France now began to taste the sweets of peace, the king employed himself in making his subjects happy, and the far greater part of his subjects, endeavored to render him so. The protestants applied themselves to the care of their churches, and, as they had at this time a great many able ministers, they flourished, and increased the remaining part of this reign. The doctrine of their churches was calvinism, and their discipline was presbyterian, after the Geneva plan. Their churches were supplied by able pastors; their universities were adorned with learned and pious professors, such as Casaubon, Daille, and others, whose praises are in all the reformed churches; their provincial, and national synods were regularly convened, and their people were well governed. Much pains were taken with the king to alienate his mind from his protestant subjects: but no motives could influence him. He knew the worth of the men, and he protected them till his death. This great prince was hated by the Popish clergy for his lenity, and was stabbed in his coach by the execrable Ravillac, whose name inspires one with horror and pain.

May 14, 1610.

Lewis XIII. was not quite nine years of age, when he succeeded his father Henry. The first act of the queen mother, who had the regency during the king's minority, was the confirmation of the edict of Nantz. Lewis confirmed it again at his majority, promising to observe it inviolably. The protestants deserved a confirmation of their privileges at his hands; for they had taken no

1614.

part in the civil wars and disturbances which troubled his minority. They had been earnestly solicited to intermeddle with government: but they had wisely avoided it.

Lewis was a weak ambitious man, he was jealous of his power to excess, though he did not know wherein it consisted. He was so void of prudence, that he could not help exalting his flatterers into favorites, and his favorites into excessive power. He was so timorous that his favorites became the objects of his hatred, the moment after he had elevated them to authority: and he was so callous that he never lamented a favorite's death or downfall. By a solemn act of devotion, attended with all the farce of pictures, masses, processions, and festivals, he consecrated his person, his dominions, his crown and his subjects to the Virgin Mary, desiring her to defend his kingdom, and to inspire him with grace to lead a holy life. The Popish clergy adored him for thus sanctifying their superstitions by his example, and he, in return, lent them his power to punish his protestant subjects, whom he hated. His panegyrists call him Lewis the just: but they ought to acknowledge that his majesty did nothing to merit the title, till he found himself a-dying.

1638.

Lewis's prime minister was an artful, enterprizing clergyman, who, before his elevation, was a country bishop, and, after it, was known by the title of Cardinal de Richlieu: but the most proper title for his eminence is that, which some historians give him, of the Jupiter Mactator of France. He was a man of

great ability: but of no merit. Had his virtue been as great as his capacity, he ought not to have been intrusted with government, because all Cardinals take an oath to the Pope, and although an oath does not bind a bad man, yet as the taking of it gives him credit, so the breach of it ruins all his prospects among those with whom he hath taken it.

1594. 1604.

The Jesuits, who had been banished from France, for attempting the life of Henry

IV. had been recalled, and restored to their houses, and one of their society, under pretence of being responsible, as an hostage, for the whole fraternity, was allowed to attend the king. The Jesuits, by this mean, gained the greatest honor and power, and, as they excelled in learning, address, and intrigue, they knew how to obtain the king's ear, and how to improve his credulity to their own advantage.

This dangerous society was first formed 1534. by Ignatus Loyola, a Spanish deserter, who, being frighted out of the army by a wound, took it into his head to go on pilgrimage, and to form a religious society for the support of the catholic faith. The Popes, who knew how to avail themselves of enthusiasm in church government, directed this grand spring of human action to secu lar purposes, and, by canonizing the founder, and arranging the order, elevated the society in a few years, to a height that astonished all Europe. It was one opinion of their society, that the authority of kings is inferior to that of the people, and that they may be punished by the people in certain ca

ses. It was another maxim with them, that sovereign princes have received from the hand of God a sword to punish heretics. The Jesuits did not invent these doctrines; but they drew such consequences from them as were most prejudicial to the public tranquility: for, from the conjunction of these two principles, they concluded that an heretical prince ought to be deposed, and that heresy ought to be extirpated by fire and sword, in case it could not be extirpated otherwise. In conformity to the first of these principles, two kings of France had been murdered successively, under pretext that they were fautors of heretics. The parliament in this reign condemned this as a pernicious tenet, and declared that the authority of monarchs was dependent only on God. But the last principle, that related to the extirpation of heresy, as it flattered the court and the clergy, came into vogue. Jus divinum was the test of sound orthodoxy; and this reasoning became popular argumentation, Princes MAY put heretics to death; therefore they OUGHT to put them to death.

1615.

Richlieu, who had wriggled himself into power, by publishing a scandalous libel on the protestants of France, advised the king to establish his authority, by extirpating the intestine evils of the kingdom. He assured his majesty that the Hugonots had the power of doing him mischief, and that it was a principle with them, that kings might be deposed by the people. The protestants replied to his invectives, and exposed the absurdity of his reasoning. Richlieu reasoned thus. John Knox, the

Scotch reformer, did not believe the divine authority of kings. Calvin held a correspondence with Knox, therefore Calvin did not believe it. The French reformed church derived its doctrine from Calvin's church of Geneva, therefore the first Hugonots did not believe it. The first Hugonots did not believe it, therefore the present Hugonots do not believe it. No man, who valued the reputation of a man of sense, would have scaled the walls of preferment with such a ridiculous ladder as this!

The king, intoxicated with despotic principles, followed the fatal advice of his minister, and began with his patrimonial province of Bearn, where he caused the catholic religion to be establish

1620. ed. The Hugonots broke out into vio

lence, at this attack on their liberties, whence the king took an opportunity to recover several places from them, and at last made peace with them on condition of their demolishing all their fortifications except those of Montauban and Rochelle. Arnoux, the Jesuit, who was a creature of Richlieu's, was, at that time, confessor to Lewis the just.

The politic Richlieu invariably pursued his design of rendering his master absolute. By one art he subdued the nobility, by another the parliaments, and, as civil and religious liberty live and die together, he had engines of all sorts to extirpate heresy. He pretended to have formed the design of re-uniting the two churches of protestants and catholics. He drew off from the protestant party the dukes of Sully, Bouillon, Lesdeguieres, Rohan, and many of the first quality: for he had the world, and