Out of this Colloquy of Poissy came the edict of January 17th, 1562, which provided that Protestants were to surrender all the churches and ecclesiastical buildings they had seized, and prohibited them from meeting for public worship, whether within a building or not, inside the walls of any town. On the other hand, they were to have the right to assemble for public worship anywhere outside walled towns, and meetings in private houses within the walls were not prohibited. Thus the Protestants of France secured legal recognition for the first time, and enjoyed the right to worship according to their conscience. They were not satisfied—they could scarcely be, so long as they were kept outside the walls; but their leaders insisted on their accepting the edict as a reasonable compromise. “If the liberty promised us in the edict lasts,” Calvin wrote, “the Papacy will fall to the ground of itself.” Within one year the Huguenots of France found themselves freed from persecution, and in the enjoyment of a measured liberty of public worship. It can scarcely be doubted that they owed this to Catherine de’ Medici. She was a child of the Renaissance, and was naturally on the side of free thought; and she was, besides, at this time persuaded that the Huguenots had the future on their side. In the coming struggle they regarded this edict as their charter, and frequently demanded its restitution and enforcement.
Catherine de’ Medici had shown both courage and constancy in her attempts at conciliation. To the remonstrances of Philip of Spain she had replied that she meant to be master in her own house; and when the Constable de Montmorency had threatened to leave the Court, he had been told that he might do as he pleased. But she was soon to be convinced that she had overestimated the strength of the Protestants, and that she could never count on the consistent support of their nominal leader, the vain and vacillating Antoine de Bourbon. Had Jeanne d’Albret been in her husband’s place, things might have been different.
The edict of January 17th, 1562, had exasperated the Romanists without satisfying the mass of the Protestants. The marked increase in the numbers of Protestant congregations, and their not very strict observance of the limitations of the edict, had given rise to disturbances in many parts of the country. Everything seemed to tend towards civil war. The spark which kindled the conflagration was the Massacre of Vassy.[217]
§ 12. The Massacre of Vassy.
The Duke of Guise, travelling from Joinville to Paris, accompanied by his brother, the Cardinal of Guise, his children and his wife, and escorted by a large armed retinue, halted at Vassy (March 1st, 1562). It was a Sunday, and the Duke wished to hear Mass. Scarcely a gunshot from the church was a barn where the Protestants (in defiance of the edict, for Vassy was a walled town) were holding a service. The congregation, barely a year old, was numerous and zealous. It was an eyesore to Antoinette de Bourbon, the mother of the Guises, who lived in the neighbouring château of Joinville, and saw her dependants attracted by the preaching at Vassy. The Duke was exasperated at seeing men whom he counted his subjects defying him in his presence. He sent some of his retainers to order the worshippers to quit the place. They were received by cries of “Papists! idolaters!” When they attempted to force an entrance, stones began to fly, and the Duke was struck. The barn was rushed, the worshippers fusilladed, and before the Duke gave orders to cease firing, sixty-three of the six or seven hundred Protestants were slain, and over a hundred wounded.
The news of the massacre spread fast; and while it exasperated the Huguenots, the Romanists hailed it as a victory. The Constable de Montmorency and the Marshal Saint André went out to meet the Duke, and the Guises entered Paris in triumph, escorted by more than three thousand armed men. The Protestants began arming themselves, and crowded to Paris to place themselves under the orders of the Prince of Condé. It was feared that the two factions would fight in the streets.
The Regent with the King retired to Fontainebleau. She was afraid of the Triumvirs (Montmorency, the Duke of Guise, and Marshal Saint-André), and she invited the Prince de Condé to protect her and her children. Condé lost this opportunity of placing himself and his co-religionists in the position of being the support of the throne. The Triumvirate, with Antoine de Bourbon, who now seemed to be their obedient servant, marched on Fontainebleau, and compelled the King and the Queen Mother to return to Paris. Catherine believed that the Protestants had abandoned her, and turned to the Romanists.
The example of massacre given at Vassy was followed in many places where the Romanists were in a majority. In Paris, Sens, Rouen, and elsewhere, the Protestant places of worship were attacked, and many of the worshippers slain. At Toulouse, the Protestants shut themselves up in the Capitol, and were besieged by the Romanists. They at last surrendered, trusting to a promise that they would be allowed to leave the town in safety. The promise was not kept, and three thousand men, women, and children were slain in cold blood. This slaughter, in violation of oath, was celebrated by the Roman Catholics of Toulouse in centenary festivals, which were held in 1662, in 1762, and would have been celebrated in 1862 had the Government of Napoleon III. not interfered to forbid it.
These massacres provoked reprisals. The Huguenots broke into the Romanist churches, tore down the images, defaced the altars, and destroyed the relics.