XIX.
The League, however, in proportion as it felt its strength decreasing, redoubled its violence. It had called to Paris bands of Spanish and Neapolitan soldiers and preachers, and with obscene or atrocious language, had demanded millions of heads. The prior of the Sorbonne, Jean Boucher, taught that it was necessary to take the knife in hand to kill and exterminate all; the bishop Rose argued that another bleeding like that of Saint Bartholomew was again necessary, and that by such means the disease would be cut short; the Jesuit Commolet said that the death of the politicians was life to the (Roman) Catholics; and the curé of Saint André asserted that he would march foremost to slay them.
Pope Gregory XIV. at the same time sent monitions to the (Roman) Catholics of France, threatening with severe pains those who had taken the oath of fidelity to Henry of Béarn, the heretic and the excommunicated. These bulls, which were worthy of the age of Robert the Devout, appeared so monstrous, that the Parliaments of Tours and Châlons, having declared them scandalous, seditious, and contrary to the rights of the Gallican church, caused them to be burned by the hands of the executioner.
But the six months, at the expiration of which Henry IV. had promised to make himself acquainted [with the difference of the two creeds], had long since expired. He had been in the field nearly four years without having made any sensible progress in this respect. All the (Roman) Catholics who had attached themselves to his fortunes, pressed him warmly to change his religion; the bishops, because they were blamed at Rome, and were desirous of freeing themselves from the reproach of infidelity; the nobility, because they were impatient to receive the reward of their services; the members of the Parliament, no less than those of the privy council, because they better understood state exigencies than conscientious scruples. The greater number of the other portions of society felt disposed to content themselves with form only; it was sufficient for them that they could tell the populace that the king of France attended mass.
The Abbé Duperron, afterwards bishop of Evreux and cardinal, an intriguing and cunning person, as well as an eloquent orator, spoke with these views to Henry IV., introducing into his arguments few theological, but many political considerations.
Gabrielle d’Estrées added to this the weight of a more direct and more intimate influence. She had no love for the Calvinists, who had frequently addressed severe expressions to her. The Béarnese, moreover, vanquished by fond passion, had led her to see in perspective the half of a throne. But to re-marry, it became necessary to be unmarried, and this, without exciting scandal, the pope alone could permit.
The king himself, whose “soul was steeped in voluptuousness,” according to the energetic expression of a contemporary, and who never had any solid religious principles, waited only for the proper time and opportunity. The single question for him, since his accession to the throne, was to abjure wisely, that is to say, that in gaining the (Roman) Catholics he might not lose the Reformed.
Among these, many of the nobility, wearied with war, showed themselves well disposed. Sully set them the example. “That I should advise you to attend mass,” said he to Henry IV., “is a thing you should not, as I think, expect from me, being of another religion; but I tell you frankly, that it is the most prompt and easy mode of overturning all these malignant projects. You will no longer have to encounter so many enemies, troubles, and difficulties in this world; as to the other,” he continued, laughing, “I will not answer for that.” On which the king laughed also.
Sully relates, in his “Economies Royales,” how he had conceived a theory, which admitted of passing in conscientious security from the Reformed communion to the Roman (Catholic) church. The king having caused him to be called very early one morning, requested him to sit down near his bed, and demanded his advice. Sully at first invoked political reasons, and as “the king was scratching his head in great perplexity,” he continued in these terms: “I hold it to be infallible, that of whatever kind of religion men make an external profession, if they die having observed the Decalogue, with a belief in the Apostles’ Creed, if they love God with all their heart, are charitable towards their neighbour, hope in the mercy of God, and to obtain redemption by the death, the merit, and the righteousness of Jesus Christ, they cannot fail to be saved.”
It was thus that Henry IV. became furnished with his famous argument of the most safe course, the (Roman) Catholics affirming that there was no safety out of their communion, and the Calvinists admitting that it is possible to be saved out of theirs. It will be seen at the first glance that the question had been improperly stated by Sully; it was a matter not of faith only, but of good faith; and when in speaking of dying in the observance of the Decalogue, which forbids us to bear false witness, he advised the king to commit an act of fraud and hypocrisy, one-half of his argument overturned the other half. Clearly it could only carry conviction to a mind already convinced by reasoning of a totally different nature.
Duplessis gave opposite advice, for he had seriously taken up the instruction of the king. He was desirous that the several points of religion should be discussed before him by the most celebrated doctors, and of recommencing in some manner the conference of Poissy. He invited each of the principal theologians of the Reformation to study one of the questions of controversy, in order that they might all come well armed before their adversaries. Henry IV., “the most cunning, and the most subtle prince in the world,” as Agrippa d’Aubigné, who had lived thirty years in his confidence, called him, permitted Mornay to take his own course, and enjoined him even to select his champions without delay.
The (Roman) Catholic nobles were deceived by this, and offered Mornay twenty thousand crowns on condition that he should not again awaken the king’s scruples. “The conscience of my master is no more to be sold,” said he to them, “than my own!” A beautiful reply, but unhappily only true on one side.
Despairing of being able to seduce Mornay, the politicians prayed Henry IV. to remove him from his person. But coming upon them unexpectedly at one of their meetings, “It is hard, gentlemen,” said he, “to prevent a master from speaking to a faithful servant. The proposals which I make to him are of such a nature that I can state them to him aloud, before you all. I propose to him that he should serve God with a good conscience, that he should have Him constantly before his eyes in every action, that he should appease the schism which is in the state, by a sacred reformation of the Church; that he should be an example to all Christians and to all posterity. Are these things to be said in secret? Would you wish that I should counsel him to attend mass? You do him wrong to imagine that he would profit by doing so. With what conscience can I advise him, if I do not first go there myself? and what religion is that which we may throw off like our shirts?”
Astonished by so much courage and virtue, Marshal d’Aumont cried, “You are more estimable than we are, Monsieur Duplessis; and if I said, two days since, that it was necessary to shoot you through the head, I say to-day, on the contrary, that you merit a statue.”
It will be surprising that the judicious Mornay, who had so closely and for so long a time observed the king, should have entertained so good an opinion of his firmness. But he had the sublime ingenuousness of men of great faith; and moreover, Henry IV. displayed in this matter—it is with regret that we say so of the most popular of the French kings—the most consummate duplicity. He went so far as to invite the Reformed of France to fast, and pray that God would bless the pretended conferences, which were about to be opened; and he said to the pastors assembled at Saumur, “If you learn that I have committed some excess, you may believe that there is some foundation in the report, for I am a man subject to great infirmities; but if they should tell you that I have been seduced from my religion, do not believe it; I would die first.” Three months afterwards he abjured at Saint Denis.
On the 22nd July, 1593, the archbishop of Bourges and other dignitaries of the (Roman) Catholic clergy, repaired to the king. It had been arranged that they alone should speak. We meet with a curious proof of this from a letter in which the bishop of Chartres was informed, that “he might come in full confidence, without troubling himself about theology.” For greater safety, Mornay had been sent away.
At a later period, Henry IV. explained the exclusion of the ministers by the following position. His mind was made up beforehand, he said. Why, then, expose the advocates of the Reformation to a certain defeat? Had they attended the conference, the bishops would have boasted of having vanquished them; in not attending, the ministers preserved the right of saying that they had not been heard. It is thus that sometimes the most serious matters are dealt with in this world.
On the 23rd July, the archbishop of Bourges delivered a discourse before the king, which lasted from six until eleven o’clock in the morning. The Béarnese only interrupted it from time to time, in order to ask for some explanation; or, if he raised an objection, he took care to add that he submitted himself entirely to the authority of the (Roman) Catholic church—conduct more worthy of a mocking philosopher than of a king. It was a ceremony arranged beforehand. Henry IV. had written to Gabrielle d’Estrées: “I commence this morning to speak to the bishops. It will be to-morrow that I shall make the perilous leap.”
An act of abjuration had been prepared, in which the king rejected, one after the other, all the doctrines of the Reformed faith. But he would not sign it, and they [the clergy] were contented with a vague adhesion in six lines to the articles of the Roman church. Nevertheless, by a cheat, very much resembling an act of forgery, and which paints the manners of the age, Loménie counterfeited the king’s signature on the first of the two formularies which it became necessary to send to the pope.
On Sunday, the 25th July, 1593, at eight o’clock in the morning, the king presented himself at the great gate of the church of Saint Denis, accompanied by the princes and the officers of the crown. At the entrance were the prelates, who awaited his arrival with the cross, the book of the Evangelists, and holy water. “Who are you?” said the archbishop of Bourges. “I am the king.” “What do you demand?” “I demand to be received within the pale of the Catholic, apostolic, and Roman church.” “Do you desire it sincerely?” “Yes, I wish it and desire it.” Then kneeling, he pronounced the formulary agreed upon, and the archbishop gave him absolution, and the benediction. The priests sang a grand mass, and at the termination of the ceremony, Cardinal de Bourbon carried to the king the book of the Evangelists to kiss.
This is what has been termed the conversion of Henry IV.—a matter of policy, through the influence of women, a lie of the priests, and a falsehood from beginning to end!