Favour shown to them by Rufus.
Comparison with the Sicilian Saracens.
William's vein of mockery.
- spised, trembling, Jew, cringing before every Christian
that he meets, is, in any age of English history, simply a romantic picture. In the days of Rufus at all events, the Jews of Rouen and London stood erect before the prince of the land, and they seem to have enjoyed no small share of his favour and personal familiarity. The presence of the unbelieving Hebrew supplied the Red King with many opportunities for mocking at Christianity and its ministers. He is even said to have shown himself more than once, when it was to his interest so to show himself, as a kind of missionary of the Hebrew faith. He was not the only prince of his age who discouraged conversions to Christianity on the part of distinct races who could be made more useful, if they remained distinct, and who could in no way be kept so distinct as if they remained in the position of infidels. Count Roger of Sicily found that the unbelieving Saracens,[1] and William Rufus found that the unbelieving Hebrews, were, each in their own way, more profitable to their several masters than if they had been allowed to lose their distinct being among their Christian neighbours. But in the whole dealings of Rufus with the Jews there is a vein of mockery in which, if Roger shared, it is not recorded. It is true that we do not find Rufus taking the part of the Jew, except when the Jew made it worth his while to do so. But when he did take the Jew's part, he clearly found a malicious pleasure in taking it. He enjoyed showing favour to the Jew, because so to do gave annoyance to the Christian.
Question of William's scepticism. Whether Rufus was in any strict sense an intellectual sceptic may be doubted. That he was such cannot be inferred from his bidding in bitter mockery the Jewish rabbis and the bishops of England to dispute before him on the tenets of their several creeds, promising to
- ↑ See Eadmer, Vit. Ans. iii. 5. We shall come across them again.
