A LETTER FROM A BENEFICED PRIEST
TO FATHER LETELLIER, THE JESUIT,
DATED THE 6th OF MAY, 1714.
Reverend Father: The following is in obedience to the orders I
received from your reverence to lay before you the most effectual
means for delivering Jesus and His company from their enemies.
I believe there may be remaining at this time in the kingdom not more
than five hundred thousand Huguenots; some say a million, others a
million and a half; but let the number be what it will, the following
is my advice, which, however, as in duty bound, I submit with all
humility to your reverence’s judgment.
In the first place, then, it will be very easy to seize in one day
all the preachers, and to hang them all at one time and in one place,
which will be not only a very edifying, but also a very entertaining
exhibition to the people.
Secondly, I would have all the fathers and mothers who are heretics
murdered in their beds, because the killing of them in the streets
might occasion some little disturbance; besides, by that means,
several of them might escape, which is above all to be prevented.
This execution is a necessary corollary of our principles; for if
we ought to kill a heretic, as so many of our great divines have
incontestably proved, it is evident that we ought to kill them all
without exception.
Thirdly, I would, the very next day, marry all the daughters to good
Catholics, inasmuch as it would not be politic to depopulate the
state so much after the late war; but as for the boys of fourteen
and fifteen years of age, who have already imbibed bad principles,
which we cannot hope to root out, ’tis my opinion that they should
be all castrated to prevent the race from ever being reproduced. As
for the other younger lads, they may be brought up in our colleges,
where they may be whipped till they have learned by heart the works
of Sanchez and Molinos.
Fourthly, I think under correction, the same method ought to be taken
with all the Lutherans of Alsace, for I remember, in the year 1704,
to have seen two old women of that country laugh on the day of our
defeat at Blenheim.
Fifthly, What relates to the Jansenists will perhaps appear a little
more difficult. I believe their numbers may amount to about six
millions, a little more or less; but this ought not to give any
alarm to a person of your reverence’s disposition. I reckon among
the Jansenists all the parliaments who have so unworthily maintained
the liberties of the Gallican church. I leave it to your reverence
to weigh with your usual prudence the most effectual methods for
reducing these turbulent spirits. The Gunpowder Plot failed of the
desired success through the weakness of one of the conspirators,
who wanted to save the life of his friend; but, as your reverence
has no friend, the same inconvenience is not to be apprehended. You
may very easily blow up all the parliaments in the kingdom with the
composition called Pulvis Pyrius, invented by the monk Schwarz. By
my calculation it will require upon an average thirty-six barrels of
powder for each of the parliaments; now, if we multiply thirty-six,
the number of barrels, by twelve, the number of parliaments, it will
make four hundred and thirty-two barrels, which, at a hundred crowns
per barrel, will amount to not quite a hundred and thirty thousand
livres—a mere trifle for the reverend father-general.
The parliaments thus disposed of, you may bestow their places upon
your congregationists, who are perfectly well versed in the laws of
the realm.
Sixthly, It will be a very easy matter to poison the Cardinal de
Noailles, who is a very simple, unsuspecting man.
Your reverence may take the same steps for conversion with several of
the refractory prelates; and their bishoprics, by a brief from the
pope, may be put into the hands of the Jesuits; thus all the bishops
that remain, being staunch to the good cause, and they making a
proper choice of curates, I, with your reverence’s permission, would
give the following advice:
Seventhly and lastly, As the Jansenists are said to take the
sacrament one time in the year at least, which is at Easter, it would
not be amiss to season the consecrated wafers with a little of that
drug which was used to do justice upon the Emperor Henry VII. Some
nice caviller may perhaps tell me that in this operation we may run
some risk of poisoning the Molinists at the same time. There is some
weight in this objection; but then it should be considered that there
is no project without its inconveniences, nor any system but what
threatens destruction in some part. And if we were to be stopped by
these little difficulties we should never attain our end in anything;
besides, as here we have in view the obtaining the greatest of all
possible advantages, we should not suffer ourselves to be shocked,
though it brings with it some bad consequences, especially as those
consequences are of little or no consideration.
And, after all, we shall have nothing to reproach ourselves with,
since it is proved that the Reformed, as they call themselves, and
the Jansenists, have all of them their portion in hell; therefore, we
only put them in possession of their inheritance a little sooner.
It is as evident that heaven belongs of right to the Molinists;
therefore by destroying them by mistake, and without any evil
intention, we hasten their happiness; and are in both cases the
ministers of Providence.
As to those who may be a little shocked at the number to be thus made
away with, your reverence may remark to them that from the first
flourishing days of the church to the year 1707—that is to say, in
about fourteen hundred years—religion has occasioned the massacre
of upwards of fifty millions of persons; whereas by my proposal not
above six millions and a half will be put to death by the halter, the
dagger, or poison.
But perhaps it may be objected that my calculation is not just, and
that I have committed an error against the Rule of Three; inasmuch
as, that if in fourteen hundred years there perished fifty millions
of souls on account of some trifling disputes in divinity, that makes
only thirty-five thousand seven hundred and fourteen and some little
fraction in a year, and consequently that by my method an overplus of
six millions sixty-four thousand two hundred and eighty-five and some
fractions are put to death in the current year. But, indeed, this is
a very childish quibble; nay, I’ll even call it impious; for is it
not plain that by my method I save the lives of all the Catholics, so
long as the world shall last? But, in short, there would be no end of
answering every frivolous objection.
I am, with the most profound respect, reverend father, your
reverence’s most humble, most devout, and most humane
R———,
Native of Angoulême,
Prefect of the Congregation.
This glorious scheme, however, could not be carried into execution,
because it required considerable time to make the necessary
dispositions, and that Father Letellier was banished the year
following. But as it is right to examine both sides of an argument,
it will be proper to inquire in what cases it may be lawful to
follow in part the scheme of the reverend father’s correspondent. It
would seem rather too severe to execute it in all its parts; let us
therefore examine in what cases we ought to break upon the wheel,
to hang, or to make galley-slaves of those who differ from us in
opinion. This shall be the subject of the following chapter.