THE ARREST OF THE TEMPLARS IN FRANCE 237
not require lands and houses in France and other Christian
countries for that purpose. He would give the brethren an
income to carry on the struggle against Islam, and would
turn the preceptories and commanderies of the Orders into
schools where children, especially the children of men who
had lost their lives in fighting the Moslems, would be
instructed in the arts or in trades. Philip the Fair agreed
that the possessions of the Temple should be seized, but he
meant to use them for purposes other than educational ones.
He was always in want of money. When he mounted the
throne, he found France almost bankrupt and his expensive
wars with England and Flanders had further weakened the
finances of the kingdom. His first collision with the Holy
See had been over the question of money, but the right to
tax the Church was not enough. He took the gold and silver
vessels of his barons at a fraction of their value and melted
them in his mint. He robbed the Lombards $ he seized all
the Jews in the kingdom, forced them to give nearly the
whole of their fortunes to save their lives, then expelled
them, their business being transferred, for a consideration,
to Italian bankers who were deep in Philip's confidence 5 and
he imposed levies on trade and property which had
previously been unknown. His principal means of raising
funds, however, was to debase the currency, and he did it
so often that in ten years the franc had depreciated to less
than half of its value—Pope Boniface had complained
bitterly against the practice, calling on Philip " no longer to
blind himself to the iniquity " of such actions. In June,
1306, Paris had risen against the king who debased the
currency so often and so heavily, and to escape the fury of
the mob Philip had been compelled to take refuge behind
the strong walls of the Temple in Paris for three days.
The king wanted territory as well as money. He had
robbed many of his nobles of their land, but the estates of
the barons had been considerably reduced long before he was