FRANCE AFTER THE DEATH OF HENRY IV.

447

by adherents of the Covenant during this reign and in the reign of James II., at whose instance it was made a capital offense to preach in a Presbyterian conventicle, or to attend such a meeting in the open air. James wanted to have the Roman Catholics delivered from the operation of penal laws, but to allow no favor to the Covenanters. The concessions which he was at last compelled to make to them were reduced to the narrowest compass. But they stood by their cause with stubborn bravery, through all those troubled

"times,

Whose echo rings through Scotland to this hour."

In 1690, the system which was obnoxious to the body of the Scottish people was abolished, and the synodical polity established in its place. In the course of this revolution, the vindictive fury of the populace was expressed in outrages upon the Episcopal clergy, who suffered numerous indignities. In the language of the time, they were "rabbled."

Henry IV., at the time of his death, was just ready to intervene in the affairs of Germany, in pursuance of the traditional French policy, which looked to the reduction of the power of Austria, and the enlargement of the boundaries of France. In the ten years that followed his death, after Sully had retired from office, when the government was in the hands of Mary de Medici, the factions which had been held in restraint, were once more let loose, and the path which Henry had entered was for the time abandoned.

To maintain an alliance with Spain, which was to be cemented by a double matrimonial connection, was the purpose of the Queen. Nobles who were disaffected with the government, courted the support of the Huguenots, from interested motives. These influences, in conjunction with the various sorts of persecution to which they

were constantly subject, by the permission, if not at the instigation of the government, and through the hostile preaching of the Jesuits, kept the Huguenot churches in a state of perpetual alarm and discontent. Their counsels were divided, some advising a resort to arms, and others, like the aged Du Plessis Mornay, advising patience. The invasion of Lower Navarre and Bearn by the King, in 1620, the seizure of Church property, which had long been in the hands of the Protestants, and the infliction of atrocious cruelties upon them, moved the National Synod, in 1621, by a small majority, to decide upon war. The Huguenots, a great part of whom remained passive and neutral, were worsted, but the successful resistance of Montauban, and, in the next year, of Montpellier, led to a treaty in which the Protestants were confirmed in the possession of their religious rights, and Montauban and Rochelle were still left in their hands. Their peculiar circumstances gave them more and more the character of a political party, with which malcontents of all shades would naturally ally themselves within the kingdom, and which would borrow strength by a connection with the Protestants of other countries. A spirit of hostility to the Crown and a love of independence would naturally grow in the Huguenot ranks; and this took place at the very time when the Crown was entering upon the work of fully subjugating feudalism.1

With the reign of Louis XIII., and the administration of Richelieu, there was a return, as regards foreign affairs, to the policy of Henry IV. The aim of Richelieu (1624– 42), as far as the government of France was concerned, was to consolidate the monarchy, by bringing the aristocracy into thorough subjection to the King, and by inflicting a deadly blow on the old spirit of feudal independence. Under him began the process of centralization, of officers

1 De Félice, Hist. d. Prot. d. France, p. 307.

THE CHARACTER AND POLICY OF RICHELIEU.

449

appointed and paid by the government, which was fully developed in France after the great Revolution. His policy involved the annihilation of the Huguenot party, as a distinct political organization, a state within the state; and this he accomplished when La Rochelle, the last of their towns, fell into his hands (1628).

The foreign policy of Richelieu receives the general applause of Frenchmen; not so his domestic rule. The interests of the State must prevail over every other consideration. This was his first maxim. To this end, absolute obedience must be exacted of all orders of men, and disobedience be punished with unrelenting severity. The Prince must allow no interference of the Church or the Pope with the rights of the civil authority. Nobles must be prevented from oppressing the people, and must serve the State in war. The Judges in Parliament must be kept from interfering with the prerogatives of the Crown. The people must be kept in absolute subjection, and be subject to burdens not so heavy as to crush them, nor so light as to induce them to forget their subordination. Care should rather be had for the culture and instruction of a part of the nation, than of the whole, which might be mischievous.1 Richelieu abolished anarchy, but he made it possible for the selfish and ruinous despotism of Louis XIV. to arise in its place. His destruction of the political power of the Huguenots left them open to the deadly assaults of rulers more fanatical than himself. Had he been inclined, or if inclined, had he been able, to draw the Huguenot power on his side, and to use it against Spain, the final result might have been happier for France.2 In truth, the capture of La Rochelle gave an impulse to the emigration of Protestants, and France

1 Richelieu's political Testament is well epitomized by Häusser, p. 586. Of the part taken by Richelieu in the composition of the Testament and Memoirs, see Ranke, v. 137 seq., Martin, xi. 591 seq.

2 Martin says of the Huguenot party, that it retarded the encroaching wave of despotism. "Mieux eût valu lancer les Rochelois sur l'Espagne que

began to lose the most valuablé portion of its population.1 Abroad, Richelieu joined with Sweden and with the Protestants of Germany in making war upon the Hapsburg dynasty, and succeeded in his double purpose of breaking down the imperial power, and amplifying the territory of France. The work of Richelieu was carried forward in the same spirit by Mazarin, in the early part of the reign of Louis XIV. The design of this monarch was to make himself an absolute ruler in France, even in ecclesiastical affairs, without an actual separation from the Papacy; in other words, to imitate Henry VIII., as far as was compatible with maintaining the connection of the French Church with Rome; and, in relation to foreign powers, he aspired to be the dictator in the European commonwealth. His quarrel with the Pope, his persecution of the Jansenists, and his persecution of the Huguenots, are the three principal events in his domestic religious policy. His controversy with Innocent X., grew out of the King's attempt to extend the right called la régale - that is, the right to appropriate the revenues of a see and temporarily fill the vacancy, until a new incumbent should take the oath of fidelity to the King— to extend this prerogative over Burgundy, the old English portion of France, and portions of the kingdom, where the privilege in question belonged to the local ecclesiastical authorities. He required the vassals' oath of the bishops in these districts, and they were supported in their refusal to grant it by the Pope. Under the pontificate of Innocent XI., the Assembly of the French Clergy, in 1682, supporting the views of the King, passed the famous four propositions of Gallican de les détruire. Richelieu n'abusa point de sa victoire, mais il rendit facile à un autre d'en abuser après lui; La Rochelle debout, ou n'eût osé restaurer l'ère des persécutions et révoquer l'édit de Nantes." xi. 307. Michelet observes that Henry IV. and Richelieu both aimed at national unity, but by different means -the first by the use, the second by the destruction of the vital forces. Hist. de France, xi. 461. Upon Richelieu's personal traits, see Sismondi, Hist. des Français, xxiii. 1 seq. Ranke judges him more favorably.

1 Smiles, The Huguenots in England, etc., 1867.

.

liberty that the Pope has authority only in spiritual matters, not over kings and princes; that the authority of a General Council is above that of the Pope; that the Pope is bound by the Church laws, and by the particular institutions and usages of the French Church; and that the doctrinal decisions of the Pope are not irreformable, unless they are supported by the concurrence of the whole Church. The long controversy was at length adjusted by an accommodation, under Innocent XII., in which Louis retained his prerogative, which had formed the original subject of dispute, but gave up the four propositions. He allowed bishops to retract their assent to them, but would not suffer them to be compelled to do 80. Bossuet had assumed the post of a literary champion of the Gallican theory, in behalf of the King; but, in consequence of the settlement just referred to, his celebrated work against the ultramontane type of Catholicism did not see the light until 1730.

Jansenism was a reaction within the Catholic Church, against the theology, casuistry, and general spirit of the Jesuit order. Molina and other theologians set up a middle type of doctrine, between the system of Augustine and that of Pelagius. The Molinists ingeniously reserved to the will a coöperative part in conversion. Jansenism was a revival of the Augustinian tenets upon the inability of the fallen will and upon efficacious grace. In this respect, the Jansenists were on the same path as the Reformers; but, unlike these, instead of going back of the Fathers in order to abide by the teaching of Scripture; they rested upon patristic authority and were content to follow implicitly the great founder of Latin theology.1 Bajus, professor at Louvain, towards the end of the sixteenth century, led the way in this re-assertion of Augustinian principles. But it was Jansenius, also a professor at Louvain and Bishop of Ypres, and his fellow-student, 1 Ranke, History of the Popes, iii. 143 seq.