As the power of the pope was founded upon the progress of the faith and the holy enthusiasm of the Christians, Innocent gave his first attention to the suppression of the dangerous innovations and imprudent doctrines that began to corrupt his age and menace the sanctuary; he particularly endeavoured to reanimate the ardour for the crusades: and, to master the minds of kings and nations, to rally all Christians, and make them concur in the triumph of the Church, he spoke to them of the captivity of Jerusalem; he pointed to the tomb of Christ, and the holy places profaned by the presence and the domination of infidels. In a letter[36] addressed to the bishops, the clergy, the nobles, and people of France, England, Hungary, and Sicily, the sovereign pontiff made known the will, the menaces, and the promises of God. “Since the lamentable loss of Jerusalem,” said he, “the Holy See has never ceased to cry towards Heaven, and to exhort the faithful to avenge the injury done to Christ, thus banished from his heritage. Formerly Uriah would not enter into his house, or see his wife, whilst the ark of the Lord was in the camp; but now our princes, in this public calamity, abandon themselves to illegitimate amours; immerse themselves in voluptuousness; abuse the blessings that God has given them; and pursue each other with implacable hatred; only thinking of revenging their own personal injuries, they never consider that our enemies insult us, saying: ‘_Where is your God, who cannot deliver himself out of our hands? We have profaned your sanctuary, and the places in which you pretend your superstition had its birth; we have crushed the arms of the French, the English, the Germans, and subdued a second time the proud Spaniards: what remains then for us to do? to drive out those you have left in Syria, and to penetrate into the West to efface for ever both your name and your memory._’” Assuming then a more paternal tone: “Prove,” cried Innocent, “that you have not lost your courage; be prodigal, in the cause of God, of all you have received from him; if, on an occasion so pressing, you refuse to serve Christ, what excuse will you be able to offer at his terrible tribunal? If God died for man, shall man fear to die for his God? Will he refuse to give up his transitory life and the perishable goods of this world for him who lays before us the treasures of eternity?”