“Let us only sign our hymns before the sacred walls, and kiss the spots where Jesus stood!” Well may the modern writers and politicians have affirmed that the Crusades were only acts of faith. To cause the law of God to triumph, and to gain Paradise, were the motives of the barons of the twelfth century. This simple faith explains why, putting aside all pettiness of human policy, these brave men quitted their homes to undergo hunger and privation in a far-distant land, to die miserably alone, with their expiring eyes turned towards Jerusalem, calling on the name of Jesus. These men believed in God, and died for him, hoping for a humble place amid the saints and angels. Some may rail at such blind faith, but it will compare favorably with the contemporary formula:—“Live in comfort, and trouble about nothing.”
León Gautier, Chivalry, trans. Henry Frith (London: George Routledge and Sons, Ltd., 1891), 471.
