BOOK V.

FROM THE EDICT OF TOLERATION TO THE PRESENT TIME.

(1787-1851.)

I.

This division of our history will be shorter than its predecessors.

The period it embraces is not extensive; and it comprises no

memorable events, or great successes and calamities; and it is more

remarkable for ideas than for facts. But the recital of facts, not

the discussion of ideas, is the object of our labours, and we will

follow this plan to the end with the greater fidelity, in that we are

nearer to the present generation. We have no desire to exchange the

pen of the historian for that of the polemic.

This will explain the brevity of certain details, and even the

absence of certain subjects, which perhaps excited, in their day, the

most considerable interest. We omit them neither out of forgetfulness

nor indifference, but from respect for our duty. It would be

inconvenient in many ways, to eulogize or blame men still living, or

to take part in questions yet under debate. This is a task that will

be better accomplished hereafter.[134]

We step into a new world from the moment that we enter upon the

history of the Revolution of 1789. Before that period, every petty

reform had to be won by long negotiations, arrangements, and

agreements of various kinds. The Edict of 1787, although it granted

less than had been given by Henry IV. in the Edict of Nantes, cost

twenty years of efforts. Now, on the contrary, we shall behold

everything advancing with a firm and rapid step. The timorous

scruples of the monarch, the subtle contrivances of his counsellors,

the blind resistance of the privileged classes, no longer presided

over the public affairs. A great assembly, the faithful interpreter

of general intelligence and conscience, shook off the shackles of

the past which had only sustained itself with artificial props, and

enunciated principles that must resolve the most important problems

of political and social order.

From the 21st of August, 1789, the Constituent Assembly overthrew the

barriers, which had until then debarred the admission of Protestants

to offices of state. Article 11 of the Declaration of Rights was thus

conceived: “All citizens, being equal in the eye of the law, are

equally admissible to every public dignity, place, and employment,

according to their capacity, and without other distinctions than

those of their virtues and their talents.”

With some slight differences of expression, this article was

subsequently reproduced in each of the French constitutions. It may

have been still disregarded in practice, as it has been, indeed,

frequently, since 1814; but the principle was definitively won. It

triumphed only after ages of persecution, iniquities, and combats. So

tardy are human laws to inscribe the maxims of truth and justice!

The eighteenth article of the Declaration of Rights was destined to

guarantee liberty of conscience and of worship. The committee of the

National Assembly had drawn it up at first in these words: “No one

shall be molested on account of his religious opinions, or disturbed

in the exercise of his religion.” This was clear, precise, and

unequivocal; but a curate proposed a restriction, which was adopted.

The new article bore the appearance, in its embarrassed style, of the

impress of the legislator’s hesitation: “_No one shall be molested on

account of his opinions, or even for his religious opinions, provided

that he does not, in manifesting them, disturb the public order

established by the law._”

This addition was superfluous in one sense, since it is evident

that every religion must respect legal order in its acts. In

another sense it was dangerous, since it seemed to confer upon the

civil power more authority than it ought to have possessed in such

matters. The priest, who was inspired with this unfortunate thought,

ought to have foreseen that he placed a weapon in the hands of the

politicians, which they would perhaps turn against [the members of]

his own communion. Did the persecutors of 1793 invoke anything else

than the duty of maintaining the order established by the law?

Rabaut Saint Etienne, who had been nominated a member of the

Constituent Assembly by the seneschalry of Nismes, perceived the

danger, and pointed it out in a speech, which obtained great applause

throughout the country. It is one of the most admirable specimens

of advocacy that has ever been pronounced in favour of religious

liberty: such an oration has a place in history.

The speaker began by showing that those who have opposed toleration

in every age, have never alleged any other pretext than that adduced

by the imprudent curate. “The Inquisition always said, in its soft

and guarded language, that assuredly no attack should ever be made

upon thought; that every one is free as to his opinions, provided

he does not manifest them; but that, as this manifestation _might

disturb public order_, the law ought to watch it with scrupulous

attention; and under the favour of this principle, the intolerant

classes have arrogated to themselves that power of inspection which

has subjected thought, and enchained it during so many centuries!...

“I discharge a holy mission,” continued the orator; “I obey the

voice of my constituents. I represent a seneschalry of three hundred

and sixty thousand inhabitants, of whom more than one hundred and

twenty thousand are Protestants, who have intrusted their delegates

to solicit from you the complement of the Edict of November, 1787.

Another seneschalry of Languedoc, and other places of the kingdom,

have expressed the same hope, and ask that you should give the

non-Catholics the liberty of their worship....” (_All! All!_ shouted

a crowd of deputies.)

Rabaut Saint Etienne then appealed to the rights already sanctioned

by the Assembly. “Your principles are that liberty is common

property, and that every citizen has an equal right to it. Liberty,

then, should belong to all Frenchmen alike, and in the same manner.

Every one has a right to it, or no one has; he who would deprive

others of it, is not worthy of it himself; he who distributes it

unevenly, does not know what it is; he who assails the liberty of

others, no matter in what [fashion it may be], assails his own, and

deserves to lose it in his turn, as being unworthy of a gift, of

which he cannot estimate the value.

“Your principles are that liberty of thought and opinion is an

inalienable and indefeasible right. This liberty, gentlemen, is the

most sacred of all; it is above the control of men; its refuge is in

the depth of the conscience, whither it retreats as to an inviolable

sanctuary, where no mortal has the light to penetrate; it is the only

liberty that mankind has never submitted to the laws of universal

society. To constrain it is unjust; to attack it is sacrilege.”

Approaching the special question of the Protestants, he established

[the fact] that the Edict of 1787 permitted the continuance of a

shameful inequality between the religious communions, and that

the penal laws against the worship of the Reformed had never been

formally abolished. He claimed _their rights as Frenchmen for two

millions of useful citizens_. It was not toleration he asked for,

it was liberty. “Toleration!” he exclaimed; “sufferance! pardon!

clemency! ideas supremely unjust towards the dissenters, so long as

it is true that difference of religion, that difference of opinion,

is not a crime! Toleration! I demand that toleration should be

proscribed in its turn, and it will be,—that iniquitous word, that

deals with us as citizens worthy of pity, as criminals to whom pardon

is granted!...

“I demand for all non-Catholics that which you ask for

yourselves—equality of rights, liberty; the liberty of their

religion, the liberty of their worship, the liberty of celebrating

it in buildings consecrated to that object; the same certainty of

not being disturbed in their religion as you have in yours; and the

perfect assurance of being protected as you, as much as you are, and

in the same manner that you are by our common laws.”

Some speakers had cited the intolerance of certain Protestant people

in justification of their own. “A generous and free nation,” answered

Rabaut Saint Etienne, “will not permit that the example of these

intolerant countries, who proscribe its worship among themselves,

should be cited before yourselves. Your high place is to set

examples, not to receive them; and because there are unjust people,

are you to be so too? Europe pants for freedom, waits upon your

teaching, and you are worthy to lead it.”

The speaker conjured up before the bar of the Assembly the great body

of proscribed whom he was defending. “They would present themselves

to you,” said he, “dyed with the blood of their fathers, and would

exhibit to you the mark of the fetters wherewith they have themselves

been bound. But my country is free, and I would forget with her both

the ills we have shared, and the yet greater evils, of which we have

been the victims. What I ask is, that my native land should show

herself worthy of liberty, by distributing it equally among all her

citizens, without distinction of rank, of birth, or of religion.”

In concluding, Rabaut Saint Etienne enunciated that every religion

demands a worship in common; that one set of Christians cannot refuse

it to another without contradicting their own maxims; and that every

restriction placed upon the public exercise of a religion, is an

attack upon the basis of all creeds, since belief inevitably produces

worship, which corresponds to it.

Notwithstanding the logic and eloquence of Rabaut Saint Etienne,

the Right, succumbing to religious prejudices, the Centre, governed

by political views and pre-occupations, and the priests of the

Left, obeying their doctrinal antipathies, formed a majority, which

accepted the proposed restriction. Each party had occasion to repent

of their resolution.

Four months after this memorable debate, the National Assembly

confirmed, on the 24th of December, 1789, by the following decree,

the admissibility of Frenchmen to all offices and employments. “1.

That the non-Catholics, who should otherwise have complied with all

the conditions prescribed by the preceding decrees, with regard to

electors, and [such as were] eligible, might be elected to every

department of public administration. 2. That the non-Catholics were

capable of receiving appointments to every civil and military office,

without exception.”

The opportunity of applying this law in the most striking manner

soon presented itself. On the 15th of March, 1790, Rabaut Saint

Etienne, the son of the long-proscribed pastor, who had been glad

to shelter his venerable head under a hut of piled stones, was

nominated president of the Constituent Assembly; he filled the chair

of the Abbé de Montesquieu. It was on this occasion that he wrote to

his father these words, that mark so well the change of ideas and

situations: “The president of the National Assembly kneels at your

feet.”

Rabaut Saint Etienne was born at Nismes in 1743. He completed his

theological studies in the seminary of Lausanne. On his return to

France, he was ordained to the ministry of the Gospel, and fulfilled

his functions most courageously in the emergency when the Parliament

of Toulouse condemned the pastor François Rochette, the three

gentlemen glass-makers, and Calas to death. In the front of these

execrable scaffolds, he unceasingly preached resignation, obedience

to the law, and the duties of fraternal love.

In 1779, he pronounced, as we have elsewhere said, the funeral

oration of M. Becdelièvre, bishop of Nismes. This discourse having

been printed and communicated to Laharpe, by M. Boissy d’Anglas,

that illustrious critic replied: “You have sent me an admirable

composition, replete with true eloquence, that of the soul and of

feeling. It is clear that everything which flows from the pen of the

author, is inspired by the virtues which he celebrates.”

Rabaut Saint Etienne published other discourses, and a book entitled:

_Amboise Borély, or the Old Cévenole_. In this last work he painted,

under a dramatic form, the sufferings of the French Protestants at

the period of the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, and during the

eighteenth century.

Chosen by the seneschalry of Nismes first among the eight deputies of

the Third Estate, his noble character, his oratorical talents, and

his devotion to the public good, immediately obtained for him great

influence in the Constituent Assembly, over which he was elected to

preside on several occasions.

Having been sent to the National Convention by the department of

Aude, Rabaut Saint Etienne brought to his place in the Assembly a

wise moderation, as well as a generous love of liberty. He sided

with the party of the Girondists, and boldly confronted the popular

passions, by refusing to vote for the death of Louis XVI. “The

nation,” he said, “has sent you to delegate its powers, not to

exercise them all at once; for it is impossible that it should have

desired only to change its masters. As for myself, I avow it, I am

weary of my part in despotism; I am fatigued and harassed with it,

and loathe the tyranny which I share in exercising; I sigh for the

moment when you shall have created a national tribunal that will

divest me of the features and the aspect of a tyrant.”

At the sitting of the 3rd of May, he presented the report of the

Commission of Twelve who represented the party of the Gironde,

and maintained an obstinate struggle against the violence of the

Mountain. Its doom awaited so firm a courage. His arrest was decreed,

and his retreat having been discovered, he was dragged before the

Revolutionary tribunal, who ordered, upon his simple identification,

that he should be executed within twenty-four hours. Rabaut Saint

Etienne perished on the scaffold on the 3rd of December, 1793.

Let us return to the Constituent Assembly. A member of the Left,

the Carthusian Don Gerle, a man of singular, but unsettled ideas,

who had begun to experience some disquietude about the course he

was following with his new associates, suddenly proposed, on the

12th of April, 1790, that (Roman) Catholicism should be declared the

religion of the State, and that no other religious worship than the

Romish should be authorized. The Right and a few Jansenists hailed

this unexpected motion with transport. The bishop of Clermont even

asked that it should be voted by acclamation, as a homage paid to the

(Roman) Catholic religion.

The majority seemed for a moment to be undecided, and the sitting

was adjourned until the following day. In the interval, the

defenders of religious liberty had time to combine. Charles Lameth

had already appealed to the maxims of the Gospel in favour of the

dissenting communions. Public opinion, in the meanwhile, became

agitated; tumultuous crowds gathered round the building occupied

by the legislative body; Mirabeau recalled to mind the horrible

recollections of the Saint Bartholomew massacre; and Don Gerle, by

this time aware of the dangers of his proposition, withdrew it.

The Constituent Assembly hastened to give the Protestants new proof

of its good-will. It ordered the restitution of property confiscated

on account of religion, which was still in the possession of the

State, to the heirs of the lawful proprietors. By another decree, it

restored all the rights of French citizens to the descendants of the

refugees, on the sole condition that they should return to France and

take the civic oath. Finally, the constitution of 1791 sanctioned

the liberty of religious creeds in these terms: “The Constitution

guarantees to every man the exercise of the religious worship to

which he is attached.”

The legislature had fulfilled its task by proclaiming true

principles; the people had next to fulfil their duty. But if, in

former periods, the manners of the nation were in advance of the

laws, the laws were at this epoch in advance of popular manners,

at least in the southern districts, where there existed greater

ignorance and stronger religious passions in combination.

The province of Vendée did not rise until 1793, because it contained

scarcely any Protestants within its territory. In the south, on the

contrary, where they were very numerous, the old antipathies between

the two communions began to explode from the year 1790. These facts

were accompanied by results of grave importance, which require

illustration.

II.

In the earliest days of the Revolution, the (Roman) Catholics and the

Reformed lived in concord throughout the south of France, as in other

provinces. “Everything worked easily and naturally by the concurrence

of wishes,” says the historian of the disturbances of Gard, “and the

only noise heard was that of rejoicing, on the receipt of the news

of some favourable event at Paris. In many communes, the Protestants

assisted at the _Te Deum_ of the (Roman) Catholics, and the (Roman)

Catholics (it is a well-known circumstance), were also present at the

thanksgivings of the Reformed.”[135]

But differences began to manifest themselves from the day that the

Constituent Assembly decreed, on the proposition of the Bishop

Talleyrand, the sale of the property of the clergy (2nd of November,

1789). The priests and the monks persuaded the multitude that it was

intended to destroy the Church, to abolish religion, to persecute the

(Roman) Catholics; and the lower orders of the south, not being able

to vent their anger upon the philosophers and the Jansenists, of whom

they knew nothing, turned all their fury against the Protestants, who

were entirely strangers to the measures of which they complained.

Violent separations and burning enmities were the result. The

elements of discord were kept alive, increased, and envenomed by

some members of the privileged classes, who hoped, with the help of

religious collisions, to give the signal for a counter-revolution in

the southern provinces, afterwards to raise the west, then to march

upon Paris, and once more to seize upon their ancient prerogatives.

This fact has not only been avowed, but was publicly boasted of in

1814 and 1815, as an admirable combination to restore the cause of

royalty, the priesthood, and the aristocracy.

Among others, there was a certain François Froment, afterwards

cabinet secretary to Louis XVIII., who published, in October, 1815,

a pamphlet entitled, _An Account of my Operations for the Defence of

Religion and Royalty during the Course of the Revolution_. He relates

therein, with a frankness that blushes at nothing, all the details

of this conspiracy, of which he was one of the principal agents.

His recital is accompanied by official documents, with which he

substantiates his narrative.

“I went secretly to Turin,” he says, “to solicit the French princes

for their approbation and assistance. At a council which was held

on my arrival, January, 1790, I demonstrated to them that if they

would arm the partisans of the altar and the throne, and combine the

interests of religion with those of royalty, it would be easy to save

both. I was then, as I am now, convinced of this truth, that a strong

passion must be smothered by one still stronger, and that religious

zeal could alone smother the rage of republicanism.”

François Froment reasoned correctly from his point of view. The

people of the country and the towns would not willingly have

defended privileges, by which they were the first to suffer. They

were instinctively led to cherish a revolution, which had freed

them from tithes and feudal services, and had bestowed upon them

civil equality. But by appealing to their religious passions, by

re-awakening their traditional hatred against heretics, they might

have been roused to arm against a cause hostile to their own, and,

once excited, might have been blindly urged further than they would

have desired. This is the secret of all conspirators, and beneath

many a flag recourse will be had to these tactics so long as

ambitious men are found on one part, and ignorant or fanatical men

are met with on the other.

Froment had little difficulty in procuring the adoption of his

project. The emigrant princes (we continue to use his own narrative),

confided to him the charge of forming a royalist party in the south,

and of organizing and commanding it. Money was given to him, with the

promise of men and ammunition, as soon as the struggle should begin.

He returned to France, travelled through the south, communicated with

the nobles and priests, whose opinions corresponded with his own,

and soon after the two towns of Montauban and Nismes were deluged in

blood.

The conspirators pursued everywhere a pre-arranged and uniform

course. They circulated atrocious calumnies against the Protestants,

and even scattered about the streets and public squares, incendiary

libels without number. The following extract, by no means the most

violent, from one of these pamphlets, will serve as a specimen of

their style: “Close against the Protestants the door of public

offices and civil and military honours. They seek to participate

in the advantages which you enjoy; but you will no sooner have

associated them with yourselves than their only aim will be to

despoil you; and they will shortly succeed. Ungrateful vipers,

whose benumbed strength, disabled from hurting you, warmed by your

benefactions, only recover to kill you. They are your born enemies!”

These odious provocations did not fail to produce their effect

upon the masses of the people. The Protestants were systematically

excluded from all the municipal councils; and generally from all

elective offices. This was a first step: the communal authority might

be now wielded to the advantage of the counter-revolution, and an

appearance of legality thrown over the plans of the faction.

A second line of action was to excite the (Roman) Catholics to sign

addresses demanding unity of religion. Many conferences were held

upon this subject, usually at the houses of the curates, or in the

convents. The devotees flocked to sign, thinking they obeyed the will

of God by attacking the most sacred rights of human conscience, and

their fanaticism increased to a frenzy. The women of the populace,

particularly, enslaved by a servile bigotry, abandoned themselves to

the most savage fury. The Protestants, on their side, were profoundly

irritated, when they saw that their opponents were bent upon

soliciting a new Revocation of the Edict of Nantes. All this had been

foreseen by the conspirators, and formed a feature of their plan.

But more was wanted: an armed force was necessary. The regular

troops were faithful to the government that had issued from the

Revolution. In the national guard, many Protestants had obtained

high rank, because they generally possessed more intelligence and

ampler fortunes than the (Roman) Catholics. How were soldiers to

be obtained? Companies of volunteers were organized, who obeyed

concealed leaders. Recruited for the most part from among the dregs

of the people, or agricultural labourers, their ignorance was a

guarantee for their docility, and the contest might be ventured upon

with no mean prospect of success.

These miserable partisans not only raised the cry of “_Long live

the King, and the Cross!_” but they shouted also: “_Down with the

Nation!_” as if they did not belong to a nation that had just resumed

its rights and its liberties. Many wore, instead of the national

cockade, a white cross, in imitation of the old Leaguers. The

brotherhoods of penitents, who dated so far back as the religious

wars of the sixteenth century, furnished their contingent of

devotees. The League in fine was resuscitated, the League without the

Guises; the League without Philip II. and Sixtus V., the League after

Voltaire—an empty phantom summoned in vain from its bloody tombs!

On the 10th of May, 1790, the day of the Rogations, which had been

chosen by the municipal council to visit the convents about to be

suppressed, the people rose at Montauban. Six dragoons, or picked

national guards, of whom five were Protestants and one a (Roman)

Catholic, were killed at the Hôtel de Ville, before they could defend

themselves. Many others were shamefully maltreated and thrown into

prison, where, however, they found a refuge from the bloodthirstiness

of the assassins. We forbear from relating the details.

On the 13th of June in the same year, the struggle known under

the name of _bagarre_ began at Nismes, and lasted four days. The

official report laid before the Constituent Assembly after a most

searching inquiry, shows who were the provokers and aggressors in

this ill-fated collision. The conspiracy is evident; and it is easy

to discover its origin, to follow its windings, and to convince

oneself that religion was only used as a pretext for bringing about a

counter-revolution.

The (Roman) Catholics of the lowest order, whom the leaders of the

faction had armed and collected, committed the most atrocious acts.

We will only cite one instance, that happened on the 14th.

The youth Peyre, fifteen years of age, was carrying victuals to his

brother, and on his way passed before a company posted on the bridge

of the Isles: a man asked him if he were a (Roman) Catholic or a

Protestant. The lad answered: “I am a Protestant.” Whereupon the man

shot the child dead. A companion of the assassin exclaimed: “You

might as well have slain a lamb.” “I have promised,” rejoined the

ruffian, “to kill four Protestants as my share, and this youngster

will count as one.”[136]

Negotiations were opened; but the reports of some guns fired from

a convent, interrupted them. The (Roman) Catholics, attached to

the cause of the Revolution, joined the Protestants, and fearful

reprisals were exacted. On one side and the other, a hundred and

thirty-four individuals were deprived of life during these fatal

days; for which let those who prepared, organized, and excited

these insurrections be responsible to posterity! It is gratifying

and consoling to add, that several curates of the neighbourhood of

Nismes, hearkening only to the voice of their consciences, hastened,

at the head of the national guards of their communes, to aid in

restoring order and peace between the two communions.

In the report read to the Constituent Assembly, M. Alquier attests

in the most formal terms that it was not the Protestants, who had

provoked these conflicts.

“They became,” said he, “the objects of the hatred of a party, as

soon as a party was formed against the Constitution, at the period

of your first decrees respecting the property of the clergy; and

loaded with the vile outpourings of calumnies, fabricated against

them in order to excite disturbances, and the outbreak of a

counter-revolution, their only enemies have been the enemies of the

Revolution itself.”

At Toulouse, Bordeaux, Montpellier, Marseilles, where the Protestants

were of too small numbers to afford the opportunity of throwing more

importance into the religious than into the political question, there

was no stir. The attitude of these places preserved the south from

civil war, and the conspirators were driven to seek the aid from

foreign powers, which their own country refused them.

When quiet was restored at Nismes, the Reformed opened a place of

worship there, according to the right which had been guaranteed to

them by the Constitution. They placed this inscription upon the

front: “An edifice consecrated to religious worship by a private

society: peace and liberty.” The venerable Paul Rabaut pronounced the

inaugurative prayer, with a faltering voice and tearful countenance.

In the other provinces of France, the Protestants also applied

themselves to their new organization, paying the pastors from their

own purses, as they had long been accustomed to do, and no longer

seeking from the civil power anything else than the preservation of

their liberty under the safeguard of the common laws.

The Revolution, however, daily exhibited a more hostile feeling

towards the (Roman) Catholic clergy. After having deprived them of

their property, it was determined to impose upon them a constitution

and an oath. This was the work of the Jansenists, and particularly

of the representative Camus. They were irritated by the remembrance

of the long injuries inflicted upon them by the majority of the

priests, and they were unfortunately powerful enough to draw into

their quarrel the party of the Left in the Constituent Assembly,

which had a presentiment it was about to commit a serious mistake.

The Protestants took no part in this debate.

The Civil Constitution imposed upon the (Roman) Catholic church,

precipitated the Revolution out of the limits, which it ought to

have respected. A great part of the clergy resisted. The priests,

who were refractory or had not sworn, fled to the woods and caves,

pursued by the insults of that same people, who had so many times

outraged the pastors of the Reformation. France had not been taught

by her spiritual leaders to bow before the independence of the human

conscience, and the ministers of Rome were now the victims of the

lessons of persecution they had themselves taught. Woe to them,

who take the sword of intolerance; sooner or later it recoils upon

themselves!

These sad conflicts do not belong to our subject. The (Roman)

Catholic clergy, we say freely, did their duty then, and the

politicians failed in theirs. They outstepped the boundaries of

civil authority by pretending to regulate ecclesiastical points in

which doctrine was necessarily implicated; and having been guilty of

this first error, they committed a second—that of attacking, and of

proscribing religion itself, in order to take revenge for the lawful

resistance with which they had been met.

It is true that no express law was ever passed against religious

liberty. The Constitution of 1793 still contained an article (22),

which professed _to guarantee to the whole French people the free

exercise of their worship_. But the Convention by the arbitrary

acts of its agents, overthrew the rights it had inscribed in its

legislation, and itself passed decrees which assailed every religious

communion. Thus, on the 22nd September, 1793, it replaced the ancient

division of the week by that of the Decade, and attempted to compel

all the French people to work on the Sabbath, whatever might be their

scruples of faith.

This unjustifiable tyranny was not exercised without opposition, in

spite of the terror which weighed upon France. The younger Rabaut

relates, in his _Ecclesiastical Repertory_, a circumstance connected

with the Protestant communion, which happened in the commune of La

Salle (Gard): “A country labourer, called Alègre, about sixty years

of age, was arrested and thrown into prison for not having worked

on a Sunday. A week after, this man, dressed in his best clothes,

presented himself before the committee. Being asked what he wanted,

he replied that he was now an old man, that he had worked the whole

week long, that he absolutely required rest; that if he went to work

on the Sabbath he would be only robbing his employer, and that he

preferred to be put in prison. The committee, who expected that he

was about to denounce some one, were surprised by his answer and sent

him home.”

On the 7th of November, 1793, Gobel, the constitutional bishop

of Paris, abjured the (Roman) Catholic faith at the bar of the

Convention, accompanied by some priests, who were well worthy to

follow in his rear. He laid down the insignia of his office upon the

table, declaring that there was no necessity for any other worship

than that of liberty, equality, and morality. Certain members of the

Assembly, (Roman) Catholic and Protestant ecclesiastics, followed

his example. The Bishop Gregory alone had the courage to ascend the

tribune and disavow this apostasy. Rabaut Saint Etienne was then

absent and proscribed.

The abjuration of Gobel was the signal for the invasion of the

churches and the abolition of all religious worship. No one spoke

any longer, according to the language of the period, but of invoking

reason, of listening to the voice of nature, of lighting the lamp of

truth upon the altar, and of rendering mankind happy by stifling the

monster of superstition.

The temples of the Protestants, which had been opened only the day

before, were closed like the churches of the (Roman) Catholics, and

the pastors were compelled to abstain from their functions under

pain of being held as suspected, and consequently liable to capital

punishment. The delegate of the Convention in Gard and Lozère,

published, on the 16th Prairial, in the year II., a decree commanding

the priests and the pastors to withdraw, within the space of eight

days, to a distance of twenty leagues from the communes where they

had exercised their ministry. The Terrorist had invented nothing new;

he merely copied or reproduced an ordinance dictated by the Jesuits

in the reign of Louis XIV.

Some of the pastors perished by the Revolutionary axe; others were

imprisoned, and among them the veteran of the desert, Paul Rabaut,

who was led to the citadel of Nismes upon an ass, as his age and

infirmities had deprived him of the strength to travel on foot. “He

had seen his eldest son die upon the scaffold, had wept over the

proscription of two other children (Rabaut-Pomier and Rabaut-Dupuy),

and he was in his turn incarcerated himself. We are witnesses of the

resignation he displayed at this painful moment. Imperturbably calm

with respect to his own fate, he showed anxiety only for his children

and for his fellow-captives, whom he consoled and supported by his

example.”[137]

Protestantism counted as many victims in proportion to (Roman)

Catholicism, if not more, either pastors or laymen, in the days of

1793. The _Dictionary of the Condemned_ indicates, for the department

of Gard, where the Reformed did not constitute half of the whole

population, forty-six Protestants, ninety-one (Roman) Catholics, and

one Jew. The members of the Revolutionary tribunal of Nismes were,

with one exception, all (Roman) Catholics. The French Reformation, to

use the expression of M. Aignan, was never named in the mourning and

terror of France, and it paid the tribute of blood twice over,—first

to the intolerance of Rome, next, to that of impiety.

We find it impossible to trace the Protestant religion at this epoch.

It appears that at Sainte Foy and the neighbourhood, the public

exercise of religion was never completely interrupted. Doubtless the

memory of the aged has also preserved other instances, but books make

no mention of them. Piety, which had generally been greatly weakened,

nearly everywhere secluded itself in the depth of the conscience, or

in the asylum of the domestic roof.

The day of the 9th Thermidor marked the term of this oppression, for

as soon as public opinion dared to raise its voice, it demanded and

obtained religious freedom. A decree of the 3rd Ventose, year III.

(21st February, 1795), authorized the free exercise of religious

worship, leaving to the faithful the care of making a provision

for it out of their own subscriptions, and prohibiting them from

celebrating any worship upon the public highways. The constitution

of the year III. confirmed this regulation by the following article:

“No one shall be prevented from exercising the worship he has chosen,

provided he conforms to the laws; no one can be forced to contribute

to the expenses of any creed; the Republic salaries none.”

A police law, issued on the 7th Vendémiaire, year III. (28th

September, 1795), commanded that a preliminary declaration should

be made before the opening of places of worship, and obliged the

ministers of the different communions to sign this formula: “I

acknowledge that the universality of French citizens is supreme, and

I promise submission and obedience to the laws of the Republic.” The

condition of an oath to the following effect was afterwards added: “I

swear hatred to royalty and to anarchy, attachment and fidelity to

the Republic and to the Constitution of the year III.” The promise

of obedience to purely political laws was just; the order to swear

hatred to royalty was not so, and excited legitimate remonstrances.

Some Reformed churches seized the opportunity, offered by the

appeasement of the public mind and the protection of the authorities,

to re-establish themselves. This restoration was laborious and slow.

There were but few pastors; some had died during the Revolutionary

tempest; others had definitively abandoned the ministry of the

Gospel; and the youths of the seminary of Lausanne were dispersed.

The laity also displayed little zeal: the scandal of apostasies

had produced a deplorable impression upon them, and many had given

themselves up to the negations of scepticism, or to the chimeras of

theo-philanthropy.

In the midst of this painful re-establishment of Protestantism, Paul

Rabaut gave up his soul to God. He had been set at liberty after the

9th Thermidor; but the weight of his years no longer permitted him to

participate in the reconstruction of the sanctuary. He died at the

age of seventy-six years, on the 26th of September, 1795, invoking

the name of the Lord, whom he had confessed before four generations

of Christians.

III.

The first consul found the affairs of the (Roman) Catholic church

in great disorder. Sworn and unsworn priests assailed each other

in violent controversies, and divided their flocks. Buonaparte’s

advisers almost unanimously recommended him to abstain from

interfering in the religious question, assuring him that the

advantage he could reap would be but small, while the difficulties

were infinite; and that it would be better to leave the Church

itself to pacify, as it could, its internal struggles. The new chief

of the state did not adopt this advice, and opened negotiation

with the Holy See. We are assured that he confessed, fifteen years

afterwards, that this was the greatest mistake of his reign.

A Concordat was signed between the first consul and the legate

of Pius VII., on the 26th Messidor, year IX. (15th July, 1801).

This re-establishment of the alliance between the temporal and the

spiritual powers was necessarily destined to react upon the position

of French Protestantism.

The pope had strongly insisted that the (Roman) Catholic religion

should be proclaimed as the _state_, or at least as the _dominant

religion_. Neither the one nor the other of these pretensions were

admitted, lest, as the negotiator of the consular government stated,

the supposition might be excited of the return of an intolerant and

oppressive religion. The following declaration was merely inserted

in the preamble of the Concordat: “The government of the Republic

recognises the Catholic, Apostolic, and Roman religion, as the

religion of the great majority of the French people.”

This was nothing more than the enunciation of a simple fact.

Nevertheless the council of state conceived that it was bound

to remove any interpretation that might be unfavourable to the

Protestants. We read these remarkable words in a report submitted

to the Consuls in the beginning of 1802: “While the government has

declared that Catholicism is in the ascendant in France, it has not

intended to authorize any civil or political pre-eminence in its

favour. It has simply signified the priority of the measures it has

taken to secure the independence, which it proposes to guarantee to

all creeds. Protestantism is a Christian communion, which unites in

the same belief and the same rites a very great number of French

citizens. On that ground alone, this communion is entitled to the

protection of the government. In other respects it deserves marks

of consideration and favour. Its founders were the first to spread

liberal maxims of government in Europe; they gave an impulse to

morals, philosophy, and the useful arts and sciences. In later

times, the Protestants were the first to hasten to the standard of

liberty, and have never deserted it. It is, therefore, the duty of

the government to insure its protection to the peaceable assemblies

of this enlightened and generous minority of citizens, met together

in their temples with the praiseworthy view of hearkening to the

precepts of the religion of Christ.... Everything that is secured

to the different Christian communions by the articles agreed upon

between his holiness and the government of the Republic, is equally

guaranteed to the Protestants, _with the exception of pecuniary

subvention_.”

The Protestant pastors were therefore to receive no salary from

the public treasury, while the bishops and the priests had one.

This was returning to the decree of the Constituent Assembly, which

granted incomes in effect to the ministers of the (Roman) Catholic

creed only, but different reasons were relied upon. The Constituent

Assembly regarded the salary of the clergy as an indemnification for

the loss of their property. The council of state of 1802, left out

this consideration altogether. It justified its intention of paying

the priests without paying the pastors, upon three grounds. Firstly,

certain expenses might be imposed upon all for the interest of the

majority. Next, the voluntary offerings raised by the priests for

the maintenance of the (Roman) Catholic worship, begot prodigality

and abuses, which, for different causes, did not exist among the

Protestants in the same degree. Finally, “in the articles agreed

upon between the head of the Roman church and the government of

the Republic, the burden imposed upon the State was compensated by

the right acquired by the government, to interfere directly and

efficaciously in the administration of the Church by its nomination

of the principal ministers and its control over the subordinate

ministers.”

Thus there arose two very distinct positions for the (Roman)

Catholics and the Protestants. For the former, a state salary, but

also the intervention of the government in the appointment of the

bishops and cantonal curates: the civil power provided the money,

and by its money _acquired_ the right of interference in the affairs

of the Church. For the latter, no salary, but also a full liberty of

internal action [was permitted]. [There was to be] no sacrifice of

money on the one side, no sacrifice of independence on the other.

In reality a decree of nine articles was drawn up, on the 21st

Ventose, year X. (12th March, 1802), by which there was no question

[admitted] but of general measures of police and common right for the

communion of the Protestants. Buonaparte wrote in the margin of the

minute of this decree, that two articles were wanting,—one respecting

the oath of the Protestant ministers, another respecting the manner

of their appointment; but the project went no farther.[138]

It may be thus seen that the Reformed communion narrowly escaped

completely realizing the separation of Church and the State. The

obstacle came from the first consul, who, anxious to secure authority

over Protestantism by the oath and the appointment of the pastors,

felt at the same time that he must, in compensation, support the

Reformed faith at the cost of the public treasury; and out of the

desire to possess this influence flowed the law of the 18th Germinal,

year X. (7th April, 1802).

If we had proposed to ourselves to write observations upon the

history of French Protestantism instead of relating the history

itself, we might ask what would have been the destiny of their

churches, and what would be their position to-day if Buonaparte had

adopted the advice of his council of state, and had left them wholly

independent without granting them any endowment. Opposite opinions

might be maintained upon this question with equal good faith; but the

examination of this subject would lead us away from our subject.

The historical fact, which is the only point that engages our present

attention, is, that the majority of the Protestants, both pastors

and laity, right or wrong, hailed the law of the 18th Germinal as an

inestimable favour. They cared less for the sacrifice of a part of

their religious independence than for the advantages they hoped for

from a state endowment; in which they beheld two great advantages,—a

legal and incontestable recognition, and the official pledge of a

perfect equality with the Roman Catholics.

Rabaut-Dupuy, who presided in the legislative body in 1802, made

himself the organ of the feelings of gratitude and joy of his

co-religionists at the closing of the session. “Legislators,” he

said, “this law of justice has been received with thankfulness by

all Christians; the Protestants have recognised all its value....

Restored to the freedom of civil, political, and religious rights,

now that the law organizes all creeds _in a parallel manner_, they

will be the firmest supporters of a protecting government.”

He also said, in 1807, in a letter addressed to the Reformed of the

Empire: “You, who have lived like us under the yoke of intolerance,

the relict of so many persecuted generations, see and compare.—It

is no longer in deserts, and at the peril of your life, that you

pay to the Creator the homage which is due to Him. Our places of

worship are restored to us, and every day new ones spring up. Our

pastors are recognised public functionaries; _they are salaried by

the government_; the sword of a barbarous law is no longer suspended

over their heads.... Alas! those whom we have outlived, ascended the

mountain of Nebo, whence they beheld the land of promise; but we

alone have gone in to possess it.”

At the same time, however unanimous the Protestants of that epoch

may have been in their sentiments concerning the law of Germinal, it

must be acknowledged that it has in many essential points changed the

constitution of the French Reformation, and has made it pay dearly

for the advantage of the political equality of the religions.

In bringing the new organic articles before the legislative body,

the councillor of state, Portalis, afterwards minister of worship,

announced that the law had been made upon verbal or written

instructions taken from the Protestants. “If it appertains,” he said,

“to the laws to admit or to reject different creeds, the different

creeds have an existence by themselves, which they cannot hold of the

law, whose origin is not thought to take its source in human wishes.”

One would thereupon suppose that the government had confined itself

to interrogating the Protestants upon their articles of faith and

discipline, and that it had simply sanctioned them. But we have only

to compare, in order to undeceive ourselves, the law of the 18th

Germinal with the rules established by the national synods.

According to the ancient order, which is the system of Calvinistic

presbyterianism, religious society exists in and by itself. It has

its supreme authority, its secondary authorities, its doctrine, its

discipline, its means of government, and its penalties. In the new

order, religious society having no longer any confession of faith

officially recognised; having no power to establish another without

the permission of the civil magistrate; possessing no longer any

general and fixed rules outside or independent of its relations with

the state, and, controlled in the conduct of its internal affairs by

the secular power, having no government, in the true sense of the

word; it seems to lean for its very existence on a strength that does

not emanate from its own foundation.

Formerly, it was the pastors and the elders who, assembled in

conferences, in provincial synods, and in national synods,

sovereignly decided upon all ecclesiastical questions. They appointed

ministers, tried and adjudged disputes arising in the flocks,

inflicted spiritual penalties, ordered changes that were thought

to be useful; directed, in short, the churches in their quality of

churches, in everything that concerned piety, morals, edification,

and Christian life. Under the _régime_ of 1802, there was nothing

that did not seem to originate with the temporal authority, and

everything centres in it one way or another—the confirmation and

removal of pastors, dogmatic decisions, modifications in discipline,

the projects of ministers of worship or of the consistories, and

disputes among the flocks. Does not this seem to be an essentially

civil organization substituted for an essentially ecclesiastical

organization?

The chief differences, which exist in the general outline, are also

reproduced in the details.

The primitive element, which corresponded to that of the commune in

the political society, that is to say, the individual church, having

its consistory and its pastor, is suppressed, at least in its proper

and distinct authority, by the articles of 1802, and replaced by the

creation of the consistorial church, which is composed of a certain

number of agglomerated Protestants. The five or six particular

churches of which it consists, are nothing more than sections or

fragments of the body, and their consistories have no legal title. It

is absolutely as if all the communes in the domain of the state were

suppressed with their municipal councils, and absorbed in the purely

conventional existence of the cantons.

The law of the year X. concentrates the consistorial capacity in

the ranks of the persons paying the largest amount of direct taxes.

Twenty-five of these tax-payers nominate the first consistory. Then

the consistory itself designates the notables, who are, in concert

with itself, to provide for the re-elections to the vacancies. The

two conditions of piety and of fortune may doubtless be found in

union; but when they are not so, it is wealth that will prevail, if

the legal text be strictly complied with. The mass of the faithful,

or the people, according to the expression of the ancient discipline,

have no right of election, of veto, nor of consent.

In the place of the provincial synods, which reckoned from thirty to

forty members, and occasionally more, since each particular church

of the province deputed a pastor and an elder to them, the law of

Germinal instituted district synods, formed of five consistorial

churches. The assembly, therefore, can consist of ten members only,

and may last only six days. It has no privilege of meeting but with

the permission of the government, after having informed it of the

matters for discussion, and in presence of a prefect or sub-prefect.

Even farther, all the decisions which emanate from these synods,

of whatever description they may be, must be submitted for the

approbation of the civil power. And yet, for nearly half a century,

there has been, in spite of these excessive precautions, only one

district synod, that of Drôme, which was convoked in 1850.

Lastly, there is no longer a national synod; for the organic articles

having stated nothing about the composition and the attributes of

this assembly, and not having even pronounced the name, while they

carefully determined everything concerning the district synods, it is

beyond all doubt that the silence of the legislature is equivalent to

an entire suppression.

The law of Germinal, therefore, is not the confirmation of the

ancient discipline of the Reformed, as might be inferred from the

speech of M. Portalis; it is, in some respects, its destruction. It

is true, that the change of ideas and manners must necessarily induce

modifications in ecclesiastical regulations, and that no intelligent

man could have desired a complete restoration of the past. It is

also true, that the internal defects of Protestantism have done more

harm to liberty than the organic articles, and that faith might

have corrected in many respects the vices of the law. Let us not

impute to the legislator what must chiefly be laid to the charge

of the Protestants themselves. Nevertheless, the _régime_ of 1802,

established after the recent excesses of liberty, bears the marks

of an extreme reaction. No subsequent government would have exacted

so many sacrifices of independence, and the unanimous opinion of

French Protestantism, in the present day, is, that the revision of

the articles of the year X. is imperatively required. Some members of

that communion demand more, others less; but all desire a law that

shall more fully guarantee the freedom of the churches.

It was not so, as we have seen, in the time of the Consulate.

A memorial was simply presented to the political authority,

soliciting the formation of a _central commission_, which would

have been composed of a pastor and an elder from each district

synod. This commission, subjected to all the rules imposed upon the

inferior synods, would have endeavoured to establish some unity in

dogma, worship, and discipline, under the eye of the government

commissioner. But the memorial produced no effect.

Twenty-seven consistorial presidents were summoned to the coronation

of Napoleon. In a preliminary conference, they discussed whether

they ought to assist at the religious service, and after some

hesitation, they decided in the affirmative, either because the

emperor was pledged to take the oath to protect the liberty of

worship, or because they feared that their absence might be injurious

to the interests of the Reformed churches. “It would be absurd to

suppose,” they said, in a deliberation recorded upon the registers

of the consistory of Paris, “that any pastor-president could be

compromised, or have any scruple of conscience respecting a mute

assistance at ceremonies,—religious it is true in their nature, but

which require no consent, no outward sign of adoration on the part of

the spectators,—ceremonies which are so intimately associated with

the civil ceremonies, that they almost lose the peculiar character

imparted to them by the Roman Catholic creed.”

M. Martin, the president of the consistory of Geneva, which was then

a French town, presented his homage to the emperor in the name of

his colleagues and of all the Protestants. The answer of Napoleon

deserves to be remembered in history: “It is with pleasure that I

see the pastors of the Reformed churches of France here assembled.

I gladly avail myself of this opportunity to express how much I

have always been satisfied with everything that has been told me

of the fidelity and good conduct of the pastors and citizens of

the different Protestant communions. I am desirous it should be

known that my intention and my firm will are to maintain freedom of

worship. The empire of the law ends where the indefinite empire of

the conscience begins; and neither the law nor the sovereign can

prevail against this freedom. Such are my principles and those of

the nation, and if any member of my family, whose lot it may be to

succeed me, should forget the oath I have sworn, and, deceived by the

inspiration of a false conscience, should violate it, I devote him to

public animadversion, and I authorize you to style him a Nero.”

The emperor kept his promise faithfully. There was no persecution

against the Protestants during his reign; [they suffered] no violence

of any kind against their civil or religious rights; [they enjoyed] a

full and continued security. But it was an internal liberty confined

within the walls of the places of worship. There was a strict

prohibition against any disturbance, or any movement in religious

matters. Neither journals nor associations, neither controversy nor

proselytism were permitted; and if by any act or thought it was

ventured to pass beyond the precincts wherein they were restrained,

the iron hand of Napoleon immediately drove them back.

We have heard it said that a (Roman) Catholic village having formed

the design of entering the Reformed communion, a pastor, conceiving

that he had the right of doing so, visited it for the purpose; but

he immediately found himself confronted by the imperial government,

which ordered him to return home and remain quiet. The pastor was

compelled to submit and obey. How many circumstances [there were]

like this are unknown!

If Napoleon forbade the religious sects to step beyond their places

of worship, he reserved the privilege of entering and commanding

there himself whenever he thought expedient. For instance, on the

19th of February, 1806, he instituted two _fêtes_ upon the simple

report of the council of state; one for the anniversary of his birth,

the other for that of his coronation and the battle of Austerlitz.

The decree ran, “A discourse shall be preached in the churches and in

the places of worship, by a minister of religion, upon the glory of

the French armies, and upon the extent of the duty imposed on every

citizen to consecrate his life to his sovereign and the country.”

And, indeed, French Protestantism has, properly speaking, no history

during the fourteen years of the Consulate and the Empire. Weak

in numbers, scattered, without bond or union, without a common

discipline, constrained to be humble and silent, and to avoid all

occasion of disturbing the official classification of religions,

the community of the Protestants dragged on a uniform and obscure

existence. “The ministers preached,” says M. Samuel Vincent, “and

the people listened; the consistories met, and worship preserved

its forms. Beyond this, no one troubled himself, no one thought,

and religion was a thing beyond the life of all. This lasted a long

while.”[139]

We are not aware of the publication of a single important book upon

dogma, ecclesiastical history, or sacred eloquence, in the course of

Napoleon’s reign. A few occasional sermons, some courses of religious

instruction, some abridgments of sacred history, three or four

translations of English and German works, constitute the Protestant

literature of this epoch. We do not comprise such works as the

_Essay_ of Charles Villers, in which literature, arts, and philosophy

engaged the attention more than religion.

If we confine ourselves to the actual limits of France, there were

not more than two hundred pastors in 1807; the number is more than

double now. The flocks of many were spread over so wide a breadth of

country, that the pastors were necessarily compelled to lead a kind

of nomade life, which, in itself, would be a sufficient reason for

not judging them severely. Nor can we, indeed, form an idea of all

the good they did in their humble labours, of all the unfortunates

they consoled, the poor they succoured, or all the souls they edified

and brought back to God. Their burthen was heavier than that of the

men who succeeded them, and their task was less thankful. They had

to contend at the same time against the too great extent of their

ecclesiastical districts, and against the lukewarmness of the people,

who cared for nothing but the military triumphs of Napoleon.

Some of these pastors maintained relations with the German societies

of the Moravian Brethren, and gathered round them the faithful, who

were influenced by the same convictions. “They were in general,” says

M. Vincent, “peaceable and inoffensive people, who dogmatized little,

and made religion to consist of love, particularly of love for Jesus;

whilst they assembled in small numbers, without show or pretension,

with the intention of a very mild and moderate proselytism.”[140]

The French seminary of Lausanne had been transported to Geneva; but

as it was inadequate to the wants of the pastoral body, the emperor

created a Faculty of Protestant theology at Montauban (1808-1810).

The chain of associations was thus renewed for one of the most

ancient and celebrated of the chief towns of the French Reformation.

Montauban had lost its theological academy in 1661 by the intrigues

of the Jesuits; Napoleon restored it. Men pass away, and persecutions

expire; but the institutions necessary to human intelligence and

conscience fall only to rise again.

Projects of reunion between the Christian communions were proposed

about this period. Public authority did not interfere again as in the

time of Richelieu and Louis XIV.; it did not even appear to attach

the slightest importance to the notion, which simply originated with

a few private individuals.

The archbishop of Besançon, M. Claude Lecoz, who had been a member of

the Legislative Assembly, a constitutional bishop in 1791, and the

author of some very severe pamphlets against Pope Pius VI. on the

subject of the civil constitution of the clergy, felt it incumbent

upon him to evince his zeal for the (Roman) Catholic faith. In the

month of November, 1804, he addressed a public letter to MM. Marron,

Rabaut-Pomier, and Mastrezat, pastors at Paris, in which he invited

them to profit by the visit of Pius VII. to France, in order to

return to the Romish church. “With what eagerness,” said he, “would

the pontiff acquiesce in every means of reconciliation compatible

with the rights of truth! With what joy would he open his arms to

children, whose estrangement distracts his paternal bosom!” The

pastors of Paris replied, that no project of reunion was practicable

with the condition of returning as erring and repentant sheep to the

Church of Rome; and that, moreover, complete religious unity seemed

to them utterly impossible.

M. de Beaufort, a lawyer of some talent, entered the lists in his

turn; taking up the question on political grounds, he contended that

a word from Napoleon would reunite the different churches. M. Lecoz

answered this new antagonist with some asperity; M. de Beaufort

rejoined in vehement terms, and the project of reconciliation

terminated in reciprocal invectives.

M. Tabaraud, formerly a priest of the congregation of the Oratory,

also published a book with reference to the union of the Protestant

communions. He had defended their civil lights in 1788, against a

diatribe of the bishop of La Rochelle, upon the edict of Louis XVI.;

and as he was an inflexible adversary of Ultramontane opinions, and

an enlightened Jansenist, he had a stronger title than the generality

of his cloth to be listened to with favour. His attempts, however,

had no greater success than the preceding, and we have only to

admire the learning he displayed in the historical exposition of his

subject. Where can be the point of junction between the absolute

authority in matters of dogma, which Rome will not renounce, and the

right of examination, which the Reformation cannot be induced to

surrender? The most ingenious combinations must fail to supply the

want of a common ground.

IV.

When the dynasty of the Bourbons returned in 1814, the Protestants

made no effort to form a distinct political party. As agriculturists,

proprietors, members of the liberal and enlightened classes, they did

not regret the military domination of Napoleon. Those among them,

who were merchants and engaged in industrial pursuits, rejoiced at

the prospect of a peace that opened a wider field to their activity.

If they could not repress some disquietude in seeing a descendant

of the prince who had revoked the Edict of Nantes upon the throne,

their recollections reverted to the king who had bestowed it, and the

memory of Henry IV. reassured them against that of Louis XIV.

It might have been expected that the Bourbons, who had to contend

with so many adversaries, would not causelessly have irritated

a million and a half of peaceable citizens; and who could have

supposed, moreover, that they would have attacked Protestantism in

France, when Louis XVIII. said that he owed his crown, next to God,

to a Protestant prince, the regent of Great Britain.

The first acts of the restoration were dictated by a spirit of

impartiality and prudence. The Count d’Artois, afterwards Charles

X., having gone to Nismes in 1814, gave a very gracious reception

to the Reformed, and distributed several decorations of the Legion

of Honour among them. Policy, perhaps, had as much to do with this

as confidence; but the Protestants, satisfied with the protection

promised to them, might refrain from scrutinizing intentions.

The charter given by Louis XVIII. said, in its 5th article, “Every

one professes his religion with equal liberty, and obtains the

same protection for his form of worship.” It is true, it added in

the 6th article, that the Catholic, Roman, and Apostolic religion

was the religion of the state. Nevertheless, the equality between

creeds having been proclaimed first and formally, the distinction

granted to (Roman) Catholicism would be, according to the terms of

the Constitution, nothing more than a simple privilege of honour,

without any hurtful or oppressive privilege, and the Protestants were

all disposed to concede the honour of the first place to the Romish

church, provided their rights were as much respected as those of the

(Roman) Catholics.

If the charter, therefore, had been well understood by the masses

of the (Roman) Catholics, duly carried out by people in power, and

sincerely admitted by the members of the ancient privileged orders,

there would have been no Protestant party, in the political sense of

the word, nor collision of any kind. But the first were wanting in

intelligence; there was no spirit of justice in the next, or love of

liberal institutions in the last.

In the south, particularly, the workmen and the peasants, who

belonged to the Romish church, openly threatened the Reformed

with new persecutions, and were not sufficiently contradicted

and repressed by the local authorities. Sinister reports were

spread abroad. It was rumoured that the places of worship would

be closed, and the public services of the Reformed interdicted.

(Roman) Catholics of the lower order, when they met Protestants in

the streets, shouted out: _Vive le roi!_ (_long live the king_),

as if they were the only royalists. Those of the highest classes,

who called themselves respectable people, openly insulted the most

honourable men of the Reformed communion.

The emigrants, who had returned with the Bourbons, and others of the

nobility, who, shut up for five-and-twenty years in their castles,

had only learned to curse the Revolution, were indignant at the

liberties granted by Louis XVIII., and, ignorant of any direct

means to abolish the charter, they fell into the old plans of the

conspirators of 1790. A religious contest, which should make a second

Vendée of the southern provinces, might bring the fundamental law

into question; and the occult government, so frequently denounced

by the sincerest friends of the Bourbons in the two legislative

chambers, began its secret work. It has been said that these men were

more inveterate royalists than the king himself. But it was not so:

they had interests wholly different from those of the king, interests

of position and caste, and their aim was to satisfy and secure them

at any price, were it at the expense of the kingly office itself.

Fresh addresses were signed, as in 1790, demanding that there should

be only one religion in France. Handbills were distributed in many of

the churches, with these words: “The faithful are requested to say

five _Paters_ and five _Aves_ every day, for the prosperity of the

kingdom and the re-establishment of the Jesuits.” The anti-Protestant

controversy reappeared in many of the pulpits under the most bitter

and violent forms, denouncing heresy as a public calamity; and

the Reformed, pursued with as many provocations, were in a manner

forced to adopt political opinions in unison with their religious

convictions.

We wish to do justice without delay to those, to whom justice is

due. The fault of the attempt, which we are about to narrate, is

not chargeable to the majority of the (Roman) Catholics; on the

contrary, they were as indignant against them, and regretted them

as much as the Protestants. Nor must it be allowed to fall on the

majority of the priests. They were no longer to be seen in the

foremost ranks of persecution, as they had been in the sixteenth

and seventeenth centuries. The populace, excited by some of the

secret leaders, acted without the priests, and often in spite of the

priests. Many of the Roman ecclesiastics courageously interposed

to shield the victims. We shall have occasion to cite an admirable

instance of this.

Such was the situation of the south when the emperor disembarked upon

the coasts of France. The Protestants of Nismes offered the Duke

d’Angoulême their services as royal volunteers. The prince was ready

to accept them, when the fanatics repulsed them with this insult:

“We will not endure these rascally Protestants!” Their purses were,

however, taken, if not their persons.

On Napoleon’s re-entry into Paris, the Protestants resumed the places

and the legitimate influence, of which they had been deprived.

They could count upon the protection of the laws, and testified a

satisfaction that may be easily comprehended. But they were far

from committing the excesses with which they have been reproached.

The faction of 1815 felt it necessary to accuse them with expressly

invented crimes, in order to extenuate their own. All the massacres

of the Hundred Days, which have been ascribed to them, are confined,

as the official documents attest, to the death of two royal

volunteers, who were killed at Arpillargues (Gard), in a disturbance

they had themselves provoked, by obstinately persisting in marching

through the village with fifty of their companions, sword in hand.

As soon as the defeat of Waterloo was known at Nismes, the royalist

bands were reorganized, and ordered the municipal council to declare

immediately for the government of Louis XVIII., although no order

of any kind had arrived from Paris. The council replied that it

was necessary to wait for official instructions, and published a

proclamation, in which it said: “Fellow-countrymen of every opinion,

for whom we have equal solicitude, in the name of the efforts we have

made to avert the disasters which threaten our country, in the name

of your dearest interests, in the name of God, who enjoins upon you

clemency and concord, do not be deaf to our voice.” (18th July, 1815.)

The following day a courier announced the return of the king to

the capital, and the Reformed population quietly resumed the white

cockade. This prompt submission did not satisfy the men who had

adopted the white and green colours, attesting by this that they

served another cause than that of royalty. Then terror rose and

spread itself over the south.

On the 14th of July, a hideous populace, recruited at Nismes,

Beaucaire, and the surrounding places, attacked the garrison,

which, weakened by the numerous desertions after the news of the

emperor’s fall, did not reckon more than two hundred men. These brave

soldiers, besieged in their barracks, were aware that any resistance

would produce only a useless effusion of blood, and consented to

capitulate. The next day, at break of dawn, having laid down their

arms in compliance with an express arrangement, they marched out of

their quarters, four abreast, with firm though sorrowful demeanour.

But the miscreants through whom they had to pass, fired upon them in

treacherous violation of the surrender, and trampled underfoot the

corpses of the murdered veterans.

All regular authority was at an end in Nismes. Pillage, incendiarism,

and assassination, desolated this great city. The details are

horrible. “Of crimes upon crimes,” says M. Lauze de Peret, with

energetic eloquence, “shall I have to speak; of wretches without

fear, of peace without repose, of entire submission without security,

of a city without guardianship, of victims without defence, and of

chiefs mute without being absent.”[141]

The Count René de Bernis, the royal commissioner, and the Marquis

d’Arbaud-Jonques, appointed prefect of the department after the

Marquis Jules de Calvières, who was only provisional prefect,

have published justificatory memoirs. These have, however, been

contradicted upon almost every point by M. Madier de Montjau, in

his petition to the Chamber of Deputies, and by other respectable

citizens. It is right that persecutors should learn that truth has

necessarily its day; it is also right that they should remember

that history does not stop to pick from the gore the names of the

subordinate cut-throats, but that it casts the blame and odium upon

those who ought to have withheld and punished them.

This spirit of savage fanaticism soon spread beyond the precincts

of Nismes. The whole surrounding country was abandoned to the fury

of some hundreds of brigands, who, while they imposed ruinous

contributions, devastated property, sacked houses, maltreated the

most inoffensive citizens, insulted women, profaned the sacredness

of the burial-grounds, and finally massacred those, whose position

or some false rumour marked out for popular vengeance, huzzaed for

the Cross! and the King! committing at the same time crimes equally

opposed to the holiest interests of religion and royalty.

If the unhappy Protestants assembled anywhere in arms for their

common defence, or for the protection of the asylum of the aged and

the cradle of the young, they were treated as factious rebels. They

were dragged before judges, who would not, or dared not do them

justice; and these contemptible tribunals raged against the victims,

instead of striking the murderers.

Among other towns, that of Uzès had been invaded by a band of

robbers, on which occasion a priest evinced remarkable self-devotion.

The authorities were either alarmed or were accomplices, and the

national guard remained passive. “One single man, a worthy minister

of the law of charity, a priest of the God, who has commanded all

mankind to live together as brethren, the abbé Palhien, set a

different example. He encountered Graffan (Quatretaillons) near the

church of Saint Etienne; he prayed, he insisted, he knelt to him: but

he followed him in vain to the fatal place, he pleaded in vain the

words of religion to this bandit armed for the defence of the altar

and the throne. On this memorable day, Uzès appeared to contain but

one single Christian, one single Frenchman.”[142]

Terror lasted for several months. Towards the end of August, four

thousand Austrians arrived in the department of Gard. They had been

made to believe that the Protestants menaced public tranquillity,

and that it was necessary to defend both law and order against their

hatred. They advanced with great precaution, sword in hand, as if

they had entered an enemy’s country, and were surprised to find a

peaceful population, abandoned to the fury of robbers, and decimated

by assassination.

It may be asked how such disorders could have happened without

exciting universal indignation, at such a period and in a country

like France. The answer is, that the whole country was at that time

delivered up to a violent reaction. There was no liberty of the

press; no right, save that of the conqueror; the spirit of party

oppressed and disorganized everything. The official journal of

Gard, which was published in the police offices or in those of the

prefecture, did not hesitate to contest the most evident facts,

nor to deny the most authentic,—to boast of the clemency and the

generosity of the enemies of the Protestants, with the corpses

of the victims before their eyes. And if any one, even away from

this unfortunate province, uttered a free thought respecting these

atrocities, he was reputed as a calumniator and a rebel.

M. Voyer-d’Argenson experienced this, when in the session of the 23rd

October, 1815, he demanded an inquiry, affirming that his heart bled

to hear the reports of the massacres of Protestants in the south. He

was violently interrupted with cries of order, and notwithstanding

the forms of speech which he employed in his explanations were

expressive of doubt, the call to order was agreed to by a large

majority. Did the chamber of 1815 think that by stopping M.

Voyer-d’Argenson’s mouth, it could smother the terrible cry for blood

and the voice of truth?

The government was better instructed than it cared to make known.

Louis XVIII. was an enlightened prince, who was aware of the true

position of affairs, and he was not a little anxious respecting

the impression which the crimes of the south would produce upon

the opinion of France and of Europe. England and Prussia, the two

countries whose armies had restored his crown on the battle-field

of Waterloo, began to show signs of disquietude; and the cabinet

of London, interrogated in the House of Commons, appealed to the

guarantees of the charter in favour of the French Protestants.

The Duke d’Angoulême was sent, in the month of November, to the

southern provinces. He found the places of worship of Nismes

closed,—all public exercise of religion had been suspended from the

middle of July,—that a part of the Protestant population had been

driven from their homes by the dread of massacres,—that others were

hidden in their houses as if they were a proscribed race, whilst

assassins stalked boldly abroad, the magistrates powerless, and the

laws inoperative.

Some delegates of the consistory, confounded by the crowd of civil

functionaries, in order that they might avoid the ill-treatment

of the populace, went to pay their respects to the duke, and met

with a most favourable reception. He gave them an order to reopen

their places of worship from the following Thursday, the 9th of

November. But none were opened until Sunday, and then but one. The

result proved that too much reliance had been placed upon the good

disposition of the people and their leaders. Tumultuous assemblages

collected round the religious edifice, shouting: “Down with the

Protestants! Death to the Protestants! Let us have back our churches!

Scourge them back to the desert!” The doors were broken open, and

a band of wretches burst into the place of meeting. The General

Lagarde, who was endeavouring, with some fellow-officers, to repress

the assailants, was shot through the heart; and perhaps this disaster

prevented the commission of still greater crime; for the populace,

struck with dismay, hastily fled, thinking only of their own safety.

This assassination of a soldier of high rank, committed before the

whole town, obeying the orders of a prince of the blood, left the

government no longer the opportunity of denying the excesses of the

reaction or of temporizing. On the 21st of November, Louis XVIII.

published an ordinance with the following preamble: “An atrocious

crime has stained our town of Nismes. Despite the constitutional

charter, which recognises the Catholic religion as the religion

of the State, but which guarantees to other creeds protection and

liberty (the minister thought of this very tardily), seditious

crowds have dared to oppose the opening of a Protestant place of

worship. Our military commandant, whilst striving to disperse them

by persuasion before using force, has been assassinated, and his

murderer has fled from the officers of justice. If such a crime were

to remain unpunished, public order and government would be at an end,

and our ministers guilty of not executing the laws.”

Notwithstanding the more than usual solemnity of this ordinance,

which commanded the arrest not only of the assassin of General

Lagarde, but also of the authors, fautors, and accomplices of the

disturbance of the 12th of November, the judges punished no one. Even

the murderer of the general was acquitted; and the other bandits, who

had devastated half the province with incendiarism and assassination,

were allowed to display an insolent and odious impunity upon the very

scene of their misdeeds. Witnesses were afraid to come forward to

give testimony against them, and mysterious protectors gained their

absolution.

The Protestant worship was at length re-established in Nismes, after

an interruption of six months, on the 17th of December, 1815. Yet

the apprehensions of the Reformed were not calmed, and security did

not fully return until the issue of the ordinance of the 5th of

September, 1816, which again raised the hopes and the strength of the

liberal party.

We will not terminate the narrative of the troubles of Gard, without

paying a just tribute of respect to the pastors of this province.

Some threw themselves before their armed parishioners, conjuring

them in the name of the Gospel, not to return evil for evil. One

particularly, M. Juillerat Chasseur, now president of the consistory

of Paris, who was called to officiate on the fatal day of the 12th

November, continued his prayers with a serene countenance and

unfaltering voice, in the midst of the shouts of death from an

enraged populace, and compelled the respect of these madmen, who

had cast aside all reverence for the majesty of the sanctuary. He

felt that the least sign of weakness on his part might have led to a

frightful catastrophe. Such courage is both more grand and rare than

that of the soldier on the battle-field.

In the other departments, saving two or three exceptions of little

importance, the Protestants were neither molested in their worship,

nor assailed in their persons or their property. Public opinion came

to the assistance of the law, and deprived intolerance of its hope of

again renewing the persecutions of the olden times.

V.

After the re-establishment of order, two opposite influences began

to act upon the conduct of political power towards the Protestants;

whence there ensued more or less contradictory acts, and a singular

mixture of good-will and hostility until the Revolution of 1830.

On one side the promises of the Charter; the desire of not alienating

so many citizens, who reckoned, in proportion to their number,

more electors than the (Roman) Catholics; respect for opinion, the

national conscience, which would have revolted against every direct

measure of persecution; the fear, in short, of giving new weapons

to the opposition, which was ready to take up the cause of the

Protestants as their own; these reasons were quite sufficient to

recommend to the Bourbons and their ministers the maintenance of a

prudent reserve.

But on the other side, the natural and intimate alliance, which

existed between the ancient dynasty and the old religion; the

necessity of meeting the requirements of the clergy in order to gain

their support in the struggle against the new spirit; the growing

influence of the Jesuits, and the congregations, particularly under

the reign of Charles X.; the conduct and the demands of the members

of the Right, who laboured incessantly for the restoration of

(Roman) Catholicism for the sake of political interest; perhaps also

some vague distrust of the tendencies of Protestantism, and some

disagreeable recollections of which the descendants of Louis XIV.

have never been able to rid themselves completely; all this explains

the hostility, sometimes hidden, sometimes avowed, which the Reformed

might complain of after the Restoration.

To look first of all at the favourable side, we will remark that the

numbers of the Protestant faith sensibly and constantly increased.

New pastoral districts were created, new places of worship built, and

more abundant means of elementary instruction were granted out of the

public purse. This increase was even more rapid under Charles X. than

under Louis XIII.; and the cause of this is easy to be indicated:

whatever was given to the Protestants, facilitated the passing of the

prodigal grants which were lavished upon the (Roman) Catholics, and

a few thousand more francs for the former, covered with a varnish of

impartiality the millions distributed to the latter.

In the annual presentations of public bodies, the two kings never

failed to reassure the Protestants of their protection and good-will.

When he ascended the throne, Charles X., who felt that he was under

a still greater obligation than his predecessor to give solemn

guarantees to liberty of conscience and of worship, said to the

consistory of Paris: “Assure yourselves, gentlemen, of my protection,

as you did of that of the king, of whom you have been deprived. All

Frenchmen are equal in my eyes; all Frenchmen have an equal right to

my love, my protection, and my favour.”

A Protestant committee, composed of peers and deputies, was formed

under the ministry of M. Decazes, and was continued under that of M.

de Villèle. Not only did the government offer it no opposition, but

it approved and seconded this non-official commission. In 1824, M.

Georges Cuvier was placed at the head of the Faculties of Protestant

theology; and four years later, under the ministry of M. de

Martignac, he exercised the functions of director of the non-Catholic

worship. The learning and integrity of this illustrious man were

well fitted to inspire the Protestants with confidence against the

enterprises of the clerical party.

From 1817 to 1830, in a word, we have to complain of no important

act of intolerance; we might relate favours sometimes, and always

security for the mass of the Protestant population. It is but justice

due to the elder branch of the Bourbons, and we do it with the more

willingness, that the last of the race is an exile from his country.

But the same justice also requires that we should present the reverse

of the picture, always taking care to add, in order that nothing

owing to great misfortunes may be omitted, that for the words and

acts unfavourable to the Protestants, the imprudent counsellors,

who surrounded the princes, are more responsible than the princes

themselves.

A powerful and restless faction was bent on interpreting after

its own fashion, the article of the Charter which constituted the

(Roman) Catholic religion the religion of the state. It was no

longer merely a question of the first rank of honour, but of a real

pre-eminence applied to every institution, and to every measure

of public authority. According to these strange commentators upon

the fundamental law, the 6th article, which granted an official

prerogative to Roman Catholicism, ought to override the 5th article,

which established equality of protection and liberty for every creed,

whilst according to common sense, logic, and the very order in which

the articles were placed, the special privilege should be subordinate

to the general principle.[143]

The Jesuits and their allies openly declared that to put all

religious communions upon the same footing, was an anti-Catholic,

anti-social, and impious maxim. A ministerial bishop did not hesitate

to declare that the non-Catholic creeds were only tolerated, and

M. de Peyronnet pronounced these imprudent words in his defence of

the law of sacrilege in the tribune: “I recognise an equality of

protection promised to the creeds sanctioned in the kingdom, and I

respect it; but an equality of creeds, I do not recognise at all.”

The law, of which we speak, confounded the spiritual with the

temporal, and importing the (Roman) Catholic dogma into the domain of

legislation, established a great inequality between the two creeds.

No profanation of Protestant worship any longer incurred the penalty

of imprisonment, whilst profanation of the (Roman) Catholic worship

was punished with the pain of death, and even, in the project of the

government, with that against parricides. This alone ought to have

told Charles X. and his ministers that they were pursuing a fatal

course. Protestantism lost nothing by the measure; the cause of the

Bourbons and the priests suffered immensely.

Another consequence, which it was attempted to deduce from the

principle of the state religion, was that non-Catholics should be

compelled to do some act, if not of adoration, at least of homage and

indirect participation in certain ceremonies of (Roman) Catholicism.

Thus it was insisted that they should hang the fronts of their houses

with tapestry on the passage of the (Roman) Catholic processions,

under penalty of process and fine. Yet it had already been made a

question whether processions without the precincts of the churches

were not a violation of the organic articles, and generally whether,

in a well-organized society, any creed whatsoever should have the

right of transporting the celebration of its particular rites into

the public streets and highways. But without insisting upon these two

points, it may be conceived that the Protestants would energetically

refuse to decorate their houses; for they must perceive in this,

a serious attack upon their ancient discipline, a defiance of the

independence of their personal faith, and an attempt against the

equality of creeds, and against their very liberty itself.

In order to try the point, the Jesuits had put forward some

functionaries of subordinate degree, such as the Count de

Narbonne-Lara, sub-prefect of Florac, who suddenly and upon his

own authority, published a circular ordering the inhabitants, of

whatsoever religion [they might be], to decorate the front of their

houses against the passing of the Holy Sacrament. The consistory of

Barre answered this sub-prefect, on the 19th of May, 1818, with a

categorical refusal, appealing at the same time to the discipline of

the Protestants and to the Charter.

Similar attempts were made in other places, and several citizens were

fined for not having obeyed this iniquitous assumption. But there was

one M. Paul Roman, of Lourmarin, who would not submit to the sentence

of the inferior tribunals. He appealed to the supreme court, and won

his cause after a prolonged hearing. M. Odillon Barrot supported him

with his eloquence, and proved that religious liberty was altogether

involved in the question. “This cause,” he said, “is not that of a

Protestant; it is not even that of the Protestants solely; it is

that of every citizen, whatever may be his religion, whatever may be

his religious opinions, apparent or not apparent; the whole body of

citizens are represented by M. Roman in this matter.”

The Court of Cassation passed a decree on the 20th November, 1818,

conformable to justice, law, and the rights of minorities. An affair

of the same kind was also tried at Marseilles in 1820, and decided in

like manner to that we have mentioned, in favour of the Protestant

appellant. The government itself renounced this illegal exaction, in

spite of the clamours of the fanatics, and the point was definitively

settled.

Another pretence was set up, more dangerous in its principles, more

serious in its effects, more obstinate in every respect, and from

which even the politicians of the present day have not yet completely

freed themselves. This consisted in restricting the Protestants to

certain boundaries, as if Protestantism was such an evil that it was

necessary to confine it within the narrowest possible limits. It

appeared as if the disciples of the Reformation were told, “Since

you exist in the kingdom, we tolerate you; but remain where you are,

and guard yourselves from trespassing. Unity of faith is our rule,

dissent the exception; and far from authorizing it to spread, we will

restrict it to the fullest extent of our power.”

Nothing could be more opposed [than this] to the Charter, which

assured equal liberty to all creeds. For as the Romish clergy had

always and everywhere the right of proselytizing in the bosom of

Protestantism, it is evident that if the pastors were refused the

privilege of making proselytes in their turn among the (Roman)

Catholics, equal liberty was nothing but a bitter mockery.

The Charter would not be respected, at least in one sense, unless the

priests were interdicted from converting Protestants, as well as the

pastors from converting (Roman) Catholics. Now this was a condition,

which the Roman clergy would never accept; it could not; it ought not

[accept it]; it would have been a disgraceful prevarication on their

part, and they would have been right in not subjecting themselves

to it, even in Protestant countries. But then there is no logical

or legitimate resting-place, but the common right, or liberty of

proselytism for all.

The government of the Restoration did not always do its duty in this

matter. It invented administrative fetters, judiciary obstacles, and

obstinately relied upon the 21st article of the penal code, according

to which no association of more than twenty persons, could be formed

without the concurrence of the authorities. By applying this article

to religious assemblies, it was clear that the establishment of every

new assembly, the opening of any new place of worship, depended upon

the pleasure of the civil authority. Liberty of religion ceased to

exist for the French Protestants beyond, or without those places of

worship which were counted and numbered by the State. This was almost

returning to the vicious maxims of the first years of the reign of

Louis XIV.

Incessant contests, as might have been expected, were the result of

such an application of the law. We will cite only two circumstances,

in which the two greatest towns of France were concerned. In 1825,

the consistory of Paris, although it demanded the free exercise of

religion, not for converted (Roman) Catholics, but for Protestants

by birth, was hindered from opening a place of worship in the

commune of Ageux, “because,” ran the administrative decree, “the

establishment of feeble fractions of a dissenting population in the

midst of a population of an homogeneous creed, would not be without

inconvenience!” This was the very language of the persecutors of the

sixteenth century. In 1826, some communes of the neighbourhood of

Lyons expressed a desire to hear the doctrines of the Reformation

preached; the authorities interposed in spite of the reclamations of

the consistory. But in these two cases the hands of government were

strengthened both by this version of the law, and public opinion.

While the attempt was made to imprison Protestantism within

its official walls, all the doors were thrown wide open to the

proselytism of the (Roman) Catholic clergy. Three pastors having

embraced the Romish faith under the Restoration, their pamphlets

against the communion they had abandoned obtained the honour of

being printed at the royal press, and they were even rewarded with a

pension.

The idea was also conceived of resuming the ambulating missions of

the seventeenth century, with a double task, instead of one; for

they were charged with the conversion of the followers of Voltaire,

as well as those of Calvin. These vulgar declaimers travelled with

their crosses from town to town, and village to village, vociferating

in the public places senseless invectives against the Reformation

and philosophy. Far from winning either Protestants or unbelievers,

they only disgusted the more healthy and enlightened portion of the

(Roman) Catholics. Many respectable priests were themselves ashamed

of such discreditable auxiliaries, feeling that the power of (Roman)

Catholicism was not to be re-established by scenes, in which the

populace were the chief actors.

The defenders of the two communions maintained controversies in a

higher region, which did not at least do violence to the laws of

public decency. Some men of eminent reputation, although but mediocre

theologians,—M. de Bonald, M. Joseph de Maistre, and M. de Lamennais,

who has since refuted his own opinions more effectually than any

of his antagonists could have done, assailed the Reformation with

extreme pertinacity, and were much more successful in assailing it

than the justness of their arguments warranted. They were creditably

met, however, by MM. Stapfer, Samuel Vincent, Henri Pyt, and others,

opponents who, less known to fame, indeed, defended the Protestant

creed with more logic and vigour.

The substance of these polemics did not, generally, bear much

resemblance to the great discussions of the sixteenth and seventeenth

centuries. Religion, in those times, was supported on each side for

the sake of religion itself; it was dogma, and particularly the

dogma of the Holy Supper, that engaged controversialists. Under the

Restoration, the most renowned advocates of (Roman) Catholicism

took up another ground. Religion had become a political weapon.

Putting aside doctrinal matters, the [disputants] exerted themselves

to effect the establishment of the position, that the unity and

authority of the Roman (Catholic) Church secure the power of princes,

obedience to the laws, and the maintenance of social order better

than Protestantism. Heavenly interests were of secondary importance

to those of the earth, or were not considered at all.

Doubtless it might be possible to meet with some discussions purely

dogmatical or ecclesiastical, at this period; but they attracted

little notice, and awakened no echo amongst the masses of the

country. The tide of humanity seems to have retreated from its

ancient landmarks, to hollow out a new bed on unknown shores.

There is no other fact deserving mention in the external condition

of French Protestantism, until the Revolution of 1830. The 3rd

article of the Charter, which declared all citizens to be equally

admissible to civil and military offices, might, and ought to have

been observed under certain circumstances. The professorial chairs

of instruction were rarely conferred upon, and were as lightly taken

away from, the Protestants. The same partiality was shown, although

in a less degree, in the distribution of public appointments; where

the merit was equal, to say no more, the (Roman) Catholic nearly

always prevailed against the Protestant; and this dislike continued

to increase every day, as the ill-fated Charles X. gave himself up

more unreservedly to the counsels of those who ruined him.

VI.

In treating of the internal condition of Protestantism, we shall make

mention, as we have done when speaking of the preceding periods, less

of opinions considered in themselves, than of the men who were their

most distinguished representatives.