The Pocket Bible or Christian the Printer Part 23

"Speak. You are a man of arms. We should know your opinion," returned Calvin.

"Since you insist, monsieur," Coligny began, "I should here declare that my family owes a good deal to the kindness of the King. It has pleased him to entrust me--me who am barely pa.s.sed the age of youth--with a company of his army. I am, accordingly, bound to him by bonds of grat.i.tude. But there is to me a sentiment superior to that of grat.i.tude for royal favors--that sentiment is the duty that faith imposes. While deploring the cruel extremities of civil war, which I hold in horror; while deeply regretting ever to have to draw my sword against the King, or, rather, against his ill-omened advisers, I should feel constrained to resort to that fatal extremity if, persecution having reached the limits of endurance, it became necessary to defend the lives of our brothers, driven face to face with the alternative, 'Die, or abjure your faith!' As to p.r.o.nouncing myself with regard to the opportune moment for the conflict, in case, which G.o.d forfend, the conflict must break out, I leave the decision to more experienced heads than my own. At the moment of action, my property, my sword, my life--all shall be at the service of our cause. I shall do my duty--all my duty."

Ambroise Pare, the surgeon, was the next to speak. "Both Christ and my professional duties," he said, "command me to bestow my care upon friend and enemy alike. I could not, accordingly, brothers, bring hither any but words of peace. Let us be inflexible in our belief. But let us force our persecutors themselves to acknowledge our moderation. Let us tire their acts of violence with our patience and resignation. Let us leave the swords sheathed."

"Patience, nevertheless, has bounds!" objected the Viscount of Plouernel. "Has not our resignation lasted long enough? Does it not embolden the audacity of our enemies? Would you resort yet again to humble pet.i.tions? Very well. Let us pray, let us implore, once more. But if we are answered with a denial of justice, let us, then, resolutely stand up against our persecutors. We are the majority, in several mercantile cities, and several provinces. Let us, then, repel force with force. Our enemies will recoil before our att.i.tude, and will then do justice to our legitimate wishes. I hold that to carry our forbearance any further would be to expose our party to be decimated day by day.

Then, when the hour of battle shall have come--it is fatedly bound to come--we shall find ourselves stripped of our best forces. In short, let us make one more peaceful effort to secure the free exercise of our religion. Should our appeal be denied--to arms!"

"Brothers," advised Prince Charles of Gerolstein, "I am a foreigner among you. I come from Germany. I there a.s.sisted at the struggles and the triumph of the Reformation preached by the great Luther. In our old Germany we did not appeal and request. We affirmed the right of man to worship his Creator according to his own conscience. Workingmen, seigneurs, bourgeois--all proclaimed in chorus: 'We refuse to bend under the yoke of Rome; whosoever should seek to impose it upon us by the sword will be resisted with the sword.' To-day, the Reformation in Germany defies its enemies. Germany is not France; but men are men everywhere. Everywhere resolution has the name of resolution, nor are its consequences anywhere different. We are bound to uphold our rights by our arms."

"Monsieur Christian Lebrenn, what is your opinion on the grave subject before us?" asked Calvin. The printer replied:

"History teaches us that to request from Popes and Kings a reform of superst.i.tion and tyranny is absolutely idle. Never will the Church of Rome voluntarily renounce the idolatries and abuses that are the sources of its wealth and power. Never will a Catholic King--consecrated by the Church and leaning upon it for support, as it leans upon him--voluntarily recognize the Reformation. The Reformation denies the authority of the Pope. To attack the Pope is to attack royal authority.

To overthrow the altar is to shatter the throne. All authority is interdependent. What is it that we demand? The peaceful exercise of our creed, while conforming to the laws of the kingdom. But the laws of the kingdom expressly forbid the exercise of all creeds, except that of the Catholic Church. Either we must confess our faith and then expose ourselves to the rigors of the law, or escape them by abjuration; or, yet, resist them, arms in hand. Are we to obtain edicts of tolerance? We should entertain no such hope. But, even granted we obtained them, our security would be under no better safeguard. An edict is revocable. The end of it all is fatedly one of three conclusions--abjuration, martyrdom, or revolt. The blood of martyrs is fruitful, but the blood of soldiers, battling for the most sacred of rights, is also fruitful. We neither should, nor can we, I hold, hope for either the authorization, or tolerance, of our cult. Sooner or later, driven to extremities by persecution, we shall find ourselves compelled to repel violence with violence. Let us boldly face the terrible fact. But, suppose, for the sake of our peace of conscience, we said: 'It still depends upon the Church of Rome and the King of France to put an end to the torture of our brothers, and to prevent the evils of a civil and religious war.' To that end a decree conceived in these terms will suffice: '_Everyone may freely and publicly exercise his religion under the obligation to respect the religion of others_.' Such a decree, so just and simple, consecrating, as it does, the most inviolable of rights, is the only equitable and peaceful solution of the religious question. Do you imagine that such a decree would be vouchsafed to our humble pet.i.tion?"

"Neither King nor Pope, neither bishops, priests nor monks would accept such a decree," was the unanimous answer. Christian continued:

"Nevertheless, in order to place the right on our side, let us draw up one last pet.i.tion. If it is rejected, let us then run to arms, and exterminate our oppressors. It is ever by insurrection that liberty is won."

"Will Brother Bernard Palissy let us know his views?" asked Calvin when Christian had finished.

With a candor that breathed refinement, the potter replied: "I am but a poor fashioner of earthen pots. Seeing the issue is to shatter them resolutely--according to the opinion of our friend the printer--I shall tell you what happened to me the other day. I was wondering how it came about that the Evangelical religion--benign, charitable, peaceful, full of resignation, asking for naught but for a modest place in the sun of the good G.o.d in behalf of its little flock--should have so many inveterate enemies. Being a little versed in alchemy, 'Let's see,' said I to myself, 'when, mixing the varnish, colors and enamel with which I decorate my pottery, I encounter some refractory substance, what do I do? I submit it to the alembic. I decompose it. In that way I ascertain the different substances of which it consists. Well now, let me submit the enemies of the Reformation to the alembic in order to ascertain what there is in their composition to render them so very refractory.' First of all, I submit to my philosophic alembic the brains of a canon. I ask him: 'Why are you such a violent enemy of the Evangelical faith?' 'Why!'

the canon makes answer, 'because, your clergymen being men of science as well as preachers, our flocks will also want to hear us preach as men of knowledge. Now, then, I know nothing about preaching, and still less about reading or writing. Since my novitiate I have been accustomed to taking my comfort, to ignorance, to idleness. That's the reason I sustain the Church of Rome, which sustains my ignorance, my delightful comfort and my idleness.' Through with that monk, I experimented with the head of an abbot. It resisted the alembic. It shook itself away, bit, roared with vindictive choler, resisting strenuously to have that which it contained within seen by me. Nevertheless, I succeeded in separating its several parts, to wit: the black and vicious choler, on one side; ambition and pride, on the other; lastly, the silent thoughts of murder that our abbot nourished towards his enemies. That done, I discovered that it was his arrogance, his greed and his vindictiveness that kept him in a refractory temper toward the humility of the Evangelical church. I afterwards experimented upon a counsellor of parliament, the finest Gautier one ever laid eyes upon. Having distilled my gallant in my alembic I found that his bowels contained large chunks of church benefices, which had fattened him so much that he almost burst in his hose. Seeing which I said to him: 'Come, now, be candid, is it not in order to preserve your large chunks of church benefices that you would inst.i.tute proceedings against the reformers? Isn't it d.a.m.nable?'

'What is there d.a.m.nable in that?' he asked me. 'If it were d.a.m.nable there must be a terrible lot of d.a.m.ned people, seeing that in our sovereign court of parliament, and in all the courts of France, there are very few counsellors or presidents without some slice of an ecclesiastical benefice which helps them to keep up the gilding, the trappings, the banquets and the smaller delights of the household, as well as the grease in the kitchen. Now, then, you devil's limb of a potter' (he was talking to me) 'if the Reformation were to triumph, would not all our benefices run to water, and, along with them, all our small and large pleasures? That's why we burn you up, you pagans!' At hearing which I cried: 'Oh, poor Christians, where are you at? You have against you the courts of parliament and the great seigneurs, all of whom profit from ecclesiastical benefices. So long as they will be fed upon such a soup they will remain your capital enemies.' That is my reason, brothers, for believing we shall be persecuted all our lives.

Let us therefore take refuge with our captain and protector Jesus Christ, who one day will wipe out the infliction of the wicked and the wrong that will have been done us.[36] Therefore, let us suffer; let us be resigned, even unto martyrdom; and, according to the judgment of a poor potter, let us not break the pots. Of what use are broken pots?"

"Will our celebrated poet Clement Marot acquaint us with his views?"

asked Calvin.

"Brothers," said the man thus called upon, "our friend Bernard Palissy, one of the great artists of these days--and of all future days--spoke to you in his capacity of a potter. I, a poet, shall address you on the profit that can be drawn from my trade for our cause. Why not make one more endeavor to use the methods of persuasion before resorting to the frightful extremity of civil war? Why not endeavor to draw the world over to our side by the charm of the Evangelical word? Listen, the other day a thought flashed through my mind. The women are better than we.

This acknowledgment is easily made in the presence of our sister, Mary La Catelle, whom I see here. She is the living ill.u.s.tration of the truth of what I say. None among us, even the foremost, excels her in tenderness or pity for the afflicted, in delicate and touching care for deserted children. I therefore say the women are better than we, are more accessible than we to pure, lofty and celestial sentiments.

Furthermore, to them life is summed up in one word--_love_. From terrestrial love to divine love it is but one aspiration higher. Let us endeavor to elevate the women to that sublime sphere. The common but just saying, Little causes often produce great results, has inspired me with the following thought. I asked myself: 'What do the women usually sing, whether they be bourgeois or workingmen's wives?' Love songs. The impure customs of our times have given these songs generally a coa.r.s.e, if not obscene turn. As a rule, the mind and the heart become the echo of what the mouth says, of what the ear hears, of what engages our thoughts. Would it not be a useful thing to subst.i.tute those licentious songs with chaste ones that attract through love? Hence I have considered the advisability of putting in verse and to music the sacred canticles of the Bible which are so frequently perfumed with an adorable poetic flavor. My hope is that little by little, penetrated by the ineffable influence of those celestial songs, the women who sing them will soon be uttering their sentiments, not with the lips only but from the depth of their hearts. Our aspirations will then be realized."

Clement Marot was about to recite some of the charming verses composed by himself, when Justin suddenly broke in upon the a.s.semblage crying:

"Danger! Danger! A troop of archers and mounted patrolmen are coming up the road to the abbey. I have seen the glitter of their casques. Flee by the opposite issue of the quarry!"

A great tumult ensued upon the artisan's words. Justin took up one of the candles, ran to the gallery that was masked by the huge boulder, and entered the narrow pa.s.sage, ordering all the others to follow him.

"Brothers!" cried out the Viscount of Plouernel, "let all those of us who are men of arms remain here and draw our swords. The patrol will not dare to lay hands upon any of us. The court must reckon with our families. As to you, Calvin, and the rest of our friends whom no privilege shelters from the pursuit of our enemies, let them flee!"

"You can leave the place in all safety," added Gaspard of Coligny; "the armed patrol, finding us ready to cross irons with them, will not push their search any further."

"Should they push forward so far as to discover this other issue," put in Prince Charles of Gerolstein, "we shall charge upon them vigorously, and shall force them back far enough to leave the pa.s.sage free for our retreat."

John Calvin, whose life was so precious to the Evangelical church, was the first to follow upon the heels of the torch-bearer Justin. The other reformers pressed close behind. The gallery, narrow at the entrance, widened by degrees, until it opened into an excavation surrounded by bluffs, up one of which a narrow path wound itself to the very top of the ravine, with the tierred fields and woods stretching beyond on the further slope of the hill of Montmartre. Robert Estienne, Clement Marot, Bernard Palissy and Ambroise Pare remained close to Calvin. Christian Lebrenn a.s.sisted Mary La Catelle to cross the rocky ground. When the fugitives were all again a.s.sembled in the hollow of the excavation, John Calvin addressed them, saying:

"Before separating, brothers, I renew to you the express recommendation not to attempt a rebellion, which, especially at this season, would only subserve the cause of our enemies. Resignation, courage, perseverance, hope--such must be our watchwords for the present. Our hour will come.

a.s.sured, after this night's council, of the adhesion of the reformers of Paris to the Credo of the Evangelical church, I shall continue my journey through France to engage our brothers in the provinces to imitate the example of Paris by opposing the violence of our enemies with patience." And turning to Christian: "Monsieur Lebrenn, you uttered a sentiment the profoundness of which has impressed me strongly. A simple decree to the effect that all are free to profess publicly their own creed while respecting the creed of others, you said, would prevent frightful disasters. Let the blood, that may some day flow, fall upon those who, by denying justice, will have kindled the flames of civil war! Anathema upon them! For the very reason that equity and right are on our side we are in duty bound to redouble our moderation."

After touching adieus, exchanged by Calvin and his co-religionists, it was agreed to return to Paris in separate groups of threes and fours, to the end of not awakening the suspicion of the guards at the Montmartre and St. Honore Gates, who were no doubt apprized of the expedition of the patrol against a nocturnal a.s.sembly of heretics held on Montmartre.

Day was about to dawn. John Calvin, Robert Estienne, Clement Marot, Ambroise Pare, Bernard Palissy and a few others ascended the path that led out of the ravine, and took their way across-fields in the direction of the St. Honore Gate. Other little groups formed themselves, each striking in a different direction. Christian, Justin, John Dubourg, Laforge, who was another rich bourgeois, Mary La Catelle and her brother-in-law the architect Poille, took the road to the Montmartre Gate, where they arrived at sunrise. Although their group consisted of only six persons, they decided, out of excessive caution, not to enter Paris but by twos--first John Dubourg and Laforge; then Mary La Catelle and her brother-in-law; lastly Justin and Christian. Their entrance, thought they, would awaken no suspicion, seeing that already the peasants, carrying vegetables and fruit for the market, crowded in the neighborhood of the gate with their carts. Soon separated from their friends in the midst of the medley of market carts, Justin and Christian were but a few steps from the arched entrance of the gate when suddenly they heard a loud clamor, and these words, repeated by a mob of voices: "Lutherans! Lutherans! Death to the heretics!" A pang of apprehension shot through the hearts of Christian and his companion. Some of their companions who preceded them must have been recognized at the gate. To rush to their a.s.sistance would have been but to share their fate.

"Let us not attempt to enter Paris at this hour," suggested Justin to Christian, "we are workmen in the printing shop of Robert Estienne. That would be enough to cause us to be suspected of heresy. Gainier, the spy of the Criminal Lieutenant, has surely given the mob our description.

Let us go around the rampart and enter by the Bastille of St. Antoine.

That gate is so far from Montmartre that it is possible the alarm has not been given from that side."

"My wife and children would be in mortal agony not to see me home this morning," answered Christian. "I shall make the attempt to go through, under shelter of the tumult which, unhappily for our friends, seems to be on the increase. Do you hear those ferocious cries?"

"I do not care to run the danger. Adieu, Christian. I have neither wife nor children. My prolonged absence will cause uneasiness to no one. I prefer to go to the Bastille of St. Antoine. We shall meet shortly, I hope, at the printing shop. May G.o.d guard you!"

The two friends separated. Christian, whose anxiety increased every minute, thinking of Mary La Catelle and those with her, decided to enter Paris at all risks. Nevertheless, noticing not far from where he stood a peasant driving a cart filled with vegetables and overspread with a cloth held up by hoops, he said to the rustic, drawing a coin from his pocket:

"Friend, I am exhausted with fatigue. I need a little rest. Would you be so good as to take me in your cart only as far as the center of the city?"

"Gladly, climb in and go to sleep, if you can," answered the peasant as he pocketed the coin.

Christian climbed in, ensconced himself in a corner of the wagon and raised a little fold of the cloth in order to catch a glimpse of what was going on outside, seeing the tumult waxed louder and more threatening. Alas! Hardly had the wagon pa.s.sed through the gate and entered the city when Christian saw at a little distance Mary La Catelle, her brother-in-law Poille, John Dubourg and Laforge--all four manacled. A troop of archers held back with difficulty the furious mob that loudly clamored for the lives of the "heretics," those "heathens,"

those "Lutheran stranglers of little children"! Pale, yet calm, the four victims looked serenely upon the surging ma.s.s of fanatics. With her eyes raised to heaven and her arms crossed over her bosom, Mary La Catelle seemed resigned to martyrdom. The imprecations redoubled. Already the most infuriate of the populace were picking up stones to stone the victims to death. The wagon in which Christian was concealed slowly pursued its way and saved the artisan the harrowing spectacle of the mob's murderous preparations. Later he learned the details of the arrest of his friends. La Catelle and her brother-in-law, who had long ago been reported by the spy Gainier as hardened heretics, had been recognized and seized by the agents of the Criminal Lieutenant, who had been posted since midnight at the Montmartre Gate. John Dubourg and Laforge, who came a few steps behind La Catelle, having yielded to a generous impulse and run to her a.s.sistance, were, in punishment for the very n.o.bility of their act, likewise suspected, arrested and manacled.

Christian also learned later that Lefevre was the informer against the meeting of the reformers at Montmartre. The bits of paper Lefevre had picked up while directing the search of the sergeant in the garret of Christian's house, proved to be bits of Calvin's draft convoking the a.s.sembly, and on one of these the word Montmartre was to be read. Armed with this evidence, Lefevre had hastened to impart his suspicions to the Criminal Lieutenant, and caused the patrol to be ordered afield; but these, finding themselves confronted with the seigneurs at the entrance of the quarry, and seeing these determined to resist them, had not dared to effect an arrest.

Christian jumped out of the wagon in the center of Paris and hastened his steps towards his house. Hardly had he stepped upon the Exchange Bridge when he saw the Franc-Taupin running towards him. Josephin had watched all night for the artisan's return. He informed him of the arrest of his wife and children, of the danger that awaited him if he entered his house, and induced him to take refuge in a place of safety.

CHAPTER XIV.

HENA'S DIARY.

After being separated from her mother, Hena Lebrenn was taken to the Augustinian Convent and locked up. One day during her confinement she narrated the incidents of her incarceration in a letter destined for Bridget, but which never reached the ill-starred mother, due to a series of distressful circ.u.mstances.

Hena wrote:

"December, 1534. At the Convent of the Augustinians.

"Joy of heaven! I am given the a.s.surance, dear mother, that you will receive this letter. My thoughts run wild in my head. I wish I could tell you, all at once, all that has happened to me since our separation until this moment. Alas! I have so many things to communicate to you. You all--yourself and my good father, and my uncle Josephin--will be so astonished, and perhaps so chagrined, to know that this very day--

"But I must go back with my narrative, and begin with that unhappy day when we were led away, you to the Chatelet prison, I to this place. I am ignorant of what may have happened to you and to father. All my questions on those topics have ever remained unanswered. They a.s.sure me you are in good health--that is all. I hope so; I believe it. What interest could they have in deceiving me regarding your lives?

"Well, I was brought to this place in the dark of night, and locked up in a little cell, without having seen a soul except the turning-box attendant. What would it avail to tell you how I wept?

In the morning the attendant informed me that I would be visited at noon by the Madam Superior. I asked leave to write to my family in order to inform them of my whereabouts. I was answered that the Mother Abbess would have to decide about that. She called upon me at noon. At first, I thought I had before me a lady of the court, so superbly ornamented she was. There was nothing in her dress to recall the religious garb. She is young and handsome. Methought I could read kindness on her face. I threw myself at her feet, imploring her to have pity upon me, and to have me taken to my parents. This was her answer:

"'My dear daughter, you have been brought up in impiety. You are here in order to labor at your salvation. When you are sufficiently instructed in our holy Roman Catholic and apostolic religion, you shall take the eternal vows to enter our Order of the Augustinians.

You will then be allowed to see your parents again. You are not to leave this cell before taking the veil. You will be allowed out every day only to take a little walk under the archway of the cloister, in the company of one of our sisters. It depends upon yourself how promptly you will have gained the religious instruction necessary to enter our Order, after which you will be allowed to receive your family once a week in the convent parlor.'

"'But, madam,' I answered the Abbess, 'I have not the religious vocation. Even if I had, I would not take vows without the sanction of my father.'

"'Your father is in heaven; He is our Lord G.o.d. Your mother also is in heaven; she is the holy Virgin Mary. Your obedience is due to those divine parents, not to your carnal and heretical parents.