Counter-Reformation Offensive and Gallican Response

In these same years, on the ideological level, a new Counter-Reformation offensive was even more effective in fueling the growth of the League. The recurring issue of the Trent decrees had arisen over registration of the Ordinances of Blois, in 1579, in which acceptance of some of the Trent decrees was slated—by Henri III—to be included. An assembly of the clergy at Melun, in June, had agreed to accept the Council ("with certain reservations"), but the Parlement, led by premier président de Thou and procureur général La Guesle, had passed an arrêt that added sans préjudice des droits du Roi, ni des arrêts de la Cour . This meant that to the requirement of royal approval was added the maintenance of l'appel comme d'abus and of the plurality of benefices. Defense of these two privileges was very important to the Parlement. Victor Martin believes that this was the chief motivation of the Gallican furor unleashed, which lasted for four years. He claims that Parlement was trying to revive the Pragmatic Sanction, et ils y arrivaient par un détour . The papal nuncio, Dandino, described the relevant text in the Ordinances of Blois as bel et bien un document schismatique . Gregory XIII felt that Dandino had bungled his assignment and replaced him by Giambattista Castelli, bishop of Rimini in 1581, with the specific task to procure the revocation of the Parlement's arrêt and the suppression of the offending section of the ordinances, or at least, its modification. The pope's own characterization of the text was "diabolical" and sufficient "to damn the king and the entire kingdom of France."^[26]

Both the pope and the king appointed commissions to negotiate the matter, procureur général La Guesle and président Barnabé Brisson representing the crown. For about a year negotiations were carried on, sporadically, and at times it seemed as if some accommodation might be reached, but political factors, delays, and especially acrimonious feuding within each camp prevented it. Among the issues was a "schism" among the Paris Cordeliers. It began as a simple division over the election of a new prior,

but the losing faction refused to accept defeat, and within a short time the royal court, the papal court, the ambassadors of Rome to Paris and Paris to Rome—and the leading parlementaires—were all actively involved. The affair dragged on for two years, and it is hard to say that anybody won, except that the papacy and the Trent decrees clearly lost, because the ordinances stood, despite threatened excommunications and the best efforts of a series of papal agents. The Gallican liberties were involved. La Guesle instigated procedures to cite an appel comme d'abus against the pope, and Christophe de Thou demanded that Castelli appear in person before the bar of Parlement.^[27]

The extreme language and immoderate behavior of Christophe de Thou in this affair was quite out of character, and he so far abandoned his usual dignity as to lose his temper in a conversation with Catherine de Médicis (whose help as a mediator had been sought by the king), by indulging in a tirade against the Italians who had "invaded" France "in order to enrich themselves and overturn the customs and laws of the country." As Martin remarks, he undoubtedly had in mind such families as the Gondi, the Sardini, and the Birague, but the daughter of the grand dukes of Tuscany took it as a personal insult. Parenthetically, we may assume that this must have been a painful occasion for all concerned. We recall that the queen mother had been influential in de Thou's selection for the high office, and they had on many occasions joined forces against extremists who threatened the frail equilibrium of the past twenty years. We should probably also bear in mind that de Thou had less than six months to live at the time. It is surprising, perhaps, that historian de Thou does not refer to this quarrel of the Cordeliers at all, since he went to such pains to clear his father's name from the accusation that he had approved the massacre, for instance. Victor Martin, by the way, either did not know what Jacques-Auguste has to say about this or did not believe it, as he recalls to his reader Christophe's opposition to the edicts of toleration—and adds, "the Catholicism of this politique is not suspect; his excess should be attributed only to his Gallican passions."^[28]

Meanwhile, Henri III's policy had taken an ultra turn. At one point he authorized the burning of the parlementaire arrêt in Castelli's presence, but this was never implemented. More importantly, he took as his confessor one of the cleverest of the "Jesuit politicians," Edmond Auger, and we recall

that this was the very time when his exaggerated religious practices became conspicuous.^[29]

After the death of Christophe de Thou, the problem did not disappear. The Gallican torch was picked up by Jacques Faye, avocat du roi in the Parlement. Victor Martin shows some compassion for de Thou as an opponent of the papacy and the Council decrees; his attitude toward Faye is unreservedly hostile, though he reluctantly admires his effectiveness. "Fierce Gallican, jurist and historian of the second rank, but an able and eloquent orator, Jacques Faye d'Espesses seems to have gathered in his heart all the hatred that a small number of French political figures ever had against the papacy." His speech to the commissioners, an "adroit mixture of old objections, regularly trotted out since 1564 . . . and outrageous insults to the pope and his government, in all, the boldest, most brutal, most unjust, but also the most complete and most effective indictment of all those in the [more than thirty] years of this controversy."^[30]

Faye's substantive points are indeed not new. Many of them go back to the lawyers of Philip the Fair, but they were fired like cannonballs at the advocates of the Trent decrees: the encroachments of the papacy in recent centuries on the secular powers in general and the Gallican liberties especially, and the resulting contrast to the former days when the king was obeyed in both temporal and spiritual matters and the kingdom was at peace, the people devout, and the bishops "learned and conscientious." Acceptance of the Trent decrees would make things even worse: "bit by bit we would become subjects of the pope." The specter of the Inquisition was again raised, with the prospect that not only the Huguenots but many good Catholics would burn. "If we search our consciences, how many of us would burn for Purgatory? for the intercession of saints? for communion in one kind? for images? . . . How much less for the primacy of the pope and his indulgences?"^[31]

It is interesting that in the heat of his oratory, Faye should choose examples that hint at personal liberal religious views, in explicitly spiritual matters. Gallican orations generally stuck very closely to the rights of the king, the independence of French bishops, the role of Parlement, with scrupulous avoidance of anything that was not legal or administrative.

Faye's concluding point is a patriotic appeal. He dwells at length on the

collaboration between the papacy and Philip of Spain, accord machiavellique . . . pour abaisser la France en la divisant . Victor Martin comments, "The Gallican who slumbers in the heart of every parlementaire, even the most Catholic and the most favorably disposed [to the Council and the papacy] was aroused, listening to Faye, and the fear of the ancient enemy was reinforced."^[32] Indeed, Faye's fusillade was fatal to Castelli's mission. He died, bitter and worn out, in Paris, after permission had been granted to return to Milan.

The partisan heat of these events had not cooled two years later, when a new pope entered the fray more directly. Sixtus V, who had made his reputation as the reformer of his Franciscan order, was also an astute politician. He wished to stamp out heresy in France and to promulgate the Trent decrees, like every other pontiff, but he did not wish credit for Catholic victories to be preempted by Spain. He specifically wished to strengthen France as a Catholic power in Europe , to offset Spanish predominance. By historical coincidence his reign began just when the new situation in France, with the death of Alençon and Navarre's becoming the immediate heir, opened a new era in the wars of religion, with the rise of the second League.^[33]

On September 9, 1585, Sixtus V issued a Bill of Excommunication against Henri de Navarre and Henri de Condé, declaring them incapable of succeeding to the throne of France and threatening excommunication of any Catholics who recognized their claims. "Another expression of opposition . . . written by the author of the present memoirs [L'Estoile], was sent to Rome from the Palais in Paris, and was included in the recueils of our times printed in La Rochelle, so great is the vanity and curiosity of our times."^[34]

If the pope and his ambassadors were the general staff of the clerical offensive, the privates of their army were the Parisian curés, who fought the battle in the front line. All the sources testify to their fanatical harassment of the king, royal favorites, those who supported him (politiques ), and anybody they could accuse of being lukewarm in defense of the faith, blackening them as fauteurs d'hérésie . The Parlement was a prime target. The fullest chronicle of this local-level clerical attack is L'Estoile's; his almost word-by-word record is valuable historically but often tiresomely repetitive

to read. From it we learn not only the common features of the party line, but some of the individual variations on the theme. Two entries of July 1587 are significant of the gathering storm:

Thursday, July 9, a picture was removed from the cemetery of St-Séverin, which the politiques call "the tableau of Madame de Montpensier," because it was put there by M. Jean Prévost, curé, at her request, so they say . . . and at the urging . . . of some of the asses of the Sorbonne. . . . This picture depicted with graphic detail the cruel and inhuman tortures of the Catholics by the queen of England. . . . It had been put there for the purpose of stirring up the people more and more to make war on the Huguenots . . . and even against the king, who the people (led by the preachers) say favors them secretly. And, in fact, the stupid people of Paris went in great numbers every day to see this beautiful picture and were moved by it, crying out that all politiques and heretics must be exterminated. For this reason the king had commanded the Parlement to have it removed, but as quietly as possible . . . to avoid a disturbance. . . .

We are not provided with good religious leaders in Paris this season . . . with the exception of seven or eight . . . they are all in the pay of the League, to take advantage of the gullibility of the people and stir up rebellion. . . . Instead of the word of God they preach I don't know what bigotry and hypocrisy . . . following the catechism of the League, which has produced more atheists than Catholics, and instilled superstition and rebellion instead of religion.

In September occurred one of the days that presaged the Barricades, nicknamed "La Journée de St-Séverin."

Wednesday, September 2, at six in the evening, great rumors spread through the quarter of the rue St-Jacques, and men rushed into the streets shouting "To arms! To arms! It is time for all good Catholics to show that they know the Huguenots are planning to kill the preachers!" [the curés of St-Séverin and St-Benoît, whom the king thought too insolent in their sermons]. And in truth, these two and most of the preachers of Paris admitted themselves that they preached only what was in the bulletins sent them by Madame de Montpensier.^[35]

De Thou's account has all the main facts, but, as usual, it lacks the color and personal opinion, predictable in the pages of a history as compared to

a diary.^[36] Pasquier gives an analysis of the phenomenon in a letter to Sainte-Marthe, written about two months before the explosion of the Barricades:

The preachers denounce from their pulpits [the king's conduct of affairs] and, because they see that he favors peace, they cry out against those who would restore public order as it was before the rise of the League, calling them sometimes politiques , sometimes machiavellians, that is, without any religion. Catholics thus are now divided into two camps; the ones that are called Leaguers are tightly embraced by the preachers, and the others politiques , whom they detest. . . . [They disagree as to whether the heretics should be exterminated, and both groups think the other's policy would be the ruin of the state.] In short, the politique shares the king's opinion, which is for peace, the ligueur that of M. de Guise, which is for war.^[37]

Pasquier goes on to say that he disapproves of members of the clergy, especially monks, who overreach themselves in presuming to pronounce on matters of state and to judge princes, a theme that appears frequently in the entries of the Mémoires-Journaux . These accounts are obviously examples of royalist/politique propaganda, but they are also accurate expressions of parlementaire opinion.

Both the king and the duke went to war in the autumn of 1587, as did the king of Navarre, who won his first great victory at the battle of Coutras, in which one of the king's two chief mignons , Joyeuse, leading the royalist forces, was killed. Joyeuse had deserted to the League and was mourned accordingly. The duc de Guise and Henri III himself were fighting the German mercenaries engaged in the Protestant cause. They were victorious, but

all the honor and credit was given to the duc de Guise throughout France and especially in Paris, where it caused great rejoicing (and to tell the truth he deserved a large part of the glory).

The king was nevertheless much put out by this, and even more when he heard that the preachers in Paris were saying from the pulpits that Saul had killed his thousands and David his ten thousands. . . .

Thus the victory of Auneau was the theme song of the League, the joy of the clergy . . . and the cause of the king's jealousy. He knew that these laurels were heaped on Guise to diminish his own. A truly miserable thing, for a great king to be jealous of his vassal.^[38]

All the politique commentators agree that the combined effect of these two victories was to spur the League into the active phase of the rebellion. Navarre's victory was a warning of impending doom should he become king—echoing the Tableau of Madame de Montpensier; and Guise's victory put the last Valois king at the greatest possible disadvantage in his subjects' eyes. Within a few days of the arrival of the news of Auneau in the capital, it set off a new and even bolder clerical offensive.^[39]