volume one

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HISTORr OF THE CRUSADES. 161
accounts that God had abandoned the cause of the Crusaders.
The despair of several Latin pilgrims who followed
the army of the Gi-reeks was so violent, that it urged them
to horrible blasphemies.* They, groaning, asked why the
true Grod had permitted the destruction of his people ? why
he had allowed them, who were going to deliver the tomb of
his Son, to fall into the hands of his enemies ? Nothing
was heard among the Latin Crusaders but such strange
speeches, and Gruy, the brother of Bohemond, exceeded all
the rest in his despair. In the excess of his grief, he blasphemed
more than any, and could not understand the mys-
teries of Providence, which betrayed the cause of the Cliristians.
" O God," cried he, " what is become of thy power ?
If thou art still an all-powerful God, what is become of thy
justice ? Are we not thy, children, are we not thy soldiers ?
"Who is the father of a family, who is the king who thus
suffers his own to perish when he has the power to save
them ? If you abandon those who fight for you, who will
dare, henceforward, to range themselves under your sacred
banner?" In their blind grief, all the Crusaders repeated
these impious words. Such was the frenzy of despair
in which sorrow had plunged them, that, according to the
report of contemporary historians, all ceremonies of religion
* These speeches and the complaints of the Crusaders are almost all
translated from contemporary historians. We feel it our duty to report
the text of them here.
O Deus verus, trinus et unus, quam ob rem hsec fieri permisisti ?
cur populum sequentem te in manibus inimicorum incidere permisisti ?
et viam tui itineris, tuique sancti sepulchri liberantem tam cito mori
concessisti ? Irofecto, si hoc verum est, quod nos ab istis nequissimis
audivimus, nobis referentibus, nos et alii Christiani derelinquemus te, nee
te amplius remorabimur, et unus ex noljis non audebit ulterius nomen
tuum invocare. Et fuit is sermo moestissimus valor in tota militia; ita
quod nuUus nostrorum audebat, neque archiepiscopus, neque e])iscopus,
neque abbas, neque presbyter, neque dericus, neque quisque laicus Christ!
invocare nomen per plures dies. Nemo poterat consolari Guidonem.
De Hierosohjmitano itinere, Dnc?tene's Collection, torn. iv. p. 799.
The following is the speecii which Robert the Monk puts into the mouth
of Guy, the brother of Bohemond :
O Deus omnipotens, ubi est virtus tua ? Si omnipntens es, cur haec
ei ant milites tui et peregrini ? Qais unquani
fieri consensisti .' Nonne
rex aut imperator aut potens dominus familiam suam ita peruiisit occidi,
si uUo modo potuit adjuvare ? Quis erit unquam miles tuus aut pere-
grinus i &c. &c.
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Robert. Monach. lib. v.
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