 66 Union of the Greek and Latin Churches, Part 3 For a tedious and troublesome navigation of seventy-seven days, this religious squadron cast anchor before Venice, and their reception proclaimed the joy and magnificence of that powerful republic. In the command of the world, the modest Augustus had never claimed such honors from his subjects as were paid to his feeble successor by an independent state. Seated on the poop on a lofty throne, he received the visit, or in the Greek style, the adoration of the doge and senators. They sailed in the Bucantar, which was accompanied by twelve stately galleys. The sea was overspread with innumerable gondolas of pomp and pleasure. The air resounded with music and acclamations. The mariners, and even the vessels, were dressed in silken gold, and in all the emblems and pageants the Roman eagles were blended with the lines of St. Mark. The triumphal procession, ascending the great canal, passed under the bridge of the Rialto, and the eastern strangers gazed with admiration on the palaces, the churches, and the populousness of a city that seems to float on the bosom of the waves. They sighed to behold the spoils and trophies with which it had been decorated after the sack of Constantinople. After a hospitable entertainment of fifteen days, Paleologus pursued his journey by land and water from Venice to Ferrara, and on this occasion the pride of the Vatican was tempered by policy to indulge the ancient dignity of the Emperor of the East. He made his entry on a black horse, but a milk-white steed whose trappings were embroidered with golden eagles was led before him, and the canopy was borne over his head by the princes of Esta, the sons or kinsmen of Nicholas, the Marquis of the city, and a sovereign more powerful than himself. Paleologus did not alight until he reached the bottom of the staircase. The Pope advanced to the door of the apartment, refused his proffer genuflection, and after a paternal embrace conducted the Emperor to a seat on his left hand. Nor would the patriarch descend from his galley till a ceremony almost equal had been stipulated between the bishops of Rome and Constantinople. The latter was saluted by his brother with a kiss of union and charity, nor would any of the Greek ecclesiastics submit to kiss the feet of the Western Primate. On the opening of the Synod the place of honour in the centre was claimed by the temporal and ecclesiastical chiefs, and it was only by alleging that his predecessors had not assisted in person at Nice or Chalcedon that Eugenius could evade the ancient precedents of Constantin and Marcian. After much debate it was agreed that the right and left sides of the church should be occupied by the two nations, that the solitary chair of St. Peter should be raised the first of the Latin line, and that the throne of the Greek Emperor at the head of his clergy should be equal and opposite to the second place, the vacant seat of the Emperor of the West. But as soon as festivity and form had given place to a more serious treaty, the Greeks were dissatisfied with their journey, with themselves and with the Pope. The artful pencil of his emissaries had painted him in a prosperous state, at the head of the princes and prelates of Europe, obedient at his voice, to believe and to arm. The thin appearance of the Universal Synod of Ferrara betrayed his weakness, and the Latins opened the first session with only five Archbishops, eighteen bishops, and ten abbots, the greatest part of whom were the subjects or countrymen of the Italian Pontiff. Except the Duke of Burgundy, none of the potentates of the West condescended to appear in person, or by their ambassadors, nor was it possible to suppress the judicial acts of Basil against the dignity and person of Eugenius, which were finally concluded by a new election. Under these circumstances a truce or delay was asked and granted till paleologists could expect from the consent of the Latins some temporal reward for an unpopular union, and after the first session the public proceedings were adjourned above six months. The emperor, with a chosen band of his favorites and Janissaries, fixed his summer residence at a pleasant, spacious monastery, six miles from Ferrara, forgot in the pleasures of the Chase, the distress of the church and state, and persisted in destroying the game without listening to the just complaints of the Marquis or the husbandmen. In the meanwhile his unfortunate Greeks were exposed to all the miseries of exile and poverty. For the support of each stranger a monthly allowance was assigned of three or four gold florins, and although the entire sum did not amount to seven hundred florins, a long arrear was repeatedly incurred by the indulgence or policy of the Roman court. They sighed for a speedy deliverance, but their escape was prevented by a triple chain. A passport from their superiors was required at the gates of Ferrara, the government of Venice had engaged to arrest and send back the fugitives, and inevitable punishment awaited them at Constantinople, excommunication, fines, and a sentence which did not respect the sacerdotal dignity, that they should be stripped, naked, and publicly whipped. It was only by the alternative of hunger or dispute that the Greeks could be persuaded to open the first conference, and they yielded with extreme reluctance to attend from Ferrara to Florence the rear of a flying synod. This new translation was urged by inevitable necessity, the city was visited by the plague, the fidelity of the Marquis might be suspected, the mercenary troops of the Duke of Milan were at the gates, and as they occupied Romagna it was not without difficulty and danger that the Pope, the Emperor, and the Bishops explored their way through the unfrequited paths of the Apennine. Yet all these obstacles were surmounted by time and policy. The violence of the Fathers of Basil rather promoted than injured the case of Eugenius. The nations of Europe abhorred the schism and disowned the election of Felix V, who was successively a Duke of Savoy, a Hermit, and a Pope, and the great princes were gradually reclaimed by his competitor to a favourable neutrality in a firm attachment. The Legates, with some respectable numbers, deserted to the Roman army, which insensibly rose in numbers in reputation. The Council of Basil was reduced to thirty-nine Bishops and three hundred of the inferior clergy, while the Latins of Florence could produce the subscription of the Pope himself, eight cardinals, two patriarchs, eight archbishops, fifty-two bishops, and forty-five abbots, or chiefs of religious orders. After the labour of nine months and debates of twenty-five sessions, they attained the advantage and glory of the reunion of the Greeks. Four principal questions had been agitated between the two churches. One, the use of unleavened bread in the communion of Christ's body. Two, the nature of purgatory. Three, the supremacy of the Pope. And four, the single or double procession of the Holy Ghost. The cause of either nation was managed by ten theological champions. The Latins were supported by the inexhaustible eloquence of Cardinal Julian, and Mark of Ephesus and Bissarion of Nice were the bold and able leaders of the Greek forces. We may bestow some praise on the progress of human reason by observing that the first of these questions was now treated as an immaterial right, which might innocently vary with the fashion of the age and country. With regard to the second, both parties were agreed in the belief of an intermediate state of purgation for the venial sins of the faithful, and whether their souls were purified by elemental fire was a doubtful point, which in a few years might be conveniently settled on the spot by the disputants. The claims of supremacy appeared of a more weighty and substantial kind, yet by the orientals the Roman bishop had ever been respected as the first of the five patriarchs, nor did they scruple to admit that his jurisdiction should be exercised agreeably to the holy canons, a vague allowance which might be defined or eluded by occasional convenience. The procession of the Holy Ghost from the Father alone or from the Father and the Son was an article of faith which had sunk much deeper into the minds of men, and in the sessions of Ferrara and Florence the Latin edition of Filioche was so divided into two questions, whether it were legal and whether it were orthodox. Perhaps it may not be necessary to boast on this subject of my own impartial indifference, but I must think that the Greeks were strongly supported by the prohibition of the Council of Calcuton against adding any article whatsoever to the Creed of Nice, or rather of Constantinople. In earthly affairs it is not easy to conceive how an assembly equal of legislators can bind their successors invested with powers equal to their own. But the dictates of inspiration must be true and unchangeable, or a provincial synod have presumed to innovate against the judgment of the Catholic Church. On the substance of the doctrine the controversy was equal and endless, reason is confounded by the procession of a deity, the gospel which lay on the altar was silent, the various texts of the Fathers might be corrupted by fraud or entangled by sophistry, and the Greeks were ignorant of the characters and writings of the Latin Saints. Of this at least we may be sure that neither side could be convinced by the arguments of their opponents. This may be enlightened by reason, and a superficial lance may be rectified by a clear and more perfect view of an object adapted to our faculties. But the bishops and monks had been taught from their infancy to repeat a form of mysterious words. Their national and personal honor depended on the repetition of the same sounds, and their narrow minds were hardened and inflamed by the acrimony of a public dispute. While they were most in a cloud of dust and darkness, the Pope and Emperor were desirous of a seeming union, which could alone accomplish the purposes of their interview, and the obstinacy of public dispute was softened by the arts of private and personal negotiation. The patriarch Joseph had sunk under the weight of age and infirmities, his dying voice breathed the counsels of charity and concord, and his vacant benefits might tempt the hopes of the ambitious clergy. The ready and active obedience of the archbishops of Russia and Nice, of Isidore and Basarian, was prompted and recompensed by their speedy promotion to the dignity of cardinals. Basarian, in the first debates, had stood forth the most strenuous and eloquent champion of the Greek Church, and if the apostate, the bastard, was reparated by his country, he appears an ecclesiastical story, a rare example of a patriot, who was recommended to court favor by loud opposition and well-timed compliance. With the aid of his two spiritual co-ajuders, the emperor applied his arguments to the general situation and personal characters of the bishops, and each was successively moved by authority and example. Their revenues were in the hands of the Turks, their persons in those of the Latins, and Episcopal treasure, three robes and forty dukets, was soon exhausted. The hopes of their return still depended on the ships of Venice and the alms of Rome, and such was their indulgence, that their arrears, the payment of a debt, would be accepted as a favor and might operate as a bribe. The danger and relief of Constantinople might excuse some prudent and pious dissimulation, and it was insinuated that the obstinate heretics who should resist the consent of the East and West would be abandoned in a hostile land to the revenge or justice of the Roman Pontiff. In the first private assembly of the Greeks, the formulary of union was approved by twenty-four and rejected by twelve members, but the five cross-bearers of Saint Sophia, who aspired to represent the patriarch, were disqualified by ancient discipline, and their right of voting was transferred to the obsequitious train of monks, grammarians, and profane laymen. The will of the monarch produced a false and servile unanimity, and no more than two patriots had courage to speak their own sentiments and those of their country. Demetrius, the emperor's brother, retired to Venice, that he might not be witness of the union, and Mark of Ephesus, mistaking perhaps his pride for his conscience, disclaimed all communion with the Latin heretics, and avowed himself the champion and confessor of the Orthodox Creed. In the treaty between the two nations, several forms of consent were proposed, such as might satisfy the Latins without dishonoring the Greeks, and they weighed the scruples of words and syllables till the theological balance trembled with a slight preponderance in favor of the Vatican. It was agreed, I must entreat the attention of the reader, that the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father and the Son, as from one principle and one substance, that he proceeds by the Son, being of the same nature and substance, and that he proceeds from the Father and the Son, by one spiration and production. It is less difficult to understand the articles of the preliminary treaty, that the Pope should defray all the expenses of the Greeks in their return home, that he should annually maintain two galleys and three hundred soldiers for the defense of Constantinople, that all the ships which transported pilgrims to Jerusalem should be obliged to touch at that port, that as often as they were required, the Pope should furnish ten galleys for a year, or twenty for six months, and that he should powerfully solicit the princes of Europe, if the emperor had occasion for land forces. The same year, and almost the same day, were marked by the deposition of Eugenius at Basil, and at Florence by his reunion of the Greeks and Latins. In the former Synod, which he styled an assembly of demons, the Pope was branded with the guilt of simony, perjury, tyranny, heresy, and schism, and declared to be incorrigible in his vices, unworthy of any title, and incapable of holding any ecclesiastical office. In the latter he was revered as the true and holy vicar of Christ, who after a separation of six hundred years had reconciled the Catholics of the East and West in one fold, and under one shepherd. The act of union was subscribed by the Pope, the Emperor, and the principal members of both churches, even by those who, like Syrupulus, had been deprived of the right of voting. Two copies might have sufficed for the East and West, but Eugenius was not satisfied, unless four authentic and similar transcripts were signed and attested as the monuments of his victory. On a memorable day, the 6th of July, the successors of St. Peter and Constantine ascended their thrones, the two nations assembled in the Cathedral of Florence. Their representatives, Cardinal Julian and Visarian Archbishop of Nice, appeared in the pulpit, and after reading in their respective tongues the act of union, they mutually embraced in the name and the presence of their plodding brethren. The Pope and his ministers then officiated according to the Roman liturgy. The creed was chanted with the addition of filioc, the acquiescence of the Greeks was poorly excused by their ignorance of the harmonious, but inarticulate sounds, and the more scrupulous Latins refused any public celebration of the Byzantine right. Yet the Emperor and his clergy were not totally unmindful of national honour. The treaty was ratified by their consent. It was tacitly agreed that no innovation should be attempted in their creed or ceremonies. They spared and secretly respected the generous firmness of Mark of Ephesus, and on the decease of the patriarch they refused to elect his successor, except in the Cathedral of St. Sophia. In the distribution of public and private rewards the liberal pontiff exceeded their hopes and his promises. The Greeks, with less pomp and pride, returned by the same road of Ferrara and Venice, and their reception at Constantinople was such as will be described in the following chapter. The success of the first trial encouraged Eugenius to repeat the same edifying scenes, and the deputies of their Armenians, their Maronites, the Jacobites of Syria and Egypt, the Nestorians and the Ethiopians were successively introduced, to kiss the feet of the Roman pontiff, and to announce the obedience and the orthodoxy of the East. These oriental embassies, unknown in the country which they presumed to represent, diffused over the West the fame of Eugenius, and a clamour was artfully propagated against the remnant of a schism in Switzerland and Savoy, which alone impeded the harmony of the Christian world. The vigor of opposition was succeeded by the lassitude of despair. The Council of Basil was silently dissolved, and Felix, renouncing the tiara, again withdrew to the devout or delicious hermitage of Rapai. A general peace was secured by mutual acts of oblivion and indemnity. All ideas of reformation subsided, the Popes continued to exercise and abuse their ecclesiastical despotism, nor has Rome since been disturbed by the mischiefs of a contested election. The journeys of three emperors were unavailing for their temporal or perhaps their spiritual salvation, but they were productive of a beneficial consequence. The revival of the Greek learning in Italy, from once it was propagated to the last nations of the West and North. In their lowest servitude in depression the subjects of the Byzantine throne were still possessed of a golden key that could unlock the treasures of antiquity, of a musical and prolific language that gives a soul to the objects of sense and a body to the abstractions of philosophy. Since the barriers of the monarchy and even of the capital had been trampled underfoot, the various barbarians had doubtless corrupted the form and substance of the national dialect, and ample glossaries have been composed to interpret a multitude of words of Arabic, Turkish, Scrivonian, Latin, or French origin. But a purer idiom was spoken in the court and taught in the college, and the flourishing state of the language is described and perhaps embellished by a learned Italian, who, by a long residence and noble marriage, was naturalized at Constantinople about thirty years before the Turkish conquest. The vulgar speech, says Philelfis, has been depraved by the people and infected by the multitude of strangers and merchants, who every day flock to the city and mingle with the inhabitants. It is from the disciples of such a school that the Latin language received the version of Aristotle and Plato, so obscure in sense and in spirit so poor. But the Greeks who have escaped the contagion are those whom we follow, and they alone are worthy of our imitation. In familiar discourse they still speak the tongue of Aristophanes and Euripides, of the historians and philosophers of Athens, and the style of their writings is still more elaborate and correct. The persons who, by their birth and offices, are attached to the Byzantine court, are those who maintain, with the least deloy, the ancient standard of elegance and purity, and the native graces of language most conspicuously shine among the noble matrons, who are excluded from all intercourse with foreigners. With foreigners, do I say? They live retired and sequestered from the eyes of their fellow citizens. Seldom are they seen in the streets, and when they leave their houses it is in the dusk of evening, on visits to the churches and their nearest kindred. On these occasions they are on horseback, covered with a veil, and encompassed by their parents, their husbands, or their servants. Among the Greeks, a numerous and opulent clergy was dedicated to the service of religion. Their monks and bishops have ever been distinguished by their gravity and austerity of their manners, nor were they diverted, like the Latin priests, by the pursuits and pleasures of a secular and even military life. After a large deduction for the time and talent that were lost in devotion, the laziness and the discord of the church and cloister, the more inquisitive and ambitious minds would explore the sacred and profane erudition of their native language. The ecclesiastics presided over the education of youth. The schools of philosophy and eloquence were perpetuated till the fall of the Empire, and it may be affirmed that more books and more knowledge were included within the walls of Constantinople than could be dispersed over the extensive countries of the West. But an important distinction has been already noticed. The Greeks were stationary or retrograde, while the Latins were advancing with a rapid and progressive motion. The nations were excited by the spirit of independence and emulation, and even the little world of the Italian states contained more people and industry than the decreasing circle of the Byzantine Empire. In Europe, the lower ranks of society were relieved from the yoke of feudal servitude, and freedom is the first step to curiosity and knowledge. The use, however rude and corrupt, of the Latin tongue had been preserved by superstition. The universities, from Bologna to Oxford, were peopled with thousands of scholars, and their misguided ardor might be directed to more liberal and manly studies. In the resurrection of science, Italy was the first that cast away her shroud, and the eloquent Petrarch, by his lessons and his example, may justly be applauded as the first harbinger of day. A purer style of composition, a more generous and rational strain of sentiment, flowed from the study and imitation of the writers of ancient Rome, and the disciples of Cicero and Virgil approached, with reverence and love, the sanctuary of their Grecian masters. In the sack of Constantinople, the French and even the Venetians had despised and destroyed the works of Lisyphus and Homer. The monuments of art may be annihilated by a single blow, but the immortal mind is renewed and multiplied by the copies of the pen, and such copies it was the ambition of Petrarch and his friends to possess and understand. The arms of the Turks undoubtedly pressed the flight of the Muses, yet we may tremble at the thought that Greece might have been overwhelmed, with her schools and libraries, before Europe had emerged from the deluge of barbarism, that the seeds of science might have been scattered by the winds, before the Italian soil was prepared for their cultivation. CHAPTER 66 by EDWARD GIMMON. CHAPTER 66. THE UNION OF THE GRIEK AND LATIN CHURCHES, PART IV. The most learned Italians of the fifteenth century have confessed and applauded the restoration of Greek literature, after a long oblivion of many hundred years. Yet in that country and beyond the Alps some names are quoted, some profound scholars who in the darker ages were honorably distinguished by their knowledge of the Greek tongue, and national vanity has been loud in the praise of such rare examples of erudition. Without scrutinizing the merit of individuals, truth must observe that their science is without a cause, and without an effect, that it was easy for them to satisfy themselves and their more ignorant contemporaries, and that the idiom which they had so marvelously acquired was transcribed in a few manuscripts, and was not taught in any university of the West. In a corner of Italy it faintly existed as the popular, or at least as the ecclesiastical dialect. The first impression of the Doric and Ionic colonies has never been completely erased. The Calabrian churches were long attached to the throne of Constantinople, and the monks of St. Basil pursued their studies in Mount Athos and the schools of the East. Calabria was the native country of Barlam, who has already appeared as a sectarian and ambassador, and Barlam was the first who revived, beyond the Alps, the memory or at least the writings of Homer. He is described by Petrarch and Boccacce as a man of diminutive stature, though truly great in the measure of learning and genius, of a piercing discernment, though of a slow and painful elocution. For many ages, as they affirm, Greece had not produced his equal in the knowledge of history, grammar, and philosophy, and his merit was celebrated in the attestations of the princes and doctors of Constantinople. One of these attestations is still extant, and the emperor can't accuse him, the protector of his adversaries is forced to allow that Euclid, Aristotle, and Plato were familiar to that profound and subtle logician. In the court of Avignon he formed an intimate connection with Petrarch, the first of the Latin scholars, and the desire of mutual instruction was the principle of their literary commerce. Lutuscan applied himself with eager curiosity and assiduous diligence to the study of the Greek language, and in a laborious struggle with the dryness and difficulty of the first rudiments he began to reach the sense and to feel the spirit of poets and philosophers whose minds were congenial to his own. But he was soon deprived of the society and lessons of this useful assistant. Barlem relinquished his fruitless embassy, and on his return to Greece he rashly provoked the swarms of fanatic monks by attempting to substitute the light of reason to that of their naval. After a separation of three years the two friends again met at the court of Naples, but the generous pupil renounced the fairest occasion of improvement, and by his recommendation Barlem was finally settled in a small bishopric of his native Calabria. The manifold avocations of Petrarch, love and friendship, his various correspondence and frequent journeys, the Roman laurel and his elaborate compositions in prose and verse, in Latin and Italian, diverted him from a foreign idiom, and as he advanced in life the attainment of the Greek language was the object of his wishes rather than of his hopes. When he was about fifty years of age a Byzantine ambassador, his friend, and a master of both tongues, presented him with a copy of Homer, and the answer of Petrarch is at once expressive of his eloquence, gratitude, and regret. After celebrating the generosity of the donor, the value of a gift more precious in his estimation than gold or rubies, he thus proceeds, your present of the genuine and original text of the Divine Poet, The Fountain of All Inventions, is worthy of yourself and of me. You have fulfilled your promise and satisfied my desires. Yet your liberality is still imperfect. With Homer you should have given me yourself, a guide, who could leave me into the fields of light, and disclose to my wondering eyes the spacious miracles of the Iliad and the Odyssey. But alas, Homer is dumb, or I am deaf, nor is it in my power to enjoy the beauty which I possess. I have ceded him by the side of Plato, the Prince of Poets, near the Prince of Philosophers, and I glory in the sight of my illustrious guests. Of their immortal writings, whatever had been translated into the Latin idiom, I had already acquired. But if there be no profit, there is some pleasure in beholding these venerable Greeks in their proper and national habit. I am delighted with the aspect of Homer, and as often as I embrace the silent volume I exclaim with a sigh, illustrious bard, with what pleasure should I listen to thy song if my sense of hearing were not obstructed and lost by the dearth of one friend, and in the much lamented absence of another. Nor do I yet despair, and the example of Cato suggests some comfort and hope, since it was in the last period of age that he attained the knowledge of the Greek letters. The prize which eluded the efforts of Petrarch was obtained by the fortune and industry of his friend Boccacce, the father of the Tuscan prose. That popular writer, who derives his reputation from the Decameran, a hundred novels of pleasantry and love, may aspire to the more serious praise of restoring in Italy the study of the Greek language. In the year 1360 a disciple of Barlam, whose name was Leo, or Lyontius Pilatus, was detained on his way to Avignon by the advice and hospitality of Boccacce, who lodged the stranger in his house, prevailed on the Republic of Florence to allow him an annual stipend, and devoted his leisure to the first Greek professor who taught that language in the western countries of Europe. The appearance of Leo might discuss the most eager disciple. He was clothed in the mantle of a philosopher or a mendicant. His countenance was hideous. His face was overshadowed with black hair. His beard long and uncombed. His deportment rustic. His temper gloomy and inconstant. Nor could he grace his discourse with the ornaments, or even the perspicuity of Latin elocution. But his mind was stored with a treasure of Greek learning, history and fable, philosophy and grammar, were alike at his command. And he read the poems of Homer in the schools of Florence. It was from his explanation that Boccacce composed and transcribed a literal prose version of the Iliad and Odyssey, which satisfied the thirst of his friend Petrarch, and which perhaps in the succeeding century was clandestinely used by Laurentius Vala, the Latin interpreter. It was from his narratives that the same Boccacce collected the materials for his treatise on the genealogy of the heathen gods, a work in that age of stupendous erudition, and which he ostentatiously sprinkled with Greek characters and passages to excite the wonder and applause of his more ignorant readers. The first steps of learning are slow and laborious. No more than ten votaries of Homer could be enumerated in all Italy, and neither Rome nor Venice nor Naples could add a single name to this studious catalogue. But their numbers would have multiplied, their progress would have been accelerated, if the inconstant leo, at the end of three years, had not relinquished an honorable and beneficial station. In his passage Petrarch entertained him at Padua a short time. He enjoyed the scholar, but was justly offended with the gloomy and unsocial temper of the man. Discontented with the world and with himself, Leo depreciated his present enjoyments, while absent persons and objects were dear to his imagination. In Italy he was a Thessalian, in Greece a native of Calabria. In the company of the Latins he disdained their language, religion and manners. No sooner was he landed at Constantinople than he again sighed for the wealth of Venice and the elegance of Florence. His Italian friends were deaf to his importunity. He depended on their curiosity and indulgence, and embarked on a second voyage. But on his entrance into the Adriatic the ship was assailed by a tempest, and the unfortunate teacher, who like Ulysses had fastened himself to the mast, was struck dead by a flash of lightning. The humane Petrarch dropped a tear on his disaster, but he was most anxious to learn whether some copy of Euripides or Sophocles might not be saved from the hands of the mariners. But the faint rudiments of Greek learning, which Petrarch had encouraged and Boccaccia had planted, soon withered and expired. The succeeding generation was content for a while with the improvement of Latin eloquence. Nor was it before the end of the fourteenth century that a new and perpetual flame was rekindled in Italy. Previous to his own journey the Emperor Emanuel dispatched his envoys and orators to implore the compassion of the Western princes. Of these envoys the most conspicuous or the most learned was Manuel Chrysaloris of noble births whose Roman ancestors are supposed to have migrated with the great Constantine. After visiting the courts of France and England, where he obtained some contributions and more promises, the envoy was invited to assume the office of a professor, and Florence had again the honour of this second imitation. By his knowledge not only of the Greek but of the Latin tongue Chrysaloris deserved this stipend and surpassed the expectation of the Republic. His school was frequented by a crowd of disciples of every rank and age, and one of these, in a general history, has described his motives and his success. At that time, says Leonard Eretton, I was a student of the civil law, but my soul was inflamed with the love of letters and I bestowed some application on the sciences of logic and rhetoric. On the arrival of Manuel I hesitated whether I should desert my legal studies or relinquish this golden opportunity, and thus in the ardour of youth I communed with my own mind. Will thou be wanting to thyself and thy fortune? Will thou refuse to be introduced to a familiar converse with Homer, Plato, and Demosthenes? With those poets, philosophers and orators of whom such wonders are related, and who are celebrated by every age as the great masters of human science? A professor's and scholar's in civil law, a sufficient supply will always be found in our universities, but a teacher, and such a teacher, of the Greek language, if he once be suffered to escape, may never afterwards be retrieved. Convinced by these reasons I gave myself to Chrysaloris, and so strong was my passion, that the lessons which I had imbibed in the day were the constant object of my nightly dreams. At the same time and place the Latin classics were explained by John of Ravenna, the domestic pupil of Petrarch. The Italians, who illustrated their age and country, were formed in this double school, and Florence became the fruitful seminary of Greek and Roman erudition. The presence of the emperor recalled Chrysaloris from the college to the court, but he afterwards taught Apavia and Rome with equal industry and applause. The remainder of his life, about fifteen years, was divided between Italy and Constantinople, between embassies and lessons. In the noble office of enlightening a foreign nation, the grammarian was not unmindful of a more sacred duty to his prince and country, and Emmanuel Chrysaloris died at Constance on a public mission from the emperor to the council. After his example the restoration of the Greek letters in Italy was prosecuted by a series of immigrants, who were destitute of fortune and endowed with learning, or at least with language. From the terror or oppression of the Turkish arms, the natives of Thessalonica and Constantinople escaped to a land of freedom, curiosity, and wealth. The Synod introduced into Florence the lights of the Greek Church and the oracles of the Platonic philosophy, and the fugitives who adhered to the union had the double merit of renouncing their country, not only for the Christian but for the Catholic cause. A patriot who sacrifices his party and conscience to the allurements of favor may be possessed, however, of the private and social virtues. He no longer hears the reproachful epithets of slave and apostate, and the consideration which he acquires among his new associates will restore in his own eyes the dignity of his character. The prudent conformity of Bessarion was rewarded with the Roman purple. He fixed his residence in Italy, and the Greek cardinal, the titular patriarch of Constantinople, was respected as the chief and protector of his nation. His abilities were exercised in the legations of Bologna, Venice, Germany, and France, and his election to the chair of St. Peter floated for a moment on the uncertain breath of a conclave. His ecclesiastical honors diffused a splendor and preeminence over his literary merit and service. His palace was a school, as often as the cardinal visited the Vatican, he was attended by a learned train of both nations. Of men applauded by themselves and the public, and whose writings, now overspread with dust, were popular and useful in their own times. I shall not attempt to enumerate the restorers of Grecian literature in the fifteenth century, and it may be sufficient to mention with gratitude the names of Theodor Gaza, of George of Trebizand, of John Agrippolis, and Demetrius Chalco-Condelis, who taught their native language in the schools of Florence and Rome. Their labors were not inferior to those of Bessarion, whose purple they revered, and whose fortune was the secret object of their envy. But the lives of these gromerians were humble and obscure. They had declined the lucrative paths of the church, their dress and manners secluded them from the commerce of the world, and since they were confined to the merit they might be content with the rewards of learning. From this character, Janus Lascaris will deserve an exception. His eloquence, politeness, and imperial dissent recommended him to the French monarch, and in the same cities he was alternately employed to teach and to negotiate. Duty and interest prompted them to cultivate the study of the Latin language, and the most successful attained the faculty of writing and speaking with fluency and elegance in a foreign idiom. But they ever retained the inveterate vanity of their country. Their praise, or at least their esteem, was reserved for the national writers, to whom they owed their fame and subsistence, and they sometimes portrayed their contempt in Lysentius criticism or satire on Virgil's poetry and the oratory of Tully. The superiority of these masters arose from the familiar use of a living language, and their first disciples were incapable of discerning how far they had degenerated from the knowledge and even the practice of their ancestors. A vicious pronunciation, which they introduced, was banished from the schools by the reason of the succeeding age. Of the power of the Greek accents they were ignorant, and those musical notes which from an attic tongue and to an attic ear must have been the secret soul of harmony, were to their eyes, as to our own, no more than minute and unmeaning marks, in prose superfluous and troublesome in verse. The art of grammar they truly possessed, the valuable fragments of Apollonius and Herodion were transfused onto their lessons, and their treatises of syntax and etymology, though devoid of philosophic spirit, are still useful to the Greek student. In the shipwreck of the Byzantine libraries, each fugitive seized a fragment of treasure, a copy of some author, who without his industry might have perished. The transcripts were multiplied by an Asidius and sometimes an elegant pen, and the text was corrected and explained by their own comments, or those of the Elder Scolius. The sense, though not the spirit of the Greek classics, was interpreted to the Latin world. The beauties of style evaporate in aversion, but the judgment of Theodor Gaza selected the more solid works of Aristotle and Theophrastus, and their natural histories of animals and plants opened a rich fund of genuine and experimental science. Yet the fleeting shadows of metaphysics were pursued with more curiosity and ardor. After a long oblivion Plato was revived in Italy by a venerable Greek, who taught in the House of Cosmo of Medici. While the Synod of Florence was involved in theological debate, some beneficial consequences might blow from the study of his elegant philosophy. His style is the purest standard of the Attic dialect, and his sublime thoughts are sometimes adapted to familiar conversation, and sometimes adorned with the richest colors of poetry and eloquence. The dialogues of Plato are a dramatic picture of the life and death of a sage, and as often as he descends from the clouds, his moral system inculcates the love of truth, of our country and of mankind. The precept and example of Socrates recommended a modest doubt and liberal inquiry, and if the Platonists, with blind devotion, adored the visions and errors of their divine master, their enthusiasm might correct the dry, dogmatic method of the parapetetic school. So equal, yet so opposite, are the merits of Plato and Aristotle, that they may be balanced in endless controversy, but some spark of freedom may be produced by the collision of adverse servitude. The modern Greeks were divided between the two sects, with more fury than skill they fought under the banner of their leaders, and the field of battle was removed in their flight from Constantinople to Rome. But this philosophical debate soon degenerated into an angry and personal quarrel of grammarians, and Bessarion, though an advocate for Plato, protected the national honour by interposing the advice and authority of a mediator. In the gardens of the Medici, the academic doctrine was enjoyed by the polite and learned, but their philosophic society was quickly dissolved, and if the writings of the addict sage were perused in the closet, the more powerful staggerite continued to reign, the oracle of the church and school. I have fairly represented the literary merits of the Greeks, yet it must be confessed that they were seconded and surpassed by the ardour of the Latins. Italy was divided into many independent states, and at that time it was the ambition of princes and republics to vie with each other in the encouragement and reward of literature. The fame of Nicholas V. has not been adequate to his merits. From a plebeian origin he raised himself by his virtue and learning. The character of the man prevailed over the interest of the Pope, and he sharpened those weapons which were soon pointed against the Roman church. He had been the friend of the most eminent scholars of the age. He became their patron, and such was the humility of his manners that the change was scarcely discernible either to them or to himself. If he pressed the acceptance of a liberal gift it was not as the measure of dessert, but as the proof of benevolence, and when modest merit declined his bounty, except it, he would say, with a consciousness of his own worth, you will not always have a Nicholas among you. The influence of the Holy See pervaded Christendom, and he exerted that influence in the search, not of benefices, but of books. From the ruins of the Byzantine libraries, from the darkest monasteries of Germany and Britain, he collected the dusty manuscripts of the writers of antiquity, and wherever the original could not be removed, a faithful copy was transcribed and transmitted for his use. The Vatican, the old repository for bulls and legends, for superstition and forgery, was daily replenished with more precious furniture, and such was the industry of Nicholas that in a reign of eight years he formed a library of five thousand volumes. To his munificence the Latin world was indebted for the versions of Xenophon, Deodorus, Polybius, Thucydides, Herodotus and Appian, of Strabo's geography, of the Iliad, of the most valuable works of Plato and Aristotle, of Ptolemy and Theophrastus, and of the Fathers of the Greek Church. The example of the Roman pontiff was preceded or imitated by a Florentine merchant, who governed the Republic without arms and without a title. Cosimo of Medici's was the father of a line of princes whose name and age are almost synonymous with the restoration of learning. His credit was ennobled into fame, his riches were dedicated to the service of mankind, he corresponded at once with Cairo and London, and a cargo of Indian spices and Greek books was often imported in the same vessel. The genius and education of his grandson Lorenzo rendered him not only a patron, but a judge and candidate in the literary race. In his palace distress was entitled to relief and merit to reward, his leisure hours were delightfully spent in the Platonic Academy. He encouraged the emulation of Demetrius Calculcandiles, and Angelo Politician, and his active missionary, Janus Lascaris, returned from the east with a treasure of two hundred manuscripts, for score of which were as yet unknown in the libraries of Europe. The rest of Italy was animated by a similar spirit, and the progress of the nation repaid the liberality of their princes. The Latins held the exclusive property of their own literature, and these disciples of Greece were soon capable of transmitting and improving the lessons which they had imbibed. After a short succession of foreign teachers, the tide of emigration subsided, but the language of Constantinople was spread beyond the Alps and the natives of France, Germany, and England, imparted to their country the sacred fire which they had kindled in the schools of Florence and Rome. In the productions of the mind, as in those of the soil, the gifts of nature are excelled by industry and skill. The Greek authors, forgotten on the banks of the Elyseus, have been illustrated on those of the Elba and the Thames, and Viserion or Gaza might have envied the superior science of the Barbarians, the accuracy of Budeis, the taste of Erasmus, the copiousness of Stevens, the erudition of Scaliger, the discernment of Resca, or Bentley. On the side of the Latins the discovery of printing was a casual advantage, but this useful art has been applied by Aldous and his innumerable successors to perpetuate and multiply the works of antiquity. A single manuscript imported from Greece is revived in ten thousand copies, and each copy is fairer than the original. In this form Homer and Plato would peruse with more satisfaction their own writings, and their Scalius must resign the prize to the labors of our Western editors. Before the revival of classic literature the Barbarians in Europe were immersed in ignorance, and their vulgar tongues were marked with the rudeness and poverty of their manners. The students of the more perfect idioms of Roman Greece were introduced to a new world of light and science, to the society of the free and polished nations of antiquity, and to a familiar converse with those immortal men who spoke the sublime language of eloquence and reason. Such an intercourse must tend to refine the taste and to elevate the genius of the moderns, and yet from the first experiments it might appear that the study of the ancients had given fetters rather than wings to the human mind. However laudable the spirit of imitation is of a servile cast, and the first disciples of the Greeks and Romans were a colony of strangers in the midst of their age and country. The minute and laborious diligence which explored the antiquities of remote times might have improved or adorned the present state of society. The critic and metaphysician were the slaves of Aristotle. The poets, historians, and orators were proud to repeat the thoughts and words of the Augustan age. The works of nature were observed with the eyes of Pliny and Theophrastus, and some pagan votaries professed a secret devotion to the gods of Homer and Plato. The Italians were oppressed by the strengthened number of their ancient auxiliaries. The century after the deaths of Petrarch and Boccacce was filled with the crowd of Latin imitators, who decently repose on our shelves, but in that era of learning it will not be easy to discern a real discovery of science, a work of invention or eloquence, in the popular language of the country. But as soon as it had been deeply saturated with the celestial dew, the soil was quickened into vegetation and life, the modern idioms were refined, the classics of Athens and Rome inspired a pure taste in a generous emulation, and in Italy, as afterwards in France and England, the pleasing reign of poetry and fiction was succeeded by the light of speculative and experimental philosophy. Genius may anticipate the season of maturity, but in the education of a people, as in that of an individual, memory must be exercised before the powers of reason and fancy can be expanded, nor may the artist hope to equal or surpass till he has learned to imitate the works of his predecessors. Chapter 67 Part 1 of the History of the Declined and Fall of the Roman Empire, Volume 6. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. The History of the Declined and Fall of the Roman Empire, Volume 6 by Edward Gibbon, Chapter 67 Part 1. Princess of the Greeks and Latins. Reign and character of Amurath II. Cresce de Vladislavus, King of Hungary. His defeat and death. John Huniades. Skanderberg. Constantin Palaeologus, last Emperor of the East. The respective merits of Roman Constantinople are compared and celebrated by an eloquent Greek, the father of the Italian schools. The View of the Ancient Capital. – the seat of his ancestors – surpassed the most sanguine expectations of Immanuel Chrysóloras, and he no longer blamed the exclamation of an old sophist, that Rome was the habitation not of men, but of gods. Those gods, and those men, had long since vanished, but to the eye of liberal enthusiasm the majesty of ruin restored the image of a range and prosperity. The monuments of the consuls and ceasars, of the martyrs and apostles engaged in all sides the curiosity of the philosopher and the Christian, and he confessed that in every age the arms and religion of Rome were destined to reign over the earth. While Chrysóloras admired the venerable beauties of the mother, he was not forgetful of his native country, her first daughter, her imperial colony, and the Byzantine patriot expatiates with zeal and truth on the eternal advantages of nature and the more transitory glories of art and dominion, which adorned, or had adorned, the city of Constantine. Yet the perfection of the copy still redounds, as he modellously observes, to the honour of the original, and parents are delighted to be renewed and even excelled by the superior merit of their children. Constantine Opel, says the auditor, is situated on a commanding point between Europe and Asia, between the Archipelago and the Yucsen, by her interposition the two seas and the two continents are united for the common benefit of nations, and the gates of commerce may be shut and opened at Hoekman. The harbour, and compassed on all sides by the sea and the continent, is the most secure and capacious in the world, the walls and gates of Constantine Opel may be compared with those of Babylon, the towers many, each tower is a solid and lofty structure, and the second wall, the outer fortification, would be sufficient for the defence and dignity of an ordinary capital. A broad and rapid stream may be introduced into the ditches and the artificial island, may be encompassed, like Athens, my land or water. Two strong and natural courses are leaked for the perfection of the model of New Rome, the royal founder reigned over the most illustrious nations of the globe, and in the accomplishment of his designs, the power of the Romans was combined with the art and science of the Greeks. Other cities have been reared into maturity by accident and time, their beauties are mingled with disorder and deformity, and the inhabitants, unwilling to remove from their natal spot, are incapable of correcting the errors of their ancestors and the original vices of situational climate, but the free idea of Constantine Opel was formed and executed by a single mind, and the primitive model was improved by the obedience zeal of the subjects and successors of the First Monarch. The adjacent aisles were stored with an inexhaustible supply of marble, but the various materials were transported from the most remote shores of Europe and Asia, and the public and private buildings, the palaces, churches, aqueducts, cisterns, porticoes, columns, baths and hippodromes, were adapted to the greatness of the capital of the east. The superfluity of wealth was spread along the shores of Europe and Asia, and the Byzantine territory, as far as the Euchsin, the Hellespont and the Long Wall, might be considered as a popular suburb and a perpetual garden. In this flattering picture, the past and the present, the times of prosperity and decay, are artfully confounded, but as I in a confession escape from the orator that his wretched country was the shadow and sepulchre of its former self. The works of ancient sculpture had been defaced by Christian zeal or barbaric violence. The fairest structures were demolished, and the marbles of paris or Numidia were burned for a line or applied to the meanest uses. On many a statue, the place was marked by an empty pedestal. On many a column, the size was determined by a broken capital. The tombs of the emperors were scattered on the ground. The stroke of time was accelerated by storms and earthquakes. And the vacant space was adorned by a vulgar tradition with fabulous monuments of gold and silver. From these wonders, which lived only in memory or belief, he distinguishes, however, the porphyry pillar, the column and colossus of Justinian, and the church, or especially the dome, of Saint Sophia. The best conclusion, since it could not be described according to its merits, and after it, no other object could deserve to be mentioned. But he forgets that. A century before, the trembling fabrics of the colossus and the church had been saved and supported by the timely care of Andronicus the Elder. 30 years after the emperor had fortified Saint Sophia with two new buttresses or pyramids, the eastern hemisphere suddenly gave way, and the images, the altars, and the sanctuary were crushed by the falling ruin. The mischief indeed was speedily repaired. The rubbish was cleared by the incessant labor of every rank and age, and the poor remains of riches and industry were consecrated by the Greeks to the most stately and venerable temple of the East. The last hope of the falling city and empire was placed in the harmony of the mother and daughter in the maternal tenderness of Rome and the filial obedience of Constantinople. In the Synod of Florence, the Greeks and Latins had embraced and subscribed and promised, but these signs of friendship were perfidious or fruitless, and the baseless fabric of the union vanished like a dream. The emperor and his prelates returned home in the Venetian galleys, but as they touched at the moria and the aisles of Corfu and Lesbos, the subjects of the Latins complained that the pretend union would be an instrument of oppression. No sooner did they land on the Byzantine shore than they were saluted or rather assailed with a general murmur of zeal and discontent. During their absence, above two years, the capital had been deprived of its civil and ecclesiastical rulers. Fanaticism fermented in anarchy. The most furious monks reigned over the conscience of women and bigots, and the hatred of the Latin name was the first principle of nature and religion. Before his departure for Italy, the emperor had flattered the city with the assurance of a prompt relief and a powerful succor and a clergy confident in their orthodoxy and science. They had promised themselves and their flocks an easy victory over the blind shepherds of the west. The double disappointment exasperated the Greeks. The conscience of the subscribing prelates was awakened, the hour of temptation was passed, and they had more to dread from the public resentment that they could hope from the favor of the emperor or the pope. Instead of justifying their conduct, they deplored their weakness, professed their contrition, and cast themselves on the mercy of God and their brethren. To their approachable question, what had been the event or the use of the Italian Senate, they answered with sighs and tears. Alas, we have made a new fate. We have exchanged piety for impiety. We have betrayed the immaculate sacrifice, and we have become azimites. The azimites were those who celebrated the communion with unleavened bread, and I must retract or qualify the praise which I have bestowed on the growing philosophy of the times. Alas, we have been seduced by the stress, my fraud, and by the hopes and fears of transitory life. The hand that has signed the union should be cut off, and the tongue that has pronounced the Latin creed deserves to be torn from the root. The best proof of their repentance was an increase of zeal for the most trivial rights and the most incomprehensible doctrines, and an absolute separation from all without accepting their prince, who preserved some regard for honor and consistency. After the disease of the Patriot Joseph, the archbishops of Heraclea and Trebizond had courage to refuse the vacant office, and Cardinal Bessarion preferred a warm and comfortable shelter of the Vatican. The choice of the emperor and his clergy was confined to metrophonics of Succicus. He was consecrated in Saint Sophia, but the temple was vacant. The cross-bearers abdicated their service, the infection spread from the city to the villages, and metrophonics discharged without effect, some at least siastical thunders against the nation of schismatics. The eyes of the Greeks were directed to Mark of Ephesus, the champion of his country, and the sufferings of the Holy Confessor were repaid with the tribute of admiration and applause. His example and writings propagated the flame of religious discord. Age and infirmity soon removed him from the world, but the Gospel of Mark was not a law of forgiveness, and he requested with his dying breath that none of the adherents of Rome might attend the obsequities or pray for his soul. The schism was not confined to the narrow limits of the Byzantine Empire. Secure under the Mamaluk Scepter, the three patriarchs of Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem, assembled numerous synod, disowned their representatives at Ferrara and Florence, condemned the creed and council of the Latins, and threatened the emperor of Constantinople with the censures of the Eastern Church. Of the sectaries of the Greek Communion, the Russians were the most powerful, ignorant, and superstitious. Their primate, the cardinal Isidore, hastened from Florence to Moscow to reduce the independent nation under the Roman yoke. But the Russian bishops had been educated at Mount Athos, and the prince and people embraced the theology of their priests. They were scandalized by the title, the palm, the Latin cross of the legate, the friend of those empire's men who shaved their beards and performed a divine office with gloves on their hands and rings on their fingers. Isidore was condemned by a synod, his person was imprisoned in a monastery, and it was with extreme difficulty that the cardinal could escape from the hands of fierce and fanatic people. The Russians refused to passage the missionaries of Rome who aspired to convert the pagans beyond the Tannais, and their refusal was justified by the maxim that the guilt of idolatry is less damnable than that of schism. The errors of the Bohemians were excused by their abhorrence for the pope, and the deputation of the Greek clergy solicited the friendship of those sanguinary enthusiasts. While Eugenius triumphed in the union and orthodoxy of the Greeks, his party was contracted to the walls rather to the palace of Constantinople. The seal of Paleologus had been excised by interest. It was soon cooled by opposition. An attempt to vitiate the national belief might endanger his life in crown. Not could the pious rebels be destitute of foreign and domestic aid. The sword of his brother Demetrius, when Italy had maintained a prudent and popular silence, was half unsheathed in the course of religion, and Amurad, Turkish sultan, was displeased and alarmed by the seeming friendship of the Greeks and Latins. Sultan Murad, or Amurad, lived 49 and reigned 30 years, 6 months and 8 days. He was a just and valiant prince of a great soul, patient of labourers, learned merciful religious charitable, a lover and encourager of the studios, and of all who excelled in any art or science, a good emperor and a great general. No man obtained moral greater victories than Amurad. Belgrade alone withstood his attacks. On his reign, the soldier was ever victorious, the citizen rich and secure. If he subdued any country, his first care was to build mosques and caravanseras, hospitals and colleges. Every year he gave a thousand pieces of gold to the sons of the prophet, and sent 2,500 to the religious persons of Mecca, Medina and Jerusalem. This portrait is transcribed from the historian of the Ottoman Empire, but the applause of a servile and superstitious people has been lavished on the worst of tyrants and the virtues of a sultan, or often devises most useful to himself, or most agreeable to his subjects. An Asian ignorant of the equal benefits of liberty and law must be awed by the flashes of arbitrary power. The cruelty of a despot will assume the character of justice, his profusion of liberality, his obstinacy of firmness. If the most reasonable excuse be rejected, few acts of obedience will be found impossible, and guilt must tremble where innocence cannot always be secure. The tranquility of the people and the discipline of his troops were best maintained by perpetual action in the field, war was the trade of the jenniseries, and those who survived the peril and divided the spoil applauded the generous ambition of their sovereign. To propagate the true religion was the duty of the faithful muslim. The unbelievers were his enemies, and those were the prophet, and in the hands of the Turks, the symetre was the only instrumental conversion. Under these circumstances, however, the justice and moderation of Amurat are attested by his conduct and acknowledged by the Christians themselves, who consider a prosperous reign and a peaceful death as the reward of his singular merits. In the vigor of his age and military power, he seldom engaged in war till he was justified by a previous and adequate provocation. The victorious Sultan was disarmed by submission, and in the observance of treaties, his word was inviolate and sacred. The Hungarians were commonly the aggressors. He was provoked by the revolt of Skanderbeg, and the perfidious Karamanian was twice vanquished and twice pardoned by the Ottoman monarch. Before he invaded the Moria, Thebes had been surprised by the despot in the conquest of Thessalonica. The grandson of Baza Jait might dispute the recent purchase of the Venetians, and after the first siege of Constantinople, the Sultan was never tempted by the distress, the absence, or the injuries of Palaeologus to extinguish the dying light for the Byzantine Empire. But the most striking feature in the life and character of Amurath is the double abdication of the Turkish throne, and were not his motives debased by an alloy of superstition, we must praise the royal philosopher, who at the age of 40 could discern the vanity of human greatness. For assigning the scepter to his son, he retired to the pleasant residence of Magnesia, but he retired to the society of saints and hermits. It was not till the fourth century of the Higheera that the religion of Muhammad had been corrupted by an institution so adverse to his genius, but in the age of the Crusades, the various orders of dervishes were multiplied by the example of the Christian and even Latin monks. The Lord of nations submitted to fast and pray and turned round in endless rotation with the fanatics, whom he stuck the jiddiness of the head for the illumination of the spirit, but he was soon awakened from his dreams of enthusiasm by the Hungarian invasion, and his obedient son was the former's to urge the public danger and the wishes of the people. Under the banner of the veteran leader, the Geneserys fought and conquered, but he withdrew from the field of Varna, again to pray too fast and to turn round with his Magnesian brethren. These pious occupations were again interrupted by the danger of the state, a victorious army disdain the inexperience of their youthful ruler. The city of Adrianople was abandoned to the rapine slaughter, and the unanimous divan implored his presence to appease the tumult and prevent the rebellion from the Geneserys. At the well-known voice of their master, they trembled and obeyed, and their reluctant sultan was compelled to support his splendid servitude, till at the end of 40 years he was relieved by the angel of death. Age or disease, misfortune or caprice have tempted several princes to dissent from the throne, and they have had leisure to repent of their irretrievable step. But Amorat alone, in the full liberty of choice, after the trial of empire solitude, has repeated his preference of private life. After the departure of his Greek brethren, Eugenius had not been unmindful of their temporal interests, and his tender regard for the Byzantine empire was animated by just apprehension of the Turks, who approached and might soon invade the borders of Italy. But the spirit of the Crusades had expired, and the coldness of the Franks was not less unreasonable than their headlong passion. In the 11th century, a fanatic monk could precipitate Europe on Asia for the recovery of the Holy Sepulchre, but in the 15th, the most pressing motives of religion and policy were insufficient to unite the Latins in the defense of Christendom. Germany was an inexhaustible storehouse of men and arms, but that complex and languid body required the impulse of a vigorous hand, and Frederick III was alike impotent in his personal character and his imperial dignity. A long war had impaired the strength without satiating the animosity of France and England, but Philip Duke of Burgundy was a vain and magnificent prince, and he enjoyed without danger or expense the adventurous piety with subjects who sailed in a gallant fleet from the coast of Landers to the Hellespont. The maritime republics of Venice and Guinea were less remote from the scene of action, and their hostile fleets were associated under the standard of St. Peter. The kingdoms of Hungary and Poland, which covered, as it were, the interior pale of the Latin Church, were the most nearly concerned to oppose the progress of the Turks. Arms were the patrimony of disquietions and summations, and these nations might appear equal to the context, could they point against the common foe, those swords that were so wanderingly drawn in bloody and domestic quarrels. But the same spirit was adverged to conquer the Nobedians. A poor country and a limited monarch are incapable of maintaining a standing force, and the loose bodies of Polish and Hungarian horse were not armed with the sentiments and weapons which, on some occasions, have given irresistible weight to the French chivalry. Yet on this side, the designs of the Roman Pontiff and the eloquence of Cardinal Julian, his legate, were promoted by the circumstances of the times, by the union of the two crowns on the head of Ladislaus, a young and ambitious soldier, by the valor of a hero whose name, the name of John Huniades, was already popular among the Christians and formidable to the Turks. An endless treasure of pardons and indulgences was scattered by the legate. Many private warriors of France and Germany enlisted under the Holy Banner, and the crusade derived some strength, or at least some reputation, from the new allies, both of Europe and Asia. A fugitive desperate of Serbia exaggerated the distress and ardour of the Christians way on the Danube, who would unanimously rise to vindicate their religion and liberty. The Greek emperor, with a spirit unknown to his fathers, engaged to guard the Bosphorus and to salivate on Constantinople the head of his national and mercenary troops. The Sultan of Caramania announced the retreat of Amurat, and a powerful diversion in the heart of Anatolia, and if the fleets of the west could occupy at the same moment the straits of the Hellespont, the Ottoman monarchy would be dissevered and destroyed. Heaven and earth must rejoice in the perdition of the miscreants, and the legates with prudent ambiguity instilled the opinion on the invisible, perhaps the visible, aid of the Son of God, and his Divine Mother. Of the Polish and Hungarian diets, a religious war was the unanimous cry and laddies' louse, after passing the Danube, led an army of his confederate subjects as far as Sofia, the capital of the Bulgarian Kingdom. In this expedition they obtained two signal victories, which were justly ascribed to the valor and conduct of Hunyades. In the first, with a vanguard of 10,000 men, he surprised the Turkish camp. In the second, he vanquished and made prisoner the most renowned of the generals, who possessed the double advantage of grounded numbers. The approach of winter, and the natural and artificial obstacles of Mount Hamas, arrested the progress of the hero, who measured a narrow interval of six days march from the foot of the mountains to the hostile towers of Adrianople, and the friendly capital of the Greek Empire. The retreat was undisturbed, and the entrance into Buda was at once a military and religious triumph. An ecclesiastical procession was followed by the king and his warriors of foot. He nicely balanced the merits and rewards of the two nations, and the pride of conquest was blended with the humble temper of Christianity. Thirteen boshos, nine standards and four thousand captives were unquestionable trophies, and as all were willing to believe, and none were present to contradict. The crusaders multiplied with unblushing confidence, the myriad of Turks who they had left on the fields of battle. The most solid proof, and the most salutary consequence of victory, was the deputation from the divan to solicit peace, to restore Serbia, to ransom the prisoners, and to evacuate the Hungarian frontiers. By this treaty, the rational objects of the war were obtained, the king, the despot, and Huniadis himself, in the diet of Zygerin, were satisfied with public and private emolement. A truce of ten years was concluded, and the followers of Jesus and Muhammad, who swore on the Gospel and the Quran, attested the Word of God as the guardian of truth and the Avenger of Perfidy. In the place of the Gospel, the Turkish ministers had proposed to substitute the Eucharist, the real presence of the Catholic deity, but the Christians refused to profane their holy mysteries, and the superstitious conscience is less forcibly bound by the spiritual energy, than by the outward invisible symbols of an oath. During the whole transaction, the cardinal legate had observed the solemn silence, unwilling to approve, and unable to oppose the consent to the king and people. But the diet was not dissolved before Julian was fortified by the welcome intelligence that Anatolia was invaded by the Caramanian, and traced by the Greek Emperor, that the fleets of Genua, Venice and Burgundy were masters of the helispand, and that the allies informed of the victory and ignorant of the Treaty of Ladislaus, impatiently waited for the return of his victorious army. And this thus explained the cardinal, that you will desert their expectations and your own fortune. It is to them, to your God, and your fellow Christians, that you have pledged your faith, and that prior obligation annihilates a rash and sacrilegious oath to the enemies of Christ. His vicar on earth is the Roman Pontiff, without whose sanction you can neither promise nor perform. In his name, I absolve your perjury and sanctify your arms. I follow your footsteps in the path of glory and salvation, and if still ye have scruples, devolve on my head the punishment and the sin. This mischievous casuistry was seconded by his respectable character, and the levity of popular assemblies, war was resolved on the same spot where peace had so lately been sworn, and in the execution of the Treaty, the Turks were assaulted by the Christians to whom, with some reason, they might apply the epithet of infidels. The false Sudevladyslaus to his word and oath was palliated by the religion of the times. The most perfect, or at least the most popular excuse, would have been the success of his arms in the deliverance of the Eastern Church. But the same Treaty which should have bound his conscience had diminished his strength. On the proclamation of the peace, the French and German volunteers departed with indignant murmurs. The Poles were exhausted by distant warfare and perhaps disgusted with foreign command, and their palatines accepted the first license and hastily retired to their provinces and castles. Even Hungary was divided by a faction or restrained by a lawful scruple, and the relics of the crusade that marched in the Second Expedition were reduced to an inadequate force of 20,000 men. A Wallachian chief who joined the royal standards with his vessels presumed to remark that their numbers did not exceed the hunting retinue that sometimes attended the Sultan, and the gift of two horses of matchless speed might admonish Ladislaus of his secret foresight of the event. But the despot of Serbia, after the restoration of his country and children, was tempted by the promise of new realms, and the inexperience of the king, the enthusiasm of the legate, and the martial presumption of Huniades himself were persuaded that every obstacle must yield to the invincible virtue of the sword and the cross. After the passage of the Danube, two roads might lead to Constantinople and the Hellespont, the one direct, abrupt, and difficult through the mountains of Hymnus, the other more tedious and secure of a reliable country and along the shores of the Uxin, in which their flanks, according to the Skivian discipline, might always be covered by a movable fortification of wagons. The latter was judiciously preferred. The Catholics marched through the plains of Bulgaria, burning with wanton cruelty the churches and villages of Christian natives. And the last station was at Varna, near the seashore, on which the defeat and death of Ladislavs had bestowed a memorable name. End of chapter 67 part 1 recording by Monsbru, Helsingfors, Finland Chapter 67 part 2 of the history of the decline and fall of the Roman Empire, volume 6. This is a Librivox recording. All Librivox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librivox.org. The history of the decline and fall of the Roman Empire, volume 6, by Edward Gibbon. Chapter 67 part 2 It was on this fatal spot that, instead of finding a confederate fleet to second their operations, they were alarmed by the approach of Amurat himself, where he issued from his magnesium solitude and transported the forces of Asia to the defense of Europe. According to some writers, the Greek emperor had been awed or seduced to grant the passage of the phosphorus, and an indelible stain of corruption is fixed on the Genoese, or the Pope's nephew, the Catholic admiral, whose mercenary connivance betrayed the guard of the Hellespent. From Adrianople, the Sultan advanced by hasty marches at the head of 60,000 men, and when the Cardinal and Huniades had taken a nearer survey of the numbers in order of the Turks, these ardent warriors proposed the tardy and impracticable measures of a retreat. The king alone was resolved to conquer or die, and his resolution had almost been crowned with a glorious and salutary victory. The princes were opposite to each other in the center, and the Bigler Bigs, or generals of Anatolia and Romania, commanded on the right and left against the adverse divisions of the Despot and Huniades. The Turkish wings were broken on the first onset, but the advantage was fatal, and the rash victors, in the heat of the pursuit, were carried away far from the annoyance of the enemy, or the support of their friends. When Amurat beheld the flight of his squadrons, he disbared of his fortune and that of the Empire, a veteran Janisari seized his horse's bridle, and he had magnanimity to pardon and reward the soldier who dared to perceive the terror and arrest the flight of his sovereign. A copy of the treaty, the monument of Christian perfidy, had been displayed in front of the battle, and it is said that the Sultan in his distress, lifting his eyes and his hands to heaven, implored the protection of the God of Truth, and called on the Prophet Jesus himself to avenge the impious mockery of his name and religion. With inferior numbers and disordered ranks, the King of Hungary rushed forward in the confidence of victory, till his career was stopped by the impenetrable phalanx or the Janisaris. If we make ready the Ottoman annuals, his horse was pierced by the javelin of Amurat, he fell among the spears of the infantry, and the Turkish soldier proclaimed with a loud voice, Hungarian, behold the head of your king. The death of Ladislaus was the signal of their defeat, on his return from an intemperate pursuit. When Yadis deplored his error and the public loss, he strove to rescue the royal body till he was overwhelmed by the tumultuous crowded victors and vanquished, and the last efforts of his courage and conduct was exerted to save the remnant of his Wallachian cavalry. Ten thousand Christians were slain in the disastrous Battle of Varna. The loss of the Turks, more considerable in numbers, bore a smaller proportion to their total strength, yet the philosophic Sultan was not ashamed to confess that his ruin must be the consequence of a second and similar victory. At his command, the colon was erected on the spot where Ladislaus had fallen, but the modest inscription, instead of recusing the rashness, recorded the valor and bewailed the misfortune for the Hungarian youth. Before I was sited to the field of Varna, I attempted to pause on the character and story of two principal actors, Cardinal Julian and John Huniades. Julian Cesarini was born of a noble family in Rome. His study had embraced both the Latin and Greek learning, both the sciences of divinity and law, and his versatile genius was equally adapted to the schools, the camp and the court. No sooner had he been invested with the Roman purple, that he was sent into Germany to arm the empire against the rebels and heretics of Bohemian, the spirit of persecution is unworthy of a Christian. The military profession ill becomes a priest, but the former is excused by the times, and the latter was ennobled by the courage of Julian, who stood dauntless and alone in the disgraceful flight of the German host. As the Pope's legate, he opened the council of Basel, but the president soon appeared, the most tenuous champion of ecclesiastical freedom, and an opposition of seven years was conducted by his ability in zeal. After promoting the strongest measures against the authority and person of a eugenius, some secret motive of interest or conscience engaged him to desert on the sudden the popular party. The Cardinal withdrew himself from Basel to Ferrara, and in the debates of the Greeks and Latins, the two nations admired dexterity of his arguments and the depth of his theological euridition. In his Hungarian embassy, who have already seen the mischievous effects of his sophistry and eloquence of which Julian himself was the first victim. The Cardinal, who performed the duties of a priest and soldier, was lost in the defeat of Varna. The circumstances of his death are variously related, but it is believed that the weighty incomprehence of gold impeded his flight and tempted the crew laboratories of some Christian fugitives. From a humble or at least a doubtful origin, the merit of John Huniades promoted him to the command of the Hungarian armies. His father was a Velakian, his mother a Greek, her unknown race might possibly ascend to the emperor of Constantinople and the claims of the Velakians with the surname of Corvinus from the place of his nativity might suggest the thin pretense for mingling his blood with the petitions of ancient Rome. In his youth he served in the wars of Italy and also detained with 12 horsemen by the bishop of Sagreb the valour of the white knight was soon conspicuous. He increased his fortunes by noble and wealthy marriage and in defence of the Hungarian borders he won in the same year three battles against the Turks. By his influence Ladislaus of Poland obtained the crown of Hungary and the important service was rewarded by the title and office of Wywood of Transylvania. The first of Julian's Crusades added two Turkish laurels on his brow and in the public distress the fatal errors of Werner were forgotten. During the absence and minority of Ladislaus of Austria the titular king Hunyades was elected supreme captain and governor of Hungary and if envy at first was silenced by terror a reign of 12 years supposes the arts of policy as well as of war. Yet the idea of a consummate general is not delineated in his campaigns. The white knight fought with the hand rather than the head as the chief of the sultry barbarians who attacked without fear and fly without shame and his military life is composed of a romantic alternative of victories and escapes. By the Turks who employed his name to frighten the perverse children he was corruptly denominated Janku's line or the wicked. Their hatred is the proof of their esteem. The kingdom which he guarded was inaccessible to their arms and they felt him most daring and formidable when they fondly believed the captain and his country irrecoverably lost. Instead of confining himself to a defensive war four years after the defeat of Varna he again penetrated into the heart of Bulgaria and in the plane of Kosovo sustained till the third day the shock of the Ottoman army four times more numerous than in seven. As he fled alone through the woods of Alakja the hero was surprised by two robbers but while they disputed a gold chain that hung at his neck he recovered his sword slew the one terrified the other and after new perils of captivity or death consoled by his presence in afflicted kingdom. But the last and most glorious action of his life was the defense of Belgrade against the powers of Muhammad II in person. After a siege of 40 days the Turks who had already entered the town were compelled to retreat and the joyful nations celebrated Hunyades and Belgrade as the bulwarks of Christendom. About a month after this great deliverance the champion expired and his most splendid epitaph is the regret of the Ottoman prince who sighed that he could no longer hope for revenge against the single antagonist who had triumphed over his arms. On the first vacancy of the throne Matthias Corvinus a youth of 18 years of age was elected and crowned by the grateful Hungarians. His reign was prosperous and long. Matthias aspired to the glory of a conqueror and the saint but his purest merit is the encouragement of learning and the Latin orators and historians who were invited from Italy by the sun have shed a luster of their eloquence on the father's character. In the list of heroes John Hunyades and Skanderbeg are commonly associated and they are both entitled to our notice since their occupation of the Ottoman army delayed the ruin of the Greek empire. John Castriot the father of Skanderbeg was the hereditary prince of a small district of Ipirus or Albania between the mountains and the Adriatic Sea unable to contend with the sultan's power Castriot submitted to the hard conditions of peace and tributes. He delivered his four sons as the pledges of his fidelity and the Christian youths after receiving the marks of circumcision were instructed in the Mohammedan religion and trained in the alms and arts of Turkish policy. The three elder brothers were confounded in the crowd of slaves and the poison to which their deaths are described cannot be verified or disproved by any positive evidence. If the suspicion is in great measure removed by the kind and paternal treatment of George Castriot the fourth brother who from his tender youth displayed the strength and spirit of a soldier the successive overthrow of a Tartar and two Persians who carried a proud defiance to the Turkish court recommended him to the favor of Amurat and his Turkish appellation of Skanderbeg Iskenderbeg or the Lord of Alexander is an indelible memorial of his glory and servitude. His father's principality was reduced into a province but the loss was compensated by the rank and title of Sanjiaq a commander of 5000 horse and the prospect of the first dignities of the empire. He served with honor in the wars of Europe and Asia and we may smile at the art or credulity of the historian who supposes that in every encounter he spared the Christians while he fell with a thundering arm on his muslim foes. The glory of Hunyades is without reproach. He fought in the defense of his religion and country but the enemies who applaud the patriot have branded his rival with the name of traitor and the post. In the eyes of the Christian the rebellion of Skanderbeg is justified by his father's wrongs the ambiguous death of his three brothers his own degradation and the slavery of his country and they adored the generous the Tartar zeal with which he asserted the faith and the dependence of his ancestors but he had imbibed from his 90th year the doctrine of the Quran he was ignorant of the gospel the religion of a soldier is determined by authority and habit nor is it easy to conceive what new elimination at the age of 40 could be poured into his soul. His motives would be less exposed to the suspicion of interest or revenge had he broken his chain from the moment that he was sensible of its weight but a long oblivion had surely impaired his original rights and every year of obedience and reward it cemented the mutual bond of the Sultan and his subject. If Skanderbeg had long harbored the belief of Christianity and the intentional revolt a worthy mind must condemn the base dissimulation that could serve only to betray that could promise only to be forsoorn that could actively join in the temporal and spiritual perdition of so many thousands of his unhappy brethren. Shall we praise a secret correspondence with Huniades? Will he command the vanguard of the Turkish army? Shall we excuse the desertion of his standard? A treacherous desertion which abandoned the victory to the enemies of his benefactor? In the confusion of a defeat the IO Skanderbeg was fixed on the race Effendi or principal secretary with the dagger at his breast he extorted a foreman or patent for the government of Albania and the murder of the guyless scribe and his train prevented the consequences of an immediate discovery with some bold companions to whom he had revealed his design he escaped in the night by rapid marches from the field of battle to his paternal mountains the gates of Kroja were open to the royal mandate and no sooner did he command the fortress than George Kastriot dropped the mask of dissimulation abjured the prophet and the sultan and proclaimed himself the avenger of his family and country the names of religion and liberty provoked the general revolt the Albanians and martial race were unanimous to live and die with their hereditary prince and the Ottoman garrisons were indulged in the choice of martyrdom or baptism in the assembly of the states of Epirus Skanderbeg was elected general of the Turkish war and each of the allies engaged to furnish his respective proportion of men and money from these contributions from his patrimonial estate and from the valuable salt pit so Selina he drew an annual revenue of 200,000 ducats and the entire sum, exempt from the bonds of luxury was strictly appropriated to public use his manners were popular but his discipline was severe and every superfluous vice was banished from his camp his examples strengthened his command and under his conduct the Albanians were invincible in their own opinion and that of their enemies the bravest adversaries of France and Germany were allured by his fame and retained in his service his standing militia consisted of 8,000 horses and 7,000 foot the horses were small the men were active but he viewed with a discerning eye the difficulties and the sources of the mountains and at the blaze of the beacons the whole nation was distributed in the strongest posts with such unequal arms Skanderbeg resisted 23 years the powers of the Ottoman Empire and two conquerors Amurat II and his greater son were repeatedly baffled by rebel whom they pursued with seeming contempt and implacable resentment at the head of 60,000 horses and 40,000 Janissaries Amurat entered Albania he might ravage the open country occupy the defenseless towns convert the churches into mosques circumcise the christian youths and punish with death his adult and obstinate captives but the conquests of the sultan were confined to the petty fortress of his 50 grad and the garrison invincible to his arms were oppressed by a paltry artifice and a superstitious scruple Amurat retired with shame and loss from the walls of Kroja the castle and residence of the Kastriols the march, the siege, the retreat were harassed by a vexatious and almost invincible adversary and the disappointment might tend to embitter perhaps to shorten the last days of the sultan in the fullness of conquest Muhammad II still felt at his bosom this domestic thorn his lieutenants were permitted to negotiate the truce and the Albanian prince may justly be praised as a firm and able champion of his natural independence the enthusiasm of chivalry and religion has ranked him with the names of Alexander and Pyrrhus nor would they blush to acknowledge their intrepid countrymen but his narrow dominion and slender powers must leave him at a humble distance below the heroes of antiquity with triumph toward the east and their own legions his splendid achievements the bachelors whom he encountered the armies that he discomforted and the 3000 Turks who were slain by his single hand must be weighted in the scales of suspicious criticism against an illiterate enemy and in the dark solitude of Epirus his partial biographers may safely indulge the latitude of romance but their fictions are exposed by the light of Italian history and they afford a strong presumption against their own truth by a fabulous tale of his exploits when he passed the Adriatic with 800 horses to the so-called of the king of Naples without disparagement to his fame they might have owned that he was finally oppressed by the Ottoman powers in his extreme danger he applied to Pope Pius II for a refuge in the ecclesiastical state and his resources were almost exhausted since Skanderbeg died a fugitive at Lissus on the Venetian territory his sepulchre was soon violated by the Turkish conquerors but the Janissaries who wore his bones encased in a bracelet declared by this superstitious amulet during voluntary reverence for his valor the instant ruin of his country made it down to the hero's glory yet, yet had he balanced the consequences of submission and resistance a patriot perhaps would have declined the unequal contest which must depend on the life and genius of one man Skanderbeg might indeed be supported by the rational though fallacious hope that the Pope, the king of Naples and the Venetian Republic would join in the defence of a free and Christian people who guarded the sea coast of the Adriatic and a narrow passage from Greece to Italy his infant son was saved from the national shipwreck the Castriots were invested with the Neapolitan duke them and their blood continues to flow in the noblest families of the realm a colony of Albanian fugitives obtained a settlement in Calabria and they preserve at this day the language and manners of their ancestors in the long career of the decline and fall of the Roman Empire I have reached at last the last reign of the Princess of Constantinople who so feebly sustained the name and majesty of the Seasers under the disease of John Paleologus who survived about four years to Hungarian Crusade the royal family by the death of Andronicus and the monastic profession of Isidore was reduced to three princes Constantine, Demetrius and Thomas the surviving sons of the Emperor Manuel of these the first and the last were far distant in the Morea but Demetrius who possessed the domain of Selibria was in the suburbs at the head of a party his ambition was not chilled by the public distress and his conspiracy with the Turks and the Schismatics had already disturbed the peace of his country the funeral of the late emperor was accelerated with singular and even suspicious haste the claim of Demetrius to the vacant throne was justified by a trite and flimsy sophism that he was born in the purple the eldest son of his father's reign but the Empress mother the senate and soldiers the clergy and people were unanimous in the course of the lawful successor and the despot Thomas who ignorant of the change accidentally returned to the capital asserted with becoming sealed the interest of his absent brother an ambassador the historian Franzer was immediately dispatched to the court of Adrian Apple Amorata received him with honor and dismissed him with gifts but the gracious appropriation of the Turkish Sultan announced his supremacy and the approaching downfall of the eastern empire by the hands of two illustrious deputies the imperial crown was placed at Sparta on the head of Constantine in the spring he sailed from the Maria escaped the encounter of a Turkish squadron enjoyed the acclimations of his subjects celebrated the festival of a new reign and exhausted by his donatives the treasurer or rather the indigents of the state the emperor immediately resigned to his brothers the possession of the Maria and the brittle friendship of the two princes Demetrius and Thomas was confined in their mother's presence by a frail security of oaths and embraces his next occupation was the choice of a concert the daughter of the dords of Venice had been proposed but the Byzantine nobles objected the distance between a headard, dirty monarch and an elective magistrate and in their subsequent distress the chief of that powerful republic was not unmindful of the affront Constantine afterwards hesitated between the royal families of Trebisond and Georgia and the embassy of Franca represents in his public and private life the last days of the Byzantine empire the Provestiar or Great Chamberlain Franca sailed from Constantinople as the minister of a bridegroom and the relics of wealth and luxury were applied to his pompous appearance his numerous retinue consisted of nobles and guards of physicians and monks he was attended by a band of music and the term of his costly embassy was protected above two years on his arrival in Georgia or Iberia the natives from the towns and villages flocked around the strangers and such was their simplicity that they were delighted with the effects without understanding the cause of musical harmony among the crowd was an old man above a hundred years of age who had formally been carried away captive by the barbarians and who amused his hearers with the tale of the wonders of India from whence he had returned to Portugal by an unknown sea from this hospitable land Franca proceeded to the court of Trebisond where he was informed by the Greek prince of the recent disease of Amorad instead of rejoicing in the deliverance the experienced statesman expressed his apprehension that an ambitious youth would not long adhere to this age in the pacific system of his father after the sultan's disease his Christian wife Maria the daughter of the Serbian despot had been honorably restored to her parents on the fame of her royal beauty and merit she was recommended by the ambassador as the most worthy object of the royal choice and Franca recapitulates and refutes the specious objections that might be raised against the proposal the majesty of the purple with the noble and unequal alliance the bar of affinity might be removed by liberal arms and the dispassionation of the church the disgrace of Turkish nuptials had been repeatedly overlooked and though the fair Maria was nearly 50 years of age she might yet hope to give an heir to the empire Constantine listened to the advice which was transmitted in the first ship that sailed from Trebisond but the factions of the court opposed his marriage and it was finally prevented by the pious vow of the sultan who ended her days in the monastic profession reduced to the first alternative the choice of Franca was decided in favor of a Georgian princess and the vanity of her father was dazzled by the glorious alliance instead of demanding according to the primitive and national customer price for his daughter he offered a portion of 56 000 with an annual pension of 5000 dukats and the services of the ambassador were repaid by an assurance that as his son had been adopted in baptism by the emperor the establishment of his daughter should be the peculiar care of the empress of Constantineople on the return of Franca the treaty was ratified by the greek monarch who with his own hand impressed three vermilion crosses on the golden bull and assured the Georgian envoy that in the spring his galleys would conduct the bride to her imperial palace but Constantine embraced his faithful servant not with the cold approbation of a sovereign but with the warm confidence of a friend who after a long absence is impatient to pour his secrets into the bosom of his friend since the death of my mother and of Kantat Zuini who alone advised me without interest or passion I'm surrounded said the emperor by men whom I can neither love nor trust nor esteem you are not a stranger to Lukas Notaras the great admiral obstinately attached to his own sentiments he declares both in private and public that his sentiments are the absolute measure of my thoughts and actions the rest of the courtiers are swayed by their personal or factitious views and how can I consult the monks on the questions of policy and marriage I have yet much employment for your diligence and fidelity in the spring you shall engage one of my brothers to solicit the succor of the western powers from the Morea you shall sail to Cyprus on a particular commission and from thence proceed to Georgia to receive and conduct the future empires your commands replied Franca are irresistible but then great sir he added with a serious smile to consider that if I am thus perpetually absent from my family my wife may be tempted either to seek another husband or throw herself into a monastery after laughing at his apprehensions the emperor more gravely consoled him by the pleasing assurances that this should be his last service abroad and that they distanced for his son a wealthy and noble heiress for himself the important office of great logitate or principal minister of state the marriage was immediately stipulated but the office however incompatible with his own had been asserted by the ambition of the admiral some delay was requisite to negotiate a consent and an equivalent and the nomination of Franca was half declared and half suppressed lest it might be displeasing to an insolent and powerful favorite the winter was spent in the preparations of his embassy and Franca had resolved that his young son should embrace this opportunity of foreign travel and be left on the appearance of danger with his maternal kindred of the Maria such were the private and public designs which were interrupted by a Turkish war and finally buried in the ruins of the empire end of chapter 67 part 2 recording by Monsbruh Helsingfors Finland