History of Civilization in England, Vol. 2 of 3. Henry Buckley
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Название: History of Civilization in England, Vol. 2 of 3
Автор: Henry Buckley
Издательство: Public Domain
Жанр: Зарубежная классика
isbn: http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/44494
isbn:
Such was, in France, the natural consequence of the power of the church being prolonged beyond the period which the exigencies of society required. But while this was the intellectual result, the moral and physical results were still more serious. While the minds of men were thus heated by religious strife, it would have been idle to expect any of those maxims of charity to which theological faction is always a stranger. While the Protestants were murdering the Catholics,16 and the Catholics murdering the Protestants, it was hardly likely that either sect should feel tolerance for the opinions of its enemy.17 During the sixteenth century, treaties were occasionally made between the two parties; but they were only made to be immediately broken;18 and, with the single exception of l'Hôpital, the bare idea of toleration does not seem to have entered the head of any statesman of the age. It was recommended by him;19 but neither his splendid abilities, nor his unblemished integrity, could make head against the prevailing prejudices, and he eventually retired into private life without effecting any of his noble schemes.20
Indeed, in the leading events of this period of French history, the predominance of the theological spirit was painfully shown. It was shown in the universal determination to subordinate political acts to religious opinions.21 It was shown in the conspiracy of Amboise, and in the conference of Poissy; and still more was it shown in those revolting crimes so natural to superstition, the massacres of Vassy and of St. Bartholomew, the murder of Guise by Poltrot, and of Henry III. by Clement. These were the legitimate results of the spirit of religious bigotry. They were the results of that accursed spirit, which, whenever it has had the power, has punished even to the death those who dared to differ from it; and which, now that the power has passed away, still continues to dogmatize on the most mysterious subjects, tamper with the most sacred principles of the human heart, and darken with its miserable superstitions those sublime questions that no one should rudely touch, because they are for each according to the measure of his own soul, because they lie in that unknown tract which separates the Finite from the Infinite, and because they are as a secret and individual covenant between Man and his God.
How long these sad days22 would, in the ordinary course of affairs, have been prolonged in France, is a question which we now perhaps have no means of answering; though there is no doubt that the progress even of empirical knowledge must, according to the process already pointed out, have eventually sufficed to rescue so great a country from her degraded position. Fortunately, however, there now took place what we must be content to call an accident, but which was the beginning of a most important change. In the year 1589, Henry IV. ascended the throne of France. This great prince, who was far superior to any of the French sovereigns of the sixteenth century,23 made small account of those theological disputes which his predecessors had thought to be of paramount importance. Before him, the kings of France, animated by the piety natural to the guardians of the church, had exerted all their authority to uphold the interests of the sacred profession. Francis I. said, that if his right hand were a heretic, he would cut it off.24 Henry II., whose zeal was still greater,25 ordered the judges to proceed against the Protestants, and publicly declared that he would ‘make the extirpation of the heretics his principal business.’26 Charles IX., on the celebrated day of St. Bartholomew, attempted to relieve the church by destroying them at a single blow. Henry III. promised to ‘oppose heresy even at the risk of his life;’ for he said, ‘he could not find a prouder grave than amidst the ruins of heresy.’27
These were the opinions expressed, in the sixteenth century, by the heads of the oldest monarchy in Europe.28 But with such feelings, the powerful intellect of Henry IV. had not the slightest sympathy. To suit the shifting politics of his age, he had already changed his religion twice; and he did not hesitate to change it a third time,29 when he found that by doing so he could ensure tranquillity to his country. As he had displayed such indifference about his own creed, he could not with decency show much bigotry about the creed of his subjects.30 We find, accordingly, that he was the author of the first public act of toleration which any government promulgated in France since Christianity had been the religion of the country. Only five years after he had solemnly abjured Protestantism, he published the celebrated Edict of Nantes,31 by which, for the first time, a Catholic government granted to heretics a fair share of civil and religious rights. This was, unquestionably, the most important event that had yet occurred in the history of French civilization.32 If it is considered by itself, it is merely an evidence of the enlightened principles of the king; but when we look at its general success, and at the cessation of religious war which followed it, we cannot fail to perceive that it was part of a vast movement, in which the people themselves participated. Those who recognize the truth of the principles I have laboured to establish, will expect that this great step towards religious liberty was accompanied by that spirit of scepticism, in the absence of which toleration has always been unknown. And that this was actually the case, may be easily proved by an examination of the transitionary state which France began to enter towards the end of the sixteenth century.
The writings of Rabelais are often considered to afford the first instance of religious scepticism in the French language.33 But, after a tolerably intimate acquaintance with the works of this remarkable man, I have found nothing to justify such an opinion. He certainly treats the clergy with great disrespect, and takes every opportunity of covering them with ridicule.34 His attacks, however, are always made upon their personal vices, and not upon that narrow and intolerant spirit to which those vices were chiefly to be ascribed. In not a single instance does he show any thing like consistent scepticism;35 nor does he appear to be aware that the disgraceful lives of the French clergy were but the inevitable consequence of a system, which, corrupt as it was, still possessed every appearance of strength and vitality. Indeed, the immense popularity which he enjoyed is, almost of itself, a decisive consideration; since no one, who is well informed as to the condition of the French early in the sixteenth century, will believe it possible that a people, so sunk in superstition, should delight in a writer by whom superstition is constantly attacked.
But the extension of experience, and the consequent increase of knowledge, were preparing the way for a great change in the French intellect. The process, which had just taken place in England, was now beginning to take place in France; and in both countries the order of events was precisely the same. The spirit of doubt, hitherto confined to an occasional solitary thinker, gradually assumed a bolder form: first it found a vent in the national literature, and then it influenced the conduct of practical statesmen. That there was, in France, an intimate connexion between scepticism and toleration, is proved, not only by those general arguments which make us infer that such connexion must always exist, but also by the circumstance, that only a few years before the promulgation of the Edict of Nantes, there appeared the first systematic sceptic who wrote in the French language. The Essays of Montaigne were published in 1588,36 and form an epoch, not only in the literature, but also in the civilization, of France. Putting aside personal peculiarities, which have less weight than is commonly supposed, it will be found that the difference СКАЧАТЬ
The crimes of the French Protestants, though hardly noticed in
In 1569 Corero writes: ‘Ritrovai quel regno, certo, posto in grandissima confusione; perchè, stante quella divisione di religione (convertita quasi in due fazioni e inimicizie particolari), era causa ch' ognuno, senza che amicizia o parentela potesse aver luoco, stava con l'orecchie attente; e pieno disospetto ascoltava da che parte nasceva qualche romore,’
For which l'Hôpital was accused of atheism: ‘Homo doctus, sed verus atheus.’
I have not been able to meet with any good life of this great man: that by Charles Butler is very superficial, and so is that by Bernardi, in
‘Ce fut alors que la nation ne prit conseil que de son fanatisme. Les esprits, de jour en jour plus échauffés, ne virent plus d'autre objet que celui de la religion, et par piété se firent les injures les plus atroces.’
The 19th and 20th volumes of
This, indeed, is not saying much; and far higher praise might be justly bestowed. As to his domestic policy, there can be only one opinion; and M. Flassan speaks in the most favourable terms of his management of foreign affairs.
So it is generally related: but there is a slightly different version of this orthodox declaration in
The historian of the French Protestants says, in 1548, ‘le nouveau roi Henry II. fut encore plus rigoureux que son père.’
M. Ranke (
He said this to the Estates of Blois in 1588.
With what zeal these opinions were enforced, appears, besides many other authorities, from Marino Cavalli, who writes in 1546, ‘Li maestri di Sorbona hanno autorità estrema di castigare li eretici, il che fanno con il fuoco, brustolandoli vivi a poco a poco.’
Indeed, Clement VIII. was afterwards apprehensive of a fourth apostasy: ‘Er meinte noch immer, Heinrich IV. werde zuletzt vielleicht wieder zum Protestantismus zurückkehren, wie er es schon einmal gethan.’
On his conversion, the character of which was as obvious then as it is now, compare
The edict of Nantes was in 1598; the abjuration in 1593.
Of this edict, Sismondi says, ‘Aucune époque dans l'histoire de France ne marque mieux peut-être la fin d'un monde ancien, le commencement d'un monde nouveau.’
On Rabelais, as the supposed founder of French scepticism, compare
Particularly the monks. See, among numerous other instances, vol. i. pp. 278, 282, vol. ii. pp. 284, 285, of
His joke on the strength of Samson (
The two first books in 1580; the third in 1588, with additions to the first two. See