CENT. X. dedicated to that highly honoured saint." It is PART II. more than probable, that the avarice of the priests, who officiated in the church of St. Michael, was the real source of this extravagant fancy; and that in this, as in many other cases, a rapacious clergy took advantage of the credulity of the people, and made them believe whatever they thought would contribute to augment the opulence of the church.

P Ratherii Epist. Synodica in Dacherii Spicilegio Script. Veter. tom. ii, p. 294. Sigebertus Gemblac. Chronol. ad A. 939.

THE ELEVENTH CENTURY.

PART I.

EXTERNAL HISTORY OF THE CHURCH.

CHAPTER I.

CONCERNING THE PROSPEROUS EVENTS WHICH HAPPENED TO THE
CHURCH DURING THIS CENTURY.

PART I.

propagated.

1. IN the preceding century some faint notions of CENT. XL the christian religion, some scattered rays of that divine light which it administers to mortals, had Christianity been received among the Hungarians, Danes, Poles, and Russians; but the rude and savage spirit of these nations, together with their deplorable ignorance and their violent attachment to the superstitions of their ancestors, rendered their total conversion to Christianity a work of great difficulty, and which could not be accomplished all of a sudden. The zeal however with which this important work was carried on, did much honour to the piety of the princes and governors of these unpolished countries, who united their influence with the labours of the learned men whom they had invited into their dominions, to open the eyes of their subjects upon the truth.* In Tarta

a

For an account of the Poles, Russians, and Hungarians, see Romualdi Vita in Actis Sanctor. tom. ii, Februar. p. 113, 114, 117.

PART I.

CENT. XL ry, and the adjacent countries, the zeal and diligence of the nestorians gained over daily vast numbers to the profession of Christianity. It appears also evident, from a multitude of unexceptionable testimonies, that metropolitan prelates, with a great number of inferior bishops under their jurisdiction, were established at this time in the provinces of Casgar, Nuacheta, Turkestan, Genda, and Tangut; from which we may conclude, that in this and the following century, there was a prodigious number of christians in those very countries which are at present overrun with mahometanism and idolatry. All these christians were undoubtedly nestorians, and lived under the jurisdiction of the patriarch of that sect, who resided in Chaldæa.

II. Among the European nations that lay yet groveling in their native darkness and superstition,

b Tartary is taken here in its most comprehensive sense; for between the inhabitants of Tartary, properly so called, and the Calmucs, Moguls, and the inhabitants of Tangut, there is a manifest difference.

< Marcus Paul. Venetus De Regionibus Orientalibus, lib. i. cap. 38, 40, 45, 47, 48, 49, 62, 63, 64, lib. ii. cap. 39. Euseb. Renaudot Anciennes Relations des Indes et de la Chine, p. 420. Jos. Simon, Assemanni Biblioth. Orient. Vatican. tom. iii. pars ii. p. 502, &c. This successful propagation of the gospel, by the ministry of the nestorians in Tartary, China, and the neighbouring provinces, is a most important event, and every way worthy to employ the researches and the pen of some able writer, well acquainted with oriental history. It must indeed be acknowledged, that if this subject be important, it is also difficult on many accounts. It was attempted however notwithstanding its difficulty, by the most learned Theoph. Sigifred. Bayer, who had collected a great quantity of materials relative to this interesting branch of the history of Christianity, both from the works that have been published upon this subject, and from manuscripts that lie yet concealed in the cabinets of the curious. But, unhappily for the republic of letters, the death of that excellent man interrupted his labours, and prevented him from executing a design, which was worthy of his superior abilities, and his well known zeal for the interests of religion.

PART 1.

were the Sclavonians, the Obotriti," the Venedi, CENT. XI. and the Prussians, whose conversion had been attempted, but with little or no success, by certain missionaries, from whose piety and zeal better fruits might have been expected. Toward the conclusion of the preceding century, Adalbert, bishop of Prague, had endeavoured to instil into the minds of the fierce and savage Prussians, the salutary doctrines of the gospel; but he perished in the fruitless attempt, and received, in the year 996, from the murdering lance of Siggo, a pagan priest, the crown of martyrdom. Boleslaus, king of Poland, revenged the death of this pious apostle by entering into a bloody war with the Prussians, and he obtained by the force of penal laws, and of a victorious army, what Adalbert could not effect by exhortation and argument. He dragooned this savage people into the christian church; yet beside this violent method of conversion, others of a more gentle kind were certainly practised by the attendants of Boleslaus, who seconded the military arguments of their prince by the more persuasive influence of admonition and instruction. A certain ecclesiastic of illustrious birth, whose name was Boniface, and who was one of the disciples of St. Romuald, undertook the conversion of the Prussians, and was succeeded in this pious enterprise by Bruno, who set out from Germany with a

d

& The Obotriti were a great and powerful branch of the Vandals, whose kings resided in the country of Mecklenburgh, and whose domination extended along the coasts of the Baltic from the river Pene in Pomerania to the dutchy of Holstein.

The Venedi dwelt upon the banks of the Weissell or Vistula, in what is at present called the Palatinate of Marienburg.

f See the Acta Sanctor. ad d ̧ xxii. Aprilis, p. 174. Solignac Hist. de Pologne, tom. i. p. 133.

h Fleury differs from Dr. Mosheim in his account of Bruno, in two points. First he maintains that Boniface and Bruno were one and the same person, and here he is manifestly in the right; but he main

PART I.

CENT. XL. Company of eighteen persons, who had entered with zeal into the same laudable design. These were however all barbarously massacred by the fierce and cruel Prussians, and neither the vigorous efforts of Boleslaus, nor of the succeeding kings of Poland, could engage this rude and inflexible nation to abandon totally the idolatry of their ancestors.i

The Saracens driven out of Sicily.

m. Sicily had been groaning under the dominion of the Saracens since the ninth century; nor had the repeated attempts of the Greeks and Latins to dispossess them of that rich and fertile country, been hitherto crowned with the desired success. But in this century the face of affairs changed entirely in that island; for in the year 1059, Robert Guiscard, who had formed a settlement in Italy at the head of a Norman colony, and was afterward created duke of Apulia, encouraged by the exhortations of the Roman pontiff, Nicolas II. and seconded by the assistance of his brother Roger, attacked with the greatest vigour and intrepidity the Saracens in Sicily; nor did this latter sheath the victorious sword before he had rendered himself master of that island, and cleared it absolutely of its former tyrants. As soon as this great work was accomplished, which was not before the year 1090, count Roger not only restored to its former glory and lustre the christian religion, which had been almost totally extinguished under the Saracen yoke, but also established bishoprics, founded monasteries, erected magnificent churches throughout that province, and bestowed upon the clergy those immense revenues and those distinguished

tains farther, that he suffered martyrdom in Russia, in which he is evidently mistaken. It is proper farther to admonish the reader to distinguish carefully the Bruno here mentioned, from a monk of the same name, who founded the order of the carthusians.

Ant. Pagi Critica in Baronium, tom. iv. ad Annum 1008, p. 97. Christ. Hartknoch's Ecclesiastical History of Prussia, book i. ch. i. p. 12.