, both in the civil and ecclesiastical tribunals. 
 The interrogatory of the suspected was not the 
 only part of the procedure in which the practice 
 of the inquisition influenced the courts of justice; 
 the inquest by witnesses received from it also a 
 new character. Every thing had been public in 
 the ancient French jurisprudence, both under the 
 Merovingians, where the citizens judged each other 
 in their malli, and under the first of the Capets, in 
 the baronial courts, where the peers of the accu- 
 sed sate in judgment upon him. But the monks, 
 on the contrary, surrounded themselves with thick 
 darkness ; all was secret in their inquests ; they 
 suppressed the confrontation of witnesses, and 
 even concealed, from the accused, the names of 
 those who had deposed against them. 3 
 
 The heretics supported their doctrines by the 
 authority of the holy Scriptures ; the first indica- 
 tion of heresy was, therefore, considered to be the 
 citation either of the epistles or the gospels ; se- 
 condly, any exhortation against lying; and finally, 
 any signs of compassion shown to the prisoners 
 
 a Guill. de Podio Laurentii, ch. xl, p. G92. 
 
227 
 
 of the inquisition. 4 The council of Toulouse for 
 the first time decided, that the reading of the holy 
 books should not he permitted to the people. 
 " We prohibit, says the fourteenth canon, p. 430, 
 the laics from having the books of the Old and 
 New Testament ; unless it be at most that any 
 one wishes to have, from devotion, a psalter, a 
 breviary for the divine offices, or the hours of the 
 blessed Mary ; but we forhid them, in the most 
 express manner, to have the above books trans- 
 lated into the vulgar tongue." 5 The following 
 article merits also attention. " We command 
 that whoever shall be accused of heresy or noted 
 with suspicion shall be deprived of the assistance 
 of a physician. Likewise when a sick person 
 shall have received the holy communion of his 
 priest, it is our will that he be watched with the 
 greatest care to the day of his death or convales- 
 cence, that no heretic or one suspected of heresy 
 may have access to him." 
 
 The establishment of the inquisition in Langue- 
 [doc, was not, however, followed by a number of 
 executions proportioned to the expectations of 
 the orthodox. Many of the converted were 
 obliged to wear upon their breast two crosses of 
 m different colour from their clothes, to quit places 
 mspected of heresy, and to establish themselves 
 
 4 Tractatus de Hares. Anecdot. Thes. torn, v, p. 1784—1786. 
 
 5 Labbei Consil. Tolosan. t. xi, p. 427 et seq. Fleury t Hist. Eccles. liv. 
 x\ ix, n. 5S. 
 
228 
 
 in cities zealous for the catholic faith, where the 
 eyes of all were drawn upon them by the costume 
 to which they had been condemned. Others, 
 who were regarded as more culpable, or more 
 suspected, were, in spite of their conversion, im- 
 prisoned for the remainder of their lives, or, in the 
 language of the inquisition, were immured. But 
 as for those who were called perfect heretics, or 
 the relapsed, it became very difficult to find any 
 in the province. It was in vain that the bishop 
 Fouquet, having converted one of the most cele- 
 brated of the sect, William de Sobers, caused him 
 to be reestablished, that he might testify his zeal 
 in denouncing his ancient fellow-religionists. It 
 was in vain that he ordered, by a most particular 
 favour, that the testimony of this new convert 
 should be considered equal to that of one of the 
 faithful who had never erred. 6 The reformed 
 church had already been destroyed by the preced- 
 ing massacres ; some few individuals who were 
 timid, and unstable in their faith, had alone been 
 able to escape by frequently denying their belief. 
 It was upon them, that the inquisition exercised, 
 henceforward, all its severity. Terror became 
 extreme, suspicion universal, all teaching of the 
 proscribed doctrine had ceased, the very sight of 
 a book made the people tremble, and ignorance 
 was for the greater number a salutary guarantee. 
 The reform had arisen from the first advance- 
 
 « Guill. de Podio Laurentii, ch. xl, p. 692. 
 
229 
 
 ment in literature, from the first application of 
 reason to religious instruction ; by thickening the 
 darkness, by striking the minds of men with ter- 
 ror, they could not fail to arrest this fermentation, 
 and to bring back their consciences to a blind 
 submission and to their hereditary belief. 
 
 By a strange contrast, the university of Tou- 
 louse sprung from this persecution. It was found- 
 ed with the inquisition, and by those who wished 
 to inthral the human mind. But it was the de- 
 sire of the church, that, in the very place where 
 the reprobated doctrines had been taught, there 
 should henceforth be no other teachers than her 
 own, nor any other study but that of the orthodox 
 theology. Consequently the count of Toulouse 
 was enjoined to maintain in his capital, for ten 
 years, at his own expence, professors and masters 
 of theology and canon law. But it is impossible 
 at the same time to excite and restrain the human 
 mind. Encouragement given to one science is 
 favourable to others. The school of canon law, 
 which was founded at Toulouse and which col- 
 lected together a number of young men, shewed 
 the necessity of establishing also a school of civil 
 law, then another for literature, and the university 
 was thus gradually completed, in some respects 
 in spite of those to whom it owed its foundation. 7 
 
 1229. Whilst Raymond VII delivered up his 
 country to its persecutors, he submitted himself 
 
 7 Hist. gin. de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. li, p. 377. 
 
230 
 
 on the 12th of April to the most humiliating pen- 
 ance. He repaired, with his feet naked, and with 
 only his shirt and trowsers, to the church of Notre- 
 Dame at Paris; there the cardinal, Romano di 
 Sant. Angelo, met him, and, after administering 
 the discipline upon his naked shoulders, con- 
 ducted him to the foot of the grand altar, where 
 be declared that, on account of his humility and 
 devotion, he pronounced his absolution; under 
 this condition, however, that he should again fall 
 under the preceding excommunication if he failed 
 to observe the treaty of Paris. Raymond was 
 afterwards confined, for six weeks, in his prison 
 of the Louvre, whilst his daughter was delivered 
 to the king's commissioners, his strong castles were 
 opened to them, and the wall of his capital, to the 
 extent of three thousand feet, was thrown down. 
 On his release from captivity, Louis IX received 
 his homage for the fiefs which still remained to 
 him, knighted him on the 3rd of June, the day 
 * of Pentecost, and allowed him to return to his 
 country. 8 
 
 As long as the bishop Fouquet lived, the resi- 
 dence of Raymond VII at Toulouse was embit- 
 tered by the ferocity of a prelate, who thought 
 that he could only honour God by sacrificing hu- 
 man victims, and who had long been obliged to 
 tear from their lord those whom he demanded to 
 ofYer upon his altars. Daily denunciations, and 
 
 8 Hist, de LangutdoCyliv. xxiv, ch. lviii, p. 380. 
 
231 
 
 every kind of humiliation, caused the count of 
 Toulouse to live in continual dread of new excom- 
 munications, and a new crusade. Happily, Fou- 
 quet at last died, on Christmas-day, 1231, after 
 an episcopate of twenty-eight years, and Ray- 
 mond VII then experienced a diminution of the 
 severities to which he had hitherto been exposed. 9 
 He obtained from the court of Rome, first a res- 
 pite, and afterwards a dispensation from proceed- 
 ing to the Holy Land, according to his engage- 
 ment; and if he could succeed in silencing the 
 reproaches of honour and conscience, he might, 
 from that time, enjoy a sort of peace, in the do- 
 mains which were still spared to him. 
 
 Notwithstanding the engagement which count 
 Raymond had entered into, and which he partly 
 executed, to make war upon the count of Foix, 
 he continued to interest himself for that ancient 
 ally, and succeeded in obtaining peace for him, 
 on the 16th of June, 1229, on conditions anala- 
 gous to his own. 1 But his other ally, the young 
 Trencavel, heir of the viscounties of Beziers and 
 of Carcassonne, could obtain no mercy. All his 
 heritage was already united to the domain of the 
 crown, and he had no resource but to retire to 
 the court of the king of Aragon. On the other 
 hand, two French houses were formed in Albi- 
 
 9 PrcBclara Francor. facinora, p. 778. Guil. de Podio Laur. c. xli, p. 693. 
 i Hist. gin. de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. Ixi, p. 381. P. de Marca, Hist, 
 ne Beam. liv. vm, ch. xxi, ^ viii— x, p. 756. 
 
232 
 
 geois, and preserved their establishment as a mo- 
 nument of the crusade. One was that of Simon 
 de Montfort, whose nephew Philip, son of Guy, 
 obtained in fief from Louis IX, the lordship of 
 Castres, or that part of Albigeois, situated on the 
 left of the Tarn ; the other was that of Levis, who 
 retained, under the name of a mareschall's estate, 
 that portion of the diocese of Toulouse, which 
 was afterwards detached to form the diocese of 
 Mirepoix and Pamiers. 2 
 
 The pacification of Albigeois, and the submis- 
 sion of Raymond of Toulouse made also a change 
 in the political state of the provinces situated on 
 the left side of the Rhone, or in the kingdom of 
 Aries. Raymond VII possessed there an exten- 
 sive domain, designated by the name of Marquis- 
 ate of Proven ge, out of the fragments of which was 
 afterwards formed the principality of Orange and 
 the countship of Venaissin. He had ceded this 
 territory to the pope, and to cardinal Romano di 
 Sant. Angelo, in his name, but as it was then suf- 
 fering under a famine, the legate gave the pope to 
 understand that the charge of it would be burden- 
 some, and that the church would be a gainer, by 
 remitting it to queen Blanche. Adam de Milly, 
 vicegerent of the King of France, in the province 
 of Narbonne, and the seneschal of Beaucaire were 
 therefore charged with the administration of these 
 provinces, till the church should restore the pos- 
 
 2 Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. liv,p. 378. 
 
233 
 
 session to Raymond VII. 3 Nevertheless, the 
 cession made to the church by this prince, of that 
 part of his domain, is almost the sole origin of 
 the pretensions of the court of Rome to the sove- 
 reignty of the countship of Venaissin. 4 
 
 The queen Blanche had by the treaty of Paris 
 united to the states of her son a very important 
 province, which for the first time placed the do- 
 main of the crown of France in communication 
 with the Mediterranean Sea, on which it displayed 
 about thirty leagues of coast. The acquisition of 
 fields covered with the richest harvests of the 
 South, of cities which had been animated by com- 
 merce and industry, of a population which had 
 already developed its understanding and tasted 
 of liberty, really augmented the royal authority 
 more than any other fief of the same extent in a 
 less favoured climate could have done. It would 
 appear however that Blanche hoped to conceal 
 from the eyes of the vassals of the crown and 
 from her rivals the importance of these acquisi- 
 tions, for she neither formed a new administration, 
 nor appointed new officers, to govern her con- 
 quests. Louis VIII, after taking possession of 
 Beaucaire and Carcassonne, had intrusted to a 
 seneschal the command of each of these cities. 
 Blanche extended their jurisdiction, so that they 
 might embrace all the countries which she had 
 
 3 Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. lxvi, p. 385. Preuves, § cxcvi, p. 346. 
 
 4 Bouchc, Hint, de Provence, liv. ix, sect, ii, p. 223. 
 
234 
 
 obtained from the count of Toulouse. The re- 
 mainder of Languedoc which had been left to 
 Raymond VII was not finally united to the crown 
 till the year 1271, and the death of count Ray- 
 mond's daughter.* 
 
 All kinds of oppression now pressed at once 
 upon the people. They suffered, at the same time, 
 from the arbitrary extent and the capricious exer- 
 cise of the royal authority, from the power of the 
 nobles, from the power of the priests, and from 
 the power of the proprietors of the soil, who 
 claimed, also, a property in the persons of their 
 villains. But in this state of v universal suffering, 
 the people of France, as well as those of the rest 
 of Europe, appeared to resign themselves to the 
 ills which were inflicted on their bodies, and only 
 demanded liberty for their souls. The sanctuary 
 of conscience was the only one the entrance to 
 which they still endeavoured to defend, surround- 
 ed as they were by such a host of tyrannies. We 
 cannot reflect, without emotion, that tormented by 
 necessities, by cares, and by sorrows, the independ- 
 ence of the mind was the only boon they demand- 
 ed, and that this was refused them by their sus- 
 picious masters, with the same unfeeling cruelty 
 as the rest. 
 
 1231 — 1236. The reform which had commenced 
 in Albigeois had been extinguished there by the 
 arms of half Europe. Blood never ceased to flow, 
 
 * Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. xlvi, p. 375. 
 
235 
 
 nor the flames to devour their victims in these pro- 
 vinces now abandoned to the dark fanaticism of 
 the inquisitors. But that terror which had dis- 
 persed the heretics, had also scattered sparks 
 through all Europe, by which the torch of reason 
 might be again rekindled. No voice, no outward 
 appearance announced the preaching of reform, 
 or troubled the public tranquillity. Yet, the pro- 
 scribed Albigenses, who, far from their country, 
 had found an asylum in the cottage of the peasant, 
 or the poor artisan, whose labours they shared in 
 profound obscurity, had taught their hosts to read 
 the gospel in common, to pray in their native 
 tongue without the ministry of priests, to praise 
 God, and gratefully submit to the chastisements 
 which his hand inflicted, as the means of their 
 sanctification. In vain did the inquisition believe 
 that it had compelled human reason to submission, 
 and established an invariable rule of faith. In 
 the midst of the darkness which it had created, 
 it saw, all at once, some luminous points appear 
 where it would least have expected them. Its 
 efforts to extinguish, served only to scatter them, 
 and no sooner had it conquered, than it was com- 
 pelled to renew the combat. 
 
 Gregory IX, who had deemed the very soil of 
 Languedoc polluted, by its having produced so 
 many sectaries, and that the count of Toulouse 
 could not be innocent, whilst he had so many he- 
 retics amongst his subjects, all at once discovered, 
 
with alarm, that even at Rome he was surrounded 
 with heretics. To give an example to Christen- 
 dom, he caused a great number of them to be 
 burned before the gates of Santa Maria Majora; 
 he afterwards imprisoned, in the convents of la 
 Cava, and of the monte Cassino, those who were 
 priests or clerks, and who had been publickly de- 
 graded, with those that had given signs of peni- 
 tence. 6 At the same time, he caused the senator 
 of Rome to promulgate an edict, which determin- 
 ed the different punishments to be assigned to the 
 heretics, to those who encouraged them, to those 
 who should give them an asylum, and to those who 
 neglected to accuse them; always dividing the 
 confiscations between the spy who denounces, and 
 the judge who condemns, that the scaffolds might 
 never be left without victims: a combination which 
 the Roman court has not renounced to this day. 7 
 He sent the senators edict and his own bull to 
 the archbishop of Milan, to engage him to follow 
 his example. He afterwards profited by his recent 
 reconciliation with Frederic II, to announce to 
 him, that Catharins, Paterins, Poor of Lyons, and 
 other heretics, formed in the school of the Albi- 
 genses, had, at the same time, appeared in Lom- 
 bard y and in the two Sicilies, and to obtain from 
 his friendship an edict which has gained him the 
 
 6 Raynaldi Annul. Eccles. A. 1231, xiii et xiv, p. 415. Richardi de Sane. 
 Germano Chr. t. vii, p. 1206. Vita Gregorii IX, a Cardinal. Aragonio. t. iii. 
 p. 578. 
 
 7 Capitula Annibaldi Senatoris ap. Raynald. Ann. Eccles. 1231, 16 et 17. 
 
237 
 
 eulogium of the annalist of the church, and has 
 been deposited in the pontifical archives. By this 
 edict, the emperor commanded all podestats and 
 other judges, immediately to deliver to the flames 
 every man who should be convicted of heresy by 
 the bishop of his diocese, and to pull out the 
 tongue of those to whom the bishop should think 
 it proper to show favour, that they might not cor- 
 rupt others, by attempting to justify themselves. 8 
 After having thus raged in Italy against the fugi- 
 tive Albigenses and their disciples, Gregory IX did 
 not forget to pursue them in France. He wrote 
 to the archbishop of Bourges, and to the bishop of 
 Auxerre, to exhort them to show themselves wor- 
 thy of the sacred ordination they had received, by 
 committing to the flames all the heretics that had 
 been discovered at la Charite upon the Loire. 9 
 
 The pope might have concluded, from seeing 
 the apostles of the Albigensian reformation spread 
 through a great part of Europe, that he had but 
 ill served his church, by granting them no respite 
 in their own country. He did not, however, rea- 
 son thus, but on the contrary, endeavoured to re- 
 double the ardour of the persecutions in the count- 
 ship of Toulouse, by giving Raymond VII to ex- 
 pect that he would, on this condition, restore to 
 him themarquisate of Provence. Raymond, either 
 converted or terrified, no longer refused any act 
 of inquisition or of cruelty against his unhappy 
 
 s Raijnaldi Annul Eccles. 1231, § 18. 8 Ibid, i 23. 
 
238 
 
 subjects. In 1232 he consented to associate him- 
 self with the new bishop of Toulouse, to surprise 
 by night a house in which they discovered nine- 
 teen relapsed men and women, whom they caused 
 to perish in the flames. 1 Notwithstanding this 
 shameful condescension, the condition of count 
 Raymond was scarcely ameliorated. Sometimes 
 he was suspected by the bishops of his states, of 
 not seconding them sincerely in their persecutions. 
 Sometimes it pleased them to humble him, only 
 to imitate their predecessors, or perhaps, to enrich 
 themselves with his spoils. Gregory IX was him- 
 self obliged to recommend him to the bishop of 
 Tournay, his legate in the province, inviting him 
 " to water him kindly, as a young plant, and to 
 nourish him with the milk of the church." 2 
 
 Others of the Albigenses had found a refuge in 
 the province of Gascony, which depended on the 
 king of England, but where the authority of the 
 government was almost absolutely disregarded, so 
 that the heretics, masters of the strong castles, de- 
 fended themselves by open force. Gregory IX 
 WTote to the knights of Saint James of Galicia, to 
 exterminate them with fire and sword, and he 
 charged the archbishops of Auch and of Bour- 
 deaux, to give every kind of succour to these 
 knights. 3 
 
 i Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. lxxxi, p. 392. 
 u Gregorii IX epistola in torn. XL Concil. Labbei ep. xxiii, p. 361. ep. 
 xxvii, p. 363. 
 
 8 Raynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1232, § xxvi, p. 430. 
 
239 
 
 Rome was soon after alarmed by the news, that 
 the same reform, which had been so often extin- 
 guished, yet was always breaking out afresh, had 
 first appeared in the centre of Germany, and that 
 the city of Stettin was subjected to those same 
 heretics, who, as they thought, had been extir- 
 pated in Languedoc. Gregory addressed bulls 
 to the bishops of Minden, of Lubeck, and of 
 Kachhasbourg in Styria, to induce them to preach 
 up a crusade against the heretics. 4 In order to 
 excite greater horror against these sectaries, the 
 most fearful things were related concerning them, 
 which excited as much astonishment as they did 
 abomination. A hideous toad, said the pope, was 
 presented at once to the adoration and the caress- 
 es of the initiated. The same being, who was no 
 other than the devil, afterwards took, successive- 
 ly, different forms, all equally revolting, and all 
 offered to the salutations of his worshippers. 5 
 Such an accusation could not fail of success. The 
 fanatics took arms in crowds, under the conduct 
 of the German bishops. The duke of Brabant 
 and the count of Holland joined them, and took 
 the command of this army of the cross. Those 
 amongst the sectaries, who were not in a condi- 
 tion to carry arms, or who had not taken refuge 
 in the strong places, were first brought to judg- 
 ment ; and, in the year 1233, " an innumerable 
 
 * Raynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1232, § viii, 427. 
 
 s Epistola Gregorii IX apud Raynald. Ann. Etcles. 123'i, xlii, p. 447. 
 
240 
 
 multitude of heretics was burned alive, through 
 all Germany : a still greater number was convert- 
 ed." 6 The army of the crusaders afterwards 
 marched against Stettin: the sectaries had the 
 boldness to arrest them in the open field ; but six 
 thousand of them were destroyed in the combat, 
 others were driven into the Oder and drowned, 
 and the whole race was exterminated.7 
 
 Gregory IX, rejoicing in his success, thought he 
 might now occupy himself with converting the 
 powerful military colony of Saracens, which Fre- 
 deric II had established at Nocera. As these 
 musulmans spoke the Italian, language, he com- 
 missioned the dominican friars to go and preach 
 Christianity 8 to them. But Frederic, who had al- 
 ready disputed with the pope, and who very well 
 knew that he might quarrel, with him again, was 
 not greatly pleased with these proselyting efforts 
 to shake the fidelity of the only soldiers of his 
 army who were not dependent upon the monks. 
 Religion was with him only a branch of politics, 
 and after having established, in each province, 
 and in each city of the two Sicilies, a tribunal 
 composed of a priest and a laic, for the burning 
 of the heretics, he had brought before this tribunal 
 all the rebels whom he had vanquished; and, 
 amongst others, had burned, to the great scandal 
 
 6 Concilium Moguntinum contra Stadingos in Labbei Concil. gen. t. xi, 
 p. 476. 
 
 f Raynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1234, § xliii, p. 462. 
 s Raynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1233, § xxiv, j>. 443. 
 
24 1 
 
 of the holy father, some insurgents at Messina, 
 who were guilty of no other heresy, than that of 
 having resisted his will. 9 
 
 Gregory IX, therefore, turned towards France, 
 the only country in Christendom where persecu- 
 tion was unmitigated, and fully satisfied his heart. 
 It was there that he established that tribunal to 
 which he confided the defence of the faith, ren- 
 dering it independent, not only of the civil power, 
 but also of the prelates and all the secular clergy. 
 The family of Saint Dominic, or the order of the 
 preachers, known in France under the name of 
 Jacobins, which this father had founded, appeared 
 to Gregory fittest to receive this trust. Saint 
 Dominic died at Boulogne on the 6th of August, 
 1221. He protested on his death bed, in the pre- 
 sence of his brethren, that he had preserved his 
 virginity to that hour. Such chastity in a monk 
 was reckoned a thing hitherto unheard of, and 
 almost miraculous; and the indefatigable zeal, 
 with which he had consecrated his life to the ex- 
 termination of the heretics, was greatly admired. 
 On the 13th of July, 1233, Gregory IX commis- 
 sioned three priests to inquire into the miracles 
 which had been wrought by the invocation of 
 Saint Dominic, or around his tomb, and upon the 
 *rd of July, 1234, his canonisation was definitively 
 wonounced. 1 
 
 9 Gregorii cpist. ad Freder. apud Raynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1233, § xxxiii, 
 ucxxiv, p. 445. 
 
 i Raynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1233, § xxxix, p. 446 et 1234. § xxiv, p. 458. 
 
 R 
 
242 
 
 It was at the same period when the court of 
 Rome was occupied with the canonisation of Saint 
 Dominic, that it published, in the month of April, 
 1233, the bull by which it confided to the domini- 
 cans alone the exercise of the Inquisition, under 
 pretence of preventing the bishops from being 
 interrupted in the exercise of their pastoral func- 
 tions. The provinces of Bourges, Bonrdeaux, 
 INarbonne, Auch, Vienne, Aries, Aix, and Em- 
 brun, which comprehended all that part of France 
 where the Provencal language was spoken, were 
 particularly confided to them, though their auth- 
 ority, and power to proceed by sentence against 
 the accused, extended over the whole kingdom. 2 
 Gregory IX the same year addressed a great 
 number of letters to Louis IX, exhorting him " to 
 unite his zeal with that of the monks of the order 
 of preachers, and to inflict upon the relapsed 
 heretics, convicted by the inquisitors, their merit- 
 ed punishments." 3 He also recommended the 
 dominicans to all the prelates of the kingdom, to 
 the counts of Toulouse, and of Foix, and to all 
 the other counts, viscounts, barons, and senes- 
 chals, of France, with all the barons of Aquitaine, 
 praying them to favour these monks in the execu- \ 
 tion of their commission. The bishop of Tournay, : 
 legate of the holy see, to whom Gregory IX had 
 committed the final organisation of the inquisition, 
 
 2 Chron. Guillelmi de Podio Laur. ch. xliii, p. 694. 
 
 3 Jtaynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1233, % lix n p. 450. 
 
243 
 
 named two dominicans at Toulouse, and two in 
 each city of the province, to form the tribunal of 
 the faith. 4 He gave them an instruction in which 
 he enumerated the errors of the heretics, and the 
 series of questions by which, without alarming 
 them, they might be brought to implicate them- 
 selves sufficiently, or to denounce their accom- 
 plices. In the exposition, made by the bishop of 
 Tournay, of the errors of the Albigenses, we find 
 nearly all the principles upon which Luther and 
 Calvin founded the reformation of the sixteenth 
 century. Thus the Albigenses did not believe in 
 transubstantiation, in the efficacy of indulgences, 
 in the validity of absolution, or in the inability of 
 those, who were not priests, to perform the mys- 
 teries of religion. But the bishop of Tournay 
 pretends, that the heretics mingled with these 
 articles of belief, which he denounces as their 
 peculiar tenets, absurd, disgusting, or atrocious, 
 practices, which he also details, to render them 
 odious to the populace. 5 
 
 Whilst the bishop of Tournay was labouring at 
 the new organisation of the inquisition it appeared 
 to him that the count of Toulouse shewed neither 
 sufficient severity nor activity in the pursuit of 
 heresy. He therefore accused him to the king of 
 not having fully executed the orders of the holy 
 isee, or the treaty of Paris. In the autumn of 
 
 4 Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, c. lxxxvii, p. 394. 
 
 5 Preuves de CHist. de Languedoc, No. ccxiv, p. 371. 
 
244 
 
 1233, Raymond VII was constrained to repair to 
 Melun, with the legate, the archbishop of Nar- 
 bonne, and many other bishops, to hold a confer- 
 ence with Louis IX and his mother. At that 
 meeting the inquisition received a new sanction 
 from the authority of the king. Raymond sub- 
 scribed the statutes which were presented to him. 
 By those statutes, which were afterwards publish- 
 ed in his name and have come down to us, he 
 engaged to pursue and exterminate those who 
 had killed the persecutors of the heretics, and to 
 reward with a mark of silver, whoever should 
 denounce, arrest, or cause to be arrested, a here- 
 tic; to cause every house to be pulled down in 
 which an asylum had been offered to one of the 
 proscribed, or even where he might have found a 
 burial ; to confiscate the goods of those who 
 should have rendered them any kind office ; to 
 destroy every lonely cottage, every grotto, every 
 fastness, where they might find a refuge ; to take 
 from the children of the heretics, and confiscate, 
 whatever property they might have inherited from 
 their parents ; to punish, by the confiscation of 
 all their goods, and that without prejudice to 
 corporal punishments, all those who, being called 
 upon by the inquisitors to assist in the arrest of a 
 heretic, should either refuse, or, by design, should 
 suffer the accused to escape. In these same 
 statutes, imposed upon count Raymond, nume- 
 rous articles were added to the preceding, to 
 
245 
 
 reach those who should endeavour by quitting 
 their homes, or conveying their property by ficti- 
 tious sales, or by other means, to escape from the 
 rapacity of the officers. These articles agreed 
 on at Melun were afterwards published at Tou- 
 louse on the 18th of February, 1234. 6 A council 
 held at Beziers, in the same year, under the pre- 
 sidency of the legate, added still more to this 
 oppression by permitting any of the faithful to 
 arrest every suspected person, in any place what- 
 soever, upon an accusation of heresy, and by 
 threatening with the heaviest penalties those who 
 should in any way obstruct these private arrests, 
 as soon as the word heresy was pronounced. 7 
 
 The reader is, doubtless, wearied with the repe- 
 tition of the same decrees, the same menaces, and 
 
 1 the same horrors ; but if we did not follow the per- 
 secutors in the annual renewal of their laws, and 
 of their sanguinary acts, we should give a very 
 false idea of the progress of power, and of the 
 sufFeriugs of the people. Heresy was not destroy- 
 ed by those violent shocks, after which we may at 
 least be permitted to enjoy the peace and silence 
 of the tomb. These disastrous revolutions were 
 
 i succeeded by a protracted agony, but tranquillity 
 was never restored ; persecution was never sus- 
 pended, even by the death of its victims. The 
 mly expedient for maintaining the unity of the 
 
 6 Statuta Raymondi comitis in Concil. gener. Labbei, torn, xi, p. 413. 
 
 7 Statuta Concilii Biterrensis in Cone, gener. Labbei, torn, xi p. 452. 
 
246 
 
 faith which the church had ever known, was to 
 burn those who separated from it. For two hun- 
 dred years the fires had been kindled, yet every 
 day catholics abandoned the faith of their fathers 
 to embrace that which must conduct them to the 
 flames. It was in vain that Gregory IX had de- 
 stroyed in 1231 all the heretics who had been con- 
 cealed at Rome, and in the states of the church ; 
 numerous letters addressed by him in 1235 to all 
 the bishops of that part of Italy, announced, that 
 notwithstanding the severity of the inquisitors, the 
 paterins had made fresh progress. 8 A council was 
 also held the same year in France, at Narbonne, 
 where the archbishops of Narbonne, of Aries, and 
 of Aix, presided, which addressed a circular to 
 the inquisitors of the three provinces, declaring, 
 likewise, that heresy had broken out afresh. 9 
 
 Amongst the twenty-nine articles of this circu- 
 lar, which was to serve for instruction to the in- 
 quisitors, there is none where the punishment of 
 death is expressly pronounced, though in most of 
 them it is understood by the hypocritical phrase 
 of delivering the criminal to the secular arm. In 
 fact death was the invariable consequence of re- 
 volt or relapse, and the great business of the coun- 
 cil of Narbonne, appears to have been (§10, 11, 
 12) to multiply the cases in which, by a fiction of 
 law, they might apply the punishment of relapse 
 
 s Raynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1235, ^ xv— xix, j> . 467. 
 0 Labbei Concilia gener. torn. xi. p. 487. 
 
247 
 
 or revolt. The forms of procedure prescribed by 
 this circular are perhaps more important than even 
 the definition of the crimes. " As to those you 
 are to arrest," say the prelates, § 19, " we think 
 proper to add, that no man can be exempted 
 from imprisonment, on account of his wife, how- 
 ever young she may be; no woman, on account of 
 her husband ; nor both of them on account of 
 their children, their relations, or those to whom 
 they are most necessary. Let not any one be ex- 
 empted from prison, on account of weakness, or 
 age, or any similar cause. . . .If you have not suc- 
 ceeded in arresting them, hesitate not to proceed 
 against the absent, as if they were present, § 22 ; 
 take particular care, in conformity with the dis- 
 cerning will of the apostolic see, not to publish 
 by word or sign the names of the witnesses ; and 
 if the culprit pretends, that he has enemies and 
 that they have conspired against him, ask the 
 names of those enemies, and the cause of that con- 
 spiracy, for thus you will provide for the safety of 
 the witnesses, and the conviction of the accused. 
 §24. On account of the enormity of this crime, 
 you ought to admit, in proof of it, the testimony 
 of criminals, of infamous persons, and of accom- 
 plices. § 26. He who persists in denying a fault, 
 of which he may be convicted by witnesses, or by 
 any other proof, must be considered, without he- 
 sitation, as an impenitent heretic. 1 
 
 1 Labbei Concil. gen. torn, xi, p. 488—501. 
 
248 
 
 Such favour shewn to informers, such precipi- 
 tation in pronouncing the ruin of a family, struck 
 with terror those who were the most attached to 
 the catholic faith, and even those who had to re- 
 proach themselves with their share in the preced- 
 ing persecutions. The patience of the Langue- 
 docians was exhausted ; the capitouls of Toulouse, 
 who formed the municipal magistracy, wished to 
 oppose the continuance of these inquests. They 
 could no longer hear the spectacle daily presented 
 to them by the inquisitors, of digging up the half- 
 putrified bodies of those against whom informa- 
 tions had been laid, and after the mockery of a 
 trial, dragging them on a hurdle to the flames, 
 through all the streets of the city. The capitouls 
 expelled from the city the chaplains of the paroc- 
 hial churches, who had been employed by the in- 
 quisitors in citing witnesses, and they prohibited 
 the latter from appearing or deposing in future. 2 
 The friar, William Arnold, grand inquisitor, would 
 not recognize the authority of the magistracy, and 
 he took his departure on the 5th of November, 
 1235. The next day the forty jacobin monks, who 
 were in the convent of St. Dominic, quitted the 
 cityin procession. On the 10th of the same month, 
 excommunication was pronounced against Tou- 
 louse, and Raymond VII, who happened then to 
 be with Frederic II in Alsace, was, nevertheless, 
 
 ' Mtn tmc Thesaurus Aneedot. torn. \,p. 992. 
 
249 
 
 included in the same sentence, 3 although he has- 
 tened to make his submission, and recall the in- 
 quisitors. It was not till the end of the year 1236 
 that he could obtain his absolution ; and Gregory 
 IX charged it as a crime against the emperor, 
 that he had communicated with this count, in 
 spite of the sentence that had been passed upon 
 him. 4 
 
 In France, as well as throughout the rest of 
 Europe, in the middle age, wherever great cities 
 were found, there was also a principle of liberty; 
 whenever these great cities were adjacent, and 
 could combine their efforts, there was a principle 
 of political power for the people. The early mul- 
 tiplication of cities, in certain regions, is a fact 
 which it is not always easy to explain. The first 
 rays of history, in the middle age, discover to us 
 a population, numerous and united in certain pro- 
 vinces, and thin and scattered in others. Whe- 
 ther these cities had been preserved from the ear- 
 ly times of the Roman empire, or whether the 
 richness of the soil, commerce, and a wiser gov- 
 ernment, had enabled them to repair their losses, 
 we cannot determine. Next to Italy, Provence 
 and Languedoc displayed the richest and most 
 populous cities. The war against the Albigenses 
 had not been able to destroy this superiority in 
 
 3 Hist . de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. v, p. 404. 
 
 * Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. viii, p. 407. Raynaldi Ann. Eccles. 
 1236. § xxxix— xlv,p. 484. 
 
250 
 
 riches and population. The spirit of the com- 
 munes, which was fermenting in all the cities of 
 France, assumed a more republican character in 
 these provinces. 
 
 The south of France, which, by the riches of 
 its cities, and the spirit of its inhabitants, present- 
 ed at that time the image of Italy, was, besides, 
 not uniformly submitted to the same monarchy. 
 The immediate authority of Louis IX only ex- 
 tended over the two districts of Beaucaire and 
 Carcassonne. Provence held from the empire ; 
 Aquitaine belonged to the king of England ; 
 Montpellier, Perpignan, and some neighbouring 
 lordships, to the king of Aragon ; and a part of 
 Languedoc to the Count of Toulouse. These 
 were, it is true, all three vassals of the crown of 
 France ; but vassals so powerful, that the will of 
 the king was not even consulted, about extending 
 or restraining the privileges of the citizens. No- 
 thing indicates to us that Louis IX had occupied 
 himself with the republican fermentation, in the 
 cities of the south. On the contrary, it was more 
 connected with the policy of the emperor Frede- 
 ric II, who, at this period attracted, much more 
 than the young king of France, the attention of 
 all Europe ; and the revolutions which were now 
 preparing in Italy, must also have had an influ- 
 ence upon all the cities of the provencal language. 
 
 Frederic II and Gregory IX, too proud and too 
 ambitious to divide their power between them, had 
 
251 
 
 given way afresh to mutual animosities. New 
 subjects of dispute seemed every day to arise, and 
 every day their correspondence became more bit- 
 ter, and their mutual recriminations announced an 
 approaching explosion. They were, nevertheless, 
 still at peace, though each suspected the other as 
 the secret ally of all his enemies. Each, in fact, 
 nourished the popular passions in the states of his 
 rival; not from a desire of favouring justice or 
 liberty, the rights or the happiness of the people, 
 but only in order to embarrass and weaken him, 
 whom at present he dared not call his enemy. 
 Frederic excited Pietro Frangipani to stir up the 
 Romans against the government of the pope, and 
 to name independent magistrates, 5 whilst Gregory 
 IX corresponded with the citizens of Milan, who 
 had renewed the siege of Lombardy, and still kept 
 the field against the emperor. 6 Frederic II took 
 under his protection the republics, or the imperial 
 cities in Provence, which had declared themselves 
 free, because Raymond Berenger, count of Pro- 
 vence, and father-in-law of Saint Louis, had shewn 
 himself zealous in the cause of the church. Al- 
 though the kingdom of xlrles held from the empire, 
 Frederic II well knew that he should derive no 
 advantage from this pretended sovereignty. Far 
 from feeling any jealousy at the extension which 
 
 s Richardi de Sancto Germano, torn, vii, 1037. Raijnaldi Ann. Eccles. 
 1237, $ xiii— xv, f. 494. 
 « Raynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1237, § i — xii, p. 493. 
 
252 
 
 the cities of Marseilles and Avignon sought to 
 give to their privileges, he knew that hy declaring 
 himself their protector, against their direct lord, 
 he should attach them so much the more to him- 
 self, as he should render them more free, and that 
 the occupation which he should thereby give to 
 Raymond Berenger, would prevent him from as- 
 sisting the pope in Lombardy. 7 
 
 Of the four republics of Provence, that of Nice 
 had already fallen. It had been reduced on the 
 9th of November, 1229, in spite of all the aid af- 
 forded by the republic of Genoa, to open its gates 
 to Raymond Berenger, and acknowledge him as 
 absolute sovereign. The republic of Aries, which 
 the count of Provence next attacked, resisted till 
 1239, when it was also compelled to submission. 
 But the two cities of Avignon and Marseilles dis- 
 played more vigour. They collected forces, re- 
 pulsed the soldiers of the count of Provence, and 
 bestowed the command of their troops, with pre- 
 rogatives rather honorary than real, upon Ray- 
 mond VII, count of Toulouse, who w as so much 
 the dearer to them, because they saw him expos- 
 ed to the animosity of the prelates." 8 
 
 But the republican spirit not only manifested 
 itself in the towns of Provence, it equally animated 
 the counsels of all the cities of the South. We 
 
 ~> Raijnaldi Ann. Eccles. 1237, § xxxiv, xxxvii, p. 497. 
 8 Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxv, ch. xviii, p. 412. Bouche, Hisl. de Pro- 
 vence, torn, ii, p. 239. 
 
253 
 
 have seen it exhibited at Toulouse in the resistance 
 made by the capitouls to the inquisitors. It had 
 been displayed in the cities submitted to the do- 
 main of kins; Louis, in Narbonne and Nismes, as 
 well as at Montpellier and Perpignan, which held 
 from the king of Aragon, and at Bayonne and 
 Bourdeaux, which depended on the king of Eng- 
 land. A letter written about this time, by the con- 
 suls of the town of Narbonne, to the consuls of 
 Nismes, shews us that both those cities, though 
 dependant on the kingof France, called themselves 
 republics; thai the spirit of liberty in all the cities 
 equally revolted against religious tyranny and 
 civil despotism; and, that the neighbouring cities 
 exerted their efforts to form a coalition, and to 
 combine their resistance. 
 
 " To the venerable and discreet Consuls of 
 Nismes, the Consuls of the town of Narbonne, 
 health. May the administration of your republic 
 be just, both as to temporals and spirituals. We 
 desire to make known to your discretion the dis- 
 sension which has happened between us and the 
 archbishop of Narbonne, as well as some of the 
 preaching brethren, by whom our community is 
 enormously oppressed, though it is ready to obey 
 the right, and hear devoutly the orders of the 
 church. And as, according to your equity, you 
 ought to have compassion on those that are un- 
 justly oppressed, and to obviate the ills which they 
 suffer, we supplicate your prudence, in which we 
 
254 
 
 have entire confidence, not to fear, through fatigue, 
 to listen to our entire relation of facts, since it can- 
 not be abridged. (We feel ourselves, however, 
 obliged to suppress a part.) As we have said, al- 
 though we are ready to conform to right in every 
 thing, our archbishop, who wishes to destroy our 
 consulate, has involved us in a sentence of excom- 
 munication, with all our counsellors, all who pay 
 the tribute which we levy for the government of 
 our republic, with all the collectors. He has also 
 submitted to a general interdict our whole univer- 
 sity, our wives, and our children. As the height of 
 severity, he has forbidden under pain of anathe- 
 ma to all our notaries, who hold any public office, 
 to perform any act for any member of the com- 
 munity. He has prohibited to the physicians the 
 practice of medicine, and to the priests to admit 
 any one to communion and penitence, unless it be 
 in the article of death, and also by paying eight 
 livres and a denier to be released from that sen- 
 tence." . 
 
 The consuls of Narbonne afterwards relate, 
 with long details, the causes and circumstances 
 of their quarrel with the archbishop, and the vex- 
 ations they endure on the part of the inquisitors. 
 They affirm that these, despising all the rules of 
 justice, thought of nothing but to get possession 
 of the property of the rich, even when they were 
 exposed to no suspicion of heresy. They add, 
 that when the inquisitors had plundered them, 
 
255 
 
 sometimes they dismissed them without trial, and 
 sometimes they caused them to perish in prison, 
 without pronouncing any sentence upon them. 
 They then proceed to give examples of the inter- 
 rogatories of the inquisitors, to which it was im- 
 possible to reply without being convicted of he- 
 resy. The greater part of these questions are as 
 improper to be repeated, as they were incapable 
 of being answered, being frivolous, captious, and 
 indecent ; but they afterwards passed to others of 
 a somewhat different kind. " They demanded 
 of these simple laics, if the host which the priest 
 consecrated contains all the body of Jesus Christ? 
 If the laic answers that it contains the entire bo- 
 dy of Jesus Christ, the inquisitor directly replies : 
 You believe then that when four priests, who are 
 in one church, consecrate each of them a host, as 
 they ought to do, each of these hosts contains the 
 body of Jesus Christ? If the laic replies that he 
 believes so, you think then, replies the inquisitor, 
 that there are four Gods? Then the affrighted 
 laic affirms the contrary." 9 
 
 This letter, which was written about the year 
 1234, appears rather destined to be a protest, or 
 an appeal to public opinion, than a demand of ef- 
 fective succour. The distance between the cities 
 of southern France was too great to allow of the 
 one marching its militia to the assistance of the 
 others. Neither do we know what reply the cit- 
 
 a Hist, de la villede Nimes, torn, t, liv. \u,p. 307. Preuves,No. liii, p. 73, 
 
25 
 
 izens of Nismes addressed to those of Narbonne. 
 Perhaps this letter gave occasion to a more close 
 alliance ; perhaps an association of the cities be- 
 gan to be formed in the provinces of the proven- 
 <jal language ; and as, by following the example 
 of the league of Lombardy, it might proceed to 
 acquire greater consistency, perhaps it occasion- 
 ed some apprehension to Gregory IX; perhaps 
 he feared, above all, the alliance which he saw 
 ready to be formed between several of these cit- 
 ies, the count of Toulouse, and the emperor Fred- 
 eric II. At least, and without our being able to 
 explain the reason, an order of the court of Rome 
 was, in 1237, addressed to the inquisitors of Lan- 
 guedoc, to intimate to them, that they should sus- 
 pend all inquiry after the heretics ; and, in fact, 
 throughout this province, from the year 1237 to 
 the year 1241, the inquisition remained in a state 
 of total inactivity. 1 
 
 1240. To the agitation which, during that pe- 
 riod, was excited throughout all France, by a dou- 
 ble crusade against the Greeks at Constantinople, 
 and the Mussulmans at Jerusalem, a state of lan- 
 guor and discouragement succeeded, when the ill 
 success, by which both had been attended, be- 
 came fully known. The great lords, who returned 
 from these two expeditions, entered quietly into 
 their states, with few soldiers, few equipages, and 
 
 i Guill. de Podio Laurentii, ch. xliii, 695. Hist, de Languedoc, t. iii. 
 lir. xxv, <*. xiv^ xv, p. 411. 
 
257 
 
 no money ; ashamed of their failure, of their pre- 
 cipitate return, and of the condition in which 
 they had left their companions in arms. The most 
 powerful of them disappeared, for some time, 
 from the scene, and seemed to wait quietly till 
 their reverses were forgotten, whilst, in the period 
 which immediately followed their return, history 
 is occupied only with the lords who had taken no 
 part in these expeditions 
 
 Amongst these, Raymond VII, count of Ton- 
 louse, was still one of the most powerful. He 
 began to revive after his long sufferings. The pro- 
 ceedings of the inquisition had been, for a time, 
 suspended in his country, and he endeavoured to 
 profit by the repose which he enjoyed, and by the 
 reverses which his enemies had experienced, to 
 recover, in part, that consideration which he had 
 lost by the disastrous treaty of Paris. In this 
 hope, he cultivated the friendship of Frederic II, 
 who appeared, at that time, sufficiently powerful 
 to protect him against his enemies, the priests. 
 During his misfortunes, Raymond VII had always 
 found his neighbour, Raymond Berenger, count 
 of Provence, ready, for his own advantage, still 
 more to aggravate them. This count had em- 
 braced the part of the church against Frederic II, 
 and the emperor, by a sentence pronounced at 
 Cremona, in the month of December, 1239, had 
 put Raymond Berenger IV to the ban of the em- 
 pire, and had granted his countship of Forcalquier 
 
258 
 
 to the count of Toulouse. Raymond VII, in con- 
 sequence, in the month of January, 1240, assem- 
 bled his army on the borders of the Rhone to at- 
 tack the Provencals. 2 
 
 Raymond soon took possession of a number of 
 small places in Provence, and amongst others, of 
 the castle of Trinquetaille, in the island of Cam- 
 argue, opposite to Aries. He afterwards under- 
 took the siege of that great city, which Raymond 
 Berenger had compelled to submit to himself. 
 The Marseillois, who saw, in the subjugation of 
 that neighbouring republic, the fate with which they 
 themselves were menaced, ardently desired to re- 
 store Aries to liberty, and seconded the attempts 
 of Raymond with all their power. The citizens 
 of Aries, in the mean time, joined themselves to 
 the garrison of the count who defended their walls, 
 that they might not remain exposed to the horrors 
 which were always reserved for the vanquished. 
 The resistance was prolonged during great part 
 of the summer, and the count of Toulouse was at 
 last obliged to raise the siege. 3 He then returned 
 by the countship of Venaissin, and remained some 
 time at Avignon, to establish peace in that repub- 
 lic, where troubles had arisen on account of the 
 election of a podestat. 4 
 
 Several knights of the district of Carcassonne, 
 
 2 Hist, de Longuedoc, liv. xxv, ch. xxxii, p. 419. 
 
 s Guill. de Podio Laur. ch. xliii, p. 695. Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxv, 
 ch. xxxiv, p. 419. 
 
 4 Acte du ii aotit 1240. Preuves de Languedoc, p. 394. 
 
259 
 
 subjects consequently of the king of France, took 
 upon themselves to testify their zeal against the 
 count of Toulouse, by going to the assistance of 
 the count of Provence, but, falling into an ambus- 
 cade, they were put to the rout. Raymond, how* 
 ever, recognising them as French subjects, thought 
 only of appeasing the anger which the king might 
 feel at the action. He immediately wrote to the 
 king, expressing his desire to remain at peace 
 with France, and throwing the blame of the de- 
 feat they had received, upon their own imprudence. 
 On the other side, Henry III, king of England, 
 had written to Frederic II, to recommend to his 
 clemency the count of Provence, his father-in- 
 law, 5 and, as he received from the emperor a fa- 
 vourable reply, it appeared that peace was about 
 to be established upon the borders of the Rhone, 
 when all at once, the young Trencavel, son of that 
 Raymond Roger, viscount of Beziers and of Car- 
 cassone, whom Simon de Montfort had, in 1209, 
 caused to perish in his prisons, appeared in the 
 country to claim the heritage of his fathers. He 
 was accompanied by Olivier deTermes, Jourdain 
 de Saissac, and a great number of other knights, 
 who had been proscribed under suspicion of he- 
 resy, and had afterwards distinguished themselves 
 in Aragon and Valencia, in the war against the 
 Moors. Their memory was still dear to their an- 
 cient vassals ; and they were especially preferred 
 
 * Matth. Paris. Hist. Anglice, 473. 
 
260 
 
 to the new masters, whose yoke the people had 
 ever since been obliged to support. At their ar- 
 rival, therefore, the whole country rose in their 
 cause. In this moment of danger, the archbishop 
 of Narbonne and the bishop of Toulouse shut 
 themselves up in Carcassonne, to confirm the citi- 
 zens in their fidelity to the king of France. They 
 expected to have made sure of them, by causing 
 them to renew their oaths ; the inhabitants of the 
 town of Carcassonne however rose in the night of 
 the 18th of September, after celebrating the feast 
 of the nativity of the virgin, and received Trencavel 
 within their walls. 6 
 
 Louis IX, early informed of the approach of 
 those ancient exiles, took active measures to ar- 
 rest a revolt which appeared to him as much 
 directed against heaven as against himself. He 
 dispatched into Languedoc his chamberlain, John 
 de Beaumont, with many other knights, to collect 
 an army with all expedition. Trencavel, apprised 
 of the approach of the French, and not having 
 been able during a month that he had occupied 
 the suburbs of Carcassonne to obtain possession of 
 the city, felt that he could not maintain himself 
 there, and abandoned it on the 1 1th of September, 
 to shut himself up in Montreal. He sustained 
 there a long siege, and when at last he was forced 
 to surrender the place to John de Beaumont, it 
 
 c Hist. g£n de Languedoc, liv. xxv, ch. xxxviii, p. 421. Chron, de Saint 
 Denys, p. 57. 
 
261 
 
 was by an honourable capitulation, which permit- 
 ted him to retire into Catalonia with all his knights. 7 
 But, on the other hand, the inhabitants, and all 
 those who not being gentlemen were judged un- 
 worthy of being included in the capitulation, were 
 treated by John de Beaumont with that rigour in 
 which the fanatics glory when they imagine them- 
 selves called upon to avenge the cause of God. 
 Nangis gives us no details ; he only says of the 
 kings lieutenant, " We may with truth apply to 
 him the words of Scripture, In his wrath he stamp- 
 ed the earth with his feet, and the nations were 
 dumb ivith astonishment, at beholding his fury? 
 
 During the expedition of Trencavel, Raymond 
 count of Toulouse had remained in suspense re 
 specting the part he ought to take ; but when he 
 saw that lord obliged again to quit the country, 
 his partisans given up to punishment, the French 
 flocking to range themselves under the royal 
 standards, and Louis IX employing all his acti- 
 vity to arrest the rebellion, he was afraid of seeing 
 the crusades against Albigeois renewed in all their 
 fury, and resolved upon disarming the church and 
 the French by an entire submission. He treated 
 first with the cardinal legate, James bishop of 
 Prenestum. He engaged, before the 1 st of March, 
 1241, to abandon the cause of the emperor, who 
 
 7 Hist. gin. de Languedoc, liv. xxv, ch. xxxix, p. 422. 
 
 8 Gesta Ludovici IX, p. 334. Prceclara Francor. facinora, p. 778, 779 
 Guill. Guiart, Branche aux royaux lignages, p. 135. 
 
262 
 
 bad been again excommunicated by Gregory IX, 
 and who was endeavouring to avenge himself 
 upon the weakest cities of the states of the church. 
 Raymond even promised to assist, with all his 
 power, the Roman chnrch against Frederic II 
 who called himself emperor, and against all who 
 supported his pretended rights. 9 Raymond after- 
 wards set out for the court of France, and having 
 found Louis IX at Montargis, swore to him on 
 the 14th of March to assist him " towards and 
 against all", to drive from his country the faydits, 
 or those who had been proscribed on account of 
 their faith, and to assist the king in destroying 
 them in that part of Languedo N c which belonged 
 to him. Raymond, on his return to Toulouse, 
 made peace also with Raymond Berenger count 
 of Provence, and, on the 18th of April, at Lunel, 
 signed a treaty with the king of Aragon. 1 
 
 1242. Raymond VII made still one more strug- 
 gle to free himself and his country, before the 
 chains of slavery were finally and irrevocably 
 riveted upon him. He took advantage of the war 
 between England and the French barons, and 
 Louis IX, to form a league with the kings of 
 Spain, who possessed fiefs in France, and the 
 great lords of the Provencal language. Although 
 abandoned in the moment of trial by the greater 
 part of his allies, he, in the month of April, 1242, 
 
 9 Hist, de Langued. liv. xxv, c. xli, p. 423. Preuves no. ccxxxiv, p. 399. 
 i Hist, de Langued, liv. xxv, c. xli, p. 423. Preuves no. ccxxxiv, p. 400. 
 
263 
 
 held an assembly of the lords at the foot of the 
 Pyrenees, who were for the greater part his vas- 
 sals, and who agreed in concert with him to de- 
 clare war against France. Roger count of Foix 
 was the first who promised to second him with all 
 his forces ; the counts of Armagnac, of Cominges, 
 and of Rhodez, and a ureat number of viscounts 
 and lords made similar engagements with him. 
 
 About the middle of June, the combined army 
 of the Languedocians entered the provinces w hich 
 Raymond Vll had ceded to Louis IX, by the 
 treaty of Paris. In a short time they conquered 
 the greater part of Rasez, of Minervois, of Nar- 
 bonnois, and of Termenois. Raymond was intro- 
 duced into Narbonne by the viscount of that city, 
 but the archbishop fled at his approach, and, on 
 his arrival at Beziers, fulminated against him, on 
 the 2 1st of July, a sentence of excommunication. 
 The inhabitants of the country, seeing their lord 
 engaged in a war with those same Frenchmen, 
 who had been the agents of all the persecutions 
 of the church, and had delivered them up to the 
 merciless tribunal of the faith, thought the mo- 
 ment arrived to free themselves from the insup- 
 portable tyranny of the inquisitors. Some Albi- 
 gensian heretics, who had taken refuge in the cas- 
 tle of Mirepoix, set out in the night of the 28th 
 of May, and surprised the castle of Avignonet, 
 where William Arnold had lately established the 
 supreme tribunal of the inquisition. Four Domin- 
 
264 
 
 icans, two Franciscans, and seven Nuncios or fa- 
 miliars of the inquisition, of whom this tribunal 
 was composed, were cut in pieces. These monks, 
 who had ordered so many murders, who had been 
 insensible to the sorrows of so many families, 
 awaited their murderers on their knees and sing- 
 ing Te Deum, without endeavouring either to de- 
 fend or save themselves. They already anticipat- 
 ed the enjoyment of the glory of the martyrs, so 
 sincerely did they imagine themselves serving God 
 when they bathed his altars with the blood of 
 human victims. 2 
 
 The inactivity of the kings of Spain, the suc- 
 cess of Louis in the lower Poitou, the defection 
 of the count of Marche, and the lords of Aqui- 
 taine, and the flight of Henry III, were enough 
 to abate the courage of Raymond VII. Never- 
 theless, no army at present menaced his countship 
 of Toulouse, and he wished to judge of the state 
 in which his ally, the king of England, was placed. 
 He came, therefore, to meet him at Bourdeaux, 
 where he signed the treaty of the 28th of August, 
 by which their alliance was confirmed, and both 
 engaged not to treat separately with the king of 
 France. 3 But, whoever had seen the king of En- 
 gland near, could have no confidence in him, or 
 in any league of which he was the chief. Ray- 
 
 2 Extraits des Procedures de V Inquisition, touchant le meurtre des Inquisi- 
 teurs. Preuves, no. cclxiv, p. 438. 
 
 3 Rymer Acta, t. i, p. 410, 411. 
 
265 
 
 mond soon perceived that all his allies were turn- 
 ing against him. Louis had given orders to the 
 count of Marche, to expiate his rebellion by at- 
 tacking the count of Toulouse. He had joined 
 with him, however, as an inspector, Mauclerc, the 
 ancient duke of Brittany. Raymond soon after 
 received a letter from the count of Foix, the ally 
 upon whom he reckoned the most, which announ- 
 ced that being no longer willing to persevere in a 
 desperate cause, he withdrew his homage, and that 
 he had treated with the king, who had taken him 
 under his immediate protection. 4 Whatever re- 
 sentment Raymond might testify at this defection, 
 there is reason to suspect that he had, at this very 
 time, dispatched the bishop of Toulouse to the 
 king, to treat for his own submission. The con- 
 ditions which this prelate demanded not having 
 been acceded to, Raymond VII wrote, on the 20th 
 of October, to Saint Louis, submitting to him un- 
 conditionally, and demanding mercy for himself 
 and his associates, with the exception of the he- 
 retics, upon whom he promised to execute severe 
 justice, as well as upon those who had killed the 
 inquisitors. 5 
 
 Louis, who had sent a fresh body of troops 
 against Raymond, under the orders of the bishop 
 of Clermont and Imbert de Beaujeu, and who had 
 
 4 Hist, de Langvedoc, t. hi, liv. xxv, c. 62, p. 435. GuUl. de Podio Laur. 
 ch. xlv, p. 698. P. de Marca, Hist, de Btarn, liv. vm, ch. xxiii, p. 763. 
 
 5 Hist, de Langnedoc, I. xxv, c. lxiv, p. 436. Preuves, n. 251, p. 415. 
 
266 
 
 demanded of an assembly of the Gallican church, 
 held at Paris, a twentieth of the ecclesiastical re- 
 venues, to defray the expense of a new crusade 
 against the Albigenses, 6 suffered himself neverthe- 
 less to be moved by the solicitations of Raymond ; 
 and so much the more, as they were powerfully 
 recommended by queen Blanche, cousin of the 
 count of Toulouse. Commissaries from the king 
 met Raymond in Lauraguais, the 22nd of Decem- 
 ber, 1242, and agreed with him that the treaty of 
 Paris should be restored in its full extent. Soon 
 after, Raymond set out for Lorris, in Gatinois, 
 where the king had appointed to meet him. He 
 renewed his homage to him in the month of Jan- 
 uary, 1243, and peace was thus restored to all 
 that part of France where the Provencal language 
 was spoken. 4 
 
 e Matth. Paris, p. 527. 
 
 * Hist, de Languedoc, I. xxv, c. lxv, lxvi, p. 437. Bernardi Gu'tdonis 
 vita Ccelestini IV, Scr. Rer. Ital. t. iii, p. 589. 
 
 THE END.