20 0 THE KNIGHTS TliMPLAHS. JAUW DI cerniug the Templars, and it was said that they would never ^°ljA07_ have lost the Holy Land if they had been good Christians. These rumours and accusations were soon put into a tangible shape. According to some writers, Squin de Florian, a citizen of Bezieres, who had been condemned to death or perpetual imprisonment in one of the royal castles for his iniquities, was brought before Philip, and received a free pardon, and was well rewarded iu return, for an accusation on oath, charging the Templars with heresy, and with the commission of the most horrible crimes. According to others, Nosso de Florentin, an apostate Templar, who had been condemned by the Grand Preceptor and chapter of France to perpetual imprisonment for impiety and crime, made in his dungeon a voluntary confession of the sins and abominations charged against the order.* Be this as it may, upon the strength of an information sworn to by a condemned criminal, king Philip, on the 14th of September, despatched secret orders to all the baillis of the different provinces in France, couched in the following extravagant and absurd terms : " Philip, by the grace of God king of the French, to his beloved and faithful knights. . . . &c. &c. " A deplorable and most lamentable matter, full of bitterness and grief, a monstrous business, a thing that one cannot think on without affright, canuot hear without horror, transgressions . unheard of, enormities and atrocities contrary to every sentiment of humanity, &c. &c, have reached our ears." After a long and most extraordinary tirade of this kind, Philip accuses the Templars of insulting Jesus Christ, and making him suffer more in those days than he had suffered formerly upon the cross ; of renouncing the christian religion ; of mocking the sacred image A * Bal. Γαρ. Aven. topi. L p. 99. Scita Vita, Clem. V. apud Baia», tom. i. col. Ion.