1254.

THE PASTOUREAUX.

71

his habit the symbol of a crusader; thus marking that he considered his vow as unaccomplished. He reproached himself with the ill success of his expedition, as with a crime.

The love and respect borne by his people to Louis were not diminished by his reverses; on the contrary, his captivity excited general sympathy. The ardour to avenge his indignities upon the infidel was general. The devout opinions of that age, which saw the immediate hand of Providence in every event, - distributing good fortune as the reward of piety, and disaster as the punishment of infidelity,—at once attributed the failure of the crusade to the profligate lives of the barons and clergy. Both were considered unworthy to advance the cause of heaven. It was for the innocent and the humble, for those untainted with the vices of the time, luxury, avarice, violence, and pride, — to come forth and support the standard which they did not disgrace. The same idea had formerly prevailed, when many thousands of children were collected in a kind of crusading expedition, and perished miserably. Shepherds were now the class looked to as the fittest to recruit a divine army. Numbers of these assembled, and were joined by the poor and idle of all kinds.

Their first purpose was to combat the infidel and rescue Louis. But the Pastoureaux, as they were called, soon abandoned the conquest of the Saracen for the plunder and abuse of their betters at home. Their fanaticism naturally adopted the popular tone of hatred to the clergy, and distaste of their creed and yoke, which has ever existed—a smouldering fire, always quenched with blood, at least in France, though never to utter extinction. Whenever the people rose by insurrection to enjoy the free utterance of their opinions, these were found to resemble the religious and political heresies of the unfortunate Albigenses. By the measures of queen Blanche, the Pastoureaux were exterminated, and their chief slain as he was preaching publicly in the capital. The death of Raymond count of Toulouse was another

event that took place during the absence of Louis. The king's brother Alphonse, who had married Jeanne, succeeded to the peaceable possession and dignity of the counts of Toulouse. Thus two of the royal princes divided the south betwixt them: Charles of Anjou possessing Provence, or the eastern portion bordering on the Rhone; Alphonso the western. They united their forces in a war against the free cities of their region. Avignon was reduced, and Arles; Marseilles itself submitted: but it does not appear that any were harshly treated, or deprived of their privileges and franchises.

The remainder of St. Louis's reign is marked by few incidents, although it forms the most important epoch in the legislative history of France. The monarch, as he advanced in years, became still more absorbed in religious views and scruples. He came to have no other maxim of policy than the preservation of his own soul, and that of his fellow men. He consulted his conscience rather than his ministers, and preferred its counsels to those even of prudence or of patriotism. Such unworldly policy was likely to lead to most foolish acts. He had promised, on setting out for the crusade, to restore all that the kings of France had usurped.Henry III. of England claimed Normandy and Poitou in accomplishment of the offer, and Louis for a moment meditated ceding them: but the impolicy of the act struck him, as well as its justice. He could not reconcile his duties as Christian and as sovereign; he determined in consequence to abdicate the throne, and to enter a cloister. It was with difficulty he was dissuaded from the resolve, and brought to reign according to less rigid maxims of political honesty. He made peace, however, with Henry, and ceded to him the provinces of Perigord, the Limousin, the Agenois, and a part of Saintonges. In return Henry abandoned his right to Normandy and Poitou.

The good sense of Louis in this instance overcame the absurdity of monastic notions, and prevailed over the narrow precepts of his conscience and confessor. His views

1255.

LAW OF ST. LOUIS.

73

enlarged; they opened to the wide prospects of philanthropy; and in lieu of confining himself to the observance of ascetic, I had nearly said of selfish duties, the monarch gave himself to the more noble task of ameliorating the condition of his people. The établissemens

of St. Louis, as his laws are called, form the earliest considerable attempt at legislation in France. The first of them was directed against the right of private war, asserted and practised by the barons. It established, after the commission of any crime or act of violence, forty days of truce to be observed towards the relatives and friends of the criminal. This obliged the retaliation or vengeance to be personally confined to the offender, and not, as usual, extended to his kin and clan. This ordinance, known by the name of quarantaine le roi, was succeeded by the total abolition of the right of private war. Subsequent monarchs, however, unable to enforce the latter prohibitions, were content with upholding the former. The duel, or judicial combat, was another relic of barbarism and violence that St. Louis attacked by his enactments. The legists, his new counsellors, the modern lords of parliament and of the judicature, evidently dictated these ameliorations. Versed in the pandects and the Roman law, the licence and independence of feudal customs were odious to them. They swept all these away, substituting for intricate rights and turbulent privileges their own processes and verdicts. St. Louis has been lauded and censured for having, through them, undermined the power of the aristocracy, and for having converted a government, originally feudal and free, into an absolute monarchy. But Louis, with all his sagacity, saw not whither his enactments tended. He issued them more from a love of order, and from principles of piety, than from any Machiavelian craft or kingly policy. Even his legal counsellors may share this exculpation. They did but labour in the spirit of their calling. What most detracted from the influence of the barons was not the object of an express law. This was, drawing away the trying of causes from them and

their courts to those of the royal judges and the parliament. It was effected tacitly and gradually. Appeals were encouraged; cases in which they were allowed were extended and multiplied; and the lower and middling orders were taught to look to their sovereign for that impartial justice and protection, which they could not expect from the very noble with whom they were perhaps in litigation.

Another of the enactments of Louis showed, what was still less to be expected of him, his resistance to the usurpation and pernicious immunities of the church. Here the hand of the legists is clearly seen, defending their jurisdiction against that of the clergy, and declaring their law and its royal source independent of the Holy See, its canons and decretals. In the year 1268, was published an edict called the Pragmatic Sanction, which is considered as the foundation of the liberties of the Gallican church. This declares the right of collators to benefices, of cathedral churches, and of such as enjoyed the privilege of electing their superior, to be independent of the pope; that all church preferment and promotion shall be guided by ancient custom, despite of any modern decree issuing from Rome. restricts in the same manner the money levied in the kingdom for the papal treasury. The words of the edict are simple enough, and moderate; but in the reading, the French legists afterwards took care to construe it so as to oppose and frustrate every attempt at exaction or usurpation on the part of the Holy See. It is singular that the most formidable bulwark against the grasping pretensions of the popedom, should have been raised by the only monarch of Christendom whose virtues and piety have placed him on the saintly calendar..

It

England and France, those restless neighbours, remained at peace during these years. Henry III. was engaged in a struggle with his barons, headed by Simon de Montfort earl of Leicester, a descendant of the conqueror of the Albigenses. Louis IX. never took advantage of the weakness of the rival kingdom or monarch, and

1255. NAPLES CONVEYED TO THE HOUSE OF ANJOU. 75 did not interfere except with his good offices. In 1264, both parties referred their cause to his arbitration. The king held his court at Amiens for the purpose, and patiently heard the pleas on both sides.

With all his sense of justice, it was not, however, to be hoped that a monarch could give an impartial verdict in a cause where monarchy and liberty were at issue. Louis decided against the English barons, ordering, that all his castles and powers should be restored to Henry. This I equitable sentence," as Hume calls it, was not submitted to by the barons; and the civil war in England was in no wise allayed or terminated by Louis's arbitration.

About the period of the king's departure for the crusade, Italy and Germany were convulsed by the deadly quarrel between the pope and the emperor Frederic II. This monarch died soon after at Ferentino. The pope's enmity was continued against his son Conrad, who died suddenly in 1254, poisoned, as some suppose. He left a son, Conradin, then but three years of age, the last relic of the house of Suabia. Manfred, the natural son of Frederic, held possession of Naples, and defied all the efforts of the pope to drive him thence. Innocent IV. had promised Naples to a prince of Parma, if ḥe succeeded in subduing Manfred. Alexander IV., his successor, transferred this promise to Edmund, second son of Henry III., who contributed all the money he could raise to the conquest of a new kingdom, at a time when he could scarcely retain the one over which he reigned. Manfred, however, was still successful; and the pope felt the necessity of raising up a more powerful competitor. He despatched an envoy, offering the kingdom of Naples to St. Louis. The good king would not consent to usurp the right of the young Conradin ; but when his brother, Charles of Anjou, whose ambition was not contented with the country of Provence, lately acquired by him in marriage, offered himself as the conqueror and sovereign of Naples, Louis would not interfere.

He left Charles to act with his own resources;