The statement, so often repeated, that the Convention prohibited Christian worship, or "abolished Christianity," in France, is a fiction. Throughout the Reign of Terror the Convention maintained the State Church as established by the Constituent Assembly in 1791. Though the salaries of the clergy fell into arrear, the Convention rejected a proposal to cease paying them. The non-juring priests were condemned by the Convention to transportation, and were liable to be put to death if they returned to France. But where churches were profaned, or constitutional priests molested, it was the work of local bodies or of individual Conventionalists on mission, not of the law. The Commune of Paris shut up most, but not all, of the churches in Paris. Other local bodies did the same. After the Reign of Terror ended, the Convention adopted the proposal which it had rejected before, and abolished the State salary of the clergy (Sept. 20th, 1794). This merely placed all sects on a level. But local fanatics were still busy against religion; and the Convention accordingly had to pass a law (Feb. 23, 1795), forbidding all interference with Christian services. This law required that worship should not be held in a distinctive building (i.e. church), nor in the open air. Very soon afterwards the Convention (May 23) permitted the churches to be used for worship. The laws against non-juring priests were not now enforced, and a number of churches in Paris were actually given up to non-juring priests. The Directory was inclined to renew the persecution of this class in 1796, but the Assemblies would not permit it; and in July, 1797, the Council of Five Hundred passed a motion totally abolishing the legal penalties of non-jurors. This was immediately followed by the coup d'état of Fructidor.
Grégoire, Mémoires, ii. 87. Annales de la Religion, x. 441; Pressensé, L'Eglise et la Révolution, p. 359.
Papers presented to Parliament, 1802-3, p. 95.
"The King and his Ministers are in the greatest distress and embarrassment. The latter do not hesitate to avow it, and the King has for the last week shown such evident symptoms of dejection that the least observant could not but remark it. He has expressed himself most feelingly upon the unfortunate predicament in which he finds himself. He would welcome the hand that should assist him and the voice that should give him courage to extricate himself."-F. Jackson's despatch from Berlin, May 16, 1803; Records; Prussia, vol. 189.
Häusser ii. 472. There are interesting accounts of Lombard and the other leading persons of Berlin in F. Jackson's despatches of this date. The charge of gross personal immorality made against Lombard is brought against almost every German public man of the time in the writings of opponents. History and politics are, however, a bad tribunal of private character.
Fournier, Gentz und Cobenzl, p. 79. Beer, Zehn Jahre, p. 49. The despatches of Sir J. Warren of this date from St. Petersburg (Records: Russia, vol. 175) are full of plans for meeting an expected invasion of the Morea and the possible liberation of the Greeks by Bonaparte. They give the impression that Eastern affairs were really the dominant interest with Alexander in his breach with France.
Miot de Melito, i. 16. Savary, ii. 32.
A protest handed in at Vienna by Louis XVIII. against Napoleon's title was burnt in the presence of the French ambassador. The Austrian title was assumed on August 10, but the publication was delayed a day on account of the sad memories of August 10, 1792. Fournier, p. 102. Beer, p. 60.
Papers presented to Parliament, 28th January, 1806, and 5th May, 1815.
Hardenberg, ii. 50: corrected in the articles on Hardenberg and Haugwitz in the Deutsche Allgemeine Biographie.