their Swords and Pistols to the Throat of one Chasseriau and said they would kill him if he would not change his Religion and say his Prayers Chasseriau having kneel'd and said his Prayers the Officers call'd him a thousand names and beat him outragiously because he would not change his Religion In the Burrough of Marennes several Persons are every day imprison'd without the least formality of Justice The Goods of Fougeron Captain of a Ship were taken away in the same manner Soleil was beaten and imprison'd because he would not abjure And all the Inhabitants of those places are threatned all manner of Violence shall be us'd to force them to go to Mass These Outrages Sir and those committed in the Isles of Oleron la Tremblade and Soubize force your Seamen and others of the Religion P. R. to leave the Kingdom Your Petitioners demand Justice of your Majesty and have so much the greater hopes of your Clemency because they have been always most obedient to your Orders and made appear on all occasion a constant Zeal and Fidelity to your Service for which they are still ready to sacrifice their Lives and Fortunes All the favour they beg is the Liberty of their Conscience That your Majesty will be pleas'd to put a stop to the Violences done them And that they may live in your Kingdom according to your Edicts and Declarations And your Petitioners shall continue their Vows and Prayers for your Majesties Sacred Person and the prosperity of your Raign A Petition presented to the Parliament of Guienne by the Inhabitants of the Isels of Santonge in the Government of Brouage THe Inhabitants of the Isles of Santonge in the Government of Broüage making profession of the Religion P. R. humbly praying shew that although according to his Majesties Edicts and Declarations and an Arrest of Councel of the 19th of May last they ought to live in full Liberty as well s others the Kings Subjects Yet so it is that the Sieur de Carnavalet Governor of Broüage aforesaid accompany'd with part of the Captains of his Garrison and many Souldiers exercise horrible Violences against your Petitioners plundering their Houses giving them blows without number with the But ends of their Muskettoons and Pistols dragging them by the Hair burning their Beards to force them to change their Religion By reason whereof your Petitioners are oblig'd to have recourse to the Justice and Authority of this Court that Commissioners may be sent and deputed out of the body of the Court to inquire into the truth of the Premisses and to direct the whole proceeding therein to the end a stop may be put to these inhumanities so contrary to the King's Will and the publick Tranquility it being impossible to find upon the place Officers who will pass any Act against a Governor In Consideration whereof may it please this Court favourably to grant that your Petitioners Complaints may be recorded and that such of your Lordships as you shall think fit be sent and deputed to go upon the places to inform themselves of the truth of the Premises and direct the proceeding to be had for suppressing the said inhumanities and in the mean time to take your Petitioners into the safeguard and protection of the King and this Court And you will do well Sign'd Chaille pursuant to my Procuration Bonnin pursuant to my Procuration J. Pavillon pursuant to my Procuration Sign'd Lartiguet Procurator Subscribed thus WE whose Names are under-written having not been able to obtain a day for hearing the said Petition nor to have it ssignified to the Court have personally carryed a true Copy thereof to the Attorney General who took and receiv'd it in presence of Monsieur Dalon Advocate General At Reole Septemb. 8th 1681. Sign'd Bon nin J. Pavillon Chaille Can you believe Sir If these things were Fables men could have the impudence to present them to the King and his Ministers and his Soveraign Courts Par. But what was the effect of all these Petitions Hug. Law The Effect Sir 'T was this Order was given to the Deputies of Poitou to go out of Paris in four and twenty hours and not to return The Intendant writ from the Province that all we informed at Court were Fables He sent Horsemen with Pistol in hand to force those who had chang'd their Religion to give it under their Hands they had done it voluntarily and unconstrain'd This second Violence more cruel than the first secures him against all The Court is inform'd of these Subscriptions and call our Deputies Rascals and false Informers Not but that the Court very well understands how Matters are carryed They know very well that the Intendants Guards and Retinue are not Preachers able enough to Convert such Multitudes by their Discourses Miracles are ceas'd And the King hath too clear a sense to think such numerous Conversions are made Naturally and without Violence Whence should this new illumination come I pray Or why should it be peculiar to the Province of Poitou Yet at Court they pretend not to believe a word we say to the end they may give permission to all Practices against us yet be able to say if any Violence be acted 't is without Order of the Court Since September last they have labour'd more than ever to Publish it is not the Kings pleasure any Violence should be us'd His Majesty hath had the goodness to say as much to several of his Governors and Intendants In the mean time 't is certain that in the Provinces of Santonge and Poitou the Violences and Outrages you have heard are not only continued but increas'd The Sieur Marillac finding himself authoriz'd by the connivence of the Court hath tripled his Fury I will tell you a very true story which will teach you what to believe of the mitigation so much talk'd of Four Souldiers Quarter'd in one House having sack'd and consum'd all the Goods in it and committed all Violences imaginable to make the Master of the House change his Religion took his two Daughters both grown and handsom they lock them up with themselves in a Rom and threaten if they resuse to turn Catholicks they must suffer the greatest Extremities and to be as good as their words they put them into a posture to receive the worst Outrage that can be done to a civil Woman To prevent which they chang'd their Religion I know very well his Majesty would be so far from Countenancing such an Action that he would abhor it if he knew it Neither do I believe Monsieur Marillac so mad as to Command such Brutality But this lets you see what a loose hand is held over the Insolence of the Souldiers to what point they extend the Permission granted them to act what Violence they please provided they oblige the Hugonots to change their Religion In a word you may judge from hence what you are to believe of the Mitigation they tell you of Ask me not again Sir as you did awhile
fell in Discourse of the Conduct of the Court of France as to the Hugonots He exclaim'd against the Policy of the Cabinet and said that for the good of the State it matter'd little what Religion the Subjects were of provided they were Loyal and dutiful to their Soveraign that a like Conduct had turn'd some States belonging to the King his Master into vast Deserts and Solitudes by the expulsion of the Moors who were a remnant of Jews and Mehometans multiplyed and spread over the Provinces of Castille Valentia and Andalusia They had been baptiz'd and to escape the Inquisition made profession of Christianity but privately us'd the Worship of their Ancient Religion Upon some false advice given Philip the second of Spain of a great design the Moors had against the Christians they were expell'd the Countrey They were not permitted to carry any thing away but some Commodities of Spain but were forc'd to leave behind their Gold and their Silver as well as their immoveables This was executed with extreme Rigor There went out of Spain twelve hundred thousand Men and Women the greatest part whereof perished several ways Spain having been well drained of men by sending Colonies into America was so exhausted by this great Evacuation 't is not repeopled to this day And that Countrey which was heretofore one of the fairest of Europe is now a vast and barren Desert and the Spaniards feel at this day the smart of their Barbarity God grant a like misfortune happens not to France and that it make not it self desolate by an expulsion of two millions of her best Inhabitants I cannot think those who endeavour it are much her friends Par. However Sir I am of Opinion the persons you speak of take themselves to be as great lovers of their Countrey as you or any of your Party And if the matter be disputed I very much question whether you will carry the Point Hug. Law I find all I say to you doth but vex without convincing you But you will excuse the Expressions of miserable persons who have not the Liberty to speak in Publick they may be allowed at least to complain in Private and when they can do it without danger Since you are not pleas'd with a Discourse tending to demonstrate that the Enemies of the Reformed of France are Enemies of the State I will trouble you but with a word more on that Subject You cannot but believe that Forraign Allyances are of some importance to France You understand the Politicks so well you cannot be ignorant a State without Allyes is not capable of doing great things This makes Princes labour perpetually to break those Engagements their Neighbours have with their Enemies and to perswade them to espouse their Interests The greatest part of the Allyes of France are Protestants The Swisses the Elector of Brandenburg the King of Swede and heretofore the Hollander who perhaps may again renew his Allyance But can you believe to use the Protestants of France as they are dealt with at present a proper means to engage strictly the Protestant Allyes of the Crown Par. I do not see the King finds any great difficulty in making Allyances with protestant Princes or that they concern themselves much or trouble his Ministers with your pretended Calamities Hug. Law The King is now in so elevated a Condition that all comply with him Yet the private disgusts of his Allyes are still in being though they do not appear They are Seeds that will certainly spring up sooner or later States are not always in a flourishing Condition when Fortune declares against them old grudges break out 'T is not to be imagin'd men can out of Policy wholly devest themselves of love to their Religion and become altogether insensible of the Calamities they suffer whom they call Brethren though the present State of Affairs may oblige them to dissemble 'T is very well known the Allyes I have named have heretofore concern'd themselves in our Calamities though far less than those we now endure 'T is not their Affections but the Times are chang'd The English naturally hate the French and find new reason to hate them in the rigorous Proceedings of the Catholicks of France against the Protestants there who profess the same Religion with the English To prove that strangers are somewhat concern'd for our Calamities I need but read the Letters of his Majesty of England to the Bishop and Mayor of London they are newly published and you will not repent your reading them being Letters worthy the Piety of that Prince and capable to clear him from any unjust suspitions that might have been had of him in respect of his Religion His Majesties Letters to the Bishop of London and the Lord Mayor To the Right Reverend Father in God Our Right Trusty and Well-beloved Counsellor HENRY Bishop of London CHARLES R. RIght Reverend Father in God Our Right trusty and Well-beloved Counsellor We greet you well Whereas We are given to understand that a great number of Persons and whole Families of Protestants in the Kingdom of France have lately withdrawn themselves from thence to avoid those hardships and extremities which are brought upon them there for the sake of their Religion and have betaken themselves into this Our Kingdom as a place of Refuge where they may enjoy the liberty and security of their Persons and Consciences And whereas most of them if not all having been forced to abandon their native abodes and accommodations in haste and confusion must needs be in a great measure destitute of means for their present subsistence and relief We being touched with a true sence and compassion of their deplorable Condition and looking upon them not only as distressed Strangers but chiefly as persecuted Protestants very desirous to extend Our Royal Favour and Protection towards them not doubting but all Our good and loving Subjects will be also willing and forward on their parts to afford them what helps and comforts they can in this their day of Affliction We do therefore in very especial manner recommend their Case unto your pious Consideration and Care hereby requiring you forthwith to give Directions unto all the Clergy of our City of London and parts adjacent that in their solemn Congregations upon the next Lords day or as soon as may be possible they represent the sad state of these poor People and by the most effectual Arguments of Christian-charity excite their Parishioners to contribute freely towards the supply of their necessities We shall not need to press you in this behalf well knowing your Zeal in so good a work which will be no less pleasing to Vs than We are sure it will be acceptable to Almighty God And Our further Pleasure is that you take care that the Moneys so collected which We expect should be forthwith returned into your hands be distributed in such manner as may best answer those ends for which this Collection is intended And so We bid you heartily farewell
Hug. Gent. I see you are of their opinion who hold they have a design to seize upon our Children Hug. Law Alas Sir can you doubt of it if the Declaration against the dying had not sufficiently convinc'd you if the Arrest that prohibits the Midwives of our Religion to lay any woman if the permission granted to the Midwives of the Roman-Catholick Perswasion to baptize our Infants as soon as they are born had not given you cause enough to support it I believe you will not require clearer demonstration than the late Declaration so much talk'd of by which they are impowr'd to take from us our Children at Seven years old A terrible Declaration to Fathers and Mothers A Declaration will make us take the resolution to throw our selves at the Kings feet to beg of him that he will take away our lives or allow us the liberty of our Conscience and our Children or leave to go naked out of his Kingdom to live dispers'd through all Countries of the world till we pine to death Par. The Declaration orders no more than that at Seven years old Children shall be of age to choose their Religion Is this such a matter to be exclaim'd at The Declaration of the Children shall be receiv'd but no violence offer'd them Hug. Law Is this a matter to be exclaim'd at say you Pray Sir shew me in History one Example of such a Persecution one President of a Grievance of this nature that denies Parents the liberty to instruct their Children in their Religion Was it ever heard of that Children should have power given them to make choice of their Religion at an age they are incapable to distinguish between black and white an age to be perswaded to any thing with a Plum or an Apple an age to which the best Arguments are the finest Rattles to play with No Violence say you shall be offer'd the Children Is it not a violence and wrong to the Parents to have their Children seduc'd and taken away from them What need of Violence to be us'd against Children of that Age which are easily perswaded to any thing The Violence is done to the Parents whose Children shall be taken away from them as soon as seduc'd to declare themselves inclin'd to be Roman Catholicks In a word On what account soever Children shall be forceably taken out of the Bosoms of their Mothers never to return Can you call it a small Matter a slight Business against which there is no cause to exclaim Par. Once more I affirm it the Declaration says not your Children shall be taken from you Hug. Law I confess it does not Yet they who are entrusted with the Execution of it will do it And the Declaration was desir'd and obtain'd for no other end Shall I prophesie to you the issue of this Declaration as I have been your Historian in giving you an account of the Consequences of that which concerns the sick It shall be presently given out there is no Violence design'd Order shall be given by word of mouth to the Magistrates not to permit any to be done The Priests in a while will not at all regard these Prohibitions though perhaps at first they will observe some measures and content themselves it may be with engaging by Oath in Confession all the Women particularly those of mean condition as the Servants in our Families to endeavour all they can to seduce the Children by Promises and private Instructions and all other means useful to that purpose For a Hobby-horse a Child will be made to say he hath a mind to go to Mass Two Witnesses shall be ready to swear it The Child shall presently be taken away never to be seen again by the Parents Yet they must pay an extraordinary rate for the Board and Instruction of the Children taken away Thus will they kill two Birds with one stone take away the Children and ruine the Parents to force them by Poverty to quit their Religion In a short time they will proceed farther they will find a pretence to enter our Houses They will have receiv'd News from very good hands the Children have a great inclination for the Catholick Religion but that their Parents are harsh to them for it They will enter by Authority from the Magistrate and 〈◊〉 out the Parents and Relations Having the Children alone they will say what they please The holy Spirit will inspire them in a moment and dissipate those thick Mists of Calvinism that darkned their tender understandings It will on the sudden make them so clear sighted they will in a moment discover all Catholick Truths and must presently be lock'd up in Cloysters to be educated there till they come to maturity sufficient to resist a Father and Mother and proof to the perswasions of Friends and influence of Relations Par. This I grant is already so obvious that I shall make no scruple to acknowledg it You perhaps may be permitted to dye in your Religion but care shall be taken to bring up your Children better And this is the principal means to be us'd for destroying your Sect. Hug. Law We see it very clearly Sir The Arrest against our Midwives that which orders the Magistrate to visit our sick and this last Declaration have put it out of doubt and you call this Sir 'T is a Proceeding you will be puzzl'd to parallel in the most barbarous Countries and Ages of the World It violates the most sacred and most venerable Laws It ruins the Foundation of Authority by destroying the Paternal which is the most Ancient the most Just the most Venerable and the ground of all other Probably Sir you have seen the Memoires and Petition we presented to the King on this Subject The many injustices of that Declaration are so fully made out by the Petition I mention'd I will forbear enlarging on them here They are Injustices that fly in our Faces Can we be silent where nature speaks Is there a greater cruelty than to rob Parents of their Children 'T is a mutilation that puts us to ineffable Torment 'T is an usage unthought of in the Age of Torture and Massacre And will you say still we have no cause to complain we are not put to extremities You may believe Sir that in taking away our Children they tear our very Bowels And that the Punishments we formerly endur'd are nothing to this The Consequences of it you will see surprizing and horrible The tenderness of Mothers the Sentiments of Religion and the Fury of Anger mixt together are a Compound capable to produce terrible Effects I fear you may see examples of Fury equal to those of the Jewish Women who finding their Children were to be forc'd from them to be baptiz'd destroy'd both the Children and themselves to prevent it 'T is a new kind of Torment will dispeople France more than all the Massacres of the last Age For all those among us who love their Religion will certainly endeavour to save
left in Thoüars and generally the Inhabitants of the Towns as well as the Countrey declare aloud nothing but an absolute impossibility of getting out shall stay them in the Kingdom But such is their Cruelty the Ports are guarded with all strictness imaginable If any one embark and they know it presently they romage the Vessel take him and imprison him I have with me an Original Writing of those poor Fugitives who were lately taken and imprison'd which I will read to you WE whose Names are under-written Prisoners as well in the Prisons Royal of the City of Rochell as in the Tower of the Lantern not only in our own Names but the Names of those of us who cannot write being in all three and thirty Persons professing the Reformed Religion do hereby certifie that having been forc'd some weeks since to leave the Province of Poitou the place of our Nativity our Houses and all our Goods by the unheard of Cruelties and Outrages exercis'd by Order of the Intendant Marillac against all those of the said Religion who will not abandon it and turn Roman-Catholicks we retir'd destitute of all conveniences and necessaries for subsistence into the said City of Rochell in hopes to find there some relief in our distress and an easie passage into England Being arriv'd at Rochell with great pains and toil several of us having Wives and sucking Children after some days stay in the said City we treated with one Mesnier a Merchant of the same City who hir'd a Vessel of purpose to transport us into England and actually took on Board the said Vessel ever since the 20th of the last month above one hundred and fifty Persons of us who remain'd in the said Vessel two days ready to set Sayl. Which coming to the knowledge of the Judge and Attorney-General of the Admiralty they sent Guards aboard the Vessel riding within Musket shot of the Harbor Which Guards forc'd us all ashore having first plunder'd some of us of our Cloaths and made some of us Prisoners whom after their Confession taken they enlarg'd without entring their names in the Goalers Book Since which we continued at Rochell aforesaid as well for recovering the Money we had paid Mesiner for our passage which he absenting himself we could not obtain as for finding out some sure means to transport our selves into England our intention being not to return home where neither our Persons nor our Consciences can be in safety all things being there in ruin and desolation But accompanyed every where by our misfortune we were so unhappy that the Civil Magistrates and Lieutenant Criminal of the said City who could not endure us made diligent search for us in all their Houses who had had the Charity to harbour us and having found us they put us into Prison where we continue since All-Saints day and had been starv'd to death but for the Charitable relief of several good People who sent us Victuals to save us from perishing with hunger having two days lain on the Boards some of us half naked having been taken out of Bed and not allow'd time to put on all our Cloaths The said search having been made between the hours of nine and ten in the Evening when some of us were in Bed whom they forc'd to get up and go to Prison where we continue as Criminals What they will do with us we know not nor are we conscious to our selves of any Crime unless it be that we make not profession of the Roman-Catholick Religion for which we think they intend to trouble us Because every day and almost every hour we are vex'd and tormented with the visits of the King'd Advocate of this City and several Monks who make us the fairest and richest promises imaginable if we will change our Religion And on the contrary threaten us terribly if we persist in our Profession And though we are hoarse with telling them we will by the grace of God persevere in our Religion and that we will dye rather than forsake it yet they leave us not but torment us incessantly Therefore we conjure all good Christians not to forsake us in the miserable Condition we are in but that they will endeavour our enlargement as well as continue their Charity for our subsistence We pray God that he will every day pour on them greater measures of his choicest Blessings and we intreat them not to forget us in their Prayers and that they will joyn their Complaints to ours and lay them at his Majesties feet that we may obtain from his Clemency such Order as is requisite for our Liberty Dated at the Tower of the Lantern in the City of Rochell where we are Prisoners Nov. 4th 1681. Tousot M. Moussault aged sixty years Daniel Pivet Jean Coussemean Francis Bourcean Lewis Bomilet John Mentauban Peter Guery James Piron Peter Moinault J. Michau James Haullice John Gouriault Reyneere I confess this proceeding appears horrible to me and that it puts me in mind of what Ozorius told us of the Condition of those miserable Jews who had the Ports of Portugal shut against them and were constrain'd to remain slaves in that Countrey In the Age of Massacres every one was at liberty to go out of the Kingdom If this Course of retaining these persecuted Wretches be continued there is cause to fear they will break out at length into some desperate Action that they will burn their Houses and set fire on the Towns The Resolution I confess is violent and furious but Wretches in Extremity bid adieu to their Reason What think you in your Conscience is not this an open Persecution and equal in Cruelty to that of past Ages What difference will you make between the Raign of Charles the 9th and Lewis the 14th the greatest of our Kings Par. If Matters be thus why do you not complain 'T is very well known the King loves not Violence He will certainly do you Justice Hug. Law How Sir are you ignorant that we complain but cannot be heard Do not you know well enough that the Province of Poitou had Deputies here who represented to the World the lamentable Condition of the poor Hugonots there In a word Have you not seen the Petition they presented to the King I have it here and will read it to you To the King SIR YOur Subjects of the Religion P.R. of Poitou most humbly shew to your Majesty that they are in extreme desolation by the unheard of Violences exercis'd against them for their Religion by Order of the Sieur Marillac Intendant of the Province They have formerly exhibited their Complaints to your Majesty who was graciously pleased to declare it was not your intention any force should be us'd to deprive them of the Liberty of Conscience granted them by your Edicts But their Grievances and great Sufferings having since been infinitely augmented they are constrain'd to come again to cast themselves at your Majesties feet to implore your justice having begg'd leave to inform
you that they are dealt with as declar'd Enemies that their Goods and their Houses are pillag'd their Persons assaulted and 't is publish'd aloud the Sieur Marillac will have it so that he commands it and that it is to oblige your Petitioners to change their Religion Your Souldiers Sir whom your Laws require to observe the strictest Discipline are made choice of to execute all these Enormities Instead of Quartering them indifferently upon all your Subjects they are Quarter'd on those only of the Religion P. R. And when they are so Quarter'd not content with ruining their Landlords by the excessive Charges they put tem to for maintaining them not content with large Contributions of Money exacted from them not content with frightning them with execrable Oaths and horrible Blasphemies when they refuse going to Mass or hearing the Sermons of the Capucins Quarter'd by Order on those of the Religion they are soundly Beaten they are Bang'd and Cudgell'd Women have been dragg'd by the Hair with Ropes about their Necks Others have been Tortur'd Old men of fourscore years have been fast bound on Benches Their Children who would have comforted them have been abus'd before their Faces The most moderate of these Souldiers hinder the Tradesmen from working at their Trades they rob the poor Labourers of what should maintain them and make publick Sale of their Goods that being reduc'd to beggary they may be sorc'd to change their Religion Others of them seeing neither Threats nor Bastonades nor the horror of a violent Death presented every hour to their Hosts by naked Swords and Pistols ready charg'd laid to their Breasts could prevail with them to quit their Religion put them in Sheets carryed them to Church and having sprinkled them with Holy-water pretend they are Roman-Catholicks and that in case they return to their former Religion they shall be guilty of the Crime of Relapse and which is yet more strange and unparallel'd in any Age these poor Wretches are not allow'd the liberty to complain If they apply themselves to the Sieur Marillac he stops their mouths without hearing them They are presently imprison'd without Warrant fil'd and without any form of Justice and are kept Prisoners without being proceeded against And to frustrate the Complaints exhibited to your Majesty the Provosts and Serjeants have gone from House to House and forc'd the Complainants to withdraw their Complaints If any Gentlemen take upon them to speak of these disorders of which they have been eye-witnesses they are answered haughtily they are to meddle with their own Business Otherwise they will be put into a place of safety So that this miserable People would think themselves utterly undone if they were not perswaded that a Conduct so contrary to your Laws and the Rules of Christianity will not be approv'd by your Majesty Prostrate therefore at your Majesties fiet they pray with a profound respect that you will look upon them with a favourable Eye and hearken to their just Complaints the truth whereof they offer at the peril of their Lives to prove before any Judge it shall please your Majesty to nominate 'T is from the sole Protection of your Majesty your Petitioners can expect an end of so many Outrages and an enjoyment of that Tranquility they presume to promise themselves under the Raign of the Greatest and most glorious Monarch of the World May it therefore please your Majesty to appoint Commissioners before whom your Petitioners may prove the Matters of Fact abovementioned with their Circumstances and Dependances And in the mean time to Order that the Souldiers be dislodg'd to the end your Petitioners may be at liberty to get in their Harvest Or if it be your Majesties Pleasure that they remain in the Province that they may in that Case be Quarter'd indifferently on your Subjects of both Religions that the strong may support the weak and those who are most able may bear the Burden as those that are least That you will injoyn them to live in the Order of Discipline and require their Officers to see it done on pain of being accountable for all the Disorders their Souldiers shall commit that you will prohibit the Souldiers and all others to exercise any Violence against your Subjects of the Religion P. R. under pretence of making them change their Religion upon pain of being punished as disturbers of the publick Peace And that you will be pleased to Order that those of the Religion P. R. who are in Prison may be forthwith proceeded against or set at Liberty And your Retitioners shall continue their Prayers to God for the health and prosperity of your Majesty and the Royal Family If you have a mind to see other pieces as authentick as this I will read you two Petitions one intended to be presented to the King the other presented to the Parliament of Guienne To the King SIR YOur Subjects of the Religion P. R of Marennes Santonge and the Government of Broüage prostrate at your Majesties seet most humbly shew That although they have always behav'd themselves according to your Majesties Declarations and Edicts and are fully perswaded it is your intention that your Petitioners should live in Peace and not have any force put upon their Conscience Yet so it is that the Governor of Broüage ceases not with his Carrison to go from House to House and from Village to Village to compel all manner of ways those of the said Religion to go to Mass forceably dragging some of them to Church threat-ning to kill others if they refuse to abjure and Quartering Souldiers in their Houses which they plunder and sell your Petitioners Goods forcing them to abandon all to go seek elsewhere that quiet they cannot find in their Countrey This Sir was done in the Burrough of Dhier near Brüage they bound Blanchet a Ship-Carpenter to a Table forc'd stones into his Mouth and whetted his Teeth with Flint They carry several Persons to Church and having made them put their hands on a Book they pretend they are thereby become good Catholicks and oblige them to Sign an Abjuration of the Religion though no other means of Perswasion or Constraint have been us'd to reduce them to it They have acted extreme Outrages upon Chadenne Marinier Ardoüin and Rambert And one Voyer having fled for Refuge to Marennes was followed by a Serjeant and four Souldiers who publickly gave him several blows with the flat of their Swords and beat him on the Stomach with the But end of their Guns And having made him so weak he could not go carryed him to Prison in a Cart. In the Village of Breüil la Menardiex and others the Souldiers of the said Garrison and entred the Houses by force carryed away and sold openly the Goods of those who were fled thither for refuge to save themselves from the Outrages they had seen done to their Neighbours particularly to Ardoüin le Comte Hervy and Baudry At Peufeucié the Officers of the same Garrison put
and he never perceiv'd me I long extreamly to see what it is Let 's read it To the King SIR YOur Majesty may very well be surpriz'd to see at your feet an unknown Person who having made his way through the Crowds about your Majesty is come to expose himself to the splendour of Rays so glorious as yours The high State your Majesty is in deprives of course the greatest part of your Subjects of the Liberty to present themselves before you but the Sentiments endeavour'd to be inspir'd into your Majesty to the disadvantage of your Subjects of the Protestant Religion keep them at greater distance and absolutely take from them the advantage of appearing before you to present to your view the true pourtrait of their Miseries to prevent being dazl'd with the Lustre of your Throne they have put a vail between themselves and Your Majesty and have drawn a Curtain behind which they may make their Complaints by a voice out of the Ground If this voice have the good fortune to reach Your Majesties Ear be Graciously pleas'd to give it Audience and to look upon this private unknown Person as a poor Wretch who in the name of Millions of other Wretches is come to Expose to Your Majesties view their common Calamities and to have an end put to their Miseries by Your Majesties Justice and Mercy Their Miseries are extream had they been but ordinary we should have submitted with silence It will not be believ'd that under the Reign of the greatest of our Kings of him who was born for the Glory and Happiness of France there is so great a number of miserable Persons within an inch of Despair but 't is Your Goodness Sir is the cause of our Calamities by giving way to the malice of our Enemies by permitting it self to be surpriz'd by the Counsels of our Persecutors These ill Counsellors Sir forgetting or not knowing the true Interests of Your Majestie arm Your Majesty against the faithfullest of Your Subjects against People who by Birth by Inclination by Interest and by their Religion are obliged to adhere inseparably to Your Majesty The bloud which was heretofore spilt with so much joy to gain to Henry the 4th that Crown Your Majesty now wears with so much Glory circulates in our veins and burns with impatience to be shed in Your Service But our Enemies Sir who are in truth the Enemies of the State force us to cease to be Your Subjects to seek other Soveraigns to live in another Air and to people the Estates of Your Neighbours who perhaps will shortly be Your Enemies they hurry us out of our Country and labour to stifle in our hearts those Sentiments of Love and Respect for Your Majesty which Nature had so deeply rooted there they will pull down our Churches they rob us of our Liberty to serve God they take from us all means of Livelyhoood they plunder our Goods they force our Children from us they consume our Houses and in some Provinces abuse our Persons they Imprison us they put us to the Rack they Torture us they beat us to death they Hang they Burn us without course of Law The Instruments that Execute these Outrages are Your Soldiers who in the heart of Your Kingdom commit Enormities humane Nature would abhor if committed in an Enemies Country and in the fury of War They possess the Souls of Your Protestant Subjects with a Spirit of terrour and fear by shewing them Your Majesties Arm always lifted up for their ruine Thus they endeavour to make us hate him as a Tyrant whom by duty and inclination we love as the best of our Kings We know very well Sir that to surprize Your Majesty they make use of an apparent Piety and mind you of the Name Your Majesty bears of Most Christian to inspire into Your Majesty those Sentiments so disastrous and pernicious to us but in the Name of God we Conjure Your Majesty to consider that those Councels of breach of promise and of violence are absolutely contrary to the Spirit of true Religion Nothing can be more agreeable to Piety than Integrity in our actions and just performance of our promises We liv'd in a profound Peace under the shadow of those Edicts Your Majesty hath so often and so solemnly confirm'd to us these Councellors Sir engage you in a Conduct steer'd by that horrible Maxim all true Christians detest That Faith is not to be kept with Hereticks They render Your Majesties Justice and Truth to Your Promises suspected to all Strangers who cannot but doubt the stability of any Treaty to be had with you seeing the Promises made to your Subjects violated in so cruel a manner The Declarations obtained every day by surprize from Your Majesty stain the most Glorious Reign France ever saw not only by the mortal Wounds they give to Your Majesties Justice and your truth to your Promises but by open violations of the most sacred Laws of God and Nature All Europe looks with astonishment on the Permission granted by the wisest of Kings to annul in his Kingdom Paternal Authority and to see Children arm'd to Revolt against their Parents in an Age they know not what Revolt is Your Majesty is too clear-sighted not to discern that Crimes and ill means are not the paths by which Souls ought to be led into the true Religion those who lay Siege to Your Majesty and make you take Resolutions so dismal to Your Subjects of the Protestant Religion carry all with a high hand without any regard to their honour or the glory of the greatest of Kings to induce them to that which they call Conversion they invite men to turn Bankrouts to rebel against their Superiors to falsify their words to be Hipocrites and profane for those they draw in by hopes of not paying their Debts or of Impunity for any Crime and those they force to turn by Bastonade fear of Poverty and other Violences exercis'd upon them cannot but become Hypocrites and profane detesting in their hearts those sacred things they are forc'd to reverence in appearance Your Majesty is told the Parents are ill Christians but their Children will be good Catholicks but we conjure Your Majesty to consider the false zeal of our Persecutors makes as many Criminals as it pretends to make Catholicks and that by the Law of God Children are punishable for the Crimes of their Parents the unhappy Parents look upon them as Tyrants who fetter their Consciences they are Rebels in their hearts and will never let slip any opportunity to be reveng'd for the Oppression they are under how can it be hop'd God will bless the posterity of those base Wretches who for fear of some Temporal Punishment or hope of some inconsiderable advantage Renounce a Religion they believe to be true and harbour in their hearts Rebellion against their Soveraigns These Sentiments will be transmitted to their posterity for it is natural for Parents to inspire their thoughts into their
Children Thus Your Majesty shall see continued in Your Kingdom a Generation of Male-Contents of Dissmblers of Profane Rebellious and ill Christians such will be the good Catholicks begot of those Parents who are at this day forc'd to change their Religion Among this wretched Multitude there will doubtless be some who totally forgetting their duty will take desperate Resolutions and choose rather to die in a violent manner than to live reduc'd to a condition wherein they betray their Conscience and suffer a thousand Calamities and it cannot but infinitely grieve Your Majesties good Nature and Clemency to see your self forc'd to revive the Age of Massacres Our zeal for Your Majesties Service holds out hitherto against the sence of our present Sufferings and the fear of future ills Your Majesty hath not in Your Armies by Sea or Land an Hugonot Officer who is not ready to sacrifice his Life in Your Service There is not Your Kingdom a Protestant who doth not venerate I may say adore Your Majesty as the brightest Image God hath given of himself to the World we hope they will always look upon the Thunderbolts that come from your hand with that respect and fear they regard those that fall from Heaven but we hope also Your Majesty in imitation of that Divinity whose Image you are will pity so many miserable Persons who groan under their Sufferings without murmuring against the hand that causes them Especially when you consider these Wretches have all Europe to witness their faithfulness to Your Service and the World sees them free from the least stain of Rebellion Your Majesty will not permit us to be persecuted any longer for no other reason but because as 't is suppos'd we are not illuminated Alas Sir 't is a Grace that depends not upon our selves 't is not a thing within the power of Man nor is it an effect of fear punishments and tortures We doubt not but if Your Majesty would take the pains to cast Your Eye upon the Arrests and Orders exhorted from Your Majesty against us and the Consequences of them they would appear dreadful and horrible Your Majesty should see Trade interrupted and spoil'd Your Towns desolate by the desertion of the Inhabitants and a great breach in Your State by the loss of so many considerable Members of it ready to fly out of it you should see your Neighbours enrich'd and fortify'd by the spoils of Your Kingdom France in many places become a vast Desart and a considerable number of unhappy Consciences groaning under a cruel Servitude they are reduc'd to You should see a People in despair capable of the most violent Resolutions against themselves We hope Sir that God the Protector of Afflicted Innocents will lay open all these Considerations to Your Majesties Eyes that you may act as the common Father of Your Subjects We remember Sir that kind and excellent Expression of Your Majesty not long since That You consider'd us all as Your Children and would have given Your Right Hand for our Conversion Here we see Your Majesty in Your Natural state and admire the genuine goodness of Your temper and are perswaded 't is not without violence you are obliged to arm Your self against us as if we were Your Enemies When Children have attain'd the age of discretion their Parents use only the ways of perswasion to reduce them to Duty because the heart is not won but by fair and gentle means and our Spirits naturally abhor and resist force We hope therefore Your Majesty will again awaken Your Paternal Compassions towards those Children whom you look upon as gone astray and that you will leave it to Heaven and it's Grace to reduce them into the right way if out of it and that You will not permit our Consciences to be dragg'd into Paths which we are not perswaded are right 'T is this hope alone Sir keeps us from falling into despair this only supports us this will ever make us most earnest Petitioners to Heaven for the preservation of Your Royal Person for Your Glory and the good Success of all Your Designs Prov. What think you of it Sir Par. I am not surpriz'd at it these poor People are so restless in their misery 't is no wonder they toss and tumble themselves every way but they are very simple if they think they can find a way to convey such a Paper to His Majesty the Avenues are all block'd up And should it come to the Kings Hands he is beset round with those shall take effectual order he shall not alter his Mind I should think it best to let them have it again but that if you restore it they will bevex'd we have seen it 'T is better pretend we know nothing of it nor say a word of it to them they will think they have lost it elsewhere Prov. I will be advis'd by you Farewel Sir 't is high time to leave you to your Repose The Printer to the Reader The Copy of the following Letter being come to my hands I thought it not improper to be communicated to the Publick because it concerns the present State of the Religion in France the Subject of this Work SIR YOu desire I would inform you what you are to believe of the Reports spread in the Province you are in of the great Mitigations lately happen'd as 't is said in the Affairs of our Religion A Man cannot write with much certainty of these matters yet I will venture to comply with your desires never were Reports more groundless than those for matters are so far from being mitigated they begin to be worse than ever The business between the Bayliff of Charanton and the Gentlemen of the Consistory is reviv'd You know without doubt that the King upon the Petition they presented him had order'd the Bayliff not to proceed any further and gave them leave in the mean time to apply themselves if they saw cause to the Parliament for Remedy but within these five or six days the Chancellor said to the Deputy-General it was much wondred the Consistory had not sued forth an Appeal from the Sentence of the Bayliff that they must look to it for if they would not appeal the King would take off the Prohibition and give the Bayliff leave to proceed What is the meaning of this but to let us see they intend to Exterminate us for questionless you remember one Article of that Sentence was that we should pay the Sacrament such respect as is due to it Whether what was said to Monsieur Ruvigny will take effect I know not but you know well enough that in what concerns us they do not their business by half but go through with their work The Provinces of Poitou and Aunix are in a condition that deserves all manner of Compassion all acts of the most Barbarous Cruelty are exercis'd in those Countries the Relations we have thence would break your heart 'T is true the Troops are drawn out which is the only ground
Liberties and Laws are too slight a Bulwark to secure Protestant Subjects the exercise of their Religion and enjoyment of their Civil Rights under a Prince of the Romish Perswasion These Persecuted Protestants the daily objects of your Charity are the Successors and Descendants of those of the last Age to whose Loyalty and Valour Henry the fourth of France acknowledged himself much a Debtor for the Diadem of that Kingdom which the Monarch now Regnant there wears with so much Glory and the Catholick Liguers labour'd so vigorously and scandalously to rend away from the Family of Bourbon It was in consideration of that Fidelity and as a Princely Mark of his favour and acceptance of the eminent service they had done him that Prince no less truly than nominally great confirm'd to them the free exercise of their Religion with ample Immunities and Priviledges ratified with all solemnity of Law requisite in such cases All Europe is witness the present Protestants of France have not degenerated from the Loyalty of their Ancestors but have serv'd their Prince with all imaginable Fidelity and Zeal for the Glory of his Crown The World admires the Royal qualities of their Monarch his Conduct proves him a Prince every way great He is particularly fam'd for strictness of Justice and profoundness of Wisdom His Protestant Subjects who are lash'd so severely by the rod of his Authority declare him a person of a generous Temper and sweet Disposition a Man that abhors Cruelty and Violence and is one of the best natur'd Princes under Heaven Rome to her sorrow finds him no Bigot though a Roman Catholick yet the Protestants of France are persecuted with that rigour and extremity they think it a happiness to purchase with the loss of all secular enjoyments the freedom of their Conscience and by a voluntary exile to find in strange Countries that Justice and Peace they cannot have in their own Poor Hugonots What can be a sufficient Guarranty for the exercise of your Religion which Edicts in its favour obtain'd on weighty and just Considerations and ratified with all the solemnity of Law the loyalty of its Professors the merit of your Ancestors the innate goodness and wisdom of your Soveraign cannot secure If Persecution be your Lot under the Reign of a Monarch so Generous and Sagacious so free from Superstition and so full of Heroick Qualities as your Lewis the 14th cease to complain of the Murders and Massacres under Charles the 9th and Henry the 3d and arm your selves with a Christian expectation of greater Sufferings and more fiery tryals of your Patience and Loyalty when it shall be your misfortune to see the French Crown on the head of a weak ill-natur'd or Bigotted Prince Your present King hath bravely defy'd the Thunderbolts of Rome and vigorously attack'd its usurp d Supremacy yet permits you to be rigorously handled what usage must you expect from a Superstitious Soul that will receive the Dictates of the Pope as Oracles of Heaven and hazard Crowns to merit the title of a true Son of the Church in executing Commands the most dishonourable and bloudy the malice of Priests or interest of the Papacy shall impose upon him Impute it singly to the good nature of your King that Fires are not kindled and Gibbets set up to destroy you as in former Ages the malice of your Enemies is not abated and your Religion the cause of your Sufferings is the same as then but your King hath a Soul too noble and tender to command Innocents to be tortur'd and burnt a Spectacle Charles the 9th made his Divertisement and Pleasure How miserable must you be under a Prince that shall delight in your Sufferings and think it not just only but meritorious to extirpate you when you are thus sharply persecuted under so great a Monarch who had the goodness to declare he would willingly sacrifice his right hand for what he calls your Conversion Had your sage and wise Prince so much tenderness for you that he would have sacrific'd the instrument of so many glorious Atchievements the Darling of his noble and ambitious soul for that which conceives your good and yet is impos'd upon by the arts of your Enemies to connive at your ruine and permit his authority to be abus'd to warrant and countenance those Violences and Outrages his Soul abhors and his eyes cannot endure a sight of Preserve as you do your Loyalty to your Soveraign admire his Vertues and extol his Goodness Triumph in the clearness of your Innocence that the Enemies of your Religion own not any cause of your present Persecution but your King's Pleasure that there shall be but one Religion in his Kingdom But lament the unhappiest of his Education in a Religion of Principles so unnatural it would take away that variety God and Nature have unalterably established no less in the Opinions and Judgments than in the Tempers and Faces of Men so tyrannically it would enslave all Mankind to its Tenets though never so absur'd so wildly ambitious it would usurp that Soveraignty God hath reserved to himself over the judgment and conscience and force Men contrary to both to comply with its Superstitions and become Traytors to God by a prophane Hypocrisie that they may appear good Subjects to the Pope by an outward Conformity to his Impositions so irrational it would perswade men to put out their eyes to be guided by it to abjure their Senses and renounce their Reason to be governed by its Dictates Bewail the malice and subtilty of your Enemies that hath perverted your Prince from a Father of his faithful Subjects into a Persecutor of Protestants an Oppressor of the Reformed Church inspired him with a Cruelty it found not in his Nature and surprized him to permit Violences and Outrages to be committed upon you which are no less contrary to his judgment than they are to his goodness But the Moon hath her spots Solomon and Alexander were not free from miscarriages and the sagacious malice of the enemies of Protestants quickly finds out those weaknesses in the Souls of the best Princes they have access to which they impose upon and manage to the prejudice of the Reformed Religion They knew the French King of too good a nature to permit general Massacres or delight in Cruelty exercised on his Subjects they were sensible he is not a Bigot to be perswaded to yield up the Lives of his Subjects to the pleasure of the Pope or the interest of his Church nor so silly to believe the God of the Christians can be pleased as some of the pretended Vicars of Christ have been with slaughter of men They observed so much Justice and Equity in his nature he would be scandalized at a proposal that would have engaged him contrary to Law and without colour of Justice to violate the rights of a loyal and numerous party of his Subjects they apprehended him too sensible of the interest of his Crown to approve of a
I say he hath written like a man of sense and consider'd well what he said And to tell you my mind I look not on this Author as an Author without Mission and without Call as a private Person who of his own head publish'd a Libel against the Hugonots 't was a business design'd That unknown Writer was put on by the same persons that constantly solicit the King to ruine the Hugonots or by the Agents of the Clergy Pro. If I may be allowed to add to the Judgment you have given I could wish that Writer had in some particulars weighed better what he said and dealt more ingenuously For instance where the Hugonots complain That in ten years three hundred of their Churches have been demolished that Author answers This is quickly said but hard to prove Pag. 6. for we aver that there have not been forty of their Churches demolish'd within these ten years If we are call'd to justifie this we cannot do it I know that in the Province of Poitou alone near forty Churches have been demolish'd And if that Paper was written by Order of the Clergy as you conjecture I wish they had taken care not to contradict themselves In the Assembly of the Clergy at Paris in May last where the Bishops at Court had Order to debate the affair of the Regale and the matter in Controversie between the King and the Pope The Agent of the Clergy who open'd the Assembly said in his Harangue that the King had demolish'd an infinite of Churches Infinite according to Mr. Churchman is confin'd in very narrow bounds being reduc'd to forty But I heard a knocking at the door and am much mistaken if it be not by our Gentlemen they are the very Men. The Hugonot Gentlemen I know not Sir what you may think of us who strangers as we are come boldly into a house so considerable as yours without having asked your leave especially since we are come with a set design to quarrel the Master of the House and oppose his sentiments We have reason to fear we shall not be very welcome But there stands a Gentleman by you hath undertaken we shall if we have presum'd too far he is to bear the blame Par. Persons of your Civility are welcome in any place And as to the Declaration of War you have made against me at your entrance I am not afraid of it there is no danger Sir of any blood to be lost in our Quarrel I am of Opinion whoever is vanquish'd will not be troubled at it I apprehend your meaning from the Discourse I have had with this Gentleman who hath given me an account of what pass'd betwixt you and him Pro. My dear Friend I am resolv'd to be even with you to day You have taken a second who is abler than I. And I shall engage you with a man too hard for you both God grant your Defeat be so happy as to dispose both of you to Conversion You shall have no more to do with me you are in good hands take my word for it I will henceforward be only a hearer The Hugonot Lawyer Since the Gentleman accepts the Challenge with so good a Grace he will not be displeas'd if I pray we may go into his Study which doubtless is well furnish'd for I foresee we shall have occasion in our Discourse to have recourse to some Books Par. With all my heart Gentlemen we will go where you please my Study is but indifferent but I believe we shall find there all the Books we shall need They go into the Parisians Study and after a turn or two take their seats and proceed in their Discourse By what I have heard from this Gentleman who hath procur'd me the pleasure of seeing you I conceive Gentlemen you approve not of the Design the King hath to reunite the Religions in his Kingdom and are not pleas'd with the Means he makes use of Hug. Law Sir We have more respect for the King then to presume to judge of his Conduct and condemn it But we cannot but see that those who give his Majesty the Counsels on which the Conduct against us is grounded are the greatest Enemies of the State All the Jealousie of the House of Austria all the Forces of Spain and of Germany will never do France so much mischief as these Politick Bigots Par. You have an ill opinion of our zealous Catholicks Methinks the name you give them is not suitable to them Besides it hath something of Contradiction in it you call them Politick Bigots Devotion is seldom joyn'd with Policy The Politicians of all ages have been always opposite to the Bigot and Devout Hug. Law Really sir they may very well be call'd Bigotted Politicians when their Devotion and Zeal for the Ruine of the poor Protestants is a meer piece of Policy their lives and their manners prove it clearly There are some among 'em to whom we do too great an Honour if we think they believe there is a God I have known some Intendants of the Provinces who had no Religion at Paris but became on the sudden in their several jurisdictions very zealous Persecutors of the Hugonots May there not be found among those of the Councel of Conscience some Persons for whose Piety you Sir would scarce pass your word I mean Bishops that keep Concubines Monks that are become Courtiers and Effeminate and these Complacent directors of Conscience who approve of all Actions so the Protestants be destroy'd the Protestants the light of whose Doctrine is too piercing and clear and exposes too much the vileness of the Actions of their Persecutors reproaches their Conduct and torments them in the very use of their pleasures Is true Devotion consistent with maxims of Morality so loose as those of our greatest Persecutors But so runs the stream thus men make their Court 't is the Mode and all the World follows it Par. I easily believe there are men of the Character you have given But I am perswaded there are of those Saints or Bigots as you call them who are really devout And I am clear of opinion they are not Enemies of the State as you say They conceive unity of Religion the greatest good imaginable and that it would be the Glory of the King to procure this good to France And this I take to be the Principle they build upon and the ground of their Actions Hug. Law I am of Opinion Sir those men may very well be call'd Enemies of the State whose Conduct tends directly to its ruin who inspire into his Majesties Subjects a mutual hatred which obliges them to look on one another as Enemies After that the late King Lewis the 13th of glorious Memory had by the Method he took to appease the late Troubles taken away the fear the Protestants were under that there were designs not only against their Liberties but their Lives it may be affirm'd the hearts of those of either Religion were so perfectly reunited
it was impossible for the Enemies of the State to find a breach to enter at But the King hath been made to tell us in one of his Arrests that the Kindness and Patience he had had for his Subjects of the pretended Reform'd Religion had heightned the adversion of his Catholick Subjects against them The Aversion the said Catholicks have always had against the said Religion and those who profess it hath been encreas'd by the publishing the said Edicts Declarations and Arrests It is really very necessary the King should be inform'd that contrary to what he hath been made believe the Edicts of Pacification had establish'd a perfect peace between both Parties and that happy union hath been considerably alter'd since the considerable Breaches that have been made of those Edicts The Roman Catholick resumes that spirit of Animosity he formerly had he looks on the Protestant as a Victim ready to be sacrific'd to his pleasure and justifies by the Conduct of his Superiors the Aversion he hath for his Countrymen and fellow Subjects The Protestant on the other side looks on the Roman Catholick as an Enemy who endeavours to ruin him He is full of diffidence and mistrusts every thing He dares not speak nor open his mind freely He is afraid of being question'd for a Word His Bowels are shut up against the poor Roman Catholick to whom he us'd to be very open-handed And he cannot forbear saying to himself doth Charity oblige me to feed an Enemy to day who perhaps will take away my Life to morrow The poor Hugonot in every Village looks upon his Magistrates and Superiors as men authoriz'd to watch all occasions to destroy him The Magistrates think themselves obliged to be harsh and severe to those who are hated by the Court They tell us every day we have Order to humble and mortifie you You may expect what you please but expect no favour Heretofore the saying was you shall have Justice done you but hope not for more Alas 'T is long since we have been in a Condition to expect any favour We should now be very well satisfi'd could we have Justice done us for Justice requires men to keep their Promises We should esteem our selves happy enough if permitted to enjoy peaceably the Priviledges and Liberties confirm'd to us by so many Promises Edicts and Arrests You cannot believe it in our Power to look upon our approaching ruin without being troubled the same time to see others rejoyce at our fall The injuries and reproaches the Hugonots receive from the insulting Roman Catholicks pierce to the heart and make deep wounds which bleed afresh every day In a word that sweetness of Commerce and fair Correspondence that raign'd among the Subjects of France is broken and lost and instead of mutual Confidence nothing appears but a general fear and universal mistrust The Tumults in several places the demolishing and burning of Churches the Seditions rais'd against the Protestants the injuries done their Persons for two years past are convincing Proofs of what I alledge And matters were carryed on with so furious hast the King found himself oblig'd to stop the Torrent of these Violences by an Arrest You are not ignorant Sir how necessary it is for the peace of a State that the Inhabitants of a Kingdom be united among themselves by the Bonds of Amity Par. 'T is for that very reason Sir the King would reduce all his Subjects to one Religion By suffering two different parties in a State you sowe the Seed of immortal Divisions You know the troubles the Guelfes and the Ghibellines caus'd in Italy they that would maintain the peace of a State must suppress the very Name and Memory of Factions Hug. Law 'T is not with Sects in Religion as with Factions in the State the case is very different Factions of State may be suppress'd by good Conduct and destroy'd by time yet a considerable time is necessary for doing it the Example you have mention'd of the Guelses and Gibellines sufficiently proves it Those Factions raign'd several Ages nor could the Name be extinguish'd but after hundreds of years and the desolation of Italy by the fury of the Parties But to take away the difference of Sentiments in Religion is a more difficult task Fire and Faggot Gibbets and Axes signifie nothing this appears clearly by the History of the last Age. We must bear with a mischief we can neither prevent nor remove and nourish Peace between two Parties which cannot be destroy'd but may be preserv'd by permitting the difference and maintaining a War between them This seems a Paradox but is not so difficult as you may imagine Provided the stronger Party oppress not the weaker 't is certain the weaker will have for the stronger a kindness and value for the Toleration indulg'd And the stronger will permit it self to be won by the kindness and grateful acknowledgments of the weaker 'T is a matter try'd and of fresh Experience Every one knows the Union the Catholick and we Hugonots liv'd in before they inspir'd the King with a design to destroy us Par. This method of preserving Peace is not so sure as you imagine But I could heartily wish a true remedy could be found for the greatest mischief in a State which is the Disunion of its Members and the Animosity raigning between the Subjects of one Soveraign Hug. Law You will grant me then Sir that those who blow up the fire and revive these Animosities are great Enemies of the State And this they are evidently guilty of who inspire into the King Sentiments of Rigor and Severity against the Reformed But alas The matter is yet more sad they are not satisfied with endeavouring to take from the King all the goodness and kindness he once had for us but they labour all they can to root out of our hearts the Love the Respect the Veneration and the Tenderness we have for our King I aver it we love our King even to adoration we are so clearly convinc'd of his sublime Qualities it adds infinitely to our grief to find our selves so ill thought of by a Prince for whom we have so much Zeal and Admiration Is it in the power of Man to love and to fear at once the same person Oh! how shall we do it We are told every moment the King hath a design to destroy us He is represented to us with his Sword in his hand ready drawn for our ruin 'T is Publish'd 't is Printed that if he live so long as by course of Nature 't is presum'd he may he will see our Religion at an end Process verbal of the Assembly March and May 1681. If God preserve to us this great Prince so long as all good People ought to wish he will utterly suppress this Monster in his Kingdom What means this but to cast us into a general Consternation with design to stifle and destroy the love we have for our Prince and to make us look on his
State it attacks the Principles by which it subsists For the bond of Love between the King and his Subjects is that which unites all the parts of this great and vast Body But 't is fit I represent to you those horrible Calamities these Enemies of France would plunge the Kingdom in They would bring back again the last Age and revive the Reigns of Henry the 2d and Charles the 9th In a word they would set up new Gibbets and kindle new Fires against the Reformed Can France expect a great Mischief Par. Y' are much mistaken Sir there 's no such intention Some Zealots may desire such a thing but the King hath not any such Design Hug. Law I believe you Sir We know the Goodness and Clemency of the King and that he naturally hates all Violence We see every day the Prudence of his Ministers But men are led where they never had intention to go they are mov'd by degrees to revoke all the Edicts of Pacification If Matters be carryed on with that Violence they have been for some years and especially within few months past the Business will be quickly at an end they will shortly perswade the King three fourths of the Hugonots of his Kingdom are converted They will tell him the residue is nothing or not worth the thinking of And so prevail with him to suppress the Edicts Thus shall near two millions of Souls remain debarr'd the exercise of their Religion 'T is a violent State in which Consciences cannot stay long The Ministers shall be forbidden to Preach on pain of death Yet they will Preach as before in the like case in Caves and Woods and Cellars and Darkness And instead of preaching in a few places they will preach in every place It cannot be but they will be discover'd exercising a Religion prohibited by the State and incur the Penalties to be inflicted by the late Edicts And according to the Severity of those Penalties they will be Imprison'd Banish'd Hang'd Consider how much it will grate the good nature of the King to see himself oblig'd to permit his Subjects to be put to a thousand Tortures for no other reason but having a desire to serve God I foresee Matters may be carryed yet farther Among two or three hundred thousand Persons able to bear Arms remaining still of that Religion 't is impossible but there is a great number of Fools impatient and desperate In plurality of Voyces Fools are always too hard for the Wise who are often oblig'd to permit themselves to be carryed away with the stream of the major Vote Such heady and impatient People instead of Submitting will Mutiny make Parties take up Arms. And then will the King be forc'd to draw Rivers of Blood out of the hearts of his Subjects Par. Ay Ay Sir there is great cause to fear you you are in a powerful and formidable Condition Where are your Chiefs where your strong Towns Where your Money Where your Forraign Allyances You have nothing to support you but the indulgence of our Kings Hug. Law Pardon me if I tell you you do not apprehend me my design is not to put you in fear but move you to pity I do not say but the King may with all the ease imaginable dissipate the Forces of any Faction that should rebel against him I am fully convinc'd of it not only by your Reasons but some stronger Arguments You say the Reformed have neither Chiefs nor Towns nor Money Have you forgot that saying of the Poet Furor arma ministrat Fury never wants Weapons they who have no Towns may take some Those who want Money may Rob and Plunder Despair can effect what Valour and Courage never durst undertake A State that has lying close in its Bowels two millions of Male-contents though but Women and Children and the dregs of Mankind is in danger of suffering terrible Revolutions After the Massacre of St. Bartholomew the Hugonots had none to head them Dandelot was dead the Admiral assassinated all the Flower of their Nobility murther'd and the Princes of the Blood Prisoners yet they never spoke bigger never insisted on higher Terms than then But I expect not any benefit to the Reformed from such Revolutions because God never blesses the designs of defending a Religion by Arms of Rebelling against our Prince and making War under pretences of Piety The furies of Civil War being absolutely inconsistent with Charity Such heady and impatient people by taking Arms will act against the Principles of Religion and I aver it particularly against the Principles of the Reformed They are to expect no other success but to be massacred by the People and the Arms of their Soveraign They would occasion as heretofore millions of Innocents to perish with them The King would certainly master them but would be griev'd to see his Countreys drown'd with the Blood of his Subjects What greater misfortune than this to a Prince so good-natur'd as ours Besides a State busied in reducing rebellious Subjects is in a manner abandon'd to strangers who fill and tear it in pieces with Factions foment Divisions take advantage of Disorders and draw Blood from all parts of it while it self opens the Veins on every side Those Gentlemen who constantly solicit the King to Rigor against us are certainly weary of the prosperity of the State they have no mind to see France any longer the most flourishing Kingdom of Europe They would bring back that Age wherein the Realm divided against it self call'd in the Duke of Parma the Flemings and Spaniards to enrich themselves with the pillages of the Towns and desolation of the Provinces Par. I see Gentlemen the alarm you have taken hath stirr'd your fancy and put you in a heat You go on too far and too fast there is a design to Ruine you 't is confest but 't is by undermining you by degrees Those very men you call Enemies of the State have no mind to see the effusion of your Blood Hug. Law Were those men guilty of no other mischief but a design to deprive the King of such a multitude of faithful Subjects they very well deserved to be call'd Enemies of the State I hope those of the Reformed Religion will never permit themselves to run into the Extremities I spoke of But they will do all they can to go seek in other Countreys the peace and the quiet they are denyed in their own I have told you already their Consternation is great and universal And all the considerable persons of our body seek only a Gate to go out at and a means to remove out of his Majesties sight the Objects that displease him Par. I cannot think they would be much troubled at your departure out of the Kingdom Hug. Law Whether they would be troubled I know not but I very well know they would have cause enough to be troubled The Count de los Balbazes during his stay at Paris being in company of several Ministers of forraign Princes they
Given at Our Court at Windsor the 22d. day of July 1681. In the Three and Thirtieth year of Our Reign By his Majesties Command L. Jenkins To Our Right trusty and Well-beloved Sir Patience Ward Knight Lord Mayor of Our City of London CHARLES R. RIght Trusty and Well-beloved We greet you well Being given to understand that very many Protestants and even whole Families finding themselves under great Pressures and Persecutions in the Kingdom of France for the sake of their Religion have chosen rather to leave their native Country and Conveniences than to hazard the Ruine of their Consciences and therefore great numbers of them are come and more are endeavouring every day to come into this Kingdom for Shelter and Security We are very desirous that here they should not only meet with all kind Reception but also with that Benevolence and Charity which may in some reasonable measure contribute towards their present Relief and Comfort in this their Affliction To which end We have signified Our Pleasure to the Bishop of London requiring him to give Directions unto the Clergy of that Our City and places adjacent to represent the sad Condition of these poor People in their solemn Congregations and also to excite their Parishioners to the free and chearful Relief of their distressed Brethren But as we cannot have too many hands employed in so good a work so We have thought fit to recommend the same unto you also that by your encouragement and endeavour Our good Subjects inhabiting in that Our City may be induced and obliged to a more than ordinary demonstration of their compassion and liberality on this Occasion And so We bid you heartily farewell Given at Our Court at Windsor the 22d. day of July 1681. in the Three and Thirtieth year of Our Reign By his Majesties Command L. Jenkins The Hugonot Gentlemen YOU know without doubt that the King of England proceeded further in our favour declaring all the persecuted Protestants who should come into England Denizens of his Kingdom And that all those who should transport their effects thither in Merchandise should import them Custom-free and whereas the Collection for the French Protestants in England was at first made only in the City and Suburbs of London the King hath commanded it should be made throughout the Kingdom Nor is it England alone opens its arms to receive the distressed Protestants of France They are entertained in all places of Europe The Duke of Hanan hath offer'd to receive four hundred Families Swede and Denmark tho very remote declare themselves ready to embrace the scatter'd Remains of the Protestant Churches of France The Charity of England towards them is very edifying yet I confess I am not equally satisfied with all other Protestants who might afford Refuge to their persecuted Brethren I have seen some of them return'd as Persons in despair from places where they had promised themselves support resolv'd to hazard all and run again into the temptation they had fled from being so scandaliz'd with the cold reception and hard usage they had found that they were ready to hearken to the solicitations of the Missionaries Hug. Law I confess the carriage of some strangers towards our persecuted Protestants appear'd to me quite contrary to the spirit of Christianity And if it continue what will become of so many poor Peasants and Tradesmen who groan at this day in search of the means to have liberty of Conscience What will become of so many eminent Persons who will be oblig'd to quit their Countrey naked and destitute to follow Jesus Christ and can carry nothing with them but their Lives and their Consciences What can be more Lamentable than to see how cold mens Charity and Zeal is 'T is more deplorable than the Persecution What is become of that spirit of our Ancestors that made them have all things common among them That render'd every private Person sensible of the publick Calamity In the beginning of the Reformation if those Protestants who were in peace and safety had done nothing for those who were under Persecution the Light of the Reformation had been long since put out in most places of Germany the Low-Countries and France Hug. Gent. Mens Charity I hope will be awaken'd again to do something for God and themselves For in truth the Compassion the Protestants in safety should express for their afflicted Brethren of France is but a good Office done to themselves There is not a Protestant State Neighbouring on France but is under apprehension of its Arms and hath cause to fear it may one day feel the miseries the Reformed of this Kingdom groan under now Where-ever the King carries his Arms those wicked Councellors who perswade him to ruine our Religion will carry their Counsels and make use of the Fortune of this great Monarch to accomplish their designs This may give them who at present are in safety cause enough to fear they may not always continue so It would become them to merit a Compassion they may one day stand in need of by exercising Compassion towards those who are actually in misery But above all they ought by Works of Mercy and the Exercise of fervent Charity and strict Union among themselves to divert the Wrath of God that threatens them and to endeavour to escape the greatest of Misfortunes the loss of Liberty and oppression of their Consciences I cannot forbear adding that the Children of this World are wiser in their Generation than the Children of Light and that their Zeal not only upbraids but may justly make us asham'd of our coldness 'T is difficult to express the great pains the Roman Catholicks take they spare no cost to make Converts as they call them There are very considerable Funds assign'd for the Maintenance and Encouragement of those they have perswaded to change their Religion The King allows out of his Revenue vast sums for gaining and recompencing these new Converts We have known lewd Women converted big with Bastard Children who had Pensions of four or five hundred Livers allow'd them 'T is a Prodigy to me that we are not willing for the support of poor distressed Protestants to be at that expence they of the other Party are at for perverting of Souls I wish all Protestant States would imitate the principal Towns of the Low Countreys which give Lodging in a manner gratis to all those who fly thither for Refuge besides immunity from Parish-Duties and Charges levyed for the use of the Town and furnish with Money and Goods those that have none till they are in a Condition to subsist by themselves and make great Collections in their Towns for that purpose Hug. Law Though all that could be wish'd is not every where done for those who leave their Countrey to save their Souls yet sufficient is done to make it appear that the Kings Protestant Allyes and Neighbours are much grieved at the ill usage of their Brethren and that disgusted with the present Conduct of
protested she had been surpriz'd and could not live in the Religion they had newly made her embrace Having made this Declaration she was put into a Covent where she found a Well into which she threw her self Such are the natural Consequences of the Declarations procur'd against us Par. If this be true why do you not complain Justice will be done you Hug. L. Justice Sir Of whom shall we demand it Of the Magistrate in whose presence these Outrages are done Of the Soveraign Courts Which take pleasure in making our Yoak the heavier Of the Ministry Who pretend they believe not a word we say Of the King Who will not give us the hearing Par. If this Declaration be executed with Moderation and Equity what cause to complain of it For since you are allow'd to live in quiet and at the end of your Life are ask'd only what Religion you will dye of what can be more clear than that without any intention of Ruining you great care is taken of your Salvation and that it is heartily wish'd for Hug. Law Can you believe Sir that those who have solicited and surpriz'd his Majesty to make this Declaration have done it out of Love to our Souls and Care of our Salvation I make no doubt but use was made of that very pretence to induce the King to it His Majesty being uncapable of a base thought or mean design But I am too fully convinc'd those who first suggested it to the King have very small care of the Salvation of our Souls There are many of them have no care of their own how then should they take care of other mens Others of them have such animosity against us that if they saw us at Hell-gate and had it in their power to thrust us in they would certainly do it But to speak in cold blood Let me perswade you on this occasion to make use of your usual Sagacity How can you imagine those who solicited this Declaration aim'd at the Salvation of mens Souls Why should they think that a man who all his Life long hath been of the Reform'd Religion should desire at his death to turn Roman Catholick If this man had had any such thought it should have been made appear in his Life 'T is far better living than dying in your Religion For that which you call Conversion makes a man capable of Imployment and Office it opens him the way into Dignities and great places to Gain and great Fortune What can be more evident than that a man dispos'd to turn Catholick would for the reason I have intimated not stay till his death but do it in his life-time and as early as he could But a man in his life hath perhaps a care of his reputation or is clogg'd with Interests that oblige him to dissemble but at his death he slights such respects he breaks all such bonds knowing that though he hath lived for others he must die for himself This were a good Argument in a Country where the Roman Catholick Religion is prohibited but in France where it is predominant where it makes use at this time of its advantages with a high hand a man hath all encouragement imaginable with all the freedom he can wish and probable hopes of extraordinary recompence to declare at any time his inclinations to quit our Religion Perhaps those Gentlemen were of opinion that God inspires many people at the hour of their death who should they recover would constantly follow the notions they are then inspir'd with True it is Sir you know we live in an Age of Miracles and extraordinary Inspirations We find them very numerous Most of those who persecute us have great faith for Inspirations In a word if this Declaration extended only to those who in their life have made appear some inclination to alter their Religion it might be thought the desire of their salvation occasioned these visits But these visits are made to all without exception to them who all their life-long have been most firm and resolv'd I would gladly know what new illumination an old firm Hugonot can be suppos'd to have from a plain single question ask'd by a Magistrate in a civil and gentle manner and if none whether there be not some other design in the business Is the asking of such a question look'd upon as a powerful instrument of the Holy Spirit for the conversion of an Heretick Have we any Presidents of Conversion by such means 'T is clear then that the Declaration strictly pursued according to the Letter is not of any use to make a man change his Religion and it is equally clear that they who sollicited that Declaration being men of sense did not in the least design by it the conversion of dying men or the salvation of their Souls Par. I would fain know what other design they could propose to themselves in it Hug. Law 'T is not hard to guess the Clergy hath a design to load us with miseries and to render our Religion odious to us by a multitude of calamities attending it The happiness of Mankind here on Earth consists in the pleasures of Life and Liberty to die quietly they have already found out a thousand ways to render our lives miserable and unpleasant and invent every day new means to continue them so there wanted nothing but a means to trouble us at our death to make our yoke insupportable And they have hit upon 't in this Declaration Besides having very small hopes of converting as they call it Fathers or Mothers or any person at the age of discretion they levell'd their design against Children and Infants To compass this they could not have invented a more effectual means than that they are furnish'd with by this Declaration whereby if they can but make believe a man died a Roman Catholick they make themselves Masters of all the Children he left under age To bring this about it was necessary to open a passage to the Beds of the Dying it was necessary to have liberty of entrance into any house which could not be had without the authority of the Soveraign the Kings goodness permitted him not to grant all they desired and had obtain'd by the Declaration in 1666. since revok'd in part and in part mitigated by that of 1669. which was that the Curates should have liberty to enter any house to perswade the Sick to change their Religion They attempted afresh to revive this Article but disappointed of their ends they rested satisfied with what was granted them which was that the Judges should go into the houses of the Sick to know what Religion they desir'd to die in they thought it sufficient for their purpose if they could by any means get mens doors open after which they would take the liberty to enter whether leave were granted them or not It hath happen'd accordingly for this we see is the course taken which puts the Sick into horrible agonies and their Families into terrible frights
into a condition I dread to imagine for if they Arm the hand of our Soveraign against us and perswade him to spill the Blood of his Subjects the State must be weakned by having drawn from it the most faithful and truest French Blood in its Veins Par. I am a Catholick but none of those who are for Monks and Clergymens intermedling in Civil Affairs Their business is to pray to God for the prosperity of the Kingdom 't is certain that matters are but very little mended since these good men wriggled themselves so deeply into Courts Hug. Law But do you not admire Sir the boldness of the Jesuits and the use they make of it at Court by the man they have there at his Majesties Elbow They were banish'd France by Arrest of the Parliament of Paris being clearly convinc'd they had by the hands of John Chatell attempted to murder Henry the 4th This Prince fearing a stab from them call'd them in again by an Edict in January 1604. One Clause of the Edict was They should be oblig'd to keep one of their Society a French man Born and sufficiently Authoriz'd to attend the King to serve him for a Preacher and to be answerable for the Actions of the Society that is That there should always be a Jesuit attending at Court as an evidence that all those of his Society were look'd upon as disturbers of the publick Peace as Murderers of Kings and Enemies of the State one of whose Chiefs the Court would have always in its Power that he might be responsible for the attempts of his Fellows and remain as an Hostage to receive such Punishments as the Criminal enterprizes of his Society should deserve This is the natural Character which from Father Cotton to Father Le Chaise ought to be given according to the intention of the Edict of all the Jesuits that follow the Court. A Character that ought to make them asham'd and keep them continually humble Instead of which they are become Masters of the Consciences of our Kings the Tyrants of the Church and we may say of all France This gave occasion to Monsieur de Mezeray to make this judicious Remark That this Condition annex'd to the Edict Tom. 6. Hen. 4. An. 1604. instead of branding them as they imagin'd who got it inserted procur'd them the greatest Honour they could desire Philip of Macedon was awak'd every Morning by a Page who told him Remember you are a man I wish our cruel Enemy were awak'd every Morning with these words Remember you are here to be answerable for the Doctrine and Actions of those who teach that Kings may be assassinated when disobedient to the Pope and inspir'd these detestable Sentiments into John Chatel and Clement and Ravaillac and William Parry Robert Catesby Thomas Percy and other Murtherers of our Kings the Kings of England and the Princes of Orange in the last Age and this Par. I see you are no Friend of that good Father and it must be confess'd he is not much yours Hug. Law We find by experience he is not much our Friend And the more unhappy we he hath as much Credit with the King as Hatred for our Party It seems the King cannot refuse him any thing Was any thing ever seen more terrible than the Arrest he had obtain'd whereby our Ministers and Elders were prohibited on pain of Corporal Punishment to go into any House by night or by day on any occasion but to visit the sick By this Arrest as soon as a man was an Elder he was excluded from the Company of all those of his Religion His Majesty look'd on this as so strange a surprize that he thought fit by another Arrest to explain this and declare it was not his intention to hinder the Ministers and Elders to visit their Flocks I will give you another instance how this man abuses his Credit The King upon the Complaint of his Subjects of the Religion of divers Violences burning of Churches and other Outrages done them pass'd an Arrest in May 1681. Prohibiting any Violence by Word or Action to be done to the Reformed A poor Minister of Poitou in one of his Sermons gave God thanks for having inspir'd the King with this Equity and Clemency Father Le Chaise had news of it by Letter and presently obtain'd another Arrest which orders those to be inform'd against who in their Interpretations of this Arrest should say That the Exhortations made in the Kings name to the People to change their Religion are not according to his intention You are to observe Sir that the Exhortations made in the Kings Name in Poitou are no other than strange Menaces and extraordinary Outrages And to prevent their being stopp'd by his Majesties Arrest the Sieur de Marillac and Father le Chaise thought fit to annul it by another Arrest which will give way to all the Exorbitances his Majesty design'd to hinder by this Par. It hath been observ'd there hath been for some months past an extraordinary Emotion amongst you What 's the Reason of it Hug. Law The Reason Sir 'T is because we see things hurryed on faster than we imagin'd To tell you the truth we have been long sensible of a Design laid to ruine us but fancy'd they would not have gone so roundly to work with us We lull'd our selves asleep in hopes the Affairs of the State might occasion a change in ours But ever since last Summer we look'd upon our selves to be very near Destruction The suppressing our Colledges and Academies convinces us effectually we have not long to continue in the Kingdom for if the King were willing we should stay he would allow us our Ministers and permit us to enjoy places necessary for Instruction Hug. Gent. Now you mind me of it have you seen the Arrest against the Academy of Sedan if you have you cannot but think them out of their Wits who draw those Arrests making one of the wisest Princes of the World speak so ridiculously They make the King say he had granted the Hugonots of Sedan an Academy for instruction of their Children and that they had abus'd his Grant by receiving strangers into their Academy Have you ever seen an Academy strangers were deny'd access to I admir'd at the confidence of these Penners of Arrests in publishing falsities so gross I was wishing to see the Edict of Reunion of the Principality of Sedan to the Crown I find it repeated there five or six times that the King Confirm'd to them their Academy with all Rights and Priviledges they enjoy'd under their Princes Is not the King Master of it Is not his Pleasure reason enough Why then are such notorious falshoods impos'd on the World Hug. Law I was more astonish'd at the Declaration that gives all Hugonots who will turn Catholicks three years respit for payment of their Debts It will be easily granted they have not in this been very tender of the Honour of the King or of their
telling a story which probably I know better than you I have Friends in Poitou who inform me of all and am well acquainted with the Deputies of the Province I believe I know some Circumstances you may be ignorant of Hug. Law I shall most willingly give you the hearing Sir if these Gentlemen will do so too Hug. Gent. First then you are to know that the Publisher of the Gazetts swells extremely the number of these Converts If you account them half or two thirds of what the Gazett speaks you may perhaps account them more numerous than they are But the falseness of the Calculation is not the thing I intend principally to insist on I confess the number of the Revolted is prodigious and that so many Persons have in so short a time chang'd their Religion without Instruction without Preaching without Disputes without knowing why is perhaps a thing not to be parallell'd in any Age. But that you may cease admiring at it I must acquaint you with the whole matter First you are to know that the Province of Poitou is the heaviest charg'd with Taxes of any in the Kingdom and consequently the poorest Nothing can be poorer than the Peasants there I need not tell you that meanness of Condition abases the Spirits and takes away mens Courage it dulls their Wit puts out the very light of their Understanding and makes men degenerate almost into Beasts For ten years last past effectual Orders have been given that the Peasants living at distance from considerable Towns should not be instructed their Churches have been rac'd and their Ministers taken away Ignorance joyn'd with the extreme Misery of their Condition and Slavery hath made them Brutish and capable not only of meanest thoughts but the most base Actions The Intendant Marillac a Person who had not thriven very well in the World applyes himself to the Bigots the Jesuits and their Patriarch Father La Chaise for repairing his broken Fortune This man according to the Orders of those he had sold himself to began at first with the lesser Temptations That is he walk'd through the Province with his Purse in one hand and his Sword in the other But at last the Myrmidons he had pick'd out for his assistants with some pitiful Priests pass'd from Village to Village entring every House beginning with Threats and ending with Promises They told the poor Wretches the King would have but one Religion in his Kingdom that whoever refus'd to turn Catholick should be us'd with the utmost Severity and Rigor But those who would change their Religion should be well paid and live at their ease Accordingly they fall a bargaining with those rascally Wretches some valued themselves higher than others One among the rest held out stoutly several days for ten Groats they offer'd him a Pistol he stood out stifly and would not bate them a Farthing of four Crowns At last they gave him his price This shameful Trade was driven in so scandalous a manner that these Convertors had provided a multitude of Printed Acquittances with Blanks for the Names and the Sums which Blanks were fill'd with the Names of the new Converts and the Sums they receiv'd in order to the giving an account to the Treasurers of the Chamber of Accounts of the Conversion whereof the Sieur Pelision is President These Sums amounted not to much for some of the Converts had not above sevenpence wrapt up in a piece of Paper But for recompence immediately after their Conversion they were discharg'd of Taxes and freed from Quartering Souldiers and all publick Payments On this Rock split a great number of those Wretches who fear'd the sight of the Collectors of Taxes as of so many Devils and look'd upon the Priviledge of exemption from payments as their Soveraign Good and chiefest Felicity You may hear the account the Gazett gives how those Conversions were made I have in my Pocket that of the 25th of April 1681. 'T is in the Article of Poitiers The Sieur Marillac Intendant of this Province applying himself continually with a great deal of Zeal to the work of Conversion arriv'd the 28th of the last month at St. Sauvan with the Sieur Rabreüil Vicar-General to our Bishop He receiv'd there advice of importance concerning those of the Religion and went away the 20th from St. Sauvan to hasten to the place from whence he had the News He receiv'd there the abjuration of an incredible number of Persons Afterwards they return'd to Poitiers and the Bishop much affected with the fruit of this Voyage sent Missionaries into those parts to instruct the New Converts Hug. Law Perhaps Gentlemen you observe not how new this Method of Conversion is I assure my self in all your reading Sir you have scarce met with any such Convertors Our Saviour understood not this way of Conversion For had he known what belongs to it instead of his twelve Apostles and seventy Disciples he would have sent so many Intendants such as the Sieur Marillac All the World would have been Christian To trouble our selves with Preaching to the Peasants that 's filly piece of business Shew them Money in one hand and a Cudgel in the other you make them Saints in a quarter of an hour and shall convert more in a month than St. Paul with his Preaching ever did in twelve Heretofore in those simple Ages of Primitive Christianity men made it their business to instruct before Conversion to make them know and believe before they made Profession and often Catechis'd them several years before they were admitted to the Mysteries of Religion But the Gazettier tells us Monsieur Marillac understands better the Mystery of Conversion he knows how to convert numbers in a trice and afterwards sends Missionaries to instruct them Hug. Gent. Pray Sir Let us not make it a Subject of Mirth those of our Party have no cause to laugh at it but to shed Tears and Tears of Blood Monsieur Marillac hath no been always so careful as the Gazettier tells us I know from good hands those wretched Converts who have been made to abjure their Religion have not been at all instructed A Gentleman of Quality a Roman-Catholick assur'd me the other day with an Oath that being at the Intendants he saw there about two hundred Peasants who were come purposely to complain they knew not what Prayers to make for they had been forbidden to say their old Prayers and not taught any other so that since they had been compell'd to be Catholicks they had no Religion at all The bishop of Poitiers one day in good Company rally'd these Conversions calling those new Catholicks Monsieur Marillac's Converts But this is not all The Intendant Marillac having tasted the sweet of these Conversions and finding Promises and Threats ineffectual to bring about as many as he desir'd resolv'd to make use of more violent Means He and his Agents had quickly scumm'd off out of our Society those base Souls who had no Sentiment of Religion and
whence proceeds that terrible fright we are observ'd to be in for some time past We see coming towards us that Scourge which now Afflicts Santonge and Poitou We understand well enough they will not open a Persecution in all places at once this would make too great a noise But when they have laid these two Provinces desolate they will pass into another They scatter and lay wast all our Congregations in one end of the Kingdom and in the other tell us we shall be dealt with better far than we imagine that we are to blame to take the Alarm and ought not to think of leaving the Kingdom That is that we are a File of Wretched men mark'd out for death while those at the one end of the File are Hang'd or Shot to death those at the other end are spoken fair to and made drink to amuse them that they run not away but may when the rest are dispatch'd be Hang'd as the others They began with this poor Province of Poitou because it is bounded on one side by the Sea and on the other side borders on all the Provinces of France so that the wretched Inhabitants have no way to escape out of the Kingdom And it is certain those who will permit themselves to be surpriz'd and neglect the opportunity of getting into a place of safety will one day dearly pay for their Imprudence and Security Hug. Gent. Your Reflections have interrupted me in the Course of my story I have many things more to acquaint you with which will give you further Light into the Character of this Persecutor who Ravages Poitou He spreads and causes it to be spread abroad every where with inconceivable boldness that 't is the King's intention there shall be but one Religion in his Kingdom If any one chance to say any thing to the contrary what Religion soever he is of he is punish'd for 't It happen'd that three Roman-Catholicks said the King had not declar'd himself as fully in this particular as 't was reported he had they were all three Imprison'd for it A Man of the Religion having taken an occasion to raâ—ly these Conversions made for Money and having said the King was too wise to be at great expence to carry on an Action so base as that of Bribing People out of their Religion was Imprison'd and Condemn'd to go bare-head and bare-foot with a lighted Torch in his hand through the Street follow'd by the Executioner to the Court of Justice to beg Pardon for his fault But I have one thing more to tell you by which you may better know what a Person he is I am speaking of He went to Dinner at the Marquess of Verac's a Gentleman of note in the Province While they were at Dinner the Intendant gave Order the Inhabitants of the place should assemble at the Cross After Dinner he took his Coach got up on the streps of the Cross and said to the Peasants assembled Children you are to know 't is the King's intention there shall be henceforth but one Religion in France Turn Catholicks Whoever does so shall have cause upon all occasions to praise the King's Bounty Those who refuse shall experience his Severity To prove what I say see here your Lord the Marquess of Verac come along with me to change his Religion Whereupon the Marquess who is a very honest man and a very good Protestant stepping up immediately to the same Cross said to the Peasants Children The Intendant does but jest with you The King has no design to revoke his Edicts And it is not true that I am come along with him or have any design to change my Religion Hug. Law This is surprizing and sufficient of it self to make out the Character of the Man I cannot tell Sir what you think of these Conversions of Poitou But as for me I confess that assuming the Sentiments of a reasonable Catholick I could not forbear being of the Opinion of Ozorjus Bishop of the Algarues That nothing is more opposite to the Spirit of Christianity than a Conduct of this Nature that exposes so many Mysteries and holy things to men suspected and evidently prophane Can you choose but tremble Sir to think that at this day in Poitou thousands of those who are forc'd to go to Mass and prostrate themselves before that which you call Our Lord detest and look upon that as an Idol which they pretend to adore When they are sick they bring them the holy Oyl and make them take the Sacrament after your manner They obey with their bodies the Violence us'd but they think very Prophanely of those things you esteem so Holy 'T is in your Opinion an enormous Crime these Wretches commit yet 't is your Zealous Catholicks are the Cause of these horrible Prophanations of your Mysteries When Violence is us'd to force men to Lock up in the bottom of their Hearts their sentiments of Religion it produces the effect of that Violent and inconsiderate Zeal of Emmanuel the second King of Portugal who compell'd the Jews to turn Christians as I told you The Jews profess'd themselves Christians but continued Jews in their Hearts Their Children inherited their Dissimulation and Religion Hence it is that half those Portuguese who to avoid the Inquisition are Christians in Portugal no sooner set foot in Holland but they are Jews Those Hugonots who have been forc'd to turn Roman-Catholicks will inspire into their Children their Religion and the disquiet of their Spirit These Sentiments will be transmitted from Generation to Generation as a Seed of Rebellion that will always incline this People to shake off the Yoke impos'd on their Conscience as Soon as they have opportunity So that by the Course now taken instead of gaining Servants to God you raise Enemies to the State And I had reason to say that by the Method now us'd for Conversion you will make you a Church of Rogues and Villains of Atheistical and Prophane Rascals destitute both of Religion and Honour Conversion at this day is a Cloak to cover Debauches and the most abominable Enormities Let the most infamous of men profess himself a Catholick he is presently become a right honest man That Church which claims the title of Holy as proper to it self opens her Gates to Bankrupts and Cheats and exhorts men to become Bankrupts by turning Roman-Catholicks which is a sure Means of Pardon and Oblivion for all Sins and in a word a Salve for all Sores a Remedy for all Evils Hug. Gent. Give me leave to tell you a little story not impertinent to the Purpose which I had the other day from an Officer You know 't is now every ones business to make Converts 'T is the imployment of Gentlemen and Officers of War as well as of the Bigots A Souldier of the Garrison of Friburg having committed a considerable Robbery was imprison'd for it He had wit enough to know it would go very hard with him unless he could find Favour The
first Question ask'd him in Prison was what Religion he was of to which he answered without the least Hesitation he was a Hugonot Presently flock'd about him all the Devotes of the Town and in the Head of them Madam de Chamilly the Governor's Wife Never Martyr made a more resolute Defence than this Souldier who was look'd upon as a Hugonot would sooner Burn than turn Monsieur de Chamilly the Governor of the place came in Person to the Prison spoke home to the Souldier and made him understand it would go very ill with him if he did not turn Catholick The Souldier was not a whit mov'd at all this But at length he began to relent and yield to the gentle instances of the Lady Governess Yet not without entring into a formal Treaty for fear of a surprize and being hang'd when converted In short they gave him all the security he desir'd for his Life and they kept their words When the Souldier was got clearly off his Comrades made it appear he had never been a Hugonot but to the day of his imprisonment had always been a Roman-Catholick Madam de Chamilly was so vex'd when she knew it she would have had the Souldier try'd again for his Crime But the business was over he had obtain'd his Pardon and the Matter was past bringing about Par. Sir I see you will not have opportunity this day to make use of the Arguments in your little Book These Gentlemen make great Complaints and are not wanting in words to express them Let me advise you to put up your Book in your Pocket Methinks our Discourse has been so long 't is now time to take a little Breath But to interrupt as little as may be a business we are all so much concern'd in I think we may do well to proceed in our Discourse and finish to morrow The end of the First Discourse The Last Efforts OF AFFLICTED INNOCENCE The Second Discourse Prov. Cath. GEntlemen you shall not escape me to day We have given you leave to Attack us and must now see how well you can defend your selves That Gentleman jeer'd me that I was oblig'd yesterday to put up again my Book in my Pocket But I 'le take it out now and you shall if you please Gentlemen presently give your Answers to the Objections of my Author Hug. Law You Author Sir is none of the Greatest He is a Scribler of Libels a man without a Name one that hides himself in a Corner to shoot as us like a base treacherous Fellow when most of the World beside glory to appear eminent among those who destroy us But we will put upon him the Value you please If we cannot answer him it will be our fault having had time enough to provide for it Every seditious Monk and hot-headed writer have made the same Objections against us These things have been a hundred times charg'd upon us and as often answer'd But I am very sensible they are concern'd now more than ever to insist upon and maintain these Calumnies 'T is no wonder to see them endeavour to stain the Reputation of those they use as Enemies of the State Our Loyalty is a continual Reproach to our Persecutors We cannot be surpriz'd to see them Labouring so earnestly to blemish it Prov. This Sir is beating the Air and complaining without Cause That which I have to say and to read to you is certain and indisputable matter of Fact Hear what our Church-man says These Gentlemen have gain'd themselves no more advantage by adding They had never been so unfortunate to render themselves unworthy of those Concessions For if I were allow'd to call to mind and relate here what pass'd in the Raign of Lewis the 13th of triumphant Memory they would find it very difficult to perswade the World of the truth of what they say We may see by the Edicts published on that occasion to what point the disobedience of those Gentlemen had reduc'd that great Prince You may read what follows and see the terms the Edict of Niort of 27th of May 1621. is penn'd in where the King complains of Exorbitances committed by those of your Religion of Politick Assemblies of Rebellions of taking up Arms of Orders sent into the Provinces to seize his Majesties Revenue and Finances of Commissions given for making great Guns and for raising of Souldiers You will meet with the sieges of Montauban Rochell Montpellier and Privas and many actions of Rebellion committed by you in the late times when you would not obey the King's Orders whereby your Churches were to be demolish'd and you were prohibited to preach in certain places But hear what he says after To which they add as if they were the most miserable People of the World that without looking back into times long since past their present Condition is very different from that they were in some years ago We know very well these Gentlemen sigh for those times they call longsince past in which they were so formidable 'T is true we are not now in the times of their Enterprizes of Ambois and Meaux and those other attempts of theirs when they call'd in the English and the Rheiters to their assistance to Sack all our Provinces to Rob and pull down our Churches to surprize the Towns of greatest importance to give Battel within view of Paris and in sight of their King The Battel of St. Denis in 1567. And when they were not asham'd to propose to Charles the 9th to disarm first if he would have peace with them and to send back for that purpose those six thousand Swisses he had call'd in for the safety of his Person and of the State Here Sir in few lines is a great deal of business you will not easily rid your hands of Hug. Law I le do my endeavour Sir I very well know that a hundred Authors before yours charge on us as a great Crime the Civil Wars of the last Age and of the beginning of this But if you will give us the hearing we will examine who ought to bear the blame of them Hug. Gent. Sir Before you answer this Anonymus Author I think you may do well to speak a little to what I read to day in a Book of Dr. Arnaud intituled The Overthrow of the Morals of Jesus Christ by the Calvinists I see it on the Table there and will if you please read you the passage The first Christians had no other Arms but their Faith and their Patience Book 1 Ch. 5. Nothing could ever move them to use force for ruining Idolatry But as for them as soon as they saw themselves in a Condition to resist the Powers ordain'd by God they fill'd Europe with bloody Wars they chang'd the Governments of States broke down the Images polluted the Altars burnt the Churches and prophan'd the most holy things You know this Monsieur Arnaud hath gain'd himself a great Reputation among his Party And what he says is of
which was verified in all the Parliaments The Constable 't is known was the Favourite of Henry the second who lov'd him to that degree that after his misfortune and imprisonment unfortunate as he was yet at his return to Court the King made him lie in his own bed But his Absence was fatal to him and his Family The Duke of Guise render'd himself necessary to the King and as Mezeray says the misfortune of France was the happiness of the Duke of Guise and the fall of the Constable was his Exaltation The Duke of Guise had in all his Enterprizes the success every one knows He recovered Calais from the English he took Thionville he married his Niece the Queen of Scots to the Dauphin who was afterwards Francis the second Fortune abandon'd the Constable and sided with the Duke of Guise Read the words of Mezeray from that very time the jealously between these two Houses tended to the forming two contrary Parties in the Kingdom as will appear This is the first Seed of the Civil War wherein Religion had not any part Thence forward the House of Guise us'd all its power to destroy Montmorency's Party The Duke met with the pretence of Religion luckily by the way Admiral Chatillon and Dandelot his Brother the Constables Nephews were suspected the Spaniards increas'd the Suspition by saying that at the taking of St. Quintin they found Heretical Books amongst Dandelots Baggage Henry the second being a violent Persecuter caused him to be arrested and committed him Prisoner to Blaise de Montluc a Creature of the Duke of Guise this was a matter agreed on by the Guises and the Spaniards with design to weaken the Constable by the loss of his Nephews But they miss'd their aim the Constables favour brought Dandelot clear off and gain'd him his Liberty And the Authority of Henry the second kept the two Parties in an appearance of Peace during the rest of his life which was not long but in the beginning of the Reign of Francis the second the Discord broke out Mezeray will tell you in the beginning of this Reign the cause of the Civil War A Multitude of Princes says he and of puissant Lords is an infallible cause of Civil War when there wants Authority powerful enough to keep them within the bounds of their duty This was the misfortune of France after the death of Henry the second From the time of his death the Factions form'd during his Reign began to appear and to fortify them the more unhappily met with different Parties in Religion a great number of Male-Contents who long'd for change and which is more many Soldiers and Officers of War who having been disbanded were desirous of Employment at any rate Methinks that by this Relation Religion is not the cause of the Troubles but the cause of them were the Factions of Princes and great Lords who meeting with Parties differing in Religion made use of them to serve their designs In the same place that Author makes it appear the two Parties fought not for Religion but for Empire On the one side were the Princes of the Bloud and the Constable On the other the Princes of the House of Guise and between both the Regent who by turns made use of one to beat down and destroy the other that she might Reign The Princes of Guise having got into their hands the Person of Francis the second a weak Prince governed under his Authority in a tyrannical manner The Princes of the Bloud Antony and Lewis de Bourbon who ought to have had the management of Affairs during the Kings Minority could not endure that Strangers should enjoy an Authority and Honour belonging of right and properly to them These Princes were ill us'd Antony of Bourbon King of Navar came to Court but was slighted they did not so much as give him a Lodging and he might have lain on the Pavement had not the Marshal of St Andrew receiv'd him The Princes began with the Pen and caused several Writings to be publish'd to make it appear that the Laws of the State admit neither Women nor Strangers to the Government that during the Minority of the Kings this honour belongs to the Princes of the Bloud That the Guises were not natural French that it was dangerous to commit to them the Government of the State because of their Pretensions on the Kingdom in saying they were descended from Charlemaign At last Lewis of Bounbon Prince of Conde resolv'd upon a dangerous attempt to gain Possession of his Rights which the weakness of his Brother the King of Navarr abandon'd and gave up to the Princes of Guise He design'd to seize the Person of King Francis the second and remove the Guises from Court The Admiral and Dandelot were of the Party and the Prince of Conde was the Head But because the success of the Enterprize was doubtful they would not appear in it La Renaudie was intrusted with the management of this great design which goes under the name of the Conspiracy of Amboise which our Church-man whose Book you have in your hand makes such a noise about there cannot be a greater injustice then to charge our Hugonots with this Affair 'T is certain there were ingag'd in that business as many Roman Catholicks as Hugonots or if the number of Hugonots were greater it was because there were more Male-Contents of their Party the Chancellor de l' Hospital was one I have read in good Authors that La Renaudie was a Roman Catholick yet I will not undertake to justifie it 'T is agreed on all hands that all the Officers who had receiv'd Indignities at Court and been unjustly expell'd thence engag'd themselves in the Enterprise to be reveng'd of the Princes of Guise There was at Court says Mezeray a great number of Persons out of all the Provinces particularly Soldiers and Officers of War demanding Pay or Reward The Cardinal of Lorrain who had the management of the Finances was much troubled with them and apprehended a Conspiracy in their multitude This made him publish an Edict commanding that all those who followed the Court to demand any thing should retire on pain of being hang'd on a Gibbet which was publickly set up for that purpose A great part of those who had serv'd in the Armies disgusted with this Indignity turn'd against the Cardinal Thus you have an account of what persons that Party was compos'd which would have destroyed the Princes of Guise where there appears so sensible and so clear a cause of Revolt 't is not worth our pains to go in search of a hidden one On the one side the Rights of the Princes of the Bloud which they were resolv'd to maintain on the other side the design to be reveng'd of the grossest affront that ever was put on Persons of Quality by setting up a Gibbet to hang them on for no other cause but that they desir'd to be paid for the bloud they had lost are so visibly the
I know for the reports of mitigation but the Forces were drawn out of Poitou for no other reason but because there was business to imploy them elsewhere or to lay the noise the violence of their proceedings rais'd in those parts In all other points the Persecution in those Provinces is not at all abated from Poitiers to Rochelle there is not a Minister to be seen and in all that Province formerly full of places for Religious Worship there are not six places but the Churches are shut up or the Ministers silenced all those Churches which were appendants of Mannors the tenure whereof gave Right to the Lords to have Religious Worship perform'd there were all shut up on the sudden The Ministers of other Churches yet standing are some confin'd others banished others silenc'd and most imprison'd Monsieur Bossatran Minister of Niort and seven of his Elders are Prisoners at Rochelle The Sieurs Paumier D'Isle Champion Le Pain Du Son Loquet Ministers of St. Maixaut de la Motte de Mougon de Fontenay de Marennes and many others have had Sentence pronounc'd against them that their Goods shall be sold or are imprison'd or fled or banish'd one is confin'd to Vezelay another to Bezomson others to other places so that in all these Provinces you can hardly find one officiating Minister this new kind of Persecution is exercis'd upon pretence that the Ministers gave Certificates to those who are gone out of the Kingdom they Prosecute with that Cruely those who give relief to these miserable Fugitives that Burgesses of Rochell have been imprison'd and fined for giving them a glass of water The Marquess of Dompierre a Gentleman of Note hath been a long time Prisoner for harbouring forty or fifty poor men who were in search of means to set themselves at Liberty from the tyranny exercis'd upon their Consciences 'T is true the Intendant Marillac hath not any Soldiers left but he stirs not abroad without his Deputies and his Guards who act the same Out-rages the Soldiers did He sends before him his Harbingers into the Villages to frighten them when arriv'd he calls before him the Inhabitants of the Protestant Profession exhorts them to obey the King's Orders and embrace his Religion those who carry his Orders about observe no Measures Menaces Promises Troubles newly rais'd or reviv'd Discharges Officers pay easing those who have been over-rated in Assessements and money distributed have made an infinite number of Revolters The Shepherds are smitten that the flocks maybe scatter'd The Ministers of all Churches held by right of Tenure are tax'd in assessments to the King that they may be forc'd to desert The violence is so terrible and excessive by the Taxes they assess for payment of Offices as they call them that the Country is not eas'd in the least by the Soldiers being drawn out those who the last year were tax'd but at thirty Livers have this year been tax'd by the Intendant at five or six hundred Thus all are obliged to desert and if any one leave his house he is carried to Prison under pretence he was going out of the Kingdom 'T is certain that nothing but an inability of getting out hath retain'd in the Provinces any Person of the Protestant Religion and you may be assur'd that the next Spring Millions will follow you into strange Countries they who cannot go out at the Door will leap out at the Window and trust the mercy of the Waves to convey them to some Vessel at Sea God grant the poor Wretches may in forreign parts meet with tender Hearts and Compassionate Souls these reports of mitigation are rais'd by our Enemies on design to cool the fervor of that Charity those Protestant Countries which injoy the Peace God hath taken from us exercis'd toward our fugitive Brethren and those Enemies are in the midst of us as well as among our Adversaries We have among us some wretched Traytors who spread a Report that we shall shortly see a great change of Affairs that there shall be a Reformation in France not of us but a Reformation of far greater value and importance and therefore we are not to think of leaving the Kingdom These Men catch new hold when others let go theirs and fancy grounds of fresh hopes where others see nothing but cause of Despair You understand well enough what such Persons think and what is to be expected from them This Sir you are to believe of the mitigations you have heard of What I have now told you is truth of which I have been an Ocular Witness being lately return'd out of the places where the Facts have been committed you see there is cause to wish your Gazetteers had better Information or better Intentions and would not Stuff their Gazettes with News grounded on intelligence altogether false We have had a flying Report that Marillac will be recall'd but 't is as true as the rest Expect not he shall be Revok'd till he hath compleated our ruine in the Province of Poitou the design of this Letter was only to inform you of the particulars you desir'd to know I will not make it longer but Conclude with assuring you I am Sir Your most humble and obedient Servant Paris Jan. 20. 1682. A Catalogue of Plays Printed for R. Bently and M. Magnes 1. FArtus or the French Puritan 2. Forc'd Marriage or the Jealous Bride-groom 3. English Monsieur 4. All mistaken or the Mad Couple 5. Generous Enemies or the Rediculous Lovers 6. The Plain-Dealer 7. Sertorions a Tragedy 8. Nero a Tragedy 9. Sophomisba or Hannibal's overthrow 10. Gloriana or the Certe of Augusta Caesar 11. Alexander the Great 12. Methridates King of Pontus 13. Oedipus King of Thebes 14. Ceasar Borgia 15. Theodocious or the force of Love 16. Madam Fickle or the witty false one 17. The Fond Husband or the Plotting Sisters 18. Esquire Old Sap or the Night Adventures 19. Fool turn'd Critick 20. Virtuous Wife or God luck at last 21. The Fatal Wager 22. Andromecha 23. Country Wit 24. Calesto or the Chast Nun. 25. Destruction of Jerusalem in 2 parts 26. Ambitious States-Man or the Loyal Favourite 27. Misery of Civil War 28. The Murder of the D. of Gloucester 29. Thestis a Tragedy 30. Hamblet Prince of Denmark a Tragedy 31. The Orphan or the Unhappy Marriage 32. The Souldiers Fortune 33. Tamberlain the Great 34. Mr. Limberham or the kind Keeper 35. Mistaken Husband 36. Notes of marrow by the Wits 37. Essex and Elizabeth or the Unhappy Favourite 38. Vertue Betray'd or Anna Boloyn 39. King Leare 40. Abdellazor or the Mares Revenge 41. Town Fop or Sir Timothy Tawdery 42. Rare an tout a French Comedy 43. Moor of Venice FINIS