appearance, impracticable project of
leading into Asia, from the farthest extremities of the west, armies
sufficient to subdue those potent and warlike nations which now held
the holy city in subjection.[*] He proposed his views to Martin II., who
filled the papal chair, and who, though sensible of the advantages which
the head of the Christian religion must reap from a religious war, and
though he esteemed the blind zeal of Peter a proper means for effecting
the purpose,[**] resolved not to interpose his authority till he saw
a greater probability of success. He summoned a council at Placentia,
which consisted of four thousand ecclesiastics and thirty thousand
seculars; and which was so numerous that no hall could contain the
multitude, and it was necessary to hold the assembly in a plain.

[* Gul. Tyrius, lib. i. cap. 11 M. Paria, p, 17.]

[** Gul. Trrius, lib. i. cap. 13.]

The harangues of the pope, and of Peter himself, representing the dismal
situation of their brethren in the East, and the indignity suffered by
the Christian name, in allowing the holy city to remain in the hands of
infidels, here found the minds of men so well prepared, that the whole
multitude suddenly and violently declared for the war, and solemnly
devoted themselves to perform this service, so meritorious, as they
believed it, to God and religion.

But though Italy seemed thus to have zealously embraced the enterprise,
Martin knew that, in order to insure success, it was necessary to enlist
the greater and more warlike nations in the same engagement; and having
previously exhorted Peter to visit the chief cities and sovereigns of
Christendom, he summoned another council at Clermont, in Auvergne.[*]
The fame of this great and pious design being now universally diffused,
procured the attendance of the greatest prelates, nobles, and princes;
and when the pope and the hermit renewed their pathetic exhortations,
the whole assembly, as if impelled by an immediate inspiration, not
moved by their preceeding impressions, exclaimed with one voice, "It is
the will of God, It is the will of God"--words deemed so memorable and
so much the result of a divine influence, that they were employed as
the signal of rendezvous and battle in all the future exploits of those
adventurers.[**] Men of all ranks flew to arms with the utmost ardor;
and an exterior symbol too--a circumstance of chief moment,--was here
chosen by the devoted combatants. The si