works include Études bibliques (2 vols., 1873–1874; 4th ed., 1889;
Eng. trans. 1875 f.), and Introduction au Nouveau Testament (1893 f.;
Eng. trans., 1894, &c.); Lectures in Defence of the Christian Faith
(Eng. trans. 4th ed., 1900).
GODFREY, SIR EDMUND BERRY (1621–1678), English
magistrate and politician, younger son of Thomas Godfrey
(1586–1664), a member of an old Kentish family, was born on
the 23rd of December 1621. He was educated at Westminster
school and at Christ Church, Oxford, and after entering Gray’s
Inn became a dealer in wood. His business prospered. He was
made a justice of the peace for the city of Westminster, and in
September 1666 was knighted as a reward for his services as
magistrate and citizen during the great plague in London; but
in 1669 he was imprisoned for a few days for instituting the
arrest of the king’s physician, Sir Alexander Fraizer (d. 1681),
who owed him money. The tragic events in Godfrey’s life began
in September 1678 when Titus Oates and two other men appeared
before him with written information about the Popish Plot, and
swore to the truth of their statements. During the intense
excitement which followed the magistrate expressed a fear that
his life was in danger, but took no extra precautions for safety.
On the 12th of October he did not return home as usual, and on
the 17th his body was found on Primrose Hill, Hampstead.
Medical and other evidence made it certain that he had been
murdered, and the excited populace regarded the deed as the
work of the Roman Catholics. Two committees investigated
the occurrence without definite result, but in December 1678
a certain Miles Prance, who had been arrested for conspiracy,
confessed that he had shared in the murder. According to
Prance the deed was instigated by some Roman Catholic priests,
three of whom witnessed the murder, and was committed in the
courtyard of Somerset House, where Godfrey was strangled by
Robert Green, Lawrence Hill and Henry Berry, the body being
afterwards taken to Hampstead. The three men were promptly
arrested; the evidence of the informer William Bedloe, although
contradictory, was similar on a few points to that of Prance, and
in February 1679 they were hanged. Soon afterwards, however,
some doubt was cast upon this story; a war of words ensued
between Prance and others, and it was freely asserted that
Godfrey had committed suicide. Later the falsehood of Prance’s
confession was proved and Prance pleaded guilty to perjury;
but the fact remains that Godfrey was murdered. Godfrey
was an excellent magistrate, and was very charitable both in
public and in private life. Mr John Pollock, in the Popish Plot
(London, 1903), confirms the view that the three men, Green,
Hill and Berry, were wrongfully executed, and thinks the
murder was committed by some Jesuits aided by Prance.
Godfrey was feared by the Jesuits because he knew, through
Oates, that on the 24th of April 1678 a Jesuit congregation had
met at the residence of the duke of York to concert plans for the
king’s murder. He concludes thus: “The success of Godfrey’s
murder as a political move is indubitable. The duke of York
was the pivot of the Roman Catholic scheme in England, and
Godfrey’s death saved both from utter ruin.” On the other hand
Mr Alfred Marks in his Who killed Sir E. B. Godfrey? (1905)
maintains that suicide was the cause of Godfrey’s death.
See the article Oates, Titus, also R. Tuke, Memoirs of the Life and Death of Sir Edmondbury Godfrey (London, 1682); and G. Burnet, History of my Own Time; The Reign of Charles II., edited by O. Airy (Oxford, 1900).
GODFREY OF BOUILLON (c. 1060–1100), a leader in the First
Crusade, was the second son of Eustace II., count of Boulogne,
by his marriage with Ida, daughter of Duke Godfrey II. of
Lower Lorraine. He was designated by Duke Godfrey as his
successor; but the emperor Henry IV. gave him only the mark
of Antwerp, in which the lordship of Bouillon was included
(1076). He fought for Henry, however, both on the Elster and
in the siege of Rome; and he was invested in 1082 with the duchy
of Lower Lorraine. Lorraine had been penetrated by Cluniac
influences, and Godfrey would seem to have been a man of
notable piety. Accordingly, though he had himself served as
an imperialist, and though the Germans in general had little
sympathy with the Crusaders (subsannabant . . . quasi delirantes),
Godfrey, nevertheless, when the call came “to follow Christ,”
almost literally sold all that he had, and followed. Along with
his brothers Eustace and Baldwin (the future Baldwin I. of
Jerusalem) he led a German contingent, some 40,000 strong,
along “Charlemagne’s road,” through Hungary to Constantinople,
starting in August 1096, and arriving at Constantinople, after
some difficulties in Hungary, in November. He was the first
of the crusading princes to arrive, and on him fell the duty of
deciding what the relations of the princes to the eastern emperor
Alexius were to be. Eventually, after several disputes and
some fighting, he did homage to Alexius in January 1097; and
his example was followed by the other princes. From this time
until the beginning of 1099 Godfrey appears as one of the
minor princes, plodding onwards, and steadily fighting, while
men like Bohemund and Raymund, Baldwin and Tancred were
determining the course of events.
In 1099 he came once more to the front. The mass of the crusaders became weary of the political factions which divided some of their leaders; and Godfrey, who was more of a pilgrim than a politician, becomes the natural representative of this feeling. He was thus able to force the reluctant Raymund to march southward to Jerusalem; and he took a prominent part in the siege, his division being the first to enter when the city was captured. It was natural therefore that, when Raymund of Provence refused the offered dignity, Godfrey should be elected ruler of Jerusalem (July 22, 1099). He assumed the title not of king, but of “advocate”[1] of the Holy Sepulchre. The new dignity proved still more onerous than honourable; and during his short reign of a year Godfrey had to combat the Arabs of Egypt, and the opposition of Raymund and the patriarch Dagobert. He was successful In repelling the Egyptian attack at the battle of Ascalon (August 1099); but he failed, owing to Raymund’s obstinacy and greed, to acquire the town of Ascalon after the battle. Left alone, at the end of the autumn, with an army of some 2000 men, Godfrey was yet able, in the spring of 1100, probably with the aid of new pilgrims, to exact tribute from towns like Acre, Ascalon, Arsuf and Caesarea. But already, at the end of 1099 Dagobert, archbishop of Pisa, had been substituted as patriarch for Arnulf (who had been acting as vicar) by the influence of Bohemund; and Dagobert, whose vassal Godfrey had at once piously acknowledged himself, seems to have forced him to an agreement in April 1100, by which he promised Jerusalem and Jaffa to the patriarch, in case he should acquire in their place Cairo or some other town, or should die without issue. Thus were the foundations of a theocracy laid in Jerusalem; and when Godfrey died (July 1100) he left the question to be decided, whether a theocracy or a monarchy should be the government of the Holy Land.
Because he had been the first ruler in Jerusalem Godfrey was idolized in later saga. He was depicted as the leader of the crusades, the king of Jerusalem, the legislator who laid down the assizes of Jerusalem. He was none of these things. Bohemund was the leader of the crusades; Baldwin was first king; the assizes were the result of a gradual development. In still other ways was the figure of Godfrey idealized by the grateful tradition of later days; but in reality he would seem to have been a quiet, pious, hard-fighting knight, who was chosen to rule in Jerusalem because he had no dangerous qualities, and no obvious defects.
Literature.—The narrative of Albert of Aix may be regarded as presenting the Lotharingian point of view, as the Gesta presents the Norman, and Raymund of Agiles the Provençal. The career of Godfrey has been discussed in modern times by R. Röhricht, Die Deutschen im heiligen Lande, Band ii., and Geschichte des ersten Kreuzzuges, passim (Innsbruck, 1901). (E. Br.)
Romances.—Godfrey was the principal hero of two French chansons de geste dealing with the Crusade, the Chanson d’Antioche (ed. P. Paris, 2 vols., 1848) and the Chanson de Jérusalem (ed. C. Hippeau, 1868), and other poems, containing less historical
