The "Wars of religion" had left the Church of France in a state of miserable depression and disorder. From an official report made to the King by the Assembly of the clergy in 1595, we learn that at that time three-fourths of the parochial churches were unprovided with legitimate pastors. Out of fourteen archiepiscopal sees, six or seven were without occupants; from thirty to forty bishoprics were vacant out of a total of about a hundred; and several of the existing prelates had been elected uncanonically and by discreditable means. With regard to abbeys, the destitution was still worse; in twenty-five dioceses there were one hundred and twenty conventual houses without qualified superiors. "These foundations," said the Bishop of Le Mans, who spoke on this occasion on behalf of the clergy, "are managed as to temporal matters (the spiritual administration is scarcely thought of at all), by certain laymen, who appropriate the revenues dedicated by the founders to the service of God, and enjoy them under the name of some hireling substitute. The spiritual rule and government of these houses, which is a matter of Divine right, and for which persons of the highest merit for piety and learning ought to be chosen, is sold for hard cash, bestowed as a marriage portion, bartered for worldly goods, and this openly, with the knowledge of your Majesty and your Council. The fold being thus deprived of true shepherds, the sheep are scattered abroad, and the ravening wolf, finding none to oppose him, preys upon them at his will. The sins thereby committed draw down upon us the wrath of God, and make the service of His Church offensive to Him."

The bishop proceeded to entreat the king to restore to the Church the right of free election; and to authorise the publication of the bulls of Pius V and Sixtus V against "confidences"."Such elections would fill our ranks with learned divines, faithful pastors, and able rulers, who would raise the Church in this realm into a flourishing condition; while the constitutions we refer to, if published and executed, would remove the curse that now lies upon us by reason of the crying sin of simony."

The clergy complain further, that the civil power had lately made bold encroachments on the spiritual; the Grand Conseil having taken upon itself to grant to its own nominees ecclesiastical preferment of all kinds, even the highest; and to such a scandalous extent had this been carried, that children, mere schoolboys, were placed in the position of spiritual heads and governors of religious houses. The Council had also presumed to grant dispensations of marriage, licences for plurality of benefices, and absolutions for canonical irregularities—matters belonging exclusively to the jurisdiction of the Sovereign Pontiff. In conclusion, they express their hope that, as his Majesty naturally desired that those things which are Caesar's should be rendered to Caesar, so he would not be less solicitous to render to God the things which be God's.

The king, in his reply, promised to do his utmost to remedy the abuses and corruptions specified; and in particular, he declared that vacancies in the episcopate should henceforth be filled by persons competent to preach, and to execute all other duties of their office. At the same time he administered a sharp rebuke to the clergy, whose personal misconduct was, in his Majesty's judgment, the main cause of existing evils. He accused them of having instigated the aggressive interference of foreign powers in France; of scandalous maladministration of their dioceses; of caring little for the honour of God in comparison with their own interest, convenience, and enjoyment; of squandering upon mere worldly objects the revenues which should be consecrated to the work of the Church. To such causes, he said, he attributed the rise and growth of religious dissension in the kingdom; and if the clergy desired to see a return to unity and concord, they must undertake in good earnest their own part in the work of general reformation.

It was the first and indispensable condition of improvement that they should set an edifying example to the people by word and deed. This was the true method to appease the wrath of God, to secure success in public affairs, and to make converts to the Catholic religion. If he could once see the ecclesiastical body thoroughly reformed, he would engage to bring back the Huguenots to the bosom of the Church.

Very similar representations were made by the clerical Assemblies of 1598, 1600, 1602, and 1605. On the latter occasion, in addition to the usual denunciations of simony, uncanonical elections, and mismanagement of Church property, the clergy urgently petitioned for the publication of the Council of Trent. They reminded the king that the same desire had been repeatedly expressed before, both by General Assemblies and by provincial Councils. It was grievous that France, which had for its sovereign the "eldest son of the Church", should have the appearance of being schismatic, and disobedient to injunctions so sacred, to decrees enacted so unquestionably under the guidance of the Divine Spirit. How long were human reasonings to prevail in opposition to the behests of Heaven? How long was the sacred to give way to the secular, the will of God to the cavillings of man? If there was anything in the Tridentine statutes that seemed inconsistent with the legislation of France, it was, in fact, of so small importance, that in a single conference between the bishops, the Council of State, and the Parliament, they would engage that perfect satis- faction should be given to his Majesty on that head.

In answer to this harangue, the King fully admitted the magnitude of the evils under which the Church still laboured; and, with respect to the Council of Trent, assured the clergy that he was as anxious as they themselves could be to see it duly promulgated. "But, as you remind me very truly," said Henry, taking a somewhat unfair advantage of an expression which had fallen from the Archbishop of Vienne, "considerations of temporal policy sometimes come into collision with the dictates of heavenly wisdom." At the same time he promised that no effort should be spared on his part to promote the efficiency of the Church and the triumph of true religion; and he took the prelates present to witness that he had never bestowed preferment on any but well-qualified persons.

This course had already produced a considerable change for the better, and by adhering to it a still further improvement might be expected for the future. As to the simoniacal practices complained of, it was for those among the clergy who felt themselves justly chargeable with such offences to make voluntary reparation by resigning forth with the preferments thus unlawfully acquired;—an example which would demonstrate their sincerity as Church reformers, and which could not fail to have a powerful effect upon the minds of the laity.

The dilapidated and ruinous condition of ecclesiastical buildings was another pitiable feature of the Church of France at this epoch. The 'Gallia Christiana' enumerates upwards of 150 cathedral and abbey churches which had been demolished by the Huguenots. This list does not include the parochial churches ravaged by the sectaries in places captured by their troops, such as Orleans, Soissons, Auxerre, Montpellier, Nimes, Montauban, Castres, and others. In the district of Beauce three hundred churches were destroyed: five hundred shared the same fate in the dioceses of Uzès, Viviers, Nimes, and Mende. Fearful profanations and devastations were committed in the cities of Perigueux, Lodève, Foix, La Charité, and especially at Orleans, where not a single Catholic church was left standing.

In short, wherever the Calvinists had the upper hand, the sanctuaries of the Church, and conventual houses of all kinds, were sacrificed without mercy to their furious passions.

No sooner was peace restored, than the bishops and clergy, zealously seconded by the faithful of all classes, applied themselves to the vast task of rebuilding these sacred edifices throughout the land. Henry IV and his Queen laid the first stone of the new cathedral of Sainte Croix at Orleans on the 17th of April, 1601; and promised a princely contribution towards the completion of the work for ten years following. During the first decade of the century two other churches were built at Orleans; six at Paris, including those belonging to the convents of the Recollets, the Carmelites, and the Feuillans; the much-admired Church of Notre-Dame de Clery, in the Orleanois; and several founded in different parts of the country under the auspices of the Jesuits after their re-establishment in France. These were placed in the towns where the Order had its principal houses, such as La Flêche, Moulins, Rennes, Poitiers, Amiens, and Caen. That at La Flêche is a structure of remarkable beauty.

The conversion of the sovereign to Catholicism naturally formed a prelude to a considerable movement in the same direction among the Huguenots, particularly those of the higher and better educated classes. During the reign of Henry IV this was the principal field in which the Galilean clergy exhibited their zeal; and their success was such as to produce a marked effect upon the general tone and spirit of society with regard to religion. In connexion with this important feature of the time it will be suitable to place before the reader some account of the character and labours of Cardinal Du Perron.

Jacques Davy du Perron belonged to a family of good repute in Lower Normandy. His parents, having embraced the "new doctrine", emigrated into Switzerland to avoid molestation on account of their belief; and it was in the Canton of Berne that the future prelate and cardinal first saw the light, on the 25th of November, 1556. The earliest religious notions instilled into him were, of course, those of the Reformers; his father, a man of superior acquirements, directed his education up to the age of ten years. The lad discovered extraordinary capacity, and an insatiable love of learning. He devoted himself to study, and in the course of a few years made surprising progress in various branches of knowledge—in the classical languages, in mathematics, logic, philosophy, and natural sciences.

The family returned to France on the pacification with the Huguenots in 1576; and, not long afterwards, the mind of young Du Perron became unsettled with respect to certain articles of the Calvinist creed. It is said that his doubts were first suggested by reading a treatise "On the Church", written by the well-known Duplessis - Mornay in defence of Protestantism. With characteristic zeal he at once entered on an investigation of the whole controversy between Rome and Geneva. The works of the Fathers and Schoolmen—particularly those of Augustine and Thomas Aquinas— gradually opened his eyes to the hollowness of the system in which he had been nurtured; and his researches left him profoundly convinced of the truth and authority of the Catholic religion, Du Perron lost no time in abjuring the heresy of Calvin; and, having resolved to embrace the ecclesiastical profession, he received holy orders in 1577. Immediately afterwards he was appointed reader to Henry III; and, after the assassination of that monarch, he obtained a place in the household of the Cardinal of Bourbon, whom the League dignified with the empty title of King. But in 1591 he attached himself to the cause of Henry IV; who quickly recognized his talents, and raised him in due time to the highest stations in the Church. Du Perron now devoted his vast stores of learning, and his remarkable argumentative powers, to the work of converting the Huguenots to the true faith. His labours were richly rewarded, and he became, perhaps, the most successful agent in the great revival of religion which distinguished this epoch in France.

In December, 1593, Du Perron sustained a controversial discussion with some Protestant ministers at Mantes, by the special permission of the king, and under conditions prescribed by him. With one of them named Rotan, a man highly esteemed by his co-religionists, he debated the question, "whether Holy Scripture is sufficient to salvation"; and we learn from L'Estoile that, after arguing for several hours, the Huguenot divine had the manliness and candour to confess himself vanquished. The next day François Becault, another eminent minister, experienced a like defeat.

Shortly after Henry's reconciliation to the Church, Du Perron, to whose influence that step was in great measure due, was nominated to the see of Evreux, in succession to Claude de Saintes. The king now despatched him as special envoy to Rome, where we have already seen him taking a principal part in the negociations which ended in his master's recognition by the Papal Court. During his stay at Rome he was consecrated Bishop of Evreux by Cardinal de Joyeuse, Archbishop of Rouen, on the 27th December, 1595. Returning to France, he renewed his public disputations with the Calvinists—an arena in which he never failed to figure to advantage. A long list of conversions attested his prowess. Among his conquests were Pierre Palma-Cayet, autlior of the 'Chronologie Novenaire; Nicolas Harlai de Sancy, a confidential friend of Henry IV; and Spondanus, or De Sponde, afterwards Bishop of Pamiers, the continuator of the Annals of Baronius. But it was in his famous conference with Duplessis-Mornay, in the year 1600, that the genius of Du Perron achieved its most brilliant triumph. Some detailed account of this occurrence, which at the time created an immense sensation, will doubtless be acceptable to the reader.

Duplessis-Mornay, at this time Governor of Saumur, was no less eminent for his zeal in defence of the doctrines of the Reformation than for his ability as a politician and diplomatist. His authority with his co-religionists was such that he was commonly styled "the Huguenot Pope". He had lately published a book entitled 'L'Institution de l'Eucharistie,' in which he undertook to prove that the Calvinist view of that Sacranaent is supported by the unanimous testimony of all Christian ages. It possessed considerable merit, both in point of style and learning; but the writer had unfortunately taken upon trust the quotations from the Fathers furnished to him by the Huguenot ministers, without troubling himself to verify them by personal research. These quotations were to a great extent garbled, mutilated, and perverted from their real meaning; and the result upon Mornay's line of argument may be easily imagined. The truth was speedily detected by the orthodox divines, among others by the Bishop of Evreux. The book had been sent to him by Sully, whose party had taught him to regard it as a masterpiece; and great must have been his surprise on learning from the prelate that it was full of errors from beginning to end. "Not," said Du Perron, "that I wish to charge M. Duplessis with intentional bad faith; but I regret that he has been so unfortunate as to rely upon the romances of mere compilers, who have treated him extremely ill."

Mornay, on being informed of the bishop's accusation—that the work contained at least five hundred falsified quotations—challenged him to prove this publicly; and Du Perron having signified his willingness, a request was made to the king that the question thus raised might be argued before appointed witnesses in his Majesty's presence. Henry assented, not without some malicious satisfaction at seeing his ancient comrade enter the lists with so accomplished an antagonist; and the passage of arms was fixed to take place at the Palace of Fontainebleau in the month of May, 1600.

Commissioners were appointed to superintend the proceedings; the president de Thou, Franjois Pithou the advocate, and Martin the king's reader, acting for the Catholics, and Isaac Casaubon and Canaye de Fresne, president of one of the "chambres mi-parties", for the Protestants. As the important day approached, Mornay betrayed symptoms of hesitation and shrinking from the contest. Difficulties were started as to the form, subjectmatter, and extent of the controversy ; but these were at length overruled, and the Conference was opened on the 4th of May in the council chamber of the palace, before the king, the Chancellor Bellièvre, the ministers of state, and a large audience of distinguished personages.

Sixty passages had been selected for examination, but, at the request of Mornay, these were reduced at the last moment to nineteen, and only nine were actually discussed. The first extract was from Joannes Scotus, on the Real Presence. Scotus, after the usual fashion of the Schoolmen, first proposes the point to be argued in the form of a question, then subjoins a negative—"videtur quod non"—on the part of a supposed opponent, and lastly proceeds to refute this fallacy and establish the truth.

Mornay, from want of familiarity with this quaint mode of reasoning, mistook the negative position for the conclusion of Scotus himself; and thus attributed to him the very sentiment which it was his object to confute. It appeared that he had repeated this blunder with regard to the second passage, which was taken from Durandus.

The third and fourth quotations were from St. Chrysostom, on the invocation of saints; these were proved to have been mutilated by Mornay or his friends, by the omission of some essential words.

The fifth, from St. Jerome, on the same subject, was found to be curtailed in like manner.

The sixth, on the use of the sign of the cross, attributed by Mornay to St. Cyril, was not to be discovered in any part of that father's writings.

The seventh was from a law of the Emperor Theodosius, which Mornay had copied correctly from a treatise by Crinitus, but it seems that the latter had misquoted it.

The eighth, from St. Bernard, consisted of two passages which had been jumbled together in such a way as materially to alter the meaning.

And with regard to the ninth, which was cited by Mornay from Theodoret as relating to image worship, it appeared that the historian was not speaking at all of the worship of Christians, but of the idolatry of Pagans.

At seven in the evening the king adjourned the Conference to the next day. But during the night Mornay was suddenly taken ill; De Rivière, the King's physician, found him suffering severely with vomiting, shivering, and pains in the limbs; and in the morning he declared himself incapable of resuming the disputation. The Commissioners were accordingly dismissed.

On the 8th of May Mornay quitted Fontainebleau and retired to Saumur, without taking leave of the king; and this precipitate abandonment of the field was naturally interpreted as a confession of defeat. After a time, the fallen hero thought it necessary to make some movement for the purpose of covering his disgrace. With this view he published a statement under the title of 'Discours Veritable', in which, after making bitter complaints against the king, the Chancellor, the Commissioners, and especially against Du Perron, he proceeded to give his own version of the conference at Fontainebleau;—a version, it need hardly be said, in the highest degree favourable to himself.

By way of reply, Du Perron contented himself with making public the official acts of the Conference, attested by the sign-manual of the king, and accompanied by a letter from the Chancellor. To these documents he added a brief and pungent 'Refutation du faux Discours,' from his own pen.

In the dedication of this volume to the king, Du Perron indulges in the following somewhat caustic remarks: —"If M. du Plessis does not feel satisfied with what has passed, he has still in his hands the fifty-two remaining articles of the first day's discussion, which he carried away without taking leave of any one, and which since then he must have had abundant time to study. I am quite ready to give him the same opportunity of exercising his talents upon these, and afterwards upon the rest of the five hundred which I spoke of; and this I shall do all the more willingly, inasmuch as the authors are of more weight, the topics of more importance, and the misstatements more outrageous."

Sully relates that, during the progress "of the debate at Fontainebleau, the king turned to him, and said, "Well, what do you think now of your Pope?" ''It seems to me. Sire," replied the Duke, "that he is more of a Pope than your Majesty supposes; for at this moment he is giving the red hat to the Bishop of Evreux."

The fame of Du Perron received, indeed, no small additional lustre from the result of the Conference. The Pope sent him an autograph letter of congratulation in the most flattering terms. The King, writing to the Duke of Epernon, announced that "the diocese of Evreux had gained a signal victory over that of Saumur; that it was one of the greatest strokes of success that had been made by the Church for a long while; and that proceedings of this kind would effect more towards bringing back the Protestants to the Church than fifty years of war and violence."

In 1604, Du Perron was promoted to the archbishopric of Sens, and appointed Grand Almoner of France; and in the same year he was elevated by Clement VIII to the dignity of cardinal.

All circumstances considered, it is not surprising to find that the Fontainebleau Conference was followed by several notable conversions to Catholicism. Ste. Marie du Mont, one of the gentlemen of the king's chamber, was the first to give this practical testimony to Du Perron's superiority. It was he who had been the original promoter of the controversy, by directing the bishop's attention to the rash challenge of Duplessis-Mornay, and entreating him to answer it. Already half-resolved to abandon Calvinism, Ste. Marie took leave of his remaining scruples in the course of the discussion; and on its conclusion forthwith re-entered the communion of the Church.

Canaye de Fresne, after acting as one of the Protestant Moderators at the Conference, scandalized his party by taking a similar step shortly afterwards.

Isaac Casaubon, the other commissioner on the Huguenot side, is said to have been profoundly affected by Du Perron's reasonings; but, being of a timid, hesitating disposition, he could not summon sufficient courage to act on his conviction. Casaubon was a man of extensive learning, and one of the best classical scholars of the day. He had filled the post of Professor of Greek in the University of Montpellier. Henry IV, who valued him highly, summoned him to Paris, and made him his librarian. Casaubon had, for some time, been much dissatisfied with many of the tenets of Calvin, and with the general course of the Reformation. "I cannot conceal my disquietude," he writes to one of his friends, "at the wide divergence of our belief from that of the ancient Church. For, not to enter upon other subjects, Luther departed from the primitive doctrine as to the Sacraments; Zwingle differs from Luther; Calvin disagrees with both ; and more recent teachers have abandoned Calvin. For it appears to me most certain that the doctrine of Calvin on the Eucharist is greatly at variance with that laid down in Du Moulin's treatise on that Sacrament, which is now generally taught in our churches. Hence the opponents of Du Moulin charge him with being no less adverse to the sentiments of Calvin than to those of every ancient doctor of the Church. If we continue to go on at this rate, where is it all to end?"

But, although he had little or no faith in the principles of the Reformation, Casaubon could not make up his mind to an unqualified acceptance of the system of the Church of Rome. By way of a mezzo-termine, he resolved, after prolonged indecision, to adopt the communion of the Chureh of England; and quitting France, under circumstances apparently not very creditable to his sincerity and honour, he proceeded to London. He now ingratiated himself with King James I, who gave him a prebendal stall at Canterbury, and afterwards another at Westminster. One of his sons, however, was honest enough to abjure the Reformed religion, and took the vows as a Capuchin monk. His father's words, on parting with him, were characteristic. " I give you my blessing with all my heart. I condemn you not; I beg you not to condemn me. Jesus Christ will judge us both." Casaubon died in England in 1614, and was buried in the Abbey Church of Westminster.

Du Perron, as Cardinal, Grand Almoner, and Archbishop of Sens (which province at that time included the capital and the diocese of Paris), took a conspicuous part in the administration of affairs both in Church and State. He soon proved himself a strenuous supporter of Ultramontane doctrine, and a powerful champion of Papal interests. In the many anxious questions which were debated in his time in the Roman consistory, the opinion of Du Perron always carried extraordinary weight, and rarely failed to command the assent of the majority. Such, indeed, was the fascination of his eloquence, that Pope Paul V was accustomed to say to the cardinals around him, "Let us all pray God to inspire Cardinal Du Perron ; for he will make us believe whatever he pleases."

Amid the seductions of general admiration and brilliant success, this great prelate seems to have preserved much simplicity and modesty of character. He was ever ready to acknowledge to their full extent the gifts and powers of others, and to depreciate his own in comparison. "To convince is but a small thing," he was wont to say; "to convert is the grand difficulty. I may be able to silence heretics, but the man to convert them is François de Sales." The celebrated person here named (to whose history the reader's attention will be called hereafter) was at this time beginning to attract notice and interest in France.

François de Sales, then coadjutor to the Bishop of Geneva, preached the course of Lent sermons in the chapel of the Louvre in the year 1602, and produced a marvellous impression, not only on Henry IV and his family, but on the Huguenot nobility, who flocked in crowds to hear him; several of them are said to have been converted in consequence.

The Galilean Church possessed at this period, besides Du Perron, six other prelates who had attained the rank of cardinal. These were—(1.) Franpois de Joyeuse, Archbishop of Narbonne, afterwards of Toulouse, and finally of Rouen. De Joyeuse was raised to the purple by Gregoiy XIII in 1583. The greater part of his life was passed in diplomatic employments. For several years he was agent for the Duke of Mayenne and the League at the Court of Rome; but on the conversion of Henfy IV he at once declared in his favour, and exerted all his influence to procure his absolution at the hands of Clement VIII. Perhaps the most important transaction in which this cardinal figured was the reconciliation effected by his means between the Venetian States and the Church, after the rash interdict inflicted on the Republic by Paul V. De Joyeuse enjoyed a high place in the confidence of Henry IV, and was named by him a member of the Council of Regency in 1610, in the prospect of his setting out to join the army a few days before his assassination. The Cardinal died in 1615.

(2.) Arnaud d'Ossat was a remarkable instance of elevation, by the force of personal merit, from obscurity and poverty to the highest posts of dignity and honour. His father was a blacksmith in a small hamlet of Languedoc. Both his parents died while he was a mere child, and he was left friendless and destitute in the world. A chai-itable gentleman in the neighbourhood took pity on him, and had him educated as a companion to his nephew. His powers of mind rapidly developed, and he prosecuted his studies with unremitting energy and surprising success. For some time he practised as a barrister, but abandoned that profession on being appointed secretary to the French ambassador at Rome, and from that time forth he was identified with the diplomatic intercourse between France and the Holy See. Upon the death of the ambassador De Foix, D'Ossat succeeded to the post of charge d'affaires at Rome, and in that capacity conducted the intricate ecclesiastical negociations of the earlier part of the reign of Henry IV. His services in the affair of the King's reconciliation with the Pope were rewarded with the bishopric of Rennes, from which he was afterwards translated to Bayeux. D'Ossat was created a Cardinal in 1598, and continued to reside chiefly at Eome as the official representative of his sovereign until his death, which happened in 1604.

(3.) François d'Escoubleau de Sourdis was the eldest son of a noble family; and, had he pursued the walk of life for which he was originally destined, would doubtless have risen to high rank at court and in the army. But his impressions of religion were so deep and strong that he found it no difficult task to forego his brilliant prospects in the world. Having taken orders, he devoted himself energetically to the work of the ministry, and acquired a distinguished reputation in the south of France. Clement VIII, at the personal solicitation of Henry IV, gave him a cardinal's hat in 1598, and he was named to the archbishopric of Bordeaux in the same year. Cardinal de Sourdis administered his diocese with exemplary zeal, vigour, and piety; insomuch that he was commonly called the "French Borromeo." He laboured earnestly, and with considerable success, to restore discipline, and raise the standard of professional exertion, among his clergy ; and a provincial Council which he held at Bordeaux in 1624 is an event of no small importance in the ecclesiastical annals of the time. This admirable prelate died in 1628, and was succeeded as archbishop by his brother, Henri de Sourdis;—a man of ability, but of a disposition more ambitious and warlike than became his profession. He acted as second in command to Cardinal Richelieu at the famous siege of La Rochelle.

(4.) Pierre de Gondi, a member of the great Florentine family of that name, was consecrated Bishop of Langres in 1566, and translated to Paris two years afterwards. He was a prelate of high merit, and conducted himself with singular moderation and discretion during the troubles of the League. Pope Sixtus V made him a cardinal in 1587. Some years afterwards he resigned the bishopric of Paris in favour of his nephew, Henri de Gondi. He died in 1616. The see of Paris, it should be noticed, was occupied successively by four prelates of the Gondi family. The first was Pierre de Gondi, above mentioned; the second, his nephew Henri, son of the first Due de Retz, and a favourite counsellor of Louis XIII. The third, Jean François de Gondi, brother of the preceding, was the first archbishop of Paris; the see having been detached from the province of Sens, and raised to metropolitical rank, by Gregory XV in 1622. The fourth, Jean François Paul, son of Philippe Comte de Joigny, was the celebrated Cardinal de Retz, the demagogue of the Fronde; a man whose name is associated in history with pursuits and qualities the most diametrically opposite to those of the ecclesiastical profession. He became Archbishop of Paris on the death of his uncle in 1654.

(5.) Anne Escars de Givri, Bishop of Lisieux, and afterwards of Metz, had been a zealous member of the Catholic League; and as such, his elevation to the Cardinalate in 1596 was by no means acceptable to Henry IV. Appreciating, however, the prelate's many excellent qualities, Henry treated him with favour and confidence, and advanced him to the see of Metz. Cardinal de Givri died in 1612.

(6.) Charles, Cardinal of Lorraine, was the son of Charles, Duke of Lorraine, by the Princess Claude, daughter of King Henry II. He was Bishop of Metz, and subsequently of Strasburg, and was created cardinal by Sixtus V in 1589. He died at an early age in 1607.

The general spirit of Henry's policy in the earlier part of his reign was, naturally and pre-eminently, that of conciliation. The Edict of Nantes was one movement of vast importance in this direction. It was closely followed by another of scarcely less moment, but prompted by very different considerations, and tending towards almost opposite results, namely, the recall of the banished Jesuits to France.

On the 29th of December, 1594, at a moment when the popular mind was violently exasperated by the attempt of Jean Chatel to assassinate the king on his return from Amiens, the Parliament of Paris had published an arret by which all members of the "so-called Society of Jesus" were expelled from the kingdom, "as corrupters of youth, disturbers of the public peace, and enemies to the King and the State." The property of the Order was confiscated; Jean Chatel's house was levelled with the ground; and an obelisk was raised on the spot, with an inscription which recorded that his crime was dictated by "that pestilent sect of heretics, who, masking under the garb of piety the most atrocious wickedness, had of late publicly maintained that it was lawful to take the life of the king". The sentence of banishment was executed only within the jurisdiction of the Parliament of Paris. In other parts of France—in Languedoc, Gascony, and Lorraine—the residence of the Jesuits was connived at, and their educational labours were not interrupted. No sooner had the king reconciled himself with the Holy See, than representations reached him from many quarters in behalf of the proscribed followers of Loyola. Cardinal de Medicis, the Pope's legate, assured him, in the name of the Holy Father, that he could not do a greater service to the Church than by taking measures for their restoration, and reminded him that he had made a promise to that effect on the occasion of his absolution. Apology after apology was put forth by members and friends of the Order, elaborately defending it from the imputations of regicide and revolutionary doctrine, and indignantly repudiating all complicity with the traitorous deed of Chatel. The popular persuasion, that the Jesuits were intimately leagued with the enemies of France, and were unscrupulous agents of Philip of Spain, was combated with vehement earnestness. At length, on the 1st of January, 1600, the project of re-establishment was mooted in the royal Council; the king, however, acted with caution, and, finding that several of the ministers were adverse to it, postponed the matter for further consideration.

Three years later it was resumed, and this time with practical effect. Just at that moment, the French Protestants held a general Synod at Gap in Dauphiné; and here, among other extravagant proceedings, they added to their Confession a new article of faith, affirming the Pope to be Antichrist—the "son of perdition" predicted by St. Paul—the "beast" of Daniel and of the Apocalypse. It appears that they adopted this offensive dogma because it was thought necessary to support one of their pastors named Ferrier, who had lately maintained the same sentiment, and had encouraged his brethren in holding like intemperate language. The good sense of Sully revolted against this strange piece of synodical legislation. He remonstrated with some of the leading ministers; and his arguments, accompanied by an intimation of the King's serious displeasure, procured at length the suppression of the article in question. The Pope, however, was so vehement in his indignation, that Henry found considerable difficulty in appeasing him; and, according to Sully's account, it was chiefly with a view to give his Holiness satisfaction for the offence that he now finally determined on re-establishing the Jesuits.

During a visit which the king made to Metz, in March, 1603, certain of the Jesuit fathers were received by him at a private audience, being introduced by the Duke of Epernon and a favourite courtier named Fouquet de la Varenne. The Provincial, Ignace Armand, took care to improve the opportunity, and succeeded in obtaining from his Majesty an assurance that they would not have long to wait for decisive measures in their favour. On his return to the capital, Henry assembled the Council of State, and laid before them his design for re-instating the Society of Jesus. The members present were the Constable Montmorency, the Chancellor Belliévre, the Secretary of State Villeroi, Sully, Chateauneuf, Pontcarré, and the presidents of the Parliament Sillery, De Vic, Calignon, Caumartin, Jeannin, and De Thou. The majority of these were favourably disposed towards the Jesuits; and as it was understood that the monarch's mind was already made up on the subject, little or no discussion took place. The only objector was De Thou, who proposed that the case should be referred to the Parliament, and that its decision should be final. The veteran Sully avoided giving his opinion at the Council board; but the next day he sought an interview with Henry, and candidly expressed his sense of the inexpediency and danger of the proposed scheme. His arguments were strongly flavoured, as was natural, by his religious prejudices; but they displayed at the same time remarkable sagacity and foresight. He urged that the Jesuits, adepts as they were notoriously in all the arts of intrigue, would not fail to stir up bitterness and animosity between his Majesty's subjects of the two rival communions; that, if restored unconditionally, they would make such use of the various expedients at their command, in private familiar intercourse, in the pulpit, and, above all, in the confessional, as would array class against class in open enmity, and sooner or later precipitate the kingdom once more into civil war. He feared, moreover, that they would completely gain the ear, and perhaps the heart, of the monarch himself; and would exercise their influence by excluding from, and admitting to, his presence and councils whatever individuals they pleased. He reminded him, again, of the absolute subserviency of the Jesuits to their General and to the Pope; the former of whom was always a Spaniard, while the latter was dependent upon the King of Spain for the security of his Italian possessions. Lastly, he appealed to Henry's personal experience of their ill-will, and pointed out that it was their interest to place another prince upon the throne, in whom they might hope to find a more passive instrument of their own purposes.

Some of these anticipations have almost a prophetic air, when we regard them in connection with certain passages in the subsequent history of the Jesuits in France.

Henry, in reply, told Sully that, as he was now situated, he must of necessity do one of two things; either completely reinstate the Jesuits, or expel them from France more rigorously than ever. In the latter case they would be driven to extremities and would inevitably embark in desperate conspiracies against his life; and, in spite of all precautions, they might one day succeed in their design. This, it appears, was a risk which even the chivalrous Henry had no mind to incur if he could avoid it. The force of such a consideration was, of course, irresistible. Sully remained silent; and the king proceeded to give effect to his determination.

The ordonnance recalling the Jesuits was signed at Rouen in September, 1603; but on being presented to the Parliament of Paris for registration, it met with a warm and obstinate resistance. The magistrates proceeded in a body to the Louvre, headed by their first president, Achille de Harlai; who, in a speech full of energetic eloquence, laboured to dissuade the sovereign from a step so pregnant with disaster both to the royal person and to the State. "His harangue," says Dupleix, "was an outrageous philippic, crammed with all the abuse which had been heaped on the Society in the pleadings of Pasquier and Arnauld, the Catechism of the said Pasquier, and by the author of the Franc-advis, rather than a fair and reasonable remonstrance."

It was, however, a performance of considerable talent. De Harlai adverted to the strong opposition which had been raised by the Sorbonne and by the clergy of all ranks to the original introduction of the Jesuits into France. The Sorbonne had warned the Government of that day that if this step were taken, it would not be for edification but for destruction. He enlarged on the dangerous character of an order of men claiming to be exempt from all jurisdiction, spiritual and temporal, except that of the Pope; and holding, as a fundamental maxim, that the Pope may excommunicate kings, and that an excommunicated king is no better than a tyrant, so that all men may lawfully rise against him. He intimated to the king that his predecessors, even those who were most disposed to govern absolutely, had always been accustomed to regulate affairs connected with public justice by the advice of their Parliament, and to submit their own inclinations to the authority of the laws. " We entreat you, Sire," he concluded, "to uphold these powers which have always been legally vested in your Parliamentary Courts. If they should unhappily be lost, pardon us for observing that the loss would fall, not upon the Parliament, but upon yourself."

The friends of the Jesuits were somewhat apprehensive that Henry might not be able to reply off-hand to the studied and dignified address of the Chief Magistrate. He acquitted himself, however, with an ease, force, and mastery both of argument and language, which far surpassed their expectations. De Thou, and other writers hostile to the Order, contest the authenticity of the speech commonly attributed to his Majesty on this occasion; but there are no sufficient grounds for questioning it. It is given at length by the contemporary historian Pierre Matthieu, who is known to have been furnished with materials for his work by the king himself; and all the evidence derivable from its style and phraseology is strongly in favour of its genuineness.

Henry assured them that the difficulties which they had started were only such as he bimself had fully considered during many years past; and hinted that, in taking cognizance of state affairs of that description, they had travelled beyond their legitimate sphere. With regard to the Colloquy of Poissy (on which occasion the Society had first succeeded in establishing itself in France), he observed that things would have gone better for the Catholics if all had played their part flith the same ability as was displayed by a certain Jesuit (Lainez), who fortunately happened to be there.

"Ignorance," he continued, "has been in all ages the malicious enemy of knowledge; and I have remarked that ever since I first began to speak of restoring the Jesuits, two classes of men have been foremost in opposing it,—those who belong to the pretended Reformed religion, and ecclesiastics of disreputable lives; and this has served to make them all the more entitled to esteem. If the Sorbonne formerly condemned them, this was done, after your own example at present, without knowing much about them; I believe that the existing Theological Faculty estimates them very highly. The University opposed them, because they teach better than others ; this is the real reason why the University is deserted, as you complain, since their expulsion, and why students flock after them to Douai and other places, both within and beyond the kingdom. You say, again, that the Jesuits attract superior minds, and choose their members from among the best of men. I commend them for so doing. I desire that the best men we can procure should be chosen to serve as soldiers, and that none but those who deserve it shall be admitted to seats on the judicial bench; I wish that in all professions virtue and merit should be the main distinctions between man and man. It is objected that they gain entrance into cities and towns by whatever means they can; so do others. I myself was obliged to find my way to the throne as best I might. But it must be allowed that through their perseverance and steadiness of conduct the Jesuits succeed in accomplishing whatever they undertake ; and their scrupulous care to maintain their original constitution without change will ensure to theni a long existence.

"It is alleged that the King of Spain avails himself of their services. I, for my part, declare that I mean to do the same; for why should France be in a less advantageous position in this respect than Spain? I consider the Jesuits needful to my empire ; they are native Frenchmen, and owe me allegiance as their sovereign. I do not wish to be on bad terms with any class of my natural born subjects; and if there should be any danger of their betraying my secrets to my enemies, be sure that I shall not communicate to them anything more than I think proper. Be so good as to allow me to manage this affair; I have settled many others far more difficult; do not trouble yourselves further in the business than to obey my orders."

Notwithstanding the king's peremptory tone, the Parliament still demurred, and attempted to interpose modifications before they consented to register the ordonnance. Henry rejected their suggestions, and insisted on unqualified and speedy compliance. The Parliament at length registered the edict on the 2nd of January, 1604, and the Jesuits resumed their legal position in France.

Several conditions, however, were appended to this act of grace. The edict specified the localities in which the Order was authorized to possess colleges: namely, Toulouse, Auch, Bordeaux, Rodez, Limoges, Perigueux, Aubenas, Tournon, Beziers, and Le Puy; to these were now added three others, Lyons, Dijon, and La Flêche. In no other place was their residence to be fixed without the king's express permission. They were all to be native Frenchmen, and were to take an oath before the royal officers, "without mental reservation," that they would never attempt anything to the prejudice of the king or against the tranquillity of the State. They were to be incapable of acquiring real property by purchase, gift, or otherwise, without the king's permission; nor could they succeed to any inheritance either direct or collateral. They were never to infringe the rights and privileges of bishops, of civil corporations, of the Universities, or of religious orders. They were not to preach, administer the Sacraments, or hear confessions, beyond the walls of their own establishments, unless by licence from the ordinary. And lastly, one member of their body was to reside constantly at Court, in the quality of preacher, to be answerable to the king for the good conduct of his brethren. Any infraction of these articles was to be punished by the revocation of the present edict.

The individual selected by the king to remain near his person in the capacity of hostage for the good behaviour of the rest of the fraternity was Pierre Coton or Cotton, a native of Nerondes in the Forez, where he was bom in 1564. At the age of twenty he entered the Jesuit college at Arona in Piedmont; and after completing his noviciate, he studied theology with singular zeal first at Milan and afterwards at Rome. Having given proof of distinguished oratorical talent, Coton was sent by his superiors to Lyons, where he acquired a first-rate reputation as a preacher. He was soon employed on missions, and engaged in polemical discussions with the Huguenots throughout the southern provinces. His success was almost unexampled. At Nimes, in September, 1600, he held a debate with the Protestant minister Chamier, who had charged him with falsifying quotations in a treatise which he had published on the Eucharistic sacrifice; hoping thus to turn the tables on the Catholics for the humiliation which had just been inflicted on Duplessis-Mornay. Judges having been appointed on both sides, the question was publicly argued in the presence of Cardinal de Sourdis, the Bishop of Nimes, and a large audience. Coton cleared himself triumphantly from the charge of misquotation, and defended his doctrine with so much spirit, learning, readiness of resource, and force of reasoning, as to produce a marked impression. The president Canaye de Fresne arrived from Paris during the progress of the discussion, and interposed his influence to bring it to a close, which was done accordingly. That conscientious magistrate, whose judgment was already substantially convinced by the logic of Du Perron at Fontainebleau, made his public recantation of Calvinism a few months afterwards. Thirty-five Protestants of Nimes followed his example.

The talents of Father Coton were well known to Henry IV through the good offices of Lesdiguières, who admired him warmly; and from the first moment of his introduction at Court the King seems to have conceived for him feelings of extraordinary regard. A vacancy occurring just then in the Archbishopric of Arles, Henry offered the preferment to his new favourite, and was surprised when he declined it, on the ground that the rules of his Order forbade him to accept any ecclesi- astical dignity. Such a proof of disinterestedness is said to have raised the Jesuits still higher in the royal esteem; and it was not long before Coton was installed in the deeply responsible office of the king's confessor.

This was the commencement of the prodigious empire which was exercised by the Jesuits over the entire fabric of society in France during the seventeenth century, and in the first half of the eighteenth. Having once gained the prestige of this confidential relationship with royalty, they monopolised the position with a long series of the most skilful directors that the Institute could furnish; and however reprehensible their policy may have been in certain instances, there cannot be a clearer proof of the superlative ability with which the Order was governed in the earlier part of its career. The obligation to have one of their number in constant residence at Court, imposed originally as a mark of distrust and a means of control, was thus converted by their adroitness into an instrument of moral domination almost without example.

One of the first points carried by Father Coton after assuming his new character was the demolition of the obelisk on the site of Jean Chatel's house, which mutely, yet eloquently, denounced the Order as the instigators of his crime. It was removed in July, 1605, and the measure provoked no small amount of sarcastic merriment among the Parisians. In one pamphlet the obelisk was personified, and made to declare that after all its fate was not to be regretted, since, though first erected as an act of justice, its destruction was prompted by clemency and compassion. Another suggested that in order to obliterate all trace of the condoned offence, the king ought to replace the tooth which had been dashed from his mouth by the blow of Chatel's dagger.

The chateau of La Flêche, in Anjou, was now bestowed, as a token of distinguished favour, on the Jesuits, and became a collegiate seminary under their direction. The King endowed the institution with princely generosity. The most accomplished members of the Order in France,—among them Fathers Petau, Caussin, Cellot, Mambrun, Vavasseur—were appointed to the professorial chairs; and in the course of a few years La Flêche attained the highest reputation, and was thronged with students from all parts of the kingdom. René Descartes, afterwards the renowned philosopher, was one of the first pupils admitted within its walls. Similar establishments on a smaller scale were founded under royal patronage at Bourges, Poitiers, Amiens, Moulins, and elsewhere; and in 1608 the Jesuits received permission to open a house in the metropolis. In the same year the king thought proper to dispense with the regulation which required all Jesuits domiciled in France to be native-born Frenchmen. Foreign members of the Order were thenceforth to share all the privileges enjoyed by their brethren under the late edict. It was not, however, till several years later that they obtained licence to give public lectures at Paris; nor were they even then admitted to the corporate body of the University.

In the transactions which we have been reviewing, as well as in other ecclesiastical affairs of the highest moment, Henry IV is known to have been guided by the counsels of an illustrious prelate, whose character and ministry left so deep a mark on the religious society of his age, that some account of him is indispensable to our narrative.

FRANÇOIS DE SALES cannot be claimed, in strict accuracy, as a member of the Galilean Church. He was, however, intimately connected with France by education and early association; he maintained a close intercourse with that country throughout life; and in several important passages of his history he acted with the national bishops and clergy rather as one of their own body than as a foreigner.

Sprung from one of the most ancient and distinguished houses of Savoy, François de Sales inherited worldly prospects attractive in no common degree. From his boyhood, however, he discovered a decided vocation for the sacred ministry; and disdaining in comparison the gifts of fortune, the allurements of pleasure, and the advantages of high social position, he devoted himself with full purpose of heart to that laborious career. He received the tonsure at the age of eleven; and after some elementary instruction at the college of Annecy, he was sent to pursue his studies at Paris under the care of the Jesuits. Here his preceptors were the famous Genebrard, and Maldonatus (Maldonat), author of the well-known Commentary on the Gospels. Under such tuition his taste for ecclesiastical learning and for a religious life rose to intense enthusiasm. It was to no purpose that his father procured for him a lucrative appointment connected with the Parliament at Chambery, which would have opened an almost certain path to distinction in the legal profession. Francois modestly, but steadily, declined it, and remained fixed in his early determination. At length his father consented to his wishes, though not without considerable reluctance; and in 1592 he was ordained deacon, and appointed prevot of the cathedral church of Annecy by Claude de Granier, titular Bishop of Geneva. François de Sales at once threw himself with all the energies of his impassioned nature into the duties of the pastoral care; in which his zeal and ability became so conspicuous, that as soon as he was admitted to priests' orders, his diocesan entrusted him with an enterprise requiring the very highest ministerial qualifications, and involving no small share of personal danger. This was a mission for re-establishing the Catholic religion in the province of Chablais, and in the bailliages of Gex, Ternier, and Gaillard, where it had been almost totally suppressed by the Zwinglian Reformation fifty years before. Accompanied by only one colleague, a kinsman of like spirit, François undertook without hesitation this hazardous task, in spite of the tears, intreaties, and remonstrances of his nearest relatives. The inhabitants of the Chablais were a rude, ferocious race, and of that fanatical type in religion which Calvinism usually engenders. The two missionaries met with a reception which might have daunted the bravest heart. During the whole of the first year they endured a bitter persecution. Coarse abuse, reckless calumny, cowardly insults, deadly menaces, were their daily portion: oftentimes their lives were in imminent peril, and they were forced to fly from "the madness of the people" into the recesses of the forests. These trials they supported with heroic fortitude. The grossest outrage never overcame their gentleness of temper; the severest hardships were never allowed to interrupt the progress of their labours. At last the tide turned. The first symptom of the change was a remarkable reformation among the licentious soldiery of the garrison of Thonon, the capital of the district; and such a phenomenon in such a quarter made an immediate impression on the town and neighbourhood. The impulse, once given, proved irresistible. This practical specimen of the effect of Catholic teaching was a triumphant answer to the falsehoods so industriously propagated by the Calvinists; the prejudices of the multitude began to abate; the instructions of François and his companion, so long scorned, were sought with avidity, and received with admiring gratitude. Never was reaction more complete. Day after day fresh conversions were announced, to the great discomfiture of the Protestant ministers; and the flock thus happily regained by the Church became ere long powerful enough to effect the restoration of Catholic worship in the principal church of Thonon. The details of the movement read like the records of a miraculous age. Six hundred individuals are said to have yielded to the matchless eloquence and pathos of a single discourse of François de Sales. Some of his biographers estimate at seventy-two thousand the number of those who were reclaimed from Zwinglian and Calvinistic error during his mission in the Chablais. In less than four years from the commencement of the undertaking, François de Sales had the satisfaction of seeing Catholicism fully re-instated, and its ordinances universally frequented, throughout the district which had been the scene of his labours. His success drew forth warm congratulations from his sovereign the Duke of Savoy, from the aged Bishop of Geneva, and from Cardinal de Medici, Papal legate at the court of France. Bishop Granier shortly afterwards named him coadjutor in the diocese of Geneva, with the right of succession on the occurrence of a vacancy. Accepting the charge, though with hesitation and unfeigned diffidence, De Sales now proceeded to Rome, where he was received with distinguished honour by the reigning Pontiff, Clement VIII. Seated in the midst of a crowded consistory, the Pope caused the bishopdesignate to be examined in his presence upon various points of controversial and casuistical divinity; the object being (as it appears) to give him an opportunity of displaying his unrivalled powers and acquirements before this august assembly. The examination was conducted chiefly by Cardinals Bellarmine and Baronius, but occasionally by the Holy Father himself. When it was finished, the Pope embraced him, hailed him as the "Apostle of the Chablais," and addressed to him the words of the royal Preacher, "Bibe, fili mi, aquam de cisterna tua, et fluenta putei tui; deriventur fontes tui foras, et in plateis aquas tuas divide." (Prov. v. 15, 16.) He was immediately preconised coadjutor to the Bishop of Geneva, with the title of Bishop of Nicopolis in partibus.

Early in the following year Francois de Sales was summoned to the French metropolis, to negociate with Henry and his ministers in favour of a portion of the flock entrusted to him, who had recently been transferred by the fortune of war from Savoy to the dominion of France. By the treaty of Lyons, concluded between Henry IV and Charles Emanuel of Savoy in January, 1601, the "Pays de Gex" was ceded, or rather restored, to France, together with the adjoining districts. The bailliage of Gex contained thirty-seven parishes, and about thirty thousand inhabitants, of whom the great majority were Calvinists. On behalf of the Catholic minority, the bishop-coadjutor petitioned, 1st, that the Catholic religion might be freely exercised in all places within the bailliage where it had prevailed before the religious troubles; and 2ndly, that the Church property which had been illegally seized in the so-called Reformation should be restored to the Catholic clergy and conventual houses. These were points upon which it was not easy to obtain satisfaction from the French Government. The Secretary Villeroi hesitated, temporized, procrastinated; and François de Sales found himself unavoidably detained at Paris for many months. His sojourn there was memorable for results of deep importance to the welfare of the Gallican Church.

The course of Lent sermons in the Chapel of the Louvre, for the year 1602, was preached, as already noticed, by the coadjutor of Geneva; and several interesting cases of conversion are recorded to have followed among Calvinists of the upper classes. The king treated him from the first with, extreme reverence and admiration, and often consulted him upon matters of the most private nature affecting his conscience. Nor was the bishop chargeable with aught of that unworthy complaisance which is so great a snare to courtly ecclesiastics under like circumstances. His Majesty left it distinctly on record, that "M. de Geneve never flattered him". No man could be better qualified, by the rare combination of fervent devotion and spirituality of mind with great practical sagacity and energy, to take the lead in works of Church reformation and Christian beneficence. Applications now arrived from all quarters for his advice and co-operation. Every new undertaking was submitted to him for approval; no gathering for any purpose connected with the work of the Church was reckoned complete without his presence; his services as a spiritual guide were sought with the utmost eagerness in every grade of society. Nothing was talked of in Paris but the virtues of the coadjutor of Geneva;—his gentleness, his tenderness, his patience, his charity, his disinterestedness, his never-failing serenity and equanimity of temper.

Henry IV repeatedly attempted to induce François de Sales to take up his abode permanently in France. "Remain with me, M. de Geneve," said the monarch; "I will obtain for you richer preferment, more desirable employments, than any which the Duke of Savoy has to dispose of." But the good bishop's ambition did not lie in this direction. He explained to Henry that he was not at liberty to form any fresh ecclesiastical connexion; he was already united to a spouse who commanded all his interest, care, and affection; and he could not be so ungenerous as to abandon her because she was poor.

He quitted Paris on his return to his diocese in the autumn of 1602; and during the journey received tidings of the death of Bishop Granier, and of his own succession to the see. On the 8th of December, 1602, he was consecrated Bishop of Geneva by the Archbishop of Vienne, Metropolitan of the province. Among other results traceable to the influence of this gifted prelate may be mentioned the establishment in France of the order of Carmelite nuns of the reform of St. Theresa of Spain.

In our own days of sober, undemonstrative, rational religion, it is not easy to comprehend the eagerness of French Catholics in the seventeenth century to introduce into the kingdom this extreme type of cloistered asceticism. The highest and noblest in the land were ardently engaged in the scheme. Princesses of the blood-royal were among its chief promoters. Catherine, Antoinette, and Marguerite, daughters of the Duke of Longueville by Marie de Bourbon, Duchess of Estouteville, though nurtured amid the luxuries and fascinations of a court, were models of devout piety and active charity. Two of them had formed at an early age the resolution to lead a single life; the third, Antoinette, was married to Charles de Gondi, Marquis of Belleisle; but, upon his death, she renounced the world for the cloister, and took the veil in the Feuillantine convent at Toulouse. These three princesses were naturally looked up to as the patronesses of every new design for the advancement of Catholicism in France;—a distinction which they shared, however, with many other personages of exalted station,—their sister-in-law Catherine de Gonzague, Duchess of Longueville, Anne de Caumont, Countess of St. Pol, Catherine of Lorraine, Duchess of Nevers, the Duchess of Mercoeur, Madame de Magnelais, and others, whose names will occur in our subsequent pages.

But the person who became the most direct instrument in the adoption of the reformed Carmelite rule in France was Barbara d'Avrillot, wife of Pierre Acarie de Villemor, one of the maitres des comptes at Paris. Nature had endowed this lady with extraordinary energy and force of character; and she exbibited from her youth upwards a pattern of every domestic and social virtue. During the convulsions of the League it was her lot to endure trials and privations of no common severity; and it was mainly owing to her admirable management—her prudence, activity, and courage—that her husband and family were saved from utter ruin.

Madame Acarie enjoyed the highest consideration in the religious society of Paris. She was consulted like an oracle, and was believed by her friends to enjoy the privilege of special communications from above. Under her auspices the introduction of the Carmelites was now discussed in frequent conferences, the three princesses of Longueville being constant attendants at these meetings, together with François de Sales, the Abbé (afterwards Cardinal) de Berulle, M. de Marillac, and André Duval, an eminent doctor of the Sorbonne. Upon their solicitation the necessary letters patent were granted by the Crown; but it was found a matter of great difficulty to obtain the services of some professed sisters of the order from Spain, whose presence was deemed essential to the foundation of the institution at Paris. The obstacle was at length surmounted through the self-denying exertions of the Abbé de Bérulle, who made a journey to Spain for the purpose; no trifling undertaking in those days. In October, 1604, six Carmelite nuns arrived at Paris, and were installed in a con- ventual building which had been prepared for them in the Faubourg S. Jacques ; the ancient priory of Notre Dame des Champs, a dependency of the great Abbey of Marmoutier. Shortly afterwards Queen Marie de Medicis visited the convent in state, with the princesses and a brilliant train; on which occasion seven ladies, who had been carefully disciplined in all the usages of the rule under the superintendence of Madame Acarie, made their profession, and assumed the habit of the Order. One of them was Charlotte, Marquise de Breauté, daughter of De Harlai de Sanci, one of the favourite ministers of Henry IV. It was not long before this example was followed by other devout women of the higher ranks; the three daughters of Madame Acarie, a daughter of the Duc de Brissac, Madame de Chandenier, sister of Cardinal de la Rochefoucauld, and Madame de Bérulle, daughter of the President de Seguier, and mother of the future Cardinal.

The French Carmelites increased rapidly in numbers and reputation. So early as the year 1605, two additional convents were founded, one at Pontoise, the other at Dijon; and in the course of a few years similar communities were established at Amiens, Tours, Rouen, and Bordeaux. By the close of the century the Order possessed no fewer than sixty three houses in different parts of France. Pope Paul V, by a brief of April 17, 1614, placed the Carmelite sisterhoods in France under the government of three ecclesiastics, De Bérulle, Gallemand, and Duval; the first- named being appointed Visitor-General. This arrangement gave rise to considerable dissatisfaction, inasmuch as hitherto the superiors of the Carmelites had always been members of the same monastic society, and bound by the same vows, with those who were subject to their rule. The convent of Bordeaux raised the standard of opposition; the nuns renounced De Bérulle as their visitor, and were supported in their opposition by Cardinal de Sourdis, Archbishop of Bordeax, who declared that they were lawfully subject to the Superior-General of the Carmelites, and to him alone. The nuns of Saintes, Limoges, Bourges, and Morlaix hastened to imitate their ecclesiastical sisters; the dissension widened rapidly, and assumed the aspect of a serious scandal. De Bérulle appealed to Rome; and in due time two briefs arrived from Gregory XV (March 20, Sept. 12, 1620) confirming the original appointments, and enjoining the Carmelites to submit without further question. Even this was not at once effectual. The refractory nuns, instigated by secret agitators, appealed, comme d'abus, to the Parliament; a step which in all probability would have protracted the contest for a length of time, but that the Government now interfered, and two peremptory arrets of the Council of State (Sept. 16, Dec. 15, 1620) enforced the execution of the Pope's briefs, notwithstanding the appeal to the secular courts. Summary measures followed. Cardinals de la Rochefoucald and La Valette were charged with the duty of giving effect to the orders of the Holy See, and they deputed as their commissioner a doctor of the Sorbonne named Louytre, a man of few scruples and determined vigour. He forthwith repaired to the Carmelite house at Bourges, and, the nuns having refused to make submission, he passed sentence of excommunication on them all. Firm in their purpose under this extreme penalty, they quitted their convent and their native land, and sought an asylum in the Netherlands. Similar rigours were exercised towards the Carmelites of Bordeaux and of S. Pol de Leon in Brittany. In the latter case Louytre went so far as to lay the Cathedral Church under an interdict, and to suspend the bishop of the diocese from his functions, because certain novices had been admitted at the excommunicated convent with his sanction. These violent proceedings led to further troubles. The bishop complained to the Assembly of the Clergy; the latter passed a resolution denouncing the intolerant conduct of the Papal Commissioner and sent a circular letter to their colleagues throughout France desiring them to exclude the offender from communion when he visited their diocese, until he had given public satisfaction to the Church, and in particular to the Bishop of St. Pol de Leon. The Pope (Urban VIII) now interposed, and annulled the declaration of the clergy. The clergy remonstrated, and asked permission to hold a National Council; and matters began to look so threatening, that Louis XIII found it necessary to intercede with the Pope in behalf of the indignant Gallican priesthood, who on this, as on so many other occasions, made a gallant stand in defence of the true principles of ecclesiastical discipline. Urban yielded to the king's representations; Louytre was instructed to apologize to the bishops, which he seems to have done with a bad grace and in a tone of self-justification rather than of humility; and in 1625 this unseemly strife was at last brought to a conclusion. The excommunicated nuns were absolved, but were compelled nevertheless to take up their residence in Flanders. Those only were allowed to remain in France who had accepted the government by De Bérulle and his successors imposed on them by the Roman See.

It would appear that the whole of this disturbance was the secret work of the Jesuits. In their jealousy and spite against the Oratorians, of which congregation De Bérulle was SuperiorGeneral, they stirred up the Carmelites to contest the injunc- tions from Rome, hoping that the result might be detrimental to the influence of the rival Order. "Ces choses," wrote De Bérulle to Cardinal Richelieu, "sont plus dignes de larmes que de paroles"

Madame Acarie, having been left a widow in 1613, determined to devote the remainder of her life to God as a professed nun of the Carmelite Order. Her sons were grown up, and her daughters, as we have seen, already inmates of the cloister; and being thus freed from secular ties, she no longer resisted the yearnings of her heart after the cultivation of ascetic virtue in what she considered its most perfect form. She took the veil in the convent at Amiens in April, 1614, under the name of Soeur Marie de l'Incarnation, and made her profession in the following year. In this new state of life she became a bright example of Christian humility, self-sacrifice, and holiness; but her health, always feeble, gave way under the austerities which she daily practised, and which she could not be persuaded to relax. She breathed her last at the convent of Pontoise, in the odour of sanctity, on the 18th of April, 1618. Her extraordinary reputation for piety, and the prodigious influence she had exercised on the religious movement of her time, procured for her conspicuous tokens of honour after death. Her tomb at Pontoise was visited by Queen Anne of Austria, by the Queen Dowager Mary of Medici, by François de Sales, by Madame de Chantal, and by a multitude of less illustrious pilgrims. Soeur Marie de L'Incarnation was beatified by Pope Pius VI, May 24, 1791.

Another proof of the revival of religious zeal in the same direction was the institution, in 1607, of the "Congregation des Filles de Notre Dame" by Jeanne de Lestonnac, Marquise de Monferrant. This was a sisterhood devoted to the education of young females; an undertaking of urgent necessity at that time, since the Huguenots had made energetic efforts for the instruction of the rising generation, and had lured away numbers of young Catholics from their Mother Church, especially in the southern provinces. There were then at Bordeaux two Jesuit missionaries who had acquired a high reputation by their labours, and had been the means of numerous conversions to the faith among the Protestant sectaries. They had long felt the importance of systematic exertion in the work of education; they saw, with dismay, that through the negligence of the Church in this branch of her duty, the early training the young, especially of young females, was fast passing into the hands of the Huguenots; Catholic parents being almost compelled, through dearth of competent teachers in their own communion, to entrust their children to the separatists, who of course imbued them with their own misbelief. It seems to have struck the two Jesuits suddenly and simultaneously that Madam de Lestonnac (whom as yet they knew only by report) was on eminently fitted to take the lead in some attempt to remedy this evil. The proposal, when made to her, coincided exactly with her own long-cherished aspirations, and was at once gratefully embraced. There were obstacles to be encountered, however, in the execution of the design. The Court of Rome was a this time disposed rather to diminish than to increase the number of religious houses; and Cardinal de Sourdis, Archbishop of Bordeaux, when applied to for his sanction, proposed to Madame Lestonnac, instead of founding a new Order, to undertake the restoration of an existing Ursuline convent, which of late years had fallen into decay. This she declined. Ere long the Cardinal's sentiments underwent a sudden change;— a change which he felt to be so extraordinary, that he was compelled to attribute it to a directly supernatural interposition He now cordially approved Madame Lestonnac's scheme, and recommended it so strongly at Rome, that the bull for carrying it into effect was despatched without further difficulty. The new community was established forthwith, and adopted the rule of St. Benedict. In its internal organization it was formed upon the model of the Society of Jesus; its rules and discipline being identical with those prescribed by Ignatius Loyola, with such slight variations as were required by reason of the difference of the sex and occupation. On the 1st of May, 1608 Cardinal Sourdis bestowed the veil and habit of the Order, with all solemnity, on the foundress and four other ladies whom she had trained as her associates. The letters patent were granted by Henry IV, at the special request of Marie de Medicis, in March, 1609. Such was the origin of the "Congregation de la bienheureuse et toujours Vierge Mère de Dieu Notre Dame";— the earliest religious foundation in France devoted to female education. The work prospered froja the beginning, and propagated itself with wonderful rapidity. In the course of a few years these sisterhoods were planted in all the principal towns of Languedoc and Gascony. Wherever they settled they rendered invaluable services; and such was the estimation in which they were held that in process of time they were invited into Spain, and laboured with success in many parts of Catalonia and Castillo. Madame Lestonnac survived to witness, in a venerable old age, the remarkable progress of her pious enterprize. She died in 1640, at the age of eighty-four.

It was about the same time that a kindred institution took its rise, whose history is one of special interest, namely the Order of Visitandines, founded by François de Sales at his episcopal city of Annecy. Its first Superior was one of the most celebrated of those many Christian heroines whom that age produced in France, Jeanne Françoise de Chantal.

This was a work which the saintly Bishop of Geneva always contemplated with peculiar satisfaction, calling it "his joy and crown." For many years he had been meditating a scheme for enlisting in the service of the Church females who from advanced age or delicate health were unequal to the severer discipline of cloistered life. Cases came under his observation in which such persons, finding none to encourage them to systematic exertion or to direct their energies, lost all interest in higher objects, and abandoned themselves listlessly to habits of mere worldliness. During a visit to Dijon, where he preached in Lent, 1604, the Bishop first made the acquaintance of Madame de Chantal, who had recently lost her husband, and was residing there with her father, M. de Fremiot, a President of the Parliament of Burgundy. She had married at the age of twenty the Baron de Chantal, of the same province, head of the ancient family of Rabutin. The union proved happy, but was abruptly terminated by the death of the Baron, who was accidentally shot by a companion on a hunting expedition. Madame de Chantal now made a vow to pass the rest of her days in a state of devout widowhood; and in token of this life-long consecration to her Saviour, she imprinted the letters I.H.S. upon her breast with a hot iron. In answer to her importunate prayers that God would provide for her a guide capable of conducting her in the path of perfection, we are told that one day she saw before her, during a walk in the country, a figure in soutane and rochet, with a square cap on his head,—in short, the ordinary costume of a bishop,—and heard at the same moment a voice declaring that this was the director she was seeking, and that upon him she might in all security repose her conscience. No sooner did François de Sales make his appearance in the pulpit, than she recognised the object of this superhuman intuition; while the bishop, on his part, notwithstanding the difficulty of distinguishing an individual among the crowd of his hearers, became conscious of the presence of one whom had seen in a vision before quitting his diocese, and whom he he now knew for his destined coadjutor in the work which lay so near his heart.

Madame de Chantal at once placed herself under his spiritual rule; and after some time spent in preparatory discipline, the bishop unfolded to her his project for the Order of the Visitation, and his desire that she should undertake the office of superior. Although she received the proposal with transport, she felt nevertheless that there were manifold obstacles which must retard, and might altogether prevent, its being realized. Her four children were of tender age, and maternal responsibility weighed heavily upon her mind; added to which her father was at this time labouring under infirmities which made him almost wholly dependent on her filial care. For years she waited till the way should be made clear, cherishing an unfailing confidence that in the end her heart's desire would be accomplished.

In course of time her eldest daughter was married to the Baron de Thorens, brother of the Bishop of Geneva. The two younger girls were then placed by their mother in a religious house where she was satisfied that they would be carefully educated; and her only son, the heir of the Rabutins, was committed to the charge of his grandfather De Fremiot, one well fitted for the trust by his virtues and experience. Thus it came to pass that by the summer of 1610 Madame de Chantal was so situated that she could follow with a safe conscience the track which she believed to be marked out for her by Providence; and although, when the hour of parting came, the separation from her father, her children, her friends and attached dependents, was more severe than she expected, and almost overcame her fortitude, she was enabled to persevere; and after finally disposing of her property, the whole of which she gave up to her relatives, she quitted Dijon for Annecy in June, 1610, and entered on her new career. Her only companions were two young ladies of good family, Jacqueline Favre and Charlotte de Brehard, attracted by similar motives towards the work in hand. After completing their noviciate, they pronounced their vows, which were simple, before François de Sales on the 6th of June, 1611; and shortly afterwards the Pope approved the Congregation of the Visitation, and placed it under the rule of St. Augustine.

Such was the commencement of this famous Order, which so prospered in the sequel, that even in the lifetime of the foundress it possessed seventy-five convents in France and Savoy. By the close of the century the number exceeded one hundred. Madame de Chantal died at Moulins in December, 1641, on her return from a visit to the chateau of St. Germain, whither she had been specially summoned by Queen Anne of Austria. She was beatified by Benedict XIV in 1751, and canonized in 1767 by Clement XIII.

In the history of the ecclesiastical reformation which distinguished these times, the name of Cardinal de Bérulle has been so often mentioned as to be already familiar to the reader; but his character and labours were too important to be passed over without more detailed examination.

Pierre de Bérulle, descended from an ancient family in Champagne, was born at the chateau of Serilly, near Troyes, in February, 1575. His father was a councillor of the Parliament of Paris; his mother was Louise de Seguier, aunt of the Chancellor of that name, who flourished during the Fronde. Pierre de Bérulle was the eldest son, and heir to the family estate; yet he determined at an early age to embrace the ecclesiastical profession. The motives which governed him were most disinterested. Possessed of many worldly advantages, he was free from all taint of personal ambition; and we are told that he privately made a vow never to accept any preferment to which emolument was attached. He was ordained in 1599, was appointed one of the king's chaplains, and acted as assistant to Cardinal Du Perron at the conference of Fontainebleau. De Bérulle rapidly acquired the reputation of an accomplished divine; excelling as a controversialist, and as a skilful guide in the confessional. The general estimate of his powers may be gathered from a mot of Cardinal Du Perron : "If you wish to convince the heretics, bring them to me; if you desire to convert them, take them to the Bishop of Geneva ; but if the object is both to convince and to convert them, you must go to the Abbé de Berulle."

The undertaking from which the name of De Bérulle has acquired its chief distinction is the foundation of the French congregation of the Oratory of Jesus.

It has been before observed that the state of the secular clergy at this period was one of lamentable degeneracy. "In the rural districts," writes a contemporary prelate, "the people were like scattered sheep, without spiritual pasture, without Sacraments, without instruction, and with scarcely any external aids towards their salvation. Many even of the bishops thought of nothing beyond the luxurious enjoyment of their revenues, and were quite negligent of their pastoral duties. From these irregularities it followed that the priesthood sunk into such general discredit and contempt, that for persons of any position it was reckoned a degradation to take holy orders, except for the sake of being able to hold some valuable benefice. The village curès were for the most part like those shepherds of whom the prophet speaks, who contented themselves with taking the wool and the milk of the flock, but neglected to give them that food which is indispensable to the life of souls. Thus the people fell into such a state of profound ignorance as scarcely to know whether or not there is a God. Of the mysteries of the Trinity and the Incarnation they had no apprehension whatever; nor were they at all better instructed as to the Holy Sacraments, and the dispositions with which they ought to be approached."

It may be hoped, however, that this picture is somewhat overcoloured. At all events the state of things was not so scandalous in the capital and the great towns. The inefficiency of the national clergy was viewed with deep concern by those admirable men who were labouring for the restoration of the Church of France to something like its ancient strength and power. François de Sales, Cesar de Bus, the Jesuit Cotton, Vincent de Paul, Pierre de Bérulle, with others, conferred long and anxiously together as to the means to be adopted for raising the tone of feeling and standard of duty among their brethren in the ministry. De Bérulle was the first to suggest the plan of an association of priests upon the pattern of that which had been formed in Italy under the direction of St. Philip Neri—the members of which took no special vows, and were not bound to practise the conventual life, but simply devoted themselves to the fulfilment of the obligations inherent in the sacerdotal office, according to their true extent and meaning.

The same idea had been already conceived by Madame Acarie, who seems to have had an instinctive persuasion that De Bérulle was designed by Heaven to be the instrument of its execution. "For a long time past," she wrote in 1606 to her confessor F. Cotton, "I have been urging M. de Bérulle to attempt this enterprise, but as yet he will not consent. He must do it. Help me to persuade him of this." The matter was pressed upon De Bérulle from various quarters, but his characteristic modesty led him to withstand, as long as it was possible, the call to initiate such an arduous undertaking. He strove to prevail upon others to accept the charge, addressing himself especially to François de Sales and to Gallemant, an eminent doctor of the Sorbonne; but the former declined it on the score of his episcopal duties, the latter on that of his advanced age. Thus the affair stood over from year to year; but at length, on the combined instances of the Chancellor de Silleri, Cardinal de Joyeuse, Gondi, Bishop of Paris, and, it is said, of the Queen Regent herself, De Bérulle signified his readiness to commence this "work of faith and labour of love" which the Church so clearly demanded at his hands. On the 10th of November, 1611, he took up his abode, in company with four other ecclesiastics, at the hotel du Petit-Bourbon, in the Faubourg S. Jacques, on a part of the site now occupied by the Val de Grace. The names of his first colleagues were Jean Bence, Jacques Gastaud, both doctors of the Sorbonne; Paul Metezeau, one of the most esteemed preachers of the day; and Francois Bourgoing, cure of Clichy, afterwards General of the Society. The letters patent declared the Oratory to be a house of "royal foundation." In October of the following year the Bishop of Paris officially approved the statutes; and on the 10th of May, 1613, the bull of institution was forwarded by Pope Paul V.

The founders of the Oratory did not propose to create a new monastic order; the object was to promote among the clergy a spirit of combination for improvement in those studies which became their profession, and through which alone they could hope to glorify God and minister to the edification of His Church. The Oratorians, whether in Italy, in France, in the Low Countries, or elsewhere, were united by no bonds save those of Christian charity; they undertook no duties beyond those to which they had pledged themselves on entering the sacred ministry. In consideration of the peculiar necessities of the Galilean Church, they were to practise the utmost simplicity of living, and strict self-denial with regard to worldly comforts ; they were likewise to forego all thought of ecclesiastical preferment, and to labour without remuneration. They were at liberty to quit the Society whenever they pleased ; and while they belonged to it, they were subject, like the rest of the clergy, to the jurisdiction of the diocesan bishops. "The spirit of this congregation," says Bossuet, in his funeral oration for F. Bourgoing, "is none other than that of the Church herself; it acknowledges no other rules than her sacred canons, no other superiors than her bishops, no other vows than those of baptism and the priesthood. With them a holy liberty constitutes a holy engagement; here we find obedience without dependence, government without command; all authority consists in gentleness, and penitence is maintained without the aid of fear. Here, in order to form true priests, they are conducted to the source of all truth; they have the Inspired Writings constantly in their hands, that they may seek unceasingly the interpretation of them by study, their spirit by prayer, their depth by meditation, their power by experience, their end by charity, in which grace everything is summed up—which is the sole essential treasure of Christianity."

Tabaraud mentions that certain prelates summoned De Bérulle before them to give an explanation of his views in instituting the Oratory. "Although," says the biographer, "he might have declined their jurisdiction, the pious founder replied modestly that he had only acted according to the orders of his ecclesiastical superior; and when they proceeded to enquire what were the statutes of his Congregation, he contented himself with quoting a passage from St. Paul's Epistle to the Philippians : "Let your moderation be known unto all men. The Lord is at hand. Be careful for nothing; but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known unto God." "This," said De Bérulle, "is my rule." The bishops were so much struck by this response, that they forbore to trouble him with any further questions.

The congregation of the Oratory soon gave proof of being well adapted to meet one of the most pressing exigencies of the time; and made rapid progress in numbers, reputation, and influence. In 1616 it became necessary to move into a larger building, and De Bérulle purchased from the Duchess of Guise, sister of Cardinal de Joyeuse, the Hotel de Bouchage, near the Louvre, an ancient possession of that family. Here the Oratorians laboured with great success, particularly among persons of rank connected with the Court, many of whom were constant attendants at their lectures, services, and "conferences spirituelles."

A few years later the first stone of a new church for the Society, in the same quartier, was laid with much pomp by the Duc de Montbazon, in the name and on behalf of Louis XIII. It was declared one of the chapels royal, and its clergy were entitled "chaplains of the Louvre." This became one of the most celebrated churches of the capital. It contained a splendid monument to Cardinal de Bérulle, one of the finest works of François Auguier, which was unhappily demolished at the Revolution. After suffering shameful desecration, the church was appropriated to the Protestants of the Genevese Confession, by whom it is still occupied. Its graceful chevet, or apse, forms a well-known ornament of the Rue St. Honoré.

In 1618 Cardinal de Gondi, Bishop of Paris, obtained letters patent for converting the suppressed Abbey of S. Magloire, in the Faubourg S. Jacques, into a seminary for the education of priests in his diocese, and placed it under the direction of the Fathers of the Oratory. This institution, the earliest founded for that purpose in Paris, proved most valuable and successful. Here laboured the accomplished Louis Thomassin, who has enriched the Church with his masterly dissertations on ecclesiastical discipline, on positive theology, on the doctrine of grace, and on the history of the Councils. Here, too, Charles Le Cointe compiled his ponderous 'Annales Ecclesiastic Francorum,' in eight volumes folio. Thomassin was succeeded in his professorship at St. Magloire by the no less celebrated JacquesJoseph Dnguct, whose conferences always attracted a crowded and enthusiastic auditory.

The Oratorians afterwards acquired a third establishment in Paris, situated in the Faubourg St. Michel, which they styled "L'institution." It was devoted to the elementary instruction of young men who presented themselves for admission to the Congregation. In the three great departments of theological literature, preaching, and clerical education, the priests of the Oratory produced results to which the Gallcan Church is deeply indebted, and their names will ever be inscribed on some of the brightest pages of its annals. A considerable space would be required to give even a catalogue of these worthies. It was Jean Francois Senault who emancipated the Church from that turgid, pedantic, tasteless style of pulpit eloquence, which characterized the age of the Renaissance. Senault's discourses were refined, intellectual, classical; and during the forty years in which he was engaged as a preacher in Paris and the provinces, a complete transformation took place among the clergy with regard to this branch of their ministrations. Many Oratorians formed themselves upon the model of Senault, who are more generally known to fame than their master; and by some of these the art of preaching was carried to the highest pitch of excellence. Two of his most renowned disciples may be mentioned here in passing—Jules Mascaron, Bishop of Agen, and Jean Baptiste Massillon, Bishop of Clermont.

But it was in the field of education—especially of education for the ministry of the Church—that the genius of the Oratory displayed its most brilliant colours. De Bérulle possessed in a singular degree the faculty of attaching the minds of the young. This spirit was emulated by his fellow labourers, and became the leading feature of the Congregation. Their colleges and seminaries were filled with students, a large proportion of whom belonged to the upper orders. In 1612 Cardinal de Joyeuse, Archbishop of Rouen, sent thirty candidates for the ministry to Paris to be trained by De Bérulle and his colleagues; and subsequently he opened a diocesan seminary at Rouen, which he entrusted to their management. They were next summoned for a similar purpose to Langres, afterwards to Lyons by Cardinal de Marquemont, and in like manner to several other cathedral cities. The popularity of this great work excited ere long the jealousy of the Jesuits, who ever since their re-establishment in France had aimed at monopolizing the superior education of the country. During the early part of his career De Bérulle had enjoyed the special confidence of the fathers of that Order, under whom he studied for some years in his youth. He had had the courage to befriend them in their banishment—had exerted himself personally, and through the interest of influential relatives, to procure their recall—and in recognition of these services had received letters of affiliation from the General Acquaviva. But no sooner did he start the plan of a Society which was likely to compete for the occupation of ground which they considered exclusively their own, than the Jesuits became his bitter opponents. They strained every nerve to thwart his undertaking, descending for this purpose to the meanest practices—to unblushing detraction and vulgar libels. The strife became complicated by the subsequent course of events. The Oratory and the Company of Jesus espoused opposite sides of the questions in dispute in the Jansenistic controversy; and their dissensions inflicted infinite injury on their common cause and on their mother Church.