BOOK III.

FROM THE PROMULGATION TO THE REVOCATION OF THE EDICT OF NANTES.

(1598-1685.)

I.

The compromise between the two religious communions met with the

approval of good men; but it was slow in passing from the law into

the ideas and manners [of the people].

The (Roman) Catholic clergy made the strongest protestations against

the Edict of Nantes, and Clement VIII. wrote to say that “a decree,

which gave _liberty of conscience to all, was the most accursed that

had ever been made_.” The university, governed by the Sorbonne and

the Jesuits, wished to close the gates of the colleges against the

Huguenots; and several Parliaments even raised serious obstacles

against the registration of the edict.

Little by little, however, passions died away; and in spite of the

quarrels, which were inevitable after such cruel conflicts, the

twelve years which elapsed from the promulgation of the edict to the

death of the king, form one of the most tranquil epochs of the French

Reformation. The old historians express but one regret,—that the

reign of Henry IV. had not lasted twelve years longer, in order to

have given him time to perfect his work of reconciliation.

Proselytism, already confined within narrow limits by the religious

wars, almost entirely ceased after the edict, at least on the part

of the Calvinists. The (Roman) Catholics alone continued to enlist a

few adherents; but politics weighed more in this cause than argument.

Huguenot gentlemen went through the Church of Rome in order to pass

into the antechambers of the court.

The priests wished above all things to gain over the pastors. They

even became generous in the cause, and upon the authority of a papal

brief, they raised a fund to produce thirty thousand livres a year,

for the purpose of giving pensions to those ministers and professors,

who should be tempted to abjure. But no one could be found to draw

upon the purse of the clergy on such conditions.

From 1598 to 1610 the Calvinists entered little into state affairs.

The young Henry de Condé had been summoned to Paris in 1595, on the

promise that he should be left to the enjoyment of the religion of

his father. Scarcely, however, had he arrived before he was placed

in the hands of zealous (Roman) Catholics, and he was not only

converted, but he became a _converter_. This prince rewarded his

domestics with fifteen sous every time they went to confess, provided

they brought him certificates in due form.

One single member of the family of the Bourbons, Catherine of

Navarre, sister of Henry IV., remained faithful to the religion of

Jeanne d’Albret. She manifested a singular constancy; and upon a

false report that she had been to mass, wrote to Mornay—“I shall go

there when you become pope.”

She pursued her devotional exercises at Saint Germain-en-Laye, after

the entry of Henry IV. into Paris, in order to avoid altercations.

But one day, having caused the marriage of a niece of Coligny to be

celebrated at the Louvre, and having had for this occasion the doors

thrown open during the sermon, the priests bitterly complained.

“You are bold,” said the king to them, “to hold such language in my

house, and with reference to my sister.” “But a marriage has been

performed.” “Well, since it is over, what would you have me do in the

matter?”

This trifling incident serves to show how the clergy at that time

watched the Reformers with hostile eyes, tightening their chain when

it could be done, but never permitting it to be loosened.

It does not appear that the Béarnese king ever set his mind upon his

sister’s abjuration, and he would even refer the Calvinists to her,

when he found it difficult to comply with their requests. “Address

yourselves to my sister,” said he, laughing, to some gentlemen from

Saintonge; “for your state has fallen under the spindle.”

He desired in the end to marry her to the Duke de Bar, of the house

of Lorraine. This affair, of so little intrinsic importance,

occupied the attention of the royal council, the Holy See, and the

synods for a long time. A disputation was held before the princess

between a doctor of the Sorbonne and a professor of Sedan, which did

not, however, result in Catherine’s forsaking her faith. The pope

refused to give a dispensation for the marriage; the prelates, in

their turn, also refused to move any further; whilst the king, whom

these delays disgusted, conceived the idea of summoning his natural

brother, the archbishop of Rouen, to his cabinet, a worldly priest,

who consented to give the nuptial benediction.

The marriage was not a happy one. The sister of Henry IV. had to

suffer coldness and ill-treatment from the Duke de Bar, who allowed

himself to be wholly led by the Jesuits. She died in 1604, and no

Bourbon since that time has belonged to the Reformed communion.

Some noblemen of high rank still endeavoured to draw the Huguenots

into their individual quarrels, but they were not listened to. The

Duke de Bouillon, among others, who had been compromised in the

conspiracy of Marshal Biron, invited his co-religionists to come to

his aid. “It is necessary,” said he, “that the ministers and the

churches, altogether, without exception or distinction, should defend

this very just and important cause.” Some gentlemen rose at his call,

but the majority did not respond to it. The freedom, guaranteed by

the Edict of Nantes, satisfied the Consistorialists, and the others

could effect nothing without them.

If some political assemblies continued to meet, it was only every

third year. They sometimes consisted of seventy members, namely,

thirty gentlemen, twenty delegates of the _Tiers-parti_, and twenty

pastors. They displayed no spirit of faction, and commonly confined

themselves to drawing up statements of grievances, and to naming two

general deputies for the protection of the interests of the churches

at court.

The king, without absolutely interdicting these meetings, took

umbrage at them, and, through Sully, expressed his sentiments to the

assembly of Châtellerault. “If Henry IV.,” answered the delegates,

“were immortal, we, content with his word in everything respecting

ourselves, would instantly renounce the thought of the slightest

precaution; we would abandon our places of security; we would

consider every individual rule useless for the preservation of our

society. But the dread of finding different sentiments in one of

his successors” (was not their caution prophetic?) “compels us to

preserve the measures, which have been taken for our safety.”

The national synods also assembled in a more regular manner than

they had done hitherto. Five were held from the Edict of Nantes to

1609. Pastors, elders, and the faithful, each and all, understood

that the exact observance of the synodal system was essential to

the prosperity of their religion. There was no discussion, no

circumstance of any importance, that did not, either directly or by

way of appeal, come before this high tribunal, where local passions

were without influence with reference to the common interest.

One of the attributes of the national synods was to dole out the

_deniers de l’octroi du roi_, or the king’s gift, among the provinces

and the academies, which amounted, or rather ought to have amounted

(for the funds were not very exactly paid), to forty-five thousand

crowns. A professor of theology received seven hundred livres a

year; a professor of Hebrew or Greek, or of philosophy, four hundred

livres; the regents of the colleges, from one hundred and fifty to

three hundred livres. The academies, maintained by the synods, were

established at Montauban, Saumur, Nismes, Montpellier, and Sédan; of

these, the two first were the most flourishing.

A question, which greatly agitated these assemblies, and became

almost a state affair, was an article that was added, in 1603, to

the confession of faith by the national synod of Gap, in which

the Roman pontiff was accused of being _Antichrist_. We cite this

article as a monument of the ideas and language of the times: “Since

the bishop of Rome—having erected a monarchy in Christendom, by

grasping at domination over all the churches and pastors—has raised

himself to the point of calling himself God, to seek to be adored,

to boast that he is all-powerful in heaven and on earth, to dispose

of all ecclesiastical matters, to decide upon articles of faith, to

authorize and interpret the Scriptures at his pleasure; to traffic

in souls, to dispense from vows and oaths, to order new services

to God; and, with reference to government, to tread underfoot the

legitimate authority of magistrates, by taking away, giving, and

exchanging kingdoms; we believe and maintain that he is properly the

_Antichrist_ and the _son of perdition_ prophesied of in the Word of

God, under the emblem of the scarlet woman....”

This article made a great noise. It followed upon some theses

with reference to the same subject, which had been brilliantly

supported by Jérémie Ferrier, a pastor of Nismes, and submitted to

the Parliament of Toulouse. The adhesion of the national synod of

Gap conferred much more consequence upon them. The legate loudly

complained; the pope was extremely angry; the king expressed his

displeasure, saying that the decision of the synod threatened to

endanger the peace of the kingdom; and the ardent (Roman) Catholics

did not fail to represent this affair as a personal insult to him, or

even as an act of rebellion against his crown.

A long and difficult negotiation ensued. At length the national synod

of La Rochelle, convoked in 1607, decided that, though it unanimously

approved of the contested article, and held it to be conformable

with what had been predicted in the Scriptures, it consented, at the

express command of the sovereign, to omit it from the confession of

faith. In retaliation, it directed one of its members to prove the

justice of the accusation, and the pastor Vignier acquitted himself

of the commission in a book entitled, _The Theatre of Antichrist_.

We must, to understand this perseverance, bear in mind, that

controversy was carried on at that time with extreme bitterness. The

pen and the tongue having replaced the sword, passions, which had

no longer another vent, were brought into this new battle-field.

The necessities of these polemics were so great, that by a singular

resolution, the national synod of Saint Maixent distributed the most

difficult points of controversy among the provinces, with directions

to have them examined by persons capable of successfully opposing, on

all occasions, the (Roman) Catholic doctors.

This contest assumed sometimes considerable importance, as was the

case with the conference opened at Fontainebleau, on the 14th of May,

1600, between Duplessis-Mornay and Duperron.

Mornay, in a treatise upon the Eucharist, had collected five or

six thousand texts of the Fathers, which appeared to him opposed

to the doctrine of transubstantiation. This was, so to speak, the

voice of the first centuries of Christianity, which he summoned

to testify against the inventions of succeeding ages, and all the

venerable doctors of the primitive church rose one after the other,

in his book, to protest against the alteration of the Sacrament of

the Supper. This treatise was at the same time both a religious and

political event; and this is not to be wondered at, if we reflect, on

the one side, that the author had lived thirty years in familiarity

with the king; on the other, that the dogma of the Eucharist was

the great question of the era between (Roman) Catholicism and the

Reformation. It was upon this point that the sentences of death

pronounced against the heretics had been principally founded, and

nothing contributed more, as we have seen, to break up the colloquy

of Poissy.

The Cardinal de Medicis, legate of the pope, sent six copies of

Mornay’s work to Rome, promising to have it refuted by Bellarmine.

In place of a refutation, there came despatches from Clement VIII.

denouncing a new conspiracy on the part of the heresy. Henry IV. was

the more vexed at this because he was then suing before the Holy

See for a divorce from his marriage with Marguérite de Valois. The

Parliaments also took part in the quarrel; and during a whole winter,

the pulpits of the old preachers of the League re-echoed with violent

anathemas against the audacious adversary of the real presence.

Henry IV. made known his displeasure to Mornay, by means of M. de

la Force. “I have always regulated my services,” answered Mornay,

“according to the following order—first to God, then to my king,

next to my friends; and I cannot, with a good conscience, change my

method.”

However, Duperron, bishop of Evreux, said publicly, that he

had discovered in the tract “_more than five hundred enormous

falsehoods_,” and that he would undertake to prove them [to be so].

The report of this having reached Mornay, he accused this assertion

of being an unworthy calumny, and demanded the opportunity of

justifying himself in a public conference.

At the single word “_public conference_,” the legate, the bishop

of Paris, the doctors of the Sorbonne raised an outcry; for the

priests had generally been worsted in their oral discussions with

the theologians of the Reformation. “Rest easy,” said the king, “the

affair shall be so well conducted that the defeat shall be with the

heretics.”

For this end Henry IV. chose as judges of the controversy four very

decided (Roman) Catholics, and only two Calvinists, who were moreover

suspected. Dufrêne Canaye, who had already pledged his troth to the

king to embrace (Roman) Catholicism, and De Casaubon, who, caring

only for Greek and Latin manuscripts, affected great indifference for

matters of faith. It is related of him that he replied to his son,

who asked for his blessing, after having entered the order of the

Capuchins: “I give you my blessing with all my heart: I do not blame

you; do not blame me either.”

Mornay perceived the snare, and remonstrated against such a want of

impartiality. “Sire,” said he to the king, “if there were nothing

more concerned than my life, or even my honour, I would cast them

at your feet. But since I am obliged to defend the truth, where the

honour of God is concerned, I beseech your majesty to pardon me, if I

seek just and reasonable means to secure it.”

Far from acceding fairly to this request, the king answered roughly

that he had greatly offended him by attacking the pope, to “_whom he

was under more obligations than to his own father_.” “Well! sire,”

said Mornay, “since it so pleases God, I see the thing is settled:

you will be made to condemn the truth between four walls, and God

will give me grace, if I live, to make it echo to the four corners of

the world.”

The day was fixed for the conference. Henry had imported into this

quarrel so violent a passion that he could not sleep the night

preceding. M. de Loménie, who slept in his room, said to him, as an

historian writes: “‘Your majesty must take this affair strangely to

heart: on the eve of Coutras, Arques, and Ivry, three battles where

all was at stake, your majesty was not so troubled.’ All this the

king confessed; so eagerly did he desire to content the pope by the

ruin of M. Duplessis!”

But the unfair choice of commissioners was not enough. The

incriminated texts were not indicated to Mornay until the very day

of the conference at one o’clock, and he lost another hour before he

could obtain the books that were required to verify his quotations.

At eight o’clock, he was summoned to the king’s presence, although

the discussion was not to open till noon; the object was, to use the

expression of an historian, “_to make him lose his time_.” At this

last trait, Mornay’s whole soul was moved with indignation, “Sire,”

he exclaimed, “may your majesty pardon me! This extraordinary rigour

towards a good servant is unnatural in you.”

When the time had arrived, the lords and ladies of the court, members

of the council, magistrates of the Parliament, bishops and priests,

were assembled in the great hall of the palace of Fontainebleau.

Duperron advanced, with smiling countenance, and proud of a victory

he knew to be already won beforehand. Mornay came also, not thinking

it possible to retreat without compromising the cause of the Gospel;

but he had been able only to verify a very few of his quotations; he

was suffering, dejected, and but too certain of the sentence that

would be pronounced.

At the opening of the conference, the plan of attack was changed:

instead of “enormous falsehoods,” it became merely a question of

“_simple mistakes_!” Now, what was there surprising that in a great

book wholly filled with quotations, the author should have fallen

into some inaccuracies? Mornay did not defend himself well, and upon

some thousands of texts, the judges condemned nine. The following

night he fell ill, which served as a pretext for breaking up the

conference.

Henry wished to sup in the hall of this theological tournament,

as he would have done on a field of battle. He announced all over

the kingdom the success he had obtained, and he wrote to the Duke

d’Epernon: “I have done a marvel.” Duperron was triumphant. “Let us

confess the truth,” said the king to him, who could not long repress

his humour for raillery, “the good right stood much in need of good

aid.”

Clement VIII. manifested great joy at this victory. He annulled the

marriage of Henry IV., and sent the cardinal’s hat to Duperron.

It should be noted, in exculpation of Henry IV., that he publicly

praised Mornay shortly after the conference, and declared that he had

never had a better or a nobler servant. The conscience of the man

protested against the diplomacy of the king.

Duplessis returned, broken-hearted, to his government of Saumur.

“Courage,” said his wife; “it is God who has done this. Only keep

your heart and your mind ready for the work.” He set himself to

verify all the texts on the _Eucharist_, and published a new edition,

which received the approbation of the theologians of France and

Geneva. Neither the king, nor Cardinal Duperron, cared any more about

the matter; they had both obtained what they wished.

These were the most important events of the second half of the reign

of Henry IV.; and when we recollect the horrible scenes that had

preceded them, we are happy that we have only to register theological

strifes. If they still stirred up burning passions, human blood no

longer flowed.

Divine worship was celebrated almost everywhere without obstacle

in the seven hundred and sixty churches that remained to the

French Reformation; and when serious grievances were laid before

the council, they were redressed. The faithful of Paris had been

compelled to open their church in the little village of Ablon, five

leagues from the town. The courtiers complained that they could not

on the same day discharge their duty to God and the king. The poor

also complained of the distance. Some of the children carried to

the meetings, according to the discipline, for baptism, had died on

the way. The king was touched with these difficulties, and in 1606

permitted the Reformers to exercise their worship at Charenton; which

lasted until the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes.

Nevertheless, a horrible catastrophe was preparing in the dark. The

Jesuits, expelled from the kingdom after the crime of Jean Châtel,

had returned, because Henry IV., having to choose between two

dangers, preferred having them near him than against him. And when it

was urged upon him how wrong it was to recall these perfidious and

sanguinary monks; “Ventre-Saint-Gris,” said he, “will you answer for

my person.” He tried to gain them by confidence and good services.

Father Cotton was even named confessor of the king, and preceptor

of the dauphin. But nothing disarmed them, any more than it did the

dregs of the people, who, mindful of the sermons of the League,

always esteemed the Béarnese king as an excommunicated heretic.

On the 14th of May, 1610, Ravaillac buried his knife in the bosom of

Henry IV. This wretch confessed in his interrogatories that he had

given way to the temptation to kill him, because in warring against

the pope, the king made war against God, “_inasmuch as the pope

is God_!” Thus a sacrilegious doctrine had begotten the crime of

regicide.

Henry IV. has occupied a great place in the memory and love of the

French. He redeemed his weaknesses by eminent qualities, and his very

faults by the splendid services which he rendered to his people. It

is from his reign, as has been remarked, that the end of the Middle

Ages really dates; and the Reformers have ever been grateful to

a prince, who was the first that sincerely granted them the free

exercise of their religion.

II.

The news of the king’s death re-awakened all the fears of the

Calvinists. Many families hastily quitted Paris, although the

guardianship of the gates had been confided to burghers of both

religions, as if they had been threatened with another Saint

Bartholomew. The Duke de Sully shut himself up in the Bastille, of

which he was the governor. The Huguenots of the southern provinces

took arms. It seemed as if the Edict of Nantes had been torn by the

same blow that had pierced the heart of Henry.

From the 22nd of May, the court published a declaration, confirming

in the most explicit terms all the edicts of toleration, a useless

precaution; for the Reformers believed neither in the power of the

regent Marie de Medicis, nor in her good faith. They feared they

should find in her, and in her son Louis XIII., then but eight years

and a half old, a second Queen Catherine, and a new Charles IX.

Marie de Medicis was governed by two Italian adventurers, Concini and

Leonora Galigaï. An ignorant, bigoted, and vindictive woman, with

all the vices of ambition unmixed with its qualities, she ruled the

great affairs of the state upon the predictions of astrologers, and

thought, by throwing herself into the petty intrigues of the court,

that she was using the means of government.

The public treasury, under her regency, was given up to the pillage

of the great lords, and the kingdom to their turbulent factions.

The dukes de Nevers, de Mayenne, d’Epernon, de Longueville, de

Vendôme, cantoned themselves each in his province, dictating their

conditions of obedience to the crown, and offering to the chiefs of

the Calvinists the dangerous example of subordinating the general

interest to their personal pretensions.

Some of these were too much inclined to follow such an example,

particularly the Duke de Bouillon and the Marshal de Lesdiguières,

the former, a man of capacity and good counsel, but committing fault

upon fault, through his ambition to be the first person in the

kingdom; the latter, skilful and brave upon the field of battle,

but loose in morals, unscrupulous as to the means of success, and

seduced by the prospect of the constable’s sword. Both pretended

to feel a great zeal for religion, in order to win the support of

the Huguenots; nevertheless they were soon suspected by their old

friends, and did not render to the court the services they had let it

to expect.

The Duke de Sully, despoiled of all his offices, imported into the

affairs of the Reformation the bad humour of a disgraced minister. He

did not always retreat before extreme opinions, but at the moment of

passing to the execution of them, his solid sense restrained him, and

he never forgot that he had been one of the most faithful servants of

the crown.

His son-in-law, the Duke Henry de Rohan, then thirty-two years of

age, had begun to show himself, and was preparing to take the highest

place in the Calvinist party. Young, active, of almost royal birth,

as much attached to study as to the trade of arms, he had already

travelled through all the different states of Europe to acquaint

himself with their powers and their genius. He was simple and austere

in his manners, intrepid, generous, naturally inclined to great

achievements, and capable of accomplishing them. His oratory was

clear, terse, and vigorous—the true eloquence of a party leader.

His religious sentiments inspired more confidence than those of

other noblemen of his rank; and history testifies that in all his

enterprises, devotion to the Reformed cause prevailed over ambition.

Duplessis-Mornay, either because years had cooled his ardour, or

because he had better calculated the small military resources of the

Huguenots, inclined to pacific measures, and advised that everything

should be borne rather than that they should fly to arms. As soon

as he heard of the death of the king, he convoked the magistrates

of Saumur, and said to them, “Let us talk no more of Huguenots and

Papists; these words are forbidden by the edicts. But were there no

edict in existence, if we are Frenchmen, if we love our country,

our families, ourselves, they should be henceforth effaced from our

minds. There should be only one badge for all. Whoever is a good

Frenchman, him will I love as a good citizen, and as a good brother.”

As the court felt at that time the necessity of conciliating the

Reformers, it offered to Mornay either money or favours. This

disinterested servant of Henry IV. replied to these proposals that

it should never be said that he profited by the general misfortune,

importuned the mourning of the queen, or afflicted the minority of

the king. “I leave to the queen,” he said, “to judge if I deserve

anything, should she please to give me what has been long my due.

But in this calamity I ask for nothing, and am as grateful as if the

queen had bestowed [everything upon me.”]

He applied himself, without relaxation, under the regency of Marie de

Medicis, to defeat intrigue, and to appease resentment. The president

Jeannin wrote to him after the troubles excited by the Prince de

Condé, “You have so conducted yourself during this wretched war,

that their majesties are well pleased, and therein acknowledge your

prudence and fidelity.” Duplessis-Mornay had reason to know before he

died, how oblivious and ungrateful are kings!

All the opposite passions of the Calvinist party appeared together

in the political assembly, convoked at first at Châtellerault, and

opened at Saumur on the 27th of May, 1611. The court authorized its

meeting with repugnance and disquietude, and imposed upon it the

condition that it should dissolve as soon as it had prepared the

list of the six persons, out of whom the king had to choose two

general deputies; but it was very evident that the delegates of the

Reformation did not come from all points of the kingdom for the sole

purpose of inscribing six names upon a bulletin.

The assembly of Saumur again numbered seventy members,—thirty

gentlemen, twenty pastors, sixteen deputies of the _Tiers-état_, and

four delegates of the government of La Rochelle, which formed at that

time a separate principality. Fifteen provinces were represented,

without counting Béarn, whose deputies were admitted after some

little hesitation. The principal noblemen of the party had likewise

been summoned by special letters. Among them appeared the Marshal

de Lesdiguières, the dukes de Bouillon, de Sully, and de Rohan, and

Duplessis-Mornay, who, without being of the same rank, compensated

for the inferiority of his titles, by his long services and the

authority of his character.

The Duke de Bouillon aspired to the presidency, by relying upon

the intrigues of the court. He was not elected. Three-fourths of

the votes were given for Duplessis-Mornay, and the pastor Chamier

was named as vice-president. By this decision the king’s council

were plainly told that political passions would not predominate in

the assembly, and that its chief object would be the interests of

religion, but that upon this article it was resolute not to make any

compromise.

The session lasted nearly four months, in the midst of laborious

negotiations, the court requiring the prompt dissolution of the

assembly, and the latter resolving not to separate until it obtained

a redress of its list of grievances. The oath of union was renewed,

which consisted in swearing obedience and fidelity to the king,

“_the sovereign empire of God remaining always in its entirety_.”

This reservation, so legitimate and so unimpeachable in itself,

nevertheless opened the door to farther contests. At length the

assembly separated, after having chosen and seen two general deputies

accepted.

Henry de Rohan displayed his talents as a statesman and great

political orator in this assembly. He recommended union, order, the

duty of investigating the grievances of the most humble Reformer, of

resolutely challenging admission to all offices in the kingdom, and

of providing for the safe-keeping of the towns of hostage. “We have

come,” said he, “to a cross-way where many roads meet, but there is

only one which has any safety for us. The life of Henry the Great

maintained it; in this crisis our virtue must do so.... Let our aim

be the glory of God and the security of the churches, which He has

so miraculously established in this kingdom, striving with ardour

for the good of one another, but by legitimate means. Let us be

scrupulous in demanding only those things that are necessary; let us

be firm in obtaining them.”

Other political assemblies were convened in succeeding years, at

Grenoble, Nismes, La Rochelle, Loudun. The old historians distinguish

the members who composed them, by the following qualifications: _the

ambitious_, who used the pretext of religion to gain their particular

ends; the _zealous_, or well-disposed, who only sought to practise

their offices of piety in peace; the _judicious_, who tried to unite

the interests of faith with those of policy; and lastly, the _timid_,

who were ready to submit to everything rather than risk their ease

or fortune. Those who dwelt in Paris and the provinces, where the

Reformation was weak, habitually counselled measures of prudence,

from the fear of being crushed; others, relying upon their power,

spoke haughtily, and displayed the half-drawn sword. The distinction

between the Reformers of the north and those of the south, already

sensibly perceived, was shown more strongly in what followed.

The convocations of the national synods were equally frequent, and

their ecclesiastical bodies interfered more than they had hitherto

done in political questions, among others, in the synod of Privas, of

which the session opened on the 23rd May, 1612. The pastor Chamier

was its president or moderator, and the pastor Pierre Dumoulin was

named as his deputy. The members of the synod complained of the

letters patent of abolition or of pardon, published by the king’s

council in the preceding month of April.

“The churches of this kingdom,” said they, “declare that they have

never required, asked, or endeavoured to obtain grace or pardon, and

that none of their body are guilty of those imaginary crimes imputed

to them; that they are all ready, individually and collectively, to

answer for their actions, to publish them to the whole world, and

to show them in open day, in the sight of every species of torture,

more easy to bear than so shameful a blot of infamy, which would make

them despicable and hateful to posterity, and rob them of the honour

that has been ever attributed to them, of being good Frenchmen....

Moreover, they declared that they would not avail themselves, nor in

any way use the said letters of amnesty and pardon; and that if there

should be any persons who had accepted them, or consented to accept

them, that they disavowed them.”

The same synod undertook the re-establishment of harmony among the

Calvinist noblemen who had disagreed at Saumur; and there resulted a

solemn act of reconciliation, which was signed on the 16th of August,

by the marshals de Bouillon and de Lesdiguières, the dukes de Sully,

de Rohan, de Soubise, the marquis de la Force, and Duplessis-Mornay.

Another matter, more directly religious, was agitated on different

occasions in the provincial and national synods. The subject was

the conduct of Jérémie Ferrier—who has been already named—in the

beginning a vehement defender of the Reformed communion, but

afterwards secretly won over and paid by the court. Ferrier possessed

considerable learning, combined with a fertile mind and ready

speech; but his orthodoxy and probity were suspected. He was accused

of having enunciated antichristian propositions concerning the

Incarnation of Jesus Christ, and of having improperly administered

the funds of the Academy of Nismes. He was severely reprimanded

on this account, and thereupon threw himself into the arms of the

(Roman) Catholics.

Ferrier was recompensed for his apostasy by the title of councillor

of the court of judicature at Nismes, in 1613. The consistory

excommunicated him, and the people, who thenceforward styled him

“_the traitor Judas_,” desired to oppose his installation. His houses

in town and country were gutted, and he himself was forced to retire

for a while to Beaucaire.

The synod of Bas-Languedoc, upon the authority of the national synod

of Privas, confirmed Ferrier’s excommunication in the most solemn

terms: “We, pastors and elders, declare that the said M. Jérémie

Ferrier is a scandalous, incorrigible, impenitent, and unruly man;

and as such, after having invoked the name of the living and true

God, and in the name and by the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, by

the direction of the Holy Ghost, and the authority of the Church, we

have cast, and do cast him forth from the society of the faithful.”

Ferrier obtained, through the favour of the Jesuits, the post

of councillor of state, and became the apologist of Cardinal de

Richelieu. He died in 1626, detested by the Calvinists and little

esteemed by the (Roman) Catholics. His daughter, who married the

criminal-lieutenant Pardieu, figures in the satires of Boileau, for

her sordid avarice: she was murdered by robbers in 1664.

III.

The situation of the Reformers grew worse, in spite of the reiterated

declarations of the council respecting the faithful execution of the

edicts. Their rights were continually disregarded in the courts of

justice, in the nominations to public offices, hospitals, the dole of

alms, places of worship, everywhere and wherever it was possible to

vex and harass them without too openly violating the laws.

In the States-General, assembled in 1614, the orator of the

_Tiers-parti_ spoke in favour of toleration. But the clergy and even

the nobility gave the meeting to understand that, sooner or later,

the king would fulfil the oath of his coronation, by which he had

promised to expel all heretics denounced by the Church from the

countries of his jurisdiction. Cardinal Duperron declared that the

edicts were only provisional or suspensive, and that all that had

been granted was a simple reprieve to rebellious subjects.

It would be difficult in our time to conceive to what extent the

demands of the clergy against heretics proceeded, on being preferred

to the king, after they had deliberated upon them in their general

assemblies. They embraced a prohibition to write against the

sacraments of the Romish church and the authority of the pope;

prohibition to keep schools in the cities, and even in the suburbs of

episcopal towns; prohibition for the ministers to enter hospitals to

console the sick of their communion; prohibition for foreigners to

teach anything but (Roman) Catholicism; prohibition for the judges

of chambers, equally divided by an equality of votes, to adopt the

less rigorous sentence; lastly, a speedy interdiction of all exercise

of the pretended Reformed religion. These demands were periodically

renewed, with clauses increasingly harsh and oppressive, until the

Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, and afterwards down to 1787. It

was not until the great voice of the nation raised itself in the

Constituent Assembly, that that of the priests was finally silenced.

The project of a double marriage—between the young king with an

infanta of Spain, and of the prince of the Asturias with a daughter

of France—a project supported by the Holy See—redoubled the fears of

the Huguenots. It was generally rumoured that one of the conditions

of the alliance between the two courts, was the destruction of

heresy, and the (Roman) Catholic preachers took this as the text

of their sermons. “If the Jesuits,” wrote Duplessis-Mornay to the

chancellor De Sillery, “preach without circumlocution, that the

design of this double marriage with Spain is to be the extirpation of

heresy, can any one be surprised that our churches should take alarm,

and that the minutes of the assemblies should speak of it?”

The Prince de Condé, a bigoted (Roman) Catholic, as we have seen,

tried to turn the disquietude of the Calvinist party to the advantage

of his personal cause, by invoking the memory of his father and

grandfather. He published a manifesto in 1615, in which he told the

Reformers that the Edict of Nantes would be abolished, and that the

king’s only object in collecting his troops was their extermination.

These provocations carried away some gentlemen of the political

assemblies of Grenoble and Nismes. The Duke de Rohan took the field

on the side of Saintonge; but the body of the Calvinists, including

Lesdiguières, Châtillon, Sully, and Mornay, did not rise. The last

wrote on this occasion, that “a negotiation would be renewed, by

means of which the prince would be contented; while their churches

would remain behind, loaded with all the odium, and perhaps also with

the war itself.” This is exactly what happened. Condé made his peace

with the court, without any regard for the position or the interests

of his allies.

A more serious event—the oppression of the Reformation in

Béarn—occurred to furnish more weighty motives for the recommencement

of the wars of religion.

The principality of Basse-Navarre and Béarn, annexed to France by

Henry IV., was more closely re-united in 1617. Three-fourths of the

population, some say nine-tenths, belonged to the Reformed communion.

They were nevertheless ordered to reinstate the priests in all the

ecclesiastical property which had been applied, since the year 1569,

to the use of the churches, schools, hospitals, and poor.

The Jesuit Arnoux said that this property “_belonged to God, who was

its owner_,” and that consequently no one had the power or the right

to take it.

The States of Béarn, the nobility, the magistrates of the towns, the

people, all protested energetically, but in vain. The king took the

field at the head of an army, and the Béarnese not being able to

oppose more than a short resistance, he entered the town of Pau on

the 15th October, 1620. He remained there no longer than two days,

“for there was no church there,” says an historian of the time,

“where he might thank God, from whom he held this inheritance, and

he therefore went to have the mass chanted before his soldiers,

at Navarreins, where it had not been solemnized for fifty years

previously. Bishops, abbots, and curates re-entered into possession

of the property of the church, the Jesuits taking a goodly share.”

The course of the royal troops was marked with cruel violence.

“Nothing was heard to escape from the mouth of the most moderate,”

says Elie Benoît, “but threats of exemplary punishment; of hanging,

decapitating, and abolishing the Reformed religion throughout the

whole kingdom, which they called _accursed_; of banishing all who

professed it, or of compelling them to wear some badge of infamy.”

The soldiers shattered the doors of the churches, demolished the

walls, tore the books and the tables where the commandments of God

were written. They robbed and maltreated the peasants with their

staves and their swords, who came to the market of Pau, adjudging

them beforehand to be all Huguenots. They forced the Reformers,

who fell into their hands, to make the sign of the cross, and to

kneel when the procession [of the host] passed by. The women dared

not venture into the streets.... Some, who were with child, they

compelled to swear to baptize their infants at the Romish church.

“Children were carried off, the parents knew not whither, or how to

recover them; and all this was done under the eyes of the king, who

refused even to listen to the complaints of the injured. In the other

parts of the country, the soldiers lived as they pleased; publicly

told that the king had given the Huguenots up to them for pillage,

they expelled the ministers, outraged their wives, and drove men and

women to mass with blows and with curses.”[75]

Such was the first essay of the _dragonnades_, which system was

before long to be perfected and extended under the reign of Louis XIV.

The indignation of the churches on the news of the persecutions in

Béarn may be imagined. It was not this time the great lords of the

party who cried for warlike measures. They saw too well that the

Calvinists, doubly weakened by their internal dissensions and their

defections, would not be able to make head against the king.

Some pastors also advised the Reformers to remain quiet. Pierre

Dumoulin, who exercised great authority among the Consistorialists,

wrote, after the national synod of Alais, of which he had been the

moderator, that all ought to endure with patience the renewed strokes

of the enemy. “If we must be persecuted,” said he, “all those who

fear God desire that it should be for the profession of the Gospel,

and that our persecution should truly be the cross of Christ.”

But the people of the Huguenots, seconded by the lesser nobility, and

by the burghers of La Rochelle, would not hearken to this pacific

counsel. Had not the king forsworn in Béarn the oaths he had taken at

the assembly of Loudun? Was not the cause of the Béarnese the cause

of all? Would not they be obliged to suffer likewise on the first

occasion? Did not the advisers of Louis XIII. incite him to make

an end of the Huguenots without delay? Was not their extermination

preached from all the (Roman) Catholic pulpits? And was it not better

to take counsel of their despair, than to wait in fatal security for

their death-blow?

These sentiments were dominant in the political assembly convoked

at La Rochelle in the month of December, 1620. The king had sent an

usher to prohibit the deputies of the churches from meeting, and the

inhabitants of La Rochelle from receiving them. When the usher had

performed his mission, the magistrates of the town replied to him:

“Since you have executed your orders, you will quit this place as

soon as possible.”

The noblemen of the party still essayed to act as mediators between

the court and the assembly. The dukes de Rohan, de Soubise, and de

la Trémouille, had an interview at Niort with some of the deputies.

Duplessis-Mornay exerted in these negotiations all the power and

influence he possessed. But the difficulties appeared insurmountable.

The king’s council ordered the assembly to dissolve immediately, and

the assembly would not separate until they had obtained the redress

of their grievances, and solid guarantees for the free exercise

of their religion. On one side it was said: “Return home, and you

shall have satisfaction.” On the other it was replied: “Give us

satisfaction, and we will return home.” Mornay, in speaking of the

assembly of Loudun, had well stated this twofold position: “The king

orders them to dissolve, and promises to act; we beseech him to act,

being ready to dissolve.”

The debate had no result, because on either side there were

after-thoughts. The council wished at least to destroy the political

organization of the Reformers, and the latter maintained it with

obstinate constancy, under the full persuasion, not without reason,

that on such political organization their religious liberty depended.

The assembly of La Rochelle, tired of transmitting to the court

justifications and useless petitions, passed, at length, on the 10th

of May, 1621, by a majority of six or seven votes, a resolution, bold

even to rashness, and which breathed the republican spirit of the

people of La Rochelle. The measure went far beyond the rights granted

by the Edict of Nantes, and however bad were the designs of the

council, it cannot be approved of.

France, with regard to the Reformers, was divided into eight

departments or _circles_, an expression borrowed from the political

establishment of Germany; and each circle was to be placed under the

government of one of the leaders of the party. The supreme authority

was confided to the Duke de Bouillon. The governors might levy

money, appoint to offices, organize armies, and give battle. Three

deputies of the assembly were to assist in the councils held by the

general-in-chief and the military commanders. Lastly, the assembly

reserved to themselves the power of concluding treaties of peace.

This organization, however, had more of appearance than reality.

The Duke de Bouillon remained neutral. The Marshal de Lesdiguières

was on the point of embracing (Roman) Catholicism. The Duke de la

Trémouille, and the Marquis de Châtillon, grandson of Coligny, were

wavering, and soon about to exchange the command of the Huguenots

for the bâtons of marshals. The Marquis de la Force dreaded an open

rupture with the court. The Duke de Sully was anxious for quiet.

Mornay refused to take part in this recourse to arms. There were

among all the leaders but the Duke de Rohan, and his brother, the

Duke de Soubise, who showed themselves disposed to throw their whole

fortunes into the new wars of religion.

Nor did the provinces that had been divided into circles, reply

with a unanimous voice to the appeal of the assembly Picardy,

Normandy, the Orleanais, the Isle of France, where the number of

Reformers was small, even Poitou and Dauphiny, where they were more

numerous, refused to take up arms. All the efforts of resistance were

concentrated in Saintonge, Guienne, Quercy, and the two provinces of

Languedoc.

The regulations adopted by the assembly of La Rochelle, for the

maintenance of religion and good order in the army, are deserving

of mention, as an interesting trait of manners. Pastors were to say

prayers and preach daily to the soldiery. The troops were forbidden

to swear, under pain of a fine proportioned to the rank of the

delinquent; a _teston_ for a private, a _crown_ for an officer.

Heavier penalties awaited any who brought women into the military

encampments. The protection of agriculture and commerce was enjoined.

Prisoners were placed under the safeguard of the council. These

regulations proved that the assembly of La Rochelle were anxious to

honour this new war; but their execution required a fervent piety,

that had already become rare at that time.

IV.

Louis XIII. had commenced hostilities, by advancing his army towards

the Loire on the 24th of April, fifteen days before the adoption

of the resolution at La Rochelle. Some, the sagest members of his

council, had persisted in proposing means of accommodation. They

represented that the Huguenots held two hundred fortified places,

that their soldiers were of approved bravery, that despair made them

still more redoubtable, that there were in the churches four hundred

thousand men capable of bearing arms, and that the Calvinists had for

sixty years lost more by peace than by war. Others counselled, on the

contrary, that a great and decisive blow should be struck against the

Calvinist party, and Louis XIII. adopted the last opinion.

The Jesuits, his early masters and spiritual directors, urged him

unceasingly to undertake the destruction of the churches, and

invented arguments to make him safely violate the word he had given

to the heretics. “The promises of the king,” said his confessor

Arnoux, “are either promises of conscience or of state. Those made

to the Huguenots are not of conscience, for they are against the

precepts of the Church, and if they are of state, they should be

referred to the privy council, whose advice is, not to keep them.”

Thus reasoned the contemporary and brother of Escobar.

The pope offered two hundred thousand crowns, on condition that

the Huguenots were brought back willingly, or by force, into the

Church of Rome. He also addressed a brief to Louis XIII., wherein he

praised him for having imitated his ancestors, who had “_honoured

the exhortations of the pope as much as the commandments of God_.”

The cardinals offered, on the same condition, two hundred thousand

crowns, and the priests a million.

In the harangues pronounced by the orator of the clergy, the king was

pressed to follow the example of Philip Augustus, the grandfather of

Saint Louis, who had utterly exterminated the Albigenses, or at least

the example of the Emperor Constantius, who had forced the idolaters

to quit the towns and to dwell in the villages, whence they had

derived, said this priest, the name of Pagans.

The emissaries of Spain, with which country the double marriage had

led to a strict alliance, were urgent for war, from reasons of a

different kind. Every time France was troubled, the court of Madrid

felt stronger, and its language assumed a higher tone.

The king therefore put himself at the head of his army, with the

Constable de Luynes, the Duke de Lesdiguières, who had openly

declared for the court, the Cardinal de Guise, a crowd of lords, and

his mother, Marie de Medicis, whom he distrusted. His council had

taken the precaution to distinguish, before the commencement of the

campaign, between the _peaceable_ Calvinists and those who were not

so—a distinction which gave the timid and the venal the opportunity

of keeping at home, without being accused of treason.

One of the first exploits of Louis XIII. was the capture of the town

and castle of Saumur, by deceit and treachery. Duplessis-Mornay had

been governor of the place from the reign of Henry III. He kept it

as a town of hostage, granted by the edicts; and as it commanded the

course of the Loire, it was of great importance to the Calvinist

party. The Constable de Luynes demanded ingress in the name of the

king, promising that the immunities of Saumur should be as safe as

the eye of the governor, and to this “_he pledged his word, as well

as that of his majesty, with his own mouth, which was also confirmed

by M. de Lesdiguières_.” Mornay opened the gates of the fortress, and

led out, according to custom, the Calvinist garrison. But as soon

as the king had entered with his troops, he declared that he took

definite possession of Saumur.

To give to this breach of faith the appearance of an amicable

arrangement, Mornay was offered, beside payment of the arrears of

his appointment, one hundred thousand crowns and a marshal’s bâton.

He retorted with indignation, that if he had loved money, he might

have gained millions under the preceding reigns, and that, as for

dignities, he had always been more desirous of rendering himself

worthy of them, than of obtaining them. “I cannot, either in

conscience or honour,” he added, “traffic in the liberty or safety of

others.”

He went to dwell in his house, where he died on the 11th of November,

1623. His last hours were full of serenity. “We saw clearly the

Gospel of the Son of God engraved on his heart by the Holy Ghost,”

said the almoner of his family, Jean Daillé; “we saw him in the

midst of death firmly possessed of life, and enjoying a full

contentment at a moment when all men are usually shaken with fear.

And this lesson was so striking and efficacious, that even those who

suffered most from his loss, reaped both joy and edification.” He

made his confession of faith, avowing that he had received much, and

had little profited. And when he was told that he had faithfully

employed his talent: “Ah! what is there of mine?” he exclaimed. “Do

not say I, but God through me.”

Philippe de Mornay was the last representative of that great and

strong generation, which had received the lessons of Calvin, and the

examples of Coligny. He had shown that it is possible to preserve,

during half a century, even in those worst of all wars, the wars

of religion, a spotless name, an irreproachable character, conduct

always even, and a humane and generous nature. This is the highest

glory to which man can attain.

Beyond Saumur, the royal army encountered no serious resistance until

it arrived before the gates of Saint Jean d’Angély, commanded by the

Duke de Soubise. The siege began on the 30th of May, 1621, and lasted

twenty-six days. Among the number of volunteers was the Cardinal de

Guise, who acquitted himself in the soldier’s calling better than he

had done in that of the priest. He embarked in it with so much ardour

that he died of fatigue, a few days after, in the town of Saintes.

The king thence betook himself to Basse-Guienne, all the towns

hastening to throw open their gates to him, except the little place

of Clairac, which styled itself “_a town without a king, defended by

soldiers without fear_.” It was taken after twelve days’ siege. A

pastor named La Fargue, together with his father and son-in-law, was

condemned to death.

On the 18th of August, the royal army commenced an attack upon

Montauban. This siege is celebrated in the annals of the French

Reformation. The town of Montauban enjoyed municipal franchises,

which had inspired its inhabitants with a great spirit of

independence. Its councillors were men of head and action, and the

firmness of their faith redoubled their energy. The Marquis de la

Force had the command. The Duke de Rohan held his head-quarters at a

little distance, and supplied it with succours of men and ammunition.

Louis XIII. presented himself before the walls of Montauban with

the Constable, the dukes de Mayenne, d’Angoulême, de Montmorency,

the Count de Bassompierre, and the _élite_ of the nobility of the

kingdom. He also, during the siege, enlisted an auxiliary of a very

different kind. This was a Spanish Carmelite, the Father Domenique de

Jesu-Maria, who had performed, it was said, miracle upon miracle, in

the preceding year, during the war of the emperor of Germany against

Bohemia. He passed for a great prophet: the soldiers called him the

_Blessed Father_. As he was returning to his monastery in Spain, he

visited the camp of the king, who asked him for his advice. The monk

directed that four hundred discharges of artillery should be played

against the town, after which it would infallibly surrender. The four

hundred shots were fired, but the town did not yield.

The siege lasted two months and a half, and the royal army tried, at

repeated intervals, to take it by assault, but without success. At

length, after considerable loss, the king, on the setting in of the

adverse season, was, with tears in his eyes, compelled to retire. He

raised the siege on the 2nd of November. “The people of Montauban,”

says an historian, “were advertised of the approaching withdrawal of

the army by a soldier of the religion, who the evening before the

raising of the siege, betook himself to playing on the flute the

sixty-eighth Psalm. The beleaguered inhabitants took this for the

sign of their deliverance, and they were not deceived.”[76]

The war recommenced in 1622, and was conducted with unheard-of

rigour. The prisoners were treated as rebels; some were executed

on the spot, others were sent to the galleys. The Marquis de la

Force, daunted by the dangers that menaced his person and his house,

concluded a private treaty with the court, by which he delivered up

Sainte Foy and Basse-Guienne. Many of the Calvinist leaders were

either intimidated, or gained like him, so that the Huguenots were

more injured by defections than by defeats.

The little town of Nègrepelisse, close by Montauban, was the object

of horrible reprisals. All the inhabitants were put to the sword:

they were accused of having massacred the (Roman) Catholic garrison

in the preceding winter. “Mothers, who had saved themselves with

their children, by crossing the river, could obtain no pity from the

soldiers on the banks, but were thrust back or killed. In half an

hour every one in the town was slaughtered, and the streets were so

cumbered with the dead and blood that they were scarcely passable.

Those who escaped into the castle were constrained to surrender on

the next day at discretion, and were all hanged.”[77]

Another large village of the same parts, Saint Antonin, tried to

defend itself; even the women armed themselves with scythes and

halberts. But the place could not long withstand the royal army. The

garrison, holding a white wand, were allowed to quit the town. Ten

burghers were hanged with the pastor, formerly a monk of the order

of the Cordeliers. The inhabitants redeemed themselves from pillage

(the historians of the time perhaps exaggerate the amount) by a

contribution of fifty thousand crowns.

To sanctify this war, at once so full of cruelty and treason, the

lords and captains of the king’s army performed great acts of

devotion at Toulouse. The Prince de Condé, the Duke de Vendôme,

the Duke de Chevreux, went to confession and communicated with

six hundred gentlemen of their friends. Some of them affiliated

themselves with the order of the Blue Penitents; “which,” says a

chronicle, “had this advantage, that imposing no obligation, it

offered great indulgences, even at the moment of death.”

The army arrived on the 30th of August, 1622, before the walls of

Montpellier, which had a strong garrison of Huguenots. The siege made

no progress; and Louis XIII., fearing a similar check to that which

he had experienced before the ramparts of Montauban, consented to

treat with the Duke de Rohan for a general peace. The articles were

agreed upon about the middle of October.

The king confirmed the Edict of Nantes, ordered the re-establishment

of the two religions in the localities where they had been before

exercised, authorized the meetings of the consistories, conferences,

and synods for affairs purely ecclesiastical, but forbade the holding

of any political assembly without his express permission. The

fortifications of Montpellier were to be demolished, and the town

governed by four consuls, to be named by the king. The Calvinists

retained two places of safety, Montauban and La Rochelle.

This last town had been attacked several times during the war, and

had vigorously defended itself. It prolonged the struggle some time

after the new edict of peace, but ended by accepting it with the

stipulation that its liberties should be maintained. Thus, after

torrents of blood had been shed and several provinces of the kingdom

had been desolated, everything remained nearly the same as when the

war first began.

V.

The treaty of 1622 was, like many of its predecessors, nothing else

than a dead letter; and to explain fully the new recourse to arms,

which terminated by the Edict of Grace in 1629, we must state at some

length the false position into which the maxims of intolerance, put

in force from the death of Henry IV., had placed both sides.

The Calvinists, continually disturbed in the exercise of their

religion, forced to carry arms to the very doors of their churches,

and threatened with the loss of all the rights they had obtained by

the Edict of Nantes, had become embittered against royalty. They

suspected it of concealed thoughts and perfidious projects. They

accused it of encouraging, at least by its inertness, the Jesuits,

the monks, the bishops, the violent magistrates, and the populace,

who not only heaped upon them numberless vexations, but loudly

announced the approaching extirpation of heresy.

It necessarily resulted from this, that from being a simple religious

communion, the French Reformation became every day more and more a

political party, and thus from the very nature of things, as the

struggle was prolonged, the ideas and passions of the Reformers

were led into increased hostility against the crown. The spirit of

independence had grown among the Huguenots with the persecutions,

with which they were stricken, and with the menaces of destruction

that were held over their heads, and many fostered the thought of a

republican establishment.

They therefore constituted a considerable party in the first years of

the reign of Louis XIII., relying for support, within the kingdom,

upon the malcontents of all kinds;—without, upon Protestant Europe.

They communicated by La Rochelle with England, by Sédan with Germany,

by Geneva with the Swiss cantons, and seemed ever ready to divide

the strength of the state.

Such an organization was intolerable to the crown, and was so much

the more the object of its dislike, as the principle of national

unity gradually succeeded in freeing itself from the ruins of the

old feudality. The lower the great families were reduced before the

royal authority, the more would the political establishment of the

Huguenots be regarded as a singular and dangerous anomaly; and the

council was right in desiring enfranchisement from it at any price.

But through the unhappy confusion, which universally existed, at

this epoch, in temporal and spiritual matters, royalty, while

announcing that it fought only against the political privileges of

the Calvinists, put many, very many more in peril, and compromised

all their religious rights. People knew that there were impassioned

spirits behind the statesmen, and even amongst themselves, who,

after having reduced the Calvinists to become a simple sect, would

constrain them to re-enter the (Roman) Catholic church, or to quit

the kingdom.

It is true that the genius of the Cardinal de Richelieu, his

diplomatic alliances, and the European interests of France, during

half the reign of Louis XIV., retarded the complete realization of

these fears. Nevertheless the plan for the extirpation of heresy

was prosecuted in detail, without cessation and without pity, over

the whole face of France, from the moment the Calvinist party was

reduced. The capture of La Rochelle was the first act of this cruel

and merciless drama, of which the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes

was the _dénouement_.

Such then was the situation of affairs in 1622.—the Calvinists

drew the sword in behalf of their political immunities in the name

of their religious rights, which were unceasingly compromised and

menaced; and the crown attacked these immunities in the name of

the royal sovereignty and of the unity of the country, in order

afterwards to arrive at the destruction of religion itself.

As for the respective forces of the two parties, they had become

strengthened on one side and weakened on the other, since the wars of

the sixteenth century. In spite of the enterprises of some powerful

noblemen, the authority of the prince was more generally recognised,

respected, and obeyed. The lesser nobility, the _Tiers-état_ or

commons, the magistrates and the army, had, under the reign of Henry

IV., abandoned feudal traditions to obey royalty alone, and this

new spirit had naturally modified the sentiments of many Reformers,

who went, unwittingly perhaps, with the great national stream. On

the other side, the Calvinist leaders and towns, who clung to their

privileges, had no longer the same faith, or the same enthusiasm.

There were disunions, mistrust, depression below, and defections

above, in the French Reformation. It could still make itself feared

in the interior or exterior complications of the kingdom; but it

could not form a coalition between province and province, or dictate

conditions of peace.

The dukes de Rohan and de Soubise, attacked in their personal liberty

after the treaty of 1622, took up arms in Languedoc and Saintonge.

The war was one of partisans only; nothing more than sieges of

villages or strong castles, and devastations took place. The royal

troops committed great ravages round Montauban and Castres. “At

night,” say the memoirs of the time, “one might behold a thousand

fires along the plain. Crops, orchards, vines, and houses were the

aliments of the flames.... The destruction was so well executed that

there was not left a tree or a house standing, a blade of corn, or

the shoot of a vine.”

The majority of the Huguenots remained at their hearths, and the Duke

de Rohan complained of this with sorrow. “It was more difficult,” he

says, “to combat the cowardice, the irreligion, and infidelity of the

Reformers, than the hatred of their enemies.”

In the beginning of the new troubles, a national synod had been

convoked at Charenton. It was opened on the 1st of September, 1623.

The place was convenient for the court, as the proximity of Paris

guaranteed to it the docility of the assembly. An order was given

to the synod to admit a royal officer to its meetings. Although

this commissioner, named Galland, was of the Reformed religion, his

mandate caused him to be suspected. The deputies of the churches,

relying upon the letter of the treaties, and refusing to the crown

the right of establishing so important a novelty by a simple

ordinance, made many objections; but they were forced to obey,

and to content themselves with inscribing on the minutes of their

proceedings the following declaration: “This synod, desirous of

marking clearly and unmistakably its dutifulness and fidelity to

the king, admitted the said Seigneur Galland among the deputies ...

under the assurance that his majesty would in his royal goodness

re-establish us in our ancient privileges and liberties.”

A second article, less explicable than the foregoing, was that the

king expressed his displeasure on the subject of the oath that the

national synod of Alais had caused to be taken, three years before,

to the doctrine of Dordrecht. The deputies were again obliged to

temporize; they answered, that this doctrine was only conformable to

that of their confession of faith, and that the synod of Alais had no

other design than to establish the perfect union of the Reformers of

France with those of the Netherlands.

A third injunction concerned the foreign pastors, who had been

admitted to exercise their office in the kingdom. The king wrote,

that he would permit this no longer, and required the immediate

return of Primrose and Cameron, both natives of Scotland, and

ministers at Bordeaux; “not so much because they are foreigners,”

said Louis XIII., “but particularly for reasons regarding our

service.”

The principal of these reasons was that they had displeased the

Jesuits, especially Primrose. Wherefore he did not obtain, as Cameron

did, permission to reside in the kingdom, on renouncing his pastoral

charge.

One day Father Arnoux, the king’s confessor, preaching before the

court, solemnly affirmed that the casuists of his society did not

authorize regicide, and Louis XIII. thereupon expressed great

pleasure. Primrose, who was there, asked the Jesuit if Jacques

Clément had killed _his king_, or even _a king_, by striking a prince

_excommunicated by the pope_; moreover, if, in case the Holy See

should excommunicate the reigning sovereign, whether the Jesuits

would still recognise Louis XIII. as _their king_; finally, if they

were disposed to condemn their disciples Jean Châtel and Ravaillac

as guilty of the crime of lese-majesty. These questions were

embarrassing; Arnoux’s answer was a sentence of banishment.

At the national synod of Castres, convoked in 1626, the king’s

officer Galland again took his seat, notwithstanding the

protestations of the meeting. He was the bearer of an order to

nominate six persons, from whom the king would choose the two general

deputies. This election had up to this period been made by the

political assemblies, and the synod alleged the text of the last

edict, which prescribed to it to occupy itself solely with affairs

of doctrine and discipline. But the court, without having expressly

stated it in the last treaties, did not intend to permit the holding

of any more political assemblies, and compelled the synod to exceed

its powers, while it restricted it with inflexible rigour upon other

questions. Thus the council supported or overturned the letter of

the laws according to the object of the moment—the universal and

perpetual practice of the strong.

The synod of Castres made deep complaints concerning the unhappy

condition of the churches. It said to Louis XIII. “that his subjects

of the Reformed religion were molested in many parts of the kingdom,

obstructed in the exercise of their religion, and deprived of their

places of worship; that even their cemeteries had been taken away

from them, and the corpses disinterred with the extremest indignity;

that their ministers had been cruelly treated, beaten, wounded, and

driven out of their churches, although they were quite innocent,

wronging neither the public in general, nor any person in particular.”

While the court gave the Reformers satisfaction upon a few secondary

points, it prepared a formidable expedition against their last

stronghold. The Cardinal de Richelieu, who became a member of the

council in the year 1624, planned the establishment of the absolute

authority of the king upon the ruins of La Rochelle. The design was

no longer concealed. Louis XIII. announced it to the pope, who had

exhibited great vexation at the news of the new treaty with the

Huguenots. The priests published the near triumph of the (Roman)

Catholic faith, and the archbishop of Lyons wrote to Richelieu, “We

must lay siege to La Rochelle, and chastise, or to speak plainly,

exterminate the Huguenots, whatever else be left undone.”

The commune of La Rochelle enjoyed privileges far anterior to the

period of the Reformation. Eléonore d’Aquitaine had in the twelfth

century conferred important liberties upon it. The burgesses

governed themselves. They named a town council, consisting of the

mayor, twenty-four aldermen, and seventy-five peers. These hundred

magistrates, or _prud’hommes_, had troops, a navy, a treasury of

their own, and very extensive rights of jurisdiction. La Rochelle was

rather annexed than united to France, and its position resembled that

of the free towns of Germany.

To justify its pretensions, it declared that it had given itself

freely to Charles V., with the express reservation of all its

franchises and immunities, and the people of La Rochelle remembered

with pride, that they had exacted from Louis XI. the solemn sanction

of their rights. “Louis XI.,” says the historian of that city,

“made his entry into La Rochelle the 24th of May (1472). He swore

to preserve the privileges of the town; he took the oath on bended

knees, with one hand upon the cross and the other upon the Holy

Gospel, which the mayor held before him.”[78]

A governor resided at La Rochelle in the name of the king, but the

burghers did not allow him to introduce a strong garrison, nor to

build a citadel. Its real chief was the mayor, who was chosen every

year. The inhabitants were rich, industrious, intelligent, and

excellent seamen; they numbered from twenty-five to thirty thousand

souls.

The Reformation was certain of finding an easy entrance into their

town; for wherever there were intelligence and freedom, the gates

were opened to them beforehand. From the year 1557, it was known at

La Rochelle. “This first beginning was so favoured of God,” says

Theodore de Bèze, “that in a short time a great part of the town

abandoned the superstitions of the Romish church, the Lord preparing

thenceforth this place whereby to sustain on a future day the direst

efforts of His adversaries.”[79]

La Rochelle was several times besieged during the religious wars,

without having been ever taken. Condé, Coligny, Jeanne d’Albret, and

Henry of Béarn, found within its walls a secure refuge. The political

assemblies were held there in the most troublous times. It was, in

a word, the firmest rampart and the great stronghold of the French

Reformation, since the north and the centre of the kingdom could

afford it a rallying-point no longer.

The independence of La Rochelle was even important for the noblemen

of the (Roman) Catholic party, because it offered them a means of

driving the crown to buy of them more dearly the succour they lent

it, and of keeping the last remains of their feudal prerogatives

safe. “We shall not be so foolish,” said one of them, “as to take

La Rochelle;” and the Cardinal de Richelieu made this remark: “The

greatest difficulty that I see in the design, is that most of them

will labour by way of acquittal and with little affection.”

After the peace of 1622, the court had ordered the construction

of a fort near La Rochelle, notwithstanding the petitions of the

inhabitants, and the promise which had been given them, that their

privileges should be respected. Out of this, continual collisions by

sea and land had arisen, which produced no decisive result until the

year 1627.

Richelieu at length sought to strike a great blow, by employing all

the power of his genius and all the resources of the crown. He staked

his political fortune upon the capture of La Rochelle, persuaded that

if he succeeded in this expedition, he should break up the Huguenot

party, reduce the first houses of the kingdom, and leave in France

one dominant power alone—royalty.

VI.

The siege of La Rochelle began in 1627, and lasted more than a

year before attentive Europe. The king of England promised to the

inhabitants both his aid and credit. Thrice his fleet appeared in

sight of the port; but the first time it could not take the citadel

of the Isle of Ré; the second time it did not succeed in relieving

the place, and the third, it seemed to have come only to assist at

the ruin of the town. It was suspected that the duke of Buckingham

had betrayed the cause of the Reformed communion, and that Charles

I. shared in these disloyal manœuvres under the influence of his

wife, Henrietta of France. The Puritans of England did not forget

this grievance, when they drew up the account of the acts of that

unfortunate prince in 1649.

The Cardinal de Richelieu constructed a dike in the sea, as Alexander

did before Tyre, and shut up the besieged in an inclosure continually

narrowing. He was at the same time admiral, chief engineer, and

generalissimo; he superintended and directed everything, leaving to

Louis XIII. only the vain pleasure of the chase, or of touching the

sick at the grand _fêtes_ of the Church. People cited the miracles of

the king with admiration; those of the cardinal were more authentic

and more useful to the monarchy.

We have a journal written by one of the besieged, Pierre Méruault,

son of the chief of the artillery of the garrison. He relates the

sufferings of the inhabitants with minuteness. As the mole gradually

rose before the port, the dearth increased. It became horrible from

the month of June, 1628. From two to three hundred persons died every

day. The famished had acquired so sad an experience of this kind of

death, that they could foresee the very hour, and moment, when they

would cease to live, and give directions for their own burial.

They were driven, in this extreme distress, to send bands of

children, women, and old men, from the town. Louis XIII. was not so

generous as his father, Henry IV., at the siege of Paris. He ordered

their repulse without pity, and even caused his soldiers to fire

against some of these poor creatures, who stopped to pluck roots and

herbs upon the glacis, or to gather shell-fish left by the ebbing of

the tide. He commanded, also, that some crops of beans, which the

besieged had grown at the foot of their counterscarps, should be

destroyed.

Many of the fugitives, urged by the inexorable voice of hunger,

continuing to present themselves at the royal camp, gallows were

erected for their summary execution; and when they came in too

great numbers, lots were drawn for those who were to undergo this

punishment. Others, despoiled of their clothes, were beaten and

hunted out by the soldiers with rods and leathern thongs. The desire

was, by sending them back into the town, that there might be more

people to press upon the scanty stores.

Where were the co-religionists of the inhabitants of La Rochelle?

What were they doing in this last struggle for their political

existence? The Duke de Rohan went to Uzès, to Milhau, to Nismes,

to Cevennes, from one end of Languedoc to the other, exhorting the

Huguenots to rise for the common cause. His efforts were useless;

he found none but timid spirits and cold hearts, or consciences

gained by the favour of the court. He repeated the motto, of which

his mother, the dowager-duchess of Rohan, had reminded him from the

bottom of her asylum at La Rochelle: “_Complete victory, certain

peace, or honourable death_;” instead of arming and following him, he

was met by every one of them with recrimination.

He thus complained of this inertness in the preface to his _Memoirs_;

his language, though bitter, is that of the chief of a falling party;

but it serves to paint the aspect of the epoch: “In the two former

wars, divisions appeared in some quarters; in the latter, it burst

out on every side, there being no place into which corruption had not

entered, and where avarice had not appeared above piety, to such an

extent, that, without tarrying for our enemy’s seeking, men hastened

to prostitute themselves by selling their religion, and betraying

their party. Our fathers would have destroyed their children in the

cradle, had they foreseen that they would become the instruments of

the ruin of the churches, which they founded by the glare of the

martyr-pyre, and cemented with their blood.”

Deducting from these accusations what has been exaggerated by the

irritation of defeat, it remains true that the great mass of the

Reformers did not take part in this last war; some, as we have

already explained, on account of the national impulse which induced

entire submission to the royal authority; others, because they were

weary of struggles which cost so many lives, and produced no good;

some, because they did not perceive the bond that united their

religious liberty to their political security; others, again, through

indifference, through venality, or through that kind of prudence

which is keener to see the greatness of the peril, than the means of

eluding it.

The thing is notable; for many historians say that the whole Reformed

population rose against the crown in 1628, and was defeated. These

historians are in error: the majority of the Calvinists refused to

arm. If it be a title of honour to have thus acted, let them have it;

if it be a disgrace, let them bear its weight.

The people of La Rochelle, however, continued to perform prodigies of

valour and heroism under the leadership of their mayor, Jean Guiton,

a brave and inflexible old seaman, who had said: “If there should be

no more than one townsman left, it will still be his duty to keep the

gates closed.”

At length, when every hope of succour from without or within had

departed, when two-thirds of the population had fallen, when the

streets and the houses were choked with corpses, which none had

sufficient strength left to inter; when scarcely a man was to be

found, who was able to bear the weight of arms, or to walk without

a staff, the town surrendered. This happened on the 28th October,

1628. On that day the Reformers of France fell powerless before

their enemies, and were never able to raise themselves again until

one hundred and sixty years afterwards, when the principles of 1789

released them.

Misfortune had not cast down the courage of the men of La Rochelle,

and it is a matter of astonishment that Richelieu, who had the

capacity to understand great things, should have done them so little

justice. “The audacity that ever accompanies rebellion,” says he

in his Memoirs, “was so deeply impressed upon the minds of these

wretches, that although they were but the shadows of living men, and

had no hope of life, except from the king’s clemency, of which they

were unworthy, they nevertheless dared even then to propose to the

cardinal that they would make a general treaty for the whole party of

the Calvinists.” This proved that they were less careful, in their

adversity, concerning their own fate than with reference to that of

their co-religionists.

A declaration of the king, published on the 10th November, ordained

the re-establishment at La Rochelle of the exercise of the (Roman)

Catholic religion, and the restitution to the clergy of their

churches and their property. A place of worship was to be designated

for the Reformers. The privileges of the town were abolished, its

franchises annulled, and its fortifications demolished, except those

facing the sea. The Cardinal de Richelieu and the bishop Henri de

Sourdis, who had plied the trade of the soldier during the siege,

celebrated the first mass at La Rochelle, after having purified the

churches. Perhaps the hands which had just quitted the sword, ought

to have been first purified themselves before touching the host of

the _Prince of peace_. But the history of mankind is replete with

such violent contradictions.

There were great rejoicings at Rome upon the reduction of La

Rochelle. Pope Urban VIII. sang a solemn _Te Deum_, made an

extraordinary distribution of indulgences, and addressed to the

king briefs of the most flattering kind. “Great prince,” he thus

apostrophized Louis XIII., “God sits upon your right hand. May He

ever aid and sustain the power and strength of your spear!”

The Duke de Rohan kept the field in the south, until the middle of

the following year. He displayed courage, constancy, and self-denial,

worthy of a better fate. An assembly of provincial deputies,

convoked at Nismes, energetically protested against the overthrow

of the political guarantee of the Reformation. It was too late. The

Calvinist party had ceased to exist. Each town and village refused

obedience to the assembly, and claimed to transact its affairs by

itself: then division, defections, and treason, completed the ruin of

the general cause.

The royal army presented itself before the little town of Privas,

in the month of May, 1629. The inhabitants, seized with terror,

amounting to a panic, fled to the fields; and the garrison, which

retired to the fort, were soon forced to capitulate. At the moment of

the troops entering, the explosion of a powder-magazine caused the

suspicion of an ambush. The eight hundred Huguenot soldiers forming

the garrison were murdered, fifty burghers hanged, the others sent

to the galleys, the town sacked and burnt, and the property of the

inhabitants confiscated to the crown. The missionaries, who followed

in the rear of the army to convert the heretics, ascribed this

catastrophe to the _anger of God_.

The merciless butchery at Privas spread consternation and dismay.

The king marched upon Cevennes without meeting with any resistance;

and the Duke de Rohan, seeing that the affairs of his party were

desperate, sued for peace, in concert with the general assembly

transferred to Anduze. Richelieu imposed as the first condition, that

all the fortifications of the Huguenot towns should be razed to the

ground. Anduze, and the province of Cevennes, submitted after some

difficulty; and the king, being then at Nismes, published the _Edict

of Grace_, in the month of July, 1629.