us videamus, non illico Francos
homines appellemus? (p. 478.) He owns, however, that the vivacity of the
French degenerates into petulance among foreigners, (p. 488.) and vain
loquaciousness, (p. 502.)]

[Footnote 9: Per viam quam jamdudum Carolus Magnus mirificus rex
Francorum aptari fecit usque C. P., (Gesta Francorum, p. 1. Robert.
Monach. Hist. Hieros. l. i. p. 33, &c.)]

[Footnote 10: John Tilpinus, or Turpinus, was archbishop of Rheims, A.D.
773. After the year 1000, this romance was composed in his name, by
a monk of the borders of France and Spain; and such was the idea of
ecclesiastical merit, that he describes himself as a fighting and
drinking priest! Yet the book of lies was pronounced authentic by Pope
Calixtus II., (A.D. 1122,) and is respectfully quoted by the abbot
Suger, in the great Chronicles of St. Denys, (Fabric Bibliot. Latin
Medii Aevi, edit. Mansi, tom. iv. p. 161.)]

It may occasion some surprise that the Roman pontiff should erect, in
the heart of France, the tribunal from whence he hurled his anathemas
against the king; but our surprise will vanish so soon as we form a just
estimate of a king of France of the eleventh century. [11] Philip the
First was the great-grandson of Hugh Capet, the founder of the present
race, who, in the decline of Charlemagne's posterity, added the regal
title to his patrimonial estates of Paris and Orleans. In this narrow
compass, he was possessed of wealth and jurisdiction; but in the rest
of France, Hugh and his first descendants were no more than the feudal
lords of about sixty dukes and counts, of independent and hereditary
power, [12] who disdained the control of laws and legal assemblies, and
whose disregard of their sovereign was revenged by the disobedience of
their inferior vassals. At Clermont, in the territories of the count
of Auvergne, [13] the pope might brave with impunity the resentment
of Philip; and the council which he convened in that city was not less
numerous or respectable than the synod of Placentia. [14] Besides his
court and council of Roman cardinals, he was supported by thirteen
archbishops and two hundred and twenty-five bishops: the number of
mitred prelates was computed at four hundred; and the fathers of the
church were blessed by the saints and enlightened by the doctors of the
age. From the adjacent kingdoms, a martial train of lords and knights of
power and renown attended the council, [15] in high expectation of its
resolves; a