History of the Rise of the Huguenots Volume I Part 64

Septembr. in aula regis Galliae acta sunt, _apud_ F. C. Schlosser, Leben des Theodor de Beza und des Peter Martyr Vermili (Heidelberg, 1809), Appendix, 355-359. Discours des Actes de Poissy, _ubi supra_, 652-657.]

[Footnote 1127: Hist. eccles. des egl. ref., i. 327; La Place, 168; De Thou, iii. 68; Letter of Haller, _ubi supra_; Actes de Poissy, Recueil des choses mem., 657, 658.]

[Footnote 1128: The response of the queen is concisely given by La Place, the Hist. eccles. des egl. ref., the Actes de Poissy, and De Thou (_ubi supra_); but the graphic account upon which the text is based is found in the letter of Haller to Bullinger, Sept. 25, 1561, which Prof.

Baum discovered at Zurich, and has published in the volume of doc.u.ments which figures as an appendix to the second volume of his extremely valuable biography of Beza. It is superfluous for me to acknowledge formally my obligations to this rich storehouse of original authorities, since the frequent references that I have already made, and shall doubtless have occasion for some time to make, to its separate doc.u.ments, will sufficiently attest the high estimate I place upon its value. The correspondence of the reformers is always an important commentary upon the contemporaneous history. In the present instance, much of the most trustworthy information is derived from it. Prof.

Baum's own narrative is admirable (Book iv., c. 5).]

[Footnote 1129: "Car d'y proceder a present par la force," writes Catharine de' Medici at this very time, "il s'y voit un si eminent peril, pour estre ce mal penetre si avant comme il est, que je n'en suis en sorte du monde conseillee par ceux qui aiment le repos de cet Estat."

Letter of Sept. 14th, _apud_ Le Laboureur, i. 734.]

[Footnote 1130: The testimony of Marc' Antonio Barbaro is the more interesting from the reluctance he manifests to say any good of the reformer, whom he blames for a great part of the progress of the Huguenots in France. "e d'a.s.sai bello aspetto, _ma d'animo molto brutto_, perciocche, oltra l'eresie sue, e sedizioso e pieno di vizii e di scelerita, che non racconto per brevita. Ha vivo spirito, e ingegno acuto, ma non e prudente, ne ha ponto di giudizio. Mostra d'esser eloquente, perche parla a.s.sai con belle parole e p.r.o.ntamente," etc. Rel.

des Amb. Ven., i. 52.]

[Footnote 1131: "Ha operato tanto con la sua lingua, che non solamente ha persuaso infiniti, ma.s.simamente dei n.o.bili e grandi, ma e quasi adorato da molti nel regno, i quali tengono nelle camere la figura sua."

Ib., _ubi supra_.]

[Footnote 1132: So Calvin's eye saw in an instant, and he applauded Beza's boldness. "Your speech is now before us," he wrote to Beza, Sept.

24th, "in which G.o.d wonderfully directed your mind and your tongue. The testimony which stirred up the bile of the holy fathers could not but be given, unless you had been willing basely to tergiversate and to expose yourself to their taunts." "I wonder that they were thrown into agitation respecting this matter alone, since they were not less severely hit in other places. It is a stupid a.s.sertion that the conference was broken off in consequence of this ground of offence. For those who now, by rabidly laying hold of one ground, after a certain fas.h.i.+on subscribe to the rest of the doctrine, would have found out a hundred other grounds. This also has, therefore, turned out happily."

Calvini Epistolae, Opera, ix. 157.]

[Footnote 1133: To her amba.s.sador in Germany, instructed to defend her course in convening the conference, however, she purposely exaggerated her indignation, and gave a different coloring to the facts of the case.

"Mais estant enfin (de Beze) tombe sur le fait de la Cene, il s...o...b..ia en une comparaison si absurde et tant offensive des oreilles de l'a.s.sistance, que pen s'en fallut, que je ne luy imposa.s.se silence, et que je ne les renvoya.s.se tous, sans les laisser pa.s.ser plus avant." She accounts for the fact that she did not stop him, by noticing that he was evidently near the end of his speech, and by the consideration that, "as they are accustomed to take advantage of everything 'pour la confirmation et persuasion de leur doctrine,' they would rather have gained by such a command; and moreover, that those who had heard his arguments would have gone away imbued with and persuaded of his doctrine, without hearing the answer that might be made." Letter of Cath. of Sept. 14th, _ubi supra_. Prof. Baum well remarks that "the last words furnish the most irrefragable proof of the great and convincing impression which the speech in general had made." Theod. Beza, ii. 263, note.]

[Footnote 1134: It is inserted in La Place, 168, 169, and Hist. eccles.

des egl. ref., i. 328-330; De Thou, iii. (liv. 28) 69. Letter of Cath., _ubi supra_.]

[Footnote 1135: "Would that he had been dumb, or that we had been deaf!"

the Cardinal of Lorraine is said to have exclaimed in the prelatic consultation. La Place and Hist. eccles. des egl. ref., _ubi supra_; J.

de Serres, i. 273.]

[Footnote 1136: La Place, 170; Hist. eccles. des egl. ref., i. 330, 331, where the protest is reproduced.]

[Footnote 1137: "Me excludere volebant adversarii, ne interessem, tanquam hominem peregrinum. Regina tamen mater per Condaeum principem eo ipso articulo, c.u.m profisciscendum erat, evocavit et adesse voluit."

Letter of Martyr to the Senate of Zurich, Sept. 19, 1561, Baum, ii., App., 67.]

[Footnote 1138: Hist. eccles. des egl. ref., i. 332.]

[Footnote 1139: Hist. eccles. des egl. ref., i. 332-348; La Place, 170-177; De Thou, iii. 70; J. de Serres, i. 273-280. The impression made by the cardinal's speech upon his Romanist and Protestant hearers differed widely. According to the Abbe Bruslart (Mem. de Conde, i. 52), he spoke "en si bons et elegans termes, et d'une si bonne grace et a.s.seurance, que nos adversaires mesmes l'admiroient." Stuck makes him speak "admodum inepte" (_ap._ Baum, ii., App., 66); while Beza writes: "Nihil unquam audivi impudentius, nihil ineptius.... Caetera ejusmodi quae certe mihi nauseam moverunt" (Ib., 63, 64). Peter Martyr judged more leniently (Ib., 67, 68). It is, therefore, hardly likely that Beza said, as Dr. Henry White alleges without referring to his authority (Ma.s.sacre of St. Bartholomew, 64); "Had I the Cardinal's eloquence I should hope to convert half France."]

[Footnote 1140: La Place, 178; Hist. eccles. des egl. ref., _ubi supra_; Jean de Serres, i. 280; De Thou, iii. 71.]

[Footnote 1141: La Place, etc., _ubi supra_; J. de Serres, i. 281.]

[Footnote 1142: "n.o.bis certum est," says Beza in a letter of Sept. 17th, "vel mox congredi vel protestatione facta discedere, si pergant diem de die ducere." Baum, ii., App., 64.]

[Footnote 1143: "Quid novi sperare possim non video. Nempe vel ipsa necessitas aliquid extorquebit, vel, quod Deus avertat, expectanda sunt omnia belli civilis incommoda. Quotidie ex diversis regni partibus multa ad nos tristia afferuntur in utramque partem, quoniam utrinque peccatur plerisque locis." Letter of Beza, Sept. 17th, _ubi supra_. In a similar strain Stuck writes on the next day: "In Gascony and Normandy scarcely an image is any longer to be seen; ma.s.ses have ceased to be said.

Undoubtedly, unless the liberty of preaching and hearing the Gospel with impunity be granted, there is great reason to fear an intestine war."

Baum, ii., App., 67. Cf. Summa eorum, etc., _apud_ Schlosser, Leben des Theodor de Beza, Anhang, 358, 359.]

[Footnote 1144: La Place, Hist. eccles. des egl. ref., Jean de Serres, etc., _ubi supra_, Castelnau, l. iii., c. 4.]

[Footnote 1145: No wonder; the prelates had just solemnly decreed, as Abbe Bruslart informs us (Mem. de Conde, i. 52): "Non erat congrediendum c.u.m his qui principia et fundamentum totius nostrae fidei et religionis christianae negant." Not only so; but they had protested against the heretics being heard, and had declared that _whoever conferred with them would be excommunicated_! "Disants que ceux qui confereroient avec eux seroient excommunies." The reader, if he cannot admire their consistency, will certainly be struck with astonishment at the fort.i.tude of the prelates who, a few hours later, could bring themselves with so little apparent trepidation under the highest censures of the Church.

Bruslart goes on to tell us that it was the Cardinal of Lorraine who brought them into this dreadful condemnation, partly hoping to convert the Huguenots, _partly to please Catharine de' Medici_!]

[Footnote 1146: "Mais ce ne fut pas en si grande compagnie qu'auparavant. Car Messieurs les preslats croignoyent que le monde ne fut infecte de nos heresies, qu'ils appellent." Letter of Beza to the Elector Palatine, Oct. 3, 1861, Baum, ii., App., p. 88.]

[Footnote 1147: Baum, Theodor Beza, ii. 311, 312.]

[Footnote 1148: Ib., _ubi supra_, Hist. eccles., i. 349. Letter of N.

des Gallars to the Bishop of London, Sept. 29th, Baum, ii., App., 80.]

[Footnote 1149: Beza's speech is given in full by La Place, 179-189; Hist. eccl. des egl. ref., i. 350-362; and J. de Serres, i. 282-312. See also De Thou, iii. 71, and N. des Gallars, _ubi supra_.]

[Footnote 1150: "Et hoc quidem prorsus inepte, quia neque conquesti eramus, neque quemquam poterat videri magis accusare, quam eum ipsum [sc. Cardinal Loth.] cui accesserat advocatus." Letter of Beza, Sept.

27th, _apud_ Baum, ii., App., 75. It was Beza's firm belief that D'Espense had been hired by Lorraine to compose his speech of the 16th of September, as well as to defend him on the present occasion. He therefore not inappositely calls him, in this letter to Calvin, "conduct.i.tius Balaam."]

[Footnote 1151: La Place, 189, 190; Hist. eccles. des egl. ref., i. 364; Jean de Serres, i. 315; Beza, _ubi supra_.]

[Footnote 1152: La Place, 192; Jean de Serres, i. 321-323; Hist. eccles.

des egl. ref., i. 370; Beza to Calvin, Baum, ii., App., 77; N. des Gallars to the Bishop of London, ibid., 81; De Thou, iii. 73.]

[Footnote 1153: Letter of Beza to Calvin, Sept. 27th, _ubi supra_.

Besides permitting the communication of this information, the break in the conferences (caused by the discovery, on Catharine's part, that the majority of the prelates had resolved to submit a proposition respecting the ma.s.s, drawn up in a strictly Romish sense--a refusal to sign which they intended to take as the signal for declining to hold any further intercourse with the Protestants) furnished an opportunity for Montluc, Bishop of Valence--a prelate suspected of Protestant proclivities--and Claude d'Espense, one of the most moderate of the theologians of the Sorbonne, to meet privately, by request of Catharine de' Medici, with Beza and Des Gallars. The result of their interview was the provisional adoption of a declaration on the subject of the eucharist, which, though undoubtedly Protestant in its natural import, was rejected by the rest of the ministers as not sufficiently explicit. Hist. eccles. des egl.

ref., _ubi supra_. See a full account in Baum, Theodor Beza, ii.

342-344. They rightly judged that where there is essential discrepancy of belief, little or nothing can be gained by cloaking it in ambiguous expressions.]

[Footnote 1154: Beza's address is inserted in La Place, 193-196; Hist.

eccles. des egl. ref., i. 371, etc. See also De Thou, iii. (liv.

xxviii.), 74; letters of Beza to Calvin, and N. des Gallars to the Bishop of London, _ubi supra_; Jean de Serres, i. 327, etc.]

[Footnote 1155: La Place, De Thou, letters of Beza, and des Gallars, etc., _ubi supra_. "Comme si les feu rois Francois le grand, Henry le debonnaire, Francois dernier decede, et Charles a present regnant (et faisoit sonner ces mots autant qu'il pouvoit) avoient ete tyrans et simoniacles." Hist. eccles. des egl. ref., i. 375.]

[Footnote 1156: La Place, Hist. eccles. des egl. ref., etc., _ubi supra_. Letter of Beza to the Elector Palatine, Oct. 3d, Baum, ii., App., 88, 89.]

[Footnote 1157: Because he was not sufficiently familiar with French, according to La Place, 197 (ne scachant parler francois); and in order to make himself better understood by the queen "ut a regina intelligi posset," than he would have been had he spoken in Latin. Letter of Beza, Baum, ii., App., 79. "D'Espense," says La Place _ubi supra_, "lors donna ceste louange audict Martyr, qu'il n'y avoit eu homme de ce temps qui si amplement et avec telle erudition eust escript du faict du sacrement que luy."]

[Footnote 1158: Although Lainez spoke in Italian (see Baum, ii. 363), it is needless to say that the Cardinal of Lorraine made no objection to the use of a language which, it may be added, he understood perfectly.

The reader may see some reason in the summary of Lainez's speech given in the text, for dissenting from the remark of MM. Oimber et Danjou, iv.

34, note: "Il [Lainez] fit entendre dans le colloque de Poissy, des _paroles de paix et de conciliation_."]

[Footnote 1159: "I said," writes Beza, in giving an account of his brief reply to Lainez, "that I would concede all the Spaniard's a.s.sertions when he proved them. As to his statement that we were foxes, and serpents, and apes, _we no more believed it than we believed in transubstantiation_." Letter to Calvin, Baum, ii., App., 79.]

[Footnote 1160: La Place, 198; Hist. eccles. des egl. ref., i. 377-379; Jean de Serres, i. 335-339; Letter of Beza to Calvin, Sept. 27th, Baum, ii., App., 79.]

[Footnote 1161: "Qui prae ceteris doctrina et ingenio, atque etiam moderatione praestare existimantur." Letter of N. des Gallars, _ubi supra_, 82. "Gens doctes et traictables." Letter of Beza to the Elector Palatine, ibid., 90.]

[Footnote 1162: _Ante_, p. 475.]

[Footnote 1163: "Fateor equidem (nec causa est cur id negem) _falsam istam doctrinam_, non tam forta.s.se aperte, quam ipsi facere soletis, confuta.s.se: Babylonem tamen c.u.m cuniculis, tum aperto etiam marte, ut res et tempus ferebat, ita semper oppugnavi, ut noster iste in eo genere conatus optimo cuique semper probaretur." Letter of Salignac to Calvin, Calvini Opera, ix. 163, 164. Calvin (probably, as Prof. Baum remarks, at Beza's suggestion) wrote to Salignac, about a month after the termination of the Colloquy of Poissy, a respectful but extremely frank letter, in which he urged him to espouse with decision the cause he secretly advocated. He reminded him that it was no mean honor to have been among the first fruits of the revival of truth in France. He urged him to put an end to his inordinate hesitation, by the consideration of the number of those who were still vacillating, but who would forthwith imitate his example if he forsook the enemy's camp for the fold of Christ. Letter of Calvin to Salignac, Nov. 19, 1561, Calvini Opera, ix.