One of them was a poor tailor, or _sempster_, who had been thrown

into prison for having worked on forbidden days, and spoken ill words

against the Church of Rome. The king having expressed a desire to

question, by way of pastime, some one of the heretics, the Cardinal

de Lorraine had this sempster brought before him, supposing that he

could not utter a sensible word. He was deceived. The sempster held

his ground against the king and the priests with great presence of

mind. “The favourite, Diane de Poitiers,” according to the narrative

of Crespin, “would also interpose her raillery; but the sempster soon

cut her cloth in a different fashion to that she expected. For he,

not being able to endure such inordinate arrogance in her whom he

knew to be the cause of such cruel persecutions, said to her: ‘Rest

contented, Madam, that you have infected all France, without mixing

your venom and filth in so sacred and holy a thing as the religion

and truth of our Lord Jesus Christ.’”[24]

Henry II. was so angered with this boldness, that he resolved to see

him burned alive. He placed himself, for the purpose, at a window

fronting the stake. The poor sempster, having recognised him, turned

upon him a look so firm, so fixed, impressed with so much calm and

courage, that the king could not sustain this mute, but terrible

accusation. He withdrew, frightened, his whole soul disturbed, and

for many nights he imagined his couch was haunted by the sinister

image of the victim. He swore never to be present again at these

fearful executions, and he kept his word. A more truly Christian

prince would have abolished them.

The persecution, far from ceasing, raged more strongly. In 1551

appeared the famous Edict of Châteaubriant, which empowered both the

secular and the ecclesiastical judges separately to take cognizance

of the crime of heresy, so that by a complete reversal of all

justice, the accused absolved before one tribunal, might be condemned

before another. All intercession on their behalf was forbidden, and

the sentences were to be executed in spite of appeal. The third

of the goods of the convicts was to go to the informers. The king

confiscated to himself the property of all those, who took refuge

out of France. It was prohibited to send money or letters to the

fugitives. And, lastly, the obligation of presenting a certificate

of Catholic orthodoxy, was imposed upon all suspected persons. This

atrocious legislation was imitated by the men of the Reign of Terror,

but with modifications.

The most infamous baseness ensued. Such and such a favourite, such

and such a courtesan, obtained as the price of the most disgraceful

services, the spoils of a family, or even of an entire canton. The

property of the victims was fought for and disputed in open day,

before the whole country. Heretics were denounced, and in default

were invented, that there might be more goods to confiscate; and many

abbeys and noble families by this means enlarged their domains, as

they did later on the revocation of the Edict of Nantes. They have

since lost their ill-gotten acquisitions. The judgments of God have

their day of execution!

The Edict of Châteaubriant was not enough. Pope Paul IV., the

Cardinal de Lorraine, the Sorbonne, a multitude of priests, demanded

that France should become a land of inquisition. A bull to this

effect was despatched in 1557, and the king confirmed it by an

edict. But in vain did he attempt to force it upon the Parliament in

session: the lay magistrates temporized, adjourned, and in the midst

of so many disgraces, France was spared this one at least.

Exasperated by these delays, the impetuous Paul IV., whose head, it

is said, was deranged with old age, fulminated a bull, in which he

declared that all who lapsed into heresy, prelates, princes, even

kings and emperors, should be shorn of their benefices, dignities,

states, and empires, which he would bestow upon the first Catholic

occupant, without even retaining to the Holy See the power of

restitution. Paul IV. mistook the age: under the pontificate of

Gregory VII. or of Innocent III., such a bull would have set all

Europe on fire; under his, it was only an act of folly.

But in default of the Inquisition, the Sorbonne and the clergy, who

had constituted hatred of heretics the first, and the most sacred

of duties, neglected nothing to inflame every mind with implacable

fanaticism. Its effects may be seen in the affair of the Rue Saint

Jacques, which happened in the beginning of the month of September,

1557.

The battle of Saint Quentin had just been lost. Arms had been

distributed among the people with orders to be ready for any event.

Every one fancied the Spaniard at the gates of Paris, and general

terror ascribed the disaster to the mildness with which the heretics

had been treated. “We have not sufficiently avenged the honour of

God, and God takes vengeance upon us,” cried with the same voice

both the populace and churchmen. So, when Rome was attacked by

the barbarians, the Pagans accused themselves of having been too

considerate towards the Christians. So, when Paris was menaced in

1792, after the taking of Verdun, the self-accusation was that the

aristocracy and clergy had been too much spared, and the result was

the days of September. The raging of the passions is always the same.

Three or four hundred of the faithful had met together one evening

to celebrate the Supper, in a house of the Rue Saint Jacques, behind

the Sorbonne. Among them were many gentlemen and men of the law.

The ladies belonged, with the exception of four or five, to noble

families; many of them were of the court.

Some bachelors or doctors of theology, lodging at the Sorbonne, had

watched and given the signal of alarm. Fearing lest the assembly

might separate before they were sufficiently strong in numbers, they

had heaped up a great quantity of stones to overwhelm those who

should come out. About midnight, the service being over, the faithful

opened the door; but, at the threshold, they were assailed with a

shower of missiles accompanied by frightful vociferations, and were

compelled to retreat within.

The whole quarter was awakened by the tumult. The cry “to arms” was

raised. Sinister rumours agitated the crowd. “Have the Spaniards

surprised the town?” “No, not yet;” some replied, “but there are

wretches who have sold the kingdom.” “Not so,” answered others, “they

are Lutherans, damnable heretics, who rejoice in the misfortunes of

France. Death, death to the heretics!” The street was filled with men

armed with halberts, pikes, javelins, arquebuses, with everything

that came to hand.

The faithful, momentarily expecting to be massacred, fell upon their

knees and supplicated God to come to their aid. Then they deliberated

upon what they should do. To barricade themselves until the arrival

of the serjeants, would be to devote themselves to almost certain

death. To cut a passage through that furious multitude was scarcely

less perilous. Upon this, however, the most daring decided, persuaded

that the only way to daunt their adversaries was to front them

boldly. The gentlemen drew their swords and marched foremost: the

others followed. They traversed the crowd in the midst of a shower

of stones, and through the pikes of their assailants. Favoured by

the night, they escaped with their lives, though sorely wounded. One

alone fell; he was trodden underfoot, and so mutilated as to have

lost all likeness to the human form.

But what was the fate of those who had not the courage to leave

the building? They were nearly all women and children. They sought

to fly by the garden, but all the issues were watched. At break of

day they tried to gain the street, but were beaten and driven back.

The women, counting upon the pity their helplessness commanded,

presented themselves at the windows and with clasped hands implored

the compassion of the wretches who had begun to force the doors; but

they might as successfully have supplicated rocks as these pitiless

miscreants. Already, offering back their life to God, they were

preparing to die, when in the morning, the civil-lieutenant arrived

with a troop of serjeants.

He inquired into the cause of the disturbance, and learning that

the meeting had been held for reading the Bible, to celebrate the

Supper, to pray for the king and the prosperity of the kingdom, he

was moved to tears. Yet he must acquit himself of his duty. He had

the men brought forth first bound two and two: they were insulted

and beaten, those above all who, by their beards or their long

dresses, seemed to be preachers. He would have kept the women in the

house; but the populace threatened to fire it. They came out in their

turn, to be overwhelmed with cowardly outrages, their clothes rent

to shreds, their hair torn from their heads, to reach the prison of

the Châtelet, covered with dirt and gore, to the number of about a

hundred and forty victims.

The most execrable aspersions were hawked about against the new

believers, in the pulpits, in the confessionals, in the colleges, in

the market-places, at the court itself. Invention had not been much

taxed: it was word for word the old calumnies of the Pagans against

the meetings of the early Christians. The heretics were accused of

not believing in God, of immolating little children, of extinguishing

the lights.... I desist from saying more: let the history of the

primitive church be read!

And as it seems necessary that in human affairs the ridiculous should

always place itself beside the tragic, a certain bishop of Avranches

distributed a tract throughout all Paris, in which, comparing the

sound of the bells of the Catholic service to that of the arquebuses

which had interrupted the Lutheran worship, he detailed a tissue of

antitheses: “The bells ring, and the arquebuses thunder; those have a

soft sound, and these a sound of fear; those open heaven, these open

hell....” And thence this prelatical buffoon inferred that (Roman)

Catholicism has all the signs of the true church.

The Reformers published apologies, which they secretly scattered

abroad, even in the king’s chamber. But they sought in vain for a

serious inquiry. Their enemies did not by any means desire this; they

judged it better to applaud the bands of wretches, who, crowding each

day to the places appointed for capital punishments, shouted with

bloodthirsty cries, “Death to the heretics!”

Before the end of September, three prisoners were brought to the

scaffold: an old man, a young one, and a woman, Madame de Graveron,

of the family of Luns, in Périgord. She was only twenty-three years

of age, and had been a widow but a few months. On quitting the prison

for the scene of execution, she exchanged her mourning weeds, says

Crespin, for the velvet hood and other festal garments, as if to

receive a happy triumph.

After these three victims, four others were sacrificed. But by this

time, Protestant Europe had been stirred up by the voice of Calvin

and of Farel. The Swiss cantons, the County Palatine, the elector

of Saxony, the duke of Wurtemburg, the marquis of Brandenburg,

interceded for the prisoners. Henry II. wanted the support of the

Protestants, and granted their request. Everything in this affair was

therefore to overflow with disgrace, even down to the act of amnesty

wrenched from a king of France by the intervention of the foreigner.

IX.

Beaten without by the most violent storms, the French Reformation

did not neglect anything by which it might strengthen itself within.

Its organization was necessarily long defective and incomplete. At

first, as we have seen, there were simple gatherings, without fixed

pastors or regular administration of the sacraments. No churches then

existed, in the dogmatic sense of the word, but only the seeds and

scattered elements of churches. This lasted about thirty years.

Then the flocks had a consistory, ministers, a stable authority, a

recognised discipline. The example had been set by the faithful of

Paris, in 1555. A gentleman who received them at his house, M. de la

Ferrière, proposed that they should appoint a pastor. Many objections

were urged; but his representations prevailed, and the meeting

nominated a minister, elders, and deacons. The same organization was

adopted at Poitiers, Angers, Bourges, and other places. And thus was

constituted the local church or ecclesiastical community.

A great step remained to be taken. The churches were isolated and

independent of each other. They were to be confederated and united

into one general church, whether for the maintenance of unity of

belief and discipline, or to oppose a stronger barrier against the

attacks of the enemy.

Such was the subject of the discussion, held with his colleagues,

by the pastor Antoine de Chandieu, who had come to Poitiers from

Paris about the end of the year 1558. All resolved upon convoking a

general synod as soon as possible at Paris, with the consent of the

consistory, “not to attribute any pre-eminence or dignity to that

church,” as Theodore de Bèze expressly observes, “but because it was

then the most convenient town for collecting secretly a great number

of ministers and elders.”[25]

In face of the gibbets erected on the public places, and of the

sanguinary laws that crushed the Reformers, the difficulties of

executing their project were immense. The result was, that only

thirteen churches sent their deputies to this synod: Paris, Saint

Lô, Dieppe, Angers, Orleans, Tours, Poitiers, Saintes, Marennes,

Châtellerault, Saint Jean d’Angély. These delegates assembled under

the presidency of the pastor François Morel, lord of Collonges, the

25th of May, 1559.

There was in the deliberations of this assembly a simplicity and

moral grandeur that fill us with respect. Nothing of declamation or

violence, but a calm dignity, a tranquil and serene force prevailed,

as if the members of the synod debated in a profound peace, under

the guardianship of the laws. And yet the historian De Thou says

that they braved an almost certain death! Much admiration has been

bestowed upon the constituent assembly for its resumption of the

discussion upon a judiciary law, after the flight of Louis XVI.; here

the spectacle is much more grand, for it required far more energy and

self-denial.

The foundations of the French Reformation were then laid. Ensuing

synods have only changed a few terms of the confession of faith,

and developed points of discipline. The essential was established

at the first stroke. The dogmatic and ecclesiastical code were the

expression of what has been called Calvinism. Our task must be here

only that of the narrator.

The confession of faith was composed of forty articles, embracing all

the dogmas, considered fundamental in the sixteenth century. God and

His word; the Trinity; the fall of man and his state of condemnation;

the decree of the Lord towards the elect; gratuitous redemption

through Jesus Christ, very God and very man; participation in this

grace through the faith given by the Holy Ghost; the characters of

the true church; the number and signification of the Sacraments. The

Bible was taken as the sole and absolute rule of all truth.

The discipline also contained forty articles. It has been since

extended in the synodal assemblies; and it has ended by a division

into fourteen chapters or sections, comprising two hundred and twenty

articles; but all the chief ideas were in the primitive draft.

We will give a short glance at this ecclesiastical constitution.

Wherever there were a sufficient number of the faithful, they were

to constitute themselves into a church; that is to say, to name a

consistory, appoint a minister, establish the regular celebration of

the sacraments and the practice of discipline. Everything was to be

begun with this first step.

The consistory was elected at first by the common voice of the

people; it was completed afterwards by the suffrages of its own

members; but the new selections were always to be submitted for the

approval of the flock, and if there were any opposition, the debate

was to be settled either at the colloquy or at the provincial synod.

To be eligible for the consistory imposed no condition of fortune, or

of any other kind.

The election of the pastors was notified to the people in the same

way, after having been made by the provincial synod or the colloquy.

The newly elected minister preached during three consecutive Sundays.

The silence of the people was held to signify their consent. If there

were any reclamations, these were carried before the bodies charged

with the choice of pastors. There was no further appeal against the

voice of the majority.

A certain number of churches formed the conscription of a colloquy.

The colloquies assembled twice a year at least. Each church was

represented by a pastor and an elder. The office of these companies

was to arrange any difficulties that might arise, and generally to

provide for whatever was conformable to the welfare of their flocks.

Beyond the colloquies were the provincial synods, also composed of

a pastor and an elder of each church. They assembled once in each

year at least. They decided upon whatever had not been settled in the

colloquies, and upon all the important matters of their province.

The number of these synods has varied. Sixteen has been the general

number, since the union of Béarn to France.

Lastly, at the summit of the hierarchy was placed the national synod.

It was, whenever it was possible, to be convoked year by year;

which, however, scarcely ever took place, owing to the misfortunes of

the times.

Composed of two pastors, and of two elders of each particular synod,

the national synod was the supreme court for all great ecclesiastical

matters, and every one was bound to render it obedience. The

deliberations commenced by reading the confession of faith and of

discipline. The members of the assembly must adhere to the first, but

might propose amendments of the other. The presidency belonged of

right to a pastor. The duration of the sessions was indeterminate.

Before the closing of each session, the province in which the

following synod would be holden, was designated.

This constitution had been dictated by Calvin. It attests the power

and extent of his genius for organization. Throughout the whole

the elective principle was the guarantee of liberty; throughout

the whole power supported authority; and thence, order arose from

the combination of these two elements. Moreover, an equilibrium

between the pastors and the laity was preserved; the periodical and

frequent renewal of provincial and national synods was settled; and

churches were strongly united without the least trace of primacy.

It was a Presbyterian government in its essential features. In

these times it would, doubtless, be required that the part of the

people should not be limited to a simple right of veto, and that the

number of the laity should prevail over that of the pastors in the

different degrees of jurisdiction. But if we recur to the ideas which

were current in the sixteenth century, it will be seen that this

ecclesiastical charter immensely surpassed the civil institutions.

The principle of the equality of believers, pastors or laymen, great

or little, was at its base, and out of this naturally arose the

equality of the citizens; for the State and the Church ever tend to

be, in their respective attributes, the counterpart of each other.

We must add, that all these elective bodies, from the consistories

to the national synod, formed a sort of jury, which had authority

to take cognisance of private errors, and to inflict spiritual

penalties. These penalties were individual admonition, remonstrance

in consistory, suspension from the Lord’s Supper, and lastly, for

great scandals, excommunication and excision from the Church. The

heads of the highest must bend like the most humble, under this

religious penalty, and, in certain cases, make public confession of

their offences. Henry IV., already king of Navarre, submitted to it

on more than one occasion.

We are astonished in our times at this interference with private

actions; but in those days few people thought of complaining. The

ecclesiastical power penetrated without obstacle and without effort

into fireside life. It was believed that the religious law ought to

inquire into the faults which the civil law could not reach, and

for the Reformers it was still more requisite that they should have

recourse to this kind of penalty, as they were accused of having

left the Romish church only the more unrestrictedly to satisfy their

passions.

On the 29th of May, 1559, when the deputies of the first general

synod, before separating, mingled their souls in prayer, that they

might bless God for the work he had permitted them to accomplish, the

French Reformation was constituted.

X.

The Parliament of Paris began to exhibit signs of hesitation before

the growing host of the Calvinists. It had split into three parties:

the ultra-Catholics, headed by the chief president, Gilles Lemaître,

who were bent upon persisting in the old system of persecution;

the men of middle course, already styled Politicians, among whom

figured Christophe de Harlay, Seguier, and De Thou, the father of

the historian, who sought to approximate the two religions by mutual

concessions; lastly, the secret Reformers, whose chiefs were Anne

Dubourg and Louis Dubourg, who from day to day declared themselves

more openly. These divisions produced between the two chambers a

diversity of jurisprudence, the great chamber continuing to pursue

the heretics with severity, and the Tournelle seeking means to acquit

them.

These symptoms of indulgence alarmed the clergy. “If the secular arm

fails in its duty,” said the Cardinal de Lorraine to the king, “all

the malcontents will throw themselves into this detestable sect; they

will destroy the ecclesiastical power, and afterwards it will be the

turn of the regal power.”

Henry II. listened to him with greater readiness, because he

had just concluded with the king of Spain the shameful peace of

Cateau-Cambrésis, when the two monarchs engaged by a secret article,

to exterminate heresy; and as a pledge of this treaty, his daughter

Elizabeth was to espouse Philip II. It was therefore arranged that

the king should go in person to the Parliament, in order to put an

end at once to the divisions by an act of authority. It was also,

as the cardinal further observed, the most agreeable exhibition to

offer to the Spanish ambassadors, who had arrived in Paris to fetch

away the betrothed princess, to burn before the people half a dozen

Lutheran counsellors. “We must,” to use his expression, “give this

junket to these grandees of Spain.”

Henry II. proceeded to hold a bed of justice, on the 10th of August,

1559, and invited the counsellors to give him frankly their advice

upon the means of appeasing the religious differences. The chief

president, Gilles Lemaître, lauded the zeal of Philip Augustus, who

had in one day caused six hundred of the Albigenses to be burned. The

men of middle course confined themselves to vague generalities. The

secret Calvinists, Anne Dubourg in particular, demanded religious

reforms by means of a national council. “Every day,” said he, “we see

committed crimes that go unpunished, while new torments are invented

against men who have committed no crime. It is not a matter of little

importance to condemn those who, in the midst of the flames, invoke

the name of Jesus Christ.”

The irritated prince ordered him to be arrested in full Parliament,

by the captain of his guards, and said aloud, that he would see him

burned with his own eyes. But wounded, by the splinter of a lance, in

a tournament, he died a month afterwards; and we are assured that in

his last moments he remembered Anne Dubourg with grief, and the other

counsellors confined in the Bastille. “They are innocent,” he cried,

“and God punishes me for having persecuted them.” The Cardinal de

Lorraine hastened to quiet his conscience, by saying that this was a

suggestion of the devil.

Anne Dubourg was born, in 1521, at Riom, in Auvergne, and belonged

to a family of consideration. His uncle had been chancellor of

France. After having studied theology, received orders, and entered

the law at Orleans, he occupied, since the year 1557, a seat in the

Parliament of Paris. He was a man of great learning, integrity, and

devotion to his duties; and the only accusation that could be brought

against him was, that he had sided with the new religion.

The death of the king did not suspend his trial. The bishop of Paris

had him degraded from his orders, and, contrary to custom, the matter

was brought, not before the assembled chambers, but commissioners.

Some magistrates would have persuaded him to make a confession

of faith in ambiguous terms, so that, without wounding his own

conscience, he might satisfy that of the judges. Dubourg refused:

he even disavowed his advocate Marillac, who had defended him with

equivocal phrases, and he was condemned to be burned alive.

He heard his sentence read without a change of countenance, and

prayed God to pardon his judges. “Happen what will,” said he, “I am

a Christian; yes, I am a Christian; and I will shout still louder,

dying for the glory of my Lord Jesus Christ.”

As the Reformers had tried to provide him with the means of escape,

he was inclosed in an iron cage, an old implement of Louis XI.’s

fetched from the Bastille. Dubourg’s resignation was not disturbed:

he sang the praises of God in this narrow prison.

It was the usage to reserve for grand occasions the execution of

criminals of the deepest dye, and that of Anne Dubourg was fixed

for the 23rd of December, 1559, the day before Christmas-eve. Six

hundred men were put under arms. The crossways of the streets were

even inclosed with strong posts and barriers, in order that the place

of execution might not be ascertained until the last hour. Dubourg

wished to divest himself of his clothes: “My friends,” said he to the

people, “I am not here to die like a thief, or a murderer, but for

the Gospel.” He was offered a crucifix, but he rejected it, and when

suspended on the gibbet he cried: “My God, my God, forsake me not,

that I may not forsake Thee.”

Thus died, at the age of thirty-eight, this pious and illustrious

magistrate. “His execution,” says Mézeray, “inspired many persons

with the conviction that the belief professed by so good and so

enlightened a man, could not be evil;”[26] and Florimond de Rémond,

then a student, avows that every one in the colleges was moved to

tears, that they pleaded his cause after his death, and that this

execution did more harm than a hundred ministers could have done with

all their preaching.

The year following, the Chancellor Olivétan pronounced the name of

Anne Dubourg with despair upon his death-bed; and on the approach of

the Cardinal de Lorraine, he said to him: “Ah! Cardinal, thou hast

caused the damnation of us all.”

In the midst of these persecutions, the affairs of the nation were

daily becoming more critical. The new king, Francis II., was hardly

six years old. Feeble in body and mind, his person, according to the

energetic expression of an old historian, was exposed to the first

occupant. Catherine de Medicis, the Guises, Châtillons, Bourbons,

the Constable Anne de Montmorency, all worked to their own advantage

this impotent fiction of the royalty of a child, and mingled with

the religious discussions, the quarrels of their political ambition.

We shall only speak of that which is immediately connected with our

subject.

Catherine de Medicis, who had now been in France six-and-twenty

years, had brought from the country of Machiavelli the art of

dissimulation, for which she had found such ample opportunity

of exercise during the long humiliations, to which she had been

subjected under the reign of the female favourites of Henry II.

Artful and vindictive, licentious without having even the excuse of

passion, ambitious of power, as much from the love of intrigue as

from the pride of command, she had, nevertheless, abilities of a

high order, which, directed to the pursuit of a good object, might

have accomplished great designs; but having no longer either faith

or moral feeling, and constantly engaged in ruining the authority of

others in order to consolidate her own, she by turns embraced and

deserted all parties alike. No wife and mother of our kings, Isabeau

de Bavière excepted, has done so much injury to France as this

Italian.[27]

The Guises, even more than Catherine de Medicis, were during forty

years the real leaders of the (Roman) Catholic party in France, and

without them, as Mézeray remarks, the new religion would perhaps have

become dominant. This family, which was a younger branch of that of

the dukes of Lorraine, had only established itself in France since

the reign of Louis XII. Claude de Lorraine came hither in 1513, to

seek his fortune, _with a valet and a walking-stick_. He had by

Antoinette de Bourbon six sons and four daughters, who all succeeded

in raising themselves to offices of consideration.

Francis I. distrusted them in the latter days of his life, and

counselled his son to keep the Lorraines at a distance; but Henry II.

had too little haughtiness of mind and force of character to follow

this wise counsel. He allowed these foreigners, who had interests

quite distinct from those of his race and kingdom, to get into their

hands the public business; and after the accession of Francis II.,

who espoused their niece Mary Stuart, two years older than himself,

the Guises became all-powerful.

The Cardinal Charles de Lorraine, archbishop of Rheims, and the

possessor, in ecclesiastical benefices, of a revenue of three

hundred thousand crowns (many millions of our present money), had

some learning, affable manners, great facility of speech, and much

dexterity in the management of men and affairs, a deep policy, and a

vast ambition. He aspired to nothing less than the crown of France

for his brother, and to the tiara for himself. So, Pius V., somewhat

anxious concerning the part he was playing in the Church, habitually

called him the pope on the other side of the mountains. For the rest,

he was a priest without settled convictions, and half preached the

Confession of Augsburg, _to please my good masters the Germans_, as

says Brantôme; he was decried for his evil habits, which he did not

even care to hide, and raised the hooting of the populace on quitting

the dwelling of a courtesan; lastly, he was as pusillanimous in the

face of danger, as he was arrogant in prosperity.

His brother, the Duke François de Guise, less informed, and less

eloquent, had higher qualities. A great warrior, intrepid and

liberal, he had served France nobly at the defence of Metz, the

capture of Calais and Thionville, and the victory of Renty. His

character was naturally elevated and generous, but irascible, even

cruel, when he encountered an obstacle; and as he comprehended

nothing of religious controversies or of political diplomacy, he

placed his valiant sword at the service of the cardinal.

The two brothers were in a favourable position for reciprocally

assisting, without interfering with each other. The one could not

hope for the crown of France, nor could the other expect the tiara.

The priest gained for their house the support of the churchmen, and

the soldier, that of the military. Abroad they were aided by Philip

II. and the Holy See, and these foreigners contracted alliances with

foreigners, not as subjects, but as sovereigns.

Under Francis II. the cardinal got himself named Superintendent

of the Exchequer. The Duke de Guise obtained, notwithstanding the

protestations of the Constable, the command-in-chief of the army; and

being at the same time grand chamberlain, master of the hounds, grand

master, generalissimo, uncle of a king of sixteen, and brother of the

cardinal, he wielded an authority at least as great as that of the

ancient mayors of the palace.

On the other side were the Bourbons, princes of the blood, but in a

distant degree, of narrow fortune, and suspected by the Crown since

the treason of the ancient Constable, who had taken arms against his

king.

Antoine de Bourbon, the head of his race, had espoused Jeanne

d’Albret, who had conferred upon him the title of king of Navarre,

without giving him the kingdom. He was an irresolute, indolent

prince; and, timid by character, though occasionally courageous, he

floated between the two doctrines, sometimes causing the Reformed

faith to be preached in Béarn, Saintonge, and Poitou, and going to

sing psalms at the Pré-aux-Clercs, in 1558, in spite of the shouts

of the Sorbonne; sometimes returning towards the (Roman) Catholic

religion and persecuting the faithful. The first and last passion

of his life was to recover the kingdom of Navarre, or equivalent

domains. He died without succeeding, and this long dream only begat

for him the mockery and desertion of every one.

His brother, the prince Louis de Condé, had a more penetrating genius

and a more masculine character. Witty, merry, sometimes trifling,

but intrepid above all, and loved by the soldiery, he valiantly

defended the cause of the Reformers, without ever inspiring them with

full confidence. Instructed in the new opinions by his wife and his

stepmother, he showed more ambition than religion, and the looseness

of his manners has always left a doubt upon the sincerity of his

faith.

It may be asked whether the Bourbons, Henry IV. included, did not

damage more than profit the French Reformation. They launched it

into politics, drove it into the battle-field, dragged it into their

particular quarrels; and then, when it had gained them the crown,

they denied it.

Another family, less high in rank, but more eminent for its

virtues,—that of the Châtillons, served the cause with more

fidelity. It consisted of three brothers: Odet de Châtillon,

François d’Andelot, and Gaspard de Coligny. Their mother, Louise de

Montmorency, sister of the Constable, leaned to the Reformation. She

was virtuous, in those times of license, a rare example of chastity.

In her dying moments she refused the presence of a priest, saying

that God had given her the grace of fearing and loving Him.

François d’Andelot, the youngest of the three brothers, was the first

to declare himself frankly for the new religion. Made prisoner in the

wars of Italy, and detained in the castle of Milan, he had received

some pious books from the hands of Rénée de France. Sent afterwards

to Scotland, he had the opportunity of studying more closely the

doctrine and practices of the Reformation. He was a brave and loyal

knight, without fear or reproach, the worthy successor of Bayard.

Going to Brittany, where the property of his house was situated, he

took with him a pastor who preached from town to town, with open

doors: an unheard-of thing in 1558. Henry II. reproached him sharply

for it. “Sire,” answered D’Andelot, “you must not think it strange

that, after doing my duty in your service, I employ the rest of

my time for the safety of my soul. Wherefore I supplicate you to

leave my conscience safe, and to keep for your service my body and

my goods, which are entirely yours.” “But I did not give you that

order,” said the king, pointing to the collar about his neck, “to

use it thus. You have promised and sworn to go to mass and to follow

your religion.” “I did not then know,” replied the knight in his

integrity, “what it was to be a Christian, and I would not have

accepted it on that condition, had God touched my heart as He has

since.”

The king, who could contain himself no longer, threw across the

table his plate, which struck the dauphin, and he would have pierced

D’Andelot with his sword. He had him imprisoned, and took away from

him his commission of colonel-general of the infantry, which was

given to Blaise de Montluc.

This matter made a great noise. Calvin wrote to the prisoner to

felicitate him on his courage, and Pope Paul IV. was indignant that

the offender had not been led straight to execution. The ambassador

of France represented to him in vain that it was out of the question

to treat a Châtillon in this way, the nephew of the Constable, the

brother of the Admiral. The intractable pontiff exclaimed, “A heretic

never repents; it is an evil for which there is no remedy but the

fire.”

Relations and friends intervened; D’Andelot consented to allow a mass

to be said in the chamber of his prison, but without taking any part

in it, and he was set at liberty.

Gaspard de Coligny, the greatest layman of the French Reformation,

will detain us longer. We shall endeavour above all to describe the

religious side of his character, and the details of private life

neglected by other historians.

Born at Châtillon-sur-Loing in 1516, Coligny received his education

from Nicolas Bérault, a renowned professor of the age, and he

exhibited such taste for his studies, that he was compelled to

interrupt them, lest he should be turned from the career of arms.

At twenty-five he was made colonel-general of the French infantry,

and through his regulations he introduced a severe discipline among

these bands of mercenaries, who before his time were more like

brigands than soldiers. “These ordinances,” says Brantôme, “were the

most elegant and the wisest that were ever made in France, and I

believe that since they were made, the lives of a million of persons

have been preserved, and as much of their goods and faculties; for

before there was nothing but pillage, theft, brigandage, ransomings,

murders, quarrels, and disorder among these bands. This, then, is the

obligation the world owes to this eminent person.”[28]

At what time Coligny made the first step towards the new doctrine is

not known. From the year 1555, we find him seconding the enterprise

of the Chevalier de Villegagnon, for founding a colony of French

Reformers in Brazil. The Admiral, who perceived in the proposal the

twofold advantage of opening a place of retreat for the persecuted

people, and of enriching his country with a colonial establishment,

gave Villegagnon two ships with a sum of ten thousand livres: the

expedition, however, did not succeed.

Taken prisoner by the Spaniards after the disastrous battle of Saint

Quentin, he asked for a Bible and other religious books. He gave

himself wholly up to this study, and it was then that he seems to

have acquired firm and deep convictions upon the principles of the

Reformation.

When he had paid his ransom, he retired to his manor of

Châtillon-sur-Loing; and wishing to apply himself to religious

matters, he resigned to his brother D’Andelot, with the king’s

permission, the appointment of colonel-general of the infantry. He

also gave up in favour of his cousin, the Marshal de Montmorency, son

of the Constable, the government of Paris and the Isle of France,

and besought Henry II. in the most earnest manner, to designate a

successor for his government of Picardy. “All which from that time,”

says the author of the _Mémoires de Coligny_, “led many to suspect

that he had changed his religion: it being true that he made it

evident his mind was altogether drawn off from all coveting of honour

and power.”[29]

Yet this is the man, whom several historians have accused of taking

up arms and fomenting rebellions from a spirit of ambition! History

thus written is one of the darkest shames of humanity.

Coligny was encouraged in his pious resolutions by Charlotte de

Laval, his wife, who never ceased to invite him to declare himself

openly. “Wherefore the Admiral, seeing himself pressed by her so

often and with so much affection, resolved to tell her once for

all, how it really was with him, representing in the fullest manner

that, for many years, he had neither seen nor heard say of any one,

whether in Germany or in France, who had made open profession of

the religion, that they had not been overwhelmed with evils and

calamities; that by the edicts of Francis I. and of Henry II.,

rigorously observed by the Parliament, those who were convicted were

to be burned alive by a slow fire in public, and their property

confiscated to the king; that notwithstanding, if she were bent so

confidently upon not refusing the condition common to those of the

(Reformed) religion, he on his part would not be found wanting in his

duty.”[30]

Charlotte de Laval having answered that this had been the lot of true

Christians in all ages, Coligny hesitated no longer. He professed

his creed before those who came to visit him, exhorted his servants

to follow his example, gave them the Scriptures to read, engaged men

of piety to govern his children, and entirely reformed the habits of

his house. He also began to frequent the meetings, but he did not

participate yet in the Supper, having doubts upon this matter. He had

discussed the point with learned ministers, asking for explanations

upon the real presence and other similar subjects, without having

seen his way clear in this doctrine.

One day, therefore, being at a meeting at Vatteville, he rose, when

the Supper was about to be celebrated; and after having beseeched the

congregation not to take offence at his infirmity, he invited the

minister to explain himself a little more at length upon the matter.

“The Admiral, instructed by his discourse, first returned thanks to

God, and from that time resolved to participate in this sacred and

holy mystery on the first day of its celebration. The news of this

having been spread throughout France, it is impossible to describe

the joy and consolation all the churches thence received.”[31]

He persevered during his whole life in his pious habits, and

practised them more freely, as the liberty of the believers gradually

enlarged. “As soon as he left his bed, early in the morning, having

taken his dressing-gown and knelt with all his household, he himself

repeated prayers in the customary form of the churches of France;

after which, pending the interval before the hour of preachment,

which took place every second day with psalm-singing, he gave

audiences to the deputies from the churches who had been sent to him,

or occupied himself on public matters, of which he continued still to

treat awhile after the sermon, until dinner-hour.

“Standing at the table, with his wife by his side, a psalm was sung,

if there had been no preaching, and then followed the ordinary

benediction: of which an infinity, not only of Frenchmen, but of

German captains and colonels, can bear testimony of his having kept

this observance, without a single intermission, not only in his house

and at his ease, but also when with the army. The cloth having been

removed, he, rising with all present, then returned thanks himself,

or had them returned by his minister.”

The same thing was practised at supper; and perceiving that all his

household could not without inconvenience be present in the evening

at bedtime, he ordered that every one should come at the conclusion

of supper, and that when the psalms had been sung, prayers should be

said. And it would not be easy to say how many of the French nobility

began to establish in their families this devout rule of the Admiral,

who often exhorted them to the true practice of piety, saying that

it was not enough that the father of a family lived holily and

religiously, if he did not by his example induce others to follow the

same rule.

“When it was near the time of supper, he summoned all his people,

representing to them that he would not have to render to God an

account of his own life only, but also of their conduct, and he

reconciled them together, if there had happened to be any dissension

among them.”

“He was of the middle height, his limbs were well-proportioned, his

countenance calm and serene, his voice soft and pleasing, but rather

slow and hesitating, his complexion clear, his carriage and demeanour

grave, yet full of grace and kindness. Of wine, he drank very little;

he ate sparingly, and slept, at the most, but seven hours.”[32]

The character that Gaspard de Coligny displayed in public affairs,

is familiar to all. Endowed with qualities the most diverse, and of

the highest order, severe toward himself indulgent to others, never

inflated by prosperity nor cast down by misfortune, a lover of his

country, devoted to his king in whatever did not contravene his

conscience, the most illustrious statesmen, as well as the most able

captains, have esteemed it an honour to be compared with him. Perhaps

he had defects in these qualities. He appeared to be sometimes

wanting in resolution, because he was too loyal to pursue to the

utmost his advantages against royalty, and to be sometimes wanting

in foresight, because he suspected with difficulty in others that

perfidy which he found not in his own heart.

If we search in times near our own, and in a different system of

things, for a parallel character with his, we shall, doubtless,

pronounce the name of General Lafayette. The man of the sixteenth

century and he of the eighteenth had a full belief in the justice

of their cause. Each made the most generous sacrifices to it, and

to the end adhered to it with the most unshaken constancy. Both had

in their hands, on many occasions, the greatest interests of the

state. Both were held to be the most honourable persons of their age.

But Lafayette had the popular masses with him; Coligny had against

him three-fourths of France; and also, with a higher political and

military genius, he had less success.

The third brother, Odet de Châtillon, was the eldest of the family.

Made by Clement VII. a cardinal at seventeen, he demanded reforms

without completely adopting the Reformation. He ended by marrying a

lady of a noble house, Isabelle de Hauteville, who was styled _Madame

la Cardinal_, or _Madame la Comtesse de Beauvais_, when she took

her seat in the apartments of the court in the quality of wife of a

peer of France: a curious singularity, even in that time! Odet de

Châtillon died in England some years after, being poisoned by one

of his servants. Brantôme and De Thou speak in high terms of his

judgment and integrity.

XI.

Catherine de Medicis had expressed in her days of disappointment some

sentiments favourable to the Reformation, and those of the (new)

religion supposed at first that she would lend them her support with

her son Francis II. Coligny and other Calvinist lords wrote to her

that they hoped to find in her a second Esther. But her favourable

disposition was only apparent. “I comprehend nothing of this

doctrine,” she would say; “what enlisted my sympathy for them, was

rather my woman’s pity and compassion than a desire to be informed if

their doctrine were true or false.”

In concert with the queen-mother and the court of Madrid, the Guises

held the Bourbons in the background, and sent forth new edicts for

exterminating heretics. In each Parliament _chambres ardentes_ were

instituted, so called because they condemned to the fire without

pity, all those who were accused of the crime of heresy. There was

a vast system of terror, where even the shadow of justice no longer

appeared. Delations, confiscations, pillages, sentences of death,

atrocious executions—the same scenes affrighted in the beginning

of 1560, the principal towns of France,—Toulouse, Bordeaux, Lyons,

Grenoble, Poitiers, and their dependent provinces.

At Paris, the commissaries of the quarters made daily visits to the

suspected houses. One Démochères, or Mouchy, who has given the French

language the term of _mouchard_ (spy), took the field with a band of

wretches, whose object was to surprise the heretics eating meat on

the prohibited days, or assembling in meetings. They kept particular

watch on the Faubourg Saint Germain, which at that time received the

name of Little Geneva.

Many persons were seized and maltreated. Those, who were able to

fly, quitted the place, leaving furniture, money, provisions, all

their goods, at the mercy of the bandits, who were intrusted with the

office of serjeants; and houses were pillaged and sacked, according

to the relation of Theodore de Bèze, as in a town taken by assault;

the rabble gleaned and devastated what the first plunderers had

omitted to take. “But what was most to be deplored,” adds this

historian, “was to see the poor little children, who had no dwelling

but the flagstones, crying, ahungered, in the most piteous manner,

and begging about the streets, without any one daring to relieve or

shelter them, for fear of falling into the like danger; so that they

were less cared for than dogs.”[33]

Abominable contrivances had been put to work to fan the fury of

the people of Paris. There may be still seen, in old collections,

engravings which represent the heretics slaying priests with the

arquebuse, casting monks into the water, slaughtering children,

strangling women and old men, and persons were posted about the

public squares to comment upon these infamies.

The people answered these dastard provocations by erecting images

of the Virgin at the corners of the streets. They scrutinized the

countenances of the passengers, and woe to him who did not lift his

hat! woe to him who refused to put a piece of money into the trunks,

or _épargne-mailles_, which were held out to him in order to provide

for the payment of the tapers! The shout of “A heretic!” was raised;

he was dragged to the Châtelet, and the prisons were so crowded that

it was necessary to hurry the executions, that new victims might be

accommodated.

One trait will depict the state of feeling. Two miserable

apprentices, who had been won over, declared that turpitudes were

committed in the secret meetings of the Calvinists. The Cardinal

de Lorraine went straight to relate this to the queen-mother,

aggravating his recital with all the abominations with which in

former times the Gnostics, the Mersalians, the Borborites, and the

Manichæans, had been reproached, so that the Reformers might seem to

have combined, as in a common sewer, the vices of every age.

Among the persons mentioned, were the wife and two daughters of a

celebrated advocate of Paris. They voluntarily gave themselves up to

justice, preferring death to dishonour. They were confronted with

the two apprentices, who coloured, stammered, and so contradicted

themselves in their statements, that it became evident they had

invented an execrable lie. Some indignant magistrates were for

imprisoning them instead of the outraged women. Just the contrary

happened: the calumniators were absolved, and the females were sent

back to their dungeons.

At the same time the Guises created other malcontents, who made an

approach to the Calvinists, whence resulted the enterprise known by

the name of the Conspiracy of Amboise.

Many gentlemen had come to the court to claim compensation for their

blood spilled in the king’s service, or for their properties, which

had been despoiled in these times of confusion and anarchy. The

Cardinal de Lorraine, dreading the presence of so many soldiers,

caused a proclamation to be published, which commanded all the

petitioners, of whatever rank, to quit the place within twenty-four

hours, under pain of death. A gibbet was even erected at the gates

of the castle, to confirm the menace. The gentlemen departed, deeply

angered at an affront, which no king of France had ever passed upon

his brave nobility.

The war began by pamphlets, in which the Lorraines were accused of

having usurped the rights of princes of the blood, of keeping the

crown in pupilage, although they were foreigners, and of treading

underfoot all the ancient laws of the kingdom. “France can abide it

no longer,” is the language of one of these pamphlets, “and demands

the convocation of the States-General to reduce these affairs to

order.”

The malcontents soon passed from words to acts. Those of the religion

felt scruples. Could they have recourse to force to obtain redress

for their grievances? They consulted the divines of Switzerland and

Germany, who replied that it was lawful to oppose the government

usurped by the Lorraines, provided one of the legitimate chiefs,

namely, a prince of the blood, were at their head, and the support of

the States-General were secured.

Notwithstanding this, the greater number of the Reformed refused to

participate in this enterprise, in which, says Brantôme, “_there was

not less discontent than Huguenotism_.” Coligny was not initiated

into it, and those who were concerned, had expressly reserved the

person and authority of the king. They proposed nothing more than to

expel the Lorraines, and to replace the government of France in the

hands of French princes. Louis de Condé was the invisible or _mute_

chief of the conspiracy; La Renaudie, who represented the political

malcontents, rather than the religious malcontents, was its visible

chief.

Informed of the plot, through the treachery of the advocate Des

Avenelles, the Guises hastened from the town of Blois, and shut

themselves up with Francis II. in the Château d’Amboise. The poor

young king said to them, weeping: “What have I done to my people

that they thus pursue me? I will hear their complaints, and redress

them. I should wish that, for a time, you would absent yourselves,

that I might see whether it is you or me against whom they rage.” The

Lorraines took good care not to accede to this advice; for, once out

of the court, they would have seen the whole nobility of France rise

to prevent their return.

In the first moments of his fear, the Cardinal de Lorraine had sent

to the Parliament an ordinance of amnesty, from which the preachers,

and those who had conspired under pretext of religion, alone were

excepted. But when he was certain of triumph, he made his revenge

an even balance against his terror, and it was terrible. Twelve

hundred of the conspirators perished at Amboise. The public place was

covered with gallows; blood flowed in streams through the streets.

No inquiry, no form of trial, was permitted; and as there were not

executioners enough, the prisoners were thrown by hundreds, tied hand

and foot, into the waves of the Loire. This same river was destined

to engulf other victims: across the abyss of centuries, the Cardinal

Charles de Lorraine and Carrier de Nantes may shake hands.

There was worse than this done in 1560. The Cardinal reserved the

chiefs for after dinner, as Regnier de la Planche tells us, that

he might afford a pastime to the ladies, whom he perceived to be

weary of their long stay in this fortress. The queen-mother and the

courtiers placed themselves at the windows, _as if they were about to

witness some mummery, or jugglers show_. “And the Cardinal pointed

out to them the sufferers, with all the signs of a man greatly

pleased, that he might so much the more animate the prince against

his subjects.”[34]

Many of the condemned displayed wonderful firmness. A gentleman named

Villemongis, having dipped his hands in the blood of his companions,

raised them to heaven, crying: “Lord, this is the blood of Thy

children unrighteously spilled: Thou wilt avenge it.”

The Baron de Castelnau, who, having been taken by the Spaniards in

the Flemish wars, had spent, like the Admiral Coligny, the long days

of his captivity in reading the Bible, was examined in the prison

of Amboise by the Guises and the Chancellor Olivier. The latter

inquired of him, mockingly, what it was that could have made, of a

soldier, so learned a divine. “When I came to see you on my return

from Flanders,” said Castelnau, “I told you how I had passed my time.

You approved of it then, and we were good friends. Why are we not so

now? It is that, being then disgraced and out of favour, you spoke

with sincerity. To-day, in order to please a man whom you despise,

you are a traitor to your God and your conscience.” The Cardinal

wished to come to the aid of the Chancellor, saying that it was he

who had fortified him in the faith, and he set himself to expound

a controversial thesis. Castelnau appealed to the duke François de

Guise, who answered that he understood nothing about it. “Would to

Heaven it were otherwise!” cried the prisoner; “for I esteem you well

enough to think that if you were as enlightened as your brother, you

would follow better things.”

Having been condemned to death for treason: “I ought, then,” said he,

with bitterness, “to have said the Guises were kings of France.” And

bending his head to the axe, he appealed from the injustice of man to

the justice of his Maker.

These barbarous executions inflamed the hatred of the parties, and

opened the door to civil war. The conspiracy of Amboise became

popular among the Reformers. Brantôme relates, that many said,

“Yesterday, we belonged not to the conspiracy, and we would not have

been of it for all the gold in the universe; to-day, we would be so

for the smallest coin, and we say that the enterprise was good and

holy.”

The Lorraines, however, endeavoured to turn the affairs of Amboise

to the profit of their ambition. On the 17th of March, the Duke de

Guise had himself named lieutenant-general of the kingdom. Francis

II. promised to comply with everything that his uncle might do,

order, and execute. This was to abdicate the throne; or, to speak

more correctly, to replace fiction by reality.

The Cardinal de Lorraine even ventured upon re-attempting his

favourite project of establishing the Inquisition in France, as in

Spain. He had already obtained the adhesion of the privy council,

and drawn the reluctant consent of the queen-mother. But the blow

was warded off by the Chancellor Michel de l’Hospital, who procured,

in the month of May, 1560, the adoption of the edict of Romorantin,

by which he restored to the bishops the cognizance of the crime of

heresy. This edict was prodigal of the most cruel penalties; but, at

least, the foot of the inquisitor did not contaminate the soil of

France.

XII.

This same year, 1560, so full of violence and blood, witnessed a new

step of the French Reformation—the establishment of public worship.

This was in the nature of things. When towns, and nearly entire

provinces, had embraced the faith of the Reformers, secret meetings

became impossible. A whole people does not shut itself up in forests

and caverns to invoke its God. From whom, moreover, should it hide

itself? From itself? The idea is absurd.

Not only did necessity compel this step on the part of the Reformers;

they were also driven to it by the calumnies, with which their secret

meetings were attacked. What better means had they of convicting

their enemies of untruth, than by assembling in the light of day, and

by saying: “Come and see?”

Thus the primitive Christians had come out of the Catacombs, in spite

of the edicts of the emperors, as soon as they had become numerous.

The same causes produce ever the same effects.

Calvin, and other prudent men, without absolutely disapproving of

these manifestations, foresaw more clearly the results, and gave the

counsel of caution. But the popular impulse was too strong. Nîmes,

Montpellier, Aigues-Mortes, set the example, and the public worship

soon spread far and near through Languedoc, Dauphiny, Provence,

Béarn, Guienne, Saintonge, Poitou, and Normandy.

Being informed of this decision by the Count de Villars, the

Marshal de Termes, and the other governors of the provinces, the

Guises replied that the preachers should be hanged without trial,

that criminal instructions should be taken against the Huguenots,

who attended the preachings, and that “_the country must be swept

clean of this multitude of rabble, who lived like the Genevese_.”

These orders were not strictly executed, nor could they be so. The

Lorraines did not recognise the difference of the times: what was

possible against a few thousand obscure sectarians without credit,

was no longer possible before millions of proselytes, among whom were

numbered more than half the great families of the kingdom.

In some places in Dauphiny, at Valence, at Montélimart, at Romans,

those of the religion appropriated the (Roman) Catholic churches

to their use; another imitation of the ancient Christians, who had

invaded the temples of Paganism. This was also inevitable, in the

places where the population had wholly changed their doctrine. The

stones of the sanctuary belong to a religion only so long as it is

believed in; if the people give it credence no longer, those stones

become its property again, and the people reconsecrates them to its

new worship.

The Duke de Guise felt so much the more disappointed at the state of

affairs in Dauphiny, because he was the governor of that province.

The enterprises of the heretics were in his eyes so many personal

affronts, and he despatched one Maugiron, who surprised the towns of

Valence and Romans, gave them up to pillage, hanged the principal

inhabitants, and decapitated two ministers, with this inscription

suspended from their necks: “_These are the chiefs of the rebels._”

These atrocities provoked reprisals. Two gentlemen of the religion,

Montbrun and Mourans, made incursions into Dauphiny and Provence, at

the head of armed bands, sacked the churches, maltreated the priests,

who had urged the slaughter of the Reformers, and celebrated their

worship sword in hand.

Such a state of things could not long exist. It was neither peace

nor war, neither the freedom of (the two) religions, nor the

absolute domination of one alone. A remedy must be found, or the

whole kingdom would be given up to complete anarchy, and the king’s

council therefore resolved to convoke the assembly of Notables at

Fontainebleau. The Guises consented to this measure with reluctance;

but, alarmed themselves at the dangers of a situation they could no

longer direct, they yielded to the influence of the politicians, or

_tiers-parti_, which had begun to be formed under the direction of

the Chancellor L’Hospital.

The 21st of August, 1560, had been fixed for the opening of the

assembly. The young king took his seat on the throne, in the great

hall of the palace of Fontainebleau, having near him his wife, Mary

of Scotland, the queen-mother, and his brothers. Cardinals, bishops,

members of the privy council, knights of the order, masters of the

requests, the dukes of Guise and Aumale, the Constable, the Admiral,

the Chancellor, all were there, except the Bourbon princes, who,

fearing a snare, had refused to be present.

The Duke de Guise gave an account of the administration of the

army, the Cardinal de Lorraine of that of the finances. But,

notwithstanding the importance of these matters, the Notables

bestowed little attention upon them: they felt that the sole great

affair of the moment was the religious question.

Coligny had promised the Reformers to give the signal. On a sudden,

he rose, approached the throne, made a respectful obeisance,

and presented two petitions, one to the king, the other to the

queen-mother bearing this inscription: “_The supplication of those,

who, in divers provinces, invoke the name of God according to the

rule of piety._” All present were astonished at such boldness; for

the penalty of death hung always over the head of the heretics. But

the king, François II., who could not have been taught his lesson

beforehand, on this emergency graciously received the petitions, and

handed them to be read, to his secretary.

The faithful attested that their faith was that of the creed of the

Apostles, that they had always acted as loyal subjects of the king,

and that they had been most shamefully calumniated by the accusation

of being fautors of disturbance and sedition. “The Gospel, which

we profess, teaches us just the contrary,” said they; “and we even

do not hesitate to confess, that we never understood so well our

duty towards your majesty as we have understood it by means of the

holy doctrine that is preached to us.” In conclusion, they asked

permission to meet in open day, and submitted to be treated as

rebels, if they should thenceforth be found meeting by night, or

unlawfully.

It was remarked, that these documents were unsigned. “It is true,”

answered the Admiral; “but give us leave to assemble, and, in one

day, I will bring fifty thousand signatures from the province of

Normandy alone.” “And I,” interrupted the Duke de Guise, in an

arrogant tone, “will find a hundred thousand who will sign the

reverse with their blood.”

The debates were resumed on the 23rd of August.

Two prelates—it is a pleasure to state it—Jean de Montluc, bishop

of Valence, and Charles de Marillac, archbishop of Vienne, proposed

means of conciliation. Both had filled embassies in Italy, and

visited the Protestant countries. It is a memorable fact, that the

bishops of France, who had compared Rome and the Reformation, should

have generally inclined to the new ideas!

Jean de Montluc depicted with energy the disorders which filled the

Church. He compared the Calvinist ministers,—lettered, diligent men,

having always the name of Jesus Christ on their lips, fearing not to

die to confirm their doctrine,—to the (Roman) Catholic priests; and

at this point he pronounced words, which deserve to find a place in

history.

“The bishops (I speak of the greater number) have been idlers, having

no fear of giving account to God of the flock intrusted to their

charge, and their chief care has been to preserve their revenue, and

to abuse it in foolish and scandalous expenses; so true is this, that

we have seen forty residing in Paris, while the fire was blazing in

their dioceses; and at the same time we see bishoprics given over to

children and ignorant persons, who have neither the will, nor the

knowledge, to uphold their condition. The ministers of this sect have

not failed to show this to those, who were willing to listen to them.

“The curates are ignorant, greedy, busy with everything but their

duties, and, for the most part, have procured their benefices by

illicit means. And at a time which should call to our assistance men

of learning, virtue, and strong zeal, as many double crowns as the

bankers have sent to Rome, so many curates have they sent to us.

“The cardinals and the bishops have made no difficulty of conferring

benefices upon their major-domos, and, what is more, upon their

valets, cooks, barbers, and lackeys. The common priests have by their

avarice, ignorance, and dissolute life, rendered themselves odious

and despised by all the world. Such are the charming remedies that

have been used to procure peace for the Church!”

Montluc suggested two means of resolving the existing difficulties:

one was to preach every day before the king, the queen, and the lords

of the court, and to replace the “_foolish songs_” of the maids of

honour by the Psalms of David; the other, to convoke, without delay,

a universal free council, and, if the pope refused, a national

council.

The Archbishop Marillac uttered the same complaints, supported the

advice of Montluc, and proposed to decide, moreover, that nothing

should be done in the Church for money, seeing that it is not lawful

to make merchandise of spiritual things.

The next day, August 24th, it was the turn of the Admiral Coligny to

speak. He required, like the two bishops, the convocation of a free

council, either general or national, and added that permission should

be given in the meanwhile to those of the religion to meet for the

worship of God. “Give them churches, or other edifices in each place”

said he, “and send thither people to see that nothing is done against

the authority of the king and the public tranquillity. If you were

to act in this way, the kingdom would be peaceable directly, and the

subjects content.”

But the Cardinal de Lorraine rejected this request without

consideration. “Is it reasonable,” he asked, “that we should be of

the opinion of these people rather than of that of the king? And as

to concede to them churches or places of assembly, this would be to

approve of their heresy, which the king could not do without being

everlastingly damned.” The Cardinal saw no greater necessity for

convoking a council, since all that was required was to reform the

manners of the churchmen, which could be done by general or private

admonitions.

Nevertheless the Guises, being unsupported in the meeting at

Fontainebleau, both by the Chancellor and by the Constable, consented

to the convocation of the States-General for the following December,

and announced that preparatory steps would be taken for holding a

national council.

Pope Pius IV. was exceedingly disturbed by the mere idea of this

council, being apprehensive of seeing either a schism result from

it, or at least the re-establishment of the Pragmatic Sanction. He

wrote to the king of France to tell him that his crown would be in

danger, and to the king of Spain to beg him to intervene. But meeting

with no satisfactory answer, he resolved to reopen the sessions of

the Council of Trent, which had been for a long time suspended. The

pontiff of Rome preferred an assembly, the majority of which was

Italian, and under his control, to a national Council of France,

which could deliberate without him, and perhaps against him.

It will be remarked that the most enlightened men of both

communions,—Montluc, Marillac, L’Hospital, Coligny,—were of the same

opinion about convoking a national council. We must not deceive

ourselves as to what was really at the bottom of this project. It was

not religious liberty, as we understand it in our day; it was simply

the hope that by mutual concessions, (Roman) Catholicism and the

Reformation might unite upon a common ground. The principle that two

religions might not exist in one state, still held sway over the best

minds.

XIII.

In joining hands with the convocation of the States-General, the

Lorraines entertained more than one secret thought. They flattered

themselves that they should come to a conclusion with the Bourbons,

envelop the Huguenots in the ruin of their chiefs, and win the

majority in the States by seduction or intimidation.

Antoine de Bourbon and the Prince de Condé were invited to take their

seats as princes of the blood royal. They were aware that great

dangers awaited them, but a refusal would have been represented as an

open rupture with the regal authority. The opposite characters of the

two princes also concurred in inducing them to accept the invitation.

The king of Navarre was too weak to brave the crown in so evident a

manner; Louis de Condé was of too bold a nature to expose himself to

the imputation of fear. The one started on the journey because he was

not daring enough, the other, because his daring was too great.

Hardly had Condé entered Orleans, before he was arrested on a charge

of high treason, and commissioners were appointed to try him. He

refused to answer, on the plea that a prince of the blood royal could

be tried only by the king and his peers, with all the assembled

houses of Parliament. The Lorraines showed him an ordinance, by

which he was declared guilty of lese-majesty, if he, persisted in

his refusal. “We must not tolerate,” said the Duke de Guise, “the

bravadoes of this young gallant, prince though he be; we must crush

the head of heresy and rebellion at one blow.”

The chief of the house of Bourbon humbled himself before the duke and

the cardinal, to solicit the pardon of his brother. They received

him with lofty coldness, and had a strict watch kept over him. All

historians relate that they conceived the project of assassinating

him. As they dared not bring him to trial, it was resolved to summon

him before Francis II., and so to induce a quarrel, by which the

king should be led to draw his sword upon him. At this signal the

courtiers were to throw themselves upon Antoine de Bourbon, and

poniard him.

When informed of the plan, the extent of the danger inspired him with

a degree, of courage, and he said to the Captain Rente: “I am going

to a place where my death has been sworn. If I perish, take the shirt

I now wear; carry it to my wife, since my son is not yet old enough

to take vengeance for my death; and let her send it to the Christian

princes, who will avenge me.” He then entered the king’s chamber,

and the Cardinal de Lorraine shut the door behind him. The king made

some insulting observations to him; but either from the timidity of

youth, or from pity, he was afraid to give the signal. “The coward!

the poltroon!” murmured Francis de Guise, who was hidden behind the

door. A king of seventeen commissioned to assassinate his uncle!

What manners! What a reign! What a court![35]

The Cardinal de Lorraine had also conceived a plan for the

extermination of heretics, resembling those executed against the

Albigeois of Languedoc, or the Moors of Spain. Would that for the

honour of the human race, it were possible to deny such detestable

designs; but they are attested by (Roman) Catholic writers, and even

by the Jesuit Maimbourg.

The Cardinal had therefore resolved to make all Frenchmen sign a

formula of faith drawn up by the Sorbonne in 1542; a formula which,

says Jean de Serres, “_no man of the religion would for a thousand

livres have approved or signed_.”

The king was to present this document on Christmas-day to all the

princes, officers, and chevaliers of the court; the queen was to

present it to all the ladies of the palace; the Chancellor to the

deputies of the States-General and to the _maîtres des requêtes_;

the chiefs of the Parliaments and of the bailiwicks to their

subordinates; the governors of the provinces to the gentry; the

curates to all the inhabitants of their parishes; the heads of houses

to their servants. Whosoever should refuse to sign, or who should

even request time, was to be put to death on the following day; or,

according to the milder version of Maimbourg, to be despoiled of

all his goods and banished from the kingdom. Four marshals were to

scour the provinces with their troops, to assist by force of arms in

carrying out this law of extermination. The Cardinal adding burlesque

to atrocity, called this formula of faith the rat-trap of the

Huguenots.

Never before had those of the reformed faith in France been reduced

to such a terrible extremity: when suddenly Francis II. was taken

dangerously ill. The Cardinal de Lorraine had public processions made

in Paris for his recovery. The young prince called upon the Virgin

and the saints, saying, with the imbecile fanaticism in which he

had been tutored, that if it pleased God to restore him to health,

he would spare neither wife, nor mother, nor sisters, nor brothers,

if they were ever so little suspected of heresy. These vows were

fruitless. Francis II. died in his seventeenth year, after a reign of

seventeen months, on the 5th December, 1560.

No one cared for his burial, so much were the queen-mother, the

Bourbons, the Guises, the cardinals, and the courtiers engrossed by

their own affairs. Francis II. was escorted to Saint Denis by an old

blind bishop and two ancient servitors of his house.

Before he had given up his last breath, the Lorraines had barricaded

themselves in their dwelling; and there they remained for

thirty-six hours, until they were reassured as to the intentions

of the queen-mother and of the king of Navarre. Their governments

and dignities were preserved to them, but they were no longer

masters of the state. Charles IX, ten years and a half old, was

proclaimed king, Catherine de Medicis regent, and Anthony de Bourbon

lieutenant-general of the kingdom. He might, as first prince of the

blood, have claimed the regency; but he lost his opportunity for want

of vigour. The prince of Condé came out of prison; the Constable

Anne of Montmorency resumed his office of grand master near the new

king; and Admiral Coligny, asking nothing for himself, endeavoured to

secure the free exercise of religion. The whole aspect of affairs was

changed. The faithful (once more) breathed.

The States-General opened at Orleans on the 13th December. The

Chancellor Michel de l’Hospital, the first to speak in the name

of the infant king and the regent, declared that the disorder of

the Church had given birth to heresy, and that a good reformation

alone could extinguish it. He advised the (Roman) Catholics to

_adorn themselves with virtues and a good life_, and to attack their

adversaries with the arms of charity, of prayer, and of persuasion.

“The knife” he said, “avails but little against the mind; gentleness

will do more than severity. Give up those fiendish names—the symbols

of parties, factions, and seditions—Lutherans, Huguenots, Papists.

Let us not change the name of Christian.” He ended by proposing the

reunion of a national council for the settlement of all religious

differences.

The orator of the Third Estate, Jean Lange, advocate of the

Parliament of Bordeaux, keenly attacked three vices of the (Roman)

Catholic clergy—ignorance, avarice, and luxury—intimating that

troubles would cease when these abuses should be corrected.

Jacques de Silly, lord of Rochefort, spoke for the nobility, and

did not spare the priests any more than did the orator of the Third

Estate. He complained of their meddling in the administration of

justice, of their enormous possessions, of the non-residence of the

bishops, of their want of zeal for the instruction of their flocks,

and finished by asking for churches for the gentlemen of the reformed

religion.

Some months later, at the meeting of the States at Saint Germain,

another orator of the Third Estate, the first magistrate of Autun,

went so far as to propose the alienation of the goods of the Church,

which he estimated at one hundred and twenty millions of livres;

that the king should sell these possessions, and reserve forty-eight

millions, which at an interest of one in twelve, would yield a yearly

revenue of four millions, sufficient for the support of the priests;

that then seventy-two millions would remain, of which forty-two

millions might be employed in paying off the debts of the crown, and

the remainder might be spent in the encouragement of agriculture and

commerce. As to religious differences, the same orator proposed to

discuss them in a national council, legalized and free, to and from

which, safe access and return should be guaranteed.

We are astonished at finding, in 1560, thoughts which were not

fulfilled till 1789. It was the great voice of the people which was

(then) heard. Civil wars had not yet fanaticised their minds and

rendered their hearts inaccessible to pity. It was one of those

short moments when the Reformation might have obtained the ascendant

in France. Three-fourths of the nobility was gained over; the

_bourgeoisie_ was prepared; the magistracy was waiting; and would not

the lower orders, already favourable to the new ideas in one part of

the kingdom, have communicated an impulse to the other? What then

was it that arrested this vast movement, whence a new France, a new

Europe, might have sprung? First let us look to the Almighty, whose

ways are wrapt in mystery. But in looking to men, what do we find?

Among many, no doubt, sincere convictions, the weight of ancient

traditions, respect for old recollections and customs. Let us not

attribute to selfish motives the great events of mankind; but we must

not omit to point out the tortuous policy of Catherine de Medicis,

the ambition of the Guises, the intrigues of the king of Spain, the

designs and the cupidity of the clergy.

The position of the priests at the States-General of Orleans was a

difficult one, and the more they felt their weakness, the greater

was the violence they displayed. The orator they had chosen, Jean

Quintin, professor of Canon Law, began by regretting that the

nobility and the Third Estate had thought proper to speak on their

own behalf, when the States-General formed a body, of which the king

was the head, and of which _the Church was the mouth_. He accused the

heretics of having no other Gospel than that of destroying altars, of

evading ecclesiastical obedience, and of overthrowing the civil laws.

Upon the strength of this, he invited his majesty to persecute them

to the uttermost, as the sword was in his hand for no other purpose.

He added, that since they were excommunicated, it was unlawful to

dwell with them, to converse with them, to deal with them; but it was

lawful to beat them, and to put them to death, for fear of sharing in

their sin.

“Sire,” said he, in conclusion, “all the clergy of your kingdom, on

their bended knees, body and heart, humbly prostrate before your

majesty, beseech you to be their protector and defender. They pray

that if any excavator of dead and buried heresies should take upon

him to revive a sect already condemned, and should to this end

present a request, and demand churches and leave to inhabit the

kingdom (here all eyes were turned upon Coligny, who sat opposite to

the orator), we supplicate that he be held and declared a heretic,

and proceeded against with all the rigour of the law, canon and

civil, in order that the wicked wretch be driven from amongst us.”

Although not unaccustomed to the declamations and invectives of

the priests, this harangue, prompted by a savage fanaticism,

astonished the States-General. The admiral demanded satisfaction

from the queen-mother for the insult to himself, and Jean Quintin

was compelled to offer him an apology. “A few days after,” says Jean

de Serres, “he died of mortification, on finding himself exposed by

several published replies to his harangue, in which his calumnies

and falsehoods were clearly refuted.”[36]

XIV.

The States-General had served the cause of the Reformation. The

Cardinal de Lorraine, annoyed at having played only a secondary part,

withdrew to his archbishopric at Rheims. The Duke de Guise retired

from the court; and the queen-mother, seeing that the two orders

of the laity disapproved of religious persecutions, manifested, in

concert with the Chancellor L’Hospital, a favourable disposition

towards the Calvinists.

Coligny caused the reformed faith to be preached in his apartments,

and Catherine de Medicis opened the pulpit of the palace of

Fontainebleau to the bishop Montluc, the same who had so forcibly

exclaimed against the abuses of the Roman church in the assembly of

Notables. The courtiers, ever ready to range themselves on the side

of fortune and power, flocked around the new preachers, and left a

Jacobin monk to preach the Lent sermon to himself.

“It seems to me,” said the Jesuit Maimbourg bitterly of the

queen-mother, “that, on the most favourable construction, it may be

fearlessly said, that if all she did upon this occasion was but a

pretence, she did ill to feign so well as to give ground to believe

that she belonged to the new sect. For she not only allowed the

ministers to preach in the apartments of the prince, where all the

world crowded to hear him, whilst a poor Jacobin, who preached the

Lent sermon at Fontainebleau, was deserted; but she went so far as to

take part herself with all her ladies at the sermons of the bishop

of Valence, who preached openly, in one of the rooms of the château,

the new dogmas he had drawn from the heresies of Luther and Calvin.

So sudden and so strange a change took place at court, that one would

have said she was quite a Calvinist. Although it was Lent, meat was

publicly sold, and spread upon every table. They talked no more of

attending Mass, and the young king, who was still taken there to keep

up appearances, went almost alone. They scoffed at the authority

of the Popes, at the worship of the saints and of images, at

indulgences, and at the ceremonies of the Church, which they treated

as superstitions.”[37]

If the Jesuit was right in saying that the queen-mother’s going to

the sermon was only a feint, he might have added, that it was also

a feint on her part when she went to Mass. Sceptical, as for the

most part were the upper classes of Italy in her time, Catherine de

Medicis still perhaps believed in magic and sorcery, although not

in Christian truth. Instead of serving God, she turned God to her

service.

At any rate, the impulse spread to the provinces. How was it possible

to interdict the public gatherings of the religious, when they could

point to the example of the court? The timid grew bold, temporizers

made up their minds. The enthusiasm was general. Controversial

writings inundated the land. We possess an ample collection, under

the titles of “Apologetic Complaint of the Churches,” “Christian

Exhortation to the King of France,” “Remonstrances to the Queen and

to the King of Navarre,” and many others of a similar kind.

In these days of fervour and of hope, the faithful believed that the

triumph of the Reformation was completely in the hands of the leaders

of the state. “It rests with you alone,” they wrote to Catherine

de Medicis and Antoine de Bourbon, “that Jesus Christ be known and

worshipped throughout the kingdom, in all truth, righteousness, and

holiness. For if you ordain that all superstitions and idolatries

be extirpated, it will be done without let or hindrance. A single

word from your lips will banish all those, who have been guilty of

malversation in the Church. This single word will deprive them of

strength, virtue, and power.”

There were now not pastors enough. Switzerland was written to for

more. Geneva, the Pays de Vaud, the canton of Neufchâtel, supplied

as many as they could. They even deprived themselves of those, whose

services were most useful to them, in order to satisfy wants more

pressing than their own. Many young men, instructed under the eye

of Calvin, and others of mature age, of different professions, were

consecrated to the ministry of the Gospel. All saw, in the ardour of

their faith, a great nation to be conquered.

On their side, the priests, it may easily be believed, were not

asleep; and as they found no support at court, they turned their

attention to the people. Disturbances arose at several towns,—at

Pontoise, at Amiens, and particularly at Beauvais. The Cardinal Odet

de Châtillon, who was accused of having celebrated the communion of

the Lord’s Supper, on Easter-day, 1561, after the fashion of Geneva,

was assailed by the populace, and Marshal de Montmorency had to come

from Paris, with a numerous escort, to quell the sedition.

L’Hospital sent to the bailiffs and seneschals letters patent

commanding them to liberate all prisoners on account of religion,

and not again to visit the interiors of houses under the pretext of

illicit meetings. But the Parliament of Paris, angry that the letters

had been despatched before they had been registered, and ill disposed

to the Reformation, since, by a stroke of authority, Anne Dubourg and

six or seven other counsellors had been removed, demanded that the

preexisting statutes should be rigidly observed.

But this opposition would have been impotent, had not another arisen

out of it, under the name of the triumvirate. This was composed

of the Duke de Guise, of the Constable de Montmorency, and of the

Marshal de Saint André. Behind this association was the Cardinal

de Lorraine with the mass of the clergy; above them, the pope and

Philip II.; beneath them the people, especially those of the north

and west. The triumvirate, which succeeded in winning over even the

king of Navarre, was the most serious obstacle to the progress of the

Reformation in France: it is essential, therefore, to explain its

origin and character.

The Duke de Guise, kept at a distance by Catherine de Medicis, and

hated by the princes of the blood, could not by himself recover the

authority, of which the death of Francis II. had deprived him. He,

therefore, sought assistance abroad, and formed a close alliance with

the Spanish ambassador, who had received from Philip II. instructions

to keep up troubles in the kingdom, in order to weaken it, and hand

it over to his mercy. This ambassador, as is correctly observed by

the Abbé d’Anquetil, acted the part of a French minister of state;

he gave his advice in all matters of business, praised, blamed, and

corrected; whilst the Guises in all things were with him.

The support of Spain, however, would not have sufficed for the

Lorraines. An abandoned woman, the former favourite of Henry II.,

Diana of Poitiers, who feared lest the spoils of the Huguenots should

be demanded back from her, undertook to reconcile the old constable

with the Duke de Guise.

Anne de Montmorency was at that time sixty-four years old. This

companion in arms of Francis I., who had made him constable in 1538,

was a brave cavalier, a loyal servant of the crown, and able to bear

disgrace with courage; but of a narrow mind, rough in character,

mistaking obstinacy for strength, and rudeness for dignity. In

religion he only knew that he was the first Christian baron, and that

the kings, his masters, were (Roman) Catholics. He concluded that he

was bound to give no quarter to heresy.

Brantôme tells us what was the singular piety of Anne de Montmorency.

He fasted with punctilious regularity on Friday, and failed not to

repeat his _pater-noster_ morning and evening; but sometimes he broke

off, saying, “Go and hang me such a one; hang up this one to a tree;

set fire to everything for a mile round.” And then he would continue

his devotions, as if nothing were the matter.

His hands were not quite clean in his conduct of the financial

affairs under Henry II., and when he learned that the States-General

were going to call upon him for his accounts, he conceived that it

was an intrigue of the Bourbons, who had a design against his honour,

as well as his purse. From that moment he kept aloof from them.

In vain did his eldest son, the Marshal de Montmorency, esteemed,

says Mézeray, as _one of the wisest nobles of the kingdom_, represent

to him that he could not, and ought not to separate himself from the

princes of the blood, and from his nephews the Châtillons, to become

the tool of the house of Lorraine; the obstinate constable always

replied: “I am a good servant of the king and of my little masters

(so he called the young brothers of Charles IX.), and for the honour

of his majesty, I will not suffer the actions of the dead king to be

impeached.”

The wife of the constable, Madeline of Savoy, who _was usually

surrounded by priests and monks_, according to the history of Jean de

Serres, _inflamed him by her outcries_. She pandered to his vanity

as first Christian baron. “As the first officer of the crown,” she

said to him, “and descended not only from the first baron, but from

the first Christian of France, you are bound not to suffer the

diminution of the Roman church: the ancient device of the house of De

Montmorency is, ‘_Dieu aide au premier Chrétien!_’”

Diana of Poitiers, Madeline of Savoy, the Lorraines, the priests, and

the ambassador of Philip II., managed so well, that the Duke de Guise

and Anne de Montmorency took counsel together on Easter-day. The

skilful contrivers of the affair took care to forget the conscience

of the old man.

The third member of the triumvirate was Jacques d’Albon, Marshal de

Saint André. Notwithstanding his great military command, he had no

strength by himself, and sought for allies to acquire a position.

He was an epicurean, who had wasted the goods confiscated from the

Huguenots. Brantôme, so indulgent towards the vices of courtiers,

says of him: “He was always given to consult his ease, to pleasures,

and to excessive luxuries of the table. He was the first to introduce

them at court, and truly they surpassed all bounds. He was a very

Lucullus in ostentation and magnificence.”[38]

These were the authors of the triumvirate, and the pretended friends

of the (Roman) Catholic religion. Worldly motives united them;

religion was only their pretext.

The Guises had gathered confidence and courage. This clearly

appeared in the language held by the Cardinal de Lorraine after the

consecration of Charles IX., in the month of May, 1561. He uttered

grave complaints of the meetings of the Huguenots, which went on

growing, and he demanded that a new edict should be discussed and

drawn up in full Parliament, before the princes, the lords, and all

the members of the privy council.

The sittings lasted twenty days. An order resulted, which, while

giving an amnesty for the faults committed on either side, and

inviting the priests no longer to excite the people, forbade the

public meetings of the religion until the reunion of a national

council, under pain of confiscation and banishment. This order, which

was only adopted by a majority of three voices, bore the name of the

Edict of July.

The (Roman) Catholic party congratulated itself upon having obtained

a great victory, and the Duke de Guise said, on coming out of the

court of the Parliament: “To maintain this edict, my sword shall

never be sheathed.” But was it not madness to hope that men, who for

forty years had braved the scaffold and the stake, would hesitate

before the pain of banishment? What followed will show; France had

yet to go through many terrible catastrophes before the two parties

were disposed to make peace on more equitable conditions.