the duel, did not
condemn the principle on which it was founded. They still encouraged the
popular belief of divine interference in all the disputes or differences
that might arise among nations or individuals. It was the very same
principle that regulated the ordeals, which with all their influence they
supported against the duel. By the former, the power of deciding the guilt
or innocence was vested wholly in their hands; while by the latter they
enjoyed no power or privilege at all. It is not to be wondered at that,
for this reason, if for no other, they should have endeavoured to settle
all differences by the peaceful mode. While that prevailed, they were, as
they wished to be, the first party in the state; but while the strong arm
of individual prowess was allowed to be the judge in all doubtful cases,
their power and influence became secondary to those of the nobility.

Thus it was not the mere hatred of bloodshed which induced them to launch
the thunderbolts of excommunication against the combatants: it was a
desire to retain the power, which, to do them justice, they were in those
times the persons best qualified to wield. The germs of knowledge and
civilisation lay within the bounds of their order; for they were the
representatives of the intellectual, as the nobility were of the physical
power of man. To centralise this power in the Church, and make it the
judge of the last resort in all appeals, both in civil and criminal cases,
they instituted five modes of trial, the management of which lay wholly in
their hands. These were, the oath upon the evangelists; the ordeal of the
cross and the fire ordeal, for persons in the higher ranks; the water
ordeal, for the humbler classes; and, lastly, the _corsned_, or bread and
cheese ordeal, for members of their own body.

The oath upon the evangelists was taken in the following manner. The
accused who was received to this proof, says Paul Hay, Count du Chastelet,
in his _Memoirs of Bertrand du Guesclin_, swore upon a copy of the New
Testament, and on the relics of the holy martyrs, or on their tombs, that
he was innocent of the crime imputed to him. He was also obliged to find
twelve persons of acknowledged probity who should take oath at the same
time that they believed him innocent. This mode of trial led to very great
abuses, especially in cases of disputed inheritance, where the hardest
swearer was certain of the victory. This abuse was one of the principal
causes