Steven Runciman

“High ideals were besmirched by cruelty and greed, enterprise and endurance by a blind and narrow self-righteousness; and the Holy War was nothing more than a long act of intolerance in the name of God, which is the last blasphemy against the Holy Ghost.”

“There was so much courage and so little honour.”

“The historian's first duties are humility and a sober application to the facts.”

“There is no surer sign of the decay of a country than the decay of its manners.”

“But the supreme irony of the Crusades was that the one lasting victory of the Christian West was the establishment of the Turks in Europe.”

“The whole history of the crusades is a tragic and destructive episode.”

“In this world it is not possible to achieve the triumph of good, but it is possible to resist the triumph of evil.”

“It is the historian's duty to be humble.”

“A terrible crime was committed on the splendid sunny morning of April 12, 1204; and the Pope, who had designed the expedition, and the King of France, who had backed it, must share the blame with the conscienceless Count of Flanders and the evil old Doge.”