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Makers of History
Henry IV.
BY JOHN S. C. ABBOTT
WITH ENGRAVINGS
NEW YORK AND LONDON
HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS
1904
Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year one thousand eight
hundred and fifty-six, by
HARPER & BROTHERS,
in the Clerk's office of the District Court of the Southern District
of New York.
Copyright, 1884, by SUSAN ABBOT MEAD.
PREFACE.
History is our Heaven-appointed instructor. It is the guide for the
future. The calamities of yesterday are the protectors of to-day.
The sea of time we navigate is full of perils. But it is not an
unknown sea. It has been traversed for ages, and there is not a sunken
rock or a treacherous sand-bar which is not marked by the wreck of
those who have preceded us.
There is no portion of history fraught with more valuable instruction
than the period of those terrible religious wars which desolated the
sixteenth century. There is no romance so wild as the veritable
history of those times. The majestic outgoings of the Almighty, as
developed in the onward progress of our race, infinitely transcend, in
all the elements of profoundness, mystery, and grandeur, all that
man's fancy can create.
The cartoons of Raphael are beautiful, but what are they when compared
with the heaving ocean, the clouds of sunset, and the pinnacles of the
Alps? The dome of St. Peter's is man's noblest architecture, but what
is it when compared with the magnificent rotunda of the skies?
JOHN S. C. ABBOTT.
Brunswick, Maine, 1856.
CONTENTS.
Chapter Page
I. CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH 13
II. CIVIL WAR 45
III. THE MARRIAGE 68
IV. PREPARATIONS FOR MASSACRE 93
V. MASSACRE OF ST. BARTHOLOMEW 109
VI. THE HOUSES OF VALOIS, OF GUISE, AND OF
BOURBON 137
VII. REIGN OF HENRY III 167
VIII. THE LEAGUE 196
IX. THE ASSASSINATION OF THE DUKE OF GUISE
AND OF HENRY III 220
X. WAR AND WOE 256
XI. THE CONVERSION OF THE KING 281
XII. THE REIGN OF HENRY IV. AND HIS DEATH 306
ENGRAVINGS.
Page
THE BIRTH OF HENRY OF NAVARRE 19
THE FLIGHT OF THE QUEEN OF NAVARRE 52
THE MARRIAGE 87
THE MASSACRE OF ST. BARTHOLOMEW 115
THE ASSASSINATION OF FRANCIS, DUKE OF GUISE 161
THE ASSASSINATION OF HENRY, DUKE OF GUISE 228
THE ASSASSINATION OF HENRY III. 238
THE ACT OF ABJURING PROTESTANTISM 292
THE RECONCILIATION WITH MAYENNE 309
KING HENRY IV.
CHAPTER I.
CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH.
1475-1564
Navarre.--Catharine de Foix.--Ferdinand and Isabella.--Dismemberment
of Navarre.--Plans for revenge.--Death of Catharine.--Marriage of
Henry and Margaret.--Lingering hopes of Henry.--Jeanne returns to
Navarre.--Birth of Henry IV.--The royal nurse.--Name chosen for the
young prince.--The castle of Courasse.--Education of Henry.--Death of
the King of Navarre.--Jeanne d'Albret ascends the throne.--Residence
in Bearn.--Marriage of Mary, Queen of Scots.--Betrothal of
Henry.--Henry's tutor.--Remark of Dr. Johnson.--Henry's motto.--La
Gaucherie's method of instruction.--Death of Henry II.--Catharine de
Medicis regent.--Influence of Plutarch.--Religious agitation.--The
Huguenots.--The present controversy.--The Sorbonne.--Purging the
empire.--The burning chamber.--Persecution of the Protestants.--Calvin
and his writings.--Calvin's physical debility.--Continued
labors.--Execution of Servetus.--Inhabitants of France.--Antony
of Bourbon.--Jeanne d'Albret.--The separation.--Different
life.--Rage of the Pope.--Growth of Protestantism.--Catharine's
blandishments.--Undecided action.--Seizure of the queen.--Civil
war.--Death of Antony of Bourbon.--Effects of the war.--Liberty of
worship.--Indignation and animosity.--Religious toleration.--Belief of
the Romanists.--Establishment of freedom of conscience.
About four hundred years ago there was a small kingdom, spreading over
the cliffs and ravines of the eastern extremity of the Pyrenees,
called Navarre. Its population, of about five hundred thousand,
consisted of a very simple, frugal, and industrious people. Those who
lived upon the shore washed by the stormy waves of the Bay of Biscay
gratified their love of excitement and of adventure by braving the
perils of the sea. Those who lived in the solitude of the interior, on
the sunny slopes of the mountains, or by the streams which meandered
through the verdant valleys, fed their flocks, and harvested their
grain, and pressed rich wine from the grapes of their vineyards, in
the enjoyment of the most pleasant duties of rural life. Proud of
their independence, they were ever ready to grasp arms to repel
foreign aggression. The throne of this kingdom was, at the time of
which we speak, occupied by Catharine de Foix. She was a widow, and
all her hopes and affections were centred in her son Henry, an ardent
and impetuous boy six or seven years of age, who was to receive the
crown when it should fall from her brow, and transmit to posterity
their ancestral honors.
Ferdinand of Aragon had just married Isabella of Castile, and had thus
united those two populous and wealthy kingdoms; and now, in the
arrogance of power, seized with the pride of annexation, he began to
look with a wistful eye upon the picturesque kingdom of Navarre. Its
comparative feebleness, under the reign of a bereaved woman weary of
the world, invited to the enterprise. Should he grasp at the whole
territory of the little realm, France might interpose her powerful
remonstrance. Should he take but the half which was spread out upon
the southern declivity of the Pyrenees, it would be virtually saying
to the French monarch, "The rest I courteously leave for you." The
armies of Spain were soon sweeping resistlessly through these sunny
valleys, and one half of her empire was ruthlessly torn from the Queen
of Navarre, and transferred to the dominion of imperious Castile and
Aragon.
Catharine retired with her child to the colder and more uncongenial
regions of the northern declivity of the mountains. Her bosom glowed
with mortification and rage in view of her hopeless defeat. As she sat
down gloomily in the small portion which remained to her of her
dismembered empire, she endeavored to foster in the heart of her son
the spirit of revenge, and to inspire him with the resolution to
regain those lost leagues of territory which had been wrested from the
inheritance of his fathers. Henry imbibed his mother's spirit, and
chafed and fretted under wrongs for which he could obtain no redress.
Ferdinand and Isabella could not be annoyed even by any force which
feeble Navarre could raise. Queen Catharine, however, brooded deeply
over her wrongs, and laid plans for retributions of revenge, the
execution of which she knew must be deferred till long after her body
should have mouldered to dust in the grave. She courted the most
intimate alliance with Francis I., King of France. She contemplated
the merging of her own little kingdom into that powerful monarchy,
that the infant Navarre, having grown into the giant France, might
crush the Spanish tyrants into humiliation. Nerved by this determined
spirit of revenge, and inspired by a mother's ambition, she intrigued
to wed her son to the heiress of the French throne, that even in the
world of spirits she might be cheered by seeing Henry heading the
armies of France, the terrible avenger of her wrongs. These hopes
invigorated her until the fitful dream of her joyless life was
terminated, and her restless spirit sank into the repose of the grave.
She lived, however, to see her plans apparently in progress toward
their most successful fulfillment.
Henry, her son, was married to Margaret, the favorite sister of the
King of France. Their nuptials were blessed with but one child, Jeanne
d'Albret. This child, in whose destiny such ambitious hopes were
centred, bloomed into most marvelous beauty, and became also as
conspicuous for her mental endowments as for her personal charms. She
had hardly emerged from the period of childhood when she was married
to Antony of Bourbon, a near relative of the royal family of France.
Immediately after her marriage she left Navarre with her husband, to
take up her residence in the French metropolis.
One hope still lived, with undying vigor, in the bosom of Henry. It
was the hope, the intense passion, with which his departed mother had
inspired him, that a grandson would arise from this union, who would,
with the spirit of Hannibal, avenge the family wrongs upon Spain.
Twice Henry took a grandson into his arms with the feeling that the
great desire of his life was about to be realized; and twice, with
almost a broken heart, he saw these hopes blighted as he committed the
little ones to the grave.
Summers and winters had now lingered wearily away, and Henry had
become an old man. Disappointment and care had worn down his frame.
World-weary and joyless, he still clung to hope. The tidings that
Jeanne was again to become a mother rekindled the lustre of his fading
eye. The aged king sent importunately for his daughter to return
without delay to the paternal castle, that the child might be born in
the kingdom of Navarre, whose wrongs it was to be his peculiar destiny
to avenge. It was mid-winter. The journey was long and the roads
rough. But the dutiful and energetic Jeanne promptly obeyed the wishes
of her father, and hastened to his court.
Henry could hardly restrain his impatience as he waited, week after
week, for the advent of the long-looked-for avenger. With the
characteristic superstition of the times, he constrained his daughter
to promise that, at the period of birth, during the most painful
moments of her trial, she would sing a mirthful and triumphant song,
that her child might possess a sanguine, joyous, and energetic spirit.
Henry entertained not a doubt that the child would prove a boy,
commissioned by Providence as the avenger of Navarre. The old king
received the child, at the moment of its birth, into his own arms,
totally regardless of a mother's rights, and exultingly enveloping it
in soft folds, bore it off, as his own property, to his private
apartment. He rubbed the lips of the plump little boy with garlic, and
then taking a golden goblet of generous wine, the rough and royal
nurse forced the beverage he loved so well down the untainted throat
of his new-born heir.
"A little good old wine," said the doting grandfather, "will make the
boy vigorous, and brave."
We may remark, in passing, that it was _wine_, rich and pure: not that
mixture of all abominations, whose only vintage is in cellars,
sunless, damp, and fetid, where guilty men fabricate poison for a
nation.
[Illustration: THE BIRTH OF HENRY IV.]
This little stranger received the ancestral name of Henry. By his
subsequent exploits he filled the world with his renown. He was the
first of the Bourbon line who ascended the throne of France, and he
swayed the sceptre of energetic rule over that wide-spread realm with
a degree of power and grandeur which none of his descendants have ever
rivaled. The name of Henry IV. is one of the most illustrious in the
annals of France. The story of his struggles for the attainment of the
throne of Charlemagne is full of interest. His birth, to which we have
just alluded, occurred at Parr, in the kingdom of Navarre, in the year
1553.
His grandfather immediately assumed the direction of every thing
relating to the child, apparently without the slightest consciousness
that either the father or the mother of Henry had any prior claims.
The king possessed, among the wild and romantic fastnesses of the
mountains, a strong old castle, as rugged and frowning as the eternal
granite upon which its foundations were laid. Gloomy evergreens clung
to the hill-sides. A mountain stream, often swollen to an impetuous
torrent by the autumnal rains and the spring thaws, swept through the
little verdant lawn, which smiled amid the stern sublimities
surrounding this venerable and moss-covered fortress. Around the
solitary towers the eagles wheeled and screamed in harmony with the
gales and storms which often swept through these wild regions. The
expanse around was sparsely settled by a few hardy peasants, who, by
feeding their herds, and cultivating little patches of soil among the
crags, obtained a humble living, and by exercise and the pure mountain
air acquired a vigor and an athletic-hardihood of frame which had
given them much celebrity.
To the storm-battered castle of Courasse, thus lowering in congenial
gloom among these rocks, the old king sent the infant Henry to be
nurtured as a peasant-boy, that, by frugal fare and exposure to
hardship, he might acquire a peasant's robust frame. He resolved that
no French delicacies should enfeeble the constitution of this noble
child. Bareheaded and barefooted, the young prince, as yet hardly
emerging from infancy, rolled upon the grass, played with the poultry,
and the dogs, and the sturdy young mountaineers, and plunged into the
brook or paddled in the pools of water with which the mountain showers
often filled the court-yard. His hair was bleached and his cheeks
bronzed by the sun and the wind. Few would have imagined that the
unattractive child, with his unshorn locks and in his studiously
neglected garb, was the descendant of a long line of kings, and was
destined to eclipse them all by the grandeur of his name.
As years glided along he advanced to energetic boyhood, the constant
companion, and, in all his sports and modes of life, the equal of the
peasant-boys by whom he was surrounded. He hardly wore a better dress
than they; he was nourished with the same coarse fare. With them he
climbed the mountains, and leaped the streams, and swung upon the
trees. He struggled with his youthful competitors in all their
athletic games, running, wrestling, pitching the quoit, and tossing
the bar. This active out-door exercise gave a relish to the coarse
food of the peasants, consisting of brown bread, beef, cheese, and
garlic. His grandfather had decided that this regimen was essential
for the education of a prince who was to humble the proud monarchy of
Spain, and regain the territory which had been so unjustly wrested
from his ancestors.
When Henry was about six years of age, his grandfather, by gradual
decay, sank sorrowingly into his grave. Consequently, his mother,
Jeanne d'Albret, ascended the throne of Navarre. Her husband, Antony
of Bourbon, was a rough, fearless old soldier, with nothing to
distinguish him from the multitude who do but live, fight, and die.
Jeanne and her husband were in Paris at the time of the death of her
father. They immediately hastened to Bearn, the capital of Navarre, to
take possession of the dominions which had thus descended to them. The
little Henry was then brought from his wild mountain home to reside
with his mother in the royal palace. Though Navarre was but a feeble
kingdom, the grandeur of its court was said to have been unsurpassed,
at that time, by that of any other in Europe. The intellectual
education of Henry had been almost entirely neglected; but the
hardihood of his body had given such vigor and energy to his mind,
that he was now prepared to distance in intellectual pursuits, with
perfect ease, those whose infantile brains had been overtasked with
study.
Henry remained in Bearn with his parents two years, and in that time
ingrafted many courtly graces upon the free and fetterless carriage he
had acquired among the mountains. His mind expanded with remarkable
rapidity, and he became one of the most beautiful and engaging of
children.
About this time Mary, Queen of Scots, was to be married to the Dauphin
Francis, son of the King of France. Their nuptials were to be
celebrated with great magnificence. The King and Queen of Navarre
returned to the court of France to attend the marriage. They took with
them their son. His beauty and vivacity excited much admiration in the
French metropolis. One day the young prince, then but six or seven
years of age, came running into the room where his father and Henry
II. of France were conversing, and, by his artlessness and grace,
strongly attracted the attention of the French monarch. The king
fondly took the playful child in his arms, and said affectionately,
"Will you be my son?"
"No, sire, no! that is my father," replied the ardent boy, pointing to
the King of Navarre.
"Well, then, will you be my son-in-law?" demanded Henry.
"Oh yes, most willingly," the prince replied.
Henry II. had a daughter Marguerite, a year or two younger than the
Prince of Navarre, and it was immediately resolved between the two
parents that the young princes should be considered as betrothed.
Soon after this the King and Queen of Navarre, with their son,
returned to the mountainous domain which Jeanne so ardently loved. The
queen devoted herself assiduously to the education of the young
prince, providing for him the ablest teachers whom that age could
afford. A gentleman of very distinguished attainments, named La
Gaucherie, undertook the general superintendence of his studies. The
young prince was at this time an exceedingly energetic, active,
ambitious boy, very inquisitive respecting all matters of information,
and passionately fond of study.
Dr. Johnson, with his rough and impetuous severity, has said,
"It is impossible to get Latin into a boy unless you flog it into
him."
The experience of La Gaucherie, however, did not confirm this
sentiment. Henry always went with alacrity to his Latin and his Greek.
His judicious teacher did not disgust his mind with long and laborious
rules, but introduced him at once to words and phrases, while
gradually he developed the grammatical structure of the language. The
vigorous mind of Henry, grasping eagerly at intellectual culture,
made rapid progress, and he was soon able to read and write both Latin
and Greek with fluency, and ever retained the power of quoting, with
great facility and appositeness, from the classical writers of Athens
and of Rome. Even in these early days he seized upon the Greek phrase
[Greek: "_e nikan e apothanein_"], _to conquer or to die_, and adopted
it for his motto.
La Gaucherie was warmly attached to the principles of the Protestant
faith. He made a companion of his noble pupil, and taught him by
conversation in pleasant walks and rides as well as by books. It was
his practice to have him commit to memory any fine passage in prose or
verse which inculcated generous and lofty ideas. The mind of Henry
thus became filled with beautiful images and noble sentiments from the
classic writers of France. These gems of literature exerted a powerful
influence in moulding his character, and he was fond of quoting them
as the guide of his life. Such passages as the following were
frequently on the lips of the young prince:
"Over their subjects princes bear the rule,
But God, more mighty, governs kings themselves."
Soon after the return of the King and Queen of Navarre to their own
kingdom, Henry II. of France died, leaving the crown to his son
Charles, a feeble boy both in body and in mind. As Charles was but ten
or twelve years of age, his mother, Catharine de Medicis, was
appointed regent during his minority. Catharine was a woman of great
strength of mind, but of the utmost depravity of heart. There was no
crime ambition could instigate her to commit from which, in the
slightest degree, she would recoil. Perhaps the history of the world
retains not another instance in which a mother could so far forget the
yearnings of nature as to endeavor, studiously and perseveringly, to
deprave the morals, and by vice to enfeeble the constitution of her
son, that she might retain the power which belonged to him. This proud
and dissolute woman looked with great solicitude upon the enterprising
and energetic spirits of the young Prince of Navarre. There were many
providential indications that ere long Henry would be a prominent
candidate for the throne of France.
Plutarch's Lives of Ancient Heroes has perhaps been more influential
than any other uninspired book in invigorating genius and in
enkindling a passion for great achievements. Napoleon was a careful
student and a great admirer of Plutarch. His spirit was entranced with
the grandeur of the Greek and Roman heroes, and they were ever to him
as companions and bosom friends. During the whole of his stormy
career, their examples animated him, and his addresses and
proclamations were often invigorated by happy quotations from classic
story. Henry, with similar exaltation of genius, read and re-read the
pages of Plutarch with the most absorbing delight. Catharine, with an
eagle eye, watched these indications of a lofty mind. Her solicitude
was roused lest the young Prince of Navarre should, with his
commanding genius, supplant her degenerate house.
At the close of the sixteenth century, the period of which we write,
all Europe was agitated by the great controversy between the Catholics
and the Protestants. The writings of Luther, Calvin, and other
reformers had aroused the attention of the whole Christian world. In
England and Scotland the ancient faith had been overthrown, and the
doctrines of the Reformation were, in those kingdoms, established. In
France, where the writings of Calvin had been extensively circulated,
the Protestants had also become quite numerous, embracing generally
the most intelligent portion of the populace. The Protestants were in
France called Huguenots, but for what reason is not now known. They
were sustained by many noble families, and had for their leaders the
Prince of Conde, Admiral Coligni, and the house of Navarre. There were
arrayed against them the power of the crown, many of the most powerful
nobles, and conspicuously the almost regal house of Guise.
It is perhaps difficult for a Protestant to write upon this subject
with perfect impartiality, however earnestly he may desire to do so.
The lapse of two hundred years has not terminated the great conflict.
The surging strife has swept across the ocean, and even now, with more
or less of vehemence, rages in all the states of this new world.
Though the weapons of blood are laid aside, the mighty controversy is
still undecided.
The advocates of the old faith were determined to maintain their
creed, and to force all to its adoption, at whatever price. They
deemed heresy the greatest of all crimes, and thought--and doubtless
many conscientiously thought--that it should be exterminated even by
the pains of torture and death. The French Parliament adopted for its
motto, "_One religion, one law, one king._" They declared that two
religions could no more be endured in a kingdom than two governments.
At Paris there was a celebrated theological school called the
Sorbonne. It included in its faculty the most distinguished doctors of
the Catholic Church. The decisions and the decrees of the Sorbonne
were esteemed highly authoritative. The views of the Sorbonne were
almost invariably asked in reference to any measures affecting the
Church.
In 1525 the court presented the following question to the Sorbonne:
"_How can we suppress and extirpate the damnable doctrine of Luther
from this very Christian kingdom, and purge it from it entirely?_"
The prompt reply was, "_The heresy has already been endured too long.
It must be pursued with the extremest rigor, or it will overthrow the
throne._"
Two years after this, Pope Clement VII. sent a communication to the
Parliament of Paris, stating,
"It is necessary, in this great and astounding disorder,
which arises from the rage of Satan, and from the fury and
impiety of his instruments, that every body exert himself to
guard the common safety, seeing that this madness would not
only embroil and destroy religion, but also all principality,
nobility, laws, orders, and ranks."
The Protestants were pursued by the most unrelenting persecution. The
Parliament established a court called the _burning chamber_, because
all who were convicted of heresy were burned. The estates of those
who, to save their lives, fled from the kingdom, were sold, and their
children, who were left behind, were pursued with merciless cruelty.
The Protestants, with boldness which religious faith alone could
inspire, braved all these perils. They resolutely declared that the
Bible taught their faith, and their faith only, and that no earthly
power could compel them to swerve from the truth. Notwithstanding the
perils of exile, torture, and death, they persisted in preaching what
they considered the pure Gospel of Christ. In 1533 Calvin was driven
from Paris. When one said to him, "Mass must be true, since it is
celebrated in all Christendom;" he replied, pointing to the Bible,
"There is my mass." Then raising his eyes to heaven, he solemnly said,
"O Lord, if in the day of judgment thou chargest me with not having
been at mass, I will say to thee with truth, 'Lord, thou hast not
commanded it. Behold thy law. In it I have not found any other
sacrifice than that which was immolated on the altar of the cross.'"
In 1535 Calvin's celebrated "Institutes of the Christian Religion"
were published, the great reformer then residing in the city of Basle.
This great work became the banner of the Protestants of France. It was
read with avidity in the cottage of the peasant, in the work-shop of
the artisan, and in the chateau of the noble. In reference to this
extraordinary man, of whom it has been said,
"On Calvin some think Heaven's own mantle fell,
While others deem him instrument of hell,"
Theodore Beza writes, "I do not believe that his equal can be found.
Besides preaching every day from week to week, very often, and as much
as he was able, he preached twice every Sunday. He lectured on
theology three times a week. He delivered addresses to the Consistory,
and also instructed at length every Friday before the Bible
Conference, which we call the congregation. He continued this course
so constantly that he never failed a single time except in extreme
illness. Moreover, who could recount his other common or extraordinary
labors? I know of no man of our age who has had more to hear, to
answer, to write, nor things of greater importance. The number and
quality of his writings alone is enough to astonish any man who sees
them, and still more those who read them. And what renders his labors
still more astonishing is, that he had a body so feeble by nature, so
debilitated by night labors and too great abstemiousness, and, what is
more, subject to so many maladies, that no man who saw him could
understand how he had lived so long. And yet, for all that, he never
ceased to labor night and day in the work of the Lord. We entreated
him to have more regard for himself; but his ordinary reply was that
he was doing nothing, and that we should allow God to find him always
watching, and working as he could to his latest breath."
Calvin died in 1564, eleven years after the birth of Henry of Navarre,
at the age of fifty-five. For several years he was so abstemious that
he had eaten but one meal a day.[A]
[Footnote A: In reference to the execution of Servetus for heresy, an
event which, in the estimation of many, has seriously tarnished the
reputation of Calvin, the celebrated French historian M. Mignet, in a
very able dissertation, establishes the following points:
1. Servetus was not an ordinary heretic; he was a bold
pantheist, and outraged the dogma of all Christian
communions by saying that God, in three persons, was a
Cerberus, a monster with three heads. 2. He had already been
condemned to death by the Catholic doctors at Vienne in
Dauphiny. 3. The affair was judged, not by Calvin, but by
the magistrates of Geneva; and if it is objected that his
advice must have influenced their decision, it is necessary
to recollect that the councils of the other reformed cantons
of Switzerland approved the sentence with a unanimous voice.
4. It was of the utmost importance for the Reformation to
separate distinctly its cause from that of such an
unbeliever as Servetus. The Catholic Church, which in our
day accuses Calvin of having participated in his
condemnation, much more would have accused him, in the
sixteenth century, with having solicited his acquittal.]
At this time the overwhelming majority of the inhabitants of France
were Catholics--it has generally been estimated a hundred to one; but
the doctrines of the reformers gained ground until, toward the close
of the century, about the time of the Massacre of St. Bartholomew, the
Protestants composed about one sixth of the population.
The storm of persecution which fell upon them was so terrible that
they were compelled to protect themselves by force of arms. Gradually
they gained the ascendency in several cities, which they fortified,
and where they protected refugees from the persecution which had
driven them from the cities where the Catholics predominated. Such was
the deplorable condition of France at the time of which we write.
In the little kingdom of Navarre, which was but about one third as
large as the State of Massachusetts, and which, since its
dismemberment, contained less than three hundred thousand inhabitants,
nearly every individual was a Protestant. Antony of Bourbon, who had
married the queen, was a Frenchman. With him, as with many others in
that day, religion was merely a badge of party politics. Antony spent
much of his time in the voluptuous court of France, and as he was, of
course, solicitous for popularity there, he espoused the Catholic side
of the controversy.
Jeanne d'Albret was energetically a Protestant. Apparently, her faith
was founded in deep religious conviction. When Catharine of Medici
advised her to follow her husband into the Catholic Church, she
replied with firmness,
"Madam, sooner than ever go to mass, if I had my kingdom and my son
both in my hands, I would hurl them to the bottom of the sea before
they should change my purpose."
Jeanne had been married to Antony merely as a matter of state policy.
There was nothing in his character to win a noble woman's love. With
no social or religious sympathies, they lived together for a time in a
state of respectful indifference; but the court of Navarre was too
quiet and religious to satisfy the taste of the voluptuous Parisian.
He consequently spent most of his time enjoying the gayeties of the
metropolis of France. A separation, mutually and amicably agreed upon,
was the result.
Antony conveyed with him to Paris his son Henry, and there took up his
residence. Amidst the changes and the fluctuations of the
ever-agitated metropolis, he eagerly watched for opportunities to
advance his own fame and fortune. As Jeanne took leave of her beloved
child, she embraced him tenderly, and with tears entreated him never
to abandon the faith in which he had been educated.
Jeanne d'Albret, with her little daughter, remained in the less
splendid but more moral and refined metropolis of her paternal domain.
A mother's solicitude and prayers, however, followed her son. Antony
consented to retain as a tutor for Henry the wise and learned La
Gaucherie, who was himself strongly attached to the reformed religion.
The inflexibility of Jeanne d'Albret, and the refuge she ever
cheerfully afforded to the persecuted Protestants, quite enraged the
Pope. As a measure of intimidation, he at one time summoned her as a
heretic to appear before the Inquisition within six months, under
penalty of losing her crown and her possessions. Jeanne, unawed by the
threat, appealed to the monarchs of Europe for protection. None were
disposed in that age to encourage such arrogant claims, and Pope Pius
VI. was compelled to moderate his haughty tone. A plot, however, was
then formed to seize her and her children, and hand them over to the
"tender mercies" of the Spanish Inquisition. But this plot also
failed.
In Paris itself there were many bold Protestant nobles who, with arms
at their side, and stout retainers around them, kept personal
persecution at bay. They were generally men of commanding character,
of intelligence and integrity. The new religion, throughout the
country, was manifestly growing fast in strength, and at times, even
in the saloons of the palace, the rival parties were pretty nearly
balanced. Although, throughout the kingdom of France, the Catholics
were vastly more numerous than the Protestants, yet as England and
much of Germany had warmly espoused the cause of the reformers, it
was perhaps difficult to decide which party, on the whole, in Europe,
was the strongest. Nobles and princes of the highest rank were, in all
parts of Europe, ranged under either banner. In the two factions thus
contending for dominion, there were, of course, some who were not much
influenced by conscientious considerations, but who were merely
struggling for political power.
When Henry first arrived in Paris, Catharine kept a constant watch
over his words and his actions. She spared no possible efforts to
bring him under her entire control. Efforts were made to lead his
teacher to check his enthusiasm for lofty exploits, and to surrender
him to the claims of frivolous amusement. This detestable queen
presented before the impassioned young man all the blandishments of
female beauty, that she might betray him to licentious indulgence. In
some of these infamous arts she was but too successful.
Catharine, in her ambitious projects, was often undecided as to which
cause she should espouse and which party she should call to her aid.
At one time she would favor the Protestants, and again the Catholics.
At about this time she suddenly turned to the Protestants, and
courted them so decidedly as greatly to alarm and exasperate the
Catholics. Some of the Catholic nobles formed a conspiracy, and seized
Catharine and her son at the palace of Fontainebleau, and held them
both as captives. The proud queen was almost frantic with indignation
at the insult.
The Protestants, conscious that the conspiracy was aimed against them,
rallied for the defense of the queen. The Catholics all over the
kingdom sprang to arms. A bloody civil war ensued. Nearly all Europe
was drawn into the conflict. Germany and England came with eager
armies to the aid of the Protestants. Catharine hated the proud and
haughty Elizabeth, England's domineering queen, and was very jealous
of her fame and power. She resolved that she would not be indebted to
her ambitious rival for aid. She therefore, most strangely, threw
herself into the arms of the _Catholics_, and ardently espoused their
cause. The Protestants soon found her, with all the energy of her
powerful mind, heading their foes. France was deluged in blood.
A large number of Protestants threw themselves into Rouen. Antony of
Bourbon headed an army of the Catholics to besiege the city. A ball
struck him, and he fell senseless to the ground. His attendants placed
him, covered with blood, in a carriage, to convey him to a hospital.
While in the carriage and jostling over the rough ground, and as the
thunders of the cannonade were pealing in his ears, the spirit of the
blood-stained soldier ascended to the tribunal of the God of Peace.
Henry was now left fatherless, and subject entirely to the control of
his mother, whom he most tenderly loved, and whose views, as one of
the most prominent leaders of the Protestant party, he was strongly
inclined to espouse.
The sanguinary conflict still raged with unabated violence throughout
the whole kingdom, arming brother against brother, friend against
friend. Churches were sacked and destroyed; vast extents of country
were almost depopulated; cities were surrendered to pillage, and
atrocities innumerable perpetrated, from which it would seem that even
fiends would revolt. France was filled with smouldering ruins; and the
wailing cry of widows and of orphans, thus made by the wrath of man,
ascended from every plain and every hill-side to the ear of that God
who has said, "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself."
At last both parties were weary of the horrid strife. The Catholics
were struggling to extirpate what they deemed ruinous heresy from the
kingdom. The Protestants were repelling the assault, and contending,
not for general liberty of conscience, but that their doctrines _were
true_, and _therefore_ should be sustained. Terms of accommodation
were proposed, and the Catholics made the great concession, as they
regarded it, of allowing the Protestants to conduct public worship
_outside of the walls of towns_. The Protestants accepted these terms,
and sheathed the sword; but many of the more fanatic Catholics were
greatly enraged at this toleration. The Guises, the most arrogant
family of nobles the world has ever known, retired from Paris in
indignation, declaring that they would not witness such a triumph of
heresy. The decree which granted this poor boon was the famous edict
of January, 1562, issued from St. Germain. But such a peace as this
could only be a truce caused by exhaustion. Deep-seated animosity
still rankled in the bosom of both parties; and, notwithstanding all
the woes which desolating wars had engendered, the spirit of religious
intolerance was eager again to grasp the weapons of deadly strife.
During the sixteenth century the doctrine of religious toleration was
recognized by no one. That great truth had not then even dawned upon
the world. The noble toleration so earnestly advocated by Bayle and
Locke a century later, was almost a new revelation to the human mind;
but in the sixteenth century it would have been regarded as impious,
and rebellion against God to have affirmed that _error_ was not to be
pursued and punished. The reformers did not advocate the view that a
man had a right to believe what he pleased, and to disseminate that
belief. They only declared that they were bound, at all hazards, to
believe the _truth;_ that the views which they cherished were _true_,
and that _therefore_ they should be protected in them. They appealed
to the Bible, and challenged their adversaries to meet them there. Our
fathers must not be condemned for not being in advance of the age in
which they lived. That toleration which allows a man to adopt, without
any civil disabilities, any mode of worship that does not disturb the
peace of society, exists, as we believe, only in the United States.
Even in England Dissenters are excluded from many privileges.
Throughout the whole of Catholic Europe no religious toleration is
recognized. The Emperor Napoleon, during his reign, established the
most perfect freedom of conscience in every government his influence
could control. His downfall re-established through Europe the dominion
of intolerance.
The Reformation, in contending for the right of private judgment in
contradiction to the claims of councils, maintained a principle which
necessarily involved the freedom of conscience. This was not then
perceived; but time developed the truth. The Reformation became, in
reality, the mother of all religious liberty.