That such an act could be passed in a country in which the Jesuits occupied a favorite position shows that the Baltimore family was possessed of remarkable political ability and of more than ordinary courage. How profoundly this generous spirit was appreciated by some of their guests was shown in the same year when a number of Puritan exiles overthrew the government of Maryland, abolished the Act of Tolerance and replaced it by an “Act Concerning Religion” of their own which granted full religious liberty to all those who declared themselves Christians “with the exception of Catholics and Episcopalians.”
This period of reaction fortunately did not last long. In the year 1660 the Stuarts returned to power and once more the Baltimores reigned in Maryland.
The next attack upon their policy came from the other side. The Episcopalians gained a complete victory in the mother country and they insisted that henceforth their church should be the official church of all the colonies. The Calverts continued to fight but they found it impossible to attract new colonists. And so, after a struggle which lasted another generation, the experiment came to an end.
Protestantism triumphed.
So did intolerance.
CHAPTER XXIII
THE SUN KING
The eighteenth century is usually referred to as an era of despotism. And in an age which believes in the dogma of democracy, despotism, however enlightened, is not apt to be regarded as a desirable form of government.
Historians who mean well by the human race are very apt to point the finger of scorn at that great monarch Louis XIV and ask us to draw our own conclusions. When this brilliant sovereign came to the throne, he inherited a country in which the forces of Catholicism and Protestantism were so evenly balanced that the two parties, after a century of mutual assassination (with the odds heavily in favor of the Catholics), had at last concluded a definite peace and had promised to accept each other as unwelcome but unavoidable neighbors and fellow citizens. The “perpetual and irrevocable” Edict of Nantes of the year 1598 which contained the terms of agreement, stated that the Catholic religion was the official religion of the state but that the Protestants should enjoy complete liberty of conscience and should not suffer any persecution on account of their belief. They were furthermore allowed to build churches of their own and to hold public office. And as a token of good faith, the Protestants were allowed to hold two hundred fortified cities and villages within the realm of France.
This, of course, was an impossible arrangement. The Huguenots were no angels. To leave two hundred of the most prosperous cities and villages of France in the hands of a political party which was the sworn enemy of the government was quite as absurd as if we should surrender Chicago and San Francisco and Philadelphia to the Democrats to make them accept a Republican administration, or vice versa.