CHAP. II.]

ST. JOHN OR JERUSALEM.

107

The brother of the King of France and the King ofEngland’s eldest son, were there mingled with theirequals or superiors, many of them of the noblestbirth and qualities, and as unambitious as them-selves. Several of the others nourished views ofearthly ambition no doubt, yet was it ambition ofa very lofty kind. Monarchies, empires, diadems,and the summit of military reputation, might enterfor some share, and mix with their religious feel-ings—even without their knowing it; still Ver-mandois and Robert of Normandy had no projectswhatever, but heaven and glory.

Going round by Rome, the crusaders were soscandalized to see the soldiery of a Pope and of anAntipope fighting for the Lateran, the capital ofChristianity serving as the theatre of a civil war,that some of them refused to go any further, andreturned home. Profounder thinkers reflecting thatin this life a portion of the human must ever unitewith the best of the divine, and that inasmuchas it is human, it must be subject to imperfections

_whence it is written, “the just man falls seven

times a-day,” endeavoured to shut their eyes, andafter saying their prayers and visiting the curi-osities, hurried away; and all the divisions of thatmighty army soon met at Constantinople.

And most sumptuously were they treated in that