The French Revolution of 1789.
All the various forces indicated in the preceding chapter came together
in one appalling union towards the year 1789, forming a veritable
cauldron seething with malign influences. An unhappy public opinion had
been created, "a power vague and terrible, born of the confusion of all
interests, strong in its opposition to every power, constantly caressed
by princes who feared it, and feared by those who pretended to defy it."
The masses of France, provoked by the arbitrary government of Louis
XIV., angered by the feeble and scandalous rule of Louis XV., broke out
into license and destruction under the gentle and paternal
administration of Louis XVI. The latter monarch had come into an
inheritance vitiated by the extravagances and follies of his
predecessors; with all the virtues and noble characteristics of a
sincere Christian and refined gentleman, he was destined to bear the
punishment for the sins of his fathers. He had long foreseen the
hastening storm, and trembled before its coming. The exhausted state of
the treasury and the diminution of credit gave the excuse for demands
of the most far-reaching extent. The nobility, regarding the situation
with indifference, remained inert before the approaching ruin of the
social order. Unwilling to be disturbed in their round of pleasure, they
permitted the evil to grow until the very moment of the crisis.
The royal government betrayed its weakness when it convoked the States
General, which held its first session on May 5, 1789. It was an assembly
constituted of the three classes of the French nation--the nobility, the
clergy, and the common people. Of its 1148 members, the Third Estate was
represented by 598; there were 308 members of the clergy, of whom
forty-four were bishops, 205 cures, fifty-two abbes or canons, and seven
religious; the remaining 242 comprised the representatives of the noble
class. The States General was an event of rare occurrence in French
history, and was called together only in the most extreme crises of the
State. It was now nearly two centuries (1615) since a gathering of a
similar nature had been convoked, and from its unusual character and the
gravity of its purpose much was expected on all sides. In the heat of
its first debates, and in the rancor aroused in the public mind through
the foolish and humiliating etiquette of the aristocratic elements, a
strong sentiment of hostility made itself manifest between the people
and their former masters. The popular element was conscious of its
power, and made it felt almost from the beginning: in the space of a few
months it was master of the situation: it had inaugurated a revolution
before which the court, the nobility, the clergy, and every order that
stood for law and decency went down in ruin. With the political phases
of this great crisis we are not particularly concerned at present; the
religious aspects of the conflict will suffice for our consideration.
[Illustration: MEETING OF THE STATES GENERAL.]
_CONFISCATION OF CHURCH PROPERTY._
On the night of August 4, 1789, the privileged classes abandoned their
feudal rights, and the clergy renounced their titles, and the offerings
usual at baptisms, marriages, and funerals. This sacrifice, however, did
not suffice to appease the revolutionary spirits, and on August 6th, the
right of the clergy to hold property was called into question for the
first time. It was then that Buzot pronounced that phrase which was soon
to re-echo through the halls of the Assembly: "The property of the
clergy belongs to the nation."
On October 10, Talleyrand, the Bishop of Autun, so soon to become an
apostate and indefatigable persecutor of the Church, returned to the
charge. After a fawning address to the popular passions he concluded in
proposing a law whose first article declared that "the revenues and
property of the clergy are at the disposition of the nation," with the
condition that the State should recompense the ministers of worship with
a suitable salary, which should be solemnly recognized as a public debt.
The project of Talleyrand was espoused with fierce eloquence by Mirabeau
and became a law on Nov. 2, 1789, framed in these terms:
"The National Assembly decrees: First. That all
ecclesiastical property is at the disposition of the nation
which charges itself with providing in a suitable manner for
the expenses of worship, the maintenance of its ministers,
and the relief of the poor, subject to the surveillance and
according to the instructions of the provinces. Second. That
in the dispositions to be made for the maintenance of the
ministers of religion, there shall be assured every cure a
payment of not less than 1,200 livres a year, not including
his house and garden."
[Illustration: TALLEYRAND.]
On April 9, 1790, Chasset demanded the actual confiscation of all
ecclesiastical property, a motion that was voted a law on April 14th
following. The possessions of the clergy, valued at $400,000,000, were
then put up at auction, and sold to speculators at prices that at once
betrayed the venal spirit of the agitators. Indignant protests went up
on all sides against a sacrilege whose effect could be nothing less than
the destruction of religion; but all efforts to stay the action were
unavailing.
_PERSECUTION Of THE RELIGIOUS ORDERS._
The religious orders have ever been the object of peculiar hatred on the
part of all that stands for anti-Christianism. Their close
identification with the best interests of the Church, and the
exemplification in their life of that evangelical perfection to which
the whole doctrine of Christ invites, became a crime in the eyes of a
generation delivered up to lawlessness, and the slavery of passion. It
was only natural, therefore, that the impious spirit of 1789 should
fasten its fangs upon this order of men and women and do them to death.
The laws of the time tell the story very graphically. A decree of
October 28, 1789, suspended the taking of monastic vows. The monastic
orders were suppressed by a decree of February 13, 1790:
Article 1. The constitutional law of the realm shall no
longer recognize solemn monastic vows of either sex; in
consequence the orders and regular corporations in which such
vows are taken are and will remain suppressed in France, nor
may they be again established in the future.
Article 2. All individuals of either sex living in
monasteries and religious houses, may leave such houses by
making a declaration before the municipality of the place,
and they shall receive a suitable pension. Houses shall also
be indicated to which all religious men who do not desire to
profit by the present disposition shall be obliged to retire.
For the present there shall be no change in regard to houses
charged with public education and establishments of charity,
until measures have been taken for that purpose.
On March 11, 1791, a law was passed abolishing the monastic habit. On
July 31, of the same year, all religious houses were declared for sale.
On August 7, 1792, a new decree declares that the pension accorded to
religious shall be granted to such as should marry, or who have
abandoned or shall abandon their monasteries. On August 12, 1792, a
decree orders the evacuation before October 1, following, and the sale
of "all houses as yet actually occupied by religious men or women,"
excepting such as are consecrated to the service of hospitals or
establishments of charity.
On August 18, 1792, a decree was passed suppressing "the corporations
known in France under the name of secular ecclesiastical congregations,
such as the priests of the Oratory of Jesus, of Christian Doctrine, of
the Mission of France, of St. Lazare, etc., etc., and generally all
religious corporations of men and women, ecclesiastical or lay, even
those devoted only to the service of hospitals and the relief of the
sick, under whatever denomination they may exist in France." All such
persons, however, were authorized to continue their care of the poor and
sick, "but only as individuals, and under the surveillance of the
municipal and administrative bodies, until the definitive organization
which the Committee on Aid shall present as soon as possible to the
National Assembly. Those who shall continue their services in houses
indicated by the directories of departments shall receive only a part
of the salary which would have been accorded them. All irremovable
property of such societies shall be put on sale, except colleges still
open in 1789 which may be utilized for seminaries. Pensions shall be
accorded all members of the suppressed societies on condition that they
take the oath of fidelity to the nation, of maintaining liberty and
equality, and of being ready to die in its defence."
_THE CIVIL CONSTITUTION._
The defenders of the Revolution take great pains to demonstrate that the
object of the earlier laws was not anti-Christian or subversive of
religion, alleging that the spirit of demolition appeared only after and
because of the hostile attitude of the Church. One has only to read the
speeches in the National Assembly, and the early laws emanating
therefrom, to perceive the hypocritical nature of such assurances. The
spirit of Voltaire is evident from the first day of the States General,
and its tactics of falsehood and deception mark every stage of
revolutionary progress until the end. The pretext of establishing a
national church is a fact in evidence, whereby under the pretence of
safeguarding the liberties of Catholics in France, an effort was made to
uproot all idea of religion from the minds of the people. The signal for
the opening of such a perversive campaign was the passing of that
iniquitous law to which was given the name of the Civil Constitution of
the Clergy.
On August 20, 1789, an ecclesiastical committee was formed for the
regulation of all affairs pending between Church and State. It was
composed of thirty members, chosen with great care from among the most
violent sectaries of the Assembly. Out of the thirty only nine were
able to approach the discussion of ecclesiastical subjects with any
appearance of justice, and this small minority soon found it impossible
to advance their views in the face of the twenty-one radicals sworn to
enslave and degrade the Church; they were consequently compelled to
resign from the commission, leaving the great work of Church affairs in
the hands of an impious cabal. The result of the deliberations of this
diminished committee is found in the Civil Constitution of the Clergy,
which was voted in the Constituent Assembly, from July 12 to July 24,
1790.
The adversaries of religion betray a naive surprise that the Church
should refuse to accept a law so worded as the Civil Constitution of the
Clergy. Yet to anyone acquainted with the spirit of Christianity the
reasons for such hostility are sufficiently evident. The Abbe Hubert
Mailfait in his comprehensive little work upon the subject thus sums up
the most objectionable features of the wholly iniquitous law:
First. It destroys the religious hierarchy and annihilates
the pontifical supremacy when it stipulates: (a) that the new
bishops can no longer address the Pope to obtain from him the
bulls of confirmation (tit. II., art. 19): (b) that the
canonical institution shall no longer be given by the Pope,
but by the metropolitan (tit. II., art. 16 and 17): (c) that
the old division of France into dioceses and parishes shall
be substituted by a new repartition, decreed without the
advice of ecclesiastical authority, and without the
approbation of the head of Christianity (tit. I.).
Second. It destroys ecclesiastical discipline: (a) by
attributing the election of bishops and pastors to the laity,
by way of the ballot and the absolute plurality of votes
(tit. II., art. 2) and in decreeing the conditions of
eligibility which should be found in candidates to a
bishopric or parish (tit. II.): (b) in determining the number
of foundations, prebends, abbeys, priories, etc. (tit. I.,
art. 20-24 and 25); in restricting to the point of
annihilation the power of the bishops in the nomination to
ecclesiastical employments (tit. II., art. 22, 24, 25, 43).
Third. It sanctions an inadmissible domination of the
temporal over the spiritual power, in subordinating the
exercise of ecclesiastical functions to the taking of an oath
of fidelity to the Constitution decreed by the Assembly (tit.
II., art. 21 and 38).
The Civic Constitution of the Clergy thus established in France not only
a schism, by depriving the bishops of the right of recourse to the Pope,
but heresy also in denying the effective primacy of the Pope and his
sovereign power in the direction of the Church and the nomination of her
ministers.
_SORROW OF PIUS VI._
When the news was brought to Pope Pius VI. that the Assembly was
actually engaged in voting the several articles of the Civil
Constitution, his sorrow knew no bounds. Public prayers were at once
ordered in the churches of Rome, while at the same time the Holy Father
addressed an impressive appeal to Louis XVI., insisting on his refusing
his sanction to the impious measures. Letters were also sent by the Pope
to the Archbishops of Bordeaux and Vienne, requesting them to use their
good offices in dissuading the king from sanctioning the law. Unhappily
these two prelates betrayed the trust reposed in them and used their
influence to the opposite end. It is to their credit that they soon
perceived their error and repented bitterly for it.
In the meantime Louis XVI. wrote to the Pope beseeching him to approve,
at least provisorily, of the first five articles to which he was in a
manner forced to give his sanction. The Holy Father placed the matter in
the hands of a commission of cardinals for examination. On October 30,
of the same year, the thirty bishops who occupied seats in the Assembly
subscribed their names to a carefully prepared memorial entitled
_Exposition of Principles Concerning the Civil Constitution of the
Clergy_, wherein the new code of laws was unequivocably condemned. In
this position the episcopal deputies were supported by the adherence of
nearly all the French bishops. Their expression of disapproval, however,
came too late, as the civil constitution had already received the royal
sanction (August 24, 1790), and thereby became a law of the realm.
[Illustration: MIRABEAU.]
A test of the new decrees developed an unexpected resistance, so bitter
and decisive in many quarters as to awaken newer outbursts of harshness
from the enemies of the Church. On November 27, 1790, after a violent
diatribe delivered by Mirabeau against the independent bishops a law was
voted in the Assembly declaring that all clergy "shall take the oath
within eight days" under the penalty of being debarred from the exercise
of their functions. It stipulated, moreover, that in case of resistance
the offending clergy should be treated as disturbers of the public
peace, and deprived of their civic rights. This law received the royal
sanction on December 26, and went into execution from that date. In the
Assembly itself were many bishops and priests who were called upon to
give the example of subservience. Only a few, encouraged by such
notorious characters as Talleyrand, Gregoire, Camus, and Gobel, and
tempted by the hope of preferment under the new order, yielded to the
demands of the revolutionaries. Of the one hundred and thirty-five
bishops of France, only four, including Talleyrand and Cardinal de
Brienne, took the oath. During the following year the latter prelate was
degraded from the honor of the Roman purple, for his unworthy act.
When the question was put to the priests of the country it met with a
like reception. One should not be deceived, in reading the
anti-Christian records of this time, by the long lists of names
purporting to be the official register of priests who had subscribed to
the oath. An examination of these lists reveals the usual duplicity of
irreligious hatred, for in many cases, notably in the lists of Paris,
they contain the names of church employees, sacristans, choir-singers,
bell-ringers, and other ordinary laymen. In other cases we find the
names of young men just preparing for the seminary, and school teachers
who taught the catechism. Often, too, country pastors were deceived into
believing that the taking of such oath was an act demanded by their
bishop; these, however, were only too anxious to retract as soon as
the true state of the case was made evident to them. Of the real pastors
of the Church the number who proved unfaithful to their duty was
inconsiderable; the loyalty of the vast body, both of bishops and
clergy, forms one of the brightest pages in the dark history of those
unhappy years.
[Illustration: CARDINAL DOMENIE D. BRIENNE.]
In the midst of the general anxiety there came to Paris on April 13,
1791, the Bull of Pope Pius VI., formally condemning the Civil
Constitution and calling upon the bishops and priests of France to stand
firmly to the principles of their faith. This act of the Holy Father was
the signal for outbursts of fury in the hostile camp. The Papal Bull was
publicly burned amidst outcries of hatred and execration; women coming
from Mass were whipped through the streets; ruffians interrupted the
divine services and threw disorder into congregations of the faithful,
while in many places disorderly mobs invaded the convents and dragging
the nuns out to the public squares inflicted upon them the degrading
punishment of the scourge. It was in vain that the Directory of Paris,
frightened at the prospect of civil war, permitted Catholics to hire
places for the use of divine worship; the very appearance of leniency
only drew forth greater exhibitions of hatred and persecution. The king
himself was compelled to attend at Mass celebrated by a Constitutional
priest, as a pledge of his adherence to the principles of the Civil
Constitution. Throughout the departments the persecution had already
gone to great lengths; priests were everywhere imprisoned, and the
Catholic laity who had dared to assist at the Catholic Mass, or who had
refused to take part in the election of schismatical priests, were
declared incapable of all civil functions. On June 9, 1790, the
Constituent decreed that no bulls or briefs of the Pope might be
published or propagated in the kingdom without the authorization of the
Legislative Corps and of the king.
In the meantime, the apostate bishop of Autun, Talleyrand, had
consecrated two constitutional bishops, who in their turn proceeded to
ordain to the priesthood a list of unworthy, illiterate, immoral, and
dishonest rascals. The legitimate clergy, shut out from their churches,
and driven to the homes of their friends, had nevertheless the
consolation of knowing that the faithful were refusing everywhere to
acknowledge the authority of the unlawful priests, and demanding in
quiet, but significant ways, the services of those who alone had been
called to the sanctuary.
_THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY._
The Constituent Assembly was dissolved on Sept. 30, 1791, and was
succeeded on the following day, by the Legislative Assembly. The new
government, in the hands of men more impious than those of the
Constituent, began their proceedings with the passage of new laws of
persecution, to which, however, the king had the courage to refuse his
sanction. In spite, however, of the royal opposition new decrees
continued to be published. On the twenty-ninth of November, a law was
voted declaring that all ecclesiastics, other than those who had
conformed to the decree of November 29 last would be obliged to present
themselves before the municipality of the place in which they lived, and
there take the civic oath, in the terms of Art. 5, title II. of the
Constitution, and sign a legal attestation of the same. Such as should
refuse would be held as suspects in revolt against the law, and with
evil intent against their country, and as such particularly subjected
and recommended to the surveillance of all constituted authorities. If
trouble should arise in the place of their residence they could be
evicted from their domicile, arrested by the directory of the
department, and, in case of disobedience, condemned to prison.
On May 27, 1792, the Legislative Assembly published another decree,
stating that the deportation of non-juring ecclesiastics would take
place as a measure of public safety and police regulation. Ecclesiastics
were considered as non-juring who, being subject to the law of December
26, 1790, had not taken the oath; those also who, though not subject to
that law had not taken the oath posterior to September 3rd, preceding,
the day on which the French constitution was considered as completed;
those also, who had retracted their oath. The deportation could be
pronounced by the local authorities upon the denunciation of twenty
citizens.
A law of August 26, 1792, prescribed that "all those ecclesiastics who
have not taken the oath, or who having taken it have retracted and
persist in their retraction, shall be compelled to leave within eight
days, the limits of the district or department in which they reside, and
within fifteen days they must leave the country. After fifteen days such
ecclesiastics as shall not have obeyed the preceding dispositions should
be deported to French Guyenne. Every ecclesiastic, who should dare to
remain in the country after such procedures, should be condemned to ten
years of imprisonment." This law was applicable to all priests--both
secular and regular. About 50,000 priests became victims of these
violent proscriptions.
[Illustration: STORMING OF THE BASTILLE.]
_THE MASSACRES OF SEPTEMBER._
The passion of hatred for religion never abated during the sad days of
1792. Law followed law proscribing, persecuting, hunting down all who
dared to oppose the evil suggestions of the revolutionary despots. On
August 16, an order was issued appropriating all the sacred vessels of
the churches, with the design of converting them into money or utensils
of war. Another project of the government had for its purpose the
banishment of all clergy within a fortnight. This method, however, of
getting rid of the priesthood, seemed too slow to suit the ferocious
lust of the tyrants--a quicker and surer plan suggested itself. To
secure its execution, the leaders of the anti-Christian party sought to
inflame the minds of the rabble with stories of plots and treason,
perpetrated by the priests against the safety of the nation. Above all
the threatened invasion of the Prussians was laid to their door, and the
report of the same circulated through every street and alley of Paris.
The populace, already made familiar with the sight of blood, seized upon
the wild reports with the avidity of hungry animals, and needed only a
suggestion to lead them on to acts of violence. This was not wanting. In
the Assembly, Marat, Legendre and others openly demanded the slaughter
of the priests, while Danton, the Minister of Justice, was appointed to
see that the project was executed. In the meantime hundreds of priests,
and thousands of Catholic laity, men, women and children, had been
arrested, and filled the prisons of the country to overflowing. On
August 31, the Commune of Paris put up everywhere placards containing a
proclamation of Robespierre: "We have arrested the priestly disturbers;
we hold them behind prison bars, and in a few days, the sun of liberty
shall be purged of their presence." All was ready for a massacre of
gigantic proportions. A signal was agreed upon, for the commencement of
the bloody deed; it was to be the third discharge of the cannon on
Point-Neuf. On the morning of September 2, the dreadful carnage began in
the prison house of the Carmes, where 120 fell by the sword. The
massacre lasted four days, while bands of assassins went from prison to
prison, and in that short space of time took the lives of 1,400 persons
of every sex, age and condition, 300 of whom were priests.
[Illustration: MASSACRE OF PRINCESS LAMBELLE.]
The Abbe Lecard, an eye-witness, describes the awful scene at the prison
of the Abbey:
"The massacre took place under my window. The cries of the
victims, the blows of the sabres as they fell upon the heads
of the innocent victims, the shouts of the murderers, the
applause of the witnesses, all resounded in my soul. I even
distinguished the voices of my confreres, who were arrested
and brought in the night before. I heard the questions put to
them, and the responses they gave. They were asked if they
had taken the civil oath, but none had done so. All could
have escaped death by a lie; but all preferred death. All
said when dying: 'We are subject to your law, we die faithful
to your constitution, we except only what regards religion
and what has reference to conscience.' They were immediately
pierced by numerous swords, amid the most frightful
vociferations. The spectators while applauding cried out:
'Long live the nation!'--at the same time executing
abominable dances around the corpses.
"Towards three or four o'clock in the morning, similar cries,
tumult and ribaldry were repeated. This was in consequence of
their bringing into the court-yard, now strewn with corpses,
two priests whom they had dragged from their beds. The
executioners jested over the horrible scene. The two priests
were asked to take the oath, but they refused with mildness
and firmness. Seeing themselves on that account condemned to
death, they demanded a few hours to prepare themselves, and
they obtained their request. The assassins employed the
interval in removing the bodies, in washing and sweeping the
court-yard, red with blood--a work which caused them
considerable difficulty. To avoid this in the case of others
who were about to be massacred, they proposed various
expedients and, finally, agreed upon employing a quantity of
straw on which they would butcher their victims and which
would absorb the blood and prevent the pavement from being
stained. One of the assassins complained that the aristocrats
died too quickly; that only those in the front row had the
pleasure of striking them. It was accordingly determined that
the victims should be struck only with the back of the sword,
and that they should be made to run between two files of
assassins. It was determined that around the place where the
victims were to be immolated there should be benches for the
ladies and gentlemen. All were free to enter. All this I have
seen and heard with my own eyes and ears."
These frightful scenes of Paris were equalled if not surpassed by the
terrorists of the provinces, and especially in the cities of Lyons,
Rheims, Nantes, Bordeaux, and Avignon. It was but natural that the
flight of priests from the insane fury of the Revolution should be
hastened by the events of those days. Many succeeded in gaining the
frontier and found refuge in the Papal States, in Spain, Portugal and in
England where they were received with respect and welcome. Many returned
secretly to France and bravely defied the dangers of martyrdom in the
exercise of their sacred ministry.
[Illustration: MARAT.]
The Legislative Assembly, after a final law granting divorce upon mutual
consent, or upon the demand of one of the parties, was dissolved on
September 20, 1792.
_THE CONVENTION._
On September 21st, 1792, a new government, entitled the Convention,
began its sittings. It has been justly characterized as an organization
the most bloody and atrocious in history. It was during its
administration that that dark period occurred to which has been given
the significant name of the "Reign of Terror." Composed as it was of
the vilest and most unscrupulous element of the nation its inauguration
gave little promise of peace or security to the country. Its sessions
were dominated by the Jacobins, the Girondists, and the Mountaineers,
parties sworn to oppose each other in all political matters, though
uniting in all measures of oppression to religion and the Church.
Their methods of tyranny were conceived with system and precision worthy
of a better cause, and were executed by a machinery whose organized
efforts reached into every village and hamlet in the land. Its Committee
of Public Safety, the supreme secret council of the Convention, included
men like Danton, Marat, and Robespierre. There was a Committee of
General Security for the detection of political crimes, and the
punishment of all suspected or proscribed persons. The Revolutionary
Tribunal condemned the victims indicated by the General Security, and
condemned them to death without a hearing.
There were Revolutionary committees in every department and municipality
throughout the country, whose office it was to imprison suspects, and to
employ the guillotine regardless of trial. The Revolutionary
Army--composed of only such as had proven themselves devoted to the
anarchistic doctrines of the times--was employed in the guarding the
prisons, arresting suspects, demolishing castles, pulling down belfries,
ransacking churches for gold and silver vessels, and other like
purposes. It had its regiments in every city of France. It was by means
of such powerfully organized associations that the Convention was able
to perpetrate the atrocities of the Reign of Terror.
The first act of the new Assembly was to declare the abolition of
royalty, and to proclaim France a Republic. At the same time it began
the attempt to inaugurate a new era, the first day of the first year of
which was to be September 22nd, 1792.
_THE CALENDAR._
In the new Revolutionary calendar the Christian order of months and
weeks was set aside for an arbitrary arrangement whose awkward and
frivolous character was evident, even independently of its sacrilegious
intent. Instead of weeks of seven days, periods of ten days, or decades,
were substituted. As there was to be no Sunday, the tenth or last day of
the decade, called "Decadi," was to be observed as the day of rest, and
have all the importance of the Lord's Day, the place of which it had
taken. The months were twelve and consisted each of thirty days; to make
up the necessary 365 days of the year, five intercalary days, called
_sans culottes_, were added.
The months were adorned with festive names taken from Nature; thus
Vendemaire, the vintage month; Brumaire, the foggy; Frimaire, the
frosty; Nivose, the snowy; Pluvoise, the rainy; Ventose, the windy;
Germinal, the month of sprouting; Floreal, the month of flowers;
Prairial, the haymaking; Messidor, the time of harvest; Thermidor, the
month of heat; and Fructidor, the month of fruit. To obliterate, as far
as possible, every Christian idea associated with the days of the year,
the new calendar abolished the Christian festivals and substituted
strange and uncouth denominations for each successive day. It was a bold
stroke, and though the Convention succeeded a few months later in
causing its execution throughout the country, nevertheless it was never
heartily accepted even by the most radical, and only a favorable
opportunity was wanting for its final abolition with the Revolution
itself.
[Illustration: DANTON.]
On the twenty-seventh of September, the Convention reduced
ecclesiastical pensions to 1000 livres, and on October 23rd, it decreed
that all who had flown the country were to be considered as banished in
perpetuity, and should they return they were to be punished with death.
On November 27th, a decree was passed, declaring that if a priest should
marry, and be therefore inquieted by the residents of the commune in
which he resided, he might retire to any place he liked, and his salary
should be paid by the commune which had persecuted him. It was an effort
to render the marriage of priests popular, an attempt, however, which
always met with failure.
It was during the month of December, 1792, and that of January, 1793,
that the trial of Louis XVI. took place. The Convention voted the death
sentence, and the crime of regicide against one of the mildest
sovereigns of the century was perpetrated January 17th, of that year.
The prescriptive laws against the clergy and the Church went on apace.
On January 22nd the constitutional clergy were ordered to disregard all
canonical rules in regard to marriage, and to bless the marriages of
divorced people as well as those of constitutional priests. On February
14th, a reward of one hundred livres was offered to whoever should cause
the arrest of an emigre, or of a priest under sentence of deportation.
On March 18th, it substituted for the penalty of ten years for such
priests the sentence of death. April 23rd, it put forth the article:
"The national Convention decrees that all ecclesiastics, regular and
secular, brothers or laymen, who have not taken the oath to maintain
liberty and equality conformable to the law of August 15th, 1792, shall
be deported without delay to French Guiana."
Immediately on the appearance of this law the sea-ports of France began
to witness thousands of captive priests who were placed on board the
waiting vessels, ostensibly for transportation to America. As, however,
such voyage was at the time impracticable because of danger from the
English fleets then patrolling the seas, the victims of proscription
were left in the miserable hulks, in some cases for as long as two
years. Their sufferings in this regard were extreme. Huddled together in
the holds like so many packages of dead merchandise, the bare floor for
a bed, covered with rags and devoured by vermin, their torment was truly
horrible. Many of them perished; others lost their reason; the survivors
bore away with them many souvenirs of physical and moral torture which
they carried to the grave. The story of the deportation of priests
during the Reign of Terror is one of the ugliest records of the times.
The Convention next turned its attention to the constitutional clergy,
whom it compelled by every means of proscription and exaction to
dishonor the little remnant of sacred character that still remained
within them. Hence the laws of 1793, decreeing deportation for any
bishop who should directly or indirectly oppose an obstacle to the
marriage of priests, or who should refuse to recognize divorce. It
reduced the salaries of the bishops and limited the number of their
curates. It, moreover, dismissed from the exercise of their functions
all pastors who failed to display a pronounced enthusiasm for
revolutionary principles, and put in their stead men whose ignorance was
well known, and whose wives were willing to occupy a prominent position
in the Church.
[Illustration: THE GODDESS OF REASON.]
_THE REIGN OF TERROR._
During the latter part of 1793 the country had virtually delivered
itself up to the will of its tyrants. The war against religion had
assumed an open and defiant character, under the influence of the
guillotine; churches had already lost their sacred significance, and the
names of the saints or holy mysteries which they had hitherto borne gave
place to profane and often impious titles; the Republican calendar had
been formally adopted and enforced upon the nation; everywhere priests
were called upon to burn their letters of ordination and to bring to the
Convention their crosses, chalices, ciboriums and other objects destined
for the Holy Sacrifice. The Archbishop of Paris, the infamous Gobel,
entered the hall of the Convention at the head of other constitutional
clergy, and there despoiled himself of all insignia of episcopal or
priestly office, declaring at the same time that he renounced forever
all his rights and duties as a minister of Catholic worship.
_THE GODDESS OF REASON._
It was at this time, November 10th, 1793, that the Convention proclaimed
the worship of reason, and deified that abstract idea by a sacrilegious
ceremony in the Cathedral of Notre Dame, at Paris. An actress was placed
upon a throne within the sanctuary of that ancient temple, and received
amidst the hymns and maudlin praises of the multitude the adoration of a
fallen nation. The example of Paris was imitated in all parts of the
country, until the strange spectacle was observed of a whole nation gone
mad.
The new worship brought with it renewed hostility to Christianity.
Almost every day the Convention was called upon to review processions
whose object was to ridicule and cast odium upon the things of God.
Bands of _Sans-Culottes_ defiled through the streets, or passed through
the Assembly halls, attired in copes, chasubles and dalmatics which they
had pillaged from the churches. No limit was put to these exhibitions of
horrible sacrilege. In many cases the processions were headed by an ass
bearing a mitre upon his head, a chalice upon his back, with a cross
hanging from his tail. It seemed as if the Revolution could go no
further in its impiety, though men still held their breath waiting
anxiously for the next move in the horrible nightmare.
In the midst of the general madness the Revolution turned against its
own creatures and denied its own religion. The people had already begun
to mock at the absurdity of the worship of reason, and tired of one
false god, looked to their leaders to supply them with another. It was
at this juncture that Robespierre, the man of blood and crime, suddenly
became the apostle of a new cult, which was baptized in the blood of the
adorers of reason. The guillotine reaped rich harvests, numbering that
year among its victims the apostates, Gobel, Lamourette, Clootz,
together with Hebert, Danton, Desmoulins and others.
In the beginning of the year 1794, Robespierre caused the Convention to
pass a decree proclaiming the existence of a Supreme Being, and
constituting feast days "to recall mankind to the consideration of the
divinity and to the dignity of his being." On June 8th, he presided
personally as high priest, at the first solemn feast of the new worship.
The latter, however, proved even less popular as a religion than its
predecessor, and served only to demonstrate how the human heart craves
for the worship of God, and will not be satisfied with the human
imitations of a religion whose origin is divine.
[Illustration: WORSHIP OF SUPREME BEING.]
In its proscriptive decrees the Convention hitherto had not included the
aged and infirm priests; by a decree of Floreal 22, these also were
subjected to all exactions imposed upon others. Another decree demanded
the accusation of all enemies of the people, and pronounced the penalty
of death, without trial or witnesses, upon simple verbal denunciations.
The Terror was now in its blindest spasm of madness, and in Paris alone,
during three months, more than two thousand victims laid their heads
upon the block, including many constitutional priests, who had the good
fortune, through the pious offices of the Abbe Emery, to retract their
errors and become reconciled to God.
A pall of moral darkness hung over the nation from end to end, a deep
silence, full of anxiety and terror, was broken only by the shrieks of
the dying and the insane laughter of the murderers. The silence and
holiness of the Lord's Day was desecrated by labor and unseemly orgies;
the _decadi_ was observed instead of Sunday, and peasants or others
daring to work on that day, or daring to rest on Sunday, were treated as
suspects and punished with all the violence of irreligious hatred.
Throughout the land every symbol and remembrance of religion had
vanished: the church steeples had been torn down, the bells no longer
called the faithful to divine service, the cross was treated as an
object of public shame. Everywhere men and women suspected of fanaticism
or denounced as enemies of the Revolution were condemned to death and
executed. In the city of Lyons the guillotine severed thirty heads a
day; but its work proving too slow for the blood-thirst of the
assassins, the victims were ranged in rows, and mowed down by storms
of bullets. In this way fully one thousand seven hundred fell in a short
period of a few months.
[Illustration: ROBESPIERRE (1758-1794).]
In the departments of the Ain and the Saone-et-Loire, liberty was
decreed to priests who should agree to marry within a month; the aged
were exempted from this law upon the condition of adopting a child of
Revolutionary parents, to care for as their own. In Savoy, one thousand
two hundred livres was offered as a reward for the arrest of a
non-juring priest; all who refused to apostatize, whether faithful or
constitutional, were arrested and condemned. At Marseilles and at
Avignon, the infamous Maignet emulated his predecessor, Jourdan
Coupetete, with the guillotine and fusillade of bullets. In the South, a
young girl was arrested and put to death for having crossed over into
Spain to confess to a legitimate priest. An aged official was sentenced
to imprisonment and a heavy fine for having assisted at the "Feast of
Reason" with an air of sadness and arrogance. Six women were guillotined
for having assisted at the Mass of a non-juring priest.
In the Vendee one thousand eight hundred persons were murdered within a
period of three months. And so the list went on through all the first
half of 1794, which has left a record of millions murdered, deported,
exiled, imprisoned, or tortured in a thousand and one ways. They were
red letter days in the Revolutionary calendar, but the red color was
made from the blood of Frenchmen. A mitigation of the horrors of those
days came at last when the head of the arch-assassin, Robespierre,
rolled away from the block on July 27th, 1794.
_SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE._
Among the oppressive laws enacted by the Convention, before its final
dissolution in 1795, were those concerning education and the separation
of Church and State. The decree of October 21st, 1793, decided that
primary schools should form the first degree of instruction; therein
should be taught all that was rigorously necessary for a citizen to
know. Persons charged with instruction in such schools should be known
as institutors. The decree determined the number of schools to be
founded in each commune, according to the number of its inhabitants, and
fixed the programme of instruction.
The children shall receive in these schools the first
physical, moral, and intellectual education, the better to
develop in them republican ways, the love of country, and a
taste for work. They shall learn to speak, read and write the
French language. They shall be taught those virtues which do
most to honor free men, and particularly the ideas of the
French Revolution, which shall serve to elevate their souls
and render them worthy of liberty and equality. They shall
acquire some notions of French geography. The knowledge of
the rights and duties of man and citizen shall be taught them
by example and experience. They shall be taught the first
notions of the natural objects that surround them, and the
natural action of the elements. They shall be exercised in
the use of numbers, the compass, weights, measures, etc.
Another decree, of October 28th, 1793, declared that "no ci-devant
noble, no ecclesiastic or minister of any worship whatsoever, can be a
member of the commission of instruction, or be elected a national
institutor. No women of the ci-devant nobility, no ci-devant religious
women, canonesses, nuns, who have been placed in the old schools by
ecclesiastics or ci-devant nobles, can be nominated as institutors in
the national schools."
A decree of February 21st, 1795, read as follows:
Art. 1. Conformable to Art. 7 of the Declaration of the
Rights of Man, and to Art. 22 of the Constitution, the
exercise of no worship shall be troubled. Art. 2. The
Republic shall pay salary to no minister of worship. Art. 3.
It shall furnish no locality either for the exercise of
worship or for the residence of its ministers. Art. 4. The
ceremonies of every kind of worship are interdicted outside
the enclosures chosen for such exercise. Art. 5. The law does
not recognize any minister of worship; no such minister may
appear in public with the habit, ornaments, or costume
affected in religious ceremonies. Art. 6. All assemblages of
citizens for the exercise of any worship whatsoever shall be
subject to the surveillance of the constituted authorities.
This surveillance shall be fortified by measures of police
guard and public security. Art. 7. No particular symbol of
any worship may be erected in any public place, neither
exteriorly, nor in any manner whatsoever. No inscription can
be put up to designate such place of worship. No public
proclamation or convocation can be made to draw the citizens
thither. Art. 8. The communes or sections of communes may not
hire or purchase, in their collective name, any locality for
the exercise of worship. Art. 9. No donation, perpetual or
temporary, may be formed, and no tax imposed to pay the
expenses of such worship. Art. 10. Whosoever shall, by
violence, disturb the ceremonies of any worship whatsoever,
or who offers outrage to its objects, shall be punished,
according to the law of July 19-22, 1791, in regard to
correctional police. Art. 11. The law (of 2 des
sans-culottides, an II.) with regard to ecclesiastical
pensions, is not hereby abrogated, and its dispositions shall
be executed according to their form and tenor. Art. 12. Every
decree whose dispositions are contrary to the present law
formulated by the representatives of the people in the
departments is annulled.
[Illustration: MARIE ANTOINETTE AND HER CHILDREN.]
A decree of May 30th, 1795, decided that "no one shall fulfill the
ministry of any worship in the said edifices, unless he shall have
given legal declaration before the municipality of the place in which he
desires to exercise such functions, of his submission to the laws of the
Republic. The ministers of worship who shall contravene the present
article, and the citizens who shall invite or admit them, shall each be
punished by a fine of 1,000 livres."
A law of September 30th, 1795, decreed:
It is forbidden to all judges, administrators, and public
officials whomsoever, to have any regard for the attestations
which ministers of worship, or individuals calling themselves
such, shall give relative to the civil condition of citizens.
All officials charged with registering the civil state of
citizens, who shall make mention in their records of any
religious ceremonies, or who shall exact proof that they have
been observed, shall also be condemned to the penalties
contained in Article 18.
The Convention concluded its sanguinary existence on October 26th, 1795,
after the conclusion of the Constitution of the year III.
_THE DIRECTORY._
The Convention was immediately followed by the government of the
Directory, which lasted until the end of the Revolutionary period, in
1799. It was composed of a Council of Five Hundred, whose duty it was to
propose laws, a Council of two hundred and fifty Ancients to approve or
reject the laws thus proposed, and a supreme body consisting of five
members--all regicides--which was called the Directory.
The new government was less bold in its persecutions than its
predecessor, though the spirit that had actuated the Convention still
lived in both houses of the Directory. The pursuit of priests was still
continued, and the laws against them and their protectors enforced
with the greatest rigor. In the year 1796 eighteen priests were executed
under the orders of the government. Nevertheless a sentiment of
hostility to the oppressive measures of the law was beginning to
manifest itself in a number of the departments; churches were again
being opened and the practice of religion renewed.
[Illustration: DEATH OF ROBESPIERRE.]
The rigors of the Terror, however, were not yet extinct; the worship of
the Revolution was enforced, the sound of the church bells was
forbidden, and the Revolutionary calendar still held its place in the
ordering of the life of the people. An effort was made in 1796 to bring
back into full force all the proscriptive laws of the Convention, but
through the efforts of Portalis the Council of Five Hundred refused to
vote the bill.
In the meantime the exiled and deported priests began to return in great
numbers. In Paris more than three hundred were exercising their ministry
openly; the diocesan administration was reorganized; and a general
interest in the unhappy lot of imprisoned priests began to manifest
itself among the people. In 1797, June 17th, a motion was placed before
the Council of Five Hundred, demanding liberty of worship, the
suppression of the oath, and the abrogation of the laws of deportation.
These reforms were voted--after a few weeks of discussion--and in place
of the obnoxious oath the Directory substituted the words: "I swear to
be submissive to the government of the French Republic." Everything thus
seemed to hold out promise of peace and security to the Church, and
might have thus continued but for the _coup-d'-Etat_ of the 10
Fructidor, which brought with it the renewal, for two years, of the
horrors of the Terror.
The new government instituted under the three Directors, Rewbel, la
Reveillere and Barras, brought back the Revolutionary forces into the
Councils, and the old laws of proscription were renewed. Priests who
had obtained their liberty were again arrested and imprisoned or
deported; the oath of the Constitution was re-established; the
persecution became more rabid than ever in its last struggle for
supremacy. To gather greater numbers to the Revolutionary ceremonies, it
was decreed that marriages could take place only on the "decadi" or
tenth day, whereon no manual labor might be performed, or merchandise
bought or sold. It became a crime to print or hold in one's possession
copies of the Christian calendar, and on Fridays and Saturdays of the
old order the very sale of fish was forbidden, that the citizens might
be compelled to eat meat. The deported priests suffered intolerable
torments through the cruel treatment dealt out to them. Out of three
hundred transported to Conamana, only thirty-nine were alive after a
month's detention. In other places many died through famine, sickness
and misery.
In the midst of these discouraging afflictions of the Church, the
constitutional bishops, in a council held on August 15th, 1797, had the
hardihood to plan a reconciliation between the schismatic church of
France and the orthodox church, and went so far as to send their decrees
to the Pope for ratification; Pius VI., however, refused to honor the
communication with an answer.
_PERSECUTION OF POPE PIUS VI._
In the incessant struggle of French anti-Christianism against the
Church, its leaders had not neglected early in the period to turn their
attacks against the head and centre of Christianity, in the person of
the Holy Pontiff, Pius VI. Rome, "the mother of nations," was the
sanctuary towards which many French students turned their steps to
acquire a knowledge of art and literature; these young men, imbued with
the false spirit of their unhappy country, made use of the hospitality
of the Eternal City to betray her. In the Academy of France, in the
midst of obscene orgies and ribald speeches, the statues and busts of
kings, cardinals and popes were overthrown, and sentiments of revolution
and irreligion openly pronounced. Basseville and Laflotte, bearing an
insulting message to Pope Pius VI., utilized their time in Rome in an
attempt to arouse the populace to accept Republican ideas; but the Roman
people, infuriated at the insulting bravado of these couriers of the
French Government, attacked them in the Corso, giving a death blow to
Basseville, and causing his companion to fly for his life. This was in
1793. The Constituent Assembly at Paris took up the death of its
messenger as a pretext for hostilities against the government of the
Holy See.
It was at this time also, that there began to appear in Paris certain
_Letters_ to the Pope, which displayed openly the intention of the new
liberty with regard to the Papacy. The _Moniteur_ of October 1st, 1792,
put forth the following grandiloquent address:
Holy Father, gather your people together, and rising in the
midst of them, declare fearlessly: Descendants of the
grandest people of the world, imposture has too long been
desolating your country. The hour of truth has come; come and
enjoy the rights that nature gave you; be free, be sovereign;
be your own lawmakers; bring back once more the Roman
Republic. But guard well against the abuses and vices which
were the ruin of the ancient republic; drive out from you all
patricians, cavaliers, prelates, cardinals, bishops, priests,
monks and nuns; be citizens all. See, I give you my tiara,
and I hope that my example will be followed by my clergy.
It was only a month after these words had been printed that General
Kellerman declared from the tribune: "Citizen legislators, to liberate
ancient Rome from the yoke of the priests, command our soldiers to pass
the Alps, and we shall pass them."
[Illustration: LAFAYETTE.]
It was, however, during the administration of the Directory that the
first actual assaults upon the Holy See were made by the forces of
France. Under an appearance of good will, which only served to conceal
its weakness, the Directory stultified itself in the face of Europe; the
army alone by its victories sustained the honor of the nation.
After conquering the Rhine countries the Republic turned its eyes upon
Italy. In the beginning of 1796, General Bonaparte, with an army of
30,000 men, crossed the Alps. Despite the snows of the winter and the
continual blizzards they encountered, the French soldiers continued to
descend into Piedmont, while the Italians still believed them to be on
the borders of the Rhine.
Mantua fell, the Austrians were driven beyond the Adige, and Bonaparte
hastened to besiege and take Bologna. It was the desire of the Directory
that the conqueror should proceed on his way to Rome and annihilate
forever the power of the Papacy. Bonaparte himself proved less greedy
than his masters; he would be satisfied with one or two provinces from
the revenues of which he might draw funds to defray the expenses of his
campaign. His victories, nevertheless, were rapid and decisive, and in a
few days made him master of all Northern Italy. The King of Sardinia and
the dukes of Parma and Modena made their act of submission, while the
Court of Naples manifested a desire to frame a treaty of peace.
Admonished by the fate of the neighboring nations, Pius VI. began to
frame terms of negotiation with the conqueror. Towards the end of 1796,
the Chevalier d'Azara, Ambassador of Spain to the Holy See, was
charged with the duty of arranging a convention with the French
Government. The Directory had looked to Rome as the repository of
immense riches, the plunder of which might help to bolster up the
enfeebled finances of France. The first condition imposed upon the Pope,
in order to gain an armistice, was to turn over to Saliceti and Garrau,
the representatives of France, the sum of 50,000,000 livres. D'Azara
rejected the exorbitant terms, and seeing that he could effect nothing
with the Directory, he opened up negotiations with Bonaparte directly.
[Illustration: CAPTURE OF LOUIS XVI.]
His demands in this part met at first with the usual hauteur of the
General, who required that His Holiness should first drive from Rome all
French emigres, and that he should expedite a Bull approving of the
revolutionary government. To these first terms the ambassador answered:
"If you imagine that you can compel the Pope to do the least thing
contrary to dogma, and whatever is intimately connected with dogma, you
are much mistaken, for he will never do so! You can take revenge by
sacking, burning and destroying Rome and St. Peter's, but religion shall
remain in spite of you. If, on the other hand, you desire the Pope to
exhort all in a general way to good behavior and obedience to legitimate
authority, he will do that willingly."
The words of d'Azara produced a favorable impression upon the General,
though at first they had but little real effect. On June 19th, d'Azara
was summoned to meet the representatives of the Directory at Bologna,
where a demand for 40,000,000 livres was made together with the cession
of Ancona, the occupation of Bologna and Ferrara, provisions for the
soldiery, one hundred pictures or statues from the Papal museums, five
hundred manuscripts, and the treasures of Loretto, or failing the
latter, a fine of 1,000,000 francs. After many discussions the sum of
payment in money was fixed at 21,000,000 livres. To arrange all matters
in a more satisfactory manner the Holy Father sent Mgr. Pierracchi as
plenipotentiary to Paris. Here the messenger of the Pope was received in
so barbarous and insulting a manner that he was obliged to leave the
French territory with all haste.
[Illustration: TREATY OF TOLLENTINO.]
So discouraging did affairs now appear to the Holy Father that for a
time he thought seriously of abandoning Rome for the present and taking
refuge in the Island of Malta. However, he determined to effect if
possible a new accommodation; this attempt proved as unsuccessful as
those which preceded it, and the Holy Father in his desolation declared
before a commission of the cardinals: "Let the Directory consider well
the motives which constrain the conscience of His Holiness to such
refusal, a refusal which he will be obliged to sustain at the peril of
his life."
The representatives of the Directory to whom this protest of His
Holiness was brought, at Florence, could not but admire the courage with
which it was inspired. The matter was now taken up personally by
Bonaparte himself, whose influence led finally to the signing of a
treaty at Tollentino, February 19th, 1797. By the terms of this
convention the Pope revoked all treaties of alliance against France, he
recognized the Republic, he ceded his rights over Venaissin, he
abandoned to the Cis-Alpine Republic the Legations of Bologna, and
Ferrara, and all of Romagna; Ancona was to remain in the possession of
the French; the Duchies of Urbino and Macerata were to be restored to
the Pope on the payment of 15,000,000 livres. A like sum was to be paid
conformable to the armistice of Bologna, not yet executed. These
30,000,000 livres were payable, two-thirds in money and the rest in
diamonds and precious stones; 300,000 francs were to be paid to the
heirs of Basseville.
We shall not linger in relating the great difficulties the Holy Father
experienced in raising the immense funds required by this treaty. The
generosity of the Roman people, the cardinals, and the prelates of
Italy, was displayed in a manner to reflect lasting honor upon their
names. The whole transaction dealt a severe blow to the peace and
security of the aged Pontiff from the effects of which he never fully
recovered.
_ARREST AND DEATH OF THE POPE._
The Directory, ever on the watch for a pretext that might seem to
justify new attempts against the government of the Pope, found one
during the month of December, 1797. General Duphot, at the head of a
band of rebellious Romans, had attacked the garrison at Ponte Sixto. The
Papal soldiers, angered by the assault and the offensive insults of the
mob, endeavored to repulse it by a harmless show of force. One soldier,
more quick-tempered than his comrades, forgot himself in the moment of
excitement, and fired into the crowd. The bullet struck General Duphot,
who fell mortally wounded. The affair, accidental though it was, and
perfectly natural, considering the circumstances, was taken by the
French Government as an act demanding summary punishment. Accordingly,
General Berthier, in command of the French forces at Ancona, received
from General Bonaparte the following instructions:
Paris, 22 Nivose An. (January 11, 1798.)
Quickness will be of supreme importance in your march upon
Rome; it alone can assure the success of the operation. The
moment that you have sufficient troops at Ancona you will
take up the march.
You will strive secretly for a union of all the surrounding
districts with that city, such as the Duchy of Urbino and the
province of Macerata.
You will not make known your intentions against the Pope
until your troops are at Macerata. You will say very briefly
that the reason for your marching on Rome is to punish the
assassins of General Duphot and all those who have dared to
be wanting in the respect which is due to the ambassador of
France.
The King of Naples will send his ministers to you, and you
will say that the executive Directory is not influenced in
this affair by any designs of ambition; that, on the
contrary, if the French Republic was so generous as to
restrain itself at Tollentino when it had still graver
reasons for complaint against Rome, it will not be
impossible, if the Pope gives satisfaction agreeable to our
Government, to arrange this affair.
In the meantime, while making such proposals, you will
continue on your way by forced marches. The art of the whole
matter will consist in gaining ground, so that when the King
of Naples becomes convinced that you are actually headed for
Rome, he will not have the time to prevent it.
When you are two days' journey from Rome, you will menace the
Pope and all the members of his government, who have rendered
themselves culpable of the greatest of crimes, in order to
inspire them with fear and cause them to take flight.
The plans of Bonaparte were carried out successfully. On February 10th,
1798, the French troops entered Rome by the Porta Angelica, and the
Pontifical garrison was obliged to evacuate Castle San Angelo. On
February 15th, a Calvinist named Haller brought to the Pope the final
orders of the Directory, announcing his overthrow. French soldiers
immediately replaced the Pontifical guards of the Papal palace, while
one of Berthier's generals, Cervoni, had the effrontery to present to
the Pope the tri-color cockade, which the Holy Father refused, saying,
"I know no other uniform than that with which the Church has honored
me." It was the beginning of the end.
[Illustration: NAPOLEON IN COUNCIL OF 500.]
The commissioner Haller was now delegated to announce to the Pope that
he must leave Rome. The Holy Father protested: "I am hardly
convalescent, and I cannot abandon my people or my duty; I wish to die
here."--"You can die anywhere," answered the brutal messenger. "If the
ways of gentleness cannot persuade you to go, we shall employ rigorous
means to compel you."
Pius VI. left alone with his servants, appeared for the first time
overcome with sadness. He entered his oratory, and after imploring the
aid of the Almighty; re-appeared in a few moments. "It is God's will,"
he said calmly, "let us prepare to accept all His Providence has in
store for us."
On February 20th, the commissioner, on entering the apartment, found the
Pope prostrate at the foot of the crucifix. "Make haste!" he cried, and
pushing his august prisoner before him he compelled him to descend the
stairs with undue hurry, nor did he leave him until he had entered the
carriage waiting at the gate. A detachment of dragoons, which
accompanied the carriage, served to hold in check the crowds that had
gathered in the hope of following in the footsteps of their sovereign.
It was the intention of the Directory to deport the Holy Pontiff to the
island of Sardinia; but it abandoned this design in the fear that the
English might attempt his deliverance. At Sienna, the Pope was lodged in
the Augustinian monastery, where he remained three months, when an
extraordinary event compelled his departure thence. On May 25th, an
earthquake destroyed the building, and the Holy Father had only time to
quit his room when the floor collapsed. In June he arrived at Florence,
where he remained for ten months, a prisoner, indeed, but yet enjoying
many comforts from the company of congenial souls who were permitted to
offer their words of sympathy. Among such were the Grand Duke of Tuscany
and the King and Queen of Sardinia, the latter being a sister of Louis
XVI., Maria Clotilda, besides numbers of the poor who craved a blessing
from his hands.
In the meantime the Directory found it a very difficult matter to
dispose of its august prisoner. In its fear and cruelty it strove to
induce the Grand Duke to drive the Pope out of his dominions, to which
demand the noble sovereign answered that as he had not brought the Pope
to Tuscany it was not for him to drive the Holy Father away. This
generous resistance was immediately punished by the invasion of Etruria.
In the beginning of the year 1799 the Russian and Austrian armies were
already menacing Italy; the Directory thereupon found it expedient to
transfer their illustrious captive to France. Hence, on April 1st,
despite the paralysis of one of his limbs, he was hurried away to Parma,
where he could rest only a few days. On the thirteenth the journey was
again taken up, although the physicians protested the great danger of
proceeding while the Pope remained in so feeble a condition. The
commissioner, upon learning the opinions of the physicians, entered the
apartment of the Pontiff, and there dragging the coverings from the bed,
inspected the limbs, examined the ulcers that had collected, and
proclaimed brutally: "The Pope must go on, dead or alive."
The journey now led through Northern Italy, and across the Alps. On the
evening of July 14th, the anniversary of the storming of the Bastille,
the cortege arrived finally at Valence, in France. The Pope was lodged
in the citadel, in the governor's apartments, near the convent of the
Cordeliers, which served as the prison of thirty-two priests. In this
place he died August 29, 1799, in the eighty-first year of his age.