Something higher than prudence, higher even than virtue is required, if a monarch—a man to whom the government of men has been committed—is to accomplish his entire task and actually to deserve the title of 'Very Christian.' He must know the 'enthusiasm of humanity'; his heart and brain must be in sympathy with the vast number of human beings over whose fate he exercises so great an influence.
More than any king who has ever lived, St. Louis seems to have been actuated by this generous sympathy and fellow-feeling with his subjects. He loved his people and he loved mankind spontaneously, and because he could not help it; he took the tenderest and deepest interest in their destiny, their happiness, their sorrows. He was dangerously ill in 1259, and desired to give his last and most earnest advice to his son, Prince Louis, who died the year following. He said: 'Fair son, I pray you to teach the people of your kingdom to love you; for verily I would rather that a Scotchman should come from Scotland and govern the people of this realm loyally and well, than that you should govern them badly.'
To govern wisely, to watch over the interests of all classes in his kingdom, to secure strict and ready justice to all his subjects, these things were sources of continued and anxious solicitude to St. Louis. M. Félix Faure, in the history to which I have alluded, enumerates all the journeys which the King undertook in his own country between 1254 and 1270, in order to make himself acquainted with the facts and details of his government; and he also gives an account of all the 'Parlements' which Louis held during the same period for the better administration of justice: these two tables show how unceasing was his activity. Joinville's account of the simple and kindly manner in which St. Louis would himself listen to the grievances of his subjects, and administer justice, has been often quoted, but I cannot resist the temptation of repeating it.
'Now many a time it befell,' he says, 'that in summer, after mass, the King would go and sit down in the wood at Vincennes with his back to an oak, and would make us all sit round him. And all those who had any grievance came to speak to him without hindrance from any ushers or such folk. And then with his own lips he would question them. "Is there any one here who has a suit to bring before me?" And all those who wished to appeal to him would stand forward; then he would say, "Be silent, all of you, and your cases shall be dispatched one after the other." Upon that he would call Monseigneur Pierre de Fontanes and Monseigneur Geoffroy de Villette, [Footnote 42] and would say to one of them, "Dispose of this case for me." When he saw anything to correct in the words of those who spoke for him, or in the words of those who spoke for others, with his own lips he would correct it.Sometimes, in summer, I have seen him come into the garden at Paris to administer justice to his people, and he would be dressed in a camlet coat [Footnote 43] and a surcoat of tiretaine [Footnote 44] without sleeves, a coat of black taffetas on his shoulders, his hair very carefully combed and without coif, and a hat with white peacock's feathers on his head. Carpets were spread that we might sit around him, and all the people who brought suits before him stood round about, and he would have their cases dispatched in the manner I have described before, as he used to do in the wood at Vincennes.'
[Footnote 42: Two eminent jurists and councillors of St. Louis.][Footnote 43: The 'cotte,' or coat, was the principal vestment at that time; the 'surcoat' was worn over it.][Footnote 44: 'Tiretaine,' a coarse woollen material, grey, still manufactured in France.]
The active benevolence of St. Louis extended beyond this paternal interest in the private affairs of his people; he gave quite as much attention and interest to those measures which were required by the social conditions of the age and the general welfare of his kingdom. Among the twenty-six ordinances, edicts, and official letters of his reign contained in the first volume of the 'Recueil des Ordonnances des Rois de France,' seven at least were acts of great legislative and administrative importance. These decrees all bear the same character, and whatever may have been their result, their aim was never to extend the power of the Crown or to serve some special interest of royalty when it was struggling with other social forces; they were intended to effect great social and moral reforms, were directed against the violence, the disorder and the abuses of feudal society, and aimed at the extension of justice and peace in the nation, but they did not seek to destroy the existing conditions of society, or to control them exclusively in the interest either of the King or of any one class of citizens.
Many other of the King's ordinances and decrees have been published, either in the later volumes of the work already alluded to or in similar collections. M. Daunou, in an article on St. Louis which he has prepared for the continuation of 'L'Histoire Littéraire de France, par des Membres de l'Institut,' vol. xix. has alluded to a great many inedited documents to be found in different archives. The great collection of legislative enactments known as the 'Etablissements' of St. Louis, which seems to be a kind of general but confused code of laws of the period, is probably a work of jurisprudence of later date than this reign; but in it we see the same endeavour to secure practical and moral reform, and note the same absence of attempt to promote any private interests whatsoever. There is a spirit of such true piety in the paragraph which serves as a preface to this work, that it might have been dictated by St. Louis himself. I reproduce it here, with only such modifications in the language as may be necessary to render it intelligible.
'Louis, by the grace of God King of France, to all good Christians dwelling in the kingdom and under the suzerainty of France, and to all others present and to come, greeting in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.'
'Seeing that malice and fraud are so prevalent in the human race that some men often do wrong and injury and all kinds of evil to their fellows against the will and the law of God, and that there are many who have neither fear nor dread of the terrible day of judgment of the Lord Jesus Christ; and seeing that we wish all our subjects to live in peace and loyalty, and each one to beware of doing any ill to his neighbour for fear of bodily chastisement and loss of worldly goods; seeing that we desire also to punish and repress malefactors by means of the law and by a rigorous execution of justice, and by turning for help to God, who is a true and just Judge above all others: We have therefore ordained these enactments, and we require that justice shall be administered in accordance with them in all lay courts throughout the kingdom and suzerainty of France.'
At the head of one of his essays Montaigne wrote, 'This is an honest book.' We may say of the measures and decrees of St. Louis that they were acts of honest legislation, altogether devoid of egotistical ambition, of party spirit, or the desire of inventing a system; they were inspired solely by an instinctive respect for the common rights of all men, and by love of the public good.
Another act, known as the Pragmatic Sanction, is also given [Footnote 45] as the work of St. Louis, under date of March 1268. Its object is first to assert the rights, liberties, and canonical rules of the Church of France; then to forbid 'the exactions and very heavy pecuniary dues imposed, or which may at any future time be imposed, upon the said Church by the Court of Rome, by which our kingdom has been miserably impoverished, unless they arise from a reasonable, pious and very urgent necessity, from some unavoidable cause, and are imposed with our spontaneous and express consent, together with that of the Church of our kingdom.'
[Footnote 45: Recueil des Ordonnances des Rois de France, vol. i. p. 97.]
The authenticity of this document was eagerly maintained in the seventeenth century by Bossuet, [Footnote 46] and has been asserted in our own days by M. Daunou, [Footnote 47] but many and weighty reasons have been urged in opposition to it, which M. Faure sums up in the following words:—
[Footnote 46: In his defence of the declaration of the clergy of France in 1682, chap. ix.][Footnote 47: L'Histoire Littéraire de France, vol. xvi. p. 75.]
'It is not mentioned by any writer of the period, or in any contemporaneous document; in the correspondence between Louis and the sovereign Pontiffs of his reign it is never once alluded to, although analogous subjects were discussed, and the importance of this would have given it precedence over all the others. It was not until two hundred years after the date assigned to it (in the remonstrances presented to Louis XI. by the 'Parlement' of Paris when, on his accession to the throne, he violated the Pragmatic Sanction of his father, Charles VII.) that the Pragmatic Sanction of St. Louis was for the first time alluded to and quoted. The authority of his name was then invoked in aid of legislative measures to which the promoters wished to give the appearance of ancient and venerable institutions. It is impossible to understand why Philip le Bel—the grandson of Louis—did not quote this document in his disputes with Boniface VIII. Why did not Charles VI. succeed, if it existed when he tried to put a stop to the exactions of the Court of Rome? Nay, how was it that Charles VII., when he promulgated his Pragmatic Sanction, did not rest it upon an authority and example so highly revered as that of his sainted ancestor?'
I do not intend to discuss this unimportant problem of historical criticism, but I wish to call attention to the fact that, even if the authenticity of the document is open to doubt, there is nothing in the 'Pragmatic Sanction of St. Louis' which is not in entire harmony with all that we know of the character and actions of that prince. In his relation to the Papacy he was the respectful, affectionate and faithful son of the Church, but he took good care to maintain the independence of his crown in temporal affairs, and his own right of supervision, and sometimes even of intervention, in spiritual matters. I have already called attention to his cautious and reserved attitude in the great quarrel between the Papacy and the Empire, and to the firmness with which he resisted the violent measures of Gregory IX. and Innocent IV. against the Emperor Frederick II. He carried his notions as to the entire independence of his authority and judgment beyond political matters, and into questions that were purely religious. The Bishop of Auxerre one day said to him, in the name of several prelates: 'Sire, the archbishops and bishops here present desire me to tell you that Christianity is perishing in your hands.' The King made the sign of the cross, and said, 'Now tell me how that may be.' 'Sire,' said the bishop, 'it is because people now-a-days think so little of excommunication that those who are excommunicated are not afraid of dying before they have obtained absolution, and rendered satisfaction to Holy Church.Therefore these prelates require of you, sire, for the love of God, and because you ought so to do, that you command your serjeants and bailiffs, by the seizure of their goods, to compel all those who have been excommunicated for a year and a day to obtain absolution.' And the King replied that he was quite willing to command that this should be done when he had received proof that they were in the wrong. The bishop said that the prelates would not on any account consent to this, and that they did not acknowledge the King's jurisdiction in ecclesiastical matters; and the King said that he would not consent on any other condition, for that it would be against God and against reason if he were to compel those who were excommunicated to seek absolution when not they, but the clergy, were in the wrong.
'For example,' said the King, 'take the case of the Count of Bretagne, who for seven years was at law with the prelates of Bretagne, and all that time was excommunicated, and at the end of it he proved his case, and the Pope condemned them all. Now, if I had constrained the Count to obtain absolution at the end of the first year, I should have sinned against God and against him.' Thereupon the prelates were forced to submit, and I have not heard that any similar demand has ever since been made. [Footnote 48]
[Footnote 48: Joinville, chap. xiii. p. 43.]
I now come to that which is perhaps the most striking and original feature in the character of St. Louis. He was engrossed by religion,—I may say that piety was his ruling passion; and yet his naturally clear and upright judgment in secular and social affairs was scarcely ever disturbed by his religious views. He was not content with the mere forms and appearances of a thing or a person, but must go straight to the very heart of every fact, seeking truth and justice underneath all human conditions, social relations, and royal customs.
Tillemont, the most thorough and minutely accurate of his historians, analyses the life of Louis as the best method of describing it.
'We will study him,' he says, 'first as a simple individual, with no other care than that of his own soul; 'then as a father, the head of a family, having the charge of a wife, children, and servants; and last of all as a king, to whom has been confided the guidance of a whole people, and who has to conduct himself as a Christian prince both toward his own subjects and the nations around.'
I am certain that this was precisely the order in which St. Louis himself viewed his duties, and I shall preserve a certain harmony and conformity with that which was passing in his own thoughts, if I close this sketch by relating some of those incidents in which the innermost recesses of so noble a nature are spontaneously and truthfully revealed.
'He called me one day,' says Joinville, 'and said, "You are a man of such a light nature that I do not dare to speak to you of things relating to God, and I have called these monks who are here because I wish to ask you a question." Now the demand was this:
'"Seneschal, what is God?"
'"Sire," I answered, "so good a thing that better cannot be."
'"Truly," said he, "that is well spoken, for the answer you have given is written down in the book which I hold in my hand. Now I wish to ask," he continued, "which you would prefer to be, a leper or to have committed a mortal sin?" And I, who never told him a lie, I answered I would rather commit thirty mortal sins than be a leper. When the monks had gone, he called me to him alone, made me sit down at his feet, and said, "How could you tell me what you did yesterday?" And I answered that I should say the same thing over again. Then he said, "You spoke rashly and foolishly, for there is no leper so hideous as he who is in a state of mortal sin. When a man dies he is set free from the leprosy of the body, but when a man dies who has committed a mortal sin, he does not know, nor can he be quite sure, that his repentance has been such as to secure the forgiveness of God. And for this reason he ought to be greatly afraid lest this leprosy of sin should last as long as God is in heaven.Therefore I entreat you, as urgently as I can, for the love of God and the love of me, to teach your heart to choose rather that any ill should happen to your body, by leprosy or any other disease, than that mortal sin should attack your soul."
'Another day he asked me,' says Joinville, 'if I wished to be honoured in this world and to go to Paradise when I died; and I said, "Yes." Then he said, "Beware, then, of doing or saying anything wittingly which, if all the world knew, you would be ashamed to own, and would hesitate to acknowledge, I did this, I said that."'
Tillemont says, 'Even in his early youth he had a great dislike to profane oaths in conversation; he contented himself with affirming a thing in the simplest and plainest terms, without introducing the name of God, or of the saints or evangelists, or using a single word which could diminish the respect due to things sacred, whatever cause he might have for anger. When he wished to affirm a thing very strongly, he would say, "Truly it is so," or "Truly it is not so." In order to avoid using other oaths he used at one time to say, "By my name!" but hearing that a religious person found fault with this expression, he never after made use of it' [Footnote 49]
[Footnote 49: Tillemont, vol. v. p. 371.]
M. Faure says: 'It was with the utmost sincerity that he placed the name of Christian high above his title as king. One day, at the Castle of Poissy, the place of his birth, he said to those around him: "In this castle God granted me the greatest blessing and the greatest honour I ever received in this world."
'Every one tried to find out, but no one could guess this honour: his words seemed to point rather to the town of Rheims, where he had been crowned, than to Poissy. At last he said, with a smile, "I was baptized here." He always retained a feeling of affection and gratitude for Poissy, as if it had been his native land. In the letters which he wrote as friend to friend when he wished to discard even the shadow of royal dignity, he was in the habit of styling himself "Louis of Poissy," or "Louis, lord of Poissy."' [Footnote 50]
[Footnote 50: Faure, vol. ii. p. 559.]
I have already spoken of his relation to the two queens, his mother and his wife. His position was often one of great difficulty, but his conduct was never short of exemplary. Louis was a model both of conjugal fidelity and filial piety. He had eleven children by Queen Margaret, six boys and five girls. He loved his wife very tenderly and was scarcely ever apart from her, and the noble courage which she displayed during the first crusade certainly made her dearer to him than ever. But he was not blind to her ambition and her want of political capacity. When he was preparing for his second crusade, he did not confide the regency of France to Queen Margaret in his absence; nay more, before he left the kingdom he took care to regulate her expenses and to restrain her power; he forbade her to receive any presents for herself or her children, to interfere with the administration of justice, or to choose any attendant for herself or her family without the consent of the Council of Regency. He had good reasons for acting in this manner, for about this time Queen Margaret, eager to hold the same position in the state that Queen Blanche had done, was making provision for herself in case of her husband's death.She had induced her son Philip, heir to the throne and at that time only sixteen years old, to take oath that he would remain under her tutelage until he was thirty, that he would have no advisers of whom she did not approve, reveal to her all the designs which were formed against her, enter into no alliance with his uncle, Charles of Anjou, and keep this oath which she administered to him a secret. Louis was probably informed of this strange transaction by his young son himself, and Philip took care to ask Pope Urban IV. to absolve him from his oath. But the King foresaw the tendencies of Queen Margaret, and therefore adopted measures to protect the crown and the kingdom.
The education of his children, their future position and well-being, engrossed the attention of the King as entirely, and were subjects of as keen an interest, as if he had been a father with no other task than the care of his children. 'After supper they followed him to his apartment, where he made them sit around him for a time whilst he instructed them in their duty; he then sent them to bed. He would direct their attention particularly to the good and bad actions of princes. He used to visit them in their own apartment when he had any leisure, inquire as to their progress, and, like a second Tobias, give them excellent instruction. … On Maunday Thursday, he and his children used to wash the feet of thirteen poor persons, give them large alms, and afterwards wait upon them whilst they dined. The King, together with his son-in-law King Thibault, whom he loved and looked upon as his own son, carried the first poor man to the hospital of Compiègne, and his two eldest sons, Louis and Philippe, carried the second.They were accustomed to act with him in all things, showing him great reverence, and he desired that they and Thibault also should obey him implicitly in everything that he commanded.'
He was very anxious that his three children born in the East during the Crusade—Jean Tristan, Pierre, and Blanche—and even his eldest daughter Isabella, should enter the monastic life, which he looked upon as the most likely to insure their salvation; he frequently exhorted them to take this step, writing letters of the greatest tenderness and piety, especially to his daughter Isabella; but, as they did not show any taste for it, he did not attempt to force their inclinations. Thenceforward, he busied himself in making suitable marriages for them, and establishing them according to their rank; at the same time he gave them the most judicious advice as to their conduct and actions in the world upon which they were entering. When he was before Tunis and found that he was sick unto death, he gave the instructions which he had written out in French with his own hand to his eldest son, Philip. They are models of virtue, wisdom, and paternal tenderness, worthy of a king and a Christian. [Footnote 51]
[Footnote 51: There are several versions of these instructions, differing in form but identical in spirit. They are contained in Bouquet's 'Recueil des Historiens des Gaules et de la France,' vol. xx. pp. 84, 300, and 459; Tillemont, vol. v. pp. 166 and 180-383; Faure, vol. ii. pp. 582-593.]
I proceed now from the family of St. Louis to the royal household, and pass on from his children to his servants. In the relation between master and servant we miss the strongest tie—that of blood, and lose that intensely personal and yet disinterested feeling which parents feel when they live again in their children: kindly feeling and custom, much weaker motives, form the bond between master and servant, and give a moral tone to the relation. Now, in St. Louis, the kindliness of his nature was so great that it resembled affection, and called out affection in the hearts of those to whom it was shown.
He could not pardon any breach of morality in his servants, but he passed over in silence all the small faults of which they were guilty, and in such cases treated them not only with gentleness but with that consideration which calls out self-respect, and raises a man in his own eyes, let his position in life be what it may. 'Louis visited his servants when they were sick, and he never failed to pray for them himself and to entreat the prayers of others also, when they were dead. A mass for the dead was chanted for them daily, at which he was always present.'
He took into his household an old servant of his grandfather's, Philip Augustus, dismissed by that king because one day his fire crackled and Jean, who had charge of it, had not been able to make it burn quietly. Now from time to time Louis used to suffer from an inflammation of the right leg. That part between the calf and the ankle would swell, grow very red and cause him great pain. One day when he had an attack of this kind and was lying down, he wished to examine the part affected. Jean held a lighted candle close to the King, and so awkwardly that a drop of boiling grease fell on the bad leg.The King started up from his bed and cried out, 'Oh, Jean, Jean, my grandfather sent you away for a much less thing!' and this exclamation was the only reproof which Jean received for his clumsiness.
Far from the King's household, not engaged in his service, and without any personal claim upon him, there was a large class of persons who nevertheless held an important place in his thoughts and whom he was always ready to help. They were the poor, the infirm, the sick, and all who were destitute and in misery. All the chronicles of the time and the historians of his reign praise his charity as much as his piety, and the philosophers of the eighteenth century almost overlooked his love of relics in consideration of his benevolence. The benevolence of St. Louis was not of that vicarious kind which contents itself with making laws and instituting charities; he was not satisfied merely to build and endow hospitals, infirmaries, and asylums, such as the Hôtel Dieu (or hospital) at Pontoise, those of Vernon and Compiègne, and the Maison des Quinze-Vingt for the blind; it was benevolence shown in his own person, by his own actions, and it taught him that no deed of mercy was beneath the dignity of a king.
Wherever the King might be, a hundred and twenty poor persons received daily two loaves each, a quart of wine, meat or fish enough for a good meal, and a silver penny. Mothers had an extra loaf for each child. Besides these hundred and twenty who received outdoor relief, thirteen others were daily admitted to the palace, and had their meals with the officers of the royal household. Three of them dined at the same time as the King, in the same apartment, and quite near to him.
'Many a time,' says Joinville, 'I have seen him cut their bread for them, and pour out their drink. One day he asked me if I washed the feet of the poor on Maunday Thursday. "Sire," I answered, "what, the feet of those dirty wretches! No, indeed, I shall never wash them." "Truly," replied the King, "you have spoken ill; for you ought not to despise that which God intended for our instruction. I pray you, therefore, first of all for the love of God, and then by your love towards me, that you make a habit of washing their feet."
Sometimes, when the King had a little spare time, he would say, 'Let us go and visit the poor of such a place, and give them a feast to their liking.'
Once when he went to Château Neuf on the Loire, a poor old woman, who was standing at the palace door with a loaf in her hand, said, 'Good King, it is this bread, thy charity, upon which my poor husband lives, who is lying at home very ill.' The King took the loaf, saying, 'The bread is hard enough,' and went with her to the house to see the sick man.
One Maunday Thursday, at Compiègne, he was going to all the churches, walking barefooted from one to the other, as he was wont to do, and distributing alms to all the poor whom he met when he saw a leper on the other side of a muddy pool in the street. The leper did not dare to approach the King, but he was trying to attract his attention; Louis immediately crossed over to him, gave him some money, and then took his hand and kissed it.'All present,' says the chronicle, 'were astonished, and made the sign of the cross when they witnessed the pious temerity of the King, who was not afraid to press his lips to a hand which no other person would have dared to touch.'
In acts like these there is infinitely more than the kindness and generosity of a noble nature; they show that fervour of Christian sympathy which at the sight of human suffering, either of body or mind, knows no fear, shuns no anxiety, feels no repugnance, and has no thought beyond alleviating pain and administering comfort.
And the man who felt and acted thus was no monk, no monarch absorbed by his religious duties, and exclusively addicted to charitable works and devout observances; he was a knight, a warrior, a politician, a true king, as earnest in the performance of the duties of his position as in doing deeds of charity. He obtained the reverence and admiration of his intimate friends as well as of strangers, sometimes by the fervour of his mystic piety and his monkish austerities, sometimes by his administrative ability, his freedom from intolerance and prejudice, and the noble independence of his attitude even towards those representatives of Christian faith and the Christian Church with whom he was in full sympathy.
'The King himself was considered the wisest member of his whole council: when grave difficulties arose or great questions had to be discussed, no one showed more insight or was able to estimate them more justly; and in addition to a clear and vigorous intellect he possessed the power of expressing his thoughts with such a measured grace that he was a most perfect an agreeable speaker.
'He was very cheerful,' says Joinville; 'and when we were in private with him, after dinner, he used to sit at the foot of his bed, and if the Franciscans and Dominicans told him of a book which they thought he would like to hear, he would answer, "No, you shan't read to me now, for there is no book so good after eating as a talkad libitum;that is, let each one say what he likes." But, for all this, he was very fond of books and learning.
'He sometimes listened to the sermons and discussions in the University, but he took care also to seek the truth himself in the Word of God and the traditions of the Church. When he was in the East he heard that a Saracen sultan had collected a great number of books for the use of the philosophers of his sect; he was ashamed to think that the Christians were less zealous to learn the truth than the infidels were to teach themselves lies. Therefore, on his return to France, he commanded that search should be made in the abbeys for all the genuine works of St. Augustine, St. Ambrose, St. Jerome, St. Gregory, and other orthodox teachers, and, having caused them all to be copied, he had them laid up in the treasure-house of the Sainte-Chapelle. He read them whenever he had any spare time, and gladly lent them to those who could make any use of them either for themselves or others. Sometimes towards the close of the afternoon he would send for persons of well-known piety, and converse with them of God, and also of the Bible stories and the lives of the saints or fathers of the Church.'
He had a special friendship for Robert of Sorbon the founder of the Sorbonne, and not only afforded him every facility and gave him all the necessary help for establishing his learned college, but also made him one of his chaplains, and often invited him to sit near him at dinner in order that he might have the pleasure of hearing him converse.
'One day it happened,' says Joinville, 'that Master Robert of Sorbon was sitting by my side at dinner-time, and we were talking together in a low voice. The King reproved us, saying, "Speak aloud, or your companions will think that you are speaking ill of them. If you are talking of anything at dinner-time that can give us pleasure, speak so that we can hear you; if not, be silent."'
Another day, when they had met in the King's presence, Robert of Sorbon reproached Joinville for being 'more magnificently attired than the King, for,' said he, 'you dress yourself in furs and green cloth, which the King does not do.' Joinville defended himself very warmly, and turned the tables on Master Robert, attacking him for the smartness of his clothes. The King took the part of the learned doctor, but when he had left them, 'My lord the King,' continues Joinville, 'called Monseigneur Philip, his son, and King Thibault, and sat down at the door of his oratory; placing his hand on the ground, he said, "Come and sit close to me, that no one may hear us." Then he said he had called us that he might confess to me that he had been wrong in defending Master Robert. "But," he said, "I saw he was so taken aback that he had need of my help. For all that, do not think too much of what I said in defence of Master Robert; for, as the Seneschal has said, you ought to dress well and suitably: your wives will love you the better for it, and your people will also think more of you.For," said this wise king, "we ought so to choose both our apparel and our dress, that the old men of this age may not say we do too much, nor the young ones that we do too little."'
In his own costume and manner of life nothing could be more simple than St. Louis. 'After he returned from beyond the sea,' says Joinville, 'he never wore furs, either miniver or squirrel, nor scarlet cloth, neither did he use gilded spurs or stirrups; his vestments were of camlet or of pers'—a dark blue cloth—'and the linings of his coverlets and garments were of doeskin or hareskin.'
He dressed and undressed himself almost without attendants, rose in the morning and went to bed at night, dispensing altogether with royal etiquette. 'But,' adds Joinville, 'the daily expenses of his household were very great; he behaved with great generosity and liberality in the "Parlements" and at the assemblies of the barons and knights; the service of his court also was conducted with great courtesy, liberally and without stint; far more so than had been the case for a long time at the court of his ancestors.'
Unquestionably the life of St. Louis was no mere empty royal life. Its varied interests and great labours might have employed the most active mind, and satisfied the most exacting conscience; but although the soul of the King was serene and calm, his imagination was incessantly excited, and he suffered from a kind of pious fever,—a fever very different in its aim, but also similar in kind, to that which consumes those great potentates whose restless nature is always discontented, who cherish some vast project quite apart from the ordinary course of events until its accomplishment becomes their fixed idea and ruling passion. As Alexander and Napoleon continually formed new plans, or, to speak more accurately, new dreams, of conquest and dominion, so Louis, in his Christian ambition, always pictured to himself the return to Jerusalem, the deliverance of the Holy Sepulchre and the victory of Christianity over Islamism in the East. It was all in vain that during his first crusade he discovered the immense difficulty, not to say the impossibility of the enterprise, and found that his utmost efforts could not ensure success: the crusade always remained his passion, as the one and only method of realizing his fondest hope and fulfilling his most sacred duty.During the first years after his return from Syria to France—that is, from 1254 to 1260—it does not appear that he spoke of his scheme even to his most intimate and confidential friends. But I am convinced that it was never out of his thoughts, and that he always hoped favourable circumstance would recall him to his interrupted work.
There was no lack of difficulties in the East: the Christians of Palestine and Syria were exposed to perils and losses which increased daily; they were losing their bravest warriors, the Templars and Hospitallers, by incessant warfare; their strong places were falling to ruin; the soldiers of the Cross were defeated now by the Tartars of Tchinggis Khan, now by the Mamelukes of Egypt; the Latin Empire of Constantinople was disappearing; and the Greek Church had again obtained possession of St. Sophia. The most lamentable accounts, the most urgent entreaties daily reached the Christians of the West; and Pope Urban IV. made a special appeal to the King of France. Geoffrey of Sargines, the heroic and faithful representative whom Louis had left in St. Jean d'Acre at the head of a small, garrison, wrote to tell him that all was lost unless they received immediate succour.
In 1261 Louis held a 'Parlement' at Paris, and although he did not then speak of a new crusade, he took measures which revealed his intentions and thoughts. Fasts and prayers were appointed on behalf of the Christians of the East; all extravagant expenses, shows, and tournaments were forbidden; and frequent and important military exercises were appointed.
In 1263 the crusade was preached throughout France. Taxes were levied in aid of it which even the clergy had to pay. Princes and barons undertook to join in the expedition; some even went so far as to set out. Louis congratulated himself, and showed his pleasure and approval without openly declaring his own intention. In 1267 a 'Parlement' was convoked at Paris. The King very discreetly broached the subject of a crusade first of all to some of his barons, in order to make sure of their approval. Then suddenly, after the precious relics from the Sainte-Chapelle had been exposed to the gaze of the assembly, he opened the proceedings by an earnest exhortation to all present 'to avenge the ancient wrongs of our Lord and Saviour in the Holy Land, and to regain the heritage of Christendom so long—for our sins—in the possession of the infidel.' The following year another 'Parlement' met at Paris, and there, on the 9th of February, 1268, the King made a vow to set out in May of 1270.
Great was the surprise of many of his subjects, and their anxiety was even greater than their surprise. The country was tranquil and prosperous to an extent that had been unparalleled for a long period; there was peace without, and law and order within; feudal quarrels were becoming rare, and were promptly settled; the royal authority was felt everywhere, and was accompanied by a more orderly administration and greater certainty of justice; the King possessed the confidence as well as the respect of his whole people, and he was respected and obeyed by all his agents. 'Why should we risk,' they said, 'these advantages in a costly and distant, enterprise where success is more than doubtful?'Either from good sense or from displeasure at the taxes imposed upon them, many ecclesiastics as well as laymen were unfavourable to the crusade. Pope Clement IV., who had succeeded Urban IV., 'hesitated for some time about urging St. Louis to this enterprise; indeed, it seems that in a letter which he wrote towards the close of September 1266, he rather dissuaded him from it. He was, however, annoyed at having written this letter almost as soon as he had dispatched it, and said just the reverse in a letter which he wrote with his own hand, and at first thought of sending immediately; but, hesitating still, he withheld it. … He ended by making up his mind to encourage the King in his pious design; but when he learnt that Louis was taking three sons with him to the crusade, the eldest twenty-two, and the two others seventeen and eighteen years old, he could not resist writing to the Cardinal of Sainte-Cécile as follows: "It does not seem to us that it would be wise or judicious to allow so many of the King's sons to take the cross, especially the eldest; and, although we have heard many reasons given in favour of the opposite view, yet either we deceive ourselves entirely, or they are devoid of any reason whatsoever."' [Footnote 52]
[Footnote 52: Tillemont, vol. v. pp. 10 17.]
Grave anxiety was felt as to the King himself: his health was very much shattered, and it was feared that he himself was no better able to bear the fatigue of the expedition than his country was likely to endure without loss the disadvantage of his absence. Many of his wisest and most faithful advisers openly opposed his scheme. Joinville says: 'It came to pass that the King summoned all his barons to Paris during Lent (1267).I sent my excuses to him on account of a quartan fever which I then had, and begged him graciously to dispense with my attendance. He sent word that he insisted on my going, for he had good physicians at Paris who would soon cure a quartan fever. So I went thither. When I had heard mass at the Madeleine I went to the King's chapel, and found him mounted upon the platform where the relics were, and causing the true cross to be carried down. When the King was descending, two knights who were of his council began to speak together, and one said, "Never believe me, if the King does not now take the cross." And the other answered: "If the King takes the cross, it will be one of the saddest days that ever was in France; for if we do not also take it we shall lose the King's love, and if we take it we shall lose the love of God, because it will not be for His sake that we undertake this crusade."' The King earnestly entreated Joinville to take the cross, but he positively refused to do so. 'I thought,' he says, 'that all those who advised him to undertake that voyage committed a great sin, because France was in such a condition that the whole kingdom was at peace within itself, and at peace with all its neighbours; and, from the time that he departed, its condition has never ceased to grow worse and worse. Those who advised this voyage in his weak state of health committed a great sin, for he was able neither to ride in a carriage nor on horseback; nay, his debility was so great that he allowed me to carry him in my arms from the house of the Count of Auxerre, where I took leave of him, to the Franciscans. And yet, feeble as he was, if he had remained in France, he might have lived for many years, and done much good.'
But the impulse had been given, not only to the King, but to his family and the whole feudal world; his sons, his brothers, his son-in-law Thibault, King of Navarre, many foreign princes, 'a multitude of counts, barons, and knights,' took the cross; some with eager fervour, others with resignation and after much hesitation. The second crusade of St. Louis was a flame which leaps up at intervals from a dying fire, and throws out bright and fitful gleams.
But, together with tidings which aroused angry alarm, news came from the East which inspired fresh hopes and expectations. The Emperor Michael Palæologus had returned to Constantinople, and he held out to the Pope and all Christendom the hope of reunion between the Greek Church and the Church of Rome; Mohammed Mostanser, the King of Tunis (as he called himself), spoke of becoming a Christian, he and all his subjects, and offered to decide on taking this step if he could be secured against their seditions. Clement IV. was enchanted with the Greek promises. Louis heard of the prospect of the Moslem conversions with rapture; he was in the state of mind of a man who has taken a final resolve which is very dear to him, and who listens with the most astounding credulity to any reasons and hopes which seem to justify his course. 'Ah,' he wrote, 'if I might only hope to be the godfather and the compeer of so great a godson!' At the fête of St. Denis, the 9th of October, 1269, Louis was present in the abbey church, at the baptism of a recently-converted Jew. The Tunis envoys were also there: he called them to him, and said with great emotion, 'Tell the King your master, from me, that I desire the salvation of his soul so ardently that I would consent to be in prison among the Saracens all the days of my life and never see the light of day again, if only your king and his nation might become true Christians.' From henceforward Louis was absorbed by Christian zeal and faith, and was more saint than king.