The History of Christianity - John S. C. Abbott (bookstand for reading .txt) 📗

name in the world; and that is the pope’s. All princes ought to kiss his feet. He alone can nominate or displace bishops, or dissolve councils. Nobody can judge him. He has never erred, and never shall err in time to come. He can depose princes, and release subjects from their oaths of fidelity.”

All the monarchs of Europe sustained these assumptions of the pope; for, by sustaining them, they easily held their subjects under perfect control. Nothing can be conceived more awful than was then the idea of excommunication to the popular mind. It exposed one to almost all possible misery in this world, and to the eternal flames of hell in the next.

One becomes weary of the recital of the crimes and woes of those days. There is, however, one truth which stands forth prominent from every page of history: it is, that in the religion of Jesus alone can be found the remedy for the ills of earth; it is the democracy of the gospel, the recognition of the brotherhood of man, where only is to be found hope for the world. Forms of government are of little avail so long as the men who wield those forms are selfish and depraved. Governments will become better only so fast as the men who administer them become better.

It is one of the signal developments of human depravity that men will reject and oppose the religion of Jesus because bad men, assuming the Christian name, ignore, and trample beneath their feet, all the teachings of the gospel. Christianity advocates every thing that is lovely and of good report, urging all “to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with God; to visit the widow and fatherless in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world;” while at the same time it denounces, under penalty of the divine displeasure, every act which is not consistent with love to God and love to man.

Notwithstanding papal pride and corruption, the spirit of Christ, in those dark ages, was beautifully developed in thousands of hearts, among the lofty as well as among the lowly. There is a great deal of false religion now, a great deal of ritualistic pomp and of empty profession. It was so then. Still, everywhere, then as now, could be seen the most attractive evidences of the power of true religion. Devoted missionaries had penetrated the most remote and savage wilds; and not a few who wore regal crowns and ducal coronets were numbered among the disciples of Jesus.

On the 19th of May, 1126, Monomaque, one of the most renowned of the early sovereigns of semi-barbaric Russia, died at the age of seventy-six. He had developed a very beautiful character, often praying with a trembling voice and tearful eyes for suffering humanity. Just before he fell asleep in Jesus, he wrote a farewell letter to his sons and daughters. The letter was written in the Palace of Kief, nearly a thousand years ago, and is still preserved on parchment in the archives of the monarchy. Every reader will admire its truly Christian spirit.

“My dear children,” he wrote, “the foundation of all religion is the love of God and the love of man. Obey your heavenly Father; and love man, your brother. It is not fasting, it is not monastic seclusion, which will confer the favor of God: it is doing good to your brother-man. Never forget the poor: take care of them. Do not hoard up riches: that is contrary to the teachings of our Saviour. Be a father to orphans; protect widows; and never permit the powerful to oppress the weak.

“Abstain from every thing that is wrong. Banish from your heart all pride. Remember that we all must die: to-day full of life, to-morrow in the tomb. When you are travelling on horseback, instead of allowing your mind to wander upon vain thoughts, recite your prayers, or at least repeat the best of them all: ‘O Lord! have mercy upon us.’

“Never retire at night without falling upon your knees before God in prayer. Always go to church at an early hour in the morning to offer to God the homage of your first and freshest thoughts. This was the custom of my father, and of all the pious people who surrounded him. With the first rays of the sun they praised the Lord, and exclaimed with fervor, ‘Condescend, O Lord! with thy Divine Spirit to illumine my soul.’”

Near the commencement of the twelfth century, nearly all Christendom combined for the recovery of Jerusalem and the Holy Land from the Moslems. The crusades are generally regarded as among the strangest of all earthly frenzies. In the first crusade, a rabble, unorganized band of three hundred thousand persons, of all ages and both sexes, set out on an insane expedition to drive out of Syria the warlike Moslems. Though the crusaders deemed their enterprise a sacred one, their conduct was often such as could scarcely have been exceeded in wickedness by incarnate fiends. Not one of those who embarked in this first crusade ever reached Jerusalem: only a remnant of about twenty thousand, after extreme sufferings, ragged and starving, regained their homes. The well-armed and organized Turks cut down the fanatic rabble as the mower does the grass.

The next year there was another campaign commenced, still more imposing in numbers, and a little more formidable in warlike character. All the steel-clad knights of Europe mounted their chargers, eager to gain and to win the favor of Heaven by the slaughter of the infidel Turk. Six hundred thousand men—as motley an assemblage as ignorance and fanaticism ever brought together—commenced their march across Europe to the Holy Land. Trusting that they should receive supernatural aid, they made but slight provision for their wants. Soon all the horses died: famine and sickness decimated their ranks. There was no discipline, no self-command; and the wildest excesses reigned. Their track was strewn with the bodies of the dead.

As they drew near to Jerusalem, their numbers had dwindled to sixty thousand; but these were the boldest, the strongest, the hardiest. With energy which religions enthusiasm alone could inspire, they hurled themselves upon the defences of Jerusalem, broke open the gates, clambered the walls, and, after a scene of awful carnage, succeeded in recapturing the city. This was in July, 1099. Of the vast army which had left Europe, not ten thousand survived to return to their native land.

Though Jerusalem was taken, there were many portions of Palestine still in the hands of the Moslems. The insane idea then arose of organizing a crusade of children against them. Fanaticism affirmed that Christ would interpose in their behalf, and give the weak a victory over the strong; thus showing how God, out of the mouths of babes and sucklings, could perfect his praise. It seems almost incredible, but it is apparently well authenticated, that ninety thousand boys, of but ten or twelve years of age, commenced their march across Europe to present their innocence and helplessness to the cimeter of the bearded Turk.

“When the madness of the time,” writes Rev. James White, “had originated a crusade of children, and ninety thousand boys, of but ten or twelve years of age, had commenced their journey, singing hymns and anthems, and hoping to conquer the infidels with the spiritual arms of innocence and prayer, the whole band melted away before they reached the coast. Barons and counts, and bishops and dukes, all swooped down upon the devoted march; and, before many weeks’ journeying was achieved, the crusade was brought to a close. Most of the children had died of fatigue or starvation; and the survivors had been seized as legitimate prey, and sold as slaves.”202

The introduction of Christianity into Russia early in the eleventh century is one of the most interesting events in the history of the Church. Vladimir the king, a pagan, but a thoughtful man, had heard of Christianity, and became anxious respecting his own destiny beyond the grave. He made earnest inquiries of the teachers of all forms of religion respecting their peculiar tenets.

He summoned the Mohammedan doctors from Bulgaria, the Jews from Jerusalem, and Christian bishops from the Papal Church at Rome and the Greek Church at Constantinople. He soon rejected the systems of Jews and of the Mohammedans as unworthy of further consideration, but was undecided respecting the apparently-conflicting schemes of Rome and Constantinople.

He therefore selected ten of the wisest men in his kingdom, and sent them to visit Rome, and then Constantinople, and report in which country divine worship was conducted in a manner most worthy of the Supreme Being. The ambassadors seem to have made a very thorough investigation in both capitals. Upon their return to Kief, they reported in favor of the faith and ceremonies of the Greek Church. The king, still undecided, and impressed with the importance of the measures upon which he had entered, assembled a number of his most virtuous and distinguished nobles, and took counsel of them. Their voices also were in favor of the Greek Church.

This wonderful event is well authenticated. Nestor gives a recital of it in its minute details. An old Greek manuscript, preserved in the royal library of Paris, records the visit of these ambassadors to both Rome and Constantinople.

There must have been a commingling of many motives which influenced Vladimir in his course. He had been a very wicked man. He had sought, but in vain, to appease the gnawings of conscience by the debasing rites of paganism. Some light from Christianity had reached his mind, as Christian missionaries occasionally traversed his semi-barbaric realms. Indeed, the gospel had been already preached in idolatrous Kief, and some converts had been won to it. Vladimir had also sufficient intelligence to perceive that the paganism into which his realms were plunged was brutalizing. It is not probable that thus far he had been the subject of a change of heart: it was merely a change of policy,—an intellectual rather than a spiritual transformation.

Having resolved to renounce paganism, and to adopt Christianity, he deemed it important that the event should be accompanied with pageantry so imposing as to produce a deep impression upon his simple and ignorant subjects. The extraordinary measures he adopted show how little he then comprehended the true spirit of Christianity.

He assembled an immense army; with it descended the Dneiper in boats; sailed across the Black Sea; and entering the Gulf of Cherson, near Sevastopol, after several bloody battles took military possession of the Crimea. Thus victorious, he sent an embassage to Basil and Constantine, the two emperors then unitedly reigning at Constantinople, announcing that he wished the young Christian Princess Anne, daughter of one of the emperors, for his bride; and that, if she were not immediately sent to him, he would advance upon Constantinople, and utterly destroy the city.

The emperors, trembling in view of this menace, which they were conscious they had not the power to avert, after much anxious deliberation returned the answer, that they would accede to his request if he would first embrace Christianity. To this proposition Vladimir cordially assented, as it was quite in accordance with his plans. He, however, demanded that the Princess Anne should be sent immediately to him, stating that he would be baptized at the time of his nuptials.

The unhappy maiden was overwhelmed with anguish in view of what appeared to her a dreadful doom. She regarded the pagan Russians as ferocious savages, and would have preferred repose in the grave to her union with Vladimir. But policy, which is the religion of cabinets, demanded the sacrifice. The princess, weeping in despair, was conducted to the camp of Vladimir, accompanied by several of the most distinguished ecclesiastics and nobles of the empire. She was received with the most gorgeous demonstrations of rejoicing. The whole army was drawn up in battle-array to add the brilliancy of military pageantry to nuptial festivities.

The ceremony