One important result of the Crusades was the barrier they erected to the conquests of the Mohammedans in Europe.  It is true that the wave of Saracenic invasion had been arrested by Charles Martel four or five hundred years before; but in the mean time a new Mohammedan power sprang up, of greater vigor, of equal ferocity, and of a more stubborn fanaticism.  This was that of the Turks, who had their eye on Constantinople and all Eastern Europe.  And Europe might have submitted to their domination, had they instead of the Latins taken Constantinople.  The conquest of that city was averted several hundred years; and when at last it fell into Turkish hands.  Christendom was strong enough to resist the Turkish armies.  We must remember that the Turks were a great power, even in the times of Peter the Great, and would have taken Vienna but for John Sobieski.  But when Urban II., at the Council of Clermont, urged the nations of Europe to repel the infidels on the confines of Asia, rather than wait for them in the heart of Europe, the Asiatic provinces of the Greek Empire were overrun both by Turks and Saracens.  They held Syria, Armenia, Asia Minor, Africa.  Spain, and the Balearic Islands.  Had not Godfrey come to the assistance of a division of the Christian army, when it was surrounded by two hundred thousand Turks at the battle of Dorylaeum, the Christians would have been utterly overwhelmed, and the Turks would have pressed to the Hellespont.  But they were beaten back into Syria, and, for a time, as far as the line of the Euphrates.  But for that timely repulse, the battles of Belgrade and Lepanto might not have been fought in subsequent ages.  It would have been an overwhelming calamity had the Turks invaded Europe in the twelfth century.  The loss of five millions on the plains of Asia would have been nothing in comparison to an invasion of Europe by the Mohammedans,—­whether Saracens or Turks.  It may be that the chivalry of Europe would have successfully repelled an invasion, as the Saracens repelled the Christians, on their soil.  It may be that Asia could not have conquered Europe any easier than Europe could conquer Asia.

I do not know how far statesmanlike views entered into the minds of the leaders of the Crusades.  I believe the sentiment which animated Peter and Urban and Bernard was pure hatred of the Mohammedans (because they robbed, insulted, and oppressed the pilgrims), and not any controlling fears of their invasion of Europe.  If such a fear had influenced them, they would not have permitted a mere rabble to invade Asia; there would have been a sense of danger stronger than that of hatred,—­which does not seem to have existed in the self-confidence of the crusaders.  They thought it an easy thing to capture Jerusalem:  it was a sort of holiday march of the chivalry of Europe, under Richard and Philip Augustus.  Perhaps, however, the princes of Europe were governed by political rather than religious reasons.  Some few long-headed