History of the Rise of the Huguenots Volume II Part 6

Que d'aller a la messe En faussant mon serment."

--Quand sa tres-chere mere Eut entendu c' mot la,

Au bourreau de la ville Sa fille elle livra.

"Bourreau, voila ma fille!

Fais a tes volontes;

Bourreau, fais de ma fille Comme d'un meurtrier."

Quand elle fut sur l'ech.e.l.le, Trois rollons ja montee,

Elle voit sa mere Qui chaudement pleurait.

"Ho! la cruelle mere Qui pleure son enfant

Apres l'avoir livree Dans les grands feux ardents.

Vous est bien fait, ma mere, De me faire mourir.

Je vois Jesus, mon pere, Qui, de son beau royaume, Descend pour me querir.

Son royaume sur terre Dans peu de temps viendra, Et cependant mon ame En paradis ira."

FOOTNOTES:

[1] The nuncio alone seems to have thought that the edict would work so well, that "in six months, or a year at farthest, there would not be a single Huguenot in France!" His ground of confidence was that many, if not most of the reformed, were influenced, not by zeal for religion, but by cupidity. Santa Croce to Card. Borromeo, Jan. 17, 1562, Aymon, i. 44; Cimber et Danjou, vi. 30.

[2] Hist. eccles. des egl. ref., i. 428, 429. The letter is followed by an examination of the edict, article by article, as affecting the Protestants. Ib. i. 429-431.

[3] Abbe Bruslart, Mem. de Conde. i. 70. Barbaro spoke the universal sentiment of the bigoted wing of the papal party when he described "the decree" as "full of concealed poison," as "the most powerful means of advancing the new religion," as "an edict so pestiferous and so poisonous, that it brought all the calamities that have since occurred." Tommaseo, Rel. des Amb. Ven., ii. 72.

[4] Claude Haton, 211. "Et longtemps depuis ne faisoient sermon qu'ilz _Acab_ et _Hiesabel_ et leurs persecutions ne fussent mis par eux en avant," etc. In fact, Catharine seemed fated to have her name linked to that of the infamous Queen of Israel. A Protestant poem, evidently of a date posterior to the ma.s.sacre of Saint Bartholomew, is still extant in the National Library of Paris, in which the comparison of the two is drawn out at full length. The one was the ruin of Israel, the other of France.

The one maintained idolatry, the other papacy. The one slew G.o.d's holy prophets, the other has slain a hundred thousand followers of the Gospel.

Both have killed, in order to obtain the goods of their victims. But the unkindest verses are the last--even the very dogs will refuse to touch Catharine's "carrion."

"En fin le jugement fut tel Que les chiens mengent Jhesabel Par une vangeance divine; Mais la charongne de Catherine Sera differente en ce point, Car les chiens ne la vouldront point."

Appendix to Mem. de Claude Haton, ii. 1, 110.

[5] _Ante_, i. 477.

[6] Mem. de Claude Haton, 211, 212.

[7] Hist. eccles. des egl. ref., i. 431.

[8] Abbe Bruslart, Mem. de Conde. i. 70, 71.

[9] Declaration of Feb. 14, 1561/2, Du Mont, Corps diplomatique, v. 91, 92.

[10] And, indeed, with modifications which were to render it still more severe. Letter of Beza to Calvin, Feb. 26, 1562, Baum, ii., App., 167.

[11] The registry took place on Friday, March 6th. Isambert, xiv. 124; La Fosse, 45, who says "Ledict edict fut publie en la salle du palais en ung vendredy, 5e [6e] de ce moys, _la ou il y eut bien peu de conseillers et le president Baillet qui signerent_."

[12] The same prelate to whom Cardinal Lorraine doubtless referred in no complimentary terms, when, at the a.s.sembly of the clergy at Poissy, he said, "qu'il estoit contrainct de dire, _Duodecim sumus, sed unus ex n.o.bis Diabolus est_, et pa.s.sant plus outre, qu'il y avoit ung evesque de la compagnie ... qui avoit revele ce qui se faisoit en laditte a.s.semblee,"

etc. Journal de Bruslart, Mem. de Conde, i. 50.

[13] See the doc.u.ment in Schlosser, Leben des Theodor de Beze, App., 359-361; Hist. eccles. des egl. ref., i. 436, 437.

[14] Hist. eccles. des egl. ref., i. 436-450; Baum, ii. 512-545. In connection with Prof. Baum's long and thorough account of the colloquy, Beza's correspondence, printed in the appendix, is unusually interesting.

[15] "Cardinalium intercessione ac precibus mox soluta sunt omnia." Beza to Bullinger, March 2, 1562. Baum, ii., App., 169.

[16] "Nihil hoc consilio gratius accidere potuit nostris adversariis quibus iste ludus minime placebat, adeo ut _ipse Demochares ... pene sui oblitus in meos amplexus rueret_, et ejus sodales honorifice me salutarent!" Beza to Calvin, Feb. 26, 1562, ibid., 165. The Venetian Barbaro represents this second conference as an extremely efficient means of spreading heresy: "La qual [in San Germano] apport un grandissimo scandalo e pregiudizio alla religion nostra, e diede alla loro, reputazione e fomento maggiore." Rel. des Amb. Ven., ii. 74.

[17] Hist. eccles. des egl. ref., i. 432.

[18] "Qu'il ne s'y mettroit si avant qu'il ne s'en pust ais.e.m.e.nt tirer."

Hist. eccles. des egl. ref., _ubi supra_.

[19] See the frank letter of Calvin, written to him about this time, in Bonnet, Lettres franc., ii. 441; Calvin's Letters, Amer. ed., iv. 247.

[20] "That pestilent yle of Sardigna!" exclaimed Sir Thomas Smith, a clever diplomatist and a nervous writer, "that the pore crowne of it should enter so farre into the pore Navarrian hed (which, I durst warraunt, shall never ware it), [as to] make him destroy his owen countrey, and to forsake the truth knowen!" Forbes, State Papers, ii. 164.

[21] Hist. eccles. des egl. ref., _ubi supra_; De Thou, iii. (liv.

xxviii.), 96-99.

[22] Letter of Beza to Calvin, Feb. 1, 1562, Baum, ii., App., 163.

[23] Hist. eccles. des egl. ref., i. 433.

[24] Letter to Calvin, Feb. 26, 1562, _apud_ Baum, ii., App., 167, 168.

[25] Ibid., _ubi supra_.

[26] Recordon, Le protestantisme en Champagne (Paris, 1863), from MSS. of Nicholas Pithou, p. 105. This learned jurist, the equal of his more celebrated brothers in ability, and their superior in moral courage, has left his testimony respecting the beneficent influence of the reformed doctrines upon his fellow-citizens: "A la verite la ville de Troyes en general fit une perte incroyable en la rupture de cette eglise. Car c'etait une grande beaute et chose plus que emerveillable de la voir si bien fleurie. Il se voyoit en la jeunesse, touchee par la predication de la parole de Dieu, qui auparavant etait si depravee que rien plus, un changement si subit et si etrange que les catholiques memes en etoient tout etonnes. Car, tels qui au precedent se laissaient aller du tout a leurs voluptez et s'etaient plongez en gourmandises, yvrogneries et jeux defendus, tellement qu'ils y pa.s.saient la plus grande et meilleure partie du temps, et faisaient un fort mauvais menage, depuis qu'ils etaient entres dans l'eglise quittaient du tout leur vie pa.s.see et la detestaient, se rangeant et se soumettant allegrement a la discipline ecclesiastique, ce qui etait si agreable aux parents de tels personnages, que, quoiqu'ils fussent catholiques, ils en louaient Dieu." Ibid., pp. 107, 108.

[27] "Nous avons esperance que non seulement la jeunesse d'icy se faconnera par la main d'un si excellent ouvrier qui nous est venu; mais que les chanoines mesmes de Sainte-Croix le viendront ouyr en ses lecons, ce qu'ils ont desja declare. De quoy sortiront des fruicts surmontant toute expectation." Gaberel, Hist. de l'egl. de Geneve, i., Pieces justificatives, 168.

[28] The archives of Stuttgart contain the instructive correspondence which the Duke of Guise had, ever since the previous summer, maintained with the Duke of Wurtemberg. From the letters published in the Bulletin of the French Protestant Historical Society (February and March, 1875), we see that Francois endeavored to alienate Christopher from the Huguenots by representing the latter as bitter enemies of the Augsburg Confession, and as speaking of it with undisguised contempt. (Letter of July 2, 1561, Bull., xxiv. 72.) Christopher made no reply to these statements, but urged his correspondent to a candid examination of religious truth, irrespective of age or prescription, reminding him (letter of Nov. 22, 1561) that our Lord Jesus Christ "did not say 'I am the _ancient custom_,' but 'I am the _Truth_.'" (Ibid., xxiv. 114.) And he added, sensibly enough, that, had the pagan ancestors of both the French and the Germans followed the rule of blind obedience to custom, they would certainly never have become Christians.

[29] Guise's original invitation was for Sat.u.r.day, January 31st, but Christopher pleaded engagements, and named, instead, Sunday, Feb. 15th.

(Ibid., xxiv. 116, 117.)

[30] The relation was first noticed and printed by Sattler, in his Geschichte von Wurtemberg unter den Herzogen. I have used the French translation by M. A. Muntz, in the Bulletin, iv. (1856) 184-196.

[31] In a letter of Wurtemberg to Guise, written subsequently to the ma.s.sacre of Va.s.sy, he reminds him of the advice he had given him, and of Guise's a.s.surances: "Vous savez aussi avec quelle a.s.seurance vous m'avez respondu _que l'on vous faisoit grand tort_ de ce que l'on vous vouloit imposer estre cause et autheur de la mort de tant de povres chrestiens qui ont espandu leur sang par ci-devant," etc. Memoires de Guise, 494.

[32] There are some characters with whom mendacity has become so essential a part of their nature, that we cease to wonder at any possible extreme of lying. It was, however, no new thing with the cardinal to a.s.sume immaculate innocence. Over two years before this time, at the beginning of the reign of Francis II., when b.l.o.o.d.y persecution was at its height, Sir Nicholas Throkmorton wrote to Queen Elizabeth, Sept. 10, 1559: "I am enformed that they here begin to persecute againe for religion more than ever they did; and that at Paris there are three or four executed for the same, and diverse greate personages threatened shortly to be called to answer for their religion. Wherin the Cardinal of Lorraine having bene spoken unto, within these two daies, hathe said, _that it is not his faulte; and that there is no man that more hateth extremites, then he dothe_; and yet it is knowne that it is, notwithstanding, _alltogither by his occasion_." Forbes, State Papers, i. 226, 227.

[33] Bulletin, iv. 196. De Thou's account of the Saverne conference (iii.

(liv. xxix.) 127, 128) is pretty accurate so far as it goes, but has a more decidedly polemic tone than the Duke of Wurtemberg's memorandum.

[34] Throkmorton to the Queen, Paris, Feb. 16, 1562. State Paper Office. I have followed closely the condensation in the Calendars.