[207] 'Secundum humanam substantiam dereliquerat terrain cum ascendisset in cœlum.'—Fulg. ad Thrasimundum, lib. ii.
[208] Michelet, Hist. de France; the volume entitled 'La Réforme.'
CHAPTER X.
THE KING'S ANGER.
(Autumn 1534.)
=A NEW MISSIVE.=
THE terrible placard posted up during the night in Paris and over a great part of France, 'in every corner,' says Sturm,[209] produced an immense sensation. The people were agitated, the women and the weak alarmed, and the magistrates filled with indignation.[210] But the adversaries of popery did not relax their blows. At almost the same time there appeared another treatise 'against the pope's traffickers and taverners.' This writing, which was less evangelical, was rather in the mocking spirit of Erasmus. 'Everything must subserve the cupidity of the priests,' it said; 'heaven, earth, and hell, time, all creatures animate and inanimate, wine, bread, and oil, flax, milk, butter, cheese, water, salt, fire, and fumigations.... From all these they knew how to extract ... silver and gold. And the dress of the dealer adds to the price of his wares, for a mass by an abbot or a bishop costs more than one by a curate or a friar. Like women of ill fame, they sell their shame all the dearer the gayer the ornaments they wear.'[211] The agitation increased hourly; priests and friars, scattered among the groups of citizens and people, fomented their anger, increased their terror, and circulated false reports. 'The heretics,' it was said, 'have resolved to surprise the catholics during divine service, and to murder men, women, and children without mercy.' An absurd imputation, invented, says a Romish historian, to make the reformers odious. It was believed all the same, and horrible rumours began shortly to circulate among the crowd. 'A frightful plot has been laid against the State and the Church. This placard is the signal; the heretics intend to fire the churches and palaces, massacre the catholics, abolish the monarchy, and reduce the kingdom to a desert.... Death to the Lutherans!'
Nowhere was the fury so great as at the Sorbonne among the doctors: the first outbreak of their anger was incredibly violent.'This action,' says the chronicler, 'led them into such fury that their former violence seemed tolerable. No tempest ever equalled it in severity.'[212] The thunderbolt was destined, however, to be launched from a different quarter.
Francis I., who was then at Blois, had for some time felt a certain uneasiness with regard to the Reform. One day in 1534, when he was complaining of the pope to the nuncio, and insinuating that France might easily imitate the example of Henry VIII., 'Frankly, sire,' replied the nuncio, 'you will be the first to suffer; the religion of a people cannot be changed without their next demanding the change of the prince.' It had been of no use to tell Francis that neither the German princes, nor Henry VIII. himself, had been dethroned by the Reformation: the nuncio's words had sunk like an arrow into his heart.
=THE PLACARD ON THE KING'S DOOR.=
Blois was not exempt from the evangelical movement, and the Reform had made its way among the choristers of the royal chapel: it was one of these who was commissioned to post up the placards in that city. Being of a daring and enthusiastic temperament, this individual resolved to post the protestant manifesto in the castle itself, to which he had easy access.[213] Entering it at a favourable moment, he crept with his handbills as far as the king's chamber, and being satisfied that there were no servants or courtiers in the gallery, he fastened the paper to His Majesty's door, and then retired hastily.[214] This imprudent and guilty action, for it was disrespectful, was to be cruelly atoned for.