not small They had testified an inviolable Loyalty to him in all his Troubles They had spent freely their Lives and Fortunes to defend his Rights and his Life against the Princes of Lorrain who made so many Attempts to keep him from the Throne of his Ancestors and to usurp his place Had it not been for their Valour and their Loyalty the Crown had gone into the hands of Strangers and since we must speak out had it not been for them the Blood of the Bourbons would not this day have been possessed of the Throne The Edict of Nantes then was the Effect and the Recompence of the Great Obligations which King Henry the Fourth had to his Loyal Protestants and not as is slanderously reported the fruit of any violence gained by force and granted against the hair But farther the Law of Nature and common policy might challenge such an Edict for them as well as Gratitude It is true that Soveraign Magistrates are appointed by God to preserve the publick peace and by consequence to cut off or prevent as much as in them lies whatever may disturb it It is true also that new Establishments in matters of Religion may cause great troubles in a State and that there are Religions which have Maxims so pernicious that when Magistrates are of a different opinion or but so much as tolerate such a one their Lives and their Kingdoms are never in safety But Henry the Fourth found the Protestant Religion wholly establish'd in the Kingdom when he came to the Crown Besides he who had so long profess'd it knew perfectly well that it had none of those dreadful Maxims which makes Princes and States jealous that on the contrary in it Loyalty and Obedience of Subjects to Soveraigns of what Religion and what humor soever was to them an Article of Faith and an obligation of Conscience He knew that Protestants by their Religion were peaceable men who sought but to serve God according to his Word and were always ready to spend the last drop of their blood for the service and the honor of their King But he knew also that the zeal of the Romish Clergy always animated the Popish Common People against them and that they would be sure to fall upon them unless he took them into his protection The Law of Nature then did not permit him to abandon to the rage of the multitude so many innocent persons and common policy warned him to preserve so many faithful Subjects for the State so capable of supporting it on occasion as he had so freshly experienc'd It being certain that had it not been for them the Pope and the Ligue had ruin'd the whole Kingdom But it was not possible either to defend them from the fury of the People or to preserve them for the service of the State if he had granted in favour of them any thing less than the Edict of Nantes so that this Edict in truth was to be ascribed to common Equity and Prudence no less than Gratitude But said I to my Friend do you believe that the Grandson of Henry the Fourth is bound to make good what his Grandfather did I do not doubt it at all answered he otherwise there would be nothing secure or certain in Civil Society and wo be to all Governments if there be no Foundation of publick Trust. 1. For if ever Law deserv'd to be regarded by the Successors of a Prince it is this It was establish'd by a Hero who had recovered the Crown for his posterity by his Sword and this Establishment was not made but after mature and long deliberations in the calm of a prosound Peace obtained and cemented by many and signal Victories That Hero hath declar'd expresly in the Preface of the Edict that he establish'd it in the nature of an irrevocable and perpetual Law willing that it should be firm and inviolable as he also saith himself in the 90th Article Accordingly he made all the Formalities to be observed in its establishment which are necessary for the passing of a fundamental Law in a State For he made the observation of it under the quality of an irrevocable Law to be sworn to by all the Governors and Lieutenant-Generals of his Provinces by the Bailiffs Mayors and other ordinary Judges and principal Inhabitants of the Cities of each Religion by the Majors Sheriffs Consuls and Jurates by the Parliaments Chambers of Accounts Court of Aids with order to have it publish'd and registred in all the said Courts This is expresly set down in the 92d and 93d Articles Was there ever any thing more authentick 2. The same Reasons which caused the Establishment remain still and plead for its continuance 1. The Family of Bourbon preserved in the Throne 2. The Law of Nature and common Policy 3. The two Successors of Henry the Fourth look'd not upon themselves as unconcern'd in this Edict Their Word and their Royal Authority are engaged for its observation no less than the Word and Royal Authority of its Illustrious Author Lewis the Thirteenth confirm'd it as soon as he came to the Crown by his Declaration of the 22d of May 1610 ordering that the Edict of Nantes should be observed in every Point and Article These are the very words Read them said he shewing me a Book in Folio called The Great Conference of the Royal Ordinances and Edicts I read there in the first Book Title 6 of the second Part of the Volume not only the Article he mention'd but also the citation of nine several Declarations publish'd at several times by the same King on the same subject Lewis the Fourteenth who now Reigns says our Friend hath likewise assured all Europe by his authentick Edicts and Declarations that he would maintain the Edict of Nantes according to the desire of his Grandfather who had made it an irrevocable Law He himself acknowledges and confirms it himself anew by his Edict of Iune 1680 where he forbids Papists to change their Religion There it is pray take the pains to read it Lewis by the Grace of God King of France and Navarre to all persons to whom these Presents come Greeting The late Henry the Fourth our Grandfather of Glorious Memory granted by his Edict given at Nantes in the Month of April 1598 to all his Subjects of the Religion pretended Reformed who then lived in his Kingdom or who afterwards should come and settle in it Liberty of professing their Religion and at the same time provided whatsoever he judged necessary for affording those of the said Religion pretended Reformed means of living in our Kingdom in the Exercise of their Religion without being molested in it by our Catholick Subjects which the late King our most Honored Lord and Father and we since have authorised and confirmed on other Occasions by divers Declarations and Acts. But this Prince is not content to tell what he hath formerly done in confirmation of the Edict of Nantes read some Lines a little lower
of our blessed Martyr King Charles the first Their famous Amyraldus likewise took occasion from the Martyrdom of our good King to Print an excellent Discourse of the Power of Kings where by the strongest Arguments taken out of the Word of God he proves beyond dispute That the Majesty and Person of Sovereign Princes ought at all times to be Sacred to all their Subjects We have likewise to the same purpose the Letter of their learned Bochart to Doctor Morley then Chaplain to His Majesty and now most deservedly Bishop of Winchester You may see there how this excellent person defends the Rights of all Crowned Heads He takes in there in the Compass of a few Pages the strongest things that can be said The force of all this is that the performance of these Protestants has exactly answered their Confession of Faith the Prayers of their Liturgy and what their Doctors have taught as often as there was occasion for it They have been always the first in assisting their Kings when there was need with their Lives and Fortunes Every Body knows how many mischiefs the Queen Catharine de Medicis did them Yet when the Guises had seized the person of Charles the Ninth who had nothing but Tears to oppose their violence as Mezeray well observes and that the Queen finding her self under the same streights with the young King had called for help upon the Prince of Condè and his Friends the Protestants came in from all parts and ventured all they had to set their Majesties at Liberty It is a remarkable Story Mezeray does all he can to diâ—guise the matter but so known a Truth could not but extort this confession from him The Queen writ two Letters the same day to the Prince full of pitty and good words recommending to him the safety of the Kingdom beseeching him to take compassion of the innocent tears of his King who was held captive by his own Subjects and that he would generously attempt his rescue aâ—suring him that he should be maintained in whatever he should do The same Historian confesses in his Chronological Abridgement That by these Letters the Queen who was then Regent gave to the Prince who was then a Protestant a just ground to take up Arms which he did so soon as he received the Order Then flew in like lightning to the assistance of the King and Queen the same Protestants that with so much rigour and violence had been persecuted by them He sent presently says Mâ—zeray to the Reformed Churches especially to those upon the River Loire to Bourges Poitiers and others more remote ordering them immediately to seize all the Passes and that for his part he was resolved to expose his person and all that was in his power to make good the Kings Commands and Revenge the injury done to his Majesty You have here Sir the true Cause of these Proteâ—â—ants first taking up Arms and as you see it was upon a glorious account For it was in short to succour their King whom stranger-stranger-Princes who aimed at his Crown as it appeared at last held Captive Besides all here was lawful They take not up Arms but by order of the Regent who promises the Head of the Protestants That he should be justified in all he did And she made her word good to him however the great credit his enemies had and the Queens inconstancy had for some time run down the credit of this glorious Action with the people For the King gave an authentick testimony of the Innocence and Loyalty of the Prince and his Friends upon this occasion It is by the solâ—mn Edict of 1563. where the King says That the sincere and true intent of our said Cousin the Prince of Conde may not be doubted we have said and declared and do say and declare That we esteem this our said Cousin as our good Kinsman faithful Subject and Servant as likewise We hold all those Lords Knights Gentlemen and other Inhabitants of Towns Communalties Boroughs and other Places of our Kingdoms and Countries of our Dominion that have followed assisted aided and accompanied him in this present War and during the said Tumults in what part or place soever of our Kingdom for our Good and Loyal Subjects and Servants believing and esteeming what was done before this by our sâ—id Subjects as well in regard of the taking up of Arms as the Articles of Justice agreed among them and the Judgments and Executions of the same was done with a good Intent and for our Service Henry the Third was their mortal Enemy He was the chief Author of that detestible Massacre where by the confession of the Bishop of Rhodes himself near a hundred thousand Protestants had their throats cut And yet all this did not hinder them from coming in to his assistance so soon as ever they saw his Crown and Life in danger They forgot that he had been their Persâ—cutor and remembred only that he was their King And all Europe knows that without their aid he had been lost He was shut up in Tours hard pressed by the Army of the Ligue which consisted as every one knows all of Roman Catholicks Already three parts in four of his party and those of the bravest as Mezeray assures us were slain and the Duke of Mayenne General of this Army of Parricides had made himself master of the Suburb when the Protestant recruits came This brave Captain says Mezeray speaking of Chastillon lodged his Men in the Isle in despite of their continual Firing upon him from every part of the Suburb and made them work so hard that they had covered themselves in less than two hours The Liguers so soon as they had discovered them and knew him by his face did well to cry To your Quarters White Scarfs this is none of your quarrel brave Chastillon we have no design against thee retreat it is against him that Murdred thy Father let us but alone and we will revenge his death adding several reproaches against the King more insolent than commonly upon such occasion Souldiers use to do Chastillon answered That he they spake so ill of was their King that it was for women to rail and that he would see the next day whether they were as good at fighting as they were at scolding But the Duke of Mayenne fearing to stand the shock of the Protestant Troops considering as Mezeray says That it might not be safe to encounter with old Souldiers that had been used to blows he quits all his advantages and marches silently away at three a clock in the morning Thus was Tours relieved and Henry the Third saved by the same Protestants to whom he had done so much mischief And by this the Protestants preserved the Crown to the Family of Bourbon fâ—om which it had been gone past recovery if Tours had been taken For indeed they that laid the siege and intended to dethrone their King were heads of that powerful Faction which as
of Conde in the Civil Wars during the minority of Lewis XIV I am confident the Papists would cry out against it as a great and foul Injustice done to their Church And yet why do they continually use the Protestants thus unreasonably I presume this may serve for a full Justification in reference to the Spirit of Rebellion imputed upon the account of what passed in the beginning of the Reign of Lewis XIII They cannot wrong them more than to make their Religion answerable for the weakness of some of them who were disapproved by the wisest among them who have more reason to be considered than a few who acted contrary to the Principles of the Protestant Religion as they are contained in their Confession of Faith established by their most eminent Divines as I shewed you at our third Conference So that I suppose Sir it will be needlâ—ss to run through all the several troubles which followed the first down to the year 1629. This may answer the whole Yet methinks said I you should not have done before you have said something particularly of Rochel It s Rebellion and Siege have made too great a noise in the World and perchance that which happened about this Town is what has raised the greatest cry against the French Protestants as Commonwealthsmen and Traytors Therefore I shall no more question their Loyalty and you will enable me to defend them sufficiently under the Reign of Lewis XIII as well as under those that went before if you can set me right in the excuse of Rochel It will be no hard matter for me says our Friend to satisfie you in this Point And we English are particularly obligâ—d to make out the innocence of the Protestants in this affair If any be to blame we are For it was we that engaged them in this last War But God be thanked they can charge us with nothing To make it the clearer to you we must take the Business a little higher Rochel did belong to the Kings of England being a part of their Dominion by the Marriage of Eleanor Countess of Poitou in the year 1152. with Henry II. when he was yet but Duke of Normandy But the King of France Lewis VIII assaulted and took it by force in the year 2224. It fell again into the hands of our Kings who were the rightful Lords of it in the year 1359. by the Peace of Bretegny as part of the Ransome for Iohn King of France who was taken Prisoner at the Battle of Poitiers by Edward Prince of Wales But in the year 1372. the Rochellers were so unhappy as to withdraw their Allgiance from their natural Lord our King Edward III. And to compleat their Revolt they put themselves under the powâ—r of the French King This occurrence ought to be observed though I shall say nothing of it but in Mezeray's own words This Town says he having shaken off the English Yoke desired to come under the French upon condition of preseâ—ving that liberty it had acquired by its own means And therefore it delivered it self up to the King it made so good a Bargain for it self which was agreed by Letters under the Broad Seal and the Seals of his Peers that the Castle should be demolished and that there never should be any within or near the Town c. The same Historian touches upon this in another place In consideration says he that Rochel came voluntarily into France the King Charles V. seeing that the Townsmen having of themselves quitted the Power they were under to the great hazard of their Lives could either continue free or give themselves up to whom they pleased granted them all the Priviledges they could dâ—â—â—re as That they might Coin Florins Mony of a mixt Metal 〈◊〉 the Castle should be demolished and that no other should be built in their Town And by other Letters he promises them that their Walls and Forts should stand and that he would raise none upon them He goes on with the other great Immunities that were granted to Rochel by this King and by his Successors not sticking to declare ingenuously that Henry II. and Francis I. by sometimes placing their Governors and Garisons had infringed their Priviledges He adds ' That the Rochellers looked upon this as a violation and always waited for a more favourable occasion to restore themselves to their original Right By this you see that Rochel did not deliver it self up to France but upon Conditions and so were to continue their Obedience no longer than the Articles stipulated by the Rochellers and accepted by the King of France were observed It appears that one of these Articles says expresly That they were never to build Castle or Fort either in or about the Town Notwithstanding contrary to this Agreement they raise a Fort before Rochel in time of the War which was in the Years 1621 1622. And though they promised by the Articles of Peace which were afterwards agreed upon that this Fort should be slighted yet it always continued which was the cause of those troubles that followed in the Years 1625 1626. the Rochellers being no longer obliged to keep touch with the King of France because he had broke the Treaty by vertue of which alone they became his Subjects The Affairs of Europe disposing the late King our Soveraign Lord Charles I. to interpose for a Pacification The Rochellers and such other Protestants of France as had engaged in their Quarrel agreed to refer all their Concerns to him And he obtained it for them a second time that this Fort which was so great an eye-sore to Rochel should be demolished for which he was Guarantee by an Authentick Declaration that his Embassadors gave in Writing I will read it to you We Henry Rich Baron of Kensington â—arl of Holland Captain of the Guards to the King of Great Britain Knight of the Order of the Garter and Counsellor of State and Dudley Carleton Knight Counsellor of State and Vicechamberlain of His Majesties Houshold Embassadors Extraordinary from His said Majesty to the Most Christian King To all present and to come Greeting It so falling out that Montmartin and Manial Deputies-General of the Reformed Churches of France and other particular Deputies of the Dukes of Rohan and Soubise with those of several Towns and Provinces who were engaged with them have made their Peace with the Most Christiaâ— King By our advice and interposition it is agreed and consented to 〈◊〉 the said King their Soveraign And the Deputies have released many things which they esteemed very important for their security and all conformable to their â—dicts and Declarations which they had express order to insist upon at the Treaty of Peace and which they had resolutely persisted in saving the obedience they owe and desire to pay their King and Soveraign and saving the respect and deference they would shew to the so express Summons and Demands of the most Serene King of Great Britain our Master in
and you will see that he repeats again his former Ingagements We declare that confirming as much as is or may be needful the Edict of Nantes and other Declarations and Acts given in pursuit of it c. That is to say That by this new Edict he signs once more the Edict of Nantes and for a more authentick confirmation of that important Law he ratifies together with it and seals with his Royal Seal all the Declarations which had already confirmed it If all this is not sufficient to render His Word Sacred and Inviolable there is nothing in the World can do it all things are lawful and it is to no purpose to talk of any Obligation or of any Bond in humane Society They cannot make void or break the Clauses of an Edict so well deserv'd by the Protestants so just and so wise in it self so solemnly establish'd so religiously sworn to and so often and so authentically confirm'd by three Kings without shaking all the Foundations of publick Security without violating in that Act the Law of Nations and silling the World with fatal Principles which by ruining all mutual Faith among men render Divisions in States incurable and consequently immortal Dear Sir said I I am much pleased with what you have inform'd me O how I shall dash them out of countenance who hereafter shall compare the condition of our Papists in England with that of the Protestants in France There is no sort of good usage but what is due to these in their own Country of which they have deserved so well by preserving that Family which now reigns there What have they not a right to hope for under the protection of an Edict so authentick But our Papists in England have they ever deserved a like protection Hath there ever been pass'd any Act of Parliament in favour of them like to this Edict On the contrary have not there been pass'd 1000 against them And not one but upon the provocation of some Sedition or open Rebellion You need but review the Fundamental Laws of the Land now in force against the Pope against the Jesuits Seminary Priests and in general against all the Papists There is decreed justly against them all the contrary that by the Edict of Nantes is promised to the Protestants You are much in the right said our Friend when you use the word justly on this occasion Princes and Protestant Magistrates cannot look upon nor by consequence treat Papists otherwise than as declared anâ— mortal Enemies of thâ—ir Persons and of their States They may disguise themselves as they please 〈◊〉 in truth every Papist is a man who takes the Pope to be the Soveraign Head of the Universal Church and believes that on that very account there is no Prince nor King nor Emperor who is not subject to his Censures even to Excommunication Now who knows not that it is a general Maxim of that Religion that they ought to treat all excommunicated persons as common Pests Upon this all Subjects are dispensed with from their Oaths of Allegiance to their Princes Kingdoms are laid under Interdicts and they are no way obliged to keep faith with Hereticks This is the original and damnable Cause of the many Conspiracies that have been made against the Sacred Lives of our Kings And if you will search our Histories you will find none of the forementioned Acts ever passed but upon some previous provocation given by the Papists Insolence or Rebellions of the Massacres in France and Ireland wherein they of Rome have so triumph'd and of the general consternation into which so lately our Nation was cast They would fain perswade us that these pernicious Maxims are peculiar to the Jesuits and some Monks But a little Treatise called The Disserence between the Church and Court of Rome proves undeniably that it is the judgment of all true Papists I could produce other invincible authority if this point were here to be proved There cannot then be too great caution against such persons whatever they pretend they do not design simply the exercise of that Belief which their Conscience dictates to them they grasp at the Power and aspire at Dominion they design whatever it cost them to have their Church reign once more here in England There is nothing they dare not attempt nothing they are not ready to act that they may compass it They are implacable Enemies who wait but for an opportunity to cut our Throats and we must needs be very senseless and stupid if after so many proofs as they have given us of their desperate malice we should repeal those Laws which tie up their hands You are much in the right I replyed but let us leave them for the present and return to our Protestants of France You have shewed me their Rights now let me understand their Grievances I am willing to do it said he but it is a little late and if you please being somewhat weary with my Journey we will defer it till to morrow I will expect you here in my Chamber at the same hour you came to day I told him with all my heart And as our Conversation ended there I think it not amiss to end my Letter also intending in another to let you know the present condition of those poor People I am your c LETTER II. I Did not fail to wait on my Friend at the appointed hour Sit down said he as soon as he saw me in the Chamber and let us lose no time in needless Ceremony I was just putting my Papers in order by which I would desire you to judge of the Protestants Complaints and the Reasons that have made them leave their Country But since you are here take them as they come to hand The first is a Verbal Process of the extraordinary Assembly of the Archbishops and Bishops held in the Province of the Arch-Bishop of Paris in the Months of March and May this 1681. It is a Piece which justifies a Truth that the World will hardly believe Namely That whereas the Protestants by Virtue of the Edict had the Exercise of their Religion almost every where they have it now scarce any where See the proof in the tenth Page of that Verbal Process where one of the Agents General of the Clergy of France alledgeth as so many publick Testimonies of the Piety of their King An almost Infinite Number of Churches demolish'd and the Exercise of the Religion pretended Reformed suppress'd I leave you to imagine what a consternation such a terrible Blow must have put those poor people into not to mention their Grief to see those Holy Places beaten down whose very Stones they took pleasure in instead of having the Heavenly Mannah shower down at the Doors of their Tabernacles at this present they are forc'd to go 30 or 40 miles through the worst of ways in the Winter to hear the Word of God and to have their Children baptized But let us go on to a
sight of several Proclamations That they ruine all the Protestants that are Taxable in France by a Secret they have found out to Tax the people at Will and then make one or more responsible for all the rest That they are barbarously cruel upon the least complaint of any thing that falls from them in the height of their misfortunes That they Demolish their best Established Temples upon the least pretence and that besides all this they condemn them to the Galleys if they offer to quit the Realm to serve God according to a good Conscience in any other Countrey with a Fine of a thousand Crowns for the first Fault and Corporal Punishment for the rest upon their Friends that shall any way countenance directly or indirectly their departure out of the Realm I have read the Proclamation and you may read it says our Friend when you please for it lies there upon my Table The strangest thing in it is that they glory of their pretended Conversions in Poitou and elsewhere as if they had been carried on with all the gentleness and Christian temper imaginable when all Europe knows they have used no other but carnal means and since I am provoked to say it the Devil's Weapons the allurement of Riches Promises of worldly Advantages Threats Force and a thousand unheard of Cruelties whereby they have brought the poor People to this hard choice either to turn Papist or perish by Hunger and ill usage And many times we see their Consciences will not suffer them to continue in that Communion they have been thus forced into for they come over by Flocks and the Prisons in France are full of these pretended Relaps But because you know all this already I proceed now says he to the Justification of our poor persecuted Brethren I am very well satisfied that this groundless Accusation as if they were Seditious Firebrands and Enemies to Monarchs and Monarchy has given them no prejudice with you If Accusation were enough to render guilty of this Crime Moses and Christ the old and new people of God had certainly lost their Cause The Enemy of Truth has ever made this his Charge against the Innocence of Gods Children Moses was accused for Seducing the people Elias for Troubling Israel Ieremiah That he did not pray for the Prosperity of this people but their mischief the People of God That they designed to revolt from the King of Persia Iesus Christ himself That he perverted the people and forbad to pay Tribute to Caesar and his Apostles That they were common Pests Movers of Sedition and that turned the World upside down You have read Turtullians Apologetick and Arnobius against the Gentiles You see there how the most innocent of the Primitive Christians and the meekest of Men were charged with the same Crime Our Protestants of France have no reason to expect other measure than that of their Saviour and the Saints departed since it is the same Religion they strive for And by the Grace of God we shall with as much ease acquit them of all those Imputations laid to their charge There is certainly no stronger Proof of what the Opinions of a Church are than the publick Declarations her self has made of her Principles by open Professions or Confessions of Faith these are authentick pieces composed with the approbation of the whole Body and published on purpose to declare to the World what in sincerity such a Church believes in matters of Religion The Protestant Church of France has not been wanting in this particular but has composed and published a Confession of Faith that all the World might be sure what really are her thoughts and belief And certainly without the highest injustice we cannot reject what she has thus made Protestation of Then I told our Friend you need not enlarge upon this point for no Man of sense will dispute this Principle with you Let us come to the Question I shall soon dispatch it says he I will read to you the two last Articles of our Protestants Confession of Faith We believe That God will have the World governed by Laws and Policies to the end there may be a restraint upon the inordinate Appetites of Men and for this end that he has appointed Kingdoms Commonwealths and all other sorts of Government Hereditary or otherwise and whatever appertains to the dispensation of Justice and that he himself will be acknowledged the Author of it For this cause he has put the Sword inâ—o the Magistrates Hand to punish Faults committed not only against the second Table but likewise against the first We ought therefore for God's sake not only to submit to the Government of Superiors but also to honour them and hold them in such regard as esteeming them his Lieutenants and Officers whom he has constituted to exercise a Lawful and Sacred Trust. We hold it therefore our Duty to obey their Laws and Statutes to pay Tributes Imposts and other Duties and to bear the Yoke of Subjection with a cheerful and good will be they Infidels provided the Sovereign Empire of God be kept entire Thus we detest those that would reject Authority put all things in common and overthrow the course of Justice Here you see the Confession of the Protestants of France where you find they make it a part of their Religion and Faith to believe that it is God who appoints Kingdoms Hereditary and others That we ought to Honour Princes and hold them in all Reverence as the Lieutenants and Officers of God to obey them to pay them Tribute to submit to them with a good will though they happen to be of another Religion than ours and they reject with horror all those that reject the Powers Can any thing be said stronger or with greater exactness Moreover these Protestants of France have a Liturgy a Form of Common-Prayers as well as our Church of England There it is that in the presence of God and speaking to God they do confirm by a publick Act of Worship all that they say of Kings and Potentates in their Confession of Faith After they have said to God We have thy Precept to pray for those whom thou hast set over us Superiors and Governors they add We Beseech thee therefore O heavenly Father for all Kings and Princes thy Servants to whom thou hast committed the dispensation of Iustice and particularly for the King c. If ever we ought to believe Mens words no doubt it is when they speak to God in the Act and fervor of their Devotion If a man be not wicked to the last degree or an Athiest he will then at least speak the thoughts of his Heart And upon such an account it is that the Protestants of France own in conformity to their Confession of Faith That it is God who has set Rulers over them to Govern That all Princes are the Servants of God That the Justice they dispence to men is that of God himself of which God
has committed to them the Administration or Rule And upon that score it is they pray to God for their own King and for all other Princes That he would give them his holy Spirit and all Graces requisite to well Governing Is this the stile of a seditious People Enemies to Monarchs and Monarchy Since therefore the Confession of Faith and form of Common-Prayer speaks the mind of the whole Body of the French Protestants it will be needless to quote the Sermons and Writings of their particular Ministers yet because I observe to my great grief there are many here cry down the incomparable Calvin as if in this point of obedience to Monarchs he were not very sound I must needs read to you what he has said upon that subject in his excellent Institution It is in his fourth Book Chap. 20. where after he has shewed Sect. 22 23 of this Chapter the Duty of Subjects towards Princes and Magistrates which he makes consist in having a profound Reverence for them to observe their Commands with a perfect submission to pay such Taxes and Rates as they put upon them to offer up Prayers and Thansgivings to God for their Prosperity and when he has there proved by Scripture That we cannot resist the Magistrate without resisting God who is prepared to defend them he considers Sect. 24. That there are many who fancy we owe not this respect and obedience but to good Princes and so may despise the wicked and shake off the yoke of Tyrants This Maxim he confutes as a most pernicious error in the following Sections of which I shall here give you a taste The Word of God obliges us to submit not only to the authority of Princes that use us well but in general to the Dominion of all those after whatever fashion that exercise Sovereign Power though they perform nothing less than the Duty of a Prince For however the Lord assures us that Magistrates are the Bounty of his Grace set up for the conservation of Men and that therefore he sets them bounds within which they ought to keep yet he declares at the same time that whatever they prove they hold their Power of him that they who seek the publick good in their Sovereign Administration are the lively Images of his Goodness that they which rule with violence and oppression were raised by him to the Throne for a Scourge to a sinful people but that the one and the other are equally invested with that Sacredness of Majesty which he has stamped upon the Forehead of all lawful Authorities I shall insist upon this point which the Spirit of the Multitude does not so easily conceive to wit that this admirable and Divine Authority that the Lord by his Word confers upon the Ministers of his Justice remains no lâ—ss with a Man that is never so wicked or unworthy of all honour if once he be raised to the Sovereign Power so that his Subjects ought no less to Reverence him in regard of Allegiance due to Sovereigns than if he were a good King First I would have it carefully observed the special Providence of God in bestowing Crowns and setting up Kings of which we are so often told in Scripture It is God says Daniel that removeth Kings and setteth up Kings And speaking elsewhere to Nebuchadnezzâ—r Thou shalt be says he to him wet with the Dew of Heaven till thou know that the most High Ruleth in the Kingdom of Men and giveth it to whomsoever he will We know well enough what a kind of King this Nâ—buchadnezzar was who took Ierusalem He was an Usurper and an accomplished Villain Nevertheless the Lord assures us in Ezekiel that he had given him Egypt as a Reward for the Service he had done him in the mischief he did to Tyre And Daniel says to the same King The God of Heaven has given thee a Kingdom Power and Strength and Glory and wheresoever thâ— Children of Men dwell the Beasts of the Field and the Fowls of the Heaven has he given into thine hand and hath made thee Ruler over them all He says also to Belshazzar this King's Son The most high God gave Nebuchadnezzar thy Father a Kingdom and Majesty and Glory and Honour and for the Majesty that he gave him all People Nations and Languages trembled and feared before him Whenever we find God has set up any man to be King let us call to mind the heavenly Oracles which appoint us to Honour and Fear the King and then we shall not fail to bear Respect even in the persons of Tyrants to this mighty Character wherewith God has been pleased to honour them Samuel telling the People of Israel what they were to suffer from their Kings uses these words This will be the manner or Right of the King that shall Reign over you He will take your Sons and will appoint them for himself for his Chariots and to be his Horse-men and some shall run before his Chariots And he will take your Daughters to be Confectionaries and to be Cooks and to be Bakers And he will take your Fields and your Vineyards and your Olive-yards even the best of them and give them to his Servants And he will take the tenth of your Seed and of your Vineyards and give to his Officers and to his Servants And he will take your Men-servants and your Maid-servants and your goodliest Young-men and your Asses and put them to his Work He will take the tenth of your Sheep and ye shall be his Servants Doubtless Kings have no Right to deal thus those that the Law so carefully directs to Moderation and Temperance But Samuel calls this the Right of the King over the People because the People are under an indispensable Obligation to submit and are not allowed to resist as if the Prophet had explain'd himself after this manner The mismanagement of Kings shall come to this height and you shall have no right to oppose it your part must be to take their Commands and to obey them Calvin after this produces a long passage out of Ieremiah where great punishments are denounced against all those that would not submit to the Government of Nebuchâ—dnezzar who originally was but an Usurper as wel as a Tyrant And he concludes that we ought to reject these seditious thoughts That a King ought to be handled as he deserves and that there is no reason we should behave our selves as Subjects towards him if he carries not himself like a King towards us After which he most substantially answers the Objections which unquiet Spirits are used to make against this Doctrine And now I leave it to reasonable Men to judge whether it be not the greatest Injustice to this excellent Person to declare to the World That he was an Enemy to Kings They that followed him have after his example all taken the same side upon this subject No doubt you have read what their great Salmasius has writ in defence
the Bishop of Rhodes testifies would have broken the succession of the Royal Line And the General of the Army was own Brother to the Duke of Guise who as the same Bishop tells us designed the Crown for himself As for King Henry the Fourth Grand-father to our King as well as to the present King of France there is no man that understands the least of those Histories but knows it was his faithful Protestants that preserved him for the Throne and set the Crown upon his Head The Bishop of Rhodes acknowledges That this Great Prince had been bred up from his Birth among the Huguenot party and that they were his best support And indeed they expended their blood more than once to save his against the rage of the Ligue and the ambition of the Lorain Princes who would have usurped his right So soon as ever Henry the Third his Predecessor assassinated by the Fryar Iaques Clement was dead they did not do as Papists that were then in his Army For whereas these for the most part fell into Cabals and gave him a thousand troubles by their Seditious Resolutions which tended either to exclude him from the Succession or tear the Government in pieces the Protestants kept steady they immediately owned him for their King The Huguenot Nobility with the Forces they had brought which were all Protestants swore Allegiance to him presently They are the very words of the Bishop of Rhodes And when unhappily which cannot be enough lamented he forsook their Religion fearing the Papists should choose another King in his stead their Fidelity failed them not for all that they maintained his Cause with the same zeal whil'st divers â—apists continued to keep his Garrisons from him and armed several Assassins to take away his Life Peter Barriere says Mezeray had designed to kill the King because he heard some of the Clergy say That it would be an exploit worthy eternal praise and that would carry a man straight to Heaven When he was come to Lions with this resolution the same Popish Historian adds He communicated it to the Archbishops Vicar General to a Capucin Frâ—ar and to two other Priests who all approved of it and encouraged him to do it Mezeray tells us afterwards That Barriere having a little demurred upon the Kings having forsaken the Protestant Religion Christopher d' Aubry Curat of S. Andrè des Arces and Varade Rector of the Jesuits heartened him by their advice to pursue his Hellish Design of stabbing the King You know the story of Iohn Chastel one of the Jesuits Scholars to the same purpose how he wounded the King in the mouth with the stab of a Knife which he intended for his throat It is well known what share the Jesuits had in this attempt This young Desperate confessed that he heard them say That it was lawful to kill the King There were found in their Colledge several Pieces full of Invectives and most pernicious Propositions against the Honor and Life of Henry the Third and Henry the Fourth his Successor then Reigning The famous Act of Parliament at Paris has eternized the Memory of this Execrable Attempt It Ordains That all the Priests and Scholars of the Colledge of Clermont and all others that stiled themselves of the Society of Jâ—sus should quit the Kingdom in fifteen days as corrupters of Youth disturbers of the publick Peace and Enemies to the King and Kingdom Which was done accordingly And it is fit I should tell you upon this how Cardinal d'Ossat bemoaned their loss by reason of the apparent advantage the poor Protestants had by it You may see it in the eighth Letter of his first Book these are his words It must needs give a Prince converted to the Catholick Religion whom we should have comforted and confirmed by all means possible great offence and prejudice against Catholicks when they that boast themselves the Pillars of the Catholick Religion have thus endeavoured to get him Murdered Whereas if there had been any pretence for Assassinates it should have been the Hereticks that should have procured it and seen it done because he had quitted and forsaken them and they had reason to apprehend him And yet they have attempted no such thing either against Him or any of the five Kings his Predecessors whatever slaughter their Majesties made amongst them You have here at once an authentick Witness of the exact Loyalty of the Protestants of France to their Soveraign how violâ—nt soever the Soveraign might have been and a dreadful warning for all Princes to consider the Spirit of Popery perpetually engaged in Murder and ready to spill the most Sacred Blood if they think it runs cross to their interest The death of this Great Prince Henry the Fourth is a precedent enough to make the heart of any Prince ake that is so unhappy as to have in his Dominion or near his Person these sort of common pests It was to much purpose to profess the Romish Religion while these Monsters out of a suspicion perhaps that his heart was not Roman enough never rested till they had pierced it by the hand of that abominable Villain Ravilliac who had been a Monk as the Bishop of Rhodes assures us And what he says of the hardiness of this wicked Fellow to suffer all without speaking a word plainly shews us who were those Devils and Furies that Inspired him with such cursed Thoughts He was taken in the very Fact says the Bishop of Rhodes after he has given an account of the Crime of Ravilliac being Interrogated several times by the Commissioners of Parliament condemned the Courts met and by Sentence torn between four Horses in the place of Execution after they had tormented him with hot burning pincers in the Breast Arms and Thighs without discoveâ—ing the least fear or grief in the midst of so great Torment which confirmed the mistrust they had that certain Emissâ—ries under pretence of Zeal had instructed and charmed him by false assurances that he should die a Martyr if he kill'd him whom they made believe to be a sworn enemy of the Church But I should not make an end this day if I were to take notice of all the Stories of the malice and fury of the Papists against such Princes as have not had the happiness to please them and give you all the proofs of the affection and untainted Loyalty of the Protestants for their Kings how little secure soever they have been to them However said I to our Friend do not conclude before you have quitted the Subjects from that suspicion which the proceedings of the present King of France has â—aised every where of the innocence of this poor people For according to the manner he has treated them within his Kingdom he must needs look upon them rather as his Enemies than his Subjects Must there not have been some failure on thâ—ir part and that they have entred into some conspiracy or are revolted
mean no more by this their exception than what all Mankind ought to think in this matter if they have the fear of God before their eyes viz. That as God is King of Kings and by consequence to whom our Princes and we owe an indispensible Obedience without any reserve we must never admit of a dispute between the one and the other to obey the Orders of the Prince when they are contrary to those of God Provided the Soveraignty of God be kept inviolable that is to the end we diminish not the Soveraign power of God but that God be always owned for the King of all Kings it is absolutely necessary that in such a contrariety between his orders and that of the Prince we prefer his without any manner of hesitation To do otherwise would be to place the Prince in God's stead and so make an Idol of him This is all the Protestants would say But then I asked our Friend what would they have the Subjects do upon such occasions especially if Princes proceed to violence and punishing thereby to make themselves be obeyed with preference to God Methinks says he they explain themselves clearly enough when they say We ought to bear the yoke of subjection with a chearful and good will though our Princes were Infidels For an Infidel Prince signifies here a Prince that in his Laws and in his practice is opposite to the appointments of God is an eneâ—y and so a persecutor of the true Religion whenever he has a fair opportunity and is so disposed To say then as do the Protestants in their Confession of Faith that although Princes were Infidels we ought to bear the yoke of subjection is it not to declare it to be the duty of subjects to suffer quietly whatever their Prince pleases to inflict upon them Indeed they do not mean that we should execâ—te the commands of Princes when they are contrary to the commands of God but on the other side they are not for casting off their Allegiance upon pretence that their Prince does not herein do his duty and is unjustly sâ—vere to them Whence it is plain from the Doctrine of the French Protestants that Christian Subjects upon these unhappy occasions ought to continue alike faithful to their God and to their Prince to their God in being careful to observe his Statutes in the midst of all the threats and outrages of men to their Prince by suffering with all humility and Christian patience whatever is imposed upon them either to torture their Conscience or force them to renounce their holy Religion Their worthy Calvin makes it evident that this was his opinion when from what the Scripture ordains to honor and â—ear the King he concludes that Christians are obliged to reverence even in the person of a Tyrant the mighty Character with which it hath pleased God to honor Crowned Heads For a Tyrant is an unjust and cruel Prince who thirsts after the Blood of his people and is always invading their Goods or Life or good Name Therefore when Calvin teaches that Christians ought to pay respect even in the person of these sort of Princes this mighty Character with which it hath pleased God to honor Kings it shews plainly that in his judgment whatever wrong or oppression a Prince commits upon his Subjects they remain always under an indispensible obligation of being subject to his Scepter so far from ever having a right to take up Arms to depose him or to set force against force It is the same which Mâ—ses Amyraldus that famous Protestant of Saumur proves at large in his Discourse of the power of Kings upon the occasion of those unhappy Troubles which had so fatal an end and so reproachful to the Nation He mâ—kes it appear by undeniable proofs that nothing can be more pernicious to mankind more against the Word of God nor more opposite to the practice of Jesus Christ that of his Apostles the behaviour of the Primitive Christians and the very genius of Christianity than to assert a right for subjects to take up Arms against their King upon any pretence or ground whatever And it will not be amiss that I thereupon read to you a passage or two out of the Letter of the learned Bochart Minister of Caën to Doctor Morley Bishop of Winchester If one had any right to arraign a King says he why not Saul who had twice revolted from God who had slain with the edge of the sword a whole Town of the Priests of the Lord who had taken away Davids wife by force and given her to another and sought his innocent life after so many eminent Services done the State by this young Prince and who could pretend more to it than David who was appointed by God anointed and consecrated to the Government of Israel Yet David who was a Prophet and a man after Gods own heart was of another mind as we are assured by Holy Writ Saul seeking him in the desarts went alone into a Caâ— where David lay hid who finding him in such a condition might as â—asily have killed him as Macrinus did Carcalla Nay one would think he ought not to have omitted so fair an occasion of ridding himself of his enemy especially when he was in a manner constrained to it by his own Souldiers who minded him of the Prophetick Promise God had made him to deliver his Enemy into his hand But he calmly disswades them by a sober reply to attempt nothing against Saul The Lord forbid says he that I should do this thing to my master the Lords anointed to stretch forth my hand against him seeing he is the anointed of the Lord that is to say A man that God has set apart for so Sacred and Divine a Charge if he make ill use of it as did Saul and such like nevertheless as he is a King he ought to be exempt from all Civil Punishment and left to the judgment of the last day In another place this Learned Person lays down for a Maxim That against the oppression of a King there is no humane remedy He maintains likewise That when Kings abuse their Power and treat ill their Subjects all ought to be remitted to Gods Iudgment-seat and in the mean time to have recourse to our Tears and Prayers which are saith he the weapons of a true Christian. Thus the Author of the Books called Les derniers efforts de Pinnocence assligè the last attempts of persecuted innocence who is a French Protestant very well known to the World and my particular Friend takes it for a Religious Principle and that which bears the Charactâ—r of the ancient Christian Moral That the King is Master of the exteriour part of Religion that if he will suffer none but his own if we cannot conform we ought to die without resistance because the true Religion is not to employ the Arm of Flesh to establish it in a flourishing condition That Princes become very guilty when they oppose
little of Christianity She was an ambitious Queen who by a wicked Policy would govern at any rate even to the sacrificing Religion it self She did not deal faithfully with the Huguenots when she made the Peace with them Her only design was to deceive them It was she that put the King upon that barbarous resolution which was executed upon that bloody and accursed day of St. Bartholomew He sets out Charles the Ninth as a Son worthy of such a Mother This Prince was of an impetuous humour Cholerick Revengeful and very Cruel which proceeded from his dark Melancholy temper and from his wicked Education He was so good a Proficient in what his Mother taught him who was a Woman the best skilled of any in her time in the Art of Dissimulation and deceiving people that he made it appear he had outdone her in her own Craft What was it he did not do for two years together to deceive the poor Admiral He expressed the greatest value and love for him imaginable Embraced him kissed him called him his Father And yet so soon as ever they advised him to dispatch him out of hand He stood up in the greatest rage and swore by God according to his wicked custom Ay I will have him dispatched nay I will have all the Huguenots destroyed that not a man remain to reproach me hereafter with his death They hung the Body of the Admiral by the heels upon the Gibbet of Mount-Faucon lighting a Fire underneath to make him a more frightful spectacle It was so miserable a sight that Charles the King would needs see his Enemy thus dead which certainly was an act altogether unworthy I will not say of a King but of a man of any Birth to such a degree had this Spirit of hatred revenge and cruelty which he had learn'd of his Mother prevailed upon him As for Henry the Third another mortal Enemy to the Protestants Monsieur Maimbourg sets him out as the falsest and most unnatural of Mankind The Sieur Aubery du Maurier says he tells us in the Preface of his Memoirs that he has heard his Father say that he had it from the mouth of Monsieur de Vellievre that at the same time he shewed large Instructions to oblige him earnestly to intercede for the Life of Mary Queen of Scots he had private ones quite contrary from the hand of Henry the Third to advise Queen Elizabeth to put to death that common Enemy to their Persons and Kingdoms And could there be a stranger cruelty than what he makes this Prince guilty of when as yet he was only Duke d'Anjou The Prince of Condè after he had defended himself a long time most bravely at the Battle of Iarnac was forced at last to yield up himself Two Gentlemen received his Sword with all manner of respect But the Baron of Montesquiou Captain of Monsier's Swiss Guards being come up whil'st this was doing and finding by them that it was the Prince of Condè Kill him kill him says he and with a great Oath discharged his Pistol at his Head and shot him dead at the stump of a Tree where he leant It was an action doubtless no ways to be excused especially in a French Man who ought to have had respect and spared the Royal Blood had it been in the heat of the Battle much more in cold Blood They say this was done by the express command of the Duke d'Anjou He says of the Duke of Montpensier an irreconcilable enemy to the Huguenots that he would give them no Quarter that he always talked of hanging them that all he took prisoners he put to death presently without mercy that he said to that brave and wise la Noüe who came to surrender himself Prisoner of War My Friend you are a Huguenot your Sentence is passed Prepare for death that the day of the Massacre this bigotted Catholick went through the Streets with the Marshal de Tavannes encouraging the People that were but too forward of themselves and provoking them to fall upon every body and spare none He makes the Cardinal of Lorrain that great Champion for Popery to be Author of a sordid and cruel proceeding He says of the Duke of Guise whom the Catholicks looked upon as the invincible Defender of their Faith that indeed he did service to the Religion but that he likewise made it serve his turn and to invest him with that almost Regal Power which in the end prov'd so fatal to him Now a Subject that makes Religion a step to mount him into his Princes Throne and take away his Crown can he be otherwise esteemed than as a prophane and wicked man Speaking of the Ligue which as he says had for the chief Actors Philip the Second Queen Katharine and the Duke of Guise the great supporters of the Pope That it had like to have destroyed Church and State at once and that the greatest part of those that ran headlong in with that heat and passion and chiefly the People the Clergy and the Fryars were but the stales of such as made up this Cabal where Ambition Revenge and Interest took more place than Religion which was used but for a shew to cheat the World At last he represents the Court of Charles the Ninth which had been that of Francis the Second and was afterwards that of Henry the Third as a pack of Miscreants and Atheists The Court says he was at that time very corrupt where there was no difference hardly between a Catholick and a Huguenot but that the one went not to Mass nor the other to Sermon As for any thing else they agreed well enough for as much as the one and the other at least generally speaking had no Religion at all profane without the fear of God And yet it was from this Court as from a deadly Spring that flowed all the Persecutions which the Protestants suffered under the Reigns of three of their Kings And Monsieur Maimbourg is very pleasant when he makes it up of Huguenots as well as Papists All the World knows that the Huguenots were banished from the Court of Charles the Ninth so that all he says of this Court can light upon none but the Papists who alone were admitted at that time You are in the right says our Friend and it will do well to finish the draught Monsieur Maimbourg has given us of this Court that I read to you what the Bishop of Rhodes writes of it in his History of Henry the Fourth There never was one more vitious and corrupt Wickedness Atheism Magick the most enormous uncleanness the fowlest treacheries perfidiousness poysoning and murder predominated to the highest pitch But I beseech you Sir says he tell me what you would infer from these words of Monsieur Maimbourg that gives such Encomium's to the same Protestants whom he would seem at the same time to cry down with all
his might and makes such heavy Reflections upon those same Roman Catholicks whom he makes the Pillars of his Church and the greatest enemies to the Protestant Relâ—gion I make no doubt replyed I but I draw the same Consequences from hence as â—ou do that Monsieur Maimboâ—rg plainly shews by this that he ought noâ— to be believed when elsewhere he charges so many faults upon thâ— first Protestants of France and imputes all the great Exploits to their enemies the Papists and that the true Protestants or the good Huguenots being so pious and having the fear of God before their eyes for which he commâ—nds them could not be the causes of Disorders though very likely their Adversaries might have been whom the Historian represents as the most wicked ambitious ungodly and cruel of men By this he likewise convinces us that his Book ought not to be regarded and that we ought not to look upon his accusations against that which he calls Calvinism otherwise then as railing and aspersions invented at will to make way for his better reception at Court or some other by end that is not worth enquiring after It is that which prejudices his Book with all Ingenious Persons and renders it unworthy the least consideration Yet since the enemies of the French Protestants make such a noise with it let me intreat you Sir to clear the matters of Fact to me which he produces with so much confidence to raise a jealousie in Princes upon these poor Men as if they were the Authors of those Troubles and Disorders in the last Age which came within a very little of ruining France First he charges their Religion with being a mortal enemy to Monarchy I confess you have made the contrary appear beyond dispute in our former Conference But he lays his Charge upon matters of Fact whereof I have not knowledge enough to clear the Objections One shall hardly see says he more dreadful Conspiracies than those which the Huguenots have made against our Kings For instance that cruel business of Amboise and that of Meaux not to mention their terrible Rebellions which have cost France so much Blood and the unhappy Intelligences they have held with the enemy to withdraw themselves from their Allegiance and set up openly for a Commonwealth as they have done more than once I beg of you to give me all the light you can to deliver Innocence from so black an Aspersion With all my heart says our Friend and besides when I have taken off this reproach I promise to make it as clear as the Sun at Noon-day that they are Father Maimbourgs Catholicks who are guilty of all these desperate Conspiracies against the persons of Kings which he so unjustly and fasly lays to the Protestants His first proof of the dreadful Conspiracies of the Huguenots against that of their Kings is the business of Amboise and Meaux But before I enter into Particulars I set against him an unexceptionable Witness who openly declares That the Huguenots entred not into any Conspiracy against their Kings in either of those places My Witness is one of the same Religion with Monsieur Maimbourg and what is more a Cardinal and one so knowing and of so extraordinary worth that Monsieur Sainte-marthe is not afraid to stile him The Flower of the Colledge of Cardinals the Light of France and the New Star of his Age Sacrati ordinis aureum Florem Ocellum nostrae Galliae sui denique seculi novum Sidus He had over and above this advantage of Monsieur Maimbourg that he lived in the time of the businesses of Amboise and of Meaux He was above twenty years old at the time of the â—irst and he was too exact and too knowing not to have throughly examined the Causes and Motives of two Occurrences that made such a noise all over Europe You shall hear what he says in his eighth Letter of the â—irst Book upon the occasion of an attempt against the Life of Henry the Fourth You had it already but I cannot forbear reading it again to you for it deserves to be writ in Letters of Gold upon the Front of all the French Kings Palaces To a Prince turned Catholick who should have been encouraged and confirmed by all means possible it was to give him great offence and distaste at the Catholicks when they that call themselves the support of the Catholick Religion should go about to have him Assassinated that which if there were any pretence for the Hereticks ought to have procured or done it themselves because he had quitted and forsaken them and they had therefore reason to fear him and yet they attempted no such thing either against him or any of the five Kings his Predecessors whatever Butchery they had made among them These remarkable words And yet they attempted no such thing either against him or any of the five Kings his Predecessors are a manifest confutation of all that Monsieur Maimbourg's Libel sets forth against the Loyalty of the French Protestants from the beginning of the Reformation which was under Francis the first to the Reign of Henry the fourth The businesses of Amboise and of Meaux happened the one under Francis the second the other under Charles the ninth two of the five Kings Predecessors to Henry the fourth of whom Cardinal d'Ossaâ— speaks Assuring us therefore as he does That the Protestants never attempted any thing against the life of these five Kings he positively denies what Monsieur Maimbourg asserts That in 〈◊〉 two affairs the Huguenots had entred into terrible Conspiracies against their Kings Now in the presence of God which of these two ought we rather to give credit to the Cardinal a man of an unspotted Reputation and who was an Eye-witness of these two passages now in dispute or Monsieur Maimbourg who writ his Libel sixscore years after the business of Meaux and whom the Pope himself has turned out of the Jesuites Order for an untoward reason For every body knows it was for being detected of falsehood in his Writings that the Pope put this high Affront upon him But to come to our present purpose and to be short we will stick to the account Monsieur Maimbourg himself gives of that he calls the business of Amboise This is that he says That at a very close meeting at la Fertè sous Ioûare they determined a high point of Conscience by the advice of Divines Canonists and Lawyers who all agreed That during the present State of affairs men might take up Arms to seize in any manner the Duke of Guise and the Cardinal of Lorrain his Brother to bring them to Tryal provided a Prince of the Blood who is in this case a lawful Magistrate would head the Party That all this having been allowed of by a general Consent the Prince of Condé resolved to head them upon condition that they attempted nothing against the King and the Royal Family nor against the State That
to carry on this attempt under the Authority of the Prince they chose La Renaudie a Gentleman of Perigord That he contrived a meeting of a considerable number of Gentlemen and other Deputies at Nantes That after he had discovered to this Meeting what had been concluded at La Fertè he told them that the concealed Head of this Party was the Prince of Condè who had made him his Lieutenant That it was agreed that five hundred Gentlemen and a thousand Foot under thirty chosen Captains should upon the tenth of March meet from several Quarters at Blois at which time the Court was to be there and pretending to present a Petition to the King should secure his Apartment that they might effect their designs upon the Guises That the Guises having discovered this immediately removed the Court to Amboise That La Renaudie who was resolved to do that at Amboise which he could not now do at Blois was betrayed by one he trusted That by this means they apprehended most of his Associates without much trouble That they hanged a great many presently without the form of a Tryal That they cast some into the River That they hanged up the Body of La Renaudie who was slain and afterwards cut it into Quarters That the chief of his Captains were Beheaded after they had all confessed That three of their Captains who came last and had attacked the Castle were cut to pieces This was the end of that attempt After this general account Monsieur Maimbourg comes to the Prince in particular and this he says As to the Prince of Condè when the King reproached him for attempting against his Person and against the State he justified himself like a great Man and suitable to his high Courage for in presence of all the great ones at Court that were then by and before the King the Queens and Royal Family he gave the Lie to as many as should dare to say that he headed those that had attempted the King's Sacred Person or his State profering to lay aside the consideration of his being Prince of the Blood and maintain that Challenge in single Combate but no body took him up This he might do questionless with all Justice it being certain that he was resolved the first Article of the Consult at La Fertè should be That they should attempt nothing against the King's Majesty nor against the State Mezeray adds something here that is too remarkable to be passed by The Prince after he had profered To justifie his Innocence against his Accusers by Sword or Lance said That he assured himself he should make them confess that they themselves were the persons who had sworn the subversion of the State and Royal Family He had no sooner done speaking says this Popish Historian but the Duke of Guise seeming not to take it to himself addressed to him and told him That it was not to be endured so foul a Charge should be laid upon so great a Prince and offered to be his Second if there could be any so audacious as to maintain these false Accusations It appears by what Monsieur Maimbourg sets down and asserts That the design of that business of Amboise was only to seize the Duke of Guise and the Cardinal of Lorrain to bring them to their Tryal That it was resolved at the undertaking of this business That they would attempt nothing against the King the Royal Family or the State That indeed the Prince of Condè did not attempt any thing against the Kings Majesty or State in this business of Amboise When therefore Monsieur Maimbourg so shamefully contradicting himself dares say in another place That you shall hardly meet with a more desperate Conspiracy than that of the Huguenots against their King in the business of Amboise What can he pass for less in the sense of all honest men than an infamous Libeller Against the testimony of his own conscience against what himself had writ and avowed does he lay a heavy accusation upon the Innocent and all this in hopes to afflict the afflicted and to shut up the Bowels of their Brethren in Foreign Parts from taking compassion of the poor French Protestants who are so terribly persecuted in their own Countrey He would make all the World jealous of them that they might no where find reception but be reduced wherever they go to dye with Hunger and Affliction You see what a worthy Wight this Author proves that they make such a do about amongst Persons of Quality to prejudice them against their poor Brethren For we must not think that the argument he makes in his Recital to perswade us That to attack the Guises was to fall upon the King can excuse him from contradiction and calumny in this particular They are not groundless proofs that will justifie an accusation of this weight especially when it has been acknowledged that the persons accused designed neither against King nor State but only against the Guises There never was any thing says he so heinous as this Plot. For to seek to possess themselves of the King's Appartment to seize his principal Ministers and kill them before his face as Captain Mazeres who with others undertook the bloody execution attests Is it not to set upon the King himself and to seek to make themselves Masters of his Person and Government I shall not trouble my self to take off what he says of the Confession of Captain Mazeres Mezeray observes expresly in his Chronological Abridgment That the brave and wise Castelno when he was confronted sufficiently reproved this Captain and the famous Monsieur de Thou has the same passage in his History Monsieur Maimbourg himself acknowledges That the result of this meeting was not to kill the Guises but only to apprehend them that they might be brought to Tryal by the ordinary course of Justice These are the very words of their resolution as Mezeray reports them That whilst the King by reason of the tenderness of his years and the Artifices of those that had shut him up to themselves could neither foresee nor prevent the danger his Persâ—â— and Government were in they ought to seize upon the Duke of Guise and the Cardinal his Brother to bring them to Iustice before the States As to what Monsieur Maimbourg pretends that to endeavour to secure the Kings Appartment by force and in his presence to seize his principal Ministers is to seize the King himself and endeavour to become master of his Person and Government I say his pretence is unjust and very rash in regard of those extraordinary Circumstances France was then under 1. Francis the Second who then reigned was very young and Monsieur Maimbourg who calls him so often The little King Francis gives him no very advantageous Character 2. The Duke of Guise and the Cardinal of Lorrain who were strangers having become masters of the Person and Government of this young Prince played
the Tyrant so as to make the whole Kingdom despâ—rate and then they had put all the Princes of the Blood from having any thing to do with the Government the Children of the houâ—e whose chiefest Interest it was to preserve King and State 3. This Illustrious Prince of Condè whom Mezeray represents to us of so sweet a temper and great a courage sincere and loyal an enemy to all tricks and cheats and detesting to do an ill thing and who for this reason cannot be suspected in this matter had got the Informations to be drawn by men of known unblemished reputation concerning the behavior of the Guises by which Information he had made it appear that they were guilty not only of many Oppressions Violences but had moreover a design to extinguish the Royal Line that they might possess themselves of the Crown having already got into their hands the Justice the Money the Garrisons the Souldiers and the hearts of the common people 4. Indeed the Guises declared publickly that Provence and Anjou belonged to them and it was a thing commonly known that they set men to work who were versed in History to find out their Genealogy in the Line of Charles the Great on purpose to challenge their right of Succession against the Descendants of Hugh Capet of which Francis the Second then Reigning was one as is likewise Lewis the Fourteenth who now Reigns It was because the Protestants opposed this design and that the business of Amboise as well as other contests which they had afterwards with the Guise Faction down to the Reign of Henry the Fourth were to no other end but to preserve the Crown to the posterity of Hugh Capet it was I say for this cause that the Protestants were called Huguenots from the name of Hugh Mezeray observes very well that this was always esteemed by them to be the original of this Appellation But they says he took this name for an honor giving it another sense as if they had been the Preservers of the Line of Hugh Capet whom they said the Guises intended to destroy that they might restore the Crown to the Posterity of Charlemayn of whose Issue they boast themselves to be A great man of the Popish Religion has made it appear that this is the only probable Etimology of the Name So that far from the Protestants of France taking it as a reproach they ought to be proud of it as a lasting Work of their inviolable Loyalty to their Kings and their glorious oppositions they made against the attempts of the Guises who aimed at the Crown 5. Besides that we have the Word of such a Prince as the most Renowned Prince of Condè who asserted it more than once in great Assemblies the whole Conduct of the Duke of Guise makes it evident what detestable Design this ambitious Family had When he had got Francis the Second into his hands He took upon him says Mezeray to equal himself with the Princes of the Blood and to give orders in the Military Affairs and the Cardinal his Brother to direct the Treasury whereas the ancient Laws of the Realm as the same Historian has very well observed Ordain That the Blood Royal shall have the preference before 〈◊〉 in matters of Government They had in a short time made a way for themselves to the Soveraign Power as Mezeray adds speaking of the Duke and the Cardinal and possessed themselves of all Charges and Places of Trust the Garrisons and the Treasury so ordering it that all this passed either through their own hands or through those of their Creatures When the King of Navar came to Court his Purvoyer could find no room for him in the Castle and the Duke of Guise who had taken up the next Apartment to the King told him plainly That it should cost the Life of him and ten thousand of his Friends before he would quit it as much as to say he would have the Preference before the first Prince of the Blood and in truth he did trample upon him The event shewed plainly afterwards that the Prince of Condè and his Friends understood very well that the Guises aimed at the Crown The Duke procured full power to summon all the Princes great Lords Captains and others of all Conditions to give them his Orders what they were to do to raise men immediately as many as he should think fit and generally to provide and order all things either in Ammunition or repairs of Fortifications in as ample manners as the King himself could do So that he wanted nothing but the name of King And Mezeray is forced to acknowledge that since the Mayors of the Palace there had never been such an Encroachment made by any French Man upon the Crown He takes notice moreover of the bitter Resentments the French had of an Edict so injurious to their King When the Queen-Mother intreated him to go strait to the Court which was then at Monceaux and not pass through Paris he took no notice of her Request but made his Entry in the Capital City of France by the Gate of St. Dennis in the midst of the Peoples Acclamations the Provost of the Merchants going before him All Ceremonies says Mezeray which ought to be paid to the King alone The Dukes death and the incessant opposition of the Protestants hindred him from going farther But his Son who succeeded him in his Ambition and in all his Designs made it appear upon the first occasion how far the Treacherous Intentions of this Family went He shuts up his King in the Louvre on purpose to lay him aside You have the Story of it in Mezeray's Chronological Abridgement under the year 1588. He put himself in the head of that powerful Faction which as the Bishop of Rhodes assures us designed to take away the Succession of the Royal Family The same Bishops tells us That this new Duke of Guise had thoughts of making himself King and that he endeavored it several ways 6. The Prince of Condè who was so well assured that the Duke of Guise Father to this Man had so foul a design did questionless look upon him with another eye then Maimbourg do's who would make us believe that he was in a very high degree Master of all the excellent Qualities which can contribute to make a great Prince without any fault that might Ecclipse the splendor of so glorious Perfections and that he was a truly Christian Hero At this rate a profound Dissimulation and horrid bloody Treason are to be reckoned as nothing The Prince of Condè profers to justifie his Innocence against his Accusers by Combat assuring himself to make them confess that it was they themselves who had conspired the overthrow of the Government and Blood Royal. This Defiance was chiefly intended to the Duke of Guise But this Duke would not take it to himself but deeply dissembling
the matter he commends the Prince his generosity and said He was likewise ready to justifie his Innocence though privately he took care to have him apprehended In good earnest Monsieur Maimbourg's Morals must be strangely depraved since he is no longer a Jesuit not to find any fault in a Prince guilty of so prosligate a Dissimulation and notorious Treachery And does he think if Lewis the Fourteenth ever comes to open his eyes he will think himself obliged to those that would make such a Man pass for a truly Christian Hâ—ro who has done his utmost to disappoint him of the Crown by taking it from his Ancestors and endeavoring to cut off the Illustrious Race of the Bourbon's If an â—nglishman should Canonize Cromwell and place him among the Hero's Can you imagine he should be well received at Court or that the King should repose any great confidence in his Loyalty Monsieur Maimbourg must know that the Prince of Condè being what he was could not look upon this pretended Hero otherwise than as a Monster He was obliged by the duty of his Relation his Honor Loyalty and all that was becoming a Great Mind with all his might to set himself against those wicked Designs which he saw the Duke of Guise and the Cardinal of Lorrain had so plainly layed Would you have had him stood with his hands in his pockets when he discovered so great danger and suffer Strangers to ruine the State and take the Crown away from his Family with a high hand 7. These Usurpers had laid their business so well and were become so absolute Masters of the Person the Mind the Authority and the whole Power of the young King that it was impossible to carry any Address to the King unless by their means and to do any thing against them to bring them to Justice but as one may say in the Kings presence who was continually in their hands and by consequence to redress a mischief that so absolutely required a remedy without resolving upon some great and extraordinary attempt Either therefore the Prince of Condè must have done what he did or else have suffered the Throne to be usurped and the Royal Family sacrificed contrary to that duty he owed to France to his King to Himself and to his whole Race If Monsieur Maimbourg will have it that the Prince of Condè should have let the Guises go on his King ought to look upon him as his mortal Enemy If he believes he did his duty let him retract and be ashamed of those unadvised words That he would have taken the Kings Lodgings by force as Affairs then stood to seize in his presence upon his chief Ministers was to attack the King himself and to seek to make himself master of his Person and Government In the condition matters were then it was the only humane means left to rescue the young King from slavery to give a stop to the Outrages of a Forain domineering Power or rather Tyranny and to preserve the Crown to its right Heirs If God was not pleased in his All-wise providence to give so good success to the attempt as was hoped it failed not nevertheless of doing some good It gave a check to the wicked designs of the Guises and made them sensible that whil'st they had to do with men of that Courage they should not purchase the Kingdom at so cheap a rate as they thought for Besides I must not conceal it from you that the Protestants were not the only Men that Lifted themselves under the Prince of Condè for this important Service to their Country and to the Royal Family several Roman Catholicks shared with them in the glory of this Attempt The famous Mezeray has published it to all the World So that Monsieur Maimbourg is 〈◊〉 out when he would make it a quarrel upon Religion And much 〈◊〉 unjustly is he mistaken when he offers to say that at the business of Amboise The Huguenots entred into a horrible Conspiracy against their King I am satisfied says I to our Friend and I am confident every honest man that knows as much as you have told me of this matter will look upon this Jesuits Imputation with amazement and detestation Pray give me an account now of the business of Meaux The French Protestants repâ—yed he are no less innocent of Conspiracy against their King in the business of Meaux than they were in that of Amboise The testimony of the eminent Cardinal d'Ossat is an invincible Defence to them in this Affair and puts them beyond the reach of Calumny But I suppose you would be throughly informed of this matter I will do it in as few words as possibly I can And I will take the account partly from Monsieur Maimbourg himselff partly from two other Popish Historians who have much a greater esteem in the World than he it is the famous President de Thou and Mezeray We will take it from the beginning You have not forgot what I told you at our former Meeting when I gave you an account of the first War the Prince of Condè was forced to make for rescuing the King at the earnest intreaty of the Queen-mother then Regent I shall not need to take off a thousand odious Reflections which Monsieur Maimbourg lays upon the French Protestants in relation to this War They are either the faults of some private persons who having acted contrary to the principles of the Reformed Religion were disowned by all sincere Protestants or false Suggestions which the solemn Edict of Charles the Ninth in the Year 1563. has sufficiently confuted the King there owning as done for his Service all that the Prince of Condè and his Friends had done in this first taking up of Arms. This noted Edict Ordains That the Protestant Religion should be publickly exercised in several parts of the Kingdom which the Edict names it puts all the French Protestants under the protection of their King in what part of France soever they should make their abode it Wills That every one of them when they come home should be maintained and secured in their Goods Honors Estates Charges Offices c. The Prince and the Protestants observed the Articles of the Treaty of Peace most exactly Monsieur Maimbourg tells us himself That all the places which the Huguenots held submitted to the King Nay we English have occasion to complain of their too great exactness in this point For they were the hottest in taking Havre de Grace from us which we had possessed our selves of only to give them succor against their Persecutors All their great Souldiers came against us to the Siege of this Town The Prince of Condè lodged all the while in the Trenches All the French says Mezeray went thither in great fury especially the Huguenots But their Adversaries dealt not so with them they broke the Edict every where in a shamful and barbarous manner This Illustrious Queen
of Navar that made France happy with Henry the Great was the first that experienced how little sacred that protection was held which had been so solemnly promised to the Protestants Some great Men to curry-favor with Philip King of Spain by some signal service entred into a Conspiracy with him to seize the Queen Iane d' Albret and her Children in the Town of Pau in Bearn and carry them to the Inquisition in Spain An attempt says Mezeray which escaped punishment for the Qualities sake of those persons which were engaged in it Afterwards they put it into the Kings head to take a Progress through France and in this unhappy Progress it was that the ruine of the Protestants was agreed upon and sworn to contrary to so solemn an Edict The Queen was perpetually importuned by the Pope by all the Catholick Princes and especially by her two Sons-in-law Philip the Second King of Spain and Charles the Third Duke of Lorrain to perswade the King to take up a generous resolution to prohibit the Huguenots the exercise of their Calvinism c. That is to break his Royal word and to demonstrate by so pregnant a proof that the Church of Rome does not think her self obliged to keep Faith with Hereticks and consequently that they whom she holds Hereticks ought never to take her word no not when she expresses her self by the mouths of the greatest Princes of the World and by the most Authentick Records Monsieur Maimbourg without the least scruple or ceremony calls these Breaches of Publick Faith a generous resolution And as ill luck would have it his Predecessors knew but too well how to perswade Catharine de Medicis and Charles the Ninth that so it was The Queen and the King says he who were at least staggered by these Remonstrances being under such a disposition it was no wonder if the Huguenots were not very kindly used during this Progress though nothing was done directly against the Pacification They built another Citadel at Lyons in opposition to the Huguenot party who were yet the strongest in that place and they ordered the slighting of those new Fortifications in the places they held during the War They forbid the exercise of their pretended Religion ten Leagues round such places as the Court should pass though it was allowed by the Edict in certain Towns within that compass which they interpreted to be when the King was not there or within ten Leagues They made a new Edict at Rouseillon the Counte de Tournons house by which they were forbidden upon pain of death to hold any meeting but in the presence of Officers appointed by His Majesty to attend there And the Magisâ—rates had order to force the apostate Fryars and Priests who were turned Huguenots that they might marry to quit their wives upon pain of the Gallies for the men and perpetual Imprisonment for the women Whenever the Catholicks made any complaint against the Huguenots or the Huguenots against the Catholicks these had always more favour shewed them than the other who were generally found in the fault right or wrong The conference the Queen had as she passed by Avignon with the Vice-Legat which gave him wonderful satisfaction pleased them not so well so that they chose rather to be directed by that she had at Bayonne with the Duke d' Alva They did believe that a League was made between the two Crowns to drive the Calvinists out of the Dominions of both the Kings and the rather because they knew that the Queen was then contriving an interview between the Pope and the Catholick Princes According to Monsieur Maimbourg it is no ways to act directly against the Edict of Peace to hinder the Exercise of the Protestant Religion in several Towns where it was permitted by the Edict to impose conditions upon Protestant Congregations enough to disturb that peace and repose the Edict had promised them to deprive many of them of that freedom of Conscience the same Edict allowed them Nor to offer all those other Injuries to the Huguenots which Monsieur Maimbourg himself tells us they did though the Edict had given assurance of quite the contrary Mezeray deals more sincerely He ingenuously confesses That they daily retrenched that Liberty which had been allowed them by the Edict in so much that it was in a manner reduced to nothing and that they undermined the Liberty of Conscience they had promised them by several Expositions they put upon the Edict He gives many Instances but one amongst the rest which I am resolved to set down It is this The Count de Candale had contrived a League with his Brother Christopher Bishop of Aire Montluc Gabriel de Chaumont Laytun Descars Mervilles his younger Brother and Gaston Marquess of Trans of the same house of Foix who was the Author of this Advice The Contents of which being published he afterwards made open War against the Huguenots By this means he became guilty of High Treason neither could they excuse the action from being an attempt against the Kings Authority and the Faith of the Edicts But his zeal was not displeasing to the Catholicks besides that regard was to be had to his Quality and to so many Great Men that were engaged in this Affair Which is the reason why the King to stop the Huguenots mouths owns by a Declaration all that this Count and his Complices had done as having had his Order for it This is that which Monsieur Maimbourg calls To do nothing directly against the Edict of Peace It is fit you should know what the same Mezeray relates concerning the Conferences of the Queen at Bayonne with the Duke d' Alva one of the greatest Enemies the True Religion ever had She had discourse every night with the Duke d'Alva And the event has shewed since That all these Conferences drove at a secret Alliance between the two Kings utterly to root out the Protestants The Huguenots believed the Duke d'Alva had advised the Queen to invite them to some great Assembly and so to rid herself of them without mercy that he had let fall these words That a Ioal of Salmon was better worth then all the Frogs of a Marsh that from the time of the Assembly of Moulins the Queen had executed this Design had things happened as she expected St. Bartholomews day does not a little confirm this mistrust of the Huguenots But you shall hear what it was made the Prince of Condè take those Resolutions Monsieur Maimbourg so exclaims against The intention of destroying the Huguenots was evident because they daily retrenched them of that liberty which was given them by the Edicts so that they had in a manner brought it to nothing The people fell upon them in those places where they were the weaker party where they were able to maintain their Ground the Governor made use of the Kings Authority to oppress them they dismantled those Towns that had shewed them
any favour they built Citadels in the same places no Justice was to be obtained for them either in Parliament or Council they murdered them without restraiâ—t neither were they restored to their Estates or Offices These complaints were brought two or three times to the Prince of Condè and to Coligny who at two meetings had given this Answer both times That thoy ought to endure all patiently rather than to take up arms But when one of the chief Men at Court had given them certain notice that they were resolved to seize the Prince and the Admiral to confine the first to perpetual Imprisonment and bring the other to the Block Dandelot's advice who was bolder than the rest put them upon a resolution not only of defending themselves but likewise to attack their Enemies by open force and for this end to drive the Cardinal of Lorrain from the King's presence and cut off the Suisses They were six thousand Suisses they had raised under pretence of hindring the Duke Alva's passage but indeed to destroy the Protestants as Monsieur Maimbourg himself sufficiently hints and as I shall plainly shew you from a remarkable passage of Monsieur de Thou Which passage shall likewise serve to confirm what Mezeray has told us That one of the chief men at Court gave certain notice to the Protestants that they were resolved to seize the Prince and the Admiral And to convince Monsieur Maimbourg of the greatest Impudence and at the same time of the highest Injustice done to a Prince that was the Hero of his age See but how this Jesuit relates to us the occasion and motive of that he calls The business of Meaux The Prince was always in hopes that the Queen would have procured for him to be Lieutenant General over the whole Kingdom That she had promised to bring him to the point he aimed at when the Treaty of Orleans was made Tho she was no ways inclined to put so great a charge in his hands but said it only to fool him She was resolved to set the Duke of Anjou upon him who was the dearest to her of all her children And she instructed him so well that when the Prince of Condè came some days to the Queens Supper Monsieur who watched for an opportunity to affront him took him aside to a corner of the Reom where he treated him in a strange manner so far as to tell him in a threatning way laying his hand upon his Sword That if ever he thought of this place contrary to that respect he ow'd him that he would make him repent it and make him as inconsiderable as he aspired to be great After this the Prince touched to the quick disputed no farther with himself what party to take though he concealed his resentment at that time to make his Revenge the surer of which from that moment he laid the design And this was the true cause of the second Troubles which he cloaked with the pretence of Religion which had the least share if any at all in that violent resolution which he took and in that unhappy and abominable attempt at Meaux Indeed he had already had two Meetings with the Colignies chief of his Friends one at Chastillon and the other at Valery where nothing was as yet agreed upon But presently after Monsieur had used him thus and that he found himself thus tricked by the Queen and all his credit at the Court lost he went and had a third at Chastillon And there it was that without discovering any thing more than what had been said in the two former about the Ligue which they said was made to oppress and ruine their Religion they resolved to take Arms not only to defend themselves but likewise to assault and to cut in pieces the Suisses which the King had caused to be raised and to make themselves Masters of the whole Kingdom by seizing upon the Sacred Person of the King the Princes his Brothers and the Queen Really this is intolerable I could never have thought so private a Person as Monsieur Maimbourg could have dared to blast by so impudently false a story the memory of so great a Prince in the face of his Highness the Prince of Condè now living who no doubt shares in so foul a Disgrace cast upon one of the most renowned of his Ancestors 1. Mezeray gives Monsieur Maimbourg quite another reason of the second Troubles and to find out those that were the cause of them there was no need that he should go to make of one of the sincerest Princes the World ever had a Hypocrite and a wicked Person that made a stale of Religion using it for a cover to his pernicious Designs and to a mad unbridled Ambition and Revenge Philip the Second King of Spain says Mezeray contrived a second Civil War in France the severe effects of which had almost put it to its last gasp See from a Papist Writer what was the true incentive of discord in these second Troubles Surely then Monsieur Maimbourg has some secret malice against the house of Bourbon to impute as he does the crime of a Blood-thirsty King to the generous Prince of Condè 2. But with what face dare he say that they resolved at the third meeting of the Protestants to take arms though at that time they discovered no more than what they had done at the two former where by the way no such thing was concluded With what face dare he say this who is told by Mezeray That in this last meeting they determined to resist force by force forasmuch as one of the chief men at Court gave certain notice that they had resolved to seize the Prince and the Admiral In short the learned President de Thou whom he quotes some times in his History could have informed him of all that was needful to hinder him for ever doing so cruel an injustice to so excellent a Prince For he tells us in the beginning of his 42 Book That the Protestants met one and another time with the Prince of Condè the Admiral and d' Andelot at Valery first and afterwards at Chastillon upon Loin That after having well discussed the matter Pro and Con they at last unanimously agree to try all means before they came to the last Remedy that is to take Arms But that after this Provocations growing higher especially by reason of the Suisses which the King would not dismiss though he was entreated to do it and that the Duke d' Alva was now entred into the Low-Countries There came Letters from one of the great Lords at Court who was a Friend to the Protestants by which the Prince was advised that it was determined in a private Councel that they intended to seize upon him and the Admiral to cramp the one in Prison and cut off the others head that at the same time they would put two thousand Swisses into Paris two thousand into Orleans and as
many into Poictiers that then they would repeal the Edict and set out others for the extirpation of the Protestants For that reason it was according to Monsieur de Thou that they came to a resolution and not as Monsieur Maimbourg reproaches them without proof or ground that they might seize the Sacred Person of the King his Brothers and the Queen The Guises Monsieur Maimbourg's Hero's are only capable of such Exploits but to present their most humble Petitions to the young King in such a posture as might secure them from the rage of their irreconcileable Enemies and to drive the Cardinal of Lorrain from the Court who had sworn the ruine of the Princes of the Blood and sought the extirpation of the Huguenots for no other end than because they opposed with all their might this detestable Design as Mezeray very well observes I fancy it will not be amiss to read the passage to you The Duke of Guise and the Cardinal of Lorrain looked upon the Protestants as a hindrance to the establishment of their Grandeur They easily foresaw if the King should happen to dy of that sickness which they apprehended very dangerous they should have no farther pretence to keep the Authority longer in their hands which then they held in his name the Duke of Orleans that was to succeed him being a Minor and that therefore the Princes of the Blood had all the reason in the World to take it from them They knew likewise very well the weakness of these Princes and thought they had strength enough to order them like the others could they but hinder the gathering together of the Factions of the Religionaries who came to joyn them from all parts for which cause they made haste to disperse them before they should be able to form themselves into a Body which would certainly prove very sturdy and formidable and might serve as a retreat for all the rest Some thought and indeed their private dealings and those they confided in made it appear that they had attempted to draw them on their side nay they had a mind to declare themselves head of this Party if the Princes of the Blood should have got the better at the beginning but that the Religionaries did always refuse to come in to them It was they say one of the chief reasons why they set themselves upon their ruine This Cardinal thirsting after the Blood of the Huguenots because they would not betray the Interest of the Blood-Royal and who was wonderfully desirous of troubles as necessary for the setting a Value upon his Power and placing his Nephews in their Fathers Credit became an unmoveable obstacle to the Kingdoms Peace Besides the Prince knew that he was to fall into the hands of this merciless Prelate who had caused him to be condemned to have his head cut off under Francis the Second and that the whole Royal Family was in danger especially the House of Bou-bon if he made not haste to prevent it in seizing upon his person that he might rid the Court of him Therefore he takes Horse with about four hundred of his Friends to make his way to fall at the Kings Feet where he might offer his ‑ complaints of the severe Persecutions the Protestants lay under all over the Kingdom and to remove from his Majesties presence this publick Pest who had ingrossed him to himself and imposing upon his tender years possessed him with Resolutions so pernicious to the Princes of his Blood and to his best Subjects The Queen upon the news of this withdraws the King to Meaux a town of Brie By her Order the Marshal of Montmorancy goes to while off the Prince till six thousand Suisses should be got into Meaux The Constable argued exceeding well for staying at Meaux forasmuch as there was not the least danger to the Kings Person At first says Mezeray the Queen liked well of this advice but within an hour after her mind was altered either through the inconstancy of her Sex or the Cardinal of Lorrain's dissuasions They say that this Prelate being very desirous of troubles as requisite to put a value upon his power and to establish his Nephews in their Fathers Credit suggested as if Montmorency held Intelligence with the Prince That she and her Children would be delivered into their hands representing to her likewise That if this should not so fall out yet she was to consider That by staying at Meaux she would be confined and helpless under the imperious Austerity of the Constable who set himself to keep their Majesties in so inconsiderable a Town for no other end than to have them at his own disposal At the same time to encrease her suspicions his Emissaries spread a Rumour about the Court That the Constable and Chancellor had sent a secret dispatch to the Prince and were to deliver him up one of the Gates of the Town The Queen startled at the Cardinal's Suggestions and it may be at those false reports called the Council a second time in the Apartment of the Duke of Nemours who was strongly tyed up by Interest with the House of Guise There it is resolved by the advice of this Duke that it was fit to carry the King to Paris and to be gone presently aftâ—â— Mid-night It was to no purpose that the Chancellor layed before the Queen the Inconveniences that would happen upon this course and cryed out That they exposed the Sacred Person of the King to the utmost peril that they betrayed the publick Interest for private ones that they cut off all means and hopes of accommodation and that the Ambition of some was engaging the Kingdom to the necessity of entring into an Implacable War The Cardinal 's evil Counsel carryed it The King went away in the midst of seven or eight hundred Horse flanked with the Six thousand Suisses At peep of day they discovered the Princes Troops who were not in all above Four hundred Horse The Kings Troops seeing them in their way and that they cut off their passage made a Halt to receive Orders In the mean time the Prince knowing that the King was there advanced leisurely with his Horse and asked to speak to his Majesty But the young King would not vouchsafe to hear him but kept himself all the while covered under the Guard of his Suisses The Prince enraged that they would not suffer him to lay his just Complaints before the King changed both his Countenance and his Purpose says Mezeray and put himself in a Posture to vent his Fury upon the Suisses who stood here in his way and whom he knew his enemies had appointed to destroy him and all the Protestants But what could Four or Five hundred men do against above seven thousand All ended in some slight Skirmishes of words rather then blows as appears from Monsieur Thou's History who no doubt had better ground for what he said
then either Mezeray or Monsieur Maimbourg who makes here a great deal of noise about a very inconsiderable business Whatever it was the Constable thought fit to have the King conveyed speedily to Paris through By-ways with a strong party which brought him thither the same day without any hazard and all the rest of the Army got thither the next day This is the truth of the business of Meaux which Monsieur Maimbourg calls a terrible Conspiracy of the Prince of Condè against the Sacred Person of his Soveraign Lord the King He has the impudence to call those Wicked Arms which were taken up for no other end but to preserve to France the Noble Blood of the Bourbons which at this day does it so much honor and which a Conspiracy of cruel and unreasonable Adversaries were at the very point of spilling to the last drop that they might afterwards usurp to themselves the right of the Heirs of the House Is it that Monsieur Maimbourg would have had all this Noble House extinct and that the Guises who pretend to come from Charlemain should have possessed the Throne at this day In good truth his King is much beholding to him Thus then it is that he begins to observe what he promises in his Advertisement To serve his gracious Protector with more warmth zeal and freedom than ever You must give me leave says I smiling to give a check here to the carier of your Victory Monsieur Maimbourg is very unjust to attribute to the genius of the Reformed Religion of France the outrages of Subjects Rebellion against their Prince You have beyond dispute shewed the contrary in our former Conference from their Confession of Faith the Prayers in their Liturgy and from what their most Famous Doctors have taught publickly Therefore when our Jesuit for his change of Habit does not hinder but that we have still too much cause to call him by this name charges the Protestant Religion to which unjustly he imputes Heresie with Inspiring Rebellions and Outrages he gives us a cast of his office to put the sham upon us well knowing what the Jâ—suits Religion is really guilty of in this point and to augment the displeasure of his King against the poor Huguenots the most faithful of his Subjects But setting aside this Jesuitical pliableness and malice tell me a little Do you think this action of the Prince of Condè very regular to shew himself before the King in Arms as if he would wrest from him by force that Justice which was denyed him I will allow that his enemies had sworn his ruine and that of all the Protestants of France I cannot question it after all those proofs which you have brought I will allow besides that the Six thousand Suisses which environed the King had never been raised nor kept up but to be the Executioners of this unjust and bloody Design should a Subject endeavor to cut them off even before his Soveraigns eyes who secured them by his Royal Authority Was not this to invade that Soveraign Authority which ought never to be touched by any Subject In a word this attempt of the Prince is it not point blanck contrary to the Maxims of the Protestant Religion of France as you have represented it to me That we ought never to repel force by force when it is our Soveraign that does the wrong I am very glad says our Friend that you have made this Objection it will give me occasion to say somthing that will help to clear all that they reproach the Huguenots with till the Reign of Lewis the Thirteenth 1. All that pretend to be Protestants are not so Monsieur Maimbourg himself is of the same opinion And it is a shameful Injustice to make the Religion answerable for the miscarriages of those that are a disgrace to it and that make it appear by leading a life quite contrary to its maxims and instructions that they are not its followers but its enemies This is the Injustice Monseiur Maimbourg does to the Protestant Religion in every Page of his Libel For example he imputes to it the beastly and barbarous behavior of the Baron des Adrets though he himself acknowleâ—ges he was a man of no Religion far from being what he elsewhere calls a good Huguenot a man truly devoted to the Principles of the Protestant Religion who breathes nothing but piety towards God and love and bounty towards his Neighbor He likewise imputes to it the Exploit of certain seditious Fellows that coyned Silver Money with the Princes stamp and this Inscription in Latin Ludov. XIII Rex Franc. I cannot tell whether what he says of this Coyn be true I have not the Book by me which he quotes De Thou and Mezeray who are otherwise so exact and curious speak not a word of it And considering the hatred that has always been against the Huguenots they would in all probability have kept some of this Coyn very carefully to have stopt their mouths as often as they should reproach the Papists with the several attempts they had made against Kings However it be if the Story be true they that caused such money to be coyned are wicked Wretches and have most insolently transgressed the 39th and 40th Articles of the Confession of Faith made by the Reformed Church of France So that the true French Protestants are so far from owning them for their Brethren that they detest them as utter Enemies to their holy Religion In general all they that have failed in the respect which is due to Potentates having thereby acted contrary to the Principles of the Reformed Religion cannot be reckoned among the true Protestants It is therefore an idle thing to reproach us with the Extravagancies and Enterprises of such men We have nothing to do with them And if the Prince of Condè was no otherwise a Protestant than as Monsieur Maimbourg would maliciously insinuate if under a false pretence of Religion to deceive a simple people that put great confidence in him he concealed a Criminal Revenge and Ambition the honest Huguenots disown him and it would be an unconscionable thing to make them guilty of what this Prince had committed when at the same time he must have declared himself an enemy to their Religion by having violated after such a manner their Confession of Faith in so essential a Point But God forbid we should have so ill an Opinion of this Hero as Monsieur Maimbourg would perswade us to Mezâ—ray himself assures us that the Prince was sincere an enemy to cheats and treacheries and abhorred to do an ill thing He was then doubtless what he desired that men should take him for a true Protestant which is to say a good Christian. 2. But the best Christians have their faults Wherefore there is no man that does not sometimes yield to the temptations offered him And when wâ— know the temptations to be strong as no doubt they are
which Aristotle calls Iust Griefs we are apt rather to pity than blame men for the faults they have committed I am well assured Monsieur Maimbourg will not deny but that the Prince's integrity has been put to the severest tryal For he confesses that the Queen broke her word with him in a matter of the Highest Consequence and that the Duke d' Anjou had passed a cruel Affront upon him which touched him to the quick Besides the Prince knew upon very good grounds that his enemies were about to seize his Person a second time It is true they talked only of shutting him up in Prison during life But he could not forget that they were not men to be satisfied with so little when once they had got him in their hands For when he was first in Prison they condemned him to lose his Head by the hand of the common Executioner And then it was manifest they designed the death of the Admiral his great Friend and of a Million of innocent Persons more Suppose it therefore to be true that at the sight of death and of so many Injuries and so great a spilling of Blood the Prince's head was a little turned and that being intent upon saving his own Life and Honor and the Lives and Honor of so many brave Men as were engaged with him c. he forgot that he could not without a want of respect to his King attack his Ministers how wicked or injust soever they might be supposing this to be true ought he to be used after that insolent manner as Monsieur Maimbourg treats him Is he the only Hero the only true Christian that has discovered his Infirmity under so heavy a Temptation And when is it that a Fault is most excusable if it be not when a Man is hurryed away by such violent storms 3. But I cannot endure that so glorious an attempt should be blemished with the least Imputation The Prince by his Birth and the great Concern that engaged him in was under a particular Obligation to watch for the preservation of the Crown and the Blood Royal all the World must grant it It is most certain that the Princes of the House of Lorrain aimed at the Crown under a pretence that it belonged to them as the lawful Successors of Charlemain and that they only waited a fit opportunity to possess themselves of it Experience shews plainly that he was not deceived when Henry the Third to escape the ambitious Attempts of the Duke of Guise Nephew to the Cardinal of Lorrain was forced to run from his Palace and his capital City where the Duke had made every body against him and where they shewed the Suissers with which they intended to make him a Monks crown when they had taken away that of a King The Prince knows moreover that the Cardinal of Lorrain to compass his wicked Design was resolved to rid himself of all the Princes of the Blood whatever it cost him They had thoughts of stealing away the Queen of Navar and her Son the first Prince of the Blood to destroy them in a most cruel and shameful manner by putting them into the Spanish Inquisition They had raised Six thousand Suisses to seize his Person put the Admiral to death and to root out all the Protestants that is the main Supporters of the Rights of Capet's true Line against the false pretences of the Mock-posterity of Charlemain The Prince who sees and knows all this is he not obliged to set himself with all his might against this Bloody Conspiracy of Strangers who are about to shed the Noblest Blood of France to supplant the Heirs of the Family and usurp their Place There is no question of it But things were come to such a pass that the Prince could no longer set himself effectually against the wicked purposes of the House of Guise by the common methods of Remonstrances and Petitions to his Majesty and by the course of Justice either in Council or Parliament For the Cardinal of Lorrain and his party swayed all in the Parliament and Council They had all the power at Court There was no coming to the King but by them They were so got into this young Prince who was at the most but sixteen years of age that he would hear nothing but what these people told him and blindly took their advice in every thing It was then absolutely necessary either that the Prince against his duty of Prince of the Blood and a faithful Subject should suffer all the Royal Blood to be spilt with that of all true French men and that the Crown should be usurped by Strangers or else that he should do something extraordinary and put Himself in a posture to overcome all the difficulties which hindred him from undeceiving the King making him to understand who were his real enemies and bringing them to condign punishment which could never be done without the assistance at least of several of his Friends and cutting off the six thousand Swisses who were to seize his Person and ruine all the honest party unless in short he would become a prey to the Cardinal when he should present himself before the King to request Justice I must confess the Protestant that is the Christian Religion never allows a Subject to take up Arms against his Soveraign upon any pretence whatever But a Prince of the Blood does not take up Arms against his Soveraign when he takes them up to no other end but to hinder Strangers from laying hands upon the Crown and changing the Succession It is true indeed that these Strangers taking the advantage of Charles the Ninth his tender years were predominant in his Court and that it is an odd sort of a way for a Subject to come armed before his King and to seize upon his chief Ministers before his face and as it were teaâ— them out of his arms But Prudence directs us of two Evils always to avoid the greatest And I do not think any one will dispute it in earnest but that to suffer a Kingdom to be taken from its lawful Heirs and all the Royal Family to be oppressed by Tyrants who have ingrossed their King for no other end but to destroy him is an evil infinitely greater than to come short for some little time of the Laws of good manners till the King and Kingdom were safe There are none but such as would be glad to have the way left open either to invade the Throne or Royal Authority whereby to work the overthrow of the State I say there are none but the ambitious and common Pests that have the impudence to perswade the King that to fail in these rules of Good manners when it is upon the utmost necessity and in prospect to save the Crown is to give a mischievous example and encourage Rebellion Extraordinary actions upon absolute necessity as this attempt of the Prince never ought to be drawn into example for ordinary proceedings which should always be
directed by the Laws and Customs of the Country Had the business succeeded it had been easie for the Prince and his Friends to have excused to the King this indecent Violence and justified by the event of the sincerity of their Intentions in the same manner as by the event it proved that when Charles the Seventh whil'st he was Dauphin took up Arms it was neither against the King his Father nor against the Kingdom which was the Example that was brought to resolve the scruples of some of the Prince's Friends who were afraid of the odious Reflections which might be made upon the attempt at Meaux how necessary or innocent soever it might be in it self And Monsieur de Thou who gives us an account of this particular tells us likewise that the design the Prince and his Friends had in arming themselves was to drive from the Helm the Enemies of the publick Peace to undeceive the young King and to settle all things quiet in his Kingdom But I ought to read you the whole Passage since it is in my hand Objiciebatur Cardinalem semper Regi ejusdem c. It was objected that the Cardinal always beset the King and that the Swisses were continually about him whom if they should attack in these Circumstances they would not seem to assault the Cardinal and the Swisses but the King himself This must no doubt draw the utmost envy of all men upon them but the King whose favour they should seek would never forgive them To this d' Andelot who was almost always for the warmest Counsel answered That the intention of the Protestants would be judged by the event as formerly Charles the Seventh when he was yet but Dauphin made it appear to all the World by the conclusion of the War that he fought neither against his Father nor his King Nor indeed could any one imagine that a Body made up of French should conspire their Kings ruine For though we have an account of the Conspiracies of some single persons an universal revolt was never yet heard of But if fortune should favour their first attempts there would be an end of a fatal War which being crush'd at the beginning the enemies of our common repose might be removed from the Government and the King of whom being better informed of things a confirmation of the Edicts might be obtained and a firm peace setled in the Kingdom Here is enough to convince all the World of the Insolence and Malice of Monsieur Maimbourg in treating the renowned Grandfather of the present Prince of Condè so rudely in an attempt which as it had nothing in it contrary either to the Principles of Christian Religion or good Politicks was doubtless every way glorious and deserves the highest commendations The Prince appeared in this a true Hero He comes to the succor of his King and Country and all the honest part of the Kingdom and with five or six hundred men he attempts to cut off the six thousand Swisses who were to be the Tools and Bulwork of a Forain Tyranny He had not failed of success had not the contrivances of the Queen who then favored the enemies of the State disappointed him of the Conquest But God was not yet pleased to give repose to France The King retreats from Meaux to Paris against the advice of the wisest of his Councel And the Prince to hinder the utter ruine of a Party that was the only check to the wicked designs of the House of Lorrain found himself obliged to raise a small Army to give Battle at St. Dennis to besiege and to take several Towns But the deep respect he had for his King made him and all his party lay down their Arms at a time when he was just ready to take the Town of Chartres and to have reduced all the enemies of the State So soon as ever they proposed any safety for his Person and for the security of his faithful Protestants who were the only true Supports of the Crown against the ambition of the Guises he immediately quitted all his Advantages and accepted of the Peace which was offered him This was the substance of the Articles says Mezeray That they should fully and peaceably enjoy the Edict of Ianuary without any Qualification or Restriction whatever That they should be put and maintained under the Kings protection as to their Estates Honor and Priviledges That the King would esteem the Prince for his good Kinsman and his loyal Subject and Servant and all those that followed him for good and loyal Subjects You see now what this business of Meaux was with the Consequences of it that Monsieur Maimbourg has made such ado about so as to make it pass with the affair of Amboise for horrible Conspiracies which the Huguenots have contrived against the Kings of France To hinder the Princes of the House of Guise from usurping the Crown of the French Kings and taking it from Lewis the Fourteenth in the person of his Predecessors and destroying the whole Race of the Bourbons must pass according to this man for contriving horrible Conspiracies against the Kings of France Thus It is that he courts his Hero and complements the present Prince of Condè But what does he mean said I to our Friend when he says moreover Not to speak of their cruel Rebellions that have cost France so much blood and the mischievous intelligences they have held with the enemy to rid themselves of the Monarchy and with open face set up a Commonwealth as they have done more than once Our Friend answered me That since he distinguishes this from the pretended Conspiracies of Amboise and Meaux he must by the Rebellions and Plots he Imputes to these Protestants needs mean the other Troubles that happened after these two first to the Reign of Henry the Great and those that were revived in the beginning of the Reign of Lewis the 13th Indeed he accuses them upon this account that contrary to the Treaty they had made the Protestants refused to surrender to the King Sancerre Montauban Milhaud Cahors Albi and Castres but especially Rochel the Rebellion of which Town says he openly maintained by the Heads of the Huguenot party who were resolved to make it their chief place of strength was the true ground of the breach because it would not admit the Garrison which the King would have put in there but received several of the chief Leaders of the Huguenots went on with the Fortifications and gave the Court reason to believe that the Prince and the Admiral were preparing for a War Upon which it was resolved to surprise them and carry them away The Marshal de Tavannes a great Friend to the House of Guise and Confident of Queen Catharine undertook to do the thing whil'st the Prince was at his house called Noyers in Bourgoyne But the matter being discovered just as it was to be executed the Prince made his escape to
Rochel with his Famiâ—y and the Admiral His Friends upon this news came in to his aid from all parts whil'st the King repealed all the Edicts made in favor of the Protestants and drew all his Forces together This is in short the account Monsieur Maimbourg gives who according to his custom fails not to charge the Huguenots with all the Villanies that were committed in this third War by profligate fellows on both sides But the Towns he complains of knew very well at that time what Mezeray has since published to all Europe That the Councel which is to say the Cardinal of Lorrain and his Creatures had no other end in making this Peace but to remove the imminent danger the Parisians would have been in upon the taking of Chartres and to disperse the great Force the Huguenots had got together that they might oppress them when scattered The same Historian tells us That some of the Court sent them word that if they took not good caution they would be cheated and the Admiral made it appear to them what the inconvencies would be Being a person of an excellent judgment he plainly discovered that treaty to be nothing else but a trick to amuse and so surprise them This ought at least to have perswaded these poor people to have gone warily to work in surrendring their Garrisons till they had seen how the Guise party that governed all would observe the Articles of this Peace which as Mezeray expresses it exposed them to the mercy of their enemies without other security than the word of an Italian Woman It was not long before the Huguenots found by experience that the intelligence they had received from Court was but too true and that the Admirals opinion was â—ut too well grounded Immediately the Parliament of Toulouse Beheaded Rapin a worthy Gentleman whom the King had sent thither to solicit the Ratification of the Edict of Peace Monsieur de Thou gives an account of it Whatever complaint the Prince could make of so outragious a breach of the Peace the Court where the Guises were predominant made him not the least satisfaction I leave you to judge then whether the Protestants had reason to believe they had dealt fairly with them when they saw they had murdered a Man without being questioned for it who was sent by his Soveraign to solicit the verification of the Edict of Peace They found themselves constrained therefore for the safety of their own lives and the lives of the Princes of the Blood to shut up the Gates of their strong Places against those Emissaries that came from their deadly Enemies who at the bottom had no other design in destroying the Huguenots party than thereby to make the way more easie for the destruction of the Princes of Capet's Line and open themselves a passage to the Throne or Tyranny rather Doubtless they ought to have stood more carefully upon their Guard forasmuch as they could not but know what Mezeray after Monsieur de Thou assures us was acted so publickly to wit that the Popish Preachers stirred up the people incessantly by their vehement Declamations saying That if there was a necessity to make the Peace it was a sin to keep it that there could be no alliance betwixt Christ and Belial that there is no Obligation to hold Faith with Hereticks but that all Christians ought to fall upon them as Monsters and common Pests that it was an acceptable Sacrifice to God to wash their hands in the Blood of these unclean Beasts And for this they quoted in their own sense a Decree of the Councel of Constance impâ—â—â—ing That no Faith was to be kept with them adding Examples out of holy Scripture of those that were slain by the Levites upon Moses his order of those that had worshipped the golden Calf and of Iehu that slew all the Priests of Bâ—al when he had got them together upon promise of safe conduct Monsieur de Thou observes that those Preachers were Jâ—suits So that all the Protestant Princes and their loyal Subjects may well think from the account these two Popist Historians give what hazzard they run when either they receive or suâ—â—â—r in their Dominions these bloody Spirits enemies to publick Faith and by consequence to Mankind But I must needs give you all that Mezeray says upon this Subject in his Chronological Abridgement which will wholly suppress the impudence of the Jesuit Maimbourg in charging the Protestants with the breach of this Peace These are his words They â—ailed not to cheat the Huâ—uenots both of their Peace and liberty of Conscience They were then in greater danger than during the War In thâ—â—e 〈◊〉 time there were more than Two thousand killed in several parts either by their particular Enemies as Renè Lord of Sipiere son to Claud of Savoy Count of Tende and thirty persons of his Train which Gaspar de Villeneuve Marquess d'Ars murdered in Fraius or else by popular Insurrections as at Amiens near a hundred at Auxerre a hundred and fifty several at Blois Bourges Issoudun Troyes and twenty other places The Prince was at Noyers in Burgundy There they caught a Soldier measuring the Graft and the Wall in order to scale the place When the project failed the Queen sent some Troops into Burgundy to take him by force whom they could not catch by craft He sent Teligny and afterwards Iaquelin de Rohan his Wives Mother to Court to beseech the Queen Mother to observe the Peace the Edicts But it was not a thing longer to be hoped for when he found that whoever was of that Opinion he was called Libertine and Politician and that the Chancellor of the Hospital who advised to Peace was dismissed from Court and sent to his House of Vignan as suspected for a Huguenot The Prince's Mother-in-law was scarce gone from Court when he understood that the Troops had private Orders to block up Noyers and that if he continued there three or four days longer he would not be able to get away Coligny perceiving plainly the Trains that were laid for them was come to Tanlay Castle whence going to the Prince they both wen ftrom Noyers with a Party only of a hundred and fifty Horse under whose Guard were a sad sight their Wives and Children most of them in their Nurses arms or not out of their Hanging-sleeves The Pâ—ince having escaped all danger by his Expedition got to Rochel the 18th of September Soon after the Queen of Navar came thither likewise with the Prince her Son and afteâ—â—er all the Huguenot Officers with the greatest part of their Forces Now let all the World judge whether it was the Protestants of France that were Authors of this third War or not rather the Guises who thirsted after the Blood of this Innocent People to clear the way to that of the Royal Family I will prove hereafter that Rochel in particular was not so much in the wrong for pleading
her Priviledges to avoid the admitting those Men who came for no other end but to destroy her Monsieur Maimbourg is scandalized at it under pretence that the Cardinal of Lorrain who did all at Court had invested them with Regal Authority who came to take away their Religion Liberty and Lives But a scandal very absurdly taken There is no man but sees it plainly and what I shall tell you hereafter will make it more plain I will not enter into the Particulars of this unhappy War where the Prince of Condè was killed in cold Blood after the Battle of Iarnac and which concluded witâ— a Peace yet more unfortunate They allowed in this Peace several very great Advantages to the Protestants but it was only to have an opportunity to cut their Throats in the most Treacherous and Inhumane manner that was ever heard of To say the truth says Monsieur Maimbourg as the Queen made this Treaty it is very likely that such a Peace as this was never really meant on her side who concealed her Intentions and did not grant so many things to the Huguenots otherwise than to make them lay down their Arms that she might fall upon such as she had a mind to be revenged of the Admiral especially upon the first favorable occasion that should offer it self which she thought she had met with at last when she had prevailed with the King to take that horrid Resolution which was executed upon that Bloody and Accursed Day of St. Bartholomew Under pretence of Marrying the Prince of Navar to the Lady Margaret Sister to Charles the Ninth all the Protestants that were of any Quality were drawn to Paris The Queen of Navar was taken away in five days by a hot Fever occasioned as many believed by the art of the Perfumer Messer René a Florentine suspected for a skillful man at poysoning as Monsieur Maimbourg himself acknowledges At last to make the Feast more solemn they had the Admiral murdered by an old retainer to the House of Guise called Louviers Monrevel who shot him with a Carabine and they concluded it with this cruel Butchery which Monsieur de Perefixe Archbishop of Paris sums up in these words in his History of Henry the Great All the Huguenots that came to the Feast had their throats cut amongst others the Admiral Twenty other Lords of note Twelve hundred Gentlemen Three or four thousand Soldiers and Citizens and then through all the Towns of the Kingdom after the pattern at Paris near a Hundred thousand men A detestable action such as never was before nor never will be by the help of God the like But all the Popish World was of the Archbishop of Paris his mind witness what Mezeray says The holy Father and all his Court expressed a mighty joy at it and went in a solemn Procession to the Church of St. Lewis to give God thanks for so happy a riddance where the Cardinal of Lorrain who found not himself in such a transport of joy had placed over the door a Latin Inscription after the ancient manner giving the reason of this Ceremony They were not less rejoyced in Spain than at Rome where they preached up this Action before King Philip under the Title of The Triumph of the Church militant It is true that Monsieur Maimbourg Papist as he is could not bring himself to second this Joy of his High Priest and one of his Hero's the Cardinal of Lorrain But on the contrary he has highly condemned so shameful a Fact neither could he forbear to Declame in more than one place against those barbarous people that did it My Reader says he ought not to expect from me an account of all that was done upon this unhappy day which I wish with all my heart had been buryed in the shâ—des of eternal Oblivion So soon as it rung the Warning Bell at the Palace there were more than Fifty thousand men Armed running up and down the Streets like so many Furies let loose breaking open doors crowding into the Houses that were marked out or that they themselves had observed making the Air sound with the hideous Cries that were heard from the groans of Men and Women that were assassinated and the Oaths and Blasphemies of those that murdered them Dispatch kill stab knock them down fling them out of the windows made Paris all that day which was upon a Sunday and a Feast a bloody Theater of Cruelty or rather an abominable Butchery by the slaughter of above Six thousand persons whose Blood ran down the kennels and their Bodies all gored with Wounds dragged into the River This was what we might reasonably expect from the brutish and blind rage of a Rabble when they are let loose to do what they please with impunity But that which we find in this altogether mis-becoming the French generosity which ought to be the proper character of the Nobility of the Kingdom especially those of the Highest Rank was that the Marshal de Tavannes the chief contriver of this Massacre and the Duke de Montpensier too warm a Catholick went up and down the Streets encouraging the People who were already but too much transported of themselves and setting them on upon every body sparing none The King himself who saw out of his Chamber-window the mangled Bodies floating upon the Water was so far from being troubled at the sight that he shot with a long Gun though to no pâ—rpose cross the River at those who they had told him were got into the Faubourg St. Germain to save themselves from the Massacre and cryed out as loud as he could stretch his voice that they should pursue and kill them However he was afterwards extreamly trouble at it and to excuse himself from the imputation of so cruel an Act he caused Letters to be writ the same day to all the Governors of the Provinces that all which was done at Paris upon St. Bartholomew's day was the effect of an old Quarrel that was bâ—tween the Duke of Guise and the Admiral which drew on such deadly Consequences it being impossible to hinder them during that rage the Parisians were then stirred up to by running into Arms for the Guises against the Huguenots However this excuse passed but for a little while They made the King sensible that besides it would not be credited it would expose his Majesty to the contempt of his Subjects when they should see by this that he had not authority enough over the Guises to be obeyed by them nor power and resolution to punish so great a fault Wherefore wholly changing his mind he appointed the Tuesday following to appear himself in Parliament where he declared the same which he likewise caused to be writ to all the Governors that this Massacre was committed by his Order though to his great grief for prevention of a Hellish Conspiracy which the Admiral with the Huguenots had entred into against his Person
and against all the Princes of the Blood thereby to possess himself of the Soveraign Power and of the Regality when they should at one blow have destroyed all the Royal Line The premier President Christopher du Thou though in his heart he abhorred so foul an action as that of St. Bartholomew's day and openly disclaimed against it all his life does yet undertake out of a flattery little becoming so great a Magistrate to commend it as the effect of a singular prudence and in his Speech to extol the King who to preserve the Government by suppressing those that would have overthrown it understood so well how to practice that excellent Rule of Lewis the Eleventh who was used to say He that knows not how to dissemble knows nothing of the art of Governing And the better to prove this Plot which gained but little faith then and that no body believes now they proceeded against old Briquemaud Marshal du Camp to the Princes Army against Caragnes Chancellor to the party and against the dead Admiral They were all three hanged the last in Effigy by something made up like him with a tooth-pick in his mouth as he was almost always used to have and the two others in person before the King and the Queen who would needs see the Execution out of the Town-house window They thought by this likewise to perswade the Princes whom they had a mind to draw over from that Party by making them believe That they had engaged with those who were their greatest enemies and the most profligate of all men What do you think says our Friend after he had read all this long story out of Monsieur Maimbourg what do you think of the enemies of the French Protestants and their dealings I assured him I was extreamly surprised and that out of respect to the quality of those that acted I durst not tell him all I thought But I heartily thank Monsieur Maimbourg for letting the World know that this pretended hellish Conspiracy charged upon the Huguenots to take away their good Name after they had taken away their Lives was but a shameful Story raised by a devilish malice to excuse a hellish action and for so freely censuring the meaness of the Premier President Christopher du Thou who was so base to commend that in publick which he abhorred in private and to countenance such a Story against the Dictates of his own Conscience All the World may by this easily discern the Spirit of Popery It is a Spirit of Murder and Lying It causes the shedding Rivers of Blood and it invents Lies to colour its Murders and to commit fresh ones by which Briguemaud and Cavagnes were hanged This is to say much in a few words says our Friend And if Monsieur Maimbourg had been constantly so ingenuous as he is upon this occasion his Book would be no Libel but a true and righteous defence of the Protestants Innocence All those dreadful things which he there alledges against them are the stamp of the same Spirit which vouches a Conspiracy to justifie the Massacre Neither was it harder for him to be assured of that than to satisfie himself that this last report was a meer Story This Story was as he says himself the first means his Church thought fit to use for the conversion of the young King of Navarre who was afterwards Henry the Great and the young Prince of Condè to the Roman Religion They likewise believed says he that this meaning the false rumour of a hellish Conspiracy against all the Royal Line would help towards the Conversion of the Princes by making them believe they were engaged with those that were their greatest enemies and the worst of Men. An excellent way of converting truly And becoming the Christian Religion I will now read to you what account Monsieur Maimbourg gives of Charles the Ninth's proceedings in the accomplishment of this excellent Work after as Christian a manner as it had been begun Whilst they were Massacring the Huguenots in the Louvre and all over Paris the King sent for those Princes into his Closet where after he had in short given them the reason of this bloody Proceeding of which they themselves had seen some part and which was yet in execution he tells them with a stern countenance imperious and threatning according to his custom that being resolved no longer to suffer in his Kingdom so wicked a Religion which teaches its Followers to revolt and even to conspire against the Person of their Sovereign he expected they should presently renounce this cursed Sect and that they should embrace the Faith which was always professed by the most Christian Kings from whom they had the honor to be descended and that if they refused to comply with him in this he would use them just as they had seen them used whose Rebellion and Impiety they had hitherto been directed by To this the King of Navarre answered with all respect that he was no ways obstinate but was ready to submit to instruction and sincerely to embrace the Catholick Religion when he should be convinced of the truth of it which as yet he was ignorant of The Prince of Condè answered That his Majesty whose Subject he was might dispose of his Life and Fortune as he pleased but not of his Religion for which he was accountable to God alone of whom he held it This answer given to a fierce and hasty Master put him into so great a rage that falling into hard words calling him ever and anon Seditious Mad-man Rebel and Son of a Rebel he swore by God that if he did not comply in that little time which he should give him he would have his life Nay more not being able to endure to see that in spight of all their endeavors to convert him this Prince should still continue unmoveable he drew his Sword and vowed he would destroy all the rest of the Huguenots that persisted in their Heresie beginning presently with the Prince of Condè And it was with much ado that the young Queen prevailed with him to lay by his Sword casting herself at his feet to entreat him with hands lifted up and tears in her eyes but to forbear a little while He yielded but at the same time making the Prince be brought before him he cast two or three thundring looks at him without saying any more than these three words to him in a threatning and frightful tone Mass Death or the Bastile and so turning away he dismissed him This wrought so strongly upon the Mind of the poor Prince and so terrified him that he solemnly abjured Calvinism in the presence of his Uncle the Cardinal of Bourbon as had done before him the King of Navarre the Lady Catharine his Sister and the Princess of Condè You see what were the motives that converted the Princes And this detestable Massacre was the introduction of the fourth War upon the Protestants as Mezeray
says As to the Fact our Jesuite Jesuite as he is notwithstanding condemns it Neither has he the Heart to charge the Huguenots with these new troubles The King raised several Armies to extirpate those that had escaped the Massacre They layed the two so much talked of Sieges of Rochel and Sanvane which were raised at the arrival of the Polish Embassadors come to seek for the Duke of Anjou elected King of that Kingdom whither he went Charles the Ninth falls very ill The Prince of Condé flies into Germany and returns again to the Protestant Communion The King dies after a thousand remorses of Conscience upon the account of St. Bartholomew's Massacre For we are told That oftentimes he fancied that he saw a Sea of Blood flowing before his Eyes and that they should hear him from time to time cry out Ah! my poor Subjects what have ye done to me They forced me to it Then though too late he acknowledg'd that it was not the Protestants as the Jesuite Maimbourg so maliciously reports but the Montmorency's and the Guises who had been the real Authors of all the Troubles He had owned says Mezeray That the Houses of Montmorency and Guise were the true causes of the Civil Wars The King of Poland who was afterwards called Henry the Third returns into France and succeeds Charles the Ninth The Protestants apply to him for Peace and at the same time That Atheism and Blasphemy may be exemplarily punished and that the Ordinances against enormous and lewd Whoring which drew down the Wrath of God upon France might be execuâ—â—â— â—ut says Mezeray this untoward reproof made the Huguenots mere haâ—ed at Court than did all their Insurrections and Heresies They had no fruit 〈◊〉 their demands they would not be hearkned to The War was kept up every where The Duke of Alanzon presumptive Heir to the Crown retired from Court and headed the Protestants The King of Navarre likewise withdrew four Months after Their conjunction with the Prince of Condè who had raised a considerable Army obliges the Court at last to agree to Peace which they had so long desired The Edict was prepared and verified the 15th of May 1576. It allowed the Protestants the free exercise of their Religion which from that time forwards was to be called The Pretendded Reformed Religion It allowed them Church-yards and made them capable of all Offices both in the Colledges Hospitals c. forbid farther enquiry after Priests and Fryars that were married declared their Children Legitimate and capable of Succâ—ssion c. expressed a deep resentment of the Slaughters upon St. Bartholomew's day exempted the Children of those that had been killed from the Duty of the Militia if they were Gentlemen and from Taxes if Yeomen repealed all the Acts which had condemned the Admiral Briquemaud Cavagnes Montgommery Montbrun and others of the Religion owned the Prince and D' Amville for his good Subjects Casimir for his Allie and Neighbor and owned all they had done as done for his Service gave to those of the Religion for their better security of Justice the Chambres my parties in each Parliament or Court of Justice c. But all this was only for a new decoy to catch the Huguenots Mezeray observes that so soon as they had got the Duke of Alanzon from them they began afresh to contrive their ruine And then it was that terrible League broke out which under pretence of extirpating the Protestants set the whole Kingdom in a flame All the Historians agree that it was the pernicious cause of all the Wars that were made against the Huguenots during the Reign of Henry the Third and that had like to have laid France waste Wherefore to justifie the innocence of the Protestants during all these troubles we need only observe the measures and designs of the League which was the cause of them I will keep to what Monsieur Maimbourg says He is thus far ingenuous This League says he had like to have overthrown both Church and State The most of those that went into it or rather run headlong and blindfold with so much heat and passion and especially the common people the Clergy and the Fryars were but stales to those that composed the Cabal where Ambition Malice and Self-Interest had more share than Religion which in all probability was brought in for no other end but to châ—at the World These were the King of Spain Queen Catharine and the Duke of Guise who cast up their Accounts together though upon very different reasons yet such as agreed all against the State the Duke to make himself head of a Party which after the expiration of the Valois might advance him to yet a higher pitch the Queen that she might have a pretence to bring in her Grandchild Henry Son to Charles Duke of Lorrain instead of the lawful Successor to the Crown the King of Navarre her Son-in-Law whom she cared not for and the Spaniard to take advantage of the division the League would cause among the French to make them ruine one another and afterwards become their Master This League divided the Catholicks who took Arms one against anther the one to sâ—cure Religion as they said the other to defend the Royal Authority and the Fundamental Law of the Land which they designed to overthrow It obliged the King for prevention of the dangerous Conspiraciâ—s of the Leaguers to come to a difficult extreme and to join his Forces with those of the Huguenot Party to reduce the Catholick Rebels to their Duty It stirred up terrible Commotions all over the Kingdom This cursed League was made in opposition to the Royal Authority under the fair pretence of Religion It had a fowl beginning though contrary to the common apprehension of those who know not how to fift into the bottom of it It s procedure was abominable being neither more nor less but almost a continued attempt against the Government of a King who was at least as good a Catholick as they that headed the League In conclusion that the rise and design of the League extended to the Subversion of the Royal Family I shall not need to give an exact account here of all the steps the Contrivers of this violent Conspiracy took since the holding of the Estates at Blois in the year 1576. Where as the Bishop of Rhodes says The King Henry the Third was forced to declare himself Head of the League whereby from a Soveraign he became head of a Faction and Enemy to a part of his Subjects down to the year 1589. when they caused this unfortunate Prince to be stabbed by Iaques Clement the Fryar It is enough to understand that by the confession of Monsieur Maimbourg himsâ—lf the Duke of Guise and his Complices did not put Henry the Third upon persecuting the Protestants with that heat and violence for any other end but by the
ruinâ— of the Protestants to compass The Subversion of the Royal Family This was the bottom of all their Designs All their aim was to take the Crown from its lawful Heirs The first thing the Guises and the Queen Mother proposed to themselves when the Duke of Alenzon was dead says the Bishop of Rhodes was each to make sure of the Crown as if the Succession had been at an end This Prelate says further that the Duke of Guise his design was to secure the Crown to himself So soon as ever the League was coâ—â— to a heighth and strengthened they that had contrived it made it 〈◊〉 that it was not only to sâ—cure Religion for the future but from 〈◊〉 moment to get themselves up to the Throne and that thei◠〈◊〉 was not only upon the King of Navarre who was to succâ—â—d 〈◊〉 upon Henry the Third who then Reigned They had hired certain new Divinâ—s who undertook to maintain That a Prince who does not his duty ought to be deposed That nothing but a Power well disposed is of God else when it is out of order it is not Authority but Invasion and that it is as ridiculous to say such a one is King who knows not how to Govern and is void of Understanding as to believe that a blind Man may be a Guide or that a sensless Statue may give motion to living Men In short the same Bishop asseâ—ts in express Terms That the Duke of Guise ' perpetually urged Henry the Third to give him Forces to accomplish the extirpation of the Huguenots in whose ruine he certainly expected to involve the King of Navarre It appears from all this That the Protestants could not omit defending themselves with all their might in the Wars which the League stirred up against them without betraying their King their Country the Lawful Heir of the Crown who headed them and the whole Line of the Bourbons I do not think there needs any more to take off all aspersions Neither can I imagine what the Jesâ—ite Maimbourg means who understood all this so exactly well to say of these worthy Defenders of the Crown They became more obstinate and more insolent under Henry the Third What! would he have had all the Protestants suffered their Throats to be cut he that maintains the design of those who would have cut the Protestants Throats to have been the Subversion of the Fundamental Law of the Land the extinguishing of the Royal Family and to have taken away the Crown from his Kings Renowned Grandfather In good earnest his King is much beholding to him to call that Obstinacy and Insolence which was the heroick attempts of those who so often hazarded thâ—ir Lives to preserve that Throne for for him which he enjoys with so great Glory You see easily then says our Friend that justly they can no more charge the French Protestants with Rebellion than they can do with any Plot against their King down to the Reign of Henry the Fourth whom they delivered from the fury of the League and seated in the Throne in despite of all the obstructions of this powerful Faction Therefore Monsieur Maimbourg is but an infamous Detractor when he charges them with Rebellions which cost France so much Blood and Plots which he accuses them to have layed with the Enemies to withdraw themselves from under the Monarchy by openly setting up for a Commonwealth The later part of this accusation is so absurd that it deserves not to be considered Whom would this Man perswade that they who made no other War but under the conduct of Princes of the Blood who were so nearly concerned for the support of the Monarchy should â—vâ—r endâ—avor to set up a Commonwealth Besides Is there any likelihood that so many Protestants of the Nobility who hold all their Honor of the Monarchy and had no other Lustre but as they were Rays of the Royal Sun should have renounced their glory and dependence upon the Court to lie obnoxious to the caprice of a seditious multitude under the obscurity of a Commonwealth They took up Arms about the beginning of Henry the Fourths Reign or indeed rather they continued in Arms but it was only to compleat his Conquests and to settle him in the Throne by dispersing the remainder of the League which held out as long as it could from owning him King even when he was turned Roman Catholick and reconciled to the Pope So soon as all the troubles were appeased and every one reduced to his duty he setled the famous Edict of Nantes under the Title of Perpetual and Irrevocable as I shewed you at our first meeting which gave the Protestants a full Peace during the remaining part of this Prince's Life His Life had been as long as glorious in all appearance but for the wicked knife of the vile Ravillac who had the confidence to spill this illustrious Blood in time of Peace which was so much reguarded in the heat of War The disorders broke out again after France had lost its wise Pilot and invincible Protector But because this Conference has held us so long Let us if you please defer what we have more to say in justification of the French Protestants till another time Only give me leave before we part to read to you a passage out of Mezeray He confutes in very few words all Monsieur Maimbourg's Calumnies by which he would maliciously charge the Protestant Religion with all the mischiefs in France and all the rest of Europe during the Reigns of Francis the Second and Charles the Ninth whereas this excellent Historian who has more sincerity than the Jesuite though of the same Religion lays them all to the abominable Wickedness the Papists of these two Courts were alone guilty of These are his words Charlee the Ninth lived 25 years wanting 31 days But he began not to Reign till after the Siege of Rochelle His Mother always kept the Government in her own hand with three or four of her Confidents who turned all upside down to keep the Authority to themselves Thence sprung the continual Civil Wars pursued with so many fatal Battles Pillages and all sorts of Waste Thence came the abuse of Military Discipline the Corruption of Manners the overthrowing of Laws In short this barbarous day of St. Bartholomew and a thousand other mischiefs that perplexed his Reign had all their rise from hence Three great Evils prevailed likewise in those days which did most provoke the Divine Majesty to wit Blasphemy Sorcery and all sorts of Villanies which having begun ever since the Reign of Henry the Second drew the vengeance of Heaven upon this unhappy Kingdom and were the cause that God visited it with so many Judgments one after another After we had read this passage we appointed a day to meet again and so parted I take my leave therefore for this time and remain c. The End of the Fourth Letter The fifth Letter French Protestants
innocency under Lewis the Thirteenth SIR I Was no sooner come to our Friends Chamber and that we were sate down but we fell to our business I am very well satisfied says I to him in all that you have told me hitherto in behalf of the French Protestants and I am convinced That till the Reign of their King Lewis XIII they cannot justly charge them with any Plot or Rebellion against their Kings If at any time they have taken up Arms it was always to secure the Crown to their lawful Prinâ—es against the ambitious designs of the House of Guise and under the Authority of the first Princes of the Blood who had a natural Right to oppose the Usurpation these Strangers would have made who making an ill use of the Simplicity Minority and Weakness of the Kings Francis the Second Charles the Ninth and Henry the Third had taken the Scepter out of their hands or at least would have deprived their Rightful Successors of it had not the Protestants given Succour with their utmost Force the great Prince of Condè first and afterwards the King of Navarre Therefore to say the truth they armed only in their Kings Quarrel and especially to secure to France the Illustrious House of Bourbon which sits on that Throne at present After all it is clear That hitherto they cannot question their Loyalty or their Innocence but through the heart of Henry the Great by blasting his Memory and disgracing his Crown and all his Posterity But I must confess to you That I am to seek how well to defend them against the Reproaches for their several Insurrections under the Reign of Lewis the Thirteenth For in the Year 1615 they joined with the Prince of Conde against their King which had like to have set the whole Nation in a Flame In the Year 1620 they sided with the Queen-Mother who raised Forces against the King her Son In the Years 1621 and 1622 they gave the occasion by the Meeting they held at Rochel contrary to the King 's express Command of a most bloody War in which many of their Garisons were Besieged Taken and Sacked In the Year 1525 they carried away their King's Ships from Blavet they seized upon the Island of Oleron they had divers Battels Lastly in the Years 1627 and 1628 they gave fresh disturbances under the Command of the Duke of Rohan and Rochel Revolted from its Allegiance to that degree of obstinacy that nothing but the utmost extremity of Famine could make them open their Gates These several Insurrections which are continually objected against them gives occasion to their Enemies to cry them down at Court amongst the Nobility and indeed all over the Nation as a restless sort of people active and dangerous whose Religion inspires them with a Spirit of Sedition and Back-sliding pernicious to Monarchs and Monarchies Therefore pray Instruct me what I may answer in their Justification and Defence I know not says our Friend whether you are in jest or earnest but for my part I find nothing more easie than to satisfie any reasonable Persoâ— in this point 1. â—tis is a hundred and sixty Years since there have been Protestants in France For by the Confession of Monsieur Maimbourg himself the Reformation begun to be settled ever since the Year 1522. And all the World agrees That from this Year to the Death of Henry the Second who was killed with a Lance by Montgomery in the Year 1559 which was about 37 Years after the Protestants continued all along exactly Loyal anâ— in the deepest Veneration for their Kings Monsieur Maimbourg indeed disputes the thirty Years under the Reigns of Francis the Second Charles the Ninth and Henry the Third but I have confuted all his Calumnies in this particular and you have allowed the strength of my Arguments for clearing the Protestants during these three Reigns so that here are 67 Years of Allegiance and Loyalty Neither have they any thing to say against them upon this account for the one and twenty Years that Henry the Fourth Reigned or for the four first Years of Lewis the Thirteenth no more than for the 54 Years that passed between the Year 1629 at what time all the Wars about Religion ceased and this present time 1682 when they are persecuted with the utmost Rigour So that for a hundred and sixty Years that the Protestants have been in France there are but fourteen in which they have any thing to object against them that is from their uniting with the Prince of Condè in the Year 1615 to the general Peace concluded in the Month of Iuly 1629. And of these fourteen Years we must deduct seven which are the Years 1616 1617 1618 1619 1623 1624 and 1626. in which there were no Civil Wars Thus when all is cast up and due Deduction made allow the worst that can be there are but seven Years which they can reproach them with And suppose it true that the Protestants during these seven Years should have forgot themselves so far as to have come short of their duty towards their Sovereign is it just to infer from thence That the Principles they go by proceed from a Spirit of Sedition and Rebellion Is there any proportion between seven Years misbehaviour and uneasiness and above a hundred and fiâ—ty Years Duty and Loyalty such Duty and Loyalty as have undergone the greatest proofs And since they have testified twenty times more Zeal and Constancy for the service of their Kings than they have shewed Disobedience and Opposition to their Orders does not Reason and Justice plainly oblige us to conclude from thence That they are animated by a spirit of Loyalty and Obedience It must be confessed That their Loyalty which stood firm for more than fourscore Years was shaken to some degree for the space of seven Years But he that swounds away is not dead The Sun goes not out when it is â—clipsed And the Loyalty of the Protestants is so well recovered from its fainting Fit that it is more than half an Age that we find it resisting all manner of Provocations and ill usage without yielding in the least This long and constant perseverance of the Protestants in their duty is that we ought to have regard to if we would be just in taking the true Character of their Spirit and not the infirmity of a hasty and short-lived transport This ought to be enough to satisfie all reasonable Men and yet it is not all that can be said in behalf of these poor persecuted people 2. It is a great matter Sir that they can with no Justice impute those Insurrections you spake of to the whole Body of the French Protestants For First There was an infinite number of them not in the least concerned Secondly they that were the Ring-Leaders were only Protestants in Name but really men only of this World Ambitious or Covetous who only made use of Religion for a Mask to hide their wicked purposes and
for a pretence to â—ish in troubled Waters But if there happened to be any sincere Protestants who were drawn in by these Hypocrites to take up Arms with them as it is not to be doubted they did it not in pursuit of the Principles of their Religion which is point-blanck against such proceedings but out of too great a fear of Death or something worse through a usual Infirmity of Nature from which the best of Christians are not wholly exempt The first need no defence the second deserve it not and the third sort plead their fear the rather because just as it were easie to prove as well as their repentance As the first are they that held to the true Principles of their Religion it is but reasonble that we should make our judgment of the French Protestants from their behaviour The second as they did but act a part and were Impostors there is no reason their Extravagancies and Rebellions should be charged upon the true Protestants who disown their Fraternity And because the third falled out of weakness it is the duty of a Christian Compassion and the sense of our own Infirmities to forget and forgive their Failures I propose nothing in all this but upon the most authentick Authority that could be wished for upon such an occasion it is a Declaration of Lewis XIII given at Bourdeaux the 10th of November 1615. upon the joyning of the Protestants with the Prince of Condè Many says this King speaking of the Protestants of his Kingdom have taken up Arms against us to assist the Commotion begun by our Cousin the Prince of Condè amongst which there are that use Religion only for a better Pretence to conceal their Ambition and extream thirst of bettering themselves by the disturbance and ruine of the State and the rest have been Cheated and Imposed upon by false suggestions and vain fears that the former sort have put into their heads as if there were no avoiding Persecution but presently to take up Arms with them in their own defence making them believe the better to work upon their easiness That in the private Article upon the Match with Spain it was agreed and covenanted to drive them out of the Kingdom or wholly to destroy them which they being too forward to believe have run into this Engagement out of a conceit that they are forced to it in their own defence which makes their Fault pardonable and worthy rather of Pity than Punishment But these tricks have not prevailed or seduced the wiser and better sort who profess the same Religion purely out of Conscience as expecting to be Saved by it and not to promote a Faction who to a considerable number as well Lords Gentlemen Towns Corporations as other private persons of all qualities condemn and abhor the wickedness and rashness of their attempt and have publickly declared by word of mouth and writing That it ought to be esteemed as neither more nor less than a down-right Rebellion c. We have declared and ordained and do declare and ordain upon Consideration and in favour to the Loyalty which has been observed towards us by an infinite number of our good Subjects of the said Religion amongst which there are of the chiefest and best Quality who deserve a special Proof of our Good-Will That what has been committed by those of the same Religion who have taken up Arms against us or that have in any manner aided or assisted them have likewise the favour of our Edicts and that they share in this Grace as if they had always continued in their Duty c. This same King would by no means have the least Reproach lie upon those Protestants whose Fault he had declared Pardonable though they had joined with the Prince of Condè For when they came to consider ' all things for appeasing these first troubles he owns them for his faithful Subjects and maintains all they had done as done for his Service It is in Article XVII of the Edict of Blois in the Year 1616. and by your leave I will read you the Article That there may be no question of the good intention of our dearest Couâ—in the Prince of Condè and of those that joyned with him we declare That we hold and esteem our said Cousin the Prince of Condè to be our good Kinsman and faithful Subject and Servant as likewise the other Princes Dukâ—s Peers Oâ—ficers of our Crown Lords Gentlemen Towns Communalties and others as well Catholicks as those of the pretended Reformed Religion of what quality or condition soever that have assisted joined and united themselves with him either before or during the Cessation of Arms understanding also thereby the Deputies of the prâ—tended Reformed Religion lately assembled at Nismes and now at our City of Rochel to be our good and Loyal Subjects and Servants And having seen the Declaration addressed to us by our said Cousin the Prince of Condè We believe and look upon what was done by him and the aforenamed to have been done for a good end and purpose and for our Service In all the following troubles the same distinction is to be made The whole Body of Protestants was never engaged in them the greater and more sober part always kept to their Obedience and Duty in despite of all the Injuries that were done them They were contented to encounter God and their â—ing with Tears and Prayers or if they were seen in Arms it was in the Armies and under the Standards of their King whil'st they that were not Protestants but in shew made all the stirs which they unjustly impute to the true Protestants of which if any were drawn in by the insinuation of several disaffected persons and through impatience of the unjust Severities they were treated with against the Engagement of the Edicts to defend themselves by force of Arms their Religion which is from Jesus Christ never allowed it in opposition to their Superiors But after all it was but a small number of the Protestants that gave in to those rough Provocations they then lay under In so doing they departed from the Principles of the Protestant Religion Their own Brethren an inâ—inite number of them have condemned them for it true Christians are pardon'd daily for faults committed upon far more flight motives The King himself that then Reigned has determined That the cause of their taking up Arms which was undoubtedly a very just grievance as well as a sudden terror made their Crime pardonable and rather deserving Pity than Punishment However to lay the fault of particular Men upon the whole Body or the Protestant Religion it self as their Enemies do every day is as if we should charge the whole Church and Romish Religion with the Faults of those Papists who to a very great number followed either the late Prince of Condè in the troubles of the year 1615. or the Queen-Mother Mary de Medicis in those of the year 1620. or the present Prince
And this was the only end of arming himâ—elf and not any private Interest if any one shall yet question let him but consider the circumstance of the time and the poâ—ture of his Affairs For who can believe that the King my Maâ—ter has any design upon â—rance or making any Conquests there at so improper a time when he has already upon him an Enemy one of the most Powerful Princes in the World And that if he had any such thoughts of so many Men as he has raised which are the same charge to him as if he had them here and which he is always ready to send over if the Churches want them he should only send a handful in comparison of so many as would be needful for so great an undertaking besides the great Succors he sends at the same time into Germany Who would not conclude rather as in truth it is that the Forces here are but Auxiliaries and that they are for no other purpose but to assist the Churches which for so many reasons and upon such important accounts he finds himself obliged before God and Man to aid and protect that if they will say the King my Master was provoked to arm himself upon other considerations as the imbargo and seizure of all the Shipping Goods and Effects of his Subjects at Bourdeaux and other places of this Kingdom to the open breach and overthrow of the Treaties between the two Crowns which are direct in this point and to the irreparable prejudice even the entire ruine of Trade in the disappointment of which the poor people of this Kingdom not being able to put off their Commodities groan not only under the Burden of so many Taxes and Impositions but even of the Necessaries of Life it self that the apprehension the King my Master has of the growth of the Most Christian Kings Power by Sea has put him upon taking Arms to hinder the progress and in conclusion that he was forced to put himself in a Warlike posture through despair of an accommodation The answer to all this must be that whoever will take notice of the Stops Seizures and Prizes that were on the one side and the other shall find that the King my Master and his Subjects have hitherto got most by this Breach and that it has been an advantage to them in some measure In the second place he is so far from being jealous of the growth of this pretended power at Seâ— and seeking to obstruct it that there needs no more whenever the King my Master shall see his time but to give out Letters of Mart to his Subjects to disappoint all these vain and weak attempts without making use of his Royal Power And lastly that we were necessitated to this arming of our selves out of a despair of an accommodation the contrary is most apparent to any one that will consider the applications that have been made at several times as well by their own as by the Ministers of stranger Princes to the King my Master at their instance to treat about an accommodation All which justifies the King my Master who has not been forced to arm upon any private account but only in aid of the Churches for whose safety and freedom he had undertaken And there are that would possess the world that his Majesty has a private design and that he makes use of a pretence of the Religion to form a Party by the help and addition of which with his own forces he thinks to carry on his design to his own purpose But our Religion teaches us otherwise and the goodness of the King my Master in which he comes short of no man living will never suffer him to do it His purpose is to settle the Churches his interest is their good his end to give them satisfaction This being done the beating of Drums and displaying of Colours shall cease and all this noise of War shall be buried in Oblivion as what was never done but upon their account nor set forward but for their sakes Given on Board the Admiral this Wednesday the one and twentieth of Iuly 1927. Signed Buckingham This Declaration shews that our Kings are resolved to love and cheâ—ish the Protestants of France and that our Great Monarch in holding his Arms open to them at this day does but follow the steps of his Princely Father He demonstrates thereby to all his people that he inherites his goodness as well as his Crown and that as this holy Martyr he knows assuredly that these poor persecuted would breath nothing but loyalty in the enjoyment of the Edicts The same Declaration shews undeniably the innocence and justice of our arming upon the occasions whereof we are treating as not having been made but upon the extreamest necessity when there was no other way left to hold France to that promise of which our King was the Garante and to prevent the loâ—s of Rochel which was undone only for committing its concerns to his Majesty Honour sincerity publick faith the Law of Nations the urging Duty of conscience all obliged us to run in to the succour of a Town that had cast it self upon our Monarch and that had full right to shake off the yoke of France since it had been no otherwise given up to the French but upon a condition that was broken which was that they should build no Fort upon its Territory whereby to give cause of suspicion Nevertheless as the Declaration obâ—erves they had not only built one against the Article of the Treaty which made the Treaty void and put Rochel into its full liberty which it had acquired at other times but they had built several which blocked up the Town on every side and destroyed its trade Our arming therefore upon this occasion was just It was justified by the publick faith and the Law of necessity and had no other end but to protect the weak who were oppressed contrary to the â—ngagement of the Treaty which was the supporting of a good cause For Rochel which they wasted after so many manners was then in right to defend it self being no longer subject to the Prince who attaqued it Conditio non impleta liberat fidem say the Civilians A condition not fullfilled takes off all Engagement Rochel had said to the King of France you shall be my King if you build no Fort upon my Territory but not otherwise and the King of France consented or rather swore to a solemne Treaty that he would not be Master of Rochel but upon this condition So that from the moment in which he had broken the condition agreed upon and accepted of he put Rochel into its orignal right The Rochellers are no longer his subjects and therefore if they shut the gates of their Town against him if they defend themselves as well as they can against his invasion if they call in their friends for succour they do it in their own right and it is to do them open wrong it is traducing them
doubt but they who perswade this great Prince to violate a word so solemnly given are his mortal Enemies Enemies to his glory as much or more then the Protestants Were I not obliged to go abroad I would instantly discharge my self of the last part of my promise to you which is to shew you that the Papists are the really guilty persons of the sins of Rebellion and conspiracie which the Jesuits Maimbourg and such as he falsly impute to the French Protestant But this shall be for our next meeting Upon which having first appointed an other time we parted I am c. The Sixth Letter Papists themselves Antymonarchists SIR I was sure to come at the hour appointed Our friend had two little Books in his hands just as I came into the room He compared them one with an other and I observed him to smile whilst he was doing of it Pray said I give me leave to awake you out of your pleasant Dream and ask you what you are so intent upon that for what I can perceive pleases you very well If you please to sit down replied he I will tell you in short So I took my seat and he went on One of the two Books that you saw me have is The History of Calvinisme and the other The Policy of the Clergy of France Whilst I was expecting you I read what Monsiuer Mainbourg says in the First to take off the prejudice Protestant Kings and Princes might have taken against the Principles and usual practice of Papists And I must confess to you I could not forbear smiling when I saw the ridiculous evasions this man made use of especially after I had compared them with the objections of the Author of The Policy of the Clergy of France which he pretends to confute I must needs read all this to you You shall find proofs enough there to justifie you in what I promised That they are the Papists who are really to be feared in the point of Rebellion and conspiracies into which the principles of their Religion have so often lead them and not the Protestants of France whose Religion is so directly opposite to these sort of practices and who by the help of God have never been guilty of them properly so speaking as I have before demonstrated to you It is certain says Monsieur Maimbourg that in the glorious condition the King is at this day having vanquished all those that conspired against this Soverain Power to which they all bow he might with ease and justly deal with the Huguenots as the Protestant Princes do with the Catholicks Nay his glory seems to oblige him to it For is it not a wonderful thing to see some Princes who come infinitely short of him in every thing denying the Catholicks the free Exercise of their Religion within their Territories and yet to have it expected thâ—â— he should endure those that profess theirs freely to Exercise in his Kingdome Might he not very reasonably Say to the Huguenots Either let these Princes allow the free Exercise of my Religion under them or else do not look that I â—hould allow you the freedom of â—xercising yours and theirs in France If you would have us observe the Edicts that were made in your favour see then that they make the like in favour of the Catholiks And it signifies nothing what one of their last witnesses has 〈◊〉 of late to give the best answer he could to this powerful argument which overthrows them He thought to take it off by saying that there is a great difference betwixt the one and the other in this respect in as much as the Catholicks believing that the Pope may depose a Prince who is esteemed at Rome a Heretike or Excommunicated Person there is reason to be at defiance with them and to apprehend their conspiring against such a Prince which cannot be said of the Protestants who are far from any such belief so that there is no ground to suspect them or imagin they should attempt any ill against the Catholick Princes their Soveraigns To shew plainly how little force there is in such an Answer which is indeed but a poor shifting we need only mark these two things which have been laied down in this History of Calvinisme and which cannot be denied The first is that more dismal conspiracies are hardly to be met with then those the Hugunots have made against our Kings such as the accursed attempts of Amboise and of Meaux not to take notice of their terrible Rebellions which have cost France so much blood and of the unhappy Plots they have entred into with their â—nemies to withdraw their subjection from the Monarchy by openly setting up a Commonwealth as they have done more then once The second is that it is by no means our belief that a Pope can depose Princes though they be Hereticks nor absolve their subjects from the Oath of Allegiance and give up their right to him that can first take it Far from this our most Christian Kings who are known to have been the most zealous Defenders of the Catholike faith and the greatst Protectors of the holy See to which they have always unmoveably held notwithstanding all the differences they had with some Popes about temporal Affairs and the right of their Crown which they must never give up our Kings I say have ever protested against this pretension grounded upon a principle which our Doctors have always condemned as directly contrarâ— to the divine Law There may be seen to this purpose the remonstrances and the protestations that I have mentionâ—d which Charleâ— the Ninth directed to Pope Pius the Fourth upon the occasion of Queen Iean of Navar as obstinate a Huguenot as she was Therefore the King might justly use the Huguenots as the Protestant Princes in their States do the Catholicks I should not have done to day if I should take notice of all that Monsieur Maimbourg says upon this subject He makes it consistent with the Duty and Honour of the King of France to overthrow an Edict which was the reward of the Loialty and of the eminent services of the Protestants an Edict confirmed in all the Parliaments of the Kingdome under the title of a perpetual and irrevacable Law Ratified by a thousand Royal promises and by a thousand authentike Declarations which Lewis the Fourteenth had himself solemnly sworn to observe upon so many occasions It seems says the Jesuite that he is bound to do it for his glory which is to say according to this man of conscince that one does his Duty when he breaks his word and his Oath and that he acts for his Glory when he dishonours himself and his Ancestors by perjuries and overthrowing the most Religiously established Laws But above all it is a pleasant fancy that the argument he furnishes his King with to stop the mouth of the Huguenots who do not prevail with the Princes of their Religion to permit the free exercise of the
Roman Religion in their Dominions Might he not very justly say to the Huguenots says he speaking to the King of France either see that these Princes allow the free exercise of my Religion with them or do not think to have the free exercise of yours and theirs in France If it be expected that we should consider the Edicts which have been here made in your behalf let them shew then the like favour to the Catholicks Monsieur Maimbourg calls this a powerful argument which overthrows the Huguenots But as to that I remit him to the Author of the Critique General of his History He will there find his dream entertained as it deserves It is sufficient for my purpose to let you see that what the Author of the Policy of the Clergy urges to prove that the Papists upon account of the principles of their Religion are always to be feared in Protestant States is no Poor groundlâ—ss evasion as Monsieur Maimbourg would have us believe And that you may be the better judge of it give me leave to read all that this exellent Author has writ upon the Subject I am confident after you have heard it read you will not less wonder then I do at the confidence of the Jesuite who never appears more positive then where he has least reason So then our friend read to me this following discourse Hugonot Princes cannot allow the same toleration to Catholicks in their States that Catholick Princes can allow to Hugonots because Protestant Princes cannot be assured of the fidelity of their Catholick Subjects by reason they have taken Oaths of fidelity to another Prince whom they look upon as greater than all Kings It is the Pope and this Prince is a sworn â—nemy of the Protestants He obliges the People to believe that a Soveraign turned Heretick has forfeited all the Rights of Soveraignty that they owe him no Obedience that they may with impunity revolt from him that they may fall upon him as an Enemy of the Christian Name even to assassinate him See the Iesuits Morals cap. 3. Book the third And thereupon he cited to me Mariana Carolus Scribanus Ribadinera Tolet Gretser Hereau Amicus Lesâ—ius Valentia Dicatillus and several others that are cited by the Iansenists in the Book of the Jâ—suits Morals and by the Ministers All these Authors said he to me teach conformably to the Divinity of Rome that a Heretick Prince and Excommunicated by the Pope is but a private person against whom Arms may be taken that he may be likewise Assassinated or poysoned He added to this the examples of the many Parricides that have been committed or attempted in pursuance of these Maxims How many times said he would they have Assassinated Queen Elizabeth Prince William of Orange was twice Assassinated and lost his Life the Second time Henry the Third was not he killed by a Iacobin as Excommunicated by the Pope and stript of the Royal Dignity Iohn Chastel did not he attempt the same thing upon Henry the Fourth And did not Ravilliac out of a false Zeal Assassinate him After which he gave me an account of the Gun-powder Plot in England by which in the year 1606. the Catholicks had undertaken to blow up the King and all the Grandees of the Kingdom by a Mine they had made under the Parliament House He told me of the Jesuits Garnet and Oldcorn Chief of that Conspiracy who were put into the number of the Martyrs whether they would or no for the Jesuit Garnet going to Execution some one of his Companions telling him soâ—tly in his Ear that he was going to be a Martyr he answered Nunâ—uâ—m audivi parricidam esse Martyrem I never heard that a Parricide was a Martyr He related to me a hundred scandalous Stories of that nature Amongst others he told me one that extreamly surprized me he read it to me with all its circumstances in a little Book that had been published by an English Minister who calls himself the King of Englands Chaplain Thus it is in short A Divine who had been the Chaplain of King Charles who was beheaded turnd Catholick some time before his Masters Death and the English Jesuits put such confidence in him that they imparted to him a very dreadful thing It was a Consultation allowed of by the Pope about the means of re-establishing the Catholick Religion in England The English Catholicks seeing that the King was a Prisoner in the hands of the Independants formed the Resolution of laying hold on that occasion to dâ—stroy the Protestant and re-establish the Catholick Religion They concluded that the only means of re-establishing the Catholick Religion and of laying aside all the Laws that had been made against it in England was to dispatch the King and destroy Monarchy That they might be authorized and maintained in this great Undertaking they deputed eighteen Father-Jesuits to Rome to demand the Popes advice The matter was agitated in secret Assemblies and it was concluded that it was permitted and just to put the King to Death Those Deputies in their passage through Paris consulted the Sorbonne who without waiting for the Opinion of Rome had judged that that enterprise was just and lawful and upon the return of the Jesuites who had taken the Journey to Rome they communicated to the Sorbonnits the Popes Answer of which several Copies were taken The Deputies who had been at Rome being returned to London confirmed the Catholicks in their Design To compass this point they thrust themselves in amongst the Independants by dissembling their Religion They persuaded those people that the King must be put to Death and it cost that poor Prince his Life some Months after But the Death of King Charles not having had all the Consequences that was hoped and all Europe having cryed out with horrour against the Parricide committed upon the Person of that poor Prince they would have called in again all the Copies that had been made of the Consultation of the Pope and of that of Sorbonne but this English Chaplain who had turned Catholick would not restore his and he has communicated it since the return of the Family of the Stuarts to the Crown of England to several persons who are still alive and were Eye witnesses of what I have now told you Par. I never heard this before But the English Calvinists not Producing any authentick pieces to prove this accusation it may be looked upon as a Calumny Prov. My Hugâ—not Gentleman would not answer for it for he is very just However he added that what rendred it very probable is that this Conduct is a sequel of the Divinity of the zealous Catholicks of Spaim Italy and even of France Morâ—over there are several Circumstancâ—s which render the thing apparent For example he that lately published this story had already once published it in the year 1662 to answer a little Book that insulted over the English Calvinists in that they had put their King to death The
Divine who knew the story that I have related published it to prove that the Catholicks were guilty of the Crime which the Calvinists were accused of When this story came to light there was a great alarme in the House of the Queen-Mother of the King of England that House being full of Jesuits and even that great Lord who had lead the Jesuits to Rome and had made himself chief of that Conspiracy was one of the principal Officers of the House They immediately demanded Justice of the King by the means of the Queen-Mother for the injury that he who had published this scandalous story had done them The Doctor offered to prove his Accusation and to produce his Witnesses who were still living The great Lord and Officer of the Queens House and the Jesuits seeing the resolution of this Man durst not push him on they only obtain'd from the King by the means of the Queen-Mother that he should be silenced You must avow that there are but few that are innocent who would have been so easie in so terrible an Accusation Besides it is certain that this Consultation of Rome has been seen by several persons If it is false it must have been forged by this Chaplain who was turned Catholick and who shewed it since tho it must be confessed that this is not very likely However as all this is reduceed to a single Witness my Gentleman acknowledged that the proof was not wholly in forme but he stood much upon the late Conspiracy of England which was discovered two years ago by which half the Kingdom was to have had their Throats cut to become Masters of the rest Prov. Be it as it will my Hugonot Gentleman concluded from all this that a Protestant Prince can never be assured of the Fidelity of his Catholick Subjects On the contrary said he the Protestants are subject to their Prince out of Conscience and out of a Principle of their Religion They acknowledge no other Superiour than their King and do not believe that for the cause of Heresie it is permitted either to kill a lawful Prince or to refuse him obedience They oppose against us said he to me the English and Holland Catholicks But what has been promised to those people that has not been performed The United Provinces of the Low Countries are entred into the Union with this Condition of not suffering any other Religion in their States than the Protestant Though England was reformed under Edward the 6 th afterwards under Elizabeth by several Acts of Parliament which are the fundamental Laws of the Kingdom it was ordered that no other Religion should be suffered than that the Anglicane Church made choice of and that they would not suffâ—r the Assemblies of those whom they at present call Nonconformists It was even forbidden to the Priests and Monks to set Foot in England and to make any abode there However they have not kept up to this rigour and every one knows that there is at present above ten thousand Priests and Monks disguised in England and that there has ever been so Wherefore more has been given to the Catholicks than was promised them But in France where we live under favourable Edicts they have promised us what they have not performed It is only against us that they make profession of not performing what they have promised The Edicts of Pacification are in all the Forms that perpetual Laws ought to be they are verified by the Parliaments they are confirmed by a hundred Declarations which followed by Consequence and by a thousand Royal Words In fine they have been laid as irrevocable Laws and as foundations of the Peace of the State We rely upon the good Faith of so many promises and on a sudden we see snatcht from us what we looked upon as our greatest security and which we had possessed for above a hundred years Thus there is neither Title nor Prescription nor Edicts nor Acts nor Declarations which can put us in Safety This is what he told me and I avow to you that this part put me in pain for I am a Slave to my Word and an Idolater of good Faith I look upon it as the only Rampart of Civil Society and I conceive that States and Publick persons are no lâ—ss obliged to keep what they promise than particular men Far. That is true But do not you know that the safety of the people and the publick good is the Soveraign Law Very often we must suffer and even do some Evil for the good of the State Peaces and Treaties are daily broken which have been solemnly sworn because that the publick interest requires it should be so Prov. My Hugonot made himself that difficulty and told me thereupon When War is declared against Neighbours to the prejudice of Treties of Peace and Alliances this is done in the Forms They publish Manifesto's they expose or at least they suppose Grievances and Infractions in the Articles of the Treaty that have been made by those against whom War is declared When a Soveraign revokes the Graces that he had done his Subjects it is ever under pretence that they have rendered themselves unworthy of them But are we accused or can we be accused of having tampered in any Conspiracy of having had Intelligence with the Enemies of the State of having wanted Love Fidelity and Obedience towards our Soveraigns If it be so let us be brought to Tryal let the Criminals be informed against and let the Innocent be distinguished from those that are Guilty We speak boldly thâ—rein because we are certain they can reproach us with nothing and we know that his Majesty himself has very often given Testimony of our Fidelity He knows that we did not enter into any of the Parties that have been made against his Service since he has been upon the Throne During the troubles of his minority it may be said that none but those Cities we were Masters of remained Loyal When the Gates of Orleans were shut upon the King he went to Gien and that City was going to be guilty of the same Crime without the vigour of a Hugonot who made way with his Sword in his hand to the Bridge and let it down himself This action was known and recompenced for the King immediately made him Noble who had done it We had not any part in the disturbances of Bordeaux in those of Britany and Auvergue nor in the Conspiracy of the Chevalier do Roban Not one Hugonot was engaged in these Criminal Cases The King has been pleased to acknowledge it and we look upon the Testimony of so great a King as a great Recompence But our Enemies who continually sollicit him to our ruin ought to be mindful that it would be more civil in them to leave the King the liberty of following his inclinations These would without doubt move him to preserve the effects of his kindness for people who have preserved for him an inviolable Fidelity This is what
he told me upon that point and I confess I was in great perplexity how to answer him for I durst not make use of that Maxim that I have seen often maintain'd by some people That one is not obliged to keep Faith with Hereticks I have ever admired that saying of Charles the Fifth He caused Martin Luther to come to Worms and gave him safe Conduct and his Imperial word that no hurt should be done him But not having been able to obtain from him what he desired he sent him back â—ome one would have persuaded Charles That he ought to cause Luther to be seized without having regard to the safe Conduct because that this man was of the Character of those with whom one is not obliged to keep ones word Though â—incerity were banished from all the Earth answered he it ought to be found in an Emperour A saying very worthy of so great a Man But tell me Sir is it not an Opinion very contrary to that of Charles the 5 th which is the cause that so little Conscience is made of keeping touch with those people in what has been promised them Par. This Doctrin that one is not obliged to keep Faith with Hereticks is taught by some Casuists and they pretend that it is founded upon the Authority of the Council of Constance because that that Council caused Iohn Hus to be burnt contrary to the Faith of the safe Conduct that the Emperor Sigismond had granted him and Ierome of Prague notwithstanding the safe Conduct that the same Council had given him Prov. This Morality ever appeared to me terrible and I have been oftâ—n scandalized at the Conduct of that great Council of Constance Par. The most part of the Catholicks reject that Morality and maintain we are obliged to keep Faith with all the World without excepting Infidels and Hereticks otherwise there would never be any Treaty between the Turks and the Christians that were real It is pretended that the Council of Constance has not established this Maxim That we are not obliged to make good to Hereticks what we have promised them Iohn Hus had no safe Conduct from the Council he had only the Emperours and thereupon the Council in the Nineteenth Session declared That any safe Conduct granted by the Emperour by Kings and the other Secular Princes to Hereticks could not do prejudice to the Catholick Faith and to the Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction and could not hinder from proceeding in the Tribunal of the Church to the punishment of Hereticks who had provided themselves with such a safe Conduct Thus the Council did not violate its promise for it never gave any neither did it oblige the Emperour to violate his Faith But the Ecclesiastical Tribunal that had not given any word made Iohn Hus his Process Prov. That distinction seems pleasant to me I have heard say that the Church does not put its hand into blood When Iohn Hus was convicted of Heresie by the Council he was delivered without doubt to the secular Arm to be burnt Those Secular Judges were not they Imperial Judges Thus the Emperor violated his safe Conduct in permitting his Judges to put a Man to Death to whom he had promised all security But what do they say of Ierome of Prague to whom the Council it self had given a safe Conduct and yet was burnt Par. They say that the Council in the safe Conduct that was given to Ierome of Prague had inserted this Clause Salva Iustitia that thus they had only promis'd to warrant Ierome of Prague from violence and not from the arrests of Justice But I avow to you that all this is not capable of justifying the Conduct of that Council Neither does it pass in France for a Rule that they will follow If they do not keep with the Hugonots all that has been promised them it is not that they ground themselves upon the Morality and the Conduct of the Council of Constance They do not pretend to depart from sincerity they make profession of keeping the Edict of Nantes Do you not see this at the Head of all the Declarations which are made against them And now lately in that by which the Catholicks are forbidden to embrace the P. R. Religion upon pain of Confiscation of goods loss of Honour and Banishment though never any Declaration was made that was more contrary to the Edicts of Nantes We have one called Bernard and another Lawyer of the City of Poictiers called Tilleau who have made large Commentaries upon the Edict of Nantes to make it appear that without formally revoking that Edict the Hugonots may be deprived of all that Edict grants them in giving to every one of the Articles Interpretations and Glosses that would never have been imagined And these are the measures they follow Prov. This is good to amuse But after all this does not satisfie the Conscience and one is no less convinced of having violated his word For those who obtain Declarations against the Hugonots according to the Glosses of Bernard and Tilleau are well perswaded that they are Glosses of Orleans which overturn the Text. But do you know what I told my Hugonot to stop his Mouth upon these Infractions in the Edicts Par. Perhaps you told him that one is not oâ—liged to keep a word that has been extorted by violence that the Hugonots have obtained those â—dicts by main force That ours were constrained to yield to the misfortune of the times but that at present the King is in Right of Nulling those promises Our Advocates plead daily thus at the Bars and there are likewise grave Authors who write it Prov. You have guessed right but thereupon my Hugonot grew strangely passionate Ah! this is said he a cruelty we cannot suffer This is our strength and they are so bold as to attacque us in this part as if it was our weak side It is true that we were armed some years before that the Edict of Nantes was made But in favour of whom did we bear those Arms It was to establish the Illustrious branch of Bourbon upon the Throne that belonged to it We shall ever be proud of having shed the purest of our Blood to restore to France it 's lawful Kings of which they designed to deprive it Aâ—ter this growing more cool he made me an abridgement of the History of the League He shewâ—d me that the House of Lorrain in that time aimed not so much at Heresy as at the Crown He minded me that from the time of Charlâ—s the 9 â—h the Princes of that House caused a Book to be Printed for the proving their Genealogy and to make appear that they were descended in a direct Line from the Second Race of ouâ— Kings for the making way to the Crown He acquainted me that there was at the same time a Concordat passed between the Duke of Guise the Duke of Montmorency and the Marshal de St. Andrew which was called the Triumviâ—ate One of the Articles of that
Concordat bore in express terms that the Duke of Guise should have in charge to deface intirely the name of the Family and Race of the Bourbons Henry the Third said he to me could he be suspected of Heresie or an â—ider of Hereticks Never was any man more linked to the Catholick Church than he Yet the House of Guise had sworn his ruin They would have shaved him which they highly threatned him with and they one day writ upon the Chappel of the Battes to the Augustins of Paris these four French Verses The Bones of those who here lye dead Like Cross of Burgundy to thee are shown And make appear thy days are fled And that thou surely lose thy Crown They are of the same sense with those two Latin Verses which were found set upon the Palace Dyal Qui dedit ante duas unam abstulit altera nutat Tertia tonsoris nunc facienda manu He that gave two has taken one the other Shakes but the Barber still shall give another The Faction of the House of Guise caused this to be done And this poor Prince after a thousand delays and troubles resolved at length to make that execution so famous in our History it is that of the Duke and Cardinal of Guise who were executed at the States of Blois That Prince must needs have seen his ruin approaching and inevitable to come to that since that he well foresaw that this blow would raise him so many storms and give him so much trouble Who knows not that the Faction of Rome and of Spain had a Design of raising the House of Lorrain to the Throne of France for the excluding the House of Bourbon In the year 1587. the Pope sent to the Duke of Guise a Sword engraven with flames telling him by the Duke of Parma that amongst all the Princes of Europe it only belonged to Henry of Lorrain to bear the arms of the Church and to be the Chief thereof Almost all the Kingdom was engaged in that Spirit of revolt The King found no oâ—her support than the King of Navar and of his Hugonotes It was Chastillon the Son of the Admiral de Coligny who saved the King from the hands of the Duke of Mayenne at Tours This Chief of the League cryed to him retire ye white Scarfs retire you Chastillon it is not you we aim at it is the Murderer of your Father And in truth Henry the Third then Duke of Anjou was President in the Council when the Resolution was taken of making the Massacre of St. Bartholomew in which the Admiral Coligny perished But his Son forgetting that injury to save his King answered those Rebels You are Traytors to your Country and when the Service of the Prince and State is concerned I know how to lay aside all revenge and particular interest he added that after the Assassinate committed by the League in the person of Henry the Third Henry the Fourth was ready to see himself abandoned by his most faithful Servants because of the Protestant Religion which he made profession of which appears by a Declaration that this Prince made in the form of an Harangue to the Lords of his Army on the 8 th day of August 1589 in which he says that he had been informed that his Catholick Nobility set a report on foot they could not serve him unless he made profession of the Roman Religion and that they were going to quit his Army Nothing but the firmness and fidelity of the Hugonots upheld this wavering Party He must be said my Gentleman the falsest of men who dissembles the Ardour and Zeal with which those of our Religion maintained that just Cause of the House of Bourbon against the attempts of the League And to prove said he that their interest was not the only cause of their fidelity we must see what they did when Henry the Fourth turned Roman Catholick It cannot be said but that they then strove to have a King of their Religion However there was not one who bated any thing of his Zeal and Fidelity the King was peaceable possessour of the Crown the League was beaten down he was Master in Paris he was reconciled to the Court of Rome when the Edict of Nantes was granted and published Our Hugonots were no longer armed nor in a condition of obtaining any thing by force of arms Since that the Change of Religion had reduced all the Roman Catholicks to him he would have been in a State of resisting their violence It was the sole acknowledgment of the King and of good Frenchmen that obliged all France to give Peace to a Party that had shed their Blood with so much Zeal and Profession for the preserving the Crown and the restoring it to its legitimate Heirs I acknowledge that we did our Duty but are not those to be thanked who do what they ought How is it possible that these things are at present worn out of the memory of men I am certain that if the King was made to read the History of his Grand-father he would preserve some inclinâ—tion for the Children of those who sacrific'd themselves for the glory of his House No man can be ignorant of the necessary dependance that must be between the Roman Catholick Clergy and the Court of Rome This Court is the Head the Clergy is the Body the Ecclesiasticks and Monks are the Members and all these Members move by the Orders of the Head Again I have no Design to chocque the Gentlemen of the Clergy whose persons I respect I do not doubt but that they have good French Hearts But in fine they have their Maxims of Conscience they are of a Religion and they must follow its Principles Now the Principles of their Religion binds them to the Holy see and its preservation preferably to all things moreover Interest deceives the Hearts and Minds of men Their Interest obliges them to take the Popes part who is their Preserver and Protectour and what they do out of interest they perswade themselves that they do it out of Conscience First it may be said of the Monks that all the Houses they have in France are so many Citadels that the Court of Rome has in the Kingdom Those great Societies have withdrawn themselves from the jurisdiction of the Bishops they depend immediately on the Holy See they have all their Generals of Orders at Rome and those Generals who are Italians and Spaniards are the Soul of the Society they are obliged to follow their Opinions and their Orders the Italian Divinity is the Divinity of the Cloisters Thus the King may reckon that all the Monks look upon him as the Pope's Subject as being lyable to be Excommunicated his Kingdom put under an Ecclesiastical Censure his Subjects dispensed and released from the Oath of Allegiance and his States given by the Pope to another Prince And every time that this happens they will believe themselves obliged out of Conscience to obey the Pope If in
those Orders of Monks there happen to be some particular men who follow other Principles it is certain that they are in no Number so that the Body of the Monks is absolutely in the Interests of the Court of Rome and by consequence in that of Spain Thus you see already a considerable Party of whose Fidelity the Kings of France cannot be assured And what is this Party One may say that it is all France for the begging Monks and the Jesuits are Masters of all the Consciences they are Confessors they are Directors they persuade what they will to those that are devoted to them The House of Bourbon ought not to doubt of this truth if it never so little calls to mind the endeavours that were used by the Monks for the forcing from it the Crown when the Raâ—e of the Valois came to fail It is against this so considerable Party that the State ought to take its Precautions in preserving that other Party which can never be of intelligence with this it is that of the Reformed History tells us how impossible it is to be long without having Disputes with the Court of Rome It is always attempting and we are obliged to defend our selves against its enterprises It is capable of setting great Engines a going of making Engagements and Alliances It had twenty times like to have ruined Germany it has dethroned great Emperours it has likewise caused great troubles in France and one cannot be too secure against its ambition Par. I fancy that your Hugonot's Advocate would not spare the rest of the Clergy and that he endeavoured to prove that wâ— can be no more assured of their Fidelity than of that of the Religious Prov. What you have already heard may make you easily imagine that for the giving the more force to what he had to say against our Divines he prevented what might have been objected If you understood these matters Sir said he to me you could tell me that our Clergy of France teach a Divinity wholly different from that of Rome that all make profession of maintaining the Liberties of the Gallicane Church the principal Articles of which are 1. That the King of France cannot be Excommunicated by the Pope 2. That an â—cclesiastical Censure cannot be laid upon their Kingdom 3. That it cannot be given to others 4. That the Pope has nothing to do with the Temporality of Kings 5 That he is not Infallible 6. That he is inferiour to the Council These you would tell me are the Maxims of the Sorbonne that have often censured the contrary Propositions This Divinity is maintained by the Authority of the Parliaments who have often declared the Bulls of the Pope abusive null scandalous and impious and have appealed from the Execution of these Bulls when they found them contrary to the Liberties of the Gallicane Church The Estates assembled at Tours during the League caused the Bul 's of Excommunication to be burnt by the hands of the Executioner that had been published against Henry the Third and Henry the Fourth This looks great and magnificent if you please but these fair appearances have no foundation I do not speak of the Divinity of the Parliaments which is that of the Politicians I speak of the Divinity of the Clergy Once more added he I do not at all doubt of the Fidelity of the Divines of France to their King but they shall never perswade me that this Fidelity and Zeal for their Prince is without exception and I make no other exception agaiâ—st it than what they themselves make Will you hear them speak Read the Harangue that Cardinal du Perron made to the third Estate in the name of all the Clergy of France in the Assembly 1616. and remembeâ— that it is not the Cardinal du Perron who speaks it is the Clergy of France assembled in a Body who speak by the mouth of that Cardinal All France struck with a sense of the two horrible Parricides that had been committed in the persons of the two late Kings both of them assassinated out of a false Zeal for Religion would draw up a form of an Oath and establish a Fundamental Law of the State which all the Subjects were to swear to and this Law imported that every one should swear to acknowledge and believe that our Kings as to their Temporalities do not depend on any but God that it is not lawful for any cause whatsoever to assassinate Kings that even for causes of Heresie and of Schism Kings cannot be Deposed nor their Subjects Absolved from their Oath of Allegiance nor upon any other pretence whatsoever This Law methinks is the security of Kings this is a Doctrine which all the Hugonots are ready to sign with their Blood What did the Clergy of France do thereupon It formally opposed that Law Works of Cardinal du Perron p. 600 and following they were willing to acknowledge the Independancy of Kings in regard of the Temporalty they consented that Anathema should be pronounced against the assassinates of Kings But they would never pass the last Article that for what cause soever it was a King cannot be Deposed by the Pope stript of his States and his Subjects absolved from the Oath of Allegiance He who spoke for them alledged all the examples of Emperours and of Kings who had been Deposed and Excommunicated by Popes upon account of refusing Obedience to the Holy See and approved them he alledged the Example of St. Vrban the Second who Excommunicated Philip the First and laid an Ecclesiastical Censure upon his Kingdom because he had put away his Wife Bertha Daughter of a Count of Holland to Marry Bertrade Wife of Foulques Count d' Anjou then still alive He made use of the testimony of Paul Emile who said that Pope Zacharias discharged the French from the Oath of â—ideâ—iâ—y that they had made to Chilperick These two Princes were noâ— Hereticks yet the Clergy of France approved their having been stript of their States by the Popes which makes appear that the Clergy in the bottom judges that the Pope has Right to lay an Ecclesiastical Censure upon the Kingdom of France and to depose its Kings for any â—â—â—er cause as well as that of Heresie Is it not to abuse the World to confess on one side that the Temporalty of Kings does not depend on the Pope and establâ—sh on the other that the Pope may in certain cases Interdict these Kings Excommunicate them and Absolve their Subjects from the Oath of Allegiance In fine this is the result of that Famous Opinion of the Clergy of France So that if Christians are obliged to defend their Religion and their lives against Heretick or Apostate Princes when once absolved from their Allegiance the Politick Christian Laws do not permit them any thing more than whaâ— is permitted by Military Laws and by the Right of Nations to wit open War and not Assassination and Clâ—ndestine Conspiracies that is to say that when a
Pope has declared a Prince deprived of his Sâ—ates his Subjects may set up the Standard of Rebellion declare War against him refuse him Obedience and kill him if they can meet with him provided it be with arms in their hand and by the ordinary course of War I cannot comprehend how one â—an be secured of the Fidelity of those who hold such like Maxims For in fine Kings are not infallible and if they happen to do any thing that the Court of Rome judges worthy of Excommunication and Intâ—rdiction they are Kings without Kingdoms and Subjects accoâ—ding to our Clergy of France as well as according to the Divines of Italy But perhaps the Sorbonne which is the Depository of the Frenâ—h Divinity does not receive these Maxims so fatal to the safety of Kiâ—gs Let us see what it has done In the Month of December 1587 because Henry the Third for the security of his Person and of his State made a Treaty with the Rütres or the German Protestants the Sorboâ—ne without staying for the Decisions of Rome made a private determination which said That the Government might be taken from Princes who were not found such as they ought to be as the adminiâ—tration from a suspected Tutor This was known by the King he sent for the Sorbonne some days after and complained of it After the death of the Princes of Guise which happen'd at Blois the Sorbonne did much worse they declared and caused to be published in all parts of Paris That all the People of that Kingdom were Absolved from the Oaths of Fidelity that they had sworn to Henry of Valois hereâ—ofore their King they raâ—ed his name out of the publick Prayers and made known to the People that they might with safe Conscience unitâ— aâ—m and contribute to make War against him as a Tyrant If I would add to that the Story that I know this Gentleman told you concerning the Death of the late King of England we should find that the Sorbonne has â—ver been of the same Opinion This is the truth of it every time that our Kings affairs shall carry them to extremity against the Court of Rome the Clergy of France will suppress their discontents while matters go well for the Court of France but if things turn other ways the Maxims of our Divines against the King will be sure to break out Every sincere person will allow â—haâ— it has never been otherwise than so and that it will be always thus which may be observed in the very least disputes I was willing to read all these passages to you out of The Policy of the Clergy of France because the Author of that excellent piece proves there exceedâ—ng well all that I prâ—mâ—sed to shew you for the close of our Conferences which is that the Papists are truly Guilty of the Conspiracies and Rebellions which Monsieur Maimbourg would falsly fasten upon the Hugonots Of this the Murder of Henry the Third that of Henry the Fourth the violence of the League the several attempts against Queen Elizabeth King Iames and our holy Martyr Charles the Firâ—t not to mention the late Plot that has made such a noise in the World are undeniable proofs But you have seen likewise which ought to awaken the Protestant Princes to a purpose that all these black attempts have not been the fruit of impatience and human frailty under the temptation of some severe persecution but the natural Consequence and effect of the Principles of the Roman Religion as we are assured by those very men who pass for the Oracles of this Religion For you have seen just now out of Authentick pieces that the Pope the Cardinals and all the Divines of Italy who are the Pillars of the Roman Catholike Religion all the Regulars of France who draw after them more then three fourths of the French Papists and the Sorbonne it self when the rod is not over it own publickly that the Pope may Excommunicate Kings when he judges them Hereticks or countenancers of Heriticks to interdict their Kingdoms absolve their subjects from their Allegiance and expose them to the fury of all the World You have also seen that the whole Clergy of France was of this opinion by the mouth of Cardinal Perron so that this pernicious Doctrine is the vowed Faith of the whole Popish Gallican Church as well as of the Court of Rome the great depository of the Roman Religion and all its misteries From whence evidently follows what the Author of The Policy of the Clergy of France infers That there is no safety for the Crown nor for the life of Kings whether they be Protestants themselves or only protect such as are whilst they are beset with Papists so that there is not the same reason to tolerate Popery in Protestant Kingdoms as there is to toâ—erate Protestants in Popish Kingdoms Monsieur Maimbourg would make us believe that all this is but a poor shift And to convince us of it he says that we need but to consider these two things First that there are not to be found more detestable Conspiracies then those the Hugonots have made against their Kings c. Secondly that it is by no means thâ— belief of the Roman Catholicks princes that a Pope may depose Princes though they were Heretiâ—ks acquit their subjects from their Allegiance and bestow their Dominions upon those that can first take them But I have evidently shewed you the falsness of the first assertion and for the second it is expresly disproved by those undeniable proofs the Author of The Policy of the Clergy has produced to shew that the Roman Catholicks hold that belief which Monsieur Maimbourg afâ—irms they do not You say Monsieur Maimbourg that it is by no means your belief that a Pope can depose Princes c. At this rate the Pope who is the head of your Church this head for whose infallibility you have so much disputed knows not the belief of your Church for he believes that by the principles of the Church of Rome he has the power which you seem to deny him The Cardinals the Bishops and all the Divines of Italy all your Regulars all your Clergy of France speaking by the mouth of your Cardinal du Perron your Sorbonne it self so renowned for its great number of able men did not know in so important a case what was the belief of your Church For they have all held that it believes the Pope can depose Princes c. At least he should have given some answers to the Authentick Acts and notorious matters of fact which the Author of The Policy of the Clergy had quoted to this purpose To say nothing of all this and to think it enough to say at randome It is by no means our belief that a Pope may depose Princes even though they were Hereticks c. this is to pass the sentence of an unjust judge who rather then fairly to confess his errour makes no conscience of denying
that in words in which his heart gives him the lie And I beseech you consider what he adds to make us believe that the Roman Catholicks have not that belief which the Popes themselves attribute to them So far from that says he that our most Christian Kings who are known alwais to have been the most zealous asserters of the Catholick Faith and the chiefest Protectors of the Holy See to which they have inviolably held in all times notwithstanding all the disputes they have had with some Popes about temporal concerns and the rights of their Crown which they are bound never to relinquish our Kings I say have ever protested against this claim which is grounded upon a Doctrine that all our Doctors have ever condemned as point blanck against the Divine Law To this purpose may be seen the Remonstrances and Protestations which I have said that Charles the Ninth addressed to Pope Pius the Fourth upon the account of Queen Jane of Navarre as obstinate a Heretick as she was What can be said to such childish stuff Is it not an excellent way of arguing The Kings of France do not believe the Pope has that power over them as he challenges to him self therefore it is by no means the belief of the Roman Catholicks that the Pope has such a power so that Princes who are Protestants or protect such as are can be in no danger either of life or Crown from their Popish subjects The Remonstrances and the Protestations which Monsieur Maimbourg makes such a noise with did they prevail that more than half the Papists of France should noâ— rise against their King Henry the Third so soon as ever the Pope had thundred out his â—xcommunication against him This crowd of people of Churchmen and of Fryars who by Monsieur Maimbourg's own confession entred into a League with so much heat against this pooâ— Prince did they not make it appear plainly that the good Catholick subjects take much notice of the particular belief and the weighty Protestations of the French Kings when the Pope has pronounced Anathema The almost perpetual Conspiracies of our Papists against the sacred Majesty of our Kings and against their faithful Subjects are likewise a strong evidence of Monsieur Maimbourg's sound reasoning Do not the Catholicks of England plainly shew that they take these particular decisions of the French Kings for the rule of their Faith and of their practice But this assertion All our Doctors have ever condemned the Doctrine upon which is grounded the claim of Popes against Kings as directly opposite to the Divine Law is such a piece of confidence as it may be never was the like I must confess I could not have believed that what is said of the Jesuitical impudence could have gone thus far What then Is it that Anthony Santarel the Jesuite who has written That a Pope has power to depose Kings discharge their Subjects from the obedience they owe them and deprive them of their Kingdoms for Heresy nay if they governe negligently or are not useful to their Kingdom that Cardinal Bellermin who was likewise a Jesuite and has maintained That the Pope may absolve Subjects from their Oath of Allegiance and deprive Kings of their Dominion that a thousand other Priests of the same Society quoted in the second part of the moral Divinity of the Jesuits ought not to be reckoned among the Doctors of the Church of Rome that Monsieur Maimbourg pronounces so positively All our Doctors have ever condemned this Doctrine as directly opposite to the Divine Law But perchance Monsieur Maimbourg since he left the Society has almost as good an opinion of the Jesuits as their good friend sof the Port Royal No doubt he has taken up the same prejudice which these Gentlemen have done that those Jesuits are no other in the Harvest of the Church than the tares that annoy the good Corne and that they ought not to be reckoned among the Christian Doctors However he ought to have the best intelligence and know them better than any man At least he should not have forgotten that he was informed how the whole Sorbonne in a body declared it self in this point of the same judgment with the Jesuites upon the particular case of Henry the Third He should as little forget that Cardinal du Perron in one of the greatest assemblies of the World maintained with open face not in behalf of the Jesuits but of the whole Clergy of France and as the mouth of all the Prelates of the Kingdom that the Pope has all that power over Kings which the Jeâ—uâ—ts attribute to him Therefore not to sâ—ay longer upon these â—â—â—llings of Monsieur Maimbourg you may easily see says our friend that as much as it is false that the Protestants who abhor all those principles above mentioned are to be suspected by any King of any Religion whatever in whose Dominion they abide so far certain and undeniablâ— is it that Roman-Catholick Subjects of what Countrey soever from the cursed tenents oâ— their Religion ought to be dreaded by their Kings whether Protestants or favourers of such I told our friend interrupting of him that I was already fully satisfied of the second Article neither can I imagine how it is possible that any man in this Kingdom should doubt of it after the no less cleer then convincing proofs that our worthy Bishop of Lincolne has brought in his learned Observations upon the Bull of Pius the Fifth for the pretended Excommunication of our renowned Queen Elizabeth As to the Loyalty and honest intentions of the Protestants of France I am likewise fully satisfied by all that you hâ—ve said And I make no question but they that have been so good Subjects in a Kingdom where their Loyalty has undergon such rough Tryals will be all zeal and flame in the service and for the Honour of our good King who takes them into his Protection with so much charity and compassion But pray tell me before we part what do you think of a little story which Monsieur Maimbourg has printed at the end of his Libell under the Title of The Declaration of the Dutchess of York I could tell you a great many things upon this subject said our friend For I have the whole History of it I have it here in English But to speak particularly to it would force me to discover too many misteries It would carry us a great way and is much more proper for another time I will only tell you that this Declaration was drawn up for quite another person then the late Dutchess of York and it were easie to prove that the greater part of what is there said does not at all sute with this Lady It was from much a different principle to what is reported in this piece that she made so suddain a change of her Religion And they who were by when she lay a dying have testified of quite other thoughts then those they have made
her declare when they make her say she found the Romish Religion so plainly taught in the holy Scripture Her great unquietness of Spirit which she discovered when she lay a dying is as little sutable to these words in the Declaration I have been particularly and strongly convinced of the real presencâ— of Iesus Christ in the Holy Sacrament of the Altar of the Churches infallibilitâ— c. But all these things will be set out in their proper colours However they are not to our present purpose I hope I have set you right aâ— to the justification of the French Protestants quitting their Countrey and of their unshaken Loyalty to their Soveraign I do acknowledge says I and am extremely obliged for the light you have given me in this matter I will be sure to improve it upon occasion neither shall it be my fault if these poor persecuted People do not find a better Countrey with us than that they are come from After which I took my leave of our friend and remain Sir Yours c. End of the Sixth and last Letter Declaration of the 17th of Iune 1681. Art 1. Paâ—â—tic Ann. 1599 p. 285 and 286 Eâ—it Amsterdam 1664. P. 156 157 of the Lions Edition See Statures at large 1 Elizab. 1. 5 Eliz. 1. 13 Eliz. 1. 23 Eliz. 1. 27 Eliz. 2. 35 Eliz. 2. 1 Iacob 4. 3 Iac. 4 5 c. Printed for Henry Bromâ— 1674. Art 1. patâ— Mr. God Hermant Doctor of the Sorbin Tom. 1. Book 2 p. 204. and Noteâ— of the same chapâ— p. 625. Surl ' an 1572 Edit Amsterd p. 30. Printed at Pâ—ris cum Priviâ—â—gio Chaz Lionard Inprimtâ—r du â—â—y 1680. Omahon S. Th. Mag. Disputatio Apolegitica de Iure Regni Hibâ—rniâ— pro Catholicis n. 20. Exod. 5.4 1. King 18.17 Ier. 38.4 Neb. 6.6 Luc. 23.2 Act. 24.5 17.6 Art 39. Art 40 Dan. 2.21 4.25 Ezek. 29.19 Dan. 2.37.38 Dan. 5.18 1 Sam. 8.11 13 14 15 16 17. Mez. Hist. de Franc. Tom. 2. p. 841. Ibid. Hist. de Hen. le Grand sâ—r l'an 1571. Tomâ— pag 634. Hist. de Hen. le Grand sur l'an 1576. Id sur la même aneâ— Id sur l'an 1589. Sur l'an 1593. Mez. sur l'an 1594. Hist. de Hen. le Grand sur l ' an 1610. Mons. le Mareschal de Sbamberg Mr. du Quesne Acts 4.19 Acts 5.29 Chrys. in Matth. c. 17. Decr. Caus. 11. q. 3. c. 93. Si Dominus Let. de M. Boch 3. part Deuxiâ—mâ— Entret p. 75. Hist. du Calv. Ed. de Holland 1682. Pag. 124. Pag. 415. Pag 422. Pag. 124. Pag. 197. 198. Pag. 203 204. Pag. 280. Pag. 414 415. Pag. 475. Pag. 462 463. Pag. 157. Pag. 154. Pag. 179.319 Pag. 164. Pag. 248. Pag. 453. Pag. 454. Pag. 456. Pag. 458. Pag. 460. Pag. 474. Pag. 189. Pag. 421 422. So they called The Duke of Anjou Pag. 418. Pag. 478. Pag. 171 172. Pag. 132. Pag. 491. Pag. 490. Pag. 462 463. Hist. de Hen. le Grand sur l'an 1572. Pag. 96. Pag. 501. Cardinal d'Ossat Ex Elog. Clar. Vir. Sammart The insurrection of Amboise happened in the year 1560. and Cardinal ' d Ossat was born 1536. Pag. 127 * This present Stâ—te of Affairs was That the Duke of Guise and the Cardinal of Lorrain having made themselves Masters of the Mind the Person and the Authority of the young King Francis the second became insufferable Tyrants in the Kingdom committed a thousand insolencies upon the Princes of the Blood and gave all imaginable suspicion that they aimed at the Crown as pretended Heirs to Charles the Great †P. 128. | P. 129. P. 130 P. 131. P. 132. P. 133. Mez. Hlst. de France Tom. 2. P. 771. P. 501. P. 13◠〈…〉 Mez. Hist. de Franc. Tom. 2. pag. 1016. Id. ib. pag. 768. Id. ib. pag. 758. Id. ib. pag. 756. Id. ib. pag. 773. Guy Coquilâ—e dans ses Memoirs pour la Reformation de l' Estat Ecclesiastique Mezeray Hsst. de France p. 578 771. Idem ib. p. 744 745. Pag. 746. Pag. 749. Id. ib. pag. 766. Id. ib. pag. 840. Hist. de Hen. le Grand sur l'an 1576. Id sur l'an 1584. Hist. du Cal. pag 317. Id. pag. 318. Mez. Hist. de Franc. Tom. 2. pag. 771. Mez. Abreg Chro. Mez. Hist. de Fran. Tom. 2. pag. 757 p. 763. Hist. du Calv. pag. 261. Popelin Hist. de Fran. Vol. 1. l. 9. an 1563. Thuan. l. 34. Mez. Hist. de Fran. Tom. 2. pag. 903. Hist. de Calv. pag. 341. Mez. Hist. de Fran. Tom. 2. pag. 904. In his Abridg Chr. Iul. 1563. Id. Hist. of France Tom. 2. pag. 924. Maimb Hist. du Calv. p. 344. Id. ib. pag. 345. Mez. ubr Chron. Id. Hist. de Fr. Tom. 11. p. 926. Id. ib. p. 932. Id Abregè Chron. sur l'an 1565. Id. Abreg Chron. sur l'an 1565. Maimb Hist. du Calvin p. 355. Pag. 362â— Pag. 364. Mez. Hist. de Fran. Tom. â—I pag. 946. Abrig Chron. sur l'an 1569. Mez. Hist. de Fr. Tom. 2. p. 714 841. Id. ib. pag. 754 755. a The King was Francis the Second b Who was afterwards Charlâ—s the Ninth c Huguenots Id. ib. p. 958. Hist. de l' Etat de Fran. c. â—ons le Reg. de Francois H. P. 688. to p. 699. †Mez. Hist. de Fran. Tom. 11. p 956. * Id ib. p. â—57 l. p. 958. Id. ib. p. 957. Ib. Id. ib. p. 958. P. 959. Ibid. Pag 960. Thuan Hist. l. 42. Hist. du Calv. pag. 363. †Ep. Dedicat Hist du Calv. pag. 368. The nature of that Heresie which the Prince professed iâ— to harden the heart and to infuse into it all the rage which the spirit of rebellion is capable of Hist. de Calv. pag. 462 463. Pâ—g 273 274 275. Pag. 370. Hist. de France Tom. 2. P. 768. 1016. Mez. Hist. dr Franc. Tom. 111. pag. 508. Thuan. Hist. l. 42. ad ann 1567. pag. 467. Hist. de Franc. de Mez. Tom. 2. p. 985. Id. ib. pag. 986 987. Hist. du Calv. p. 399 c. Id. ib. pag. 402. Pag. 403. Pag. 404. Pag. 405. Pag. 406. Pag. 407. Mez. Hist. de Fran Tom. 2. pag. 985. Id. ib. pag. 986. Ahr. Chr. sur l'an 1568. Thuan Hist. l. XLII sub sin Mezeray Hist. de France Tom. 2. pag. 995. Thuan. Hist. lib. 44. ad an 1568. Ad ann 1568. †The same Mezeray in his Hist. Tom. 2. pag. 995 996 observes That it was shrewdly guessed that the Murder of some Persons of Quality as that of Sipierre who were set upon during the time of these rumours was not done without the privacy of the Highest Powers and that d'Arsy or the Marquess d'Ars who killed Sipierre said publickly That he did nothing but what he had good warrant for Hist. du Calv. Pag. 402. Ib. pag. 422. Id. ib. l. 6. pag. 453. Id. ib. l. 6. pag. 4â—â— Id. ib. pag. 468. Upon the year 1572. Histor. de France Tom. 2. P. 1110. Hist. diâ— Calv. pag. 476. l. 6. Ib. 477. †Toxin It is called in French which iâ— a certaiâ—â—â— flow sâ—â—nd they give the Bell when it is to warn of Fire or any thing extraordinary Pag. 478. Pag. 479. Pag. 480. †They were the new King of Navarre and the new Prince of Condè Joh 8.44 Id. ib. p. 481. P. 482. P. 483. Abr. Chr. sur l'an 1573. Id. ib. Hist. de Hen. le Grand par l' Eveq de Rhodes sur l'an 1574. Mez. Hist. de Fran. T. 11. p. 1168. Id. ib. 1170. Mez. Abreg Chr. sâ—r l an 1575. Id. ib. Id. ib. Id. ib. Id. ib. sur l'an 1576. Id. ib. * La Religion pretâ—ndue Reformed * Arriereban * A Court of Justice consisting of half Protestants and half Papists Ib. Hist. du Ca. v. p. 490. P. 491. * The Line bâ—fore that of Bourbon P. 492. P. 494. Hist. de Hen. le Grand sur Pan. 1576. Ib. sur l'an 1584. Id. sur l'an 1588. Hist. du Calv. p. 490. Id. ib. p. 501 502. Mez Hist. de Fr. Tom. 11. p 1171. Hist. du Calv. p. 10.11.12 See the following Quotation Collection of Edicts and Declarations Printed at Paris by Allowance by Anth. Stephens in the year 1659 P. 104 105 107 108 109 110. See the same Coâ—lection Mâ—z Hist. de Fr. T. 1. p. 456. Id. ib. p. â—54 Dâ— Chesne Antiq. de la Fran. p. 584.585 Mez. ib. p. 842 843. Id. ib. p. 885 886. Tom. 11. p. 978 979. Id. 16. p. 16. Recuil des Edicts c. imprime avec Privilege à Paris par Antoine Etienne l'an 165 â— p. 272. c. Hist of Calv lib 6. p 151 152. Crit. Gen. de hist. de Calv. à Ville Franc. 1682. let 22. p. 322. La Polâ—â—â— du Clerâ—â— de Fran. 3. M E Edit à la Hage p. 102. Hist. de Calv. p. 501. â— 50â— Witness the Medal where one of them caused to be Engraven Perdam Babyloniâ— nomen I will root out the name of Babylon p. 33â— P. 490.491 Sant Tract de Haeres et de Potest Summi Pont. c. 30. 31. Bell. Tract de potest summi Pont. in Temp. aâ—vers Barel Rome 1â—10 p. 35
Curate appear'd all of them who could possibly got away and hid themselves but neither the place nor the great haste of the Curate would permit all of them to do so He went up directly to one of the Company whom he had born an ill will to for some time he bids him kneel and the other answering that his Conscience would not suffer him to do it he gave him a Cuff on the Ear. He that was struck grumbled and so did two or three who were about him The Curate went on his way threatning hard Next day there were Informations made on both sides the Curate in his not complaining of any person but him he had struck and two or three others who had grumbled at it The Friends of the Curate perceiving that he had done the wrong propos'd an Accommodation It was by misfortune consented to Prosecution ceased on each side and it was believed that there was an end of that business there was not a word spoken of it in above a year But the Intendant of Languedoc revived it last Winter when they thought of nothing less and of a matter particular to two or three made it a general Concern of the whole Congregation He cites them before the Presidial of Nismes to whom he joyn'd himself He condemns them to demolish their Church in a Months time Those poor people go and cast themselves at the feet of the Court but to no purpose The King's Council hears and confirms this strange Order of the Intendant and the Church is rac'd to the ground The Council which gave this Sentence was the first in which the Dauphine was present The Report of such an Order being spred among the Courtiers and all being amaz'd that heard it a certain person took the liberty to tell the Dauphin that for the first time he had been at the Council he had assisted to a great Injustice What say you to that said a Duke and Peer to the Dauphin who had made no reply to the former I say answered the Dauphin that he may be much in the right I told our Friend I had enough of this You must not be weary said he this is but the beginning of sorrows Let 's go on to the rest Here is said he a Little Book which comes just now to my hand in it are stitch'd up together three Acts concerning Schools The first is of the ninth of November 1670. It forbids all Protestant Schoolmasters to teach any thing in their Schools but to read and write and Arithmetick The second which is of the 4th of December 1671 ordains that the Protestants shall have but one only School in any place where they have the publick Exercise of their Religion and but one Master in that School The third is of the ninth of Iuly this present 1681. Look upon them said he and give me your opinion It seems said I that the first contains nothing which the Protestants may complain of at least if that which I read there be true namely that by the Edict of Nantes it is expresly ordain'd That in the Schools of those of the pretended Reformed Religion there shall not any thing be taught but to read write and cast account For according to this the Edict of 1670 is entirely conformable to that other Edict which is the Law You are in the right said I but they who fram'd the Act have deceived you and have made no scruple to ground it upon a matter of fact entirely false For the Article which speaks of Schools doth not mention the least word of that restriction which the Act assures us to be there expressed namely of teaching only to read write and cast account See the Article length it is the 37th particular Those of the said Religion may not keep publick Schools unless in Cities and places where the publick Exercise of their Religion is allowed and the Provisions which have heretofore been granted them for the erection or maintenance of Colleges shall be authenticated where occasion shall require and have their full and entire effect Where is that express Order It is expresly ordered to teach only to read write and cast account upon which the Act is grounded Is it possible said I that they should have no sense of the horrid shame which must arise upon conviction of forgery in a matter of fact of this nature They never stick at so small a matter as that said he in the design they have of rooting out the Protestants Those who are in France dare not open their mouths to discover such kind of Falsities and Strangers whom they carry â—air with will not so far concern themselves as ever to suspect there should be falshood in a matter of fact so easie to be made out and which they make to be so positively afâ—irm'd by so great a King So that they do not fear at all the shame you speak of After all they are but pious Frauds at which they of the Popes Communion never blush And what say you continued be to that other Act which reduces all Schools to one in each City and Town where the Protestants have the publick Exercise of their Religion and that which requires that there should be only one Master in that School I replyed that it was an excellent way to restore Ignorance the Mother of the Roman Faith and Devotion In truth says he the care of one Master cannot go far Besides there is a Protestant Church which alone hath two thousand Children of age to be taught Those poor people have done all they could to obtain of the Council that at least there might be two Schools in each place one for Boys and the other for Girls But it was to little purpose that they pleaded good manners for it which such a mixture of both Sexes visibly was offensive to They were deaf to all their Prayers and to all their Remonstrances But this is not all yet In the Execution of this rigorous Act they have taken away â—rom them that little which was left them For the Judges of the places will not suffer that any Schoolmaster teach unless they have first of all approved of him and receiv'd him in all their Forms As therefore their approbation is a matter full of invincible Diâ—â—iculties above all when they are to give it to a man of merit and who may do good it is come to pass by means of these two Acts that all the little Schools of the Protestants are shut up From the little Schools they have proceeded to Colleges You see by the Act of the last of Iuly which suppresses for ever that of Sedan They have taken away also the College of Châtillon sur Loin So that hereafter the Protestants in France are to lie under worse than Egyptian Darkness I leave you now to judge whether they are to blame to seek for light in some Goshen In truth said I this is very hard But if they who inspire into the King such
strange Acts have no respect for Henry the Great and his Edicts at least they ought to be more tender of the Glory of their own Illustrious Prince and not to expose him as they do to be ranked with that Emperor against whom the Holy Fathers have cryed so loudly Is it possible they can be ignorant that this method oâ— extinguishing the Protestant Religion is exactly the same that Iulian took to extinguish the Christian Religion I do not think said our Friend that they can be ignorant of a truth so well known especially since one of their eminent Writers hath publish'd the History of the Life of S. Basil the Great and of S. Gregory Nazianzen There they might have read in more than one place that it was likewise one of the Secrets of that Emperor to ruine the Christians by keeping them from all Improvement in Learning and to prohibit their Colleges and Schools and which the Father 's judg'd to be most subtle policy But their zeal transports them above the most odious Comparisons They stick not to give occasion for them every moment I will shew you an Example which will astonish you I have here light upon the Paper They are now come to take the measures of that barbarous and inhumane King who us'd Midwives of his own Religion to destroy the Race of the people of God in Egypt For by that Declaration of the 28th of February 1680 It is ordered that the Wives of Protestants shall not be brought to bed but by Midwives or Chyrurgeons who are Papists This they make to be observ'd with the utmost rigor so far that they put a poor woman in prison for being present at the Labour of her Sister whose delivery was so quick and fortunate that there was neither time nor need to call a Midwife That you may in few words understand of what consequence this is to our poor Brethren I need but acquaint you that the King of France in his Edict of the Month of Iune 1680 where he forbids Papists to change their Religion acknowledges himself what experience doth but too plainly justifie namely that the Roman Catholicks have always had an aversion not only against the Protestant Religion but against all those that profess it and an aversion which hath been improv'd by the publication of Edicts Declarations and Acts. That is to say that whatever pretence the Roman Catholicks make to the contrary they have always been and still are Enemies of the Protestants and that the Protestants ought to look to be treated by the Catholicks as Enemies After this what can they judge of the Design and Consequences of a Declaration which puts the Lives of their Wives and Children into those very hands which the King who makes the Declaration acknowledges to be hands of Enemies But farther the Declaration it self discovers that one of its intentions was to make the Children of Protestants to be baptized by Midwives or by Popish Chyrurgions And what mischief do they not open a way for by that The Protestants will hold that Baptism void which hath been administred by such hands they will not fail to make it be administred anew by their Pastors This shall pass for a capital Crime in the Pastors and Fathers and they shall be punished as sacrilegious persons who trample on the Religion in Authority the Religion of the King for the most odious Representations are still made use of Nay said I by this they will likewise claim a right from the Baptism's being administred by Papists to make themselves Masters of the education of their Children You are in the right said he and that Article ought not to be forgotten It is just will they say that they should be brought up in the Church which hath consecrated them to God by Baptism at least that they should be bred up there till they are of age to chuse for themselves and when they are of age they will say then that it is just they should as well as others be liable to the same Edict which forbids Catholicks to change their Religion Is not this enough already to make one forsake such a Kingdom A Christian for less than this would surely flie to the utmost Parts of the World But to proceed Here is that terrible Decree which fills up the measure as to what concerns the poor Children It comes to my hand very seasonably It is the Declaration of the 17th of Iune last This ordains that all the Children of Protestants shall be admitted to abjure the Religion of their Fathers and become Papists as soon as they shall be seven years old It declares that after such an Abjuration it shall be at the choice of the Children either to return home to their Fathers and there to be maintain'd or to oblige their Fathers and Mothers to pay for their Board and Maintenance where ever they please to live It adds extreme Penalties to be laid on them who breed up their Children in foreign parts before they are sixteen years old But I pray read over the whole Edict Upon that I took the Deâ—â—aration from our Friends hand read it and returning it to him again could not forbear declaring that I did not now wonder any more that the Protestants of France were in so great a Consternation They are much in the right said I Discretion and Conscience oblige them to depart out of a Country in which there is no security for the salvation of their dear Children They are of too great a value to be so hazarded What is more easie for them who have all the power than to induce such young Children to change their Religion There is no need for this to shew them all the Kingdoms of the World and their Glory A Baby a Picture a little Cake will do the business or if there want somewhat more a Rod will not fail to complete this worthy Converâ—ion In the mean while what a condition are their wretched Fathers in besides the most inexpressible grief of seeing what is most dear to them in the world seduc'd out of the Service and House of God they shall likewise have this addition of Anguish of having their own Children for their Persecutors For knowing as I do the Spirit of that Religion I doubt not but they will all prove rebellious and unnatural and renounce all that love and natural respect which is due to them whom they owe their Lives to They 'll give Law to their Parents they will oblige them to make them great Allowances which they will dispose of as they list and if their Fathers pay them not precisely at the time appointed I am sure no rigors shall be forgotten in the prosecution No certainly said our Friend and I could give you an hundred Instances if there were need Even before this merciless Declaration was made the Goods of Parents were seis'd upon exposed to sale to pay for the maintenance of their Children who had been inveigled from them and
to charge them with Rebellion upon this account Are men Rebells when they defend themselves against the invasions of a Prince that is not their King This is so evident said I here to our friend that you need say no more I must confess the French Protestants are set right in my opinion They are not guilty of the Wars which infested France from the Reign of Francis the Second to that of Henry the Fourth They lived in perfect good understanding with their Countrymen during the Reign of this great Prince The Wars under Lewis the Thirteenth cannot justly be imputed to them because the greater and sounder part of them were not engaged because the real promoters of difference were Protestanâ—s only in name because if any true Protestants did go in it was upon motives and mistakes which in the opinion even of their King made their fault pardonable and because the standing out of Rochel must by no means pass for a Rebellion So that indisputably it is the effect of a dark and devilish malice in Monsieur Maimbourg and his Brethren to cry them down at such a rate as incendiaries and seditious by which they would render them suspected to the Magistrates and people where they go to be out of the reach of that cruel persecution that wasâ—s them I cannot recover my sâ—lf out of the astonishment that so wise a Prince as theirs is should desire to lose such subjects by driving them into despair All Europe sayes our friend is of the same mind They say plainly that the King of France cuts off the hand which saved his Crown and of which he or his son may stand in need some time or other to defend themselves against the Ligues of the Roman Clergy It is more then fifty years that they whom they persecute have given the highest testimony of their loyalty and zeal for the service of their Kings But what is yet more surprizing they make use of their loyalty for an occasion of persecuting them more severely For I know it from the first hand in the Memorial which was Presented to their King by a certain Abbot some years since to invite him to root them out and to open to him the way they lay down plainly their loyalty which sayes this Memorial they make an Article of faith and a point of conscience to satisfie him that there was no danger from them whatever injury or rigour they used towards them I have seen this Memorial of which there was means found to get a copy the Abbot who was the bearer having forgot the Rule and charge that he was under to be secret But I can assure you the French Court were not a little pleased with this motion since it doth only follow the Memorial step by step in all the tricks and outrages that have been practiced upon the Protestants against the security of the Edicts To be short that which will compleat your amazement is that this Great Lewis the Fourteenth whom the whole World has in admiration was disposed quite another way as appears not only by his Letter to the Elector of Brandenburg which I have already communicated to you and is but a private transaction but by a solemne Declaration which I must needs read to you before we part The King's Declaration by which he confirms the Edicts of Pacification LEwis by the Grace of God King of France and Navar to all that shall see these present Letters Greeting The late King our most honoured Lord and Father whom God rest being convinced that one of the most necessary things to preserve the Peace of the Kingdom was to maintain his subjects of the pretended Reformed Religion in the full and entire enjoyment of the Edicâ—â— made in their favour and to have the free exercise of their Religion took special care by all prudent means to hinder that they should not be molested in the fruition of the Liberties Prerogatives and Privileges granted to them by the said Edicts having to this end immediately upon his coming to the Crown by Letters Patents of the 22. of May 1610. and after he came of Age by his Declaration of the 20. of November 1615. declared it to be his will that the Edicts should be observed thereby to incourage his subjects so much the more to keep within their Duty And after the pattern of so great a Prince and in imitation of his bounty we intend to do the like having upon the same grounds and considerations by our Declaration of the Eight of July 1643. willed and ordained that our said subjects of the pretended Reformed Religion enjoy all the Concessions Priviledges and Advantages especially the free and full exercise of their said Religion in pursuance of the Edicts Declarations and Ordinances made in their favour upon this account And for as much as our said subjects of the Pretended Reformed Religion have given us certain proofs of their affection and loyalty particularly in the present Affairs of which we are abundantly satisfied Be it known that We for these reasons and at the most humble request which has been made us from our said Subjects professing the said pretended Reformed Religion and after having it debated in our presence at Council We by the advice of the same and upon our certain knowledge and Royal Authority have said declared and ordained say declare and ordain will and it is our pleasure That our said Subjects of the pretended Reformed Religion be maintained and protected as indeed we do maintain and protect them in the full and entire enjoymâ—nt of the Edict of Nantes other Edicts Declarations Acts Ordinances Articles and Briefs set out in their favour Registred in Parliament and Edict Chambers especially in the free and publick exercise of the said Religion in all places where these Orders have allowed it all Letters and Acts as well of our Council as of Soverain Courts or other Iudicatories to the contrary notwithstanding Willing that the transgressors of our said Edicts be punished and chastised as disturbers of our publicke peace So we give in command to our well beloved and faithfull the persons holding our Courts of Parliament Edict Chambers Bayliffs Seneschalls their Deputies and other our Officers whom it shall concern in their respective places that they cause these Presents to be Registred read and Published where it shall be requisite and keep observe and retain according to their forme and Tenure And forasmuch as there may be need of these Presents in divers places We will that the same credit shall be given to Copies duly collated by one of our well beloved and faithfull Counsellors and Secretaries as to the present Original For such is our pleasure In witness whereof we have caused our Seal to be set to these Presents Given at St Germains en Laye 20. of May in the year of Grace 1652. and of our Reign the Tenth Signed LOUIS and a little below by the King PHELIPEAUX And Sealed with the Broad Seal Can we