“Orleans had withstood a stubborn siege of many months, but its fate seemed sealed. The Dauphin had almost given up the struggle. He had made futile appeals for help to the King of Scotland …. To Naples also he made appeals, but no succor or hope came, and in despair he shut himself up at Chinon, giving up the cause of France as lost unless aid came from on high. Jeanne came as the messenger of glad tidings, and announced herself as one sent by God to aid France in her extreme need.”
“By the order of Pope Calixtus in 1455, the Trial of Jeanne d'Arc at Rouen, which had taken place twenty-four years before, was reconsidered by a great court of lawyers and churchmen, and the condemnation of Jeanne was solemnly annulled and declared wicked and unjust. By this re-trial posterity has been allowed to see the whole life of the village maiden of Domremy, as she was known first to her kinsfolk and her neighbors, and afterwards to warriors, nobles and churchmen who followed her extraordinary career. The evidence so given is unique in its minute and faith-worthy narration of a great and noble life; as indeed that life is itself unique in all human history. After all that can be done by the rationalizing process, the mystery remains of an untutored and unlettered girl of eighteen years old, not only imposing her will upon captains and courtiers, but showing a skill and judgment worthy, as General Dragomiroff says,"of the greatest commanders." While we must give due weight and consideration to the age in which this marvel showed itself on the stage of history, an age of portents and prophecies, of miracle worker and saints, yet, when all allowance is made, there remains this sane, strong, solid girl leaving her humble home, and accomplishing more, in two short months, than any great leader of men; and at an age when not one of them had achieved any success of importance.”
Jeanne D’Arc, Maid of Oreans: Deliverer of France. Being the Story of her Life, her Achievements, and her Death, as Attested on Oath and Set Forth in the Original Documents.
Editor, T. Douglas Murray, Publisher: William Heinemann, London, 1903.