[Gutenberg 46199] • Sketch of the History of the Knights Templars / Second Edition

Written and published in 1840 in London. A very detailed book.

The Publisher has copy-edited this book to improve the formatting, style and accuracy of the text to make it readable. This did not involve changing the substance of the text.

Excerpt:

.....In the eleventh century, when the apprehension of the approaching end of the world, and appearance of Christ to judge mankind, had once more fanned the flame of pious pilgrimage which had been previously dying away, and men were hastening to the land where they expected to meet their Lord and Judge, there was built within the walls of Jerusalem an Hospital for the reception of Catholic pilgrims. This hospital stood within a very short distance of the church of the Holy Sepulchre, and, by the favor of the Egyptian Khalif, a church, dedicated to the Virgin, and afterwards called St. Maria de Latina, was erected close by it; there an abbot and several monks, who followed the rule of St. Benedict, received and entertained the pilgrims who arrived each year from the west, and furnished such of them as were poor or had been plundered by the roving Bedouins, with the means of paying the tax exacted by the unbelievers. Decorum not permitting the reception of female pilgrims, the brethren established without their walls a convent, dedicated to Mary Magdalene, where a pious sisterhood entertained the pilgrims of their own sex. The number of the pilgrims still continuing to increase, the abbot and his monks erected a new Hospitium near their church, which they placed under the patronage of St. John, the Patriarch of Alexandria, named Eleemon, or the Compassionate. This last Hospital had no independent revenues, but derived its income from the bounty of the abbot of the monastery of the Holy Virgin, and the alms of the pious.

Contents:

Chapter 1. The Hospitallers ---- Chapter 2. The Templars ---- Chapter 3. The Persecution of the Templars ---- Chapter 4. The Continuation of the Order ---- Chapter 5. The Knights Templars of Scotland ---- Appendix 1. Investiture as a Knight Commander of the Bath ---- Appendix 2. Death and Funeral of Sir Sidney Smith ---- Appendix 3. Sketch of the History and Possessions of the Order in Ireland ---- Appendix 4. Proclamation by the Freemasons of Europe, --- dated at Cologne on the Rhine 1535.