Strange are the vicissitudes of human affairs! Not a hundred years passed after this event, before the great grandson of the monarch, at whose instance Brousson had laid down his life, appeared upon a scaffold in the Place Louis XIV. in Paris, and implored permission to say his few last words to the people. In vain! His voice was drowned by the drums of Santerre![Back to Contents]
CHAPTER V.
OUTBREAK IN LANGUEDOC.
Although the arbitrary measures of the King were felt all over France, they nowhere excited more dismay and consternation than in the province of Languedoc. This province had always been inhabited by a spirited and energetic people, born lovers of liberty. They were among the earliest to call in question the despotic authority over mind and conscience claimed by the see of Rome. The country is sown with the ashes of martyrs. Long before the execution of Brousson, the Peyrou at Montpellier had been the Calvary of the South of France.
As early as the twelfth century, the Albigenses, who inhabited the district, excited the wrath of the Popes. Simple, sincere believers in the Divine providence, they rejected Rome, and took their stand upon the individual responsibility of man to God. Count de Foix said to the legate of Innocent III.: "As to my religion, the Pope has nothing to do with it. Every man's conscience must be free. My father has always recommended to me this liberty, and I am content to die for it."
A crusade was waged against the Albigenses, which lasted for a period of about sixty years. Armies were concentrated upon Languedoc, and after great slaughter the heretics were supposed to be exterminated.
But enough of the people survived to perpetuate the love of liberty in their descendants, who continued to exercise a degree of independence in matters of religion and politics almost unknown in other parts of France. Languedoc was the principal stronghold of the Huguenots in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries; and when, in 1685, Louis XIV. revoked the Edict of Nantes, which interdicted freedom of worship under penalty of confiscation, banishment, and death, it is not surprising that such a policy should have occasioned widespread consternation, if not hostility and open resistance.
At the period of the Revocation there were, according to the Intendant of the province, not fewer than 250,000 Protestants in Languedoc, and these formed the most skilled, industrious, enterprising, and wealthy portion of the community. They were the best farmers, vine-dressers, manufacturers, and traders. The valley of Vaunage, lying to the westward of Nismes, was one of the richest and most highly cultivated parts of France. It contained more than sixty temples, its population being almost exclusively Protestant; and it was known as "The Little Canaan," abounding as it did in corn, and wine, and oil.
The greater part of the commerce of the South of France was conducted by the Protestant merchants of Nismes, of whom the Intendant wrote to the King in 1699, "If they are still bad Catholics, at any rate they have not ceased to be very good traders."
The Marquis d'Aguesseau bore similar testimony to the intelligent industry of the Huguenot population. "By an unfortunate fatality," said he, "in nearly every kind of art the most skilful workmen, as well as the richest merchants, belong to the pretended reformed religion."