metans. Abderam was found
dead in a vast heap, unwounded, stifled by his own multitude. Historians
record that three hundred and sixty thousand Saracens perished on _la
journee de Tours_; but their fears and their joy probably magnified
their enemies. Thus Charles saved his own country, and, at that moment,
all the rest of Europe, from this deluge of people, which had poured
down from Asia and Africa. Every Christian people returned a solemn
thanksgiving, and saluted their deliverer as "the Hammer" of France. But
the Saracens were not conquered; Charles did not even venture on their
pursuit; and a second invasion proved almost as terrifying; army still
poured down on army, and it was long, and after many dubious results,
that the Saracens were rooted out of France. Such is the history of one
of the most important events which has passed; but that of an event
which did not happen, would be the result of this famous conflict, had
the Mahometan power triumphed! The Mahometan dominion had predominated
through Europe! The imagination is startled when it discovers how much
depended on this invasion, at a time when there existed no political
state in Europe, no balance of power in one common tie of confederation!
A single battle, and a single treason, had before made the Mahometans
sovereigns of Spain. We see that the same events had nearly been
repeated in France: and had the Crescent towered above the Cross, as
every appearance promised to the Saracenic hosts, the least of our evils
had now been, that we should have worn turbans, combed our beards
instead of shaving them, have beheld a more magnificent architecture
than the Grecian, while the public mind had been bounded by the arts and
literature of the Moorish university of Cordova!

One of the great revolutions of Modern Europe perhaps had not occurred,
had the personal feelings of Luther been respected, and had his personal
interest been consulted. Guicciardini, whose veracity we cannot suspect,
has preserved a fact which proves how very nearly some important events
which have taken place, might not have happened! I transcribe the
passage from his thirteenth book: "Caesar (the Emperor Charles the
Fifth), after he had given an hearing in the Diet of Worms to Martin
Luther, and caused his opinions to be examined by a number of divines,
who reported that his doctrine was erroneous and pernicious to the
Christian religion, had, to gratify the pontiff, put him under the ban
o