History of the Rise of the Huguenots, Vol. 1

by Henry Martyn Baird

The inquisition hitherto jealously watched.

It was, however, no ordinary tribunal which the highest civil court of the kingdom was erecting. The commission was in effect nothing less than a new phase of the Inquisition, embodying many of the most obnoxious features of that detested tribunal. It is true that the "Holy Office," in a modified form, had existed in France ever since the persecutions directed against the Albigenses and the bloody campaigns of Simon de Montfort. But the seat of the solitary Inquisitor of the Faith was Toulouse, not Paris, and his powers had been jealously circumscribed by the courts of justice and the diocesan prelates, both equally interested in rearing barriers to prevent his incursions into their respective jurisdictions. The Inquisitor of Toulouse was now only a spy and informer.[261] Parliament, in particular, had clearly enunciated the principle that neither inquisitor nor bishop had the right to arrest a suspected heretic, inasmuch as bodily seizure was the exclusive prerogative of the officers of the crown. The judges of this supreme court had summoned to their bar a bishop, and his "official," or vicar, and had exacted from them an explicit disavowal of any intention to arrest, in the case of a person whom they had merely detained, as they asserted, until such time as they could deliver him into the hands of a competent civil officer.[262] And it had become a maxim of French jurisprudence, that "an inquisitor of the faith has no power of capture or arrest, save with the assistance, and by authority, of the secular arm."[263]

Parliament breaks down the safeguards of personal liberty.

But the Parliament of Paris, at the instigation of the regent's advisers, and with the consent of the bishops, was breaking down these important safeguards of personal liberty. It not only accorded to the mixed inquisitorial commission, consisting of two lay and two clerical members, the authority to apprehend persons suspected of heresy, but removed the proceedings of the commission almost entirely from review and correction. A pretext for this extraordinary course was found in the delays heretofore experienced from the interposition of technical difficulties. "The commissioners," said parliament, "by virtue of the authority delegated to them, shall secretly institute inquiries against the Lutherans, and shall proceed against them by personal summons, by bodily arrest, by seizure of goods, and by other penalties. Their decisions shall be executed in spite of any and every opposition and appeal, save in case of the final sentence."[264] While conferring such extravagant privileges, parliament took pains to prescribe that the decisions of the commission should be executed precisely as if they had emanated from the supreme court itself. Such were the lengths to which the most conservative judges were willing to go, in the hope of speedily eradicating the reformed doctrines from French soil.

The commission endorsed by Clement VII.

The regent and her master-spirit, the chancellor, did not rest here. The commission was not irrevocable; and its authority might be disputed. The work of parliament must receive the papal sanction. For this Clement the Seventh did not keep them long waiting. He addressed to parliament (May 20, 1525) a brief conceived in a vein of fulsome eulogy, expressing his marvellous commendation of their acts—acts which he declared to be worthy of the reputation for wisdom in which the French tribunal was justly held. And he incited the judges to fresh zeal by the consideration that the new madness that had fallen upon the world was prepared to confound and overturn, not religion alone, but all rule, nobility, pre-eminence and superiority—nay, all law and order. The reader, it may be feared, will tire of the frequency with which the same trite suggestions recur. It is, however, not a little important to emphasize the argument which the Roman Curia, and its emissaries at the courts of kings, were never weary of reiterating in the ears of the rich and powerful. And as they seized with avidity every slight incident of disorder that could by any means be associated with the great religious movement now in progress, and presented it as corroboratory proof of the charge preferred against the "Lutherans," it is not surprising that they were generally successful in their appeal to the fears of a class which had so much at stake.

In addition to his endorsement of their pious zeal, Clement's brief informed the judges of parliament that they would find in the accompanying bull his formal confirmation of the inquisitorial commission.[265]

This "letter with the leaden seal," dated the seventeenth of May, might well have opened the eyes of less devoted subjects of the Roman See to the injury they were inflicting upon the French liberties, heretofore so cherished an object of judicial solicitude. Addressing itself to the four commissioners named by parliament, the bull recited the lamentable progress of the doctrines of that "son of iniquity and heresiarch, Martin Luther," and praised the ardor displayed to stay their dissemination in France. It next declared that the Pope, by the advice and with the unanimous consent of the cardinals, instructed the commissioners to proceed either singly or collectively against those persons who had embraced heretical views, "simply and quietly, without noise or form of judgment." He empowered them to act independently of the prelates of the kingdom and the Inquisitor of the Faith, or to call in their assistance, as they should see fit. They might summon witnesses, under pain of ecclesiastical censures. They might make investigations against and put on trial all those infected with heresy, even should the guilty be bishops or archbishops in the church, or be clothed with the ducal authority in the state. When convicted, such persons were to be punished by arrest and imprisonment, or cut off, "like rotten members, from the communion of the church, and consigned to eternal damnation with Satan and his angels." The commissioners were further authorized to grant permission to any one of the faithful who chose so to do to invade, occupy, and acquire for himself the lands, castles, and goods of the heretics, seizing their persons and leading them away into life-long slavery. From the sentence of the commissioners all appeal, even to the "Apostolic See" itself, was expressly cut off.[266]

Its powers enlarged by the papal bull.

Rome had made one of its most brilliant strokes. While adopting as his own the commissioners appointed by parliament, Clement had enlarged their already exorbitant prerogatives, and consummated their independence of secular interference. A new and more efficient inquisition was thus introduced into France, with its secret investigation and unlimited power of inflicting punishment. The Parliament of Paris had, however, committed itself too fully to think of demurring. Accordingly, it proceeded (June 10th) to enter on its records both the regent's letter and the bull of the Pope, to which the letter enjoined obedience.[267]