CHAP. I.]

ST. JOHN OF JERUSALEM.

119

remarkable above all the princes of his time for finemental qualifications, and knew all the branches ofsciences well, particularly logic, astronomy, andmedicine. Such was the impression he left in theEast . 1 But these are Mahometan accounts, whichmust be cooled down by those of our own chro-niclers. It is not a wonder the Hospitallers andTemplars should be against him, if the Popes wereso; since even if the Pope erred, yet at that timethey owed the Holy See too much gratitude forcontinued favours, not to obey it almost blindly.As for the Teutonics, they as Germans and theemperor’s subjects, of course did him honour.But the Popes, even Gregory IX., was he notagainst him ? It were in most direct contradiction toa bull by that same Gregory IX. (which shall be inthe Appendix), in which he strictly commands theHospitallers to assist the Emperor Frederick II. asmuch as ever they can in his Palestine expedition . 2But on reading it over with more attention, itentirely alters my mind, and convinces me that noexaggerations, as I thought, but direct falsities, arewhat are told on the faith of the chroniclers. Butthese were in truth the newspapers of that day; and,when they are not in contradiction with solemn

1 Arab. Chron., 433.

2 Cod. Dipl. Geros., Bolla v., vol. i. 271.—Appendix, lxiii.