iraculous power would smooth the
difficulties of their holy enterprise. The cloud and pillar of Jehovah
had marched before the Israelites into the promised land. Might not the
Christians more reasonably hope that the rivers would open for their
passage; that the walls of their strongest cities would fall at the
sound of their trumpets; and that the sun would be arrested in his mid
career, to allow them time for the destruction of the infidels?

Chapter LVIII: The First Crusade.--Part II.

Of the chiefs and soldiers who marched to the holy sepulchre, I will
dare to affirm, that _all_ were prompted by the spirit of enthusiasm;
the belief of merit, the hope of reward, and the assurance of divine
aid. But I am equally persuaded, that in many it was not the sole, that
in _some_ it was not the leading, principle of action. The use and abuse
of religion are feeble to stem, they are strong and irresistible to
impel, the stream of national manners. Against the private wars of the
Barbarians, their bloody tournaments, licentious love, and judicial
duels, the popes and synods might ineffectually thunder. It is a more
easy task to provoke the metaphysical disputes of the Greeks, to drive
into the cloister the victims of anarchy or despotism, to sanctify the
patience of slaves and cowards, or to assume the merit of the humanity
and benevolence of modern Christians. War and exercise were the reigning
passions of the Franks or Latins; they were enjoined, as a penance, to
gratify those passions, to visit distant lands, and to draw their swords
against the nation of the East. Their victory, or even their attempt,
would immortalize the names of the intrepid heroes of the cross; and the
purest piety could not be insensible to the most splendid prospect of
military glory. In the petty quarrels of Europe, they shed the blood of
their friends and countrymen, for the acquisition perhaps of a castle
or a village. They could march with alacrity against the distant and
hostile nations who were devoted to their arms; their fancy already
grasped the golden sceptres of Asia; and the conquest of Apulia and
Sicily by the Normans might exalt to royalty the hopes of the most
private adventurer. Christendom, in her rudest state, must have yielded
to the climate and cultivation of the Mahometan countries; and their
natural and artificial wealth had been magnified by the tales of
pilgrims, and the gifts of an imperfect commerce. The vulgar, both the