言 their not having had the precaution to make friends. Even those who would have benefited by joining in a scheme for humbling the nobles and clergy did not see their true interest at the time. The parliament and the men of letters, instead of supporting the king and his mistress, poured forth remonstrances and epigrams against them. Not only the courtiers, but Machault's brother ministers, were his enemies. This they showed, indeed, not so much by opposition in the cabinet as by songs and satirical effusions. Pompadour was of course gibbeted, and Louis himself not spared. They defended themselves by lettres de cachet. Even the accomplished courtier, Maurepas, did not escape. He was suspected of being the author of some of the satirical effusions upon the mistress, which circulated at Versailles, was dismissed and exiled to the country.* It excites both surprise and regret that an able and powerful minister did not arise at this epoch, to remedy abuses, abrogate the pernicious privileges of the clergy and noblesse, and anticipate, by reform, the revolution which was already impending. The king had power to appoint and uphold such a minister. Madame de Pompadour was ready to support and second such a movement. Voltaire was frequently her guest, and encyclopedists reckoned on her protection. But the crying sin of her position marred all her good tendencies. All that was faulty in the government was imputed to her. The pusillanimity shown and the advantages thrown away at the peace were laid at her door, and the arrest and expulsion of Charles Stuart the Pretender, in obedience to the stipulations of the English treaty, were scouted as disgraceful and keenly satirised. The public, in fact, preferred Louis the Fourteenth and Maintenon to Louis the Fifteenth and Pompadour. As to reform, the first step to be taken towards this was in the domain of finance. Machault tried it boldly, with * Journal de D'Argenson, t. v. p. 456. CHAP. XXXVI. CHAP. XXXVI. the full support of Pompadour. He failed before the determined resistance of clergy, noblesse, and parliament. And whilst these, more reckless and forgetful of the necessities and advance of the age than even the king and his mistress, proceeded to quarrel about dogmas and trivialities, the court and Pompadour turned their attention to foreign policy, success in which promised to redeem popularity and augment power more than any wisdom shown in domestic administration. The French clergy thus escaped what might have been their salvation, the deprival of their idle privileges, bringing them down to a fair equality with their fellowcountrymen. The conduct of the higher classes was, indeed, marked by a fatuity almost inconceivable. Each of them possessed every advantage that could be desired. Nobles and ecclesiastics enjoyed immunity from taxation, and in great measure escaped the action of the law. Although a taciturn and reserved sovereign like Louis the Fifteenth might not open his court or his council to the members of the noblesse, still these had the monopoly of all military and of the highest civil appointments. Such advantages might have inspired moderation. But Chateaubriand testifies that what galled and incensed the middle classes was not so much the monopoly of place, privileges, and power, as the insolence of their demeanour, and the total want of consideration they showed for all beneath them. The Church, too, possessed of solid power, wealth, and respect, might have shown tolerance and even affection for the middle classes. Instead of this, their sole object seemed to be to find victims, or to make them of such as dared to differ with them. That they should seek to exterminate the Protestants is conceivable, as the reformers scouted the very idea of a hierarchic priesthood. But the Jansenists, those devout men and families, chiefly of the professional and middle class, who entertained but shades of difference with the Catholics, and objected merely to the sweeping cen- CHAP. sures of the bull Unigenitus, that these should have XXXVI. called forth the violent and unwarrantable enmity of the clergy at this time does seem little short of madness. The ecclesiastics entertained the idea that, by striking hard blows, they increased and displayed their power. And thus, whenever they fell into disputes with the government, about taxation, or ought else, the clergy universally had recourse to slaying Protestants and persecuting Jansenists. Such were the tactics which they now employed. The Huguenots of the south had been allowed to breathe during the years of the regency. This cessation of rigour opened to them free communication with their pastors from Geneva. Of these, Antoine Court especially devoted himself to revive the spirit of his Church. For years its members had not met. They were now encouraged to assemble au désert (in the desert), and in lonely places, chiefly by night, to have divine worship, as well as the rites of baptism and marriage, performed.* The Catholic spirit was roused by accounts of these meetings, and the Duke of Bourbon, under the influence, it is said, of his mistress, Madame de Prie, was induced to re-issue and re-enact, in 1724, all the severe laws of Louis the Fourteenth against the Protestants. The galleys and confiscation were the penalties for attending the reformed worship. Pastors were to be executed, and those who harboured them sent to the galleys. No place could be held, or duty performed, without a certificate of Catholicity. This and the receiving the sacrament were indispensable for burial and for marriage. The clergy and the parliaments in the south took delight in executing and enforcing this Draconic code, under which so many .pastors perished on the scaffold. Cardinal Fleury, indeed, gave no encouragement to this zeal. But soon * Coquerel, Eglises du Désert. after his death, in 1744, the Huguenots having, im prudently perhaps, held a synod, or assembly, frequented by upwards of 10,000 persons, the clergy of the region exclaimed, and the court itself took alarm. It was the time of the English descents upon the coast, and of the invasion of Provence. The Huguenots were accused of being in communication with the national enemy. In February 1745 came forth in consequence severe edicts, subjecting them to all the penalties that cruelty could devise. As to the rich suspected of Protestantism, they were reduced to penury by fines. Those of Dauphiné paid 200,000 livres; Nismes 60,000. Those who could not pay were sent to the bagne. Numbers of pastors were hanged. The most cruel persecutor of the Huguenots of the south at this time was, strange to say, the dissolute and infidel Duc de Richelieu, the friend of Voltaire, and the obsequious servitor, who had supplied the king with so many mistresses. Sent to Genoa to command, he had made use of his time to amass and rob all the money he could grasp. Appointed governor of Languedoc, the Protestants became his prey. He washed his hands in their blood, in order to fill his pockets with their money. Such was the gallant and fashionable noble of the eighteenth century. Although the young members of the different prcvincial bars showed an advanced and liberal spirit, as well as gave great promise of eloquence, the elder judges remained bigoted—as bigoted as the prelates. Even the Jansenist judges sanctioned the persecution of the Protestants, and approved of the expedient of requiring certificates of confession, which alone entitled to civic rights and Christian burial. The Jansenists who committed such a blunder and such an atrocity were caught in it as in a trap; for the clergy of Paris thought the instrument of exclusion and persecution too good and convenient a one not to be employed. In Paris there were no Protestants to per 啡 br XXXVI. secute, but there were Jansenists, strongly suspected of CHAP. This was quite as bad as Protestantism in the eyes of |