Peter the Hermit | Page 6

motives led to a movement against the Saracens, which, while never numbered among the Crusades, almost deserved that name. The acquisition of maritime power by the Saracens had led to interference with Italian commerce.
[Sidenote: "Christian" Butchery]
Promising remission of sins to all who fought, Victor besought Christians to take up arms. Christians crossed to Africa and professed to have slain a hundred thousand Saracens; certainly did decorate Italian churches with the spoils of victory, and made a Moorish king pay tribute to the pope.
What kings, emperors, and popes could not do, a pilgrim accomplished. We pass from the Foreground to the Figure.
CHAPTER II.
THE MAN AND HIS MESSAGE.
[Sidenote: Preparation for Peter]
The study of the Foreground of the Crusades exhibits the preparation for the man who was to be the great leader and, one might say, originator of these astonishing movements. Whatever part others played, or whatever the measure of the aid given, to Peter the Hermit is to be given the credit of the effective inspiration and active leadership.
The leadership here claimed for Peter is challenged, it is only fair to say, by Von Sybil whose views are, in the main, accepted by Hagenmeyer. Von Sybil gives credit to the Pope alone for inspiration and direction. It seems more probable, however, that the Pope utilized and magnified the enthusiasm and influence of Peter; and directed it into channels more likely to permit the movement of the Roman Church Eastward and the growth of Pontifical supremacy. This is the view contained in these pages.
[Sidenote: Peter's Birth]
We know where Peter came from. Born in Picardy, the historians are not agreed whether of obscure or noble family. It makes little difference, since if this were known all their dignity and life in history would proceed from Peter. He was called Peter the Hermit because he was a hermit, and not, as some have maintained, because it was his surname. The weight of opinion favors his descent from humble parents.
All are agreed that he was of very ordinary appearance; one says "ignoble and vulgar." The sum of the statements of contemporaries as to his personality, is that he was of sharp understanding, energetic, decided; coarse and sometimes brutal; enthusiastic; of great imaginative power. If a Picard, then a Frank, and if a Frank, then a fighter, and very ready to fight for religion. His nationality, therefore, gave him access by speech to a most restless, gallant, and adventurous people. Born with courage, moral intensity, restlessness, and activity, he experimented for satisfaction in every direction.
[Sidenote: Chooses Hermit's Life]
[Sidenote: Effect of Self-confidence]
It seems that neither celibacy nor marriage, study nor warfare, long attracted him. The conditions about him seemed beyond his remedy, and, like many others, he retired from a sinful world to the harshnesses and austerity of a hermit's life. Fasting did for him what it seems to do for all when excess is reached either by self-will or necessity. He became truly a "visionary." "He saw visions and dreamed dreams." His temperament and his religious exercises made him feel that, better than others he knew the will of God and that he was chosen to execute it. In this stage a man becomes capable of great things in a poor cause. The world is always impressed by the confident and the courageous. No great movement, however wrong in doctrine, defective in morals, or disastrous in results, has been without such leadership.
Like all orators of the Latin race, his fervor showed itself, not only in his tones, but in his gesticulation and his postures. He was a master of pantomime. If any were beyond his voice, they were not beyond his meaning. If he had lived in our time he would have been counted among the most "magnetic" of preachers. The reputation of his sanctity showered him with gifts. He kept nothing for himself. All went to the poor, and evil women were dowried by him that they might cease from evil in honorable marriage.
[Sidenote: Generosity Self-Sacrifice]
Peter was not stirred alone by the relations of returning pilgrims as to the ignominies heaped alike on the sacred places and on the religious by the Turks. He followed in the wake of the devotees who traversed the long road to the Holy City. That Peter actually made this journey is sufficiently attested by his contemporary, Anna Conmena. She probably met him while tarrying in Constantinople, and could easily know of his presence at the palace of her father, Alexius. From her we learn that he had to flee before the Turks and Saracens, and her narration makes it doubtful if he reached Jerusalem on his first attempt. By so much as he was more enthusiastic than others by nature, by so much was he fired with indignation, which to him was but the just expression of his zeal and