©uartertp Series, 
 
 TWENTY-FOURTH VOLUME. 
 
 THE SUFFERINGS OF THE CHURCH 
 IN BRITTANY DURING THE 
 GREAT REVOLUTION. 
 
ROEHAMPTON '. 
 PRINTED BY JAMES STANLEY. 
 
 [All rights reserved. 
 
THE SUFFERINGS 
 THE CHURCH IN BRITTANY 
 
 DURING THE GREAT REVOLUTION. 
 
 BY 
 
 EDWARD HEALY THOMPSON. 
 
 LONDON: BURNS AND OATES. 
 
 MAR 5 1934 
 
 1878. 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2014 
 
 https://archive.org/details/sufferingsofchurOOthom 
 
NOLUERUNT ' INFRINGERE 
 LEGEM - DEI • SANCTAM 
 ET 
 
 TRUCIDATI • SUNT, 
 i Macliab. i. 66.) 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 The history of the Revolution in France which by the 
 length of its duration and the magnitude of its results 
 obtained for itself the title of Great — subsequent convul- 
 sions being but its product and outcome' — has been 
 written repeatedly and in abundant detail. Its salient 
 features are well known, comprising in particular the 
 hideous atrocities which have made the Reign of Terror 
 infamous for all time — the daily holocausts of victims to 
 the guillotine at Paris, the horrors perpetrated by Carrier 
 at Nantes, by Le Bon at Amiens, by Couthon at Lyons 
 — and including also the memorable Vendean War, to 
 which Mme. de La Rochejacquelein's narrative has given 
 so personal an interest. No reader of that history can 
 be ignorant of the fact that the Church was cruelly 
 persecuted, and that for a certain period, at least, the 
 public worship of God was abolished throughout the 
 land. For if the massacre of the Cannes testified to the 
 intensity of the hatred with which a bloodthirsty faction 
 was inflamed against men whose only crime was their 
 sacred profession, the continued influx of emigrant clergy 
 into this country gave evident proof that the proscription 
 of the priesthood was due to no mere temporary ebul- 
 lition of revolutionary fuiy. And yet it may be doubted 
 
Vlll 
 
 Preface. 
 
 whether there is any general or adequate recognition 
 of the length of time during which the persecution 
 lasted, and that, too, in its most sanguinary form; the 
 subject being often so vaguely and partially treated as to 
 convey the impression that after the fall of Robespierre 
 the guillotine became comparatively inactive in the 
 provinces, as in the capital, and that, although religion 
 was not legally restored until after the accession of the 
 First Consul, the lives of clergy and religious were no 
 longer in jeopardy, and that the open profession and 
 practice of their faith no longer exposed Catholics to 
 grievous molestation. This, however, was very far from 
 being the case. For ten long years faithful Catholics, 
 and priests in particular, had to endure untold privations 
 and sufferings— untold we may truly say, since, if they 
 were recorded at all, it was in a very fragmentary and 
 imperfect manner, and the generation which witnessed 
 them has now passed away. 
 
 In the case, however, of a single province of France 
 a very full and circumstantial account has been given by 
 one who, besides being a native of the country, was a 
 contemporary, and, to a certain extent, an eye-witness of 
 what he narrated. The Abbe' Tresvaux, 1 who is our 
 chief authority for the incidents related in these pages, 
 was a most careful and painstaking writer, sparing no 
 trouble to ascertain the correctness of all the facts he 
 stated, and which he had the best opportunities of veri- 
 
 1 The title of his work, which occupies two octavo volumes, is 
 Histoirc dc la Persecution Rivoliitionnaire en Brct,ignc d la fin du 
 dix-huitttmc sicclc. Paris : Le Clerc, 1845. 
 
Preface. 
 
 ix 
 
 fying. He never puts himself forward, and says nothing 
 of his own personal history, but we gather that he was 
 quite a youth at the period of which he treats, and from 
 one passage in his narrative we incidentally learn that his 
 family practised the Christian virtue, which in those days 
 involved no little peril, of hospitality to the servants 
 of God ; in other words, the harbouring of priests, to 
 which (as heretofore in England) was assigned the 
 penalty of death. We are not aware that any one has 
 undertaken for other provinces of France the work which 
 Tresvaux has accomplished for Brittany. Writing in 
 1845, he says in his Preface, after enumerating the 
 various sources from which his materials were derived, 
 ' I may be allowed, in conclusion, to express a wish, 
 which I have often entertained, that a work similar to 
 mine should be undertaken for other parts of France. 
 But no time should be lost. AVitnesses are disappearing, 
 facts are being forgotten, and yet what a light they 
 throw upon the past, and what lessons they furnish for 
 the present, lessons which with them will be irretrievably 
 lost.' 2 
 
 The other writer to whom we are indebted, and that 
 principally when speaking of the causes which led to the 
 Revolution and of its early stages, is the Abbe Jager, 
 Professor of Ecclesiastical History at the Sorbonne, who 
 delivered a course of lectures, on the subject of that 
 
 2 Mention may also here be made of the Life of Mgr. Brute, himself 
 a Breton, published by Messrs. Burns and Oates in their Foreign 
 Missionary Scries. His reminiscences of the revolutionary period are 
 deeply interesting, abounding as they do in particulars of which he had 
 direct personal knowledge or which were related to him by eye-witnesses. 
 
X 
 
 Preface. 
 
 momentous event, which originally appeared in a series 
 of papers in the University CatJwliquc (September, 1848, 
 to June, 185 1), and were subsequently published in a 
 separate form. These lectures, unfortunately, were left 
 unfinished, the author not having proceeded much 
 beyond the return of the King from Varennes. The 
 papers, however, were continued by the Abbe Cordier, 
 whose contribution is characterized by accuracy of detail 
 and a devotional spirit, but lacks, in our opinion, the 
 originality, philosophical insight, and general grasp of 
 the subject which distinguish the work of the Sorbonne 
 professor. 
 
 2. In estimating the causes of the Revolution and its 
 successes, much stress has been laid by various writers 
 on the scandalous lives of the clergy previous to its 
 outbreak, and their obstinate adherence to absolute mom 
 archy and the abuses of the old regime. But this latter 
 accusation, as will be shown in the ensuing narrative, is 
 wholly groundless. The clergy, as a body, so far from 
 opposing, were forward in advocating needful and whole- 
 some reforms and promoting the establishment of a more 
 liberal constitution ; and as to the former allegation, it is 
 equally far from the truth in the exaggerated form in 
 which it is commonly made. It cannot, indeed, be 
 denied that worldliness and laxity of morals were but 
 too prevalent among those ecclesiastics who through 
 secular interest or noble birth had attained to high 
 places in the Church, and were thus in a position to 
 exercise a deteriorating influence, not only on the 
 clerical body, but on society at large. Such men as 
 
Preface. 
 
 XI 
 
 Lomenie de Brienne, Archbishop of Toulouse, and in 
 the early part of Louis XVI.'s reign prime minister of 
 France, a favourer of the Encyclopedists, and a personal 
 friend of D'Alembert ; the Prince de Rohan, Bishop of 
 Strasbourg and Cardinal, notorious for his licentious life 
 and in particular for the shameful affair of the diamond 
 necklace, so injurious to the reputation of the calum- 
 niated Queen ; and the famous Abbe de Talleyrand- 
 Pe'rigord, afterwards Bishop of Autun, who, if not a 
 positive infidel, was practically little better, were sufficient 
 in themselves to dishonour and degrade the ecclesiastical 
 order in popular estimation. But these men, we may be 
 sure, did not stand alone ; and the very fact that a 
 person like Lomenie de Brienne, who was reputed to be 
 an actual unbeliever, should have been able to get him- 
 self nominated by the clergy as reformer of abuses in 
 the religious orders — a work urgently needed, but one 
 which ought never to have been committed to such 
 hands — and that the Abbe de Talleyrand-Perigord 
 should have been selected to fill the post of Promoter of 
 the Clergy of France, speaks volumes (to use a familiar 
 phrase) as to the corruption which existed in high and 
 influential quarters. 
 
 To these unworthy representatives of the clerical body 
 must be added the numerous Abbes, frequenters of the 
 Parisian salons, whose idle, frivolous habits were a dis- 
 credit to their order; and, as the Church was wealthy and 
 lay patronage very powerful, there were also many priests 
 who had adopted the ecclesiastical profession simply as 
 a means of subsistence and with a view to temporal 
 
xii 
 
 Preface. 
 
 advancement. The lives and manners of such men must 
 have been calculated only to bring contempt on the 
 sacerdotal character and on religion itself ; and indeed, 
 it was chiefly from among persons of the latter class that 
 the Revolution gathered recruits for the schism which it 
 sought to force upon the nation. 
 
 But in the face of all these acknowledged scandals, 
 which, moreover, had been aggravated and, indeed, 
 mainly caused by the arbitrary conduct of the civil power 
 in impeding the action of the Holy See, promoting 
 unworthy men to high offices in the Church, and denying 
 to the Episcopate its rightful liberty of holding synods 
 and exercising discipline, one patent fact there is which 
 the writers in question are prone to overlook or lightly 
 estimate, but which ought to be regarded as affording 
 conclusive evidence in favour of the clergy of France at 
 that day. If, unhappily, there were many apostates and 
 prevaricators among their ranks when the Revolution set 
 society loose from every shackle of restraint, moral and 
 religious, it is undeniable that they constituted, com- 
 paratively, a very small minority. The Bishops, with 
 four' notorious exceptions, remained faithful to their 
 sacred trust, and the parochial clergy, as a body, pre- 
 sented a noble example of constancy and fervour. 
 Hundreds freely gave their lives in sacrifice for the faith, 
 or abandoned country and all that they possessed for 
 conscience' sake, while those who remained in the land 
 
 :J Five, if the Bishop of Lydda in partitas, coadjutor to the Bishop 
 of Bale, be reckoned (see page 37). The number of sees in France at 
 that time was a hundred and thirty-four. 
 
Preface. 
 
 xni 
 
 continued to minister to their flocks, under circumstances 
 of the greatest peril and privation, with a courage and a 
 fortitude which has never been surpassed. Thus, the 
 multitude of martyrs and confessors which the Church of 
 France produced during the terrible ordeal through 
 which it passed is of itself sufficient to disprove the 
 sweeping charge which has been brought against its 
 clergy, and which has been too frequently accepted 
 merely on the assertion of their accusers. True, a man 
 may suffer martyrdom for the Christian faith without 
 having previously led a saintly or even a very pious life, 
 but only those on whom religion had a deep and vital 
 hold, and who were animated by an ardent zeal for 
 souls, would have endured, day after day, such extreme 
 hardships and misery as the outlawed priests were con- 
 tent to undergo for the one sole purpose of ministering 
 to the spiritual necessities of their people. The facts 
 recorded in these pages will serve to show what manner 
 of men the objects of the persecution were. Brittany, it 
 is true, was a very religious province, and enjoyed the 
 advantage of not possessing many rich benefices, which 
 were temptations to the cupidity of worldly-minded 
 families, but there is every reason to believe that the 
 lives of the clergy were equally exemplary in many other 
 parts of France, and it may safely be asserted that every- 
 where worthy priests formed the large majority. In the 
 touching recitals which the Abbe Tresvaux gives, and 
 some of which have been reproduced in this volume, will 
 be found beautiful examples of the way in which these 
 Breton priests, so barbarously ill-treated, comported 
 
xiv 
 
 Preface. 
 
 themselves before their judges and at the scaffold. Their 
 modest dignity, their pious resignation, their firmness in 
 confessing the faith, their sweet and tender charity 
 towards their persecutors, the tranquil joy with which 
 they met their doom, make the patience and courage 
 they exhibited quite different in kind from any mere 
 natural heroism, however exalted. They proved them- 
 selves true soldiers of Jesus Christ, and their death was 
 a veritable martyrdom. Moreover, it is impossible to 
 read the brief references which the Abbe makes to the 
 antecedents of these men without being struck with the 
 fact that, in the quiet, ordinary times which preceded 
 the Revolution, they had been most assiduous in the 
 discharge of their sacred duties, and often eminently 
 conspicuous for their holy lives and charitable labours ; 
 to which, indeed, the love and veneration manifested 
 towards them by their parishioners when the hour of 
 trial came rendered an additional and a most con- 
 vincing testimony. For, if the priests risked their lives 
 for the spiritual welfare of their people, the people 
 encountered a like peril in sheltering and succouring 
 their priests. 
 
 We should be travelling far beyond our province if we 
 attempted to depict, even in briefest outline, the moral 
 and religious condition of France previous to the year 
 1789, but we believe that it will be found on an im- 
 partial examination of facts that, although scepticism 
 and immorality had pervaded, more or less, the upper 
 and middle strata of society — including especially the 
 professional classes — and had even begun to infect the 
 
Preface. 
 
 xv 
 
 general population of the towns, accompanied by a 
 restless spirit of dissatisfaction which the pressure of real 
 grievances had served to foster, an intense disgust with 
 the abuses which still existed, and a passionate longing 
 for any change which might introduce a new order of 
 things, nevertheless the rural gentry,' and the country 1 
 people generally, who composed the main bulk of the 
 French nation, had remained, comparatively, uncon- 
 taminated, and that the lower classes, as a body, were 
 still profoundly Catholic. Anyhow, this, at least, is 
 certain, that the condition of the people was, both morally 
 and religiously, far superior to what it subsequently 
 became. Torrents and rushing floods do not fertilize 
 the lands over which they sweep. The Revolution left 
 more corruption than it found. Needless to say, it left 
 also a large mass of infidelity and, what is as hard, 
 perhaps harder, to deal with, a rank crop of indiffer- 
 entism. A generation grew up that knew not God and 
 did not care to know Him ; and well would it be for 
 France at the present day if the Apostolic men who, 
 year after year, have been engaged in the work of evan- 
 gelization had found ready to their hand a population so 
 piously disposed, so docile to instruction, and so sub- 
 missive to authority, as that which existed throughout its 
 provinces previous to the terrible convulsion which may 
 be said to have torn society up from its very roots. 
 
 4 Mgr. Brute has given in his autobiographical notes a very 
 pleasing picture of the routine of daily life observed in his own family 
 and of the example set by his admirable mother. She was a matron of 
 the genuine Catholic type, and such appear to have abounded in the 
 France of those days. 
 
xvi 
 
 Preface. 
 
 3. No one who is acquainted with the tactics which 
 the men of the last century pursued towards the Church, 
 and which issued, as they were intended to issue, in its 
 open persecution, but must have observed how similar 
 they are in all essential respects to the measures adopted 
 by its enemies at the present day — with one notable 
 exception, the shedding of blood ; an exception which is 
 certainly not due to diminished hatred of Catholicism, 
 but to the change which has come over public opinion in 
 the matter of judicial murder : however, we have not 
 yet seen the end. The aim of modern Revolution, or of 
 Liberalism — for the terms are, in effect, convertible — is 
 still the same : that of substituting the tyranny of force 
 for the reign of truth and justice. It is the counterpart 
 in practice of the Protestant doctrine of the freedom of 
 private judgment. This spurious freedom, which is so 
 loudly claimed for mankind is, in fact, their enslave- 
 ment ; since it is the emancipation of the will, which in 
 man may be said to represent blind force, from the 
 control and dominion of truth : man being declared free 
 henceforth to accept, not what is true, but what he wills 
 to consider as true and acceptable. Even so it is the 
 aim of the Revolution to render a godless State, which it 
 affects to regard as the organ and embodiment of the 
 popular will, absolute sovereign in all t 1 ings, religious no 
 less than political and social, and t impose its laws 
 upon mankind as the ultimate rule c right and wrong, 
 to the utter corruption of their mor . sense. Protes- 
 tantism, as denoting a doctrinal system, is daily dying 
 out, but its essential heresy remains in vigorous activity, 
 
Preface. 
 
 xvn 
 
 and is bearing fruit in that deification of the State and 
 its hateful despotism over consciences which the Revo- 
 lution is everywhere labouring to accomplish.' 1 
 
 The fabrication of a State-Church or, rather, of State- 
 Churches, which shall supersede the one true Church 
 of Christ, is still the pet project of Liberal politicians, 
 who hope to be able to use these schismatic creations 
 of theirs for the degradation of the priesthood and the 
 secularization of society in all its ramifications; and if 
 the measures employed as yet are not as immediately 
 sharp and decisive as were those which the revolutionists 
 of the last century were not slow to adopt, they are as 
 surely calculated to effect the object proposed : not to 
 add, that behind these astute politicians, whose aim, 
 it may be, is only to dethrone and destroy the Church, 
 stand the agents of the Masonic conspiracy, who will 
 be satisfied with nothing less than the destruction of 
 Christianity and the substitution of the religion, or, as it 
 may be more rightly called, the worship, of Humanity. 
 For the present, the work of disintegration is to be 
 conducted by milder methods. Thus, candidates for 
 the sacred ministry are to be emancipated from the 
 trammels of ecclesiastical discipline and trained in the 
 school of free thought ; that is to say, they are to be 
 indoctrinated with rationalistic and infidel principles 
 
 5 It is a significant fact that the organs of English Protestant opinion, 
 with scarcely an exception, either systematically ignore the iniquitous 
 persecution w hich has been been going on for several years in Germany 
 and Switzerland, and has now avowedly begun in Italy, or, if they record 
 any isolated facts, do so without a word of reprobation ; while some by 
 openly advocating State-absolutism in causes ecclesiastical, including 
 dogma and worship, declare, at least by implication, their sympathy 
 with the persecutors and approval of their acts. 
 
XV111 
 
 Preface. 
 
 before they can be eligible to serve at the altar of 
 God. Theology is no longer to be reckoned among 
 the sciences, and as for vocation, the very idea is 
 absolutely disallowed: 1 ' the sacerdotal spirit is to be 
 totally eliminated, and the secular spirit, in other words, 
 the spirit of this world, is to be introduced in its stead. 
 I The laity, again, are to elect their own pastors, and 
 that without regard to the authority either of bishop 
 or of Pope. The Eccksia Disccns, is in fact, to occupy 
 the place of the Ecrfcsia Docens : for, in choosing their 
 own teachers, the people will necessarily also determine 
 what doctrines shall be taught in their respective 
 localities. Religion being thus put to the popular vote, 
 its degradation will be complete. A clergy educated 
 by laics, and elected' by laics, none of whom need to 
 be Christian, even in profession, will certainly not 
 teach Catholic doctrine, or any doctrine whatever as 
 infallibly true, and thus the wished-for consummation 
 will have been attained. There will be neither Church 
 to teach nor creed to be taught as of necessity to 
 be believed ; neither faith nor the obedience of faith : 
 Christianity, as a Divine revelation, will have ceased 
 to exist. 
 
 This system of lay-election, irrespective of Episcopal 
 
 H Accordingly in Germany, as also in Italy, ecclesiastical students, 
 parish priests, and even bishops are forced to serve in the army ; and 
 indeed in Italy, at the present time, members of religious orders, 
 priests and others, are compelled to assist in repairing the highways, 
 in other words, to break stones on the road ; because, having been 
 reduced by their rulers to a state of abject destitution, they are unable 
 to pay the sum which would have exempted them from this manual 
 labour. 
 
Preface. 
 
 xix 
 
 or Papal authority, is the boon which is being offered 
 to the populations of to-day, as it was to the Catholic 
 people of France in the Civil Constitution of the Clergy ; 
 and now, as then, it has been rejected by the faithful 
 with scorn. The same woeful farce is again enacted : 
 the schismatics are elected by a discreditable minority, 
 including Protestants, Jews, and men of no religion ; 
 they are installed by the civil power; and the 'refrac- 
 tory' priests are ejected from their cures. So, too, if 
 we compare the character and conduct of the apostates 
 who figured in the Constitutional Church of France 
 with those of the self-styled ' Old-Catholics ' of Germany 
 and Switzerland, we cannot fail to recognize the strong 
 family likeness between the two : the same mean and 
 ungenerous spirit, as shown in their combining with 
 the civil power to oppress and persecute the rightful 
 pastors and their flocks, the same secularity and self- 
 assertion, the same moral degradation, the same unblush- 
 ing violation of religious and sacredotal vows ; and 
 again, as before, we see a faithful people holding 
 steadfastly aloof from the usurpers and refusing to 
 take part in their sacrilegious ministrations. 
 
 Many other points of resemblance might be men- 
 tioned, but, as they will appear in the course of the 
 narrative, it is superfluous to enumerate them here, 
 and, indeed, they are too palpable to escape observation. 
 The parallel is exact throughout, with such only difference 
 as comports with the state of the times and the temper of 
 men's minds ; so that it may be truly said that the events 
 which we see passing before our eyes are but a repeti- 
 
XX 
 
 Preface. 
 
 tion of what befell the Church of France at the outset 
 of the Revolution. The same principles are at stake 
 now, as then ; the same conflict is once more renewed ; 
 on the one part is cruel, unprovoked wrong, on the 
 other, patient suffering : religious are driven from their 
 schools, their hospitals, their homes; the religious life 
 is itself proscribed ; bishops and priests are despoiled 
 of their goods, thrown into prison, interned, expatriated, 
 outlawed, returning only to be hunted from hiding-place 
 to hiding-place ; seminaries are closed, churches and 
 altars profaned, delivered over to heretical intruders ; the 
 people are cruelly harassed and distressed, fined, im- 
 prisoned, robbed of their pastors, of the holy sacraments, 
 of all freedom of worship, of everything they hold dearest 
 on earth — denied even the liberty of sheltering their 
 ejected clergy or supplying them with the common 
 necessaries of life ; 7 the young are deprived of Catholic 
 
 " For having said Mass three times and baptized a child, the Rev. 
 Herr Cieslinski, of the provence of Posen, was sentenced on October 
 31, 1877, to pay a fine of 1,200 marks [£6o) or suffer 120 days' 
 imprisonment. Being unable to pay the fine, he was sent to gaol. 
 Not content with having the priest thus punished, the Government 
 also prosecuted several gentlemen because they gave him something 
 to eat when he was hungry and a shelter for the night when he was 
 homeless. The district court that tried the case condemned Herr 
 Gomerski, a landowner, and Herr von Swiniarski, a manufacturer, 
 to pay each 400 marks or suffer forty days' imprisonment — the former 
 for having given Herr Cieslinski a dinner gratis and lent him a carriage 
 — and the Herr Rabbow, also a local landowner, to pay 600 marks 
 or suffer 60 days' imprisonment because he let the hunted priest have 
 a room in his house for the night. The inn -keeper Dobierznski, 
 who is also the village mayor, was fined 100 marks, with the option 
 of 10 days' imprisonment, and another inn-keeper, Okupiniak, 150 
 marks, with the option of 15 days' imprisonment. All these were 
 further adjudged to pay the costs of the prosecution. 
 
Preface. 
 
 xxi 
 
 and Christian instruction ; the poor and sick bereaved 
 of nurses, teachers, benefactors : and all this because 
 they will not defile their souls with the guilt of schism, 
 will not sever themselves from Catholic unity — the 
 people from their priests, the priests from their bishops, 
 the bishops from the Vicar of their common Lord — 
 will not accept the jurisdiction of the secular power 
 in matters ecclesiastical and spiritual ; in short, will not 
 give to Csesar the things of God. And if the conflict 
 is the same, so also, we are confident, will its issue be : 
 save that we hope and trust that it will end in a far 
 more perfect triumph of the Church than awaited it 
 at the beginning of this nineteenth century. It may be 
 that, in the inscrutable counsels of God, the sufferings 
 of His people are still to be prolonged, but even so 
 the glory of the present hour is all their own, and 
 what the world counts disaster and defeat is to the 
 eye of faith, which is ever fixed upon the Cross, but 
 the presage and the assurance of future victory. 
 
 Cheltenham, 
 Feast of St. Francis Xavier, iSjj. 
 
CONT 
 
 E NTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Chapter I. 
 
 Causes of the Revolution. 
 
 Scope of the present work . i 
 The Revolution due to the 
 
 propagandist™ of false and 
 
 infidel principles ... 2 
 Voltaire and Rousseau . . 4 
 The sovereignty of the people 5 
 Rousseau's theory of power . 6 
 Its pernicious effects . . .7 
 His principles identical with 
 
 those of modern Liberalism 8 
 Jansenism the ally of infidel 
 
 philosophy . . -9 
 
 Chapter II. 
 
 State of Brittany at the commence- 
 ment of tiie Revolution. 
 
 The Breton people eminently 
 Catholic . . . .10 
 
 Their faith and devotion . 11 
 
 Religious monuments . . 12 
 
 Beginnings of corruption. Arts 
 employed to pervert the 
 upper classes . . -13 
 
 The Government party and 
 the country party . . 14 
 
 Riots at Rennes . . -15 
 
 Deputation of the two higher 
 orders to the King . . 16 
 
 Attempts to excite the clergy 
 against their prelates . -17 
 
 Convocation of the States- 
 General . . . .18 
 
 Clerical elections . . • 19 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The clergy favourable to 
 reform . . . . .20 
 
 Character of the third estate . 21 
 
 Impending conflict between the 
 bourgeois and the nobles . 22 
 
 Wild projects of the third 
 estate . . . . -23. 
 
 Chapter III. 
 
 Spoliation of the Church. Civil 
 Constitution of the Clergy. 
 
 Meeting of the States-General 24 
 Clerical defections . . -25 
 Spoliation of the Church de- 
 creed . . . . . 26 
 Suppression of religious orders 27 
 The Civil Constitution of the 
 
 Clergy . . . .28 
 Abolition of ancient sees . 29 
 Lay election of Bishops and 
 
 Cures . . . . * 30 
 The Pope's letter to the King 31 
 The King's episcopal advisers ; 
 
 their failure in duty . . 32 
 Prevalence of Gallicanism . 33 
 Excitement among clergy and 
 
 people . . . .34 
 Weakness of the King . . 35 
 Conduct of the Breton duputies 36 
 The ' Exposition of Principles.' 
 
 Its effects . . . -37 
 Calumnies propagated against 
 
 the clergy . . . -39 
 Vigour displayed by the 
 
 Bishops . . . .40 
 
CONT 
 
 ENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Chapter I. 
 
 Causes of the Revolution. 
 
 Scope of the present work . i 
 The Revolution due to the 
 
 propagandists of false and 
 
 infidel principles. . . 2 
 
 Voltaire and Rousseau . . 4 
 
 The sovereignty of the people 5 
 
 Rousseau's theory of pow er . 6 
 Its pernicious effects . . .7 
 His principles identical with 
 
 those of modern Liberalism 8 
 Jansenism the ally of infidel 
 
 philosophy .... 9 
 
 Chapter II. 
 
 State of Brittany at the commence- 
 ment of the Revolution. 
 
 The Breton people eminently 
 Catholic . . . .10 
 
 Their faith and devotion . n 
 
 Religious monuments . . 12 
 
 Beginnings of corruption. Arts 
 employed to pervert the 
 upper classes . . 13 
 
 The Government party and 
 the country party . . 14 
 
 Riots at Rennes . . -15 
 
 Deputation of the two higher 
 orders to the King . . 16 
 
 Attempts to excite the clergy 
 against their prelates . . 17 
 
 Convocation of the States- 
 General . . . .18 
 
 Clerical elections . . 19 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The clergy favourable to 
 reform . . . . .20 
 
 Character of the third estate . 21 
 
 Impending conflict between the 
 bourgeois and the nobles . 22 
 
 Wild projects of the third 
 estate . . . . -23. 
 
 Chapter III. 
 
 Spoliation of the Church. Civil 
 Constitution of the Clergy. 
 
 Meeting of the States-General 24 
 Clerical defections . . -25 
 Spoliation of the Church de- 
 creed . . . . . 2& 
 Suppression of religious orders 27 
 The Civil Constitution of the 
 
 Clergy . . . .28 
 Abolition of ancient sees . 29 
 Lay election of Bishops and 
 
 Cures . . . . * 30 
 The Pope's letter to the King 31 
 The King's episcopal advisers ; 
 
 their failure in duty . . 32 
 Prevalence of Gallicanism . 33 
 Excitement among clergy and 
 
 people .... 34 
 Weakness of the King . . 35 
 Conduct of the Breton duputies 36 
 The ' Exposition of Principles.' 
 
 Its effects . . . -37 
 Calumnies propagated against 
 
 the clergy . . . -39 
 Vigour displayed by the 
 
 Bishops . . . .40 
 
XXIV 
 
 Contents. 
 
 l'AGE 
 
 Chapter IV. 
 Enactment of the Oath to be imposed 
 
 on the Clergy. 
 Designs of the Assembly . 41 
 State absolutism . . -42 
 Municipal tyranny . . -43 
 Charge against the Bishop of 
 
 Nantes . . . 44 
 
 Committee of Inquests . . 46 
 Voidel's report to the Assembly 47 
 His project of law . . .48 
 Enactment of schismatical oath 49 
 The Abbe Maury . . 50 
 Hesitation of the King . . 51 
 Menances employed to move 
 
 him . . . . -52 
 He signs the decree . . 53 
 Defections and Retractations . 54 
 Efforts at conciliation . . 55 
 Threatening attitude of the 
 
 mob . . . . -56 
 Schismatical oath tendered to 
 
 clerical deputies . . -57 
 Attempted compromise . . 58 
 Admirable behaviour of bi- 
 shops and clergy . . 59 
 Their sentiments misrepre- 
 sented . . . .60 
 Revolutionary tactics . . 61 
 
 Chapter V. 
 
 Consummation of the schism. Elec- 
 tion of Constitutional Bishops. 
 
 Clerical defections relatively 
 small 62 
 
 Arts adopted to deceive the 
 country clergy . . -63 
 
 Difficulties experienced in sup- 
 plying State bishops and 
 curds 64 
 
 The Chapter of Quimper . 65 
 
 Expilly elected to the see. His 
 character . . . .66 
 
 Remonstrance of the Vicars- 
 General . . . -67 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The Bishop of Rennes refuses 
 to consecrate . . .68 
 
 Expilly and Marolles conse- 
 crated by Talleyrand . . 69 
 
 Fidelity of the Breton Episco- 
 pate. Protestations on the 
 part of the laity . . .70 
 
 Meeting of Breton peasantry ; 
 conflict with the soldiery . 72 
 
 Arrest of three bishops decreed 
 by the Assembly . . .74 
 
 Case of the Bishop of Treguier 75 
 
 Escape of the Bishop of Leon 76 
 
 Arrest of the Bishop of Vannes 77 
 
 Election for the see. Le Masle 
 chosen bishop . . .78 
 
 Jacob and Le Coz. Character 
 of the latter . . .80 
 
 Le Coz elected to the consti- 
 tutional see of the North 
 West 82 
 
 How Minee was chosen bishop 
 of the Loire Inferieurc . 83 
 
 Chapter VI. 
 
 /// reception of the new Consti- 
 tution in Brittany. Publication 
 of the Papal Briefs. 
 
 The Assembly organizes the 
 schism . . . . 85 
 
 Forged Briefs. Constancy of 
 the Breton clergy . . 86 
 
 First victim of the Revolution 
 in Brittany .... 87 
 
 General character of the de- 
 faulters . . . ' . 88 
 
 Non-juring clergy forbidden to 
 preach . . . .90 
 
 Zeal of the Breton women . 91 
 
 Popular aversion to the schism 92 
 
 Brief of Pius VI. to the Arch- 
 bishops and Bishops sitting 
 in the Assembly . . -93 
 
 Second Brief to the clergy and 
 faithful . . . .94 
 
 Obduracy of the schismatics . 95 
 
Conte7its. 
 
 xxv 
 
 l'AGE 
 
 Chaptkr VII. 
 
 Installation of the schismatical 
 bishops and clergy. Beginning 
 of the persecution . 
 
 Expilly's entrance into Quimper 96 
 Mince's reception .at Nantes 97 
 Installations of Le Masle and 
 Jacob. Pastorals of Mgr. 
 de La Laurancie . . 99 
 The people disown the schis- 
 matic clergy . . . 100 
 Liberty of conscience denied 
 
 to Catholics . . . 102 
 A Rogation procession ; acts 
 
 of violence . . . 104 
 Barbarity to nuns . . . 105 
 Cruel treatment of women . 107 
 Misery caused in families . 108 
 An unnatural father. Out- 
 rages on Catholics . .110 
 
 Chapter VIII. 
 
 Decrees against the Clergy. The 
 
 persecution legalized. 
 Address of the Bishops to the 
 
 Pope 112 
 
 The Pope burnt in effigy . 113 
 State of France. Power of 
 
 the Jacobin Club . .114 
 Fresh decrees against the 
 
 clergy . . . .115 
 Persecuting measures . .116 
 Constancy of the poor in the 
 
 Hospital at Rennes . . 118 
 Constancy of the penitents at 
 
 the Madeleine of Nantes . 119 
 111 repute of the schismatic 
 
 clergy ; their scandalous 
 
 lives . ... . . 120 
 
 Pulpit invectives . . . 122 
 
 Chapter IX. 
 
 Imprisonment of priests. Suffer- 
 ings of clergy and laity. 
 
 The King's flight to Varennes 123 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Priests arrested and mal- 
 treated .... 124 
 Their wretched condition in 
 
 the Castle of Nantes . . 125 
 Priest-hunters . . . 126 
 Priests imprisoned at Brest . 127 
 A courageous printer. In- 
 creased devotion to the 
 Sacred Heart . . .129 
 Brutal treatment of Breton 
 
 women .... 130 
 A wolf in the fold . . . 132 
 A castigation well deserved . 133 
 
 Chapter X. 
 The Amnesty. Renewal of the 
 
 Persecution . 
 
 The amnesty ; how carried out 134 
 A protest in the Assembly 
 
 against its iniquitous acts . 135 
 The Legislative Assembly. 
 
 Progress of democracy . 136 
 Recommencement of the per- 
 secution .... 137 
 A threatened conflict . . 138 
 Irritation of the country- 
 people . . . .139 
 Tyrannical proceedings . 140 
 Isnard's speech . . . 141 
 A new penal law . . . 142 
 The civic oath enacted. The 
 
 King's veto . . . 143 
 
 Harsher measures proposed . 144 
 Priests imprisoned at Brest ; 
 
 their sufferings . . . 145 
 
 Priests imprisoned at Quimper 147 
 
 Close of the year 1791 . . 148 
 
 Chapter XI. 
 
 Enforcement of the Civic Oath 
 in defiance of the Royal Veto. 
 
 Fresh calumnies against the 
 
 clergy . . . .149 
 A plot defeated . . .15 
 
XXVI 
 
 Contents. 
 
 AG 
 
 Priests imprisoned at Dinan ; 
 
 their sufferings . . 151 
 Domiciliary visits. Another 
 
 Papal Brief . . . 153 
 
 Marauding bands . . . 154 
 
 Farmer Chantebel . . 156 
 A magnanimous peasant. Ig- 
 nominious treatment of a 
 
 Cure 157 
 
 A tyrannical injunction . . 158 
 Hardships endured by priests 
 
 interned at Nantes . . 159 
 
 Insult to the Bishop of Dol . 161 
 
 Royal mandates disregarded 162 
 
 Chaptkr XII. 
 
 The Legislative Assembly. Its 
 antichristian measures. 
 
 Character of the deputies . 163 
 Their determination to des- 
 troy Christianity . . 164 
 Projected extermination of 
 
 the priesthood . . .165 
 Suppression of Congregations 
 devoted to teaching and 
 the care of the sick and 
 
 poor 166 
 
 Ecclesiastical dress prohi- 
 bited 168 
 
 Deportation of clergy de- 
 creed .... 169 
 The King refuses his con- 
 sent 170 
 
 Fury of the Jacobins . . 171 
 Priests imprisoned at Rennes 172 
 Brutality of their guards . 173 
 Priests arrested and cruelly 
 
 ill-used . . . -174 
 The September massacres . 175 
 The Convention . . .176 
 Ejection of nuns ; their utter 
 
 destitution . . . 177 
 Deportation of priests ; their 
 sufferings . . . .178 
 
 l'ACE 
 
 CHAPTEK XIII. 
 
 The Reign of Terror. 
 
 Distress of the Catholic popu- 
 lations .... 182 
 Priests in hiding . . . 183 
 The Vendean rising . . 184 
 A royalist conspiracy detected 185 
 Relations of the priests with 
 
 the Vendeans . . . 186 
 
 Republican atrocities . . 187 
 Spoliation of churches. The 
 
 Girondists. . . . 189 
 
 Execution of priests . . 190 
 
 Carrier at N T antes . . . 191 
 
 The noyades .... 192 
 
 Abolition of public worship 193 
 
 Abjurations of priesthood . 194 
 Profanation and closing of 
 
 churches .... 195 
 Demolition of ancient shrines 
 
 and monuments . . 196 
 Destruction of devotional 
 
 objects .... 197 
 Systematic corruption of 
 
 morals .... 198 
 
 Apostasy of schismatics . 199 
 
 A brutal commissioner . . 200 
 
 Le Coz arrested . . . 201 
 
 Rout of the royalist forces . 202 
 
 Priests guillotined . . 203 
 
 Revolutionary tribunals . 205 
 
 The Goddess of Reason . 206 
 
 Chapter XIV. 
 
 Martyrs and Confessors. 
 
 Death of M. Deslongrais . 207 
 The military commission at 
 
 Savenay .... 208 
 
 Executions and massacres . 210 
 
 M. de Genouillac . . . 211 
 
 Last farewells . . . 212 
 
 A floating prison . . . 213- 
 
 Protracted privations . . 215 
 
 A storm at sea . . . 216 
 
 A blasphemous crew . . 217 
 
Contents. 
 
 xxvi 1 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Chapter XV. 
 The Revolutionary tribunals • 
 their victims clerical and lay. 
 Horrors of the floating prisons. 
 
 The tribunal of Brest . . 218 
 
 Martyrs, clerical and lay . 219 
 
 The De la Billias family . 221 
 
 Execution of Expilly . . 222 
 
 A sacrifice to fraternal charity 223 
 
 Martyr priests . . . 224 
 
 Death of M. Poirier . . 225 
 
 Martyrs at Rennes . . 226 
 
 Martyrs at Lorient . . 227 
 
 Martyrs at Saint-Brieue . 228 
 
 Ursule Taupin . ... 229 
 
 Death of M. Androuet . . 231 
 
 M. Saint-Pez ; his cruel death 232 
 
 Sosur Bertelot . . . 234 
 
 Priests murdered by soldiers 235 
 
 Death of M. Cormeaux . 237 
 
 Le Carpentier at Saint-Malo 238 
 
 Mdlle. de Saint-Luc . . 239 
 
 Arrest of aged priests decreed 240 
 
 Les Deux Associes . . 241 
 
 Chapter XVI. 
 Revolution of the gth Thermidor. 
 The persecution uninterrupted 
 
 i?i the Provinces. 
 
 The Filles de la Sagesse . 247 
 
 Hospitalieres of Saint-Yves . 248 
 
 Peasant hospitality . . 249 
 
 Martyrs to truth . . . 250 
 
 Robespierre .... 251 
 
 Festival of the Supreme Being 252 
 The 9th Thermidor ; its 
 
 results .... 253 
 Mgr. de Bellescize and La 
 
 Harpe .... 254 
 
 Angelique Glatin . . . 255 
 M. Marechal and the sisters 
 
 De Renac .... 257 
 
 Death of M. Sacquet . . 259 
 Capture and execution of 
 
 M. Burlct .... 260 
 
 Three martyr-priests . . 26r 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Death of M. Bodin . . 262 
 M.Jourdin and the Hospita- 
 lieres .... 263 
 Martyrs at Quimper . . 264 
 Hospitalieres imprisoned . 265 
 
 Chapter XVII. 
 Pacification of La Vendc'e and of 
 Brittany. Renewed efforts of the 
 
 schismatics. 
 
 Inspection of floating prisons 266 
 Wretched condition of the 
 
 inmates .... 267 
 
 Abatement of the persecution 268 
 
 A change in popular feeling . 269 
 
 A w oeful march . . . 270 
 Reception of clerical prisoners 
 
 at Saintes .... 271 
 The treaty of La Jaunais a 
 
 mere truce . . . 272 
 
 Public worship resumed . 274 
 The schismatics and the 
 
 Chouans .... 275 
 
 Churches re-opened . . 276 
 
 Renewed efforts of schismatics 277 
 
 Chapter XVIII. 
 The Disaster at Quibcroti. 
 
 Royalists called to arms . 278 
 
 Hostilities recommenced . 279 
 
 Landing of the emigrants . 280 
 
 Successes and disasters. . 281 
 
 A verbal convention . . 282 
 
 The brothers De Herce . 283 
 
 A military commission . . 284 
 
 Royalist prisoners. . . 285 
 
 Executions at Vannes . . 286 
 Prisoners at Auray ; their 
 
 piety and devotion . . 287 
 Their magnanimity and 
 
 charity .... 290 
 
 Executions at Auray . . 291 
 
 Emigrants and their servants 292 
 
 The ' Field of the Martyrs ' . 294 
 
 The Abbe Poulain . . 295 
 
 A marvellous escape . . 296 
 
XXV111 
 
 Contents. 
 
 Chapter XIX. 
 The moveable columns. Tlieir 
 
 murderous deeds. 
 Government favours the schis- 
 matics .... 298 
 Death of M. Le Moine. . 299 
 Gloomy prospects . . 300 
 A new constitution . ,301 
 Persecution renewed . . 302 
 The moveable columns . . 303 
 Their first victims. . . 305 
 Deatlis of MM. Crespel and 
 
 Tiengou . . . . 306 
 
 M. de Rabec ; his death . 307 
 
 Slaughter of monks . . 309 
 Lay-martyrs. . . -311 
 
 M. Rogue ; his death . . 312 
 
 Murder and sacrilege . . 314 
 
 Reprisals .... 315 
 
 Character of the apostates . 316 
 
 Chapter XX. 
 Remarkable Escapes. 
 
 M. Orain .... 317 
 
 M. Eon ; his courage and zeal 318 
 
 His presence of mind . . 321 
 
 I'ere Joseph of Loudeac . 322 
 
 A strange hiding-place . . 323 
 
 Feminine resources . . 324 
 M. Masson ; his Christian 
 
 charity . . . .323 
 
 Pere Cornille . . . 326 
 
 A wonderful preservation . 327 
 
 Searchers at fault . . . 328 
 
 Chapter XXI. 
 The Directory. Its project of 
 
 extirpating religion. 
 
 Retractations of schismatics . 329 
 
 Severer laws demanded . 330 
 
 Brighter prospects . . 332 
 
 Hopes disappointed . . 333 
 
 A pseudo-council . . . 334 
 
 A meditated coup d'i'tat . 335 
 
 The 18th Fructidor . . 336 
 
 Its deplorable results . . 337 
 
 M. Gruchy ; his seizure and 
 
 death .... 338 
 
 The sisters Ergault . . 340 
 
 The republican decadi . . 341 
 Deportation of priests ; their 
 
 cruel treatment . . . 342 
 
 A generous English sailor . 344 
 
 Rochefort prisons. . . 345 
 Deaths of MM. Duval and 
 
 Cochon .... 346 
 
 A ' dry guillotine '. . . 347 
 
 Sad state of the province . 348 
 
 Death of M. Gavard . . 349 
 M. Levesque : his forcible 
 
 liberation .... 350 
 
 Chapter XXII. 
 
 The Consulate. Freedom of wor- 
 ship restored. 
 Deaths of MM. Loncle, father 
 
 and son .... 352 
 
 Liberty of worship proclaimed 333 
 
 Local intolerance . . . 354 
 
 Cartes de surctc . . . 355 
 M. Godard and Mgr. de La 
 
 Marche .... 336 
 Attitude of the emigrant 
 
 bishops . . . -357 
 
 Policy of the Government . 358 
 
 Guiana exiles recalled . . 359 
 
 The last Breton martyr . 360 
 
 The civil promise . . . 361 
 
 Treaty with the Pope . . 362 
 
 Napoleon's policy. . . 363 
 
 Chapter XXIII. 
 The Concordat. 
 
 Re-distribution of sees . . 364 
 
 Obstinacy of the schismatics 365 
 
 The Papal legate . . . 366 
 
 Episcopal protests . . 367 
 Le Coz made Archbishop of 
 
 Besancon .... 368 
 His contumacy and forced 
 
 submission . . . 369 
 
 Collapse of the schism . . 371 
 
CHAPTER I. 
 
 Causes of the Revolution. 
 
 The object of this work, as its title indicates, is to 
 present a picture, more or less detailed, of the sufferings 
 endured by a faithful people in one single province of 
 France during the terrible persecution which fell upon 
 the Church of that country in the last decade of the 
 eighteenth century. Nowhere in the annals of those 
 dismal times are more copious or more striking examples i 
 of Christian heroism to be met with than are afforded 
 by the martyrs and confessors of Brittany ; but the limits j 
 within which our story is necessarily confined must 
 compel us to omit many a name and many an incident 
 which have quite as much claim to be commemorated 
 as those which find mention in this volume. We cannot 
 even attempt to give a full and consecutive account of 
 the progress of the persecution in Brittany, still less to 
 follow the different phases of the Revolution either in 
 the capital or in the several provinces of France. Into 
 the history of that great struggle we shall not enter further 
 than it is found to be immediately connected with our 
 subject ; a brief account of its origin and its first begin- 
 ings will suffice to show the nature of the conflict, the 
 momentous interests which were at stake, and the sacred- j 
 ness of the cause for which the faithful Catholics suffered , 
 and contended, often even unto death. 
 
 Volumes have been written on this prolific and appa- 
 rently inexhaustible theme, the Revolution of the last 
 century, and no wonder that it continues to be a living 
 b 25 
 
2 
 
 Real Cause of the Revolution 
 
 subject of interest, since, while some believe that the 
 I year '89, which saw its birth, ushered in an era of great 
 social and political blessings — procured, it is true, at a 
 costly expense of blood — and, above all, of liberal en- 
 lightenment, others see but too much cause to deplore 
 the evil principles which it inaugurated, and the bitter 
 results which still continue to flow from this poisoned 
 source. Whatever may have been the social and political 
 evils of the old order of things — and we are very far 
 from denying their gravity — they can never in themselves 
 be regarded as the efficient causes of the French Revo- 
 lution. They cannot be considered as anything more 
 than the occasion of that terrible convulsion in conjunc- 
 tion with various other circumstances, amongst which 
 the financial embarrassments of the Crown, bequeathed 
 to it by the prodigalities and corruptions of the previous 
 reign, must largely count. The causes of such a hideous 
 catastrophe lie deeper. The unjust inequalities and 
 many social abuses which prevailed under the old regime, 
 and, in particular, those resulting from the privileges of 
 the aristocratic class, were not, in fact, the true causes 
 of the horrors of the Revolution, which are often repre- 
 sented as a sort of natural outburst of a nation's fury 
 and indignation against its oppressors. In saying this, 
 we have not forgotten the attacks on the chateaux of the 
 seigneurs and the revolting cruelties committed by the 
 peasantry in different parts of France when the news of 
 the taking of the Bastile and of the triumph of the 
 populace in the capital reached their ears. It is not 
 denied that there were treasured resentments in the 
 lower strata of society, consequent on a long course of 
 tyranny and injustice, yet may it safely be affirmed that 
 they would never have found vent in that wild and 
 sanguinary form but for the impunity with which the 
 rabble in Paris had been allowed to insult the law and 
 
Propagandism of infidel principles. 3 
 
 bathe their hands in blood. This Jacquerie, as it may 
 be called, of the early days of the Revolution cannot, 
 then, be viewed in the light of the spontaneous rising of 
 an oppressed people ; in fact, it need never have occurred, 
 and never would have occurred, had the outbreak in 
 Paris been quelled, as it easily might have been if the 
 King had possessed that decision and firmness which 
 the crisis demanded, and if he had not entertained the 
 mistaken notion that in adopting coercive measures, as 
 he was in duty bound to do for the maintenance of 
 public security and order, he was incurring the respon- 
 sibility of shedding blood in his own mere personal 
 cause. Neither would it ever have occurred, notwith- 
 standing the excesses committed in the capital, but for 
 the active agency at work in all quarters to mislead the 
 rural population and fan their discontent. Anyhow, the 
 abuses which were the legacy of the feudal system were 
 all speedily swept away, perhaps only too speedily — a 
 complete tabula rasa being at the same time made of 
 almost all existing institutions — for such wholesale and 
 precipitate changes tend to excite, bewilder, and intoxi- 
 cate a people, and destroy in them all respect for law 
 and order. The Revolution took place none the less 
 for the entire removal of its alleged provocatives, and 
 that, too, under the reign of a monarch who, whatever 
 his deficiencies, certainly lacked not the will to yield 
 to every just demand of his subjects. The real cause 
 of that terrible explosion must therefore be sought else- 
 where, since it cannot be referred to the pressure of abuses 
 or the tyranny of government ; and we are persuaded that 
 a close examination will lead to the conclusion that it 
 sprang, not from the state of things, but from the state of 
 men's minds ; that state being itself the result of the 
 false principles, religious, social, and political, promul- 1 
 gated by the infidel philosophy of the times. 
 
4 Voltaire and Rousseati. 
 
 At the head of this propaganda of pernicious doctrine 
 stand two men of colossal proportions — colossal, we 
 mean, for evil — Voltaire and Rousseau. Voltaire was 
 the impersonation of hatred against Christianity. 
 Animated with a malice which might truly be called 
 fiendish, he attacked it with all the keenness of his wit, 
 and entertained the insane hope that he could destroy it. 
 But he was no enemy of the social order, nor of the 
 throne, nor of the aristocracy. He himself belonged to 
 the privileged classes ; he was intensely selfish and vain ; 
 he loved material well-being ; he loved that grand 
 society which flattered him. Voltaire, it has been truly 
 observed, would have beheld the Revolution for which 
 he prepared the way by his irreligious and blasphemous 
 writings with utter dismay, and, had he lived under the 
 Convention, would assuredly have received the honours 
 of the Place de la Guillotine instead of those of the 
 Pantheon. Such was Voltaire; his object was to 
 demolish Christianity, but, contrary to his intention, he 
 helped to effect the destruction of the social order. He 
 had this, however, in common with all his philosophical 
 fellow-conspirators of the eighteenth century — he could 
 but destroy ; he had nothing to put in the place of what 
 he would have ruined. 
 
 Rousseau directly laboured to demolish what Voltaire 
 would have spared. He was a man altogether of another 
 stamp ; he had sprung from an inferior class, and, with 
 a restless spirit and an excitable imagination, he imputed 
 the troubles and disappointments of his early career, 
 which were entirely the result of his own unprincipled 
 conduct, to the evils of the social order. Society was to 
 blame for all miseries and misfortunes, his own included ; 
 and so he attacked society. Of all the erroneous prin- 
 ciples which Rousseau put forth the most fruitful for 
 mischief was the sovereignty of the people, which he 
 
Sovereignty of the People. 5 
 
 placed upon a false basis, and from which he extracted 
 consequences most disastrous. The principle of the 
 sovereignty of the people, rightly understood, was no 
 new doctrine. It had been strongly maintained during 
 the middle ages. It had been taught by doctors in the 
 schools, and had been proclaimed from pulpits in the 
 very presence of royalty. All power and authority is | 
 from God ; but on the community, if it finds itself without 
 lawful rulers, devolves the right of choosing not only its 
 governors, but its very form of government. In this 
 sense sovereignty resides in the people, and in this sense 
 it may be said to have originally resided there. No 
 individual possesses in himself an indefeasible right to 
 sovereign power. The doctrine of the so-called ' divine 
 right' of kings was no product of Catholicism. It is 
 authority and power itself which is of divine origin and 
 has a divine sanction, God having created man to live in 
 society. But it was not in this, its legitimate sense, that 
 Rousseau taught the doctrine of sovereignty residing in 
 the community ; he set up the people as a sort of idol in 
 the place of God ; power, according to him, was not 
 simply conferred mediately through the people, but 
 belonged immediately and inalienably to them, so that 
 rulers were but their delegates and servants, whom they 
 could remove at pleasure and replace by others. Nay, 
 more ; the people made not only society, rulers, and 
 laws, but even justice itself. Everything was subject to 
 them ; the person and property of individuals were alike 
 at their disposal j the very notion of right and wrong 
 emanated from the same source, or, rather, depended 
 upon the same arbitrary will, for it could change them at 
 pleasure. Rousseau, in short, attributed to the people 
 the same monstrous and exorbitant powers which Hobbes 
 had ascribed to kings. At first sight the two theories 
 seem diametrically opposed, but their principles are 
 
6 Rousseau's theory of power. 
 
 clearly analogous. With both, existing civil law was the 
 criterion of right and wrong ; the only difference being, 
 that with the English philosopher law was the expression 
 of the absolute will of one individual, the monarch, 
 while with the Genevese it was that of the sovereign 
 people collectively. Both agreed in banishing God from 
 society and from the world. 
 
 Society, in short, was with Rousseau, as it had been 
 with his predecessor, a matter of pure convention, a mere 
 social pact into which men have entered for their own 
 convenience. Every one who has heard of Jean Jacques 
 Rousseau has probably also heard of his wild notions 
 concerning man in his primitive — that is (according to 
 him), savage, solitary, independent state. These eccentric 
 fantasies might have remained comparatively innocuous, 
 for nature will ever triumph over sophistry, and men 
 were never likely to wish to disperse into the woods in 
 order to reassert their individual rights and enjoy their 
 pristine freedom ; but Rousseau's theory of power, owing 
 to its practical bearing, was far more dangerous. As 
 power came from the people, not from God, so the 
 people in their quality of sovereign could do what they 
 pleased. He shrank from none of the fearful conse- 
 quences involved in this position ; he accepted them 
 all. The Revolution was to work them out. Rousseau, 
 like Voltaire, was an enemy to all revealed religion, 
 though his language was not so grossly impious, and he 
 would have wished to preserve a kind of natural religion, 
 albeit the principles he advocated were inconsistent with 
 any religion at all ; but his direct object of attack was 
 the social system, as the Christian religion was that of 
 Voltaire. Both, however, combined to ruin social order, 
 the one by attacking God directly, the other by assailing 
 what He has ordained. The writings of these two 
 champions of infidelity excited the emulation of a host of 
 
Its pernicious effects. 
 
 7 
 
 scribblers, and France was deluged with irreligious books 
 and pamphlets addressed to all classes. Eagerly read in 
 the chateaux and hotels of the seigneurs and the humbler 
 homes of the bourgeois, they were even hawked about to 
 cottage doors; everywhere they served to weaken or 
 break the religious bond, and to fill the heads of 
 thousands with Utopian theories founded on false and 
 godless principles. It was thus the Revolution was 
 created ; circumstances did but furnish the occasion for 
 its outbreak. But though Rousseau's attacks were 
 levelled at social order more directly than at religion, 
 his doctrines were no less fundamentally impious than 
 those of Voltaire, while the form in which they were 
 presented rendered them far more insidious and per- 
 manently mischievous. The name of the great enemy 
 of Christianity is still, it is true, in high honour with the 
 French infidels of our day, and a fresh apotheosis has 
 been decreed to him within our recent memory, while 
 Rousseau's glory has somewhat faded from the popular 
 mind ; yet his reign, or, rather, that of the false principles 
 which he elaborated with so much subtlety and skill, 
 is not yet over. He was, even at the time, much more 
 influential than Voltaire in the immediate promotion of 
 the Revolution, and how strongly men's minds were 
 infatuated with his doctrines is evidenced by the famous 
 Principles of '89, embodying the ' Rights of Man,' of 
 which the ' Contrat Social ' is the Gospel. 
 
 Again, although Rousseau did not, like Voltaire, de- 
 clare an open and ferocious war against Christianity, 
 nay, sometimes uttered words of eloquence in its praise, 
 he laid down principles which form the alleged ground 
 of the persecution which Liberalism has always directed 
 against the Church. For, according to Rousseau, the 
 sovereign people is master of the consciences as well as 
 of the property and lives of individuals. In the very 
 
8 
 
 Liberalism. 
 
 same chapter of his 'Contrat Social' in which he 
 inveighs against the Catholic Church he has this remark : 
 ' There is a profession of faith which is purely civil, the 
 fixing the articles of which appertains to the sovereign 
 people ; not precisely as dogmas of religion, but as 
 sentiments of sociality, without which it is impossible to 
 be a good citizen or a faithful subject. 1 Although not 
 possessing the power to oblige any one to believe them, 
 it may banish from the State whoever does not believe 
 them ; it may banish him, not as impious but as un- 
 sociable, as incapable of sincerely loving the laws or 
 justice, or of sacrificing his life if need be to his duty. 
 Moreover, if any person, after having publicly acknow- 
 ledged these dogmas, should behave as one who does 
 not believe them, let him be punished with death : he has 
 committed the greatest of crimes, he has lied in the face 
 of the law.' The similarity of this sentiment to the 
 views of our modern Liberals will be seen at a glance. 
 It is on the ground of its unsociability, its opposition to 
 modern progress, that the Church is now undergoing 
 persecution at their hands, whenever and in so far as 
 they have attained to power. Liberalism, in fact, which 
 was the legitimate offspring of Rousseau's doctrines, and 
 the reign of which was solemnly inaugurated in the great 
 French Revolution of '89, is not a political system the 
 aim of which is the attainment of institutions more or 
 less popular ; it is a moral system applied to the political 
 and social order of society. Its object is nothing less 
 than the exclusion of all religious influence from social 
 relations, and the entire emancipation of the political 
 order from the trammels of a Divine revelation. The 
 State must own no law which does not emanate from 
 itself; this is what, in the jargon of Liberals, is called a 
 
 1 Hence the subsequent invention, during the Revolution, of the 
 crime of incivism. 
 
Jansenism. 
 
 9 
 
 ' free State,' a state which has cast off all religious belief 
 and all recognition of any authority superior to itself. 
 It may thus easily be perceived that Liberalism and the 
 Church of God are essentially opposed to each other, 
 and that any accord between them is impossible. If in 
 our day, when we have had the experience of more than 
 three quarters of a century, there are even Catholics to 
 be found who think that a compromise between them 
 may be effected, we have less reason to wonder that 
 many good men were blinded as to the false and 
 dangerous character of the doctrines and opinions which 
 were afloat in every class of society during the years 
 preceding the first Revolution, ere they had as yet had 
 time to develop into act ; nay, that they even lent their 
 influence to help on a movement in which their generous 
 but undiscerning minds imagined they saw the dawn of 
 an era of liberty and fraternal concord. 
 
 Another potent agent which concurred in the produc- 
 tion of the French Revolution and its persecution of the 
 Church was Jansenism, which, in its hatred of Catholic 
 truth, made common cause with the infidel philosophy 
 of the day. The class from which the magistracy was 
 taken was peculiarly imbued with the spirit of this 
 insidious heresy, which ever strove to maintain its posi- 
 tion within the Church in order the more effectually to 
 injure it. Hence the Parliaments, and especially that of 
 Paris, were continually favouring the projects of the 
 enemies of religion by their invasion of ecclesiastical 
 rights, and by defeating the efforts of the clergy to stem 
 the tide of infidelity. 2 France, it may be truly said, 
 
 2 A striking proof of the extent to which Jansenism prevailed in the 
 Parliament of the capital occurred in 1737, when. Pope Clement XII. 
 having canonized St. Vincent de Paul, that body suppressed the Bull 
 because in it was noted^the zeal of that Saint against the Jansenistic 
 heresy. 
 
io Character of the Breton people. 
 
 owed her revolutionary horrors and religious persecution 
 more to her magistrates and lawyers, as a class, than to 
 any other body in the kingdom. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 State of Brittany at the commencement of the 
 Revolution. 
 
 Brittany was at the time of which we are speaking, 
 and still is, notwithstanding the terrible ordeal through 
 which it has passed and the corrosive action of ' modern 
 progress,' a pre-eminently Catholic land. Ever since 
 the day when his country was converted from Druidism, 
 the Breton had adhered with unflinching constancy to 
 the faith and retained it in all its freshness. Heresy 
 had no power to pervert or seduce him, for no profane 
 novelty had ever any attractions for his serious and 
 deeply religious mind ; and as he had always shown 
 himself proof against the allurements of error, so in 
 the day of fiery trial the terrors of persecution were 
 equally powerless to compel him to deny his God. A 
 well-known author, 1 who has dedicated his pen to the 
 
 1 Emile Souvestre. It is a pity that an author, so justly admired, 
 who not only was gifted with much literary talent and descriptive power, 
 but had also a genuine sympathy and reverence for the good, the pure, 
 and the beautiful, should be deficient in several essential qualities, the 
 absence of which renders his writings, taken as a whole, unsatisfactory 
 to Catholic readers. There is in him a certain naturalness, and what 
 may be called sensuousness, which is continually betraying itself. He 
 looks at religion mainly from an aesthetic, picturesque, and sentimental 
 point of view, and, when he attempts to go below the surface, he seems 
 to get entirely out of his element. Passages occur in which, however 
 unintentionally on his part, he expresses himself in a manner highly 
 offensive to Catholic feeling ; but, allowing for these serious drawbacks, 
 his pictures of Brittany are very valuable, and the more so as time is 
 rapidly sweeping away all distinctive features there, as in every other 
 quarter of Europe. 
 
Their faith and devotion. 
 
 1 1 
 
 description of his beloved Brittany, says that the contest 
 there was between the guillotine and faith, and that in 
 the desperate struggle the guillotine blunted its edge 
 and was worsted. That struggle never, as in La Vendee, 
 resulted in civil war. Speaking generally, it may be 
 said that Basse Bretagne 2 continued unmoved; but, as 
 the same writer forcibly expresses it, ' she remained on 
 her knees with clasped hands in spite of all that was 
 done to prevent her.' There was, indeed, something 
 marvellous in this spectacle of a passive resistance which 
 neither yielded to fear nor blazed into anger. Nothing 
 could move her from her devout attitude, or shake her 
 religious faith. * The bonnet rouge might be forced upon 
 her head, but not upon her mind.' ' I will knock down 
 your belfries,' said Bon-Saint-Andre to a village mayor. 
 'You will still have to leave us the stars,' replied 
 the noble peasant; 'and they can be seen farther off 
 than our belfry.' 
 
 Not only had the Bretons been always remarkable for 
 this strong attachment to the faith of their fathers, but 
 nowhere had religion exercised a more salutary influence. 
 The clergy were a zealous, unassuming, well-instructed 
 body, entirely devoted to their round of sacred duties 
 and possessing the respect and confidence of their flocks. 
 Missions and retreats, in which all classes took part, 
 were very frequent ; Christian education flourished ; 
 crimes were rare, and the morals of the population 
 remarkable for their purity. The geographical situation 
 of this province isolated it in a certain degree from the 
 
 2 The province of Brittany has been divided ever since the Revolution 
 into five departments, but it is in Lower Brittany alone, which com- 
 prises the departments of Finisterre, Morbihan, and the C6tes-du-Nord, 
 that the pure Celtic race, with its language, names, features, costumes, 
 and traditional superstitions, is to be chiefly found. This is the genuine 
 Brittany, the Bretagne Bretonnante of Froissart, who calls the eastern 
 part la Bretagne Douce, because the French language was spoken there. 
 
12 
 
 Religious monuments. 
 
 rest of France, and its peculiar language added a further 
 bar of separation. It was in consequence a region little 
 known and seldom visited, and was thus preserved in 
 a great measure from that influx of corruption so com- 
 , monly introduced by strangers into countries which they 
 habitually frequent. Religion was interwoven with every 
 event, with every occupation of life. It met the eye at 
 every turn. To the Breton everything was, so to say, 
 sanctified, even to the very ruins of Paganism which 
 strewed the land; for when, as the writer just alluded 
 to graphically expresses it, the old Druidess was baptized 
 by St. Pol, she kept her dolmens and her menhirs 3 along 
 with her thousand chapels of Mary and shrines of saints, 
 the cross which surmounted their summits proclaiming 
 the triumph of the faith of Christ over the ancient super- 
 stition. The amazing number even of the way-side 
 crosses may be inferred from the fact, that when at the 
 Restoration it was contemplated to replace those which 
 had been demolished in 1793, it was found that it 
 would cost no less a sum than 1,500,000 francs to 
 carry out the design. Two-thirds of these crosses were 
 in the Pays de Leon alone. Some idea may hence be 
 formed of the deep hold which the faith must have had 
 on the Breton population in the eighteenth century. 4 
 
 3 St. Pol, or St. Paul, first Bishop of L^on, was a native of Cornwall, 
 who, early in the sixth century, converted to the Christian faith the 
 Pagan inhabitants of Armorica. The menhirs are large vertical stones, 
 like those of Stonehenge. The dolmens are horizontal stones placed 
 upon vertical ones : both evidently connected with the old Druidical 
 worship. In the Ile-aux- Moines, the ancient dolmen is still traditionally 
 called the altar of sacrifice. 
 
 4 A writer in the Revue de V Enscignemcnt Chritien tells us that 
 there are two small islands on the coast of Brittany, called Hcedic and 
 Houat, which seem entirely to have escaped the influences of the last 
 century, and remain perfect relics of mediaeval Christianity, nay, of 
 Christianity still more primitive. He calls the Catholic community 
 inhabiting these islets ' the model Republic' These people have never 
 changed their manners for fifteen centuries. They have no police or 
 
Beginnings of corntption. 1 3 
 
 A very serious blow, however, was inflicted upon reli- 
 gion by the suppression of the Jesuits in the year 1773. 
 Education had been largely in their hands, and it now 
 passed into such as were less able and less firm. At 
 no time could such a loss have been more calamitous. 
 The new ideas, under the specious name of philosophy, 
 had begun to penetrate into the province and had 
 seduced not a few members of the higher classes. Com- 
 munication having become easier, the intercourse between 
 Paris, the focus of the evil, was now more frequent, and 
 nothing could surpass the activity of the propaganda of 
 impiety and the variety of the arts employed to pervert 
 and win to the cause all who by their social position 
 were in any degree raised above the people. The spirit 
 of faith began to be enfeebled amongst the youth in 
 the schools and colleges. In the meantime bad books 
 were being circulated and read, doing infinite mischief. 
 Men of moral and intellectual shallowness, with the 
 usual accompaniments of pride and self-sufficiency, 
 greedily embraced the new doctrines, which had all the 
 more attraction for them as they set them free from 
 restraint and flattered their passions. These men were 
 now to be met with everywhere, even in the smallest 
 towns, and everywhere they showed themselves as bitter 
 
 courts of justice ; their simple laws are administered by the cure in the 
 name of God. They have no lawyers, constables, journalists, usurers, 
 publicans, prisons, or illegitimate children. All their land is cultivated 
 for the use of the community, but the fishery, which is carried on by 
 a fearless and skilful race of mariners, provides the staple of their 
 sustenance ; the old people and orphans are supported by the com- 
 munity. There is no hotel or inn on either island, visitors being 
 entertained by private hospitality without charge. Objectionable 
 strangers are requested to depart as soon as possible. Crime and 
 immorality are unknown on the islands, and always have been so for 
 fifteen centuries, all the people being practical Catholics of the olden 
 stamp, and thoroughly French in their attachment to that nation, 
 though 'separated from it,' says the writer, 'by an abyss in their 
 manners and customs' {Table/, February 24, 1877). 
 
14 Contending parties. 
 
 criticizers of the clergy, of whom, before long, they were 
 to become the relentless persecutors. Nevertheless, the 
 rural population had almost wholly escaped the infection 
 of infidelity. 
 
 About the same time political causes combined to 
 trouble this peaceful land, but the agitation was confined 
 to those who shared in the administration of the country; 
 the people remained silent spectators, not presuming to 
 intermeddle, so deep at that period was the respect for 
 authority. Brittany, having been united to the Crown 
 through marriage, not through conquest, had retained 
 by express stipulation many privileges to which it was 
 much attached. The nobility, in particular, were ex- 
 tremely zealous in defence of these rights, while the 
 Court, on the contrary, was disposed to entrench upon 
 them, and was always much opposed to the Provincial 
 States, which stood in its way when it desired to effect 
 any local change. It would gladly indeed have done 
 away with this obstacle to the sovereign central power, 
 but as this was not feasible, it was always striving to 
 weaken the authority of the national legislative body. 
 Minds became more and more excited and alarmed, 
 and the changes with Louis XV. shortly before his 
 death made in the Parliaments contributed to increase 
 and extend the agitation. Certain projects of innovation, 
 the result of which would have been to deprive Brittany 
 of the greater part of its privileges and destroy its ancient 
 constitution, resulted in dividing the inhabitants into 
 two parties — the Government party and the country 
 party, and thus prepared the way for some deplorable 
 scenes which disgraced the town of Rennes in the begin- 
 ning of 1789, and formed a fitting prelude to the horrors 
 of the Revolution. For some time past, political writers, 
 strangers to the province, had been disseminating pamph- 
 lets full of violent invectives against the clergy and 
 
Riots at Rennes. 
 
 15 
 
 nobility. The States of Brittany were sitting for the 
 last time in Rennes at the close of 1788, when some 
 of these agitators established themselves in the city for 
 the purpose of kindling discord between the higher 
 classes and the third order. The Parliament, unfortu- 
 nately, was unable to take any active measures to put 
 them down, for that body did not enjoy the countenance 
 of Necker, the then Prime Minister, who wished to get 
 rid of all the local provincial courts, and favoured those 
 who were inimical to them. Profiting by this support, 
 they held tumultuous assemblies, in which the two higher 
 orders were virulently assailed, and enticing promises 
 were held out to the people, including the prospect of 
 entire exemption from taxation. Students in the schools 
 of law were admitted to these meetings and distinguished 
 themselves by their violent demeanour, which broke 
 out in open act when they were joined by some young 
 men from Nantes. Sixty of these hot-headed youths 
 attacked a peaceable body of working-men who were 
 on their way to present to the magistrates a protestation 
 of their submission to the Parliament, and a fray ensued. 
 Accusing the nobility of having excited the working-men 
 to take this step, the rioters proceeded the next day to 
 assail any gentlemen whom they met in the streets, 
 wounded many, and killed two. Yet the conduct of these 
 seditious youths found many approvers and defenders 
 in the ranks of the third estate, who were beginning 
 to regard themselves as an oppressed and injured class. 
 
 An important body in the city of Rennes, the avocats 
 or lawyers, had, in the first instance, sided with the 
 Parliament and nobility in their struggle with the Crown, 
 but, imbued with the new ideas and perceiving that 
 Government favoured the innovations provoked by the 
 philosophers, it speedily turned round against an autho- 
 rity which it had hitherto respected, and more than 
 
1 6 Deputation to the King. 
 
 one of its members were found to undertake the vin- 
 dication of the young men who had been guilty of the 
 late sanguinary riot. Things had now arrived at such 
 a point that the clergy and nobility resolved upon 
 sending a deputation to the King to claim the protection 
 which was their due against the lawless outrages to 
 which they were exposed, a protection which he was 
 himself little capable of affording. The Tiers, or third 
 order, also sent a deputation of its own to represent its 
 grievances and give its version of the late disturbances. 
 The deputation of the two higher orders consisted of 
 members of the Breton States, which had been suspended 
 on the 3rd of January by the influence of Necker, and 
 were all, both clerical and lay, persons of distinction 
 and merit. In the memoir which they addressed to 
 the sovereign they ventured to tell him that, notwith- 
 standing his love of peace, it no longer existed in his 
 dominions; that everywhere the third estate was being 
 excited against the clergy and nobility with the most 
 fatal results. After narrating the late scenes in Ren- 
 nes, they proceeded to express fears which were only 
 too well justified, and to complain that the fomenters 
 of the troubles boasted of Government support. Nor 
 does it appear that this boast on the part of the factious 
 was altogether destitute of foundation. Necker, seconded 
 by the Intendant of the province in what he called his 
 projects of reform, was striving to destroy the national 
 Parliaments, and to this end favoured the illegal asso- 
 ciations formed in Brittany with designs hostile to its 
 ancient magistracy. He gave them so much encourage- 
 ment that while the deputation of the higher orders 
 found him well-nigh inaccessible, he would readily 
 receive and give audience to the seditious malcontents. 
 Whatever there might be that needed reform in the old 
 fabric, and how great soever might be that need, such 
 
Insidious assaults 011 the clergy. 17 
 
 a course on the part of Government, it is plain, was 
 suicidal, being most injurious to the interests of order and 
 authority. The Breton delegates proceeded to lay these 
 considerations before the monarch, and to point out that 
 by no act or measure had the Government marked its 
 disapprobation of the conduct of the municipalities in 
 encouraging the attacks made upon the clergy and 
 nobility. They concluded with beseeching him to pro- 
 tect a Constitution which he had sworn to maintain, 
 and which could not be altered except by common 
 consent, still less in opposition to the wishes of two 
 orders in the State. 
 
 It may be observed that the order of the clergy here 
 alluded to included only the bishops, abbots, and chap- 
 ters of cathedrals ; the parochial clergy and other eccle- 
 siastics forming no part of it. The enemies of religion 
 profited by this exclusion to endeavour to raise a spirit 
 of insubordination towards their prelates in the inferior 
 ranks of the clergy. They affected to commiserate 
 them, and had invented the invidious term of high and 
 low clergy, in order to impress the latter with a sense 
 of degradation. They declaimed against the dignitaries 
 of the Church and the possessors of rich benefices, 
 gorged, they said, with wealth, while the cures, who 
 did the actual work and were the true fathers of the 
 people, languished in poverty. Pamphlets were also 
 addressed to them, filled with specious arguments artfully 
 directed to disposing them in favour of the projected 
 innovations. Such have ever been the tactics of the 
 enemies of the Church in making their first assaults ; 
 men were presently to discover that the tender pity 
 manifested for the cures was but a feint adopted for the 
 purpose of creating disunion, and to see these pretended 
 friends of the second order of clergy turn against them 
 so soon as they no longer needed their concurrence, 
 c 25 
 
1 8 Convocation of States-General. 
 
 and persecute both pastors and prelates with the same 
 implacable fury. In the meantime not a few were 
 deceived and seduced by their sophistry. The parochial 
 clergy of Brittany were, for the most part, simple, unsus- 
 picious, confiding men, and though well instructed in 
 all that was needful for the exercise of their vocation, 
 very ignorant of the world, and therefore the easier to 
 beguile. Add to this, that a very large proportion of 
 their body, belonging by birth to the humbler classes, 
 were naturally drawn to sympathize with the Tiers. By 
 and by, however, with the exception of a lamentable 
 but very small minority, who went astray altogether after 
 their perfidious guides, they were to recognize their 
 mistake, and to perceive that the real aim of these 
 ardent reformers was not the removal of ecclesiastical 
 abuses, but the utter subversion of the Catholic religion 
 throughout the land. 
 
 The urgent representations of the Breton deputation 
 were productive of no result, the attention of Govern- 
 ment being engrossed with one object — the approaching 
 meeting of the States-General. On January 24, 1789, 
 Louis XVI. issued his letters of convocation, and simul- 
 taneously published the rules which were to govern the 
 elections ; for as there had been an interval of one 
 hundred and seventy-five years since the last assembly 
 of the States-General, certain changes in the old forms 
 were judged needful, and in particular such as would 
 introduce a larger popular element. Accordingly, the 
 Tiers was to be represented by half the total number 
 of deputies, the other half to be equally divided between 
 the clergy and nobility. The inferior clergy, who, it 
 may be noted, had never hitherto sent deputies to the 
 States-General, were also upon the present occasion to 
 have a share in the representation. The city of Saint- 
 Brieuc having been designed as the place of meeting 
 
Clerical elections. 
 
 19 
 
 for the election of deputies of the two superior orders, 
 thither they repaired, but it was only to protest against 
 the illegal manner in which they had been summoned. 
 Elections for the States-General, according to the ancient 
 constitution of Brittany, had always been made in their 
 own Provincial States convoked for the purpose, and 
 they refused to proceed according to any other form. 
 But in a joint address to the King they expressed them- 
 selves as perfectly willing and desirous, in a constitutional 
 assembly of the States-General, to consent to a more 
 extended representation of the Tiers, as well as to a 
 more equal assessment of the taxes. No satisfaction 
 having been obtained, each of the higher orders put 
 forth a separate declaration in the form of a protest 
 against the injury done to the States of Brittany, at 
 the same time formally disavowing whatever the Tiers, 
 thus illegally chosen, might do in the Assembly con- 
 trary to the interests of the province. In thus acting, 
 they were undoubtedly only asserting their just rights, 
 but their determination may well be viewed as matter 
 of regret, since it deprived the Assembly of the presence 
 of many men both of worth and wisdom who would 
 have been able to lend their powerful support to the 
 party of order, for such might easily have been found 
 in the ranks of the nobility, while among the bishops 
 Brittany possessed men not only of sterling merit, but 
 of consummate prudence and ability. Favoured by 
 Government, the inferior clergy had been convoked a 
 fortnight earlier, and their elections took place in the 
 episcopal cities of each diocese, not in all cases with 
 perfect tranquillity, particularly at Rennes and Nantes, 
 where the prejudices lately fostered against the episcopal 
 order manifested themselves openly, and declamations 
 were heard against pretended abuses of authority, while 
 at Nantes several most estimable and able cure's were 
 
20 The clergy favourable to reform. 
 
 set aside solely because they had exhibited a strong 
 attachment to their bishop. It may hence be concluded 
 that, although the Breton clergy were represented in 
 the States-General for the most part by men of merit 
 and consideration, there was nevertheless an admixture 
 of such as not only shared to a very regrettable degree 
 the eagerness for innovation so common at the period, 
 but were tainted with the still more deplorable spirit of 
 insubordination ; while, as a class, they were too little 
 acquainted with political matters to enter with safety 
 into so perilous an arena, and one for which their pre- 
 vious training and habits of mind had in no way prepared 
 them. Accordingly, in the first instance they were 
 almost universally led away by clever, artful men, and 
 thus helped to accelerate the movement which was 
 hurrying the nation into the abyss of Revolution. Some 
 of their number were for a time even staggered in faith 
 and betrayed into deplorable compromises which they 
 were afterwards generously to disavow ; while others, 
 few, it is true, by comparison, were to make shipwreck 
 altogether. But among them were also found individuals 
 who, placed in the most trying circumstances, manifested 
 a firmness worthy of their high vocation. 
 
 The cahiers, or papers of instruction, furnished to 
 their deputies by the clergy of Brittany attest at once 
 the soundness of their views and the spirit of genuine 
 liberality which animated their body. This remark, 
 indeed, is capable of more extended application. A 
 modern historian, M. Alfred Nettement, speaking of the 
 instructions furnished by the French clergy to their 
 deputies in 1789, says, 'In the States-General the clergy 
 found themselves face to face with the mischievous 
 theories of economists, the prejudices and Jansenistic 
 resentments of the bourgeoisie, the implacable enmity of 
 the philosophers — in fine, with the levity and weakness 
 
The third estate. 
 
 21 
 
 of a vacillating Court. A formidable coalition was at 
 once organized against them, and even before they had 
 taken their seats, they were already not only judged, 
 but sentenced to death ; and yet it may be truly affirmed 
 that the cahiers which they brought with them to the 
 Assembly formed collectively a work of high political 
 science, a code of legislation, a treatise of true social 
 economy.' Whatever, then, some may be ready to 
 suppose, the clergy of France were in no way ' behind 
 their age,' as it is the fashion to assert. If anywhere, 
 assuredly in antiquated, isolated Brittany retrogradism 
 (to adopt the liberalistic phraseology of our day) might 
 have been expected to prevail. Yet, so far from this 
 being the case, not a few of their number, as we have 
 seen, were only too much infected with the fever of 
 progress, while the great and sounder majority were as 
 strong in their expressed desires for all wholesome, full, 
 and liberal reforms as was the bourgeois class itself. 
 
 But if some undesirable elements existed in the ranks 
 of the clergy, amongst the Tiers principles of a most 
 menacing and destructive character were predominant. 
 Never before had the elections been constituted on so 
 wide and popular a basis, and the decision which placed 
 the third order numerically on an equality with the two 
 others, secured it a preponderance in the event of com- 
 mon deliberation. 5 Hitherto the third estate had borne 
 all the public burdens without being allowed any part 
 in the conduct of public affairs, whilst the two other orders 
 had been entirely exempt from taxation, for which, as 
 respected the nobles, military service, conducted, as it 
 was in feudal times, at their own personal cost, was 
 
 5 The deputies for the two higher orders l.umbered together 593 ; 
 those of the third estate, 621. This excess was owing to the refusal of 
 the higher orders in Brittany to send deputies. In other parts of France 
 many, unfortunately, had also abstained from voting. 
 
22 Impending conflict. 
 
 regarded as the substitute. 0 A conflict between the 
 bourgeois and the nobles was therefore imminent, as the 
 latter, though willing to concede some reforms, were 
 bent on retaining, at least, a portion of their privileges. 
 Nevertheless, even in the aristocratic class many were 
 to be found who enthusiastically sided with the popular 
 demands, whilst the clergy, throughout France, as has 
 been already observed, were favourable to them and, 
 indeed, to all reforms consistent with justice and the 
 inalienable rights of the Church. All differences, there- 
 fore, might eventually have been overcome, and the 
 most liberal reforms harmoniously effected, had not 
 France laboured under far more serious evils than those 
 of social and political inequalities. We have seen how 
 wicked men had been actively employed in undermining 
 the faith of the people, in effacing from their consciences 
 the idea of a Present God, the Ruler of all, eradicating 
 from their hearts a sense of the duty of obedience and 
 submission, inspiring them with a contempt for authority 
 and a hatred of the rich, as well as of all superiorities, 
 in short, thoroughly demoralizing the public mind. 
 When principles are corrupted, and passions, thus set 
 free from all salutary restraint, are ready to burst into 
 a flame before the slightest opposition, then it is that 
 thrones are jeopardized and society menaced with utter 
 subversion; and to this appalling state of things the 
 higher class, which were to be its first victims, had 
 in a great measure prepared the way in France, not 
 only by the spectacle which they had too generally 
 offered of luxury, licence, and immorality, but through 
 
 6 Although the clergy were not taxed, yet they often taxed them- 
 selves ; and it is matter of history how largely they contributed, when 
 an emergency occurred, to the necessities of the State ; not to speak of 
 the liberal use they made of their ample revenues for the public benefit : 
 as, for instance, in constructing bridges, building hospitals, erecting 
 and endowing schools, &c. 
 
Wild projects of the Tiers. 
 
 23 
 
 the blind adoption and encouragement, on the part of 
 so many among them, of the philosophical errors of 
 the day. 
 
 The elections of the third order were, speaking gener- 
 ally, of a tumultuous character. The choice of deputies 
 was not happy. Naturally, in the anticipation of the 
 coming struggle, those men were elected who had been 
 the most prominent in their declamations against popular 
 grievances, and who, it was therefore expected, would 
 prove the most energetic champions of reform. These 
 individuals were almost all more or less infected with 
 the new ideas ; a large number were mere Utopians, 
 regarding all existing institutions as bad, desirous to 
 sweep them all away and to construct on their ruins 
 an ideal government and a social state in accordance 
 with the dreams of Rousseau. Men of this class had 
 already formed themselves into clubs all over the country, 
 the evil action and influence of which might already be 
 foreseen, for they rested for their support upon the 
 masses, whom, by the help of those arts which dema- 
 gogues know so well how to practise, they would be 
 able to use as their army of intimidation, as was soon 
 to be terribly exemplified. The cahiers of the Tiers in 
 Brittany, and it is with them we are chiefly concerned, 
 did not exhibit the wisdom which characterized those 
 of the clergy. Along with much which was unquestion- 
 ably just and good, they contained suggestions altogether 
 wild and unreasonable, especially as respected the 
 Church, which the avocats had set themselves up to 
 reform according to a constitution of their own devising,, 
 by which it was to be placed in harmony with the pro- 
 posed liberal institutions, political and social. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 Spoliation of the Church. Civil Constitution of the 
 Clergy. 
 
 The States-General met on the 5th of May, 1789. Those 
 who are familiar with the leading events of the Great 
 French Revolution, need scarcely be reminded of the 
 discussion which immediately ensued upon a matter 
 which had unfortunately been left undecided, viz., 
 whether the three orders were, as heretofore, to consti- 
 tute three chambers, or whether they were to be united 
 in one. The first question at issue was whether they 
 should meet together for the verification of their powers, 
 but all were aware that, this point once conceded, delibe- 
 ration and voting in common were sure to follow. Louis, 
 as usual with him, adopted that hesitating course which 
 invariably encourages the insolence of the factious, and 
 robs concession, in which it is certain to result, of all 
 the grace and good effect which attach to it so long as it 
 is accompanied by some freedom of choice, and thus 
 possesses in a measure the merit of an initiative act. 
 The clergy were employed in a fruitless measure of con- 
 ciliation ; meanwhile the Tiers was labouring with more 
 success to entice the inferior members of that body to 
 join it. On the 13th of June, three cures of Poitou led 
 the way in going over without awaiting the decision of 
 the higher clergy. On the morrow six other ecclesiastics, 
 amongst whom figured the afterwards famous schismatic 
 bishop, Gregoire, Cure of Emberme'nil, in the diocese 
 of Nancy, and two Breton cures followed their example ; 
 and on the 17th seven other cures joined the Tiers. 
 
Cle7'ical defections. 
 
 25 
 
 These ecclesiastics committed the grave error of acting 
 independently of their Superiors ; but worse was to 
 ensue. 
 
 It was on the 17th that took place the well-known 
 scene in the Tennis Court, where the Tiers, which had 
 already assumed to itself the title of National Assembly, 
 bound itself by an oath never to separate till the consti- 
 tution of the kingdom was settled on a firm basis. On 
 that day the Revolution had begun. On the 19th, the 
 clergy, after deliberating on the mode of verifying their 
 powers, decided by a clear majority against joining the 
 Tiers. The minority were betrayed into the inexcusable 
 fault of holding a meeting of their own as soon as the 
 opposite party had left their seats, and passing a resolu- 
 tion to the directly contrary effect. By the 24th of the 
 month, one hundred and ninety-one ecclesiastics had 
 gone over to the Tiers, and amongst them were all the 
 Breton deputies except four. 
 
 The motives which led to the defection of so large a 
 proportion of the clergy were of a mixed character. 
 Some went in the hopes that their presence might help 
 to check or modify violent counsels ; others, from that 
 sympathy with the third order to which we have alluded. 
 They were received with a burst of rapturous applause, 
 the last which was to greet them from the benches of 
 that Assembly. A minority of the nobility, gained over 
 by Necker, who favoured the Tiers and was then at the 
 height of his popularity, were induced to follow the 
 example of the clerical seceders. Had the Minister 
 possessed, along with his better moral qualifications, the 
 firmness and ability of Mirabeau, 1 the depraved leader of 
 
 1 After the meeting of the Tennis Court, Mirabeau, laughing with his 
 friends about his boldness on this occasion, said, ' With a handful of 
 soldiers the new legislators might all have been sent to the right-about.' 
 All that the Government did was to despatch a few workmen to remove 
 some benches and tapestry hangings, in the hopes that the noise of 
 their hammers might disturb the deliberations of the meeting ! 
 
26 
 
 Spoliation of the Church. 
 
 the Tiers, he might have saved the King and the 
 monarchy at that critical juncture. But Necker, although 
 an able financier, lacked the qualities of a good and 
 prudent Minister of State. He was also fond of popular 
 applause. His conduct at this crisis cannot be excused, and, 
 without impugning his honesty of purpose, he may well 
 be considered as having virtually betrayed the interests 
 of both the King and the kingdom, and led Louis, who 
 felt himself powerless in his hands, to consent to acts 
 which were a virtual abdication of his royal authority, 
 and a direct sanction to lawlessness and insurrection. 
 The weak monarch, thus unsupported by any sound 
 statesman, counteracted by his own Minister, and ever 
 recoiling from the employment of force, after causing a 
 declaration to be published on the 23rd of June, which, 
 among various concessions, still retained the separation 
 of the three orders, allowed the moment for decisive 
 action to pass by, and only four days later, on the 27 th, 
 signified his wishes, which in effect amounted to a com- 
 mand, that the remainder of the two orders of clergy and 
 nobility, which had hitherto held aloof, should unite 
 themselves to the Assembly. This act of Louis ought 
 either to have been done in the first instance, or never to 
 have been done at all. 
 
 We have no intention of following the rapid steps by 
 which the Revolution now advanced, or of relating the 
 terrible scenes which were enacted both in the capital 
 and in the provinces between the 27th of June and the 
 2nd of November following, on which latter day the 
 spoliation of the Church, which had been proposed by 
 the notorious Talleyrand, Bishop of Autun, in order to 
 supply the deficit in the public treasury, was decreed, 
 and its property declared to be at the disposition of the 
 nation : a decree in perfect harmony with the principles 
 promulgated by Rousseau. Determined to secure the 
 
Suppression of religions orders. 
 
 27 
 
 carrying of their measure, the enemies of religion had 
 summoned the dregs of the faubourgs to their aid. 
 Armed with clubs and other weapons, this rabble filled 
 the adjoining streets, insulting the ecclesiastics as they 
 passed to the Assembly, or menacing with death all who 
 should refuse to vote for the measure. On that day the 
 Church of France was stripped of all her property, 
 which was soon to become the prey of greedy specu- 
 lators, Jews, Protestants, and bad Catholics, who had all 
 for some time past been reckoning upon making their 
 profit out of its sale. On the 13th of February, 1790, 
 the religious orders were declared to be abolished, and 
 the greater part of the convents were suppressed. The 
 deterioration and degeneracy of the monastic institutions 
 was the pretext put forward for this act. It is not to be 
 denied that considerable relaxation prevailed in many 
 religious communities in France, but it may be truly 
 affirmed that this was chiefly owing to lay and govern- 
 mental interference. Their reform was one of the objects 
 recommended in the cahiers of the clergy ; and if that 
 body had met separately, it would have formed a suitable 
 matter for discussion and arrangement, subject to the 
 approval of the Holy See. The National Assembly, in 
 any case, was incompetent to deal with ecclesiastical 
 matters. The separation of the good grain from the 
 chaff was now to be witnessed. Bad monks availed 
 themselves of this decree of the civil power to cast aside 
 vows from which no secular authority had the right to 
 release them. They left their convents, and were soon to 
 be numbered amongst the active promoters of the 
 schism. Few religious in Brittany thus disgraced them- 
 selves, and the vast majority throughout France proved 
 faithful to their obligations. Congregating in those 
 houses which were temporarily spared, they continued 
 to practise their rule as well as they were able until 
 
28 Civil Constitution of the Clergy. 
 
 they were forcibly ejected. The nuns, in particular, gave 
 an almost universal example of fidelity to their vows and 
 attachment to their holy state. An extremely small 
 proportion of these women, who had been represented 
 as the victims of bigotry and superstition, and reluctant 
 prisoners in the cloister, profited by the permission given 
 them to return to the world. The rest remained to give 
 a splendid contradiction to their impious traducers, and 
 not a few of them were ere long to win the palm of 
 martyrdom. 2 
 
 Pursuing its work of destruction, the Assembly was 
 now about to aim its most deadly blow at the Church by 
 voting the ' Civil Constitution of the Clergy,' which 
 carries its condemnation in its very name. ' We must 
 de-Catholicize France,' had' been Mirabeau's exclamation 
 in one of his philosophic rhapsodies. The clergy had 
 been deprived of their temporal influence by being 
 stripped of their property and placed on a level with the 
 salaried officials of the State ; it was now necessary to 
 destroy their spiritual influence, by reducing the Church 
 to a mere department of the civil service. There were 
 unfortunately many even of the moderate party in the 
 Constituent Assembly, as it was now called, who were 
 willing to combine with the declared enemies of reli- 
 gion in this work, having been led astray by that 
 theory of Rousseau's which absorbed all powers in 
 one, viz., that of the State ; while the Jansenists 
 again, who formed a very numerous party in the 
 Chamber, saw in this plan the realization of their 
 own views, which made spiritual power as well as 
 temporal reside in the people ; Popes, Bishops, and 
 
 s It may be well to observe that though it had been decreed that all, 
 men and women alike, were free to renounce their vocation and leave 
 their convents, the houses of those religious women who occupied 
 themselves with active works of mercy were not in the first instance 
 suppressed. 
 
Abolition of ancient sees. 
 
 29 
 
 Pastors, being simply delegates of the community, and 
 rulers only in a ministerial sense. 3 An ecclesiastical 
 commission had been appointed ever since the 20th 
 of August to elaborate the scheme. It was composed 
 chiefly of laymen, almost all of whom were sworn 
 enemies of the Church j only five ecclesiastics were 
 associated with them, who found themselves powerless to 
 effect any good ; and when fifteen more members noted 
 for their revolutionary principles were added in the 
 February following, the small minority of worthy deputies 
 resolved to retire, and, if their names were retained as 
 forming part of the commission, it was because their 
 right to withdraw was contested. The constitution which 
 was framed under such auspices, and submitted to the 
 Assembly, assimilated the ecclesiastical to the new civil 
 divisions. Suppressing the one hundred and thirty-four 
 existing bishoprics, it created eighty-three new ones in 
 their place, corresponding to each of the civil depart- 
 ments. For the Assembly, which conceived that it had 
 the mission to change and recast everything, had ex- 
 punged all the ancient distinctions and limits of provinces, 
 and divided the kingdom into a sort of chess-board of 
 departments, to which it gave the names of adjoining 
 rivers or mountains. These departments again were sub- 
 
 3 Jansenism was in its origin a heresy on the subject of grace, but 
 after its condemnation by the Church it became a system opposed to 
 the authority of the F.cclesia Docens and of the Supreme Pontiff. There 
 is much affinity between Jansenism and Protestantism. The distinction 
 may thus be broadly stated : Private judgment rebellious against the 
 Church in the interpretation of Scripture, is the essential error of 
 Protestantism. Private judgment, similarly rebellious in the interpre- 
 tation of ecclesiastical documents, is the essential error of Jansenism. 
 The two are in principle identical ; but Jansenism was able to disguise 
 its assumption of private judgment, and consequent contempt of the 
 authority of the living Church, by an affected reverence for the Church 
 of the past, which meant, in fact, its own interpretation of primitive 
 antiquity — in this resembling the High Anglicans of our own day. 
 
3<D Lay election of clergy. 
 
 divided into a certain number of districts, each having 
 its own administration, composed for the most part of 
 hot-headed and intemperate individuals who believed 
 themselves to be invested with an almost unlimited 
 authority. Virulent persecutors for the most part of the 
 faithful clergy, they were actuated by petty local ani- 
 mosities, and ready to inflict all manner of vexations on 
 any who offered the least opposition to revolutionary 
 measures. As Brittany, by the new arrangement, was to 
 contain only five departments, four of its nine dioceses, 
 those of Dol, Leon, Saint-Malo, and Treguier, were to 
 be suppressed. The new constitution forbade the recog- 
 nition of the authority of any bishop or metropolitan not 
 resident in France. This prohibition was intended to 
 abolish the jurisdiction of certain bishops, such as those 
 of Bale, Ypres, Toumay, &c, a portion of whose 
 dioceses, more or less considerable, lay within the realm. 
 The kingdom was to be divided into ten metropolitan 
 sees. That of Rennes was to receive the title of Metro- 
 politan See of the North West, and to include in its 
 jurisdiction all the Breton bishoprics, as well as those of 
 Angers and Mans and the proposed new see of Laval. 
 
 The choice of the bishops was confided to the electors 
 of the department indiscriminately, thus including both 
 Protestants and Jews. The bishop-elect was to demand 
 canonical installation from the metropolitan, and simply 
 to acquaint the Pope, as visible Head of the Church, 
 with the fact of his election, in token of inter-communion. 
 The departmental electors were also to choose the cures, 
 and these in turn their own vicaires, from amongst the 
 priests of the diocese. The cathedral chapters, abbatical 
 and collegiate, were to be suppressed, as well as the 
 priories and other benefices. These leading articles 
 suffice to show the character of the proposed constitu- 
 tion. As may be seen, it violated the rights of the Holy 
 
The Pope's Letter to Louis. 31 
 
 See, and destroyed the whole constitution and discipline 
 of the Church ; moreover, it was vicious in its origin, 
 on account of the incompetence of the civil legislature to 
 deal with ecclesiastical matters. When it came before 
 the Assembly, the most influential deputies of the clergy, 
 and even several lay deputies, exerted all their powers in 
 opposing it and in demonstrating its injustice, and 
 amongst them a Breton by birth, Mgr. de Boisgelin, 
 Archbishop of Aix, particularly distinguished himself. 
 He represented that the Church was a spiritual society, 
 which the civil power was bound to protect, but upon 
 whose rights it could not entrench without injustice, 
 while such acts were in all cases stamped with nullity. 
 He nevertheless expressed his desire, and that of his 
 brethren, to meet the views of the Assembly for reform 
 as far as might be possible. They had already proposed, 
 and they again proposed, to consult the Gallican Church 
 in a National Council. There, taking account of the 
 wants of the age, and giving due weight to all considera- 
 tions, it would be their object to reconcile the interests 
 of religion, of which they were the depositaries, with 
 those of the State, of which the Assembly he addressed 
 were the arbiters and judges. The solid arguments he 
 employed, and the tone of moderation with which he 
 spoke, were all, however, lost upon men who wished 
 neither to hear truth nor to do justice, but merely to 
 have their own will. 
 
 On the 1 2th of July the Assembly decreed in its 
 entirety this ' work of darkness, this compendium of all 
 kinds of heresies/ as the Civil Constitution was charac- 
 terized by the illustrious Pius VI. As the project had 
 been for some time in preparation, Louis, whose con- 
 science was alarmed, had been able secretly to consult 
 the Pope, who, on the 10th of July, replied in a letter at 
 once paternal and decisive. While expressing his conn- 
 
3 2 
 
 The King's advisers. 
 
 dence in the King's personal attachment to the Catholic 
 faith, the Holy Father warned him that, if he should be 
 led to sanction the decrees relating to the clergy, he 
 would involve the whole nation in error, plunge the 
 kingdom into schism, and perhaps kindle the flames of a 
 religious war. He reminded him that in his Council 
 sat two archbishops, one distinguishable for the zeal with 
 which he had combated infidelity, the other remarkable 
 for a profound acquaintance with ecclesiastical science 
 and discipline, and recommended him to consult them, 
 as well as all those prelates and doctors in his kingdom 
 who were noted for piety and learning ; telling him, in 
 conclusion, that although he was at liberty to renounce 
 rights appertaining to the royal prerogative, he was not 
 free to alienate or renounce anything which was due to 
 God and to the Church, of which he was the eldest son. 
 The two archbishops alluded to were Pompignan, Arch- 
 bishop of Vienne, and Champion de Cice, Archbishop 
 of Bordeaux. To these two prelates the Pope also wrote 
 confidentially, and it has been asserted that Pompignan 
 kept back from Louis the Brief committed to him until 
 after the 24th of August, on which day the King 
 appended his fatal signature to the decree of the 
 Assembly ; but this is evidently an error. The Brief, 
 it is true, was kept secret, but it is probable that this 
 was done by the King's own desire. A cloud, however, 
 it must be acknowledged, rests on Pompignan's conduct, 
 who died almost immediately. Some have attempted to 
 clear his memory by saying that he was too ill to attend 
 the Council or give any advice ; but he was certainly 
 able to write to the Pope promising to do all in his 
 power to deter the King from sanctioning the decree, 
 so that this excuse can hardly avail. Others maintain 
 that he joined the Archbishop of Bordeaux in betraying 
 his sacred duty, and died of the remorse which he felt 
 
Prevalence of Gallicanism. 
 
 33 
 
 for the act. Champion de Cice lived to deplore bitterly 
 his prevarication, and to make an humble avowal of his 
 fault. Still it must remain matter of profound astonish- 
 ment that two eminent prelates, or even that one — 
 supposing, what can scarcely be proved, that Pompignan 
 was innocent — should have been found to recommend to 
 Louis an act by which he formally sanctioned schism, 
 and this in the face of a Pontifical prohibition. The 
 only explanation that can be given of so much ignorance, 
 or so much pusillanimity, is that the tie which binds 
 the Episcopate to the Holy See was sadly relaxed : 
 one of the natural results of the so-called Gallican 
 liberties, which Fenelon aptly styled liberties in relation 
 to the Pope, servitudes in relation to the King. Galli- 
 canism had fostered this spirit of servile deference 
 towards the civil power, which had hitherto been em- 
 bodied in the sacred person of the monarch, indoctrinating 
 even pious and learned men with an inordinate estimate 
 of his prerogatives in regard to ecclesiastical matters. 
 The Constituent Assembly having now concentrated 
 in itself the whole authority of the State, seemed thus to 
 step into possession of the supposed rights of the sove- 
 reign. It required a rude shock to explode these false 
 notions, and such a shock France was about to receive ; 
 but, for a moment, the old ingrained ideas may have 
 helped to create a kind of illusion in the minds of these 
 prelates. This is all that can be said to explain, for 
 nothing can excuse, their conduct. How little the rela- 
 tion between the Supreme Pastor and his universal flock 
 was practically realized by many of the clergy, is proved 
 from what we are told by a modern historian of the 
 Church, 4 that he himself knew of a town, numbering 
 fifteen thousand inhabitants, at the period of the schism 
 in 1790, in which the faithful had never heard their 
 
 4 Rohrbacher, Histoirc de I'Eglise, 1. xc. 
 D 25 
 
34 
 
 General excitement. 
 
 pastors utter one word respecting the Holy Father, either 
 to remind them of his authority as Vicar of Jesus Christ, 
 or to inculcate the filial submission due to him from all 
 Christians ; so that, in the hour of peril, they found 
 themselves in a state of complete bewilderment from 
 the want of those guiding principles which would have 
 enabled them to understand the true nature and bearings 
 of the question at issue. 
 
 Nevertheless, attachment to the See of Peter, although 
 dormant, as it may be said, in the hearts of many of the 
 clergy, was by no means entirely lost even in these 
 exceptional, but unfortunately too numerous, cases ; 
 while the profound emotion excited in the clerical body 
 generally, as well as amongst the faithful laity, when the 
 provisions of the decree about to be presented to receive 
 the royal sanction became publicly known, abundantly 
 demonstrated what were the real sentiments and convic- 
 tions of the great bulk of the nation. It was hoped, 
 however, that Louis would refuse to make himself a 
 party to so impious a law, and meanwhile prayers, 
 novenas, fasts, and works of expiation, were everywhere 
 being offered to avert the impending danger. Priests 
 who had hitherto led lives little worthy of their profes- 
 sion were now seen to awaken, as it were, from a dream, 
 and to recognize their place and office as consecrated 
 intercessors for their people. Nay, some were converted, 
 not merely from a worldly life, but from what is far 
 harder to renounce, the proud intellectual errors which 
 they had cherished ; and men saw with astonishment 
 the Cure of Saint-Etienne-du-Mont, who had borne a 
 conspicuous part in the late revolutionary events, pass 
 forty whole days at the foot of the altar, clothed in sack- 
 cloth, to turn away God's anger from the Church of 
 France. 
 
 While strongly condemning Louis's dereliction of 
 
Weakness of the Ki7ig. 
 
 35 
 
 duty at this crisis, we must always think and speak with 
 compassionate tenderness of the man himself. His 
 virtues, his piety, his misfortunes, demand this at our 
 hands. We must also remember that he had received 
 evil advice from one, if not from both, of the prelates to 
 whom he had been referred for counsel. Yet this last 
 consideration, while pleading powerfully in extenuation, 
 cannot avail to excuse him, for his own conscience 
 forbade compliance, and, besides, he had received the 
 Pope's letter, which left no room for doubt or hesitation. 
 Louis yielded from weakness and fear; not, however, 
 personal fear; he proved on many occasions that he 
 possessed the hereditary courage of his race, and in his 
 protracted trials and cruel death he showed that he could 
 suffer and die with true Christian fortitude. But he was 
 possessed, as we have said, with a morbid fear of causing 
 the effusion of blood. The Assembly threatened; the 
 threat meant insurrection — the gathering of a savage 
 rabble, whom it could summon to its aid, but whose fury 
 it was powerless to restrain ; and so the unhappy monarch 
 yielded to the imperious pressure brought to bear upon 
 him. Forced, as he persuaded himself, by dire necessity 
 — although no necessity can ever force the will to com- 
 pliance with evil — he affixed his name to the iniquitous 
 law which was to plunge France into so much misery and 
 crime. His conscience, however, was ill at ease, and he 
 wrote immediately to the Pope, begging him to confirm, 
 at least provisionally, some of the articles of the Consti- 
 tution. Pius VI., at once the mildest and the firmest of 
 men, loved Louis XVI., and, compassionating his posi- 
 tion, acted with the greatest condescension compatible 
 with his duties as Supreme Pontiff. He held two con- 
 sistories, in which the Civil Constitution of the Clergy 
 was carefully examined, although it bore on its very face 
 the unmistakeable stamp of heresy and schism. Before 
 
36 Conduct of the Breton deputies. 
 
 proceeding to an immediate condemnation, the Pope 
 also judged it well to elicit an expression of the senti- 
 ments of the collective Episcopate of France ; and he 
 wrote accordingly to that effect. 
 
 We must not suppose that the bishops and clergy 
 had hitherto remained inactive spectators of the pro- 
 ceedings of the Assembly. In Brittany, in particular, 
 two admirable bishops, those of Quimper and Leon, had 
 already privately addressed the common Father of 
 Christendom with the view of obtaining direction and 
 support in their difficulties ; and their own diocesan 
 clergy, the overwhelming majority of whom were firmly 
 attached to their bishops, had, on their part, sought 
 instruction and advice from their ecclesiastical superiors. 
 Meanwhile, the Breton clergy were by no means satisfied 
 with the conduct of their representatives, particularly 
 with the absence of so many of their names from a 
 declaration which, on the 19th of April, had been 
 addressed by the clergy sitting in the Assembly to their 
 constituents, wherein they stated their ineffectual oppo- 
 sition to the late sacrilegious measures, which had been 
 voted without their participation and in defiance of their 
 protest. The fact was that some of these Breton 
 deputies had been already gained over to the Revolution ; 
 others, following the mere dictates of human prudence, 
 had feared to compromise themselves, or, as they repre- 
 sented it, to compromise the interests of religion by 
 irritating its enemies; for several of their number had 
 written to their constituents to excuse themselves and to 
 explain their motives. It may appear extraordinary that 
 so large a proportion of the representatives of the clergy 
 of Brittany should manifest a spirit so different from that 
 of the great majority of the body which had chosen 
 them, but it must be remembered that just as the Tiers 
 had elected the most ardent of its class, so the clergy, 
 
The " Exposition of Principles" 37 
 
 whose sympathies ran in the same direction, had, under 
 the influence of a like enthusiasm, made in too many 
 cases an unfortunate selection. 
 
 As soon as the manifesto of the 19th of April became 
 known, the religious and ecclesiastical bodies hastened to 
 send in their declarations of adhesion. Some addressed 
 their protests to the Assembly itself, and foremost in this 
 course were large numbers of the Breton clergy ; a pro- 
 ceeding which was immediately denounced by the 
 revolutionary municipalities as an attempt to excite the 
 province to revolt. But, indeed, the Civil Constitution 
 of the Clergy had scarcely been published with the royal 
 sanction before a general cry of indignation arose from 
 one end of France to the other. The vast majority of 
 the clergy, especially in Brittany, rejected it with horror, 
 and a number of ecclesiastics distinguished by their 
 learning and piety were urgent in warning the faithful, 
 both by word and by their published writings, of the 
 danger to which religion was exposed, hoping thereby to 
 preserve from error all save those who had no mind 
 to learn the truth. Upon the receipt of the Holy Father's 
 letters, the bishops of France had lost no time in issuing 
 a united declaration. On the 30th of October, 1790, 
 appeared the ' Exposition of the Principles of the Civil 
 Constitution of the Clergy.' It was drawn up and 
 prepared by Mgr. Boisgelin, Archbishop of Aix, to whose 
 zealous defence of the Church's interests we have already 
 alluded. It was signed by all the French bishops except 
 four : those of Sens, Autun, Orleans, and Viviers ; five, 
 indeed, if Gobel, Bishop of Lydda in partibus, Coad- 
 jutor of the Bishop of Bale, is to be reckoned. But he 
 scarcely belonged to the Gallican Church, as only a 
 portion of the diocese lay within the French border. 
 The document contained a clear and masterly statement 
 of the respective limits of the spiritual and temporal 
 
38 Effects of the "Exposition!* 
 
 powers ; it vindicated the jurisdiction of the Church, 
 and established by irrefragable proofs its exclusive right 
 to erect dioceses, establish metropolitan sees, institute 
 bishops, give them their mission, and enact disciplinary 
 rules. After demonstrating that the State had never pos- 
 sessed these powers, the Exposition proceeded to show 
 the difference between the proposed elections and those 
 of ancient times, to which it was pretended to assimilate 
 them • such elections having always been made with the 
 concurrence of the clergy and provincial councils. It 
 complained of the suppression of the monasteries and 
 religious orders, as being a violation of the liberty of 
 conscience, and concluded with demanding that recourse 
 should be had to the Pope, and that the convocation of 
 a National Council should be authorized, wherein any 
 changes found to be desirable might be made in due 
 accordance with canonical law. As the document was 
 intended to enlighten, not the Pope, but the Assembly, 
 the tone throughout was as moderate as was consistent 
 with a firm enunciation of true principles. Pius VI. 
 did not proceed at once to pronounce any public con- 
 demnation, but waited awhile, probably in order to 
 observe what effect the Exposition would produce. That 
 effect, no doubt, was great. A large number of the 
 faithful, including certain ecclesiastics who had been 
 deluded by the specious arguments of the Jansenists in 
 favour of what was called the restoration of primitive 
 discipline, returned to a better mind, and became deter- 
 mined opponents of the measure. Even in the Assembly 
 itself there were not wanting men in whose hearts, 
 despite their dissolute lives, the faith still lingered, and 
 who had begun to repent of having lent a helping hand 
 to the work of destruction ; and, indeed, it might be 
 truly said that the majority were far from desirous of 
 utterly destroying religion. The Jansenists, with whom 
 
Calumnies against the clergy. 39 
 
 were associated many representatives of the old Parlia- 
 mentary Gallicanism, and who formed a large party in 
 the Assembly, were certainly not animated by any such 
 motive — their sole object being to carry out in practice 
 their own pet Church theory, for effecting which the Civil 
 Constitution of the Clergy furnished them with the 
 coveted opportunity — while even among the disciples of 
 Voltaire and Rousseau numbers were to be found who, 
 although they had lost their faith, were still desirous 
 of preserving religion in some form, if only as a salutary 
 check on social disorder and a necessary condescension 
 to popular feeling. But pride alone, irrespective of any 
 other motive, would have prevented any sort of compro- 
 mise on the part of the Assembly, and, besides, it was 
 urged on to pursue its anti-christian course by the 
 extreme Left, which, now that it perceived that the Civil 
 Constitution would involve as its consequence the ruin 
 of Catholicism, had become far better satisfied with the 
 measure, and were eager for its immediate enforcement. 
 These enemies of all religion were aware that for the 
 present they could not attain the full accomplishment of 
 their designs, but they were content to bide their time. 
 Ere long they were to carry matters entirely their own 
 way. 
 
 The Assembly, then, or, rather, its majority, was well 
 satisfied with its work, and not only remained unmoved 
 by the Exposition, but was exasperated all the more 
 against the clergy who had framed it. Then was let 
 loose that flood of calumny against the whole clerical 
 body which was rapidly to poison the popular mind. 
 It was held up to public obloquy as the enemy of the 
 Constitution, which was adroitly confounded with the 
 Civil Constitution of the Clergy ; for in the eyes of the 
 people to be an enemy of the Constitution was to be 
 opposed to the inauguration of the golden age which 
 
4-0 Vigour of the Breton bishops. 
 
 they were assured it was to bring about. Thus were the 
 passions of the ignorant, unreflecting multitude inflamed 
 to madness against the faithful clergy, and no imputation 
 was too gross or monstrous not to find a ready credence. 
 In this emergency the bishops behaved with the utmost 
 discretion. They followed the rule which has always 
 guided the Church whenever the State has enacted laws 
 contrary to God's law and her own. They offered a 
 passive resistance. They continued to exercise their 
 pastoral office without paying any attention to the new 
 Constitution ; those whose bishoprics had been sup- 
 pressed did not consider themselves as dispossessed ; 
 those who had received an extension of territory confined 
 themselves to their former limits ; they nominated as 
 usual to the vacant parishes ; in short, they treated the 
 new law in all respects as a nullity ; the sole notice they 
 took of it being to bestow greater care on instructing the 
 clergy and faithful in the true principles of the Church's 
 constitution. 
 
 The bishops of Brittany were behind none in the 
 vigour and prudence which they displayed at this critical 
 juncture. Several of their pastorals and manifestos have 
 been preserved, and bear witness at once to their sound 
 theological learning, their zeal for the faith, and their 
 uncompromising firmness in denouncing error, tempered 
 with that moderation and paternal forbearance which in 
 all ages is found to distinguish the Catholic bishop ; 
 who, conscious of being the divinely-appointed shepherd 
 of the flock, and of enjoying the special assistance of 
 the Holy Ghost in the discharge of his sacred trust, 
 speaks with a tone of Apostolic authority which none 
 but he knows how to assume. The example of the 
 bishops was followed by their clergy. Solid works issued 
 from the cathedral chapters, and even from the humble 
 presbytery of many a parish priest. But space forbids us 
 
Policy of the Assembly. 
 
 4i 
 
 to enter into details, in themselves most interesting, and 
 we must recur to the more immediate subject which we 
 have in hand. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 Enactment of the Oath to be imposed on the Clergy. 
 
 The Constituent Assembly had been guilty of the folly 
 and madness of thinking that it could do without God, 
 and concoct a human system of religion, civil in its 
 essence and in its administration, such as the philo- 
 sophers of the day had imagined ; but their production 
 has justly been described as 'still-born.' It fell into 
 contempt as a lifeless thing from the day of its birth. 
 True Catholics rejected it with abhorrence, while those 
 who had lost the faith did not really believe in it. All 
 the science and ingenuity of man cannot construct a 
 Church ; and when worldly legislators, applying them- 
 selves to the attempt, cast aside the divine hierarchy of 
 the Catholic Church, a despicable failure is the invariable 
 and necessary result. The whole power of the State, 
 however, as wielded by the Assembly, was to be exerted 
 to impose its own invention on the nation. This new 
 religion suited the majority, for it got rid of the Pope 
 and provided them with bishops and priests according 
 to their liking ; that is to say, civil functionaries. This 
 was in accordance with their view of reducing every- 
 thing to the civil order. It also adapted itself admirably 
 to a second system, the consequence of the first, which 
 they had been successfully labouring to establish, and 
 which is a more perfect engine of despotic power than 
 regal absolutism had ever possessed, namely, centrali- 
 
42 
 
 State absolutism. 
 
 zation. The Assembly had already made great strides 
 in this direction, for it had effaced, suppressed, expunged 
 everything which possessed an autonomy of its own. It 
 had destroyed the provincial administrations and handed 
 them over to the State, in order to make Paris the 
 exclusive centre of government ; and Paris it had con- 
 verted into a great workshop of revolution. With one 
 stroke of the pen it had appropriated to the State all 
 ecclesiastical property. All this it had done, and a great 
 deal besides, exercising an authority more tyrannical 
 than the most absolute monarch who ever sat on the 
 throne of France had wielded or attempted to wield. 
 One institution remained, which is independent in virtue 
 of its essential constitution, the Church • and this was 
 now to be absorbed in the all-devouring State by the 
 Civil Constitution of the Clergy. Thus was the State 
 to be master of all, even of religion itself. It was 
 Rousseau's dream about to be realized. 
 
 If the Assembly had been actuated by any reasonable 
 policy, and had not been urged on by a blind impiety, 
 it would have paused when it saw the antagonism mani- 
 fested throughout France to its recent decree ; it would 
 have abstained from enforcing it and endeavoured to 
 come to some arrangement with the bishops, as the latter 
 had themselves often proposed. In this manner it might 
 have obtained many of the changes it desired, many 
 even which in themselves were not desirable, but which, 
 nevertheless were admissible with the sanction of the 
 Holy See, and which the Pope — like Pius VII. after- 
 wards in the Concordat made with Napoleon — would, no 
 doubt, have sanctioned in the interests of religon and to 
 obviate a schism. Thus would Catholic consciences 
 have been quieted, and tranquillity maintained. But any 
 such compromise would not have suited the enemies of 
 religion, who, foreseeing the ruin of the Church in the 
 
Municipal tyranny. 43 
 
 Civil Constitution of the Clergy, were bent only upon 
 hurrying on its enforcement. In this object they were 
 seconded by the local municipal authorities, who even 
 surpassed the Assembly itself in the vehemence of their 
 revolutionary zeal, and in several places were already 
 adopting violent measures in order to compel the accep- 
 tance of the new decrees by the clergy, although no law 
 to that effect had as yet been passed. 
 
 In no part of France was the indignation excited by 
 the Assembly's sacrilegious acts stronger than in Brittany, 
 although the popular displeasure did not, as in some 
 of the southern provinces of the kingdom, break forth 
 in any disturbance of the peace ; and nowhere also did 
 the animosity of the revolutionary authorities and their 
 abettors assume a more virulent character. Mgr. de 
 La Laurancie, the excellent Bishop of Nantes, was at 
 Paris in October of that year, 1790, superintending the 
 printing of a new Breviary for his diocese. The district 
 authorities of Nantes, impatient to exercise their new 
 powers, wrote to order him back to his diocese, under 
 pain of having his stipend withheld. The threat was 
 not likely to make much impression on a man of Mgr. de 
 La Laurancie's character, but, as the civil power was 
 backed by the new decrees, he thought it better not to 
 furnish any pretext for accusation by prolonging his stay 
 in Paris. He was also anxious to be with his flock at 
 this trying time. Accordingly, at the end of the month 
 he returned to his diocese. The great majority of his 
 clergy hastened in person to offer him their homage, and 
 to assure him of their unshaken fidelity to the Church, 
 of which he was the intrepid defender. One of them, 
 an aged priest, was heard to express himself, on leaving 
 Mgr. de La Laurancie's presence, in sentiments of 
 enthusiastic love and admiration, adding with what 
 heartfelt sincerity he had renewed to him the oath 
 
44 Case of the Bishop of Nantes. 
 
 of obedience and attachment which he had formerly 
 made to his Bishop at his ordination. These innocent 
 words were retailed and distorted from their simple 
 meaning, and the report was diligently circulated that 
 the prelate had summoned his clergy for the purpose 
 of making them swear to use every means at their 
 disposal to oppose the Constitution. The administrators 
 of the department affected to be seized with indignation, 
 and the Bishop would have been immediately sentenced 
 to imprisonment but for the firm resistance of one well- 
 principled man amongst them, M. Fre'mont, who thus 
 incurred the implacable resentment of the revolutionists, 
 and had shortly after to provide for his safety by flight. 
 
 Of all the agencies employed in preparing and pro- 
 moting the Revolution, one of the most powerful was 
 that of the clubs, those tumultuous assemblies in which 
 everybody was free to promulgate the wildest theories — 
 the wilder and more extravagant the more certain to 
 gain a favourable acceptance ; in which bold and 
 designing demagogues harangued an ignorant crowd 
 upon the most difficult and delicate questions, the 
 solution of which was equally beyond the competence 
 of orator and hearers ; inflaming their imaginations, 
 exciting their passions, and impelling them to deeds of 
 violence and bloodshed. Nantes was not behindhand 
 in this respect, and its club was among the most 
 formidable in France for the audacity with which it 
 discussed every possible subject and passed its censures 
 alike on men and measures. Mgr. de La Laurancie's 
 affair was, of course, made matter of discussion, and his 
 conduct did not fail to be represented in the most 
 odious colours. Blindly credulous of the charges with 
 which the venerable prelate was assailed, an exasperated 
 populace began to utter the most alarming menaces 
 against him. The good pastor, strong in his innocence, 
 
He is denounced to the Assembly. 45 
 
 would fain have remained with his flock in this hour 
 of peril to its faith, but his friends, knowing his life to be 
 in imminent danger, and seeing no attempt, but the very 
 contrary, made on the part of the authorities either to 
 protect him from violence or to allay the popular ferment, 
 prevailed upon him at last to withdraw secretly from the 
 town. So poor was Mgr. de La Laurancie, who had 
 continued his accustomed almsgiving notwithstanding 
 the great reduction to which his revenues had been 
 subjected, that he had to borrow a small sum of money 
 to defray the expenses of his journey. The lender, 
 flattered at having been able to render a service to his 
 Bishop, unhappily could not hold his tongue. Imme- 
 diately it was noised abroad that Mgr. de La Laurancie 
 was raising money to effect a counter-revolution ; lists 
 of the subscribers were invented, and it was asserted 
 that on the road to Paris, whither the Bishop had 
 returned, there had been found among his baggage 
 chests full of plate, which he had carried off from the 
 cathedral. These calumnies could have been easily 
 disproved, but that would not have suited the authorities, 
 who, without occupying themselves about the matter, 
 despatched certain of their number to denounce the 
 Bishop at the bar of the Assembly, as having refused 
 to acknowledge or execute the nation's decrees — inas- 
 much as he had replied to a deputation sent to him that 
 he did not recognize the authority of the National 
 Assembly in ecclesiastical matters, although he respected 
 it in all things wherein religion was not concerned — and 
 as having subsequently taken to flight. They accord- 
 ingly prayed that he might be arrested and prosecuted 
 before the tribunals, a new bishop appointed to his see, 
 and means taken to compel the factious to obey the 
 decrees of the Assembly. These accusations found a 
 ready ear j for the Left, irritated beyond measure at that 
 
46 Committee of Inquests. 
 
 moment by the recent appearance of the ' Exposition of 
 Principles,' were already occupied with devising those 
 very projects of compulsion which were urged by the 
 Nantes deputation. It is true that difficulties which the 
 men of the Revolution ought to have felt to be insuper- 
 able stood in the way. Every form of worship had been 
 pronounced free. Liberty of conscience had been 
 declared to be one of the principles of the Constitution, 
 and, indeed, one of the inalienable ' Rights of Man.' 
 Could it be denied to Catholics, who formed the 
 immense majority of the nation ? What right, on its 
 own showing, did the Assembly possess of stigmatizing 
 the protestations of the clergy as acts of revolt and 
 calling for their punishment? What right had it to 
 impose on a Catholic people and on their pastors a 
 form of religion against which their consciences rebelled? 
 Here was a dilemma, which was not, however, to perplex 
 the new legislators long, although it was probably felt 
 to be a difficulty by the Committee for Ecclesiastical 
 Affairs (the same which had concocted the Civil Consti- 
 tution of the Clergy), before which the charge against 
 Mgr. de La Laurancie was brought, and which, to the 
 surprise and disappointment of the Left, decided against 
 the legality of rigorous measures. 
 
 Hitherto none of the clergy had been displaced ; the 
 cures who rejected the Constitution continued to serve 
 their parishes and receive their stipends, although they 
 were subjected to many local vexations, and were objects 
 of the rancorous hostility of the clubs. Some of these 
 had consulted one of the most active committees of the 
 Assembly, the Comite des Recherches, or Committee of 
 Inquests, which was chiefly composed of ardent Jacobins, 
 touching the conduct to be pursued towards ecclesiastics. 
 Voidel, its president, had replied, ' Dare all against the 
 clergy; you will be supported;' and they were every- 
 
Voider s report to the Assembly. 47 
 
 where acting in accordance with this advice. It was to 
 this very committee that the complaints against Mgr. de 
 La Laurancie were now referred. This committee being, 
 as we have said, full of ultra-democrats, with whom 
 liberty of conscience, as proclaimed by the 'Rights of 
 Man,' was a leading principle, ought to have experienced 
 no difficulty in dealing with the subject. It was a 
 question of forcibly imposing a new religion on the 
 Catholics of France — for such, and justly so, did they 
 esteem the newly devised State-system to be — a religion 
 which their consciences rejected ; and, in fact, the 
 committee did not experience the least difficulty in the 
 matter, for no sense of inconsistency interfered — it never 
 has interfered with men of their class on similar occasions 
 — with their deciding, in the face of their own cherished 
 doctrines, against the rights of conscience when pleaded 
 for Catholics. The committee, accordingly, did not 
 deliberate long, and its president forthwith proceeded to 
 present to the Assembly the project of a law by which 
 bishops and priests were to be compelled to swear to 
 the Civil Constitution of the Clergy ; prefacing his 
 project by a report which he made in the name of the 
 Comite des Recherckes, and of several other committees, 
 denouncing a large proportion of the clergy as having 
 combined in a league against the State and against 
 religion, prompted solely by ambitious and self-interested 
 motives. It is difficult to say which was most remarkable 
 in this document, its arrogance or its audacious men- 
 dacity. The conduct of the Breton bishops and clergy 
 in particular was subjected to detailed animadversion ; 
 the rest was a tirade of invectives against the Bishops 
 of Rome, as Voidel called the Popes, and against every 
 order in the Church, which, while affecting a hypocritical 
 respect for the ' religion of his fathers,' — for it was still 
 judged prudent by even the most ardent revolutionists to 
 
48 Voidel' s project of law. 
 
 throw a certain veil over their ulterior aims — he held 
 up in the persons of its ministers, from the Vicar of 
 Christ downwards, to obloquy and hatred. Such was 
 the language of the men who professed to be the staunch 
 defenders of liberty. They took under their protection 
 the most criminal of offenders, rioters, assassins, and 
 all the fanatical writers for the press ; these last had full 
 licence to print and circulate their subversive doctrines, 
 but to priests, who ever inculcate principles conservative 
 of peace, morality, and good order, no liberty was to 
 be granted ; nay, they must be forced to accept a 
 measure which their consciences condemned, or, on their 
 refusal, be declared as, ipso facto, dismissed from their 
 functions. The history of these events might, indeed, 
 excite our wonder, but that we know, from the experience 
 of our own day, that it is always thus with the men 
 of the Revolution. They have ever the names of liberty 
 and equality in their mouths while forging chains for 
 their fellow-countryman ; and as for religious liberty, of 
 which they proclaim themselves the champions, with 
 them it means only the liberty of the irreligious to 
 persecute and oppress the Church. 
 
 Voidel's report to the Assembly was seconded by 
 Mirabeau, who regarded religion as a mere political 
 institution necessary for the common people, and whose 
 impassioned eloquence rendered him the most formid- 
 able of the Church's enemies. He declaimed with 
 violence against the ' Exposition of Principles,' talked 
 theology while declaring that he was no theologian, and 
 presented his own views on the subject of jurisdiction 
 with an assurance, or rather, we may say, an audacity, 
 which was one of the secrets of his oratorical success. 
 He concluded with menaces against those ecclesiastics 
 who, by persevering in thus closing their minds against 
 the spirit of liberty, should lead men to despair of their 
 
Enactment of schismatical oath. 49 
 
 conversion to the Constitution and consequently of their 
 aptitude for citizenship. Here we have the crime of 
 incivism broadly and boldly stated. Barnave, a Protes- 
 tant, who was animated by a bitter hatred of the Church, 
 joined in supporting Voidel's project of law, or Bill, as 
 we should call it in our Parliamentary language. In 
 vain did the gentle Bishop of Clermont undertake, with 
 a patience truly marvellous, to enlighten the minds of 
 his hearers and incline them to more moderate counsels, 
 or at least to induce them to grant such a delay as might 
 enable the clergy to consult the Pope. In vain did the 
 Abbe Maury, at that time the energetic and brilliant 
 advocate of the Church, with an eloquence scarcely 
 inferior to that of Mirabeau, an irony as biting, and a 
 perfect acquaintance with the subject, which his adversary 
 wholly lacked, convict him of egregious error, and even 
 put him and his supporters to silence by exposing the 
 absurdity of his theology, demonstrating at the same 
 time by irrefragable proofs the justice of the cause for 
 which he was himself pleading — his triumph was limited 
 to the mortification of his opponents. The Jansenists 
 joined the Left in pressing for the adoption of the 
 measure. Camus, their leader, made a speech which 
 carried along with it all the constitutional party, the 
 only portion of the Assembly which there might have 
 been any hopes of favourably influencing. The request 
 for adjournment of the debate was accordingly rejected, 
 and Voidel's project of law adopted that same day, 
 November 27, 1790. 
 
 The oath was thus worded : ' I swear to watch with 
 diligence over the faithful committed to my direction. 
 I swear to be faithful to the nation, to the law, and to 
 the King. I swear to maintain, with all my power, 
 the French Constitution, and, in particular, the decrees 
 relating to the Civil Constitution of the Clergy.' It will 
 e 25 
 
5<d The Abbd Maury. 
 
 be seen how artfully the oath to the political Constitution, 
 which the clergy would never have refused to take, was 
 coupled with the oath to the Civil Constitution of the 
 Clergy, which was repugnant to their consciences ; more- 
 over, it was made to occupy the prominent position. 
 This was a cunning and malicious stratagem, devised 
 for the purpose of conveying the general impression that 
 every ecclesiastic who refused to swear refused fidelity 
 to the nation, to the laws, and to the sovereign, thereby 
 rendering them popularly odious. A delay of only eight 
 days was granted for the taking of the oath by all the 
 bishops and cures sitting in the Assembly. The clergy 
 who refused were to be accounted as deposed and others 
 installed in their place. 
 
 It has been a question with some whether Maury on 
 that day did not injure the cause he advocated by the 
 bitter reproaches, richly merited as they were, which he 
 addressed to the Assembly. The constitutional party 
 was the party of order, and was not, as a whole, disposed 
 towards the adoption of rigorous measures. At that 
 epoch, when joined with the Right, it formed a majority 
 in the Chambers. Not a few were beginning to hesitate, 
 while some were even heard to mutter that the Jansenists, 
 with their primitive Church, would ruin everything. 
 Mirabeau himself, it is said, would have been content 
 to dispense with the oath, and to limit his demand to 
 the withdrawal from the recalcitrants of the stipends that 
 had been awarded when the ecclesiastical property was 
 seized by the State. But whether or no a more temperate 
 orator might have succeeded in obtaining a favourable 
 vote on that particular occasion, there can be little doubt 
 but that the evil day would only have been postponed, 
 not averted. There was a predetermined intention, even 
 on the part of the moderate partisans of the Revolution, 
 to reduce the Church to a mere function of the State ; 
 
Hesitation of the King. 
 
 5i 
 
 whilst among the party at their back, which was urging 
 them on, and which was soon to carry everything before 
 it, there existed a deep and ferocious animosity against 
 the clergy, an animosity so strong that, in order to crush 
 them, they did not hesitate flagrantly to violate, as we 
 have seen, the Constitution which they had themselves 
 just decreed and had sworn to maintain, thus virtually 
 abrogating one of the chief articles of the famous ' Rights 
 of Man.' This hatred of the clergy was the expression 
 of that same hatred of Christianity which burns so fiercely 
 in the breasts of their modern representatives j for the 
 clergy, so far from having done anything to deserve 
 ill of the self-styled patriots of the day, had established 
 many claims on their gratitude. They had been foremost 
 in advocating all useful reforms, especially those which 
 were designed to benefit the people ; they had been 
 the first to associate themselves with the Tiers ; and on 
 the memorable night of the 4th of August, when the 
 nobility came forward to resign their old feudal privileges, 
 the clergy, in a like spirit of generosity, had renounced 
 their own immunities. 
 
 As soon as the iniquitous law had been passed, the 
 unhappy monarch was urged to affix his signature to 
 it by the same arguments which had been used to obtain 
 his sanction to the Civil Constitution itself. Louis 
 endeavoured to temporize, and sent an ambiguous reply. 
 Meanwhile he was despatching most pressing letters to 
 the Pope, beseeching him to make every possible con- 
 cession, and relieve him from his cruel embarrassment. 
 But his hopes from that quarter were vain, for it was 
 impossible that the Holy See could ever approve the late 
 acts of the Assembly. Nearly a month went by, and the 
 monarch had hitherto evaded either an immediate accept- 
 ance or refusal of the law submitted to him. The Jansenist 
 Camus meanwhile was busily engaged in pushing on the 
 
52 
 
 Threats addressed to the King. 
 
 Assembly. He knew that Louis was waiting in hopes of 
 some compromise being effected with the Holy See, and, 
 so far from desiring any such result, this was precisely 
 what he and his party dreaded. The Jansenists wished to 
 break with Rome. ' The bishops,' he said, ' declare 
 that they await the sanction of him whom they call the 
 Sovereign Pontiff of the Church, as if the Church had 
 any other than Jesus Christ, its founder.' The Left, 
 composed of men who were soon to cast out and revile 
 the Redeemer's name, vociferously applauded, and a 
 member of the Right asked Camus what was his religion, 
 since he certainly could not call himself a Catholic. To 
 the Jansenist leader this was a matter of small account ; 
 he gained his point. A fresh application was made to 
 the King, who sought a further delay by simply signing 
 his former ambiguous letter, to which hitherto he had not 
 affixed his name. The Left was furious. Louis was 
 evidently waiting for instructions from Rome, and loud 
 were its protests against the impropriety of making 
 ' the destinies of a great nation depend upon the 
 caprices of a foreign prince.' Camus now succeeded in 
 procuring a resolution that the President should repair 
 to the King for the third time in order to obtain his con- 
 sent. Meanwhile the violence of the Tribune was 
 beginning to work upon the populace of Paris, as, in fact, 
 it was intended to do. The Keeper of the Seals told Louis 
 that the faubourgs were about to rise if he did not 
 satisfy the Assembly. ' It matters little to me,' the 
 King replied, ' that they should desire to take my life, 
 for I am weary of it.' But the Minister knew that if 
 Louis was not personally timid, there was one unfailing 
 expedient for exciting his fears. ' It is not your life, 
 Sire,' he said, ' which is menaced, but the lives of all the 
 clergy, whom your hesitation is about to abandon to 
 popular fury.' To this representation the King was 
 
He signs the decree. 
 
 53 
 
 infatuated enough to hearken. He accepted the decree, 
 thereby not only violating his own conscience, but giving 
 up to persecution and death the very men whom he 
 desired to protect, unless they too were prepared to 
 obey man rather than God. It is remarkable that the 
 decree which was to make so many martyrs was signed 
 on the Protomartyr's day, December 26, and that two 
 years later, on that same day, he who put his hand to 
 it was himself to appear at the bar of that tribunal of 
 blood, the Convention. The giving his sanction to a 
 law which his conscience condemned was not the only 
 act of deplorable weakness of which this unhappy 
 monarch was guilty, but as we do not purpose to follow 
 up the course of events, we are spared the pain of any 
 detail. Louis was to make a terrible expiation. His 
 offences were to be washed out in his tears and in 
 his blood. But his own bitter captivity and tragic end, 
 the Temple and the Guillotine, have made us well- 
 nigh forget that by one sinful act of compliance, and 
 by a weakness deserving, in a monarch especially, the 
 severest censure, he had a direct share in sending 
 to the scaffold hundreds of innocent victims, priests of 
 God, and a countless number of men and women, who 
 suffered death rather than betray the faith. Or, if his 
 faults have not always been forgotten, we cannot but 
 think that from motives of natural compassion they have 
 scarcely received the amount of condemnation which 
 they deserved. 
 
 The Assembly had now associated the King's name 
 and authority with their work. When his consent was 
 announced, it was received with prolonged and deafening 
 applause by the Left. What followed has been compared 
 by a Church historian to the last great judgment. The 
 grand separation was now to begin, and with it ' the 
 purification of the French clergy and the regeneration of 
 
54 Defections and retractations. 
 
 Catholic France.' The very next day, Gregoire, so 
 notorious for his revolutionary fanaticism, without waiting 
 for the expiration of the allotted term, hastened to pro- 
 claim his defection. He mounted the tribune, took the 
 schismatical oath, and justified his act in an artful speech, 
 calculated to delude and seduce the unwary into following 
 his example. He denied that the Assembly had any inten- 
 tion of entrenching on the spiritual rights of the Church. 
 The very title of Civil Constitution of the clergy proved, 
 he said, that the oath regarded only matters of the 
 political order, so that no consideration could possibly 
 interfere with the performance of this duty of patriotism, 
 which was to cement the union between pastors and 
 their flocks throughout the kingdom. Gre'goire knew 
 well how untrue was the assertion he was making, but 
 the artifice had its effect on not a few. Sixty ecclesiastics 
 who had seats in the Assembly took the oath after him, 
 amongst whom were eight Breton deputies (two, however, 
 not being natives of the province), and on the ensuing 
 day their example was followed by thirty-five more, 
 including some cures of Brittany. The Left were in 
 high spirits, but they had not yet seen the end, and their 
 pleasure was soon to be considerably damped by the 
 retractation of several among the clergy who had been 
 surprised into giving an assent, the full bearing of which 
 they did not comprehend. The Assembly now angrily 
 forbade any retractation being made from the tribune, 
 while it continued to permit all who took the oath 
 freely to speak and state their reasons. 
 
 On the 2nd of January, the Bishop of Clermont, avail- 
 ing himself of the declaration made by Gre'goire and 
 applauded by the Assembly, that it had no intention of 
 entrenching on the spiritual province of the Church, made 
 a last effort at conciliation, and rose to protest that the 
 clergy willingly submitted to the authority of the State in 
 
Efforts at conciliation. 
 
 55 
 
 all civil matters, but as it was not from the State that they 
 received their mission, so neither was the State empowered 
 to define the limits within which they should exercise it. 
 The violent outcry which here interrupted the speaker 
 plainly proved the sense which the Assembly really 
 affixed to the Constitution which it had framed. Voices 
 from the Left loudly demanded that the Bishop should 
 take the oath, ' pure and simple,' without explanation. 
 The prelate had brought with him a form of oath 
 agreed upon in conjunction with his colleagues, which, 
 had there been any sincerity in the disclaimer made by 
 Gregoire and by others in the name of the Assembly — 
 a disclaimer which had always been received with 
 applause when put forward with the object of pacifying 
 the scruples of the doubtful and inveigling them into 
 acquiescence — ought to have been deemed satisfactory. 
 As he could not obtain a hearing, the Bishop descended 
 from the tribune, declaring that his conscience did not 
 allow him to take the oath, and leaving the form which 
 he had brought with him on the desk. This was its 
 tenor : ' I swear to watch with diligence over the faithful 
 ;he care of whom has been or shall be confided to me by the 
 Church ; to be faithful to the nation, to the law, and to 
 the King ; and to maintain with all my power, in all that 
 appertains to the political order, the Constitution decreed 
 by the National Assembly and accepted by the King, 
 always excepting those things which depend essentially 
 on the spiritual authority.' On the day following he was 
 given to understand that it could not be accepted, a 
 result easy to foresee. If any may be disposed to think 
 that the attempt was utterly futile, at least it must be 
 allowed that the clergy of France, so far from shocking 
 the prejudices and irritating the passions of the day by 
 manifesting a rigid, unyielding disposition, on the con- 
 trary carried the spirit of concession to the utmost limits 
 
56 
 
 Violence of the mob. 
 
 consistent with respect for their sacred duties. Refusal 
 to sign was, however, treated as treason to the nation, 
 and denounced in furious language, designed to influence 
 the popular mind against the whole clerical body. 
 
 The 4th of January was the day fixed for the expiration 
 of the period accorded to the clergy in the capital 
 for taking the oath, and it was to be a day for ever 
 glorious in the annals of the Church. The galleries 
 of the Hall were thronged, and an immense multitude 
 had collected without ; all the near approaches being 
 from an early hour, through the connivance of the 
 Left, densely crowded with an ill-disposed mob, whose 
 groans, yells, and threatening cries penetrated within the 
 very walls. The Assembly ruled that the non-juring 
 clergy should not be allowed to state their reasons for 
 refusing the oath, a manifest injustice, inasmuch as to 
 the others full liberty of speech was granted as before. 
 The apostate Grdgoire again harangued the Chamber 
 in support of the oath. It in no way, he said, touched 
 spiritual things, and, besides, the Assembly did not 
 require ' interior assent.' It was thus, by false state- 
 ments and the enunciation of false principles, repugnant 
 to every honest mind, that this agent of Satan sought to 
 seduce his brethren. 
 
 At all costs the clergy must be made to take the oath. 
 During the whole course of the sitting, notes and slips of 
 paper were being diligently circulated in the Assembly, 
 with these words and the like : ' Make an uproar ; 
 redouble your groans. Stir up the galleries ; they seem 
 to have gone to sleep.' To excite the fury of the crowd 
 admitted into the body of the House was, indeed, one 
 of the unworthy means commonly adopted by the Left 
 in order to intimidate that numerous party which forms 
 so large a portion in all assemblies : men wanting in 
 fixed convictions or in the courage to support such 
 
Oath tendered to the clergy. 
 
 57 
 
 opinions as they may entertain, or who, from one cause 
 or another, are impressible and irresolute. It was thus 
 that the Left succeeded in carrying through many of 
 their most violent measures. But they had other men to 
 deal with now — men who had set their faces as a flint, 
 who were ready to die for the truth and to keep their 
 consciences pure. Menaces and clamour, however, 
 silenced all attempts to speak, to remonstrate, to 
 explain ; the Right declaiming in vain against the flagrant 
 partiality exhibited. Two o'clock now struck ; it was 
 the hour fixed for calling on each ecclesiastic to take the 
 oath. The cries outside, threatening with la lanterne all 
 who refused, were now redoubled with fearful violence. 
 A member thus apostrophised the President, Emmery, 
 who, be it observed, was a Jew : ' You hear those rascals, 
 they have destroyed the monarchy, and now they wish to 
 annihilate religion. The Assembly is not free. I pro- 
 test ! ' But the shouts and menaces without had no 
 effect on the noble band of confessors. ' Trouble not 
 yourself,' said they ; ' for the clamours of a deluded 
 people will be no guide to our consciences.' 
 
 The first summoned to the tribune by the Jew Pre- 
 sident was the Bishop of Agen, who, in terms at once 
 dignified and Christian, refused to take the oath. In 
 spite of interruption and cries, he was able to make his 
 profession of faith. The Abbe Fournes, a cure of the 
 same diocese, was called next. ' You wish to bring us 
 back,' he said, ' to the discipline of the first ages of the 
 Church. Well, gentlemen, with the simplicity of the 
 early Christians, I will tell you that I glory in following 
 the example of my Bishop, and in walking in his steps, 
 as Lawrence in those of Sixtus, even to martyrdom.' 
 The Left could scarce contain itself for rage. The 
 appel, however, continued. Le Clerc, Cure of La Combe, 
 who was the next summoned, began, ' I am a child 
 
58 Attempted compromise. 
 
 of the Catholic Church. . . .' It was plain what was to 
 be expected from him ; voices immediately exclaimed 
 that he must take the oath, ' pure and simple,' and when 
 a member objected that Gregoire had been heard, the 
 President coldly reminded the ecclesiastics that the 
 Assembly had decreed that they were to limit themselves 
 to saying, ' I swear ' or ' I refuse.' The deputy Foucault 
 protested that this was tyranny, for that even the Pagan 
 Emperors, who persecuted the martyrs, had suffered 
 them to pronounce the name of God and declare their 
 fidelity to their faith. The President was then about to 
 proceed, when the deputy Bonnay represented that by 
 continuing to call upon the ecclesiastics to take the oath 
 singly, they were exposing them to danger, as their 
 names were passed on from the galleries to the angry 
 populace round the doors. Upon this, the President 
 summoned the priests to take the oath collectively. A 
 deep silence followed ; then one single renegade stepped 
 forward, and took the oath amidst the vociferous applause 
 of the Left. Two other priests wished to take it with 
 certain reservations, but they could not obtain a hearing. 
 One of them loudly expressed his indignation that their 
 mouths should thus be stopped. He was willing, he said, 
 to take the oath in accordance with the sentiments of the 
 Assembly, which had declared that it did not mean to 
 entrench on the spiritual. The President, who over- 
 heard this remark, wishing to encourage him, confirmed 
 the truth of his assertion, at which the Left applauded. 
 But if so, why not consent to a change in the form of 
 the oath, as suggested by the Bishop of Clermont? A 
 last effort was now made by the deputy Cazales, who 
 hastened to ascend the tribune to beg the Assembly 
 formally to confirm this statement of the President. 
 But the Assembly had not the smallest intention of con- 
 ceding the point ; their applause was but a lure thrown 
 
Admirable behaviour of the clergy. 59 
 
 out to beguile the clergy into compliance. Nevertheless, 
 as the President had spoken plainly, and the Left had 
 applauded, a certain embarrassment was created, and a 
 pause ensued. 
 
 The Bishop of Poitiers profited by the temporary 
 silence to make his profession of faith. He was seventy 
 years of age, had been thirty-five years in the episcopate, 
 and was not going, he said, to dishonour his old age by 
 swearing against his conscience. The Left murmured, 
 but silence still prevailed. Cazales renewed his demand, 
 when Mirabeau at last rose to extricate his friends from 
 their difficulty. All the President could have meant, he 
 said, was that, as a matter of fact, the Assembly had not 
 touched the spiritual. As to himself, he was opposed 
 to any change in the form of the oath. Clearly all 
 hope of a compromise had vanished. When the Pre- 
 sident again summoned the clergy to take the oath in a 
 body, a magnanimous silence was the sole reply. Then 
 the sitting was closed, and the bishops and clergy left 
 the Hall with a firm step, traversing the ranks of an 
 enraged multitude, unmoved by all the insults, menaces, 
 and even outrages to which they were subjected. ' We 
 have got their money,' was Mirabeau's observation when 
 all was over ; ' but they have kept their honour.' These 
 faithful men were now to enjoy a great consola- 
 tion in the return of twenty of their brethren, whose 
 eyes had been opened by the proceedings of the day; 
 others had preceded them ; so that, finally, out of three 
 hundred and five ecclesiastics sitting in the Assembly, 
 only seventy adhered to the schismatical Constitution. 
 Amongst the retractors were some of the Breton clergy, 
 who, on the following day, in order to repair the scandal 
 they had given, desired to mount the tribune, but they 
 were refused a hearing and repulsed, and when after- 
 wards they attempted to lay their written retractation on 
 the desk, the Secretary threw it in their faces. 
 
6o Sentiments of clergy misrepresented. 
 
 We have given this account of what took place in the 
 Constituent Assembly with reference to the Civil Consti- 
 tution of the Clergy and the imposition of the oath, 
 with somewhat of detail, because in so many histories of 
 the time, the facts, when not positively misrepresented, 
 are very inadequately related ; and because in the 
 interests of religion, not less than of historical truth, it is 
 important to show what was the attitude of the French 
 clergy, and the part they enacted, in the early days of the 
 Revolution. A prejudice, if we are not mistaken, widely 
 prevails in some quarters to the effect that by their 
 obstinate attachment to the ancien regime and to absolute 
 monarchy they became implicated in the odium which 
 despotism, feudal distinctions, and bigoted opposition to 
 all liberal reforms, were exciting at that period through- 
 out France. True it is that the clergy are always the 
 friends of order, that they inculcate submission to existing 
 lawful authority, and will be found, as a rule, in 
 antogonism with a restless spirit of innovation ; but even 
 the brief account we have here given will have served 
 to show that it would be an error to suppose that the 
 French clergy of that day were inimical to judicious and 
 reasonable changes, or that they offered a factious oppo- 
 sition, or, indeed, any opposition whatever, to the intro- 
 duction of a more liberal constitution. So far, indeed, 
 was this from being the case, that many of their body, 
 as we have seen, were only too readily disposed to 
 adopt, while others, at least, had not learned to mis- 
 trust, the new ideas in both the political and the social 
 order which so widely prevailed. Again, so far from 
 having been objects of general hatred — always excepting 
 the free-thinkers and those whose minds the new philo- 
 sophy had more or less perverted — it is evident that 
 they enjoyed the respect and love of the nation at 
 large, particularly of the lower classes and wherever the 
 
Tactics of the Revolution. 6 1 
 
 infidel propaganda had not tampered with the public con- 
 science. The Revolution, it must be remembered, is 
 always, in its essence as well as in the direct aims and 
 intention of the initiated, who urge on the movement, 
 pull the strings, and put the puppets in motion, anti- 
 christian. Hence one of its primary objects is to 
 make religion hated in its ministers, to hold them up to 
 popular execration by representing them as opposed 
 from selfish motives to that which the foolish, credulous 
 multitude are led to look to as the cure and charm for 
 all their evils, to denounce them as wanting in patriotism, 
 as guilty of lese-nation — treason against the nation, that 
 worst of all crimes wherever the sovereignty of the people 
 has been proclaimed— in short, to traduce and calumniate 
 them in every possible way; and such were the tactics, 
 only too successful, employed by the revolutionists of 
 the year 1790. 
 
 We shall not follow the Constituent Assembly or 
 its successors, the Legislative Assembly and the Con- 
 vention, in their impious and sanguinary career, the 
 leading features of which are no doubt familiar to the 
 reader. We will now return to Brittany, and to the 
 more immediate subject of our narrative, the sufferings 
 of its faithful clergy and people. But our account, as we 
 have already observed, must necessarily be but a partial 
 one, for to give a full and detailed history of the perse- 
 cution of the Church, even in Brittany alone, would 
 occupy at least twice the space which we have at our 
 disposal. We must, therefore, limit ourselves to such a 
 sketch of the progress of affairs as will enable the reader 
 to understand the position of the confessors of the faith 
 in that province, of whom many were soon to win the 
 crown of martyrdom. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 Consummation of the Schism. Election of Consti- 
 tutional Bishops. 
 
 Out of the hundred and thirty-four bishops of France 
 four only took the oath ; they were, as will be expected, 
 the four already named as voting for the Civil Constitu- 
 tion of the Clergy, namely, those of Autun, Sens, Orleans, 
 and Viviers, besides the suffragan Bishop of Bale. The 
 subsequent lives of these unhappy prevaricators suffi- 
 ciently evidence what manner of men they were. Through- 
 out France, taken generally, the same disproportion pre- 
 vailed between the non-juring clergy and those who 
 consented to take the schismatical oath as that which 
 existed in the Assembly, but in many of the provinces, 
 and especially in those dioceses where the ecclesiastical 
 spirit had been well maintained, it was far greater. If 
 any proof were needed that it is the maintenance of this 
 spirit which is the safeguard of the clergy, and conduces 
 more than anything else to make the salt preserve its 
 savour, we may instance the clergy of St. Sulpice, who 
 had kept up the traditional sacerdotal spirit of their 
 saintly founder, M. Olier. Of the forty-three priests of 
 which this community was composed not one fell away. 
 
 In the southern provinces of France there were very 
 few defections. In the diocese of Bordeaux, for example, 
 only twenty-five out of four hundred and fifty priests 
 took the oath. Brittany enjoyed the same honourable 
 distinction, and scarce one in twenty of her priests 
 
Revolutionary stratagems. 63 
 
 was betrayed into schism. In Paris, indeed, and else- 
 where in some of the provinces, the clergy protested at 
 the risk of their lives. Thus, at Sept-Chaux, in Cham- 
 pagne, on the priest ascending the pulpit to explain to 
 his parishioners his reasons for refusing to take the oath, 
 a man who had come to the church armed for the pur- 
 pose, deliberately shot him dead in the act of making 
 his confession of faith. But even where violent measures 
 of intimidation were not adopted, as they were in the 
 capital and elsewhere in some of the provinces, every 
 abominable artifice was employed to inveigle the clergy 
 into compliance. The Abbe 7 Royou 1 says that posterity 
 will never credit the deep and dark plots that were laid, 
 and the shameless impostures that were employed, espe- 
 cially in Brittany, to deceive and seduce the country 
 clergy. For example, it would be contrived that they 
 should hear from multiplied sources that a certain priest, 
 one who enjoyed high consideration in the province, 
 had taken the oath ; fraudulent lists of clergy stated to 
 have sworn would be sent to them, or they would be 
 visited by commissioners charged with communications 
 of a false and insidious character ; sometimes it would 
 be attempted to ensnare them with cajoleries, sometimes 
 to intimidate them by threats. Again, letters written by 
 ecclesiastical superiors for the instruction and encourage- 
 ment of the pastors during this season of trial would be 
 intercepted, and the authors denounced as conspirators 
 and traitors. When all these circumstances are taken 
 
 1 The Abbe Royou, a native of Quimper, who had held the professor- 
 ship of philosophy at the College of Louis le Grand, was a priest of 
 much ability and zeal. During the early part of the Revolution, the 
 journal which he conducted, L' Ami du Roi, was of eminent use in the 
 provinces, and particularly in Brittany. For he not only advocated 
 sound principles, but enlightened the provincial clergy, removed from 
 the theatre of events, as to what was going on ; thus preserving them 
 from being deceived by the lying assertions of the revolutionists. 
 
64 Rules for electing clergy. 
 
 into account, we have reason to consider the proportion 
 of Breton clergy who were led astray as, comparatively 
 speaking, very small. 
 
 The Assembly had by no means expected so general 
 and so strenuous an opposition as it encountered. It 
 had, doubtless, imagined that the prospect of deprivation 
 and the dread of an angry mob would triumph over the 
 scruples and overcome the reluctance of a large majority 
 of the clergy. It must be here observed that, while every 
 means was employed to hold up the clergy to popular 
 execration, the Assembly formally professed to punish 
 refusal only with deprivation, and had even fixed a 
 certain retiring pension for such bishops and priests as 
 might decline to take the oath. It was easy, however, 
 to foresee that this engagement would soon become a 
 dead letter, and that persecution must inevitably follow 
 in the wake of schism. It now became a serious question 
 with the legislature how to fill the places of the episcopal 
 body. It had at its service only four complaisant 
 bishops ; seventy-nine had therefore to be found in order 
 to make up the number of eighty-three, to which it will 
 be remembered it had reduced the hundred and thirty- 
 four existing sees. Notwithstanding the suppression of 
 many parishes, the Assembly was in a similar dilemma 
 as regarded the parochial clergy. An article of the new 
 constitution required that a bishop should have pre- 
 viously exercised the pastoral office at least fifteen years 
 in the diocese to which he was appointed, and every 
 parish priest elected must have in the same manner 
 served five years as vicaire. To carry out these rules 
 under present circumstances was clearly impossible, but 
 the Assembly without difficulty at once modified the 
 conditions for eligibility to meet the exigences of the 
 moment. There was another article, however, which 
 called still more urgently for change, that which regarded 
 
The Chapter of Quimpcr. 
 
 65 
 
 canonical institution. The bishop elect was to receive 
 it from his metropolitan, and the metropolitan from the 
 oldest bishop of the arrondissement. It was now settled, 
 provisionally, that the bishop elect should apply to the 
 Directory of the department to designate some consti- 
 tutional bishop — any such was to be good for the pur- 
 pose — who was thereupon empowered to proceed to 
 confirmation and consecration. This last measure was 
 immediately needed for the consecration of a bishop 
 already elected for the new constitutional see of Finis- 
 terre, as Quimper was now styled, who was thus to lead 
 the van of schism in one of the most Catholic provinces 
 of France. 
 
 The Bishop of Quimper, Mgr. de Saint-Luc, had died on 
 the 30th of September of that year, 1790. He had foreseen 
 the approaching schism, and his mental sufferings helped 
 to shorten his days. It was on a bed of sickness that the 
 decree of the Assembly promulgating the Civil Constitu- 
 tion of the Clergy was signified to him. He repeated two 
 or three times, ' This is my death-blow,' and four days later 
 God had removed him from the evil to come. But 
 during this interval he had drawn up a protestation 
 against the decree, thus giving an example which was 
 followed by many other bishops. The document was 
 signed on the day of his funeral by the Chapter of 
 Quimper, eighty rectors, and two hundred other members 
 of the clergy who had come to attend his obsequies. 
 The Chapter, disregarding the new schismatical ordi- 
 nances, proceeded, according to the regular practice, 
 to name Vicars-Capitular for the administration of the 
 diocese. The Ecclesiastical Committee of the Assembly, 
 which attributed to itself the authority at the very least 
 of a General Council, immediately ruled that the Chapter, 
 having no longer any legal existence — for the cathedral 
 chapters had all been suppressed by the new Civil 
 
 F 25 
 
66 
 
 Election of Expilly. 
 
 Constitution — had no right to appoint Vicars-Capitular. 
 On receipt of this decision of the Committee, signed by 
 its president, Expilly, the Directory of the department of 
 Qiiimper proceeded to organize a new election according 
 to constitutional forms. This election took place, not- 
 withstanding all the efforts used by the Vicars-General 
 to prevent it. It was the first which was held, and 
 merits notice on that account. A glance at the scene 
 will suffice to prove what sort of resemblance it bore to 
 the proceedings of the primitive Church, the vaunted 
 model of the innovators. Amidst the confused din of a 
 rabble of men and women, the body of electors met in a 
 church under the presidency of a layman. Many of 
 these electors, who spoke only their native Breton, did 
 not understand one word of what was being said ; mean- 
 while the hubbub continued without interruption, and at 
 last the name of Expilly was shouted out, and was re- 
 ceived with applause. He was rector of St. Martin-de- 
 Morlaix in the diocese of Leon, and, having been de- 
 puted to the National Assembly, was the same who, as 
 President of the Ecclesiastical Commission, had lately 
 declared the Vicars-Capitular to be deprived of their 
 office, to which circumstance, no doubt, he owed the 
 suggestion of his name on this occasion, and his conse- 
 quent election. It was certainly not owing to his merits, 
 although previous to these unhappy times he had not 
 shown himself deficient in virtue, at least externally. If 
 that virtue was sincere while he presided over his parish 
 of St. Martin at Morlaix, his sojourn in the capital after 
 his election as deputy, and his intimacy with men of 
 infidel principles, had stifled in his heart all genuine 
 sentiments of piety. But the Abbe Tresvaux throws a 
 doubt upon his ever having really entertained such 
 sentiments, for, notwithstanding his exterior propriety of 
 demeanour, clear-sighted men, who had closely observed 
 
The first tisitrping bishop. 67 
 
 him, considered that all these appearances were deceitful. 
 Such was the testimony which an ecclesiastic of merit, who 
 had known Expilly well, gave of him personally to 
 Tresvaux. It was, however, not to his former religious 
 decorum, but to his revolutionary fanaticism, the con- 
 tempt he professed for his superiors, the bishops, and 
 the large share he had taken in the compilation of the 
 Civil Constitution of the Clergy, that Expilly was in- 
 debted for the miserable distinction of being chosen 
 as the first schismatical bishop in the kingdom of 
 France. 
 
 The departmental administration immediately invited 
 him 'to come amongst his faithful people, attached to 
 the religion of Jesus Christ and to the constitution 
 decreed by the National Assembly:' a gross and impu- 
 dent falsehood, for nowhere was this constitution more 
 cordially detested by the people at large than in Brittany. 
 The Vicars-General of Quimper in vain addressed a 
 touching letter to Expilly with the object of dissuading 
 him from presenting himself in a diocese where he would 
 not be accepted by the clergy, who had declared before- 
 hand that they would not communicate in divinis with 
 one who should be elected according to forms unsanc- 
 tioned by the Church. They had nothing to allege 
 against him personally, they said, and had he been 
 chosen canonically they would have received him with 
 joy. But Expilly did not so much as vouchsafe a reply, 
 possessed as he was by an insane ambition, and con- 
 fident that the law imposing the oath, which was then 
 under discussion, and, in fact, was passed ten days later, 
 would enable him to dispense with the suffrage of the 
 Breton clergy, and ensure him a fresh body of pastors 
 attached to his own person and party. In this hope he 
 was so far not mistaken that materials existed for manu- 
 facturing a body of constitutional clergy from the refuse 
 
68 Remonstrance of Bishop of Rennes. 
 
 of the suppressed convents, religious who had cast away 
 their vows, and from amongst those priests who had 
 proved faithless in the hour of trial. These last were 
 commonly men who had entered the sanctuary without a 
 vocation and from interested motives, not a few of whom 
 were at that moment labouring under ecclesiastical 
 censure, or had incurred the suspicion of their superiors, 
 and were glad, therefore, to escape from the trammels of 
 discipline and the restraints of supervision by joining the 
 schism. The main difficulty in the first instance was to 
 find a consecrating bishop for the elect of Finisterre, as 
 by and by there was to be the more insurmountable 
 difficulty of furnishing him and his compeers with flocks. 
 For then, as now, France, as regarded the bulk of her 
 population, was divided into true Catholics and infidels. 
 The former abhorred the schismatical church which they 
 were invited to join, while the irreligious and the un- 
 believing, whatever eagerness they might exhibit in pro- 
 moting its establishment, would certainly not supply a 
 permanent congregation, seeing that it was not their 
 practice to frequent any place of worship at all. 
 
 When Expilly applied for consecration to Mgr. de 
 Girac, the Bishop of Rennes, which by the new consti- 
 tution had been erected into the metropolitan city of the 
 Breton bishoprics, that prelate protested against the 
 quality of metropolitan ascribed to him, but which the 
 Church had never conferred upon him, 2 and formally 
 refused to consecrate and install the applicant. He also 
 demonstrated to Expilly the vice of his election, and 
 endeavoured to convince him of the sin he would commit 
 by exercising episcopal functions without a legitimate 
 mission, earnestly entreating him to meditate seriously 
 on the anathema pronounced by Jesus Christ on the 
 pastor who does not enter by the true door of the sheep- 
 
 2 Tours was the true metropolitan city of Rennes. 
 
Sacrilegiotis consecrations. 69 
 
 fold ; but his charitable exhortation made no impression 
 on the hardened man. 
 
 The bishop elect was bound by the new constitution, 
 in case the metropolitan should refuse to consecrate, to 
 apply in succession to the bishops of the arrondissement 
 or province, beginning with the oldest. If all refused, 
 he was to lodge an appeal with the tribunal of the district. 
 But of what use was it to make applications which were 
 certain to entail as many mortifying rejections, and of 
 what avail to prosecute Mgr. de Girac, who, there could 
 be no doubt, would persevere in denying to the intruder 
 canonical institution? In this dilemma the Assembly 
 came to Expilly's rescue with the decree already men- 
 tioned, permitting consecration by any bishop whatever, 
 if only he had taken the oath. Such a one was found in 
 the person of Talleyrand, who was prevailed upon to 
 perform the sacreligious ceremony, although it is said 
 that on the very night previous he had well-nigh recoiled 
 from fulfilling his promise through a remnant of shame, 
 as we may believe, and a natural reluctance to put the 
 seal on his apostasy. Indeed, Expilly himself, we are told, 
 was for a moment shaken in his resolve. Be this as it 
 may, the voice of conscience was in both cases stifled, 
 and, on the 24th of February, in the church of the Oratory, 
 since converted into a Protestant temple, Talleyrand, 
 Bishop of Autun, assisted by two other episcopal rene- 
 gades, conferred consecration on Expilly and Marolles, 
 the latter having been chosen to the newly erected 
 bishopric of the department of Aisne, a rite performed 
 without commission from the Pope, without examination 
 of the candidates, without profession of faith, without 
 oath of fidelity to the Holy See, and in spite of the 
 remonstrances of the Chapter of Quimper and of the 
 Bishop of Soissons, who was still living. 
 
 But though Talleyrand had been able, albeit sacri- 
 
70 Fidelity of the Episcopate. 
 
 legiously, to confer valid consecration, he was powerless 
 to confer mission in dioceses which were not under his 
 jurisdiction. The two miserable men had therefore to 
 seek their mission from the State. The National Assem- 
 bly, which had made them, received these, its first 
 creations, with deafening applause, for thither, immedi- 
 ately after the ceremony, they repaired, invested with 
 the insignia of their usurped dignity, and three days later 
 appeared before Louis to take the oath of fidelity to the 
 monarch, an engagement which they were not long to 
 keep. But Expilly was in no hurry to go and take 
 possession of his see, dreading as he did the reception 
 he would meet with from the faithful clergy of Brittany, 
 and thinking it prudent to wait until the parishes had 
 been provided with new pastors entertaining sentiments 
 conformable to his own. After this first schismatical 
 consecration no difficulty stood in the way, as the new 
 constitutional bishops were able to manage the whole 
 affair among themselves, and fill up their numbers by 
 mutually conferring on each other, after their fashion, 
 canonical institution. Their organization was thus 
 effected during the three first months of the year 1791. 
 
 Up to the time when the oath was imposed, although 
 the clergy had been the object of furious declamation 
 and of many vexatious prosecutions, their persons had 
 been pretty generally respected, but from this date they 
 began to be exposed to more direct and systematic 
 attacks. The bishops especially were placed in a very 
 critical position. The wolf was entering the fold ; could 
 the shepherd of the flock be silent? and yet, if they 
 spoke, they were sure to be treated as rebels to the law, 
 and have the violence of the rabble directed against 
 them, while every breach of public tranquillity thence 
 resulting would cause them to be denounced as the 
 authors of the disturbance. Such was the position in 
 
Protestations of laity. 
 
 7' 
 
 which the Assembly had placed men who had simply 
 preferred their duty to a base and sinful compliance. 
 The Episcopate of France was nobly equal to the trial ; 
 everywhere, at every fresh step in the late iniquitous 
 proceedings, they had publicly protested both by word 
 and in their pastorals and other writings, but the accu- 
 sation brought against them of instigating their flocks to 
 revolt was utterly false and groundless. We have seen 
 how the resistance which they urged their people to 
 make to unchristian laws was only a passive resistance, 
 and, even in those provinces where the population did 
 eventually rise in arms, the clergy had in no way given 
 the impulse, yet, as it is needless to add, the blame was 
 always laid upon them. Brittany, to which we must 
 confine ourselves, will furnish sufficient examples of this 
 injustice. The zeal which the bishops manifested in 
 guarding their flocks from the poison of error was re- 
 garded as a crime, for which they were immediately 
 denounced to the civil authorities, who, on their part, 
 were always eager to proceed against them. Mgr. le 
 Mintier, Bishop of Treguier, Mgr. de la Marche, Bishop 
 of Leon, and Mgr. Amelot, Bishop of Vannes, were the 
 first to experience the effects of their malevolence. 
 Nevertheless, this disposition was not as yet general. 
 The Breton people were warmly attached to their pastors, 
 and displayed a marked aversion to the constitutional 
 priests who were about to take their places; and even many 
 of the municipalities had not as yet been sufficiently revo 
 lutionized to regard with any degree of favour the pro- 
 mulgation of the law imposing the oath, or be willing to 
 accept the new order of things. At the commencement 
 of the year 1791 the commune of Theix, a parish near 
 Vannes, remonstrated in very strong terms against the 
 imposition of the oath, and declared their resolution to 
 accept no pastors in the place of those they had at 
 
72 Meeting of Breton peasantry. 
 
 present until the Church had pronounced on a point of 
 such vital interest to the religion Catholic, Apostolic, 
 and Roman, which they professed and desired to profess 
 until death. This protest was ill received by the district 
 authorities, who sent in reply a pamphlet in favour of the 
 constitutional clergy, drawn up by a member of the 
 departmental administration. The municipality of Theix 
 immediately returned the document, saying that it was 
 opposed both to faith and morals, and begging the 
 authorities to send them no more such writings, which, 
 so far from attaching them to the Constitution, only 
 served to inspire them with a still greater disgust for it. 
 Other communes of the same department (Morbihan) 
 made similar declarations, and several of the smaller 
 towns manifested in like manner their opposition to the 
 innovations which the civil power had made in ecclesi- 
 astical matters and to the measures which it was pre- 
 paring to adopt against the clergy. Indeed, more than 
 twenty parishes of that department alone addressed 
 petitions to its Directory against the decrees of the 
 Assembly ; that of Sarzeau was one of the most remark- 
 able for its outspoken boldness, but all were identical 
 in substance, and evinced the firm determination of the 
 Breton peasantry to cleave to their faith at the peril of 
 all they held dear, and even of life itself. 
 
 The Bishop of Vannes was held responsible by the 
 ' patriots ' — such was the self-assumed title of the par- 
 tisans of revolution — for the protests that had emanated 
 from so many parishes in his diocese; and the hatred 
 they were known to entertain towards him, coupled with 
 their loud threats of compelling him to take the oath, 
 afforded the strongest grounds for dreading the excesses 
 to which they might proceed. Under the influence of 
 this apprehension, some of the good people of Vannes 
 held a meeting at Bondon, a place not far from that 
 
Conflict with the military. 
 
 73 
 
 town, to which the neighbouring peasantry repaired, in 
 order to consult upon the measures to be adopted for 
 the protection of their Bishop, as well as to protest 
 against the recent decrees of the Assembly. The result 
 of their deliberation was drawn up and sent to the 
 Directory, to which they accorded two days for a reply. 
 The appointed time having elapsed, a body of peasants 
 provided with arms marched to Vannes to receive their 
 answer and to watch over the safety of their Bishop. 
 Meanwhile the Directory, in its alarm, had sent to 
 Lorient for troops, and on the arrival of the peasants 
 treated them as rebels ; moreover, the National Guard, 
 as soon as they had been joined by the soldiers from 
 Lorient, mustering in all fifteen hundred strong, fell upon 
 the peasants on the road to Rennes, killed some, and 
 took others prisoners. A corps of dragoons, composed 
 of young ' patriots ' of Lorient, rushed to the episcopal 
 palace with the object of forcing Mgr. Amelot to take 
 the oath, but the prelate escaped by a garden gate, and 
 succeeded in concealing himself in the garret of a cottage. 
 Fresh bands of armed peasantry were, however, on their 
 way to Vannes, who, having halted at Theix, were with 
 some difficulty dissuaded by the priests of that place 
 from prosecuting their intention, and induced to return 
 to their homes. Such was the part taken by the clergy 
 in one of the rare instances of anything resembling active 
 resistance on the part of the Breton peasantry ; but this 
 did not save them from being denounced as the authors 
 and abettors of the whole affair, and the Vicaire of Theix, 
 M. Dorso, was summoned before the tribunal at Vannes 
 to give an account of his conduct. It was not difficult 
 for him to exculpate himself, but this did not hinder the 
 municipality from writing to the deputies of Morbihan 
 a furious letter of accusation against the clergy, which 
 was read for the edification of the Assembly in its sitting 
 
74 Arrest of bishops decreed. 
 
 of the 19th. The following may serve as a specimen of 
 its style and of that which was commonly employed : 
 ' Our hearts are lacerated at having seen the blood of 
 our fellow-citizens flow. The fanaticism of the priests 
 would fain have deluged us with blood, and their desire 
 was in part fulfilled. They have hearts of bronze, and 
 are strangers to every sentiment of humanity ; their sole 
 wish is to plunge us into all the horrors of civil war. It 
 would take us too long to detail the perfidious means 
 they employ to this end. These fanatical and sanguinary 
 priests seek to renew the crimes of the Cardinal de 
 Lorraine, by preaching murder and carnage in the name 
 of the God of peace.' The allusion is to the tragedy of 
 Charles IX., in which the Cardinal of Lorraine (who, be 
 it observed, was really at Rome at the time) is repre- 
 sented as blessing the daggers which were to be used at 
 the massacre of St. Bartholomew. They proceed to 
 mention how a cure had given the crucifix for his flock 
 to kiss, and had told them that in the cause of heaven 
 they could assassinate without sin. 
 
 The faithful peasantry of Vannes had already been 
 denounced to the Assembly on the 14th of February by 
 a certain Sieur Viellard, a lawyer of Saint-Lo. In his place, 
 as deputy, he had called attention to what he described as 
 the disturbances in Morbihan, which, so far as his know- 
 ledge went, must have been limited to the meeting at 
 Bondon, for the attempt of the country people to come to 
 the defence of their Bishop on the 13th of February could 
 not, in those days of slow communication, have been 
 known at Paris on the 14th. He proposed a decree for send- 
 ing commissioners into the department to restore order, 
 summon the disturbers of the peace before the courts of 
 justice, and suspend the functions of the refractory muni- 
 cipal officers. He also proposed that the Bishops of 
 Treguier, Leon, and Vannes should be summoned to 
 
Case of the Bishop of Treguier. 75 
 
 the bar of the Assembly. All these proposals were 
 adopted, three commissioners were despatched, and gen- 
 darmes ordered to arrest the prelates. The first two 
 were at a distance from Morbihan, so could not possibly 
 be held responsible for events occurring there ; but they 
 were continuing to rule their dioceses with zeal, and to 
 keep diligent watch over their flocks, and this was quite 
 enough to form a head of accusation against them. 
 Mgr. le Mintier, Bishop of Treguier, had long been a 
 marked man, and the subject of frequent vexatious pro- 
 ceedings. He had already been prosecuted before the 
 Tribunal du Chatelet in Paris (a court which took cogni- 
 zance of all the crimes of Use-nation) during a whole year, 
 on account of a Pastoral issued by him in 1789, in con- 
 sequence of the King having signified to all the bishops 
 his desire that prayers should be offered to implore the 
 mercy of God on France and to beseech Him to turn 
 away the evils which afflicted and threatened their 
 country. It is needless to say that there was nothing 
 in the Bishop's Pastoral calculated to excite sedition or 
 create disturbance, neither was it found possible to sub- 
 stantiate any charge against him. So the matter was at 
 last dismissed, but the hatred of the revolutionists re- 
 mained unabated, and the opportunity had now offered 
 for wreaking their vengeance. Mgr. le Mintier, however, 
 succeeded in concealing himself, and after a while he 
 emerged from his hiding-place and resumed his functions ; 
 but in the month of April following, finding himself in- 
 sulted and menaced in his palace, he took refuge in 
 Jersey, after holding an ordination as his last episcopal 
 act. 
 
 The Procureur-Ge'ne'ral of the department of Finis- 
 terre had, early in February, informed the Assembly that 
 the prolonged residence of M. de la Marche, the fi devant 
 Bishop of Saint-Paul-de-Le'on, as he called him (for Leon 
 
J 6 Escape of the Bishop of Leon. 
 
 was one of the suppressed sees) fomented disturbance 
 in the district. ' M. de la Marche,' he said, ' continues 
 to exercise his functions as heretofore.' This was the 
 head and front of his offending. The Tribunal of 
 Morlaix accordingly received an injunction to proceed 
 against him. The administrators of that district had, 
 during the previous year, given respectful heed to the 
 Bishop's remonstrances against the suppression of his 
 see and chapter, and, in consequence of their conscien- 
 tious reluctance to obey the behest of the civil power, 
 the Chapter of Saint-Paul-de-Le'on was the last in Brittany 
 to undergo the forcible suppression to which all the rest 
 had been already subjected. But a ' reform ' had by 
 this time taken place in the local administration, and its 
 officials were sufficiently indoctrinated with revolutionary 
 principles to have learned the approved way of treating 
 a Catholic bishop. They told him he was a disturber 
 of the public peace, and that, if one drop of blood was 
 shed in the department, he should answer for it with 
 his head. They concluded with recommending him to 
 leave a place where he was kindling the fires of fana- 
 ticism and discord, and warned him that his resistance 
 to the law would force them to apply for orders which 
 should not be allowed to remain without effect. 
 
 The decree for the apprehension of the three bishops 
 now furnished them with the desired opportunity. No 
 sooner had the Directory of the department of Finisterre 
 received the Assembly's injunction, than it took imme- 
 diate measures for carrying it out. A gendarme was 
 despatched to notify to the Bishop his summons to the 
 bar of the Assembly. This man had directions to pro- 
 ceed forthwith to deliver its letters to the Procureur- 
 Syndic at Morlaix, and receive his orders. This delay 
 gave time to the Bishop to effect his escape. He had 
 already been privately warned, two days before, by a 
 
Arrest of the Bishop of V amies. 77 
 
 gentleman of the neighbourhood, of the intentions of the 
 authorities, and knew that the marcc/taussee, the name 
 by which the gendarmerie were then known, had been 
 called out. He knew, moreover, that the inhabitants of 
 Saint-Paul and its vicinity were manifesting a disposition 
 to offer active opposition should any violence be done 
 to him. Dreading the effusion of blood, and yielding to 
 the entreaties of his clergy and of other persons of all 
 classes, who represented to him that his further stay 
 could only be fraught with peril not only to himself, but 
 to the peace of the town, he sought a temporary place of 
 concealment, and later, with the help of some gentlemen 
 of the neighbourhood, made his escape by night in a 
 small smuggling-boat, containing, literally, nothing except 
 barrels of brandy. After giving his blessing to his friends 
 on the beach, the venerable prelate seated himself on 
 one of these barrels, and thus made his perilous passage 
 of above a hundred miles in safety. From the hospitable 
 shores of England he addressed a pastoral letter to his 
 flock, the copies of which fell, however, into the hands 
 of the administrators of Finisterre, who, no doubt, de- 
 stroyed them. 
 
 Mgr. Amelot was the only one of the three bishops 
 upon whom the authorities succeeded in laying their 
 hands. He was arrested and sent as a criminal to Paris, 
 where his arrival was announced to the Assembly. It 
 does not appear, however, that he was ever summoned 
 to the bar. The time had not yet come when the mere 
 mockery of a trial was sufficient to dispose of an accused 
 person, and it must have been palpable that nothing 
 could be gained by allowing Mgr. Amelot to plead his 
 own cause and state facts as they had really occurred. 
 Anyhow, the matter seems to have been dropped, and 
 some months later he was able to leave Paris and take 
 refuge beyond the frontier. 
 
78 
 
 Election for see of V amies. 
 
 Mgr. Cortois de Pressigny, Bishop of Saint-Malo, Mgr. 
 de Girac, Bishop of Rennes, and Mgr. de Bellescize, 
 Bishop of Saint-Brieuc, had all removed to a distance 
 from their dioceses, whence, however, they continued to 
 warn, instruct, and encourage their flocks. One legiti- 
 mate bishop alone now remained in Brittany, Mgr. 
 Herce, Bishop of Dol, and he, too, was shortly compelled 
 to retire and seek a retreat at Mayenne, where his family 
 resided. The posts of these prelates were, in fact, no 
 longer tenable. Singled out as the first objects of revo- 
 lutionary hatred, stigmatized as fire-brands and conspi- 
 rators, they would either have speedily fallen victims to 
 the fury of the rabble, or have escaped this fate only to 
 suffer close incarceration, thus sacrificing the sole re- 
 maining possibility of fortifying and directing their flocks 
 by secret communication from their distant places of 
 retreat. No other course but expatriation was therefore 
 open to the Bishops, a course which the sanguinary 
 persecution about to ensue was so soon to force upon 
 the great bulk of the second order, the devoted priests 
 of the Church of France. 
 
 The departmental administration of Morbihan now 
 hastened to convoke an electoral assembly in order to 
 choose a constitutional bishop. A large number of 
 electors attended whose attachment to their religion 
 ought to have deterred them from taking any share in 
 the proceedings. But while some acted from weakness, 
 many, no doubt, did so from ignorance or want of due 
 consideration. Days of trial had suddenly come upon 
 them, and the duty of abstention in certain cases which 
 would compromise conscience, was not perhaps clearly 
 before their minds. At any rate, they gave a proof of 
 their good intentions by the re-election of their Bishop, 
 Mgr. Amelot. They were immediately informed that 
 this choice was inadmissible, since he had refused the 
 
Le Masle chosen bishop. 79 
 
 oath. The revolutionary party now took measures to 
 ensure better success, and contrived to make the next 
 choice fall on M. Guegan, Rector of Pontivy, who was 
 sitting as deputy in the Assembly. As he had taken the 
 oath, the ' patriots ' were confident that he would accept 
 the proffered episcopal chair, but they had mistaken their 
 man. Although he had committed one act of criminal 
 weakness, he shrank from intruding himself into the 
 place of the legitimate pastor, and wrote to the Pope 
 begging him to indicate the course which he ought to 
 pursue in case he should be further pressed on the 
 subject. Pius VI. replied in a letter in which kindness 
 and firmness were admirably blended, demonstrating to 
 him the gravity of the fault he would commit should he 
 yield either to solicitations or to threats, and perform the 
 sacrilegious and schismatical act to which he had been 
 invited. M. Guegan obeyed this paternal injunction, 
 and thus preserved himself from participation in the 
 schism. In the following year he suffered deportation. 
 The Directory of Morbihan, by M. Guegan's unexpected 
 refusal, found itself obliged to summon the electors 
 afresh. The choice fell this time on Le Masle, Rector 
 of Herbignac. He was a man past seventy, and had 
 a great reputation in the neighbourhood, where he was 
 regarded as quite a shining light. He had talents for 
 preaching, which had probably helped not a little to 
 obtain him admirers and blind men as to his true 
 character ; for unfortunately he was not always careful 
 to observe in his private life the precepts which he 
 publicly enforced so eloquently in the pulpit. He had, 
 however, been hitherto successful in concealing his de- 
 linquencies and imposing on the world. He had accepted 
 the oath, but not, he said, all its consequences ; and he 
 had told his parishioners that he had decided to take it 
 because he could not make up his mind to abandon 
 
So Jacob and Le Coz. 
 
 them to some ravening wolf, who would come to disperse 
 and kill the sheep, since an intruder could have no power 
 or authority to administer the sacraments. And now, 
 by one of those inconsistencies into which temptation 
 is sure to betray those whose hearts have departed from 
 God, he was about to become himself a ravening wolf 
 by his intrusion into the see of Valines. 
 
 By the middle of March the civil authorities had 
 completed the number of constitutional bishops for 
 Brittany. For their new see of the C6tes-du-Xord, 
 Jacob, Rector of Lannebert, a little village near Paimpol, 
 was chosen. The man thus called to take the place 
 of the true Bishop of Saint-Brieuc, unlike his brother 
 apostate, Le Masle, was moral in his conduct, but very 
 deficient in ecclesiastical science. He had, besides, an 
 extremely rustic exterior, and was altogether so below 
 par both in capacity and manners, that no one would 
 have thought of him to fill so high a station if consti- 
 tutional bishoprics had not been, so to say, going a 
 begging. He had not the virtue to resist a temptation 
 so flattering to his ambition. He fell never to rise again, 
 for he persevered in his error until death. 
 
 To the metropolitan see of Rennes — or of the Xorth- 
 West, as it was styled — erected by the new Constitution, 
 Le Coz was appointed. He was by far the cleverest of 
 the schismatical bishops — to call him the ablest would 
 be to employ a term hardly applicable to any of these 
 men — and one who had done, and was to do, most 
 extensive mischief. Although born in an obscure rank 
 of life, he had been enabled to pursue his theological 
 studies, and by his proficiency had obtained a Professor's 
 chair, first at Quimper, and afterwards at the College of 
 Louis-le-Grand at Paris. Thence he returned to Quimper, 
 and, continuing his professional career, was promoted to 
 be Principal of the College at that place. He also 
 
Character of Le Coz. 81 
 
 cultivated literature, and had showed some taste and 
 even, it is said, some slight talent for poetry. His 
 morals were without reproach, and he enjoyed credit 
 for zeal as well as for learning, but he was much more a 
 man of letters than either a theologian or a priest, and 
 generally it may be said of him that his predominant 
 passion was the desire of worldly advancement and dis- 
 tinction. From the first he had ardently embraced 
 revolutionary principles, and the so-called patriotism 
 which he displayed procured him the post of Procureur- 
 Syndic of the district of Quimper. He threw himself 
 heart and soul into the defence of the Civil Constitution 
 of the Clergy, and used his pen for the vindication of 
 that work of iniquity. In the pamphlet he put forth 
 he strove to demonstrate that every one of its articles 
 tended to the restoration of the ancient discipline, and 
 to bringing back the purest days of primitive Christianity. 
 To prove his thesis, he added to a great deal of false 
 reasoning a number of unfaithful quotations, and inter- 
 spersed the whole with satirical sallies against the Church 
 of France. It was a shallow composition, easy to refute, 
 and, in fact, it was speedily and satisfactorily refuted by 
 several competent pens, but it was welcomed with enthu- 
 siasm by many ignorant laymen, whose heads were filled 
 with the new-fangled notions, and who had been self- 
 transformed into doctors of theology. Such persons 
 eagerly seize on any flimsy production which seems to 
 furnish them with arguments and embodies their vague 
 ideas. The Directory lauded the pamphlet to the skies, 
 caused the manuscript which Le Coz had presented for 
 its approbation to be printed at the expense of the 
 department, and sent copies to all the other eighty-two 
 departments of France. Inflated by this encouragement, 
 Le Coz turned a deaf ear to the grave and charitable 
 remonstrances addressed to him by his superiors ; but, 
 
 G 25 
 
82 Le Coz's Letter to Mgr. de Girac. 
 
 although he had defied them to refute his arguments, he 
 evaded and ended by formally refusing a meeting which 
 the Vicars-General had proposed to him. Already in 
 heart a schismatic, he was soon to prove himself one of 
 the Church's bitterest enemies. Such a one was marked 
 out for the disgraceful elevation now offered to him 
 through his election by the department of Ille et Vilaine 
 to the constitutional metropolitan see of the North-West. 
 
 Mgr. Girac, the true Bishop of Rennes, the same who 
 had refused consecration to Expilly, was at that time in 
 Paris, and to him Le Coz addressed a hypocritical letter, 
 informing him of his election. In it he spoke of the 
 astonishment and perplexity into which this choice had 
 thrown him, a state from which Mgr. de Girac could by 
 one word relieve him. He did not precisely say what 
 this one word was to be, but left it to be inferred by 
 alleging the example of the Bishop of Angers, who was 
 falsely reported at that time to have taken the oath. ' I 
 throw myself at your feet,' he concluded, ' and implore 
 you to return to a flock which cannot fail to be dear to 
 you, and on which the restoration of your friendship 
 cannot but make the most salutary impressions. One 
 word, Monseigneur, and my joy, as well as that of many 
 other friends of religion and of our country, will be at 
 its height.' To this equivocal letter, in which Le Coz 
 disguised what might be his ulterior intentions, Mgr. de 
 Girac sent a reply which merited the eulogium of Pius VI. 
 He asks Le Coz what that word is which he entreats 
 him to pronounce. It could not be his own resignation, 
 for M. Le Coz must well know that this would not 
 suffice to render the see vacant, since the alliance which 
 a bishop contracted with his flock could not be dissolved 
 by him at pleasure. His resignation, however absolute, 
 is but the expression of his desire, until accepted by his 
 hierarchical superior. But were he even pusillanimous 
 
Minie. 
 
 83 
 
 enough to abandon his pastoral charge at a moment 
 when the faithful were exposed to such grievous trials, 
 whoever should be named to replace him by an Assembly 
 which had not received from the Church the necessary 
 powers, and should, moreover, be instituted by men 
 lacking all spiritual authority for the purpose, would be 
 an intruder, destitute of the jurisdiction indispensable 
 for the exercise of episcopal functions. The word, then, 
 which he is solicited to utter can only be the acceptation 
 of the oath. The rest of the letter was directed to the 
 hopeless effort of opening Le Coz's eyes to the nature of 
 the step which he was evidently about to take ; but the 
 Bishop was addressing a man who was hardened by pride 
 and wilfully blinded by worldly ambition. Of obscure 
 extraction, and not possessing talents of a sufficiently 
 high order to enable one thus circumstanced to aspire 
 to the mitre, he knew that by the help of the Revolution 
 alone could he attain to the dignity of bishop ; and this 
 dignity his soul craved with an unholy longing. It was 
 not long before he had set the seal on his errors by 
 receiving sacrilegious consecration. 
 
 Mgr. de La Laurancie will be remembered as one of 
 the earliest objects of revolutionary hostility. In the 
 beginning of March the department of the Loire Infe- 
 rieure proceeded to fill his see. Minee, the man chosen 
 to take his place, was the son of an apothecary of Nantes. 
 He had led a dissolute life in early youth, but after a 
 while he reformed his ways, at least in some outward 
 fashion, and went to Paris, where he managed to in- 
 gratiate himself with one of the Vicars-General of the 
 diocese, through whose interest he was admitted to holy 
 orders. Later, he was made cure of the parish of the 
 Trois Patrons at Saint-Denis. His conduct there was 
 far from edifying, and, when the Revolution broke out, 
 his reputation being at a very low ebb in his neighbour- 
 
8 4 
 
 Minte 's election. 
 
 hood, he became anxious for a change. To men of this 
 sort, such times held out hopes of obtaining advancement 
 without having to take on themselves the burden of a 
 virtuous life. Accordingly he affiliated himself to the 
 Jacobin club, embraced the schism, and was promoted 
 to be cure of Saint-Thomas-d'Aquin in the faubourg 
 Saint-Germain, one of the new parishes erected by the 
 civil power. Such was the man selected as chief pastor 
 for the diocese of Nantes. Now for the manner of the 
 election. The electoral body was convened to meet on 
 the nth of March, in the Dominican convent, whence it 
 adjourned to the Cathedral, whose consecrated walls were 
 now to echo with the violent harangues of men whose 
 impiety was equalled only by their ignorance and self- 
 conceit. The candidates were three in number, unhappy 
 priests who had taken the oath ; two of these anticipated 
 for themselves a favourable majority, but their hopes 
 were disappointed through the manoeuvres of the Presi- 
 dent, Coustard, who, by his ardent support of the Revo- 
 lution, had become the idol of the day with the 'patriots' 
 of Nantes. He happened to owe the sum of 6,000 francs 
 to one Vassal, an inhabitant of the place. This man was 
 brother-in-law to Mine'e, and privately offered to cancel 
 the debt if Coustard would get his relative chosen bishop. 
 Coustard consented, and by his influence with the electors 
 disposed them in favour of one who, although a native 
 of the city, was entirely unknown to the greater part of 
 them even by name, and who, had he been better known, 
 had nothing to recommend him, but the very reverse. 
 This may be taken as a specimen of the way in which 
 episcopal elections were managed by these self-styled 
 restorers of primitive purity. Minee accordingly was 
 chosen bishop of the Loire Inferieure, and, on April 10, 
 was consecrated at Paris along with his pretended metro- 
 politan Le Coz. 
 
Proceedings of the Assembly. 
 
 85 
 
 Such were the men who were about to intrude them- 
 selves into the places of the venerable prelates who had 
 occupied and ruled the nine ancient sees of Catholic 
 Brittany. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 /// reception of the nczv Constitution in Brittany. 
 Publication of the Papal Briefs. 
 
 During the months of January, February, and March, 
 1 79 1, the Assembly was, as we have seen, occupied in 
 organizing its Constitutional Church. Each sitting was 
 ushered in by the announcement of the submission of 
 one or more priests, the election of some new bishop, or 
 the denunciation of some old one. The most honour- 
 able and respectable portion of the clergy had refused the 
 oath. Those who had taken it were men whose charac- 
 ters were either notoriously bad or, at least, equivocal. 
 Some were actuated by a love of repose and the desire 
 to retain their places, while others were possessed with 
 the desire of emerging from an obscurity in which their 
 insignificance would naturally have kept them. These 
 last were not satisfied with taking their oaths before the 
 local municipal authorities, but they must needs send 
 addresses to the Assembly, that their names might be 
 inserted with commendation in the prods verbaux. The 
 Assembly received these addresses most graciously, some- 
 times causing them to be printed for distribution, and 
 always bestowing extravagant laudation upon their authors. 
 Thus the vanity of these men was flattered, and the 
 Assembly consoled itself for the mortifying refusal of so 
 many ecclesiastics of merit and distinction. The oath 
 
86 False Briefs circulated. 
 
 was demanded of the clergy of Paris at the very begin- 
 ning of January, and active measures were soon after 
 taken for exacting it from those of Brittany. 
 
 To appreciate the trial to which the priests were ex- 
 posed, but through which an overwhelming majority 
 passed with unswerving fidelity, we must consider all 
 the plausible pretexts which to timid minds might seem 
 to excuse acquiescence. The Holy See had not as yet 
 issued any public and formal condemnation, for the Brief 
 by which Pius VI. solemnly condemned the Civil Con- 
 stitution of the Clergy, and promulgated the sentence of 
 excommunication against all who should swear to it, did 
 not appear till the i oth of March. True, they who were 
 acquainted with the constitution of the Catholic Church 
 and its essential rights, as priests cannot fail to be, could 
 not be in any uncertainty as to the import of the coming 
 Pontifical decision ; and, indeed, as a matter of fact, it 
 was generally known that the Civil Constitution had been 
 very ill received at Rome, so that on both accounts no 
 one could seriously expect that it would ever obtain the 
 Papal sanction. Moreover, the clergy could consult their 
 superiors, the bishops, although of this there was no 
 need, seeing that these faithful shepherds had taken care 
 not to leave either priests or people in ignorance of their 
 duty at this crisis. Still, the Sovereign Pontiff had not 
 yet addressed them from Peter's Chair, and there were 
 persons busily engaged in disseminating erroneous infor- 
 mation on the subject. False briefs were actually in 
 circulation. Some of these which were unfavourable to 
 the decrees of the Assembly, that body did not fail to 
 stigmatize as criminal impostures, punishing severely all 
 who had helped to distribute them, but it acted very 
 differently in the case of reports and documents of an 
 opposite character. Here it was all tolerance ; and if it 
 did not take an active part in propagating these forgeries 
 
Constancy of the clergy. 87 
 
 it certainly encouraged their fabrication and publication. 
 Languinais, a Breton lawyer, and a fanatical member of 
 the Ecclesiastical Committee, did not scruple to write to 
 his friends and countrymen, informing them, ' on un- 
 questionable authority,' as he declared, that the Pope 
 and Cardinals had resolved not to interfere in the affairs 
 of the Church of France ; consequently it was plain that 
 neither faith nor morals could be compromised by the 
 oath. Moreover, he said that from all quarters news 
 reached them in the capital that the whole, or nearly the 
 whole, body of ecclesiastical functionaries had taken it, 
 except in a few departments. This circular was signed 
 by four other deputies who were members of the Com- 
 mittee. It is only fair to take these bewildering reports 
 and assertions into account when estimating the force of 
 the temptation which beset a body of men many of 
 whom were entirely without private fortune, and who 
 not unfrequently had to support some destitute relative, 
 such as an aged mother or portionless sister. The miser- 
 ably small pension of 500 francs (£20) offered to the 
 non-juring priests could not avail to save them from want 
 in the event of deprivation; yet neither the love of 
 kindred, nor the prospect of temporal ruin, nor the dread 
 of graver consequences, could shake the constancy of the 
 faithful parish priests of Brittany, and, in fact, the number 
 of those who allowed themselves to be led astray, or to 
 be so far intimidated as to take the sacrilegious oath, 
 was, as already noticed, relatively very small. 
 
 Although as yet the Assembly had decreed no 
 penalty against recusants, but had even assigned them a 
 small pension, the danger incurred was only too patent. 
 So early as the month of January, the declamations and 
 vexatious proceedings of the civil authorities had begun 
 to work fatal effects. A young priest of Moncontour, 
 Joseph Marie Le Clerc, one of a family remarkable for its 
 
88 First victim of the Revolution. 
 
 piety, had early discerned the true character of the 
 Revolution, and from its first dawn had seen in it the 
 enemy of both the altar and the throne, nor had he con- 
 cealed his sentiments, which were therefore generally 
 known. His frankness rendered him only the more 
 obnoxious to the partisans of the new ideas, and one 
 evening, as he was returning from a sick call in the 
 suburbs, he was mobbed by a number of young men, 
 who covered him with mud and filth. A far worse 
 outrage was soon to follow. M. Le Clerc's attachment to 
 the faith made him an energetic opponent of the oath, 
 and he expressed his opinions on the subject both openly 
 and strongly. This was sufficient to mark him out for 
 vengeance. Accordingly, one night, when returning from 
 the house of a relative, he was set upon by some ruffians 
 who threw him down on the ground and cruelly mal- 
 treated him. Although scarcely able to drag himself 
 home, he uttered no complaint, and refused even to 
 disclose the names of his assailants, whose persons he 
 had recognized. In spite of his sufferings he insisted 
 two days afterwards on saying Mass as usual, but he 
 had been mortally injured, and after enduring most acute 
 pain for eleven days, he expired. He was the first victim 
 of revolutionary fury in Brittany, which was soon to 
 count so many martyrs among her devoted clergy. 
 
 It was a terrible time for priests and people when the 
 oath came to be exacted, for though, as we have said, 
 the great body of the clergy stood firm, Catholic hearts 
 were saddened by some shameful and scandalous defec- 
 tions. Amongst those who fell away, were priests who 
 had hitherto enjoyed a considerable measure of public 
 esteem ; but these cases were very few, and were no 
 matter of surprise to persons of discernment who had 
 been personally acquainted with the ecclesiastics in 
 question : indeed, the Abbe Tresvaux tells us there 
 
Character of the defaulters. 89 
 
 were those who foretold with almost perfect accuracy 
 which priests would take the oath and which would 
 refuse. 
 
 Those ecclesiastics who exercised some public func- 
 tion, cure's, vicaires, and heads of seminaries, were alone 
 bound by the new law to swear fidelity to the Civil Con- 
 stitution ; and few of these failed in their duty. The 
 defaulters consisted chiefly of the untitled clergy, from 
 whose ranks men of no merit or consideration stepped 
 forth unsummoned to take the guilt of apostasy on their 
 souls, thus plainly betraying the motive by which they 
 were actuated. For the taking the oath was a mode of 
 advertising their competency for the posts which were 
 continually falling vacant through the fidelity of their 
 brethren. Nor were they disappointed, as a rule, of their 
 expected reward. A certain number of religious hastened 
 in like manner to join the schism. There could be no 
 question as to the character of these unhappy men, their 
 own behaviour and the public scandal given by not a 
 few of their number were soon to furnish the plainest 
 evidence. The number of the jurors did not bear the 
 same proportion in all parts of Brittany, but everywhere 
 a very edifying fact was noticeable ; scarcely a single 
 instance of apostasy occurred in the higher ranks of the 
 clergy ; the Vicars-General and the Canons of the 
 Cathedrals, with two exceptions, one of these not a 
 native of the province, remained faithful. The heads 
 of seminaries were equally firm ; one only, the Superior 
 of the Vannes Seminary, being guilty of an act of weak- 
 ness, which he speedily retracted. The same may be 
 said generally of the rectors, the apostates coming chiefly 
 from the inferior clergy and religious who had renounced 
 their vows. The diocese of Rennes, however, had to 
 deplore several losses ; but here, as elsewhere, it was 
 noted that they who fell away had been entirely wanting 
 
90 Non-jurors forbidden to preach. 
 
 in the ecclesiastical spirit. The defections took place 
 chiefly in the two cantons of Rhetiers and La Guerche, 
 where the priests had been remarkable for their want of 
 gravity and their love of amusement. Indeed, it was 
 generally observed that the rectors who in the different 
 towns of Brittany accepted the oath had not been 
 regarded as ornaments of their profession or models of 
 exemplary conduct. 
 
 They who lack the faith are always deceived in their 
 calculations where the order of grace and supernatural 
 motives are concerned. The firmness of the true children 
 of the Church invariably takes them by surprise, and so 
 it was with the Constitutional Assembly in 1791. When 
 it was seen that, not only the vast majority, but the 
 worthiest, the ablest, and the most respected of the clergy 
 rejected the Constitution, the Assembly immediately 
 applied itself to devise measures to counteract their 
 influence ; the zeal they displayed in maintaining the 
 fidelity of their people being qualified by the revolu- 
 tionists as a sowing of discontent and an incitement to 
 disturbance. Accordingly, on the 5th of February a 
 decree was passed interdicting all ecclesiastics who had 
 not taken the oath from preaching in any church what- 
 ever ; this violation of the vaunted ' Rights of Man ' 
 offering a strange contrast to the toleration extended 
 to the wild licence and violence of the clubs, which met 
 at their pleasure everywhere and anywhere. A deputy, 
 M. Montlauzier, derisively asked the Assembly to 
 decree that the non-juring clergy should be permitted 
 neither to print, write, hear confessions, say Mass, or 
 read the Gospel ; while another deputy, M. de Folle- 
 ville, proposed, as an amendment, that they should be 
 permitted to say Mass within the walls of a private 
 house. The time was approaching when what these 
 deputies said in irony was to become a bitter truth; when 
 
Zeal of the Breton women. 91 
 
 priests were to be debarred from making their voices 
 heard in any way, saying Mass, or exercising any act 
 of Catholic worship, even within the walls of a private 
 house. They little thought, any more than did the 
 Assembly, which resented the jest, that very soon even 
 that last consolation would be denied to Catholics. 
 
 We have mentioned that in the first instance a small 
 pension had been assigned to non-juring cures, the 
 maximum being an annuity of 500 francs, nevertheless 
 Lanjuinais cautioned the Assembly against an imprudent 
 generosity, for the double reason of sparing the public 
 treasury and not offering an inducement to the clergy 
 to refuse the oath or to retract it if taken. A condition 
 was added, that these cure's should have abandoned all 
 measures for exciting disturbance — what that meant we 
 know — and should have peaceably resigned their cures 
 to their successors. On such conditions this modest 
 allowance was likely to be often withheld. The liberality 
 of the Assembly, however, whether to the non-juring 
 clergy or to the bishops, to whom a retiring pension 
 had been voted of 10,000 francs (,£400) at a time when 
 they little anticipated having all but the whole Episcopate 
 on their list, never, in fact, cost the Treasury much, and 
 soon ceased altogether to be paid. 
 
 The Breton peasantry remained far from passive spec- 
 tators of the imposition of the oath upon their clergy. 
 At Liffre, in the diocese of Rennes, the members of the 
 municipality having met in order to summon the rector 
 and his vicaires to take the oath, the women congregated 
 together and, forming themselves into a battalion, marched 
 boldly towards the assembled municipals. Four of their 
 party, selected for their greater fluency of speech, haran- 
 gued these depositaries of authority in such energetic 
 terms that they judged it discreet to yield for the present. 
 On the morrow, however, they denounced the district for 
 
92 Popular aversion to the schism. 
 
 its resistance. Nor was this the only instance in which 
 the zeal of the Breton women displayed itself. At Plou- 
 maugot, in the diocese of Saint-Malo, the rector, a man 
 of weak character, after promising to refuse the oath, 
 took it at High Mass, where he was surrounded by 
 National Guards. M. Androuet, his vicaire, a holy priest, 
 whom we shall have occasion to mention later, indignant 
 at this act of apostasy, then and there stripped himself 
 of his surplice in the choir and left the church. A deep 
 impression was made on the people, but it was the 
 women who gave expression to the feelings shared by all. 
 They rushed on the guards and, wresting the men's 
 muskets from their hands, broke them on the rails of the 
 sanctuary. Then, forcing open the door of the sacristy, 
 where the cowardly rector had sought refuge, they com- 
 pelled him to retract his oath ; which, however, when he 
 was delivered from the fear of these Amazons of the 
 faith, and had fallen again under the terror of the autho- 
 rities, he unhappily renewed. Facts like these suffice to 
 prove that the population of Brittany in their opposition 
 to the schism acted of their own free will, and not, as 
 the revolutionists pretended, in blind obedience to the 
 dictates of the clergy. Often, indeed, throughout France 
 at this time cases occurred in which it appeared that the 
 pastor was rather controlled by his flock than the flock 
 by its pastor; and, if we step a little beyond the frontiers 
 of Brittany, we shall find the people of La Rochelle 
 attempting to set fire to the house of a canon who had 
 betrayed the faith by accepting the oath. Short of such 
 extreme and rare instances, however, it may not be 
 hazardous to presume that if some cure's were intimidated 
 into taking the oath, there were others, even in Brittany, 
 who refused it in order not to forfeit the respect of their 
 people, or — to state the case more favourably for these 
 weaker Christians — who, without that seasonable support 
 
Papal Briefs. 
 
 93 
 
 to their sense of duty, might have yielded to temptation. 
 But the men who ruled the Assembly, and who had long 
 so completely renounced all religion as to be unable even 
 to comprehend its influence on others, could not, or would 
 not, believe that there was enough faith in the hearts of 
 the people to make them reject the innovations imposed 
 by the law ; and therefore they always attributed the 
 expression of aversion to the instigation of the bishops 
 and clergy. We have seen how the municipalities in 
 some parts of Brittany were still composed of upright 
 men and good Christians, who lent their support to the 
 true pastors. Thus in the rich and populous parish of 
 Plougerneau, in the diocese of Le'on, when the Abbe 
 Poulpiquet, its rector, a distinguished man, who in after 
 times was to fill the see of Quimper, presented himself 
 before the mayor and municipality at the head of his 
 clergy, and, after setting forth in energetic language the 
 reasons which deterred him from compliance with the 
 sacrilegious law, placed a written profession of faith 
 regarding the Church, which had been signed by himself 
 and his priests, in the hands of the authorities, they 
 received it with perfect respect, declaring that liberty of 
 religious opinions having been proclaimed, they would 
 not exact the oath from their parochial clergy ; moreover, 
 that they were themselves faithfully attached to the 
 Catholic religion, and would refuse to give their adhesion 
 to the Civil Constitution, until it had been accepted by 
 the Bishops and the Holy See. 
 
 If the Sovereign Pontiff had so long delayed his formal 
 and public condemnation of the late decrees of the 
 National Assembly, it was that he might the more 
 thoroughly examine the strange innovations which it 
 pretended to introduce on its own authority, and thus 
 be enabled more fully to expose its true character, should 
 milder measures in the meantime have failed to recall 
 
94 
 
 Papal Briefs. 
 
 men to their duty. At last, on the ioth of March, 1791, 
 Pius VI. addressed a Brief to the Archbishops and Bishops 
 in the Assembly, condemning the Civil Constitution of 
 the Clergy, and unmasking its errors. It was published, 
 notwithstanding all the efforts made by the partisans of 
 the schism to suppress it, and had the happy effect of 
 determining the conduct of many who were hesitating 
 what course to pursue. 
 
 The sacrilegious consecration of Expilly and Marolles 
 drew forth a fresh Brief from Pius VI. on April 13, con- 
 firming the mandate issued by the French Bishops to the 
 faithful of their dioceses, forbidding them to communi- 
 cate with the intruders. This Brief was addressed to all 
 the clergy and faithful of the kingdom. Herein the Pope 
 explained the motives of his protracted silence ; related 
 his endeavours to dissuade the King from accepting the 
 Civil Constitution of the Clergy ; spoke of the tears he 
 had shed and the public prayers he had caused to be 
 offered for that end ; the commission with which he had 
 charged the two ministers of State, the Archbishops of 
 Vienne and Bordeaux, for the same object; and the 
 violence which had been done to the King to extort 
 his consent. After commending the zeal and fidelity 
 of the bishops and clergy who had refused to take the 
 oath, the Pontiff proceeded to point out the vices of 
 the new Constitution, declaring the election of new 
 bishops as well as the erection of new sees to be an 
 act unlawful, sacrilegious, and contrary to the Canons, 
 and all elections of parish priests made by the district 
 authorities to be in like manner null and void. In par- 
 ticular he denounced in most forcible language the 
 hypocrisy, mendacity, and sacrilege of which Expilly 
 had been guilty, and enjoined the flock whose super- 
 intendence he had usurped to reject him with abhor- 
 rence. Further, he commanded all ecclesiastics who 
 
Obduracy of the schismatics. 95 
 
 had taken the oath to retract the same within a period 
 of forty days, which were to count from the date of the 
 Brief, and addressed the most touching exhortations to 
 the bishops, canons, parish priests, and all other eccle- 
 siastics as well as laity who had remained faithful, to 
 continue firm and steadfast in their union with the Holy 
 See, the Chair of Peter, separated from which they would 
 be severed from the Church. He concluded by ex- 
 pressing a hope of seeing the schismatics repent and 
 acknowledge their errors — a hope which was very far 
 from being realized, at least as respected the great 
 majority. Not one of the wretched men elected to fill 
 the constitutional sees of Brittany was moved by the 
 solemn judgment pronounced against them by the Vicar 
 of Christ, while those who had not as yet received 
 episcopal consecration hastened to consummate their 
 guilt by participating in that sacrilegious act. In the 
 case of Expilly, Le Coz, and Mine'e, this ceremony had 
 been already performed, and they now prepared to install 
 themselves in the sees they had usurped. 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 
 Installation of tlic scliismatical bishops and clergy. 
 Beginning of the persecution. 
 
 On the eve of Palm Sunday, which in the year 1791 fell 
 on the 1 6th of April, Expilly repaired to Quimper to take 
 possession of the see. It was a bright and clear spring 
 morning when the false pastor made a halt outside the 
 town to wait for the civil authorities, who were to form 
 his escort ; for it was to them and to the mob, deluded 
 or suborned by revolutionary demagogues, that these 
 creatures of the civil power had to look for countenance 
 and support, and, indeed, for all the honours of their 
 reception. But no sooner had the procession begun its 
 march, than an unusually thick mist enveloped the whole 
 scene, so that it was under a canopy of gloom heavier 
 than that of a November fog that the intruder proceeded 
 to place himself in the seat of the venerable Conen de 
 Saint- Luc, whose successor he pretended to be ; a meet 
 presage of the dark and dismal career on which the 
 infatuated man had entered, and which only three years 
 later was to have so fatal a close. 
 
 The reception which he, in common with the other 
 intruded bishops, met with was little calculated to flatter 
 their vanity. They were accompanied, indeed, by mili- 
 tary bands, and by a crowd of revolutionists who had 
 long cast religion to the winds ; but all that was truly 
 respectable, whether among the clergy or the laity, held 
 aloof, and shunned them as the pestilence. Good 
 
Minies Reception at Nantes, 
 
 97 
 
 Catholics shut themselves up in their houses, and the 
 day of installation of the false pastor was a day of 
 mourning in the city. 
 
 So it was also at Nantes, where Mine'e installed him- 
 self in Passion Week. His entry wore all the appear- 
 ance of a military fete. Such of the National Guard as 
 had been able to provide themselves with uniforms went 
 out to meet him at a league's distance from the town. 
 There he alighted from his carriage, believing that his 
 arrival would thus be attended with more popular effect, 
 and accomplished the remainder of the way on foot, 
 amid the plaudits and vociferations of an uproarious 
 crowd. But such assemblages are ill satisfied with only 
 using their lungs, their hands must also find congenial 
 work to do ; so, when the mob observed that the Sisters 
 of St. Charles were in no hurry to ring their convent bells 
 as the procession passed their door, they would have 
 forced their way in and sacked the house, had not some- 
 thing accidentally occurred at the moment to divert them 
 from their purpose. And here it may be observed that a 
 curious incident marked Mine'e's entrance into the 
 Episcopal palace. Some repairs were going on which 
 prevented ingress by the regular approach, and he had 
 to make his way up through a breach opened for the 
 occasion in a terrace wall ; thus literally verifying those 
 words of our Lord : ' He that entereth not by the door 
 into the sheepfold, but climbeth up some other way, the 
 same is a thief and a robber.' 1 
 
 Minee was much disappointed with his reception at 
 Nantes. After being more than a week in the place, 
 not a single titled ecclesiastic or any of the principal 
 inhabitants had visited him. Even the Mayor had not 
 shown him the slightest attention. Nor could this be 
 matter of surprise. For, independently of the religious 
 1 St. John x. i. 
 
 H 25 
 
98 Mince's Installation. 
 
 motives which kept the great body of the faithful at a 
 distance from him, no person with any sense of self- 
 respect could associate with a man whose conduct set at 
 defiance all the common decencies of life. One of 
 Minee's first visits was to the club, which all sensible 
 persons, including those who did not venture to arraign 
 the new Constitution, regarded as a source of danger to 
 the town, while his connection with Coustard, the sworn 
 enemy of their revered Bishop, Mgr. de La Laurancie, 
 and with other fanatical ' patriots,' was not calculated to 
 raise him in the estimation of the well-disposed portion 
 of the community. Minee keenly felt his isolation, and 
 the mortification he experienced would have led him to 
 abandon his post from sheer disgust, but for the emolu- 
 ments attached thereto, and the opportunity it afforded 
 him of harassing the faithful Catholics. 
 
 But before he could commence his proposed measures, 
 he must be formally installed. This ceremony took place 
 with all the pomp of a military display. The artillery 
 thundered from the Castle, and the vessels in the harbour 
 joined their salvos. The troops were treated to a ban- 
 quet in the court of the College, and there, intermingled 
 with the soldiery and women of ill-fame, might be seen 
 the constitutional priests, themselves giving the worst 
 example by their intemperance and loose discourse. The 
 schismatic bishop was not ashamed himself to appear at 
 the board, and drink with them to the health of the 
 friends of the Revolution. A kind of procession was 
 then organized to make the circuit of the town, in the 
 course of which he affixed his ' pastoral ' to the doors of 
 the cathedral. The preamble contained a pompous 
 flourish about his vocation to the episcopate, but the 
 gist of this strange document was to announce the sup- 
 pression of seven parishes of Nantes, and to threaten 
 with the animadversion of the nation all who should 
 
Pastorals of Mgr. de La Laurancie. 99 
 
 venture to declare that they were not validly suppressed. 
 On the day previous to this miserable ceremony, several 
 young priests who had taken the oath, hearkening to the 
 voice of conscience, had made their retractation, and 
 Mine'e's first efforts were directed to alluring or intimi- 
 dating them into a return ; but in this he failed. 
 
 The installation of Le Masle at Vannes was very similar 
 to that of Mine'e at Nantes. It took place on May 22nd, 
 the fourth Sunday after Easter, amidst a concourse of 
 troops and National Guards, but in presence of a very 
 small proportion of the inhabitants ; for, out of a popula- 
 tion of ten thousand, not two hundred attended. Jacob 
 accomplished his intrusion at Saint-Brieuc on Whit- 
 Sunday, a perfect hurricane raging during the whole 
 proceedings. 
 
 The usurpation of his see by Mine'e drew forth a most 
 touching and energetic address from Mgr. de La Lau- 
 rancie to the clergy and faithful of his diocese. That 
 prelate, it will be remembered, had repaired to Paris 
 when threatened in his palace by the revolutionary mob 
 of Nantes, whither also he was followed by a denun- 
 ciation to the Assembly from the administrators of the 
 department. The accusation was most favourably re- 
 ceived, and, although no immediate step was taken 
 against his liberty, the bishop found that his prolonged 
 stay in Paris, exposed as he was to the ever-active 
 animosity of the Clubs, could be productive of no good 
 result. Accordingly he retired, while this was yet possible, 
 from the capital, and took refuge in Germany ; but the 
 sorrow he felt at his enforced exile brought him to the 
 very borders of the grave. From the place of his retreat 
 he then issued a pastoral, dated the 12th of May, 1791 
 in which he declared that the civil power had no authority 
 to dispossess him of his see ; that he was still Bishop of 
 Nantes ; and Minee, by the fact of his intrusion, a 
 
ioo Partisans of the schism. 
 
 schismatic and a usurper \ moreover, that every cure 
 deprived by the civil power, still continued to be the 
 true and only pastor of his parish, and that both the 
 suppression and the union of parishes were invalid. He 
 forbade all persons to recognize Minee's authority in any 
 way, or accept any office from him ; he withdrew the 
 faculties of those priests who had taken the oath, and 
 placed an interdict on his cathedral and upon all the 
 altars within its walls. The deep affliction manifested in 
 this document was only too well warranted by all that 
 was taking place in Brittany now that the schism was 
 installed ; nevertheless it was but the beginning of trou- 
 bles. 
 
 Had anything been needed to heighten the aversion 
 of the Bretons to the new Constitution, it might have 
 been found in the character of its partisans. Those 
 families which had been noted for inattention to their 
 religious duties almost invariably favoured the schism, 
 while avowed unbelievers and those whose lives were 
 morally disreputable — men who hitherto had never been 
 seen within the doors of a church — were now amongst 
 the most ardent supporters of the intruded pastors. 
 Everywhere the great mass of the population kept aloof 
 from them, and in the rural districts well-nigh the totality, 
 for the revolutionary and irreligious classes, amongst 
 whom alone the apostates could find adherents, were 
 almost exclusively confined to the towns. Those parishes 
 whose cures had taken the oath were naturally the most 
 exposed to perversion, but even in such places the 
 faithful always formed the large majority. In many of 
 the smaller towns the constitutional cures could not get 
 themselves installed, or, if they so far succeeded, they 
 found their position intolerable, because the people fled 
 from them as though they were plague-stricken, and they 
 had to officiate in empty churches. Sometimes the 
 
Behaviour of the people. 101 
 
 mayors were men who had kept their faith, and, where 
 this was the case, the intruders did not even meet with 
 official countenance. Thus at Vezin, in the diocese of 
 Rennes, the constitutional cure on arriving found no one 
 in the place ; all had absconded, the mayor and muni- 
 cipal officers included. At Noyal-sur-Vilaine, in the 
 same diocese, the church doors had been closed and 
 barred so effectually that the hireling pastor had to force 
 his way in through a window; a circumstance which 
 much impressed the parishioners, for their good rector 
 had told them that he who would come to take his place 
 would not enter by the door. 
 
 At Carfantain, in the diocese of Dol, M. Valette, the 
 rector, was about to celebrate Mass, when orders arrived 
 from the department of Ille-et-Vilaine not to allow him 
 to have the sacerdotal vestments, and almost at the same 
 moment the schismatical nominee made his appearance 
 in the sacristy and proceeded to vest himself. M. Valette, 
 leaving him there, ascended the pulpit and informed the 
 congregation of what had occurred, adding, ' I shall not 
 oppose by force the orders which the department has 
 issued j I exhort you also to bear with patience the 
 insult offered to your pastor ; but I hope that I shall be 
 allowed to say Mass elsewhere. Those who choose to 
 attend that of the intruded priest can remain here; I 
 shall go and say Mass for the others.' The whole con- 
 gregation immediately rose to a man and followed the 
 rector out of the church, so that the schismatic found 
 himself entirely deserted. The district authorities of Les- 
 neven, after naming constitutional priests for the parishes 
 composing it, despatched, on the 15th of May, a certain 
 Le Gall to Plouguerneau. It will be remembered that it 
 was here that the municipality had refused to put in 
 execution the decree of the National Assembly regarding 
 the imposition of the oath. When Le Gall made his 
 
102 
 
 Liberty of conscience 
 
 appearance, attended by some of the district officials and 
 members of the club at Lesneven. a general consternation 
 spread through the parish. It was Sunday, and the hour 
 for Mass was approaching, when the schismatic priest 
 left the inn where he had alighted, and proceeded to the 
 church. Preparations had been made for offering the 
 Adorable Sacrifice, but now the building was utterly 
 deserted, not so much as a single member of the muni- 
 cipality being visible within its walls — all were gone. 
 Le Gall, much disconcerted, left the church without 
 saying Mass, and the place also, with his whole com- 
 pany : but it was only to return later with six hundred 
 armed men and four pieces of ordnance, to take forcible 
 possession of his cure. Indeed, all these constitutional 
 priests were so well aware that the rural populations were 
 entirely opposed to them, that they seldom ventured to 
 go to be installed in country parishes without being 
 accompanied by a strong military escort. Nor were these 
 precautions superfluous : for, although the Bretons are 
 not an aggressive people, they are a sturdy race, as are 
 the Breton women also, of which, indeed, we have already 
 seen an example, and it was not without extreme irri- 
 tation that they endured the violence which was being 
 offered to their faith. 
 
 Never had there been so much talk about liberty as at 
 the beginning of the Revolution. The era of emancipa- 
 tion, it was said, had set in : Frenchmen had hitherto 
 been abject slaves, and it had needed nothing less than 
 the entire upsetting of the old order of things and sub- 
 stitution of the new to restore to them the enjoyment of 
 the most sacred rights of man. Among these sacred 
 rights, unlimited 1 liberty of conscience ' certainly held a 
 foremost place in the revolutionary creed, and it was 
 embodied in the famous Principles of r So, which were to 
 regenerate France. But now it had become plain that 
 
defiied to Catholics. 103 
 
 this vaunted liberty of conscience, while including every 
 conceivable variety of heterodox opinion and the wildest 
 forms of unbelief, admitted a notable exception in the 
 case of Catholics ; they alone were excluded from pro- 
 fiting by what was nevertheless represented, not as a 
 privilege, but as the inherent right of our common 
 humanity. From the very first, indeed, the pretended 
 patriots manifested a disposition to tyrannize over the 
 consciences of all who adhered to the true faith ; but the 
 hatred of Christianity, which animates the Revolution 
 and constitutes, as we may say, its dominant spirit, caused 
 its adherents in 1791, as it still causes them at the present 
 day, not only to act in open contradiction to their own 
 boasted principles, but to violate all the laws of natural 
 equity, and even to overlook the most obvious dictates 
 of political prudence. For regarded merely from a poli- 
 tical point of view, and apart from every moral and 
 religious consideration, the Assembly could not have 
 committed a graver fault than by setting itself in oppo- 
 sition to the religious convictions of the vast majority of 
 the French people by its Civil Constitution of the Clergy; 
 a fault which it enhanced by its obstinate determination 
 to extort from the priesthood an oath which their con- 
 sciences refused, and by persisting in imposing schis- 
 matical pastors on parishes which abhorred and rejected 
 them. The administrators of the districts, who had been 
 chosen for their revolutionary proclivities, seconded the 
 central authority with all their energy, although they 
 could not but be well aware that the men whom they 
 were compelling the people to accept as their pastors 
 were very commonly destitute of all religious principles, 
 or notorious for their immoral lives, often for a combi- 
 nation of both, their sole recommendation being that 
 they had accepted the oath. 
 
 The constitutional bishops and clergy understood and 
 
104 A Rogation procession. 
 
 practised the principles of liberty in a like fashion. Irri- 
 tated by the opposition which they encountered, they 
 did not scruple to adopt the most violent methods to 
 enforce submission and gain proselytes, willing or un- 
 willing. Expilly, Minee, and Le Coz particularly dis- 
 tinguished themselves by their animosity against all who 
 would not be partakers in their schism. Expilly, who 
 had been made a member of the council of the depart- 
 mental administration in Finisterre, was always calling 
 for severe measures against his former brethren. Le Coz 
 was more smooth-spoken ; he was one who talked a great 
 deal about charity, but it was a false and perfidious pro- 
 fession, for in his heart he hated the Catholics full as 
 much as did Expilly. As for Minee, he made no 
 attempt at disguise, and showed himself an open and 
 unrelenting persecutor from the moment of his instal- 
 lation. Not that he directly enjoined the acts of violence 
 perpetrated by his adherents, but he excited them thereto 
 by the determination he manifested to get himself recog- 
 nized as bishop, no matter by what means. When his 
 pretensions were denied, he would give vent to loud 
 complaints in the hearing of the unprincipled men who 
 formed his habitual retinue, and this was quite sufficient 
 to urge them on to deeds of cruelty and even bloodshed. 
 
 When Minee appeared for the first time in public after 
 his installation, at the Rogation processions, he was 
 bedizened with tricoloured ribbons and wore an enormous 
 national cockade in his cap. Thus ticketed and adver- 
 tised as a creature of the Revolution, he marched along 
 the streets, expecting to receive the homage commonly 
 rendered to the pastor of souls. Several persons con- 
 victed, or only suspected, of not having done him proper 
 obeisance, or of having laughed as he passed by — an 
 offence, it may be observed, which Minee's harlequin 
 attire was not unlikely to have provoked — were dragged 
 
Acts of violence. 
 
 ignominiously to prison, after being subjected to gross 
 ill-treatment. Amongst others, a young priest of Nantes 
 all but died of the blows he received from the soldiers 
 and other satellites of Mine'e, who burst like so many 
 demons into the house which he occupied, because some 
 one accused him of having looked out at a window with 
 an insulting air, with his hat on his head, when the pro- 
 cession was passing. Now, as the shutters of the house 
 had been kept closed, the misdemeanour, such as it was, 
 could not have occurred. The Wednesday procession 
 was signalized by some of those shameful scenes of which 
 the Revolution furnished such countless examples even 
 in these comparatively early days of its course. The 
 most absurd calumny was sufficient to infuriate a mob 
 whose violence the civil authorities took no measures to 
 restrain, because it was playing their game and doing 
 what they desired to see done. As the procession was 
 making its way along the Quai de la Fosse, and came in 
 front of the house of M. Montaudoin, a respectable mer- 
 chant and a friend of Mgr. de La Laurancie, a cry was 
 raised that the prelate had been seen on the balcony of 
 M. Montaudoin's house, disguised as a servant, some 
 said as a miller, insulting the procession as it advanced 
 along the Quai. Immediately a number of soldiers and 
 National Guards broke into the house with fixed bayonets, 
 burst open doors, shattered furniture, tore the tapestry 
 hangings to shreds, ripped up beds, penetrated into 
 M. Montaudoin's private study, threw his papers about, 
 and compelled him to open the chest in which he kept 
 his mercantile accounts, under the absurd pretext that 
 Mgr. de La Laurancie might be hidden in it. 
 
 But before the day closed it was to witness a still 
 more revolting scene. After the completion of the 
 exploit just described, the procession moved on to the 
 General Hospital, the chapel of which establishment 
 
io6 Barbarity to nuns. 
 
 had recently been transformed into a constitutional parish 
 chinch. It was served by an intruded priest named 
 Pimot, who under a bland exterior concealed a merciless 
 souL He now complained to Coustard, who was present 
 along with several other ardent 1 patriots,' that not one of 
 the thirty Sisters who had charge of the sick, and not one 
 of the children in the asylum, assisted at his Mass, and 
 that the Religious used all their efforts to prevent the 
 inmates from accepting the ministry of the pastor whom 
 the nation had provided for them. Hereupon it was 
 decided that the Sisters should be flogged, and the order 
 was executed on the spot, with such savage brutality 
 that one of them died in consequence the next day and 
 the life of another was seriously endangered. Although 
 the barbarous order did not emanate from Minee, yet he 
 was in the house when the matter was discussed, and a 
 word from him to Coustard would have prevented the 
 infamous sentence from being carried into effect, but 
 that word was not spoken, and he suffered his partisans 
 to do as they listed. 
 
 The Sisters at the General Hospital were not the 
 only Religious thus cruelly treated. The Sisters of 
 St Charles also were subjected to a similar outrage; 
 but the fury of Minee and his abettors was not yet 
 satiated. At no great distance from Nantes, at a place 
 known as Les Couets, was a celebrated Carmelite con- 
 vent which had been founded by Francoise dAmboise, 
 Duchess of Brittany. Minee visited it soon after his 
 arrival ; the persecution of women seeming to have been 
 his particular vocation. Presenting himself at the con- 
 vent grate, he asked for the prioress, and announced 
 himself to her as the bishop of the diocese. She replied 
 that Mgr. de La Laurancie was not dead, nor had he 
 resigned. Then Minee delivered himself of a long 
 harangue, in which he laboured to prove that he was 
 
Barbarity to nuns. 107 
 
 the legitimate pastor, but when he found that his argu- 
 ments made no impression, he broke off with this ques- 
 tion : ' You are resolved, then, Madam, not to recognize 
 me as your bishop ? ' ' Yes, Sir, quite resolved,' was 
 the firm reply. 'You will repent it,' added the false 
 pastor, as he retired. A few days afterwards a band 
 of National Guards, accompanied by a crowd of women 
 of the very lowest class, with whom some even of a 
 superior rank had not been ashamed to associate them- 
 selves, appeared before the convent. In a moment the 
 walls were scaled and the door broken open. The nuns 
 were saying office in the choir, not did they cease for 
 the hubbub which reached their ears, but continued 
 their sacred psalmody. All intervening barriers were 
 soon overcome, and the mixed mob of soldiery and 
 populace rushed in, and, laying hands on these con- 
 secrated virgins of the Lord, dragged them violently 
 from the choir, the women whose station entitled them 
 to be called ladies showing themselves even more desti- 
 tute of humanity than the rest • but where revolutionary 
 fanaticism got possession of the women's hearts in those 
 terrible days they were in every way worse than the men. 
 After suffering the most outrageous treatment, the poor 
 nuns were ejected from their convent and driven like a 
 herd of cattle to Nantes. Even the sick were torn from 
 their beds, and, being hurried off half-dressed, had to 
 walk barefooted along the rough road, so that their path 
 might be traced by the marks of blood which they left 
 on the way. They were all shut up in the Castle of 
 Nantes, where, however, they did not remain long, as 
 their families hastened to reclaim them. 
 
 The intruded priests imitated their leaders, and ex- 
 hibited the same ferocious intolerance. All means 
 seemed good to them by which they could constrain 
 the people to communicate with them, even to forcing 
 
io8 Cruel treatment of women. 
 
 the Blessed Eucharist into the mouths of sick persons 
 who had refused their ministrations. Their first act on 
 arriving invariably was to declaim against the true pastors 
 of the Church and all who adhered to them. The 
 language employed might be more or less violent, but 
 what it lacked in violence was sure to be supplied in 
 mendacity, directed equally to the purpose of exciting 
 animosity against the faithful clergy and people and 
 bewildering or intimidating the faint-hearted and irre- 
 solute. Indeed, it seemed as though nothing were too 
 vile or outrageous to be said or done against the 
 Catholics. In some places they were led through 
 the streets seated backwards on an ass and holding 
 the animal's tail in their hand. This was the way in 
 which the constitutional Cure of Verton, whose sixty 
 years had not taught him common decency or humanity, 
 punished his parishioners when they refused to hear his 
 Mass, not being ashamed himself to lend a hand, and 
 in fact, as some semblance of justice was still observed 
 in the civil courts, he was mulcted in considerable 
 damages for grievous injuries inflicted on a woman who 
 endeavoured" to resist being so ignominiously treated. 
 At Nort similar violence was offered to a woman, and 
 her condition was such that she died a few days after- 
 wards in consequence of the ill usage she had received ; 
 but in this case the instigator of the outrage contrived 
 to escape the punishment he merited. Nor were these 
 singular and exceptional cases, others might be recorded, 
 and many, doubtless, have passed into oblivion with the 
 names of the victims. 
 
 But even where the constitutional priests did not 
 proceed to these brutal excesses, they failed not to 
 bring misery and disorder into the parishes where they 
 established themselves, by their unscrupulous efforts to 
 compel the people to assist at their ministrations. Division 
 
Misery in families. 109 
 
 was thus excited in households, relatives and friends 
 were estranged from each other, and domestics, after 
 years of faithful service, turned adrift on the world. 
 Sometimes the father of a family, influenced by human 
 prudence, would conform, and wish to constrain his 
 children to do the like, who, to save their consciences, 
 were forced to abandon the paternal roof. Workmen 
 and labourers lost their employments, the schismatic 
 priest being often himself the first to denounce them, 
 and thus procure their dismissal where the master lacked 
 the Christian courage to resist. But it was the wives 
 and children of the so-called patriots who were the 
 greatest and the most frequent sufferers. In many cases 
 these had remained faithful to their religion, and they 
 became in consequence the special objects of invective 
 on the part of 'the false pastors, who would declare 
 publicly from their pulpits that the most rigorous measures 
 ought to be applied to force the rebellious to 'make 
 their salvation' — -faire leur salut, as the French have it; a 
 doctrine which they would not have found language 
 sufficiently strong to reprobate had it been propounded 
 by a true Catholic. Many a hitherto peaceful home 
 was thus made desolate, and the Abbe Tresvaux, who 
 had personal knowledge of what took place in Brittany 
 in those times, says that there were women and children 
 who literally drooped and pined away from finding them- 
 selves suddenly deprived of the love of husband or of 
 father. ' Patriotism/ as understood by the men whom 
 the Revolution had perverted, seemed to wither up all 
 common sentiments of humanity and even of natural 
 affection when it became a question of resisting the law, 
 in other words, the expressed will of the sovereign nation. 
 The nation by its representatives had willed the new 
 Constitutional Church ; to reject that Church was there- 
 fore treason against the nation, and these bigots of the 
 
no An unnatural father. 
 
 new idolatry only too faithfully followed the doctrines 
 promulgated from the pulpit. 
 
 The following may be cited as an instance. At 
 Pontivy dwelt a surgeon, a widower, with three young 
 daughters. The Abbe Tresvaux, who is our authority 
 for this story, knew the man well ; he had warmly 
 embraced the cause of the Revolution, but could not 
 induce his children to agree with him, who, encouraged 
 in their steadfastness by a devout servant, clung firmly 
 to their faith. Matters were in this state, and would 
 probably have proceeded no further, when the schismatic 
 priest took possession of the church. Then, at this 
 unhappy man's dictation, the father, who personally was 
 indifferent to religion, insisted on his daughters going 
 to Mass, and on their still refusing, being obstinately 
 determined to break their resolution, shut them up in 
 a loft over his barn, giving them for food only bread 
 and water, and for beds a shake-down of straw. At the 
 end of a fortnight, however, means were devised for then- 
 escape, and the Catholics of the place, who had admired 
 the constancy of these young girls, joined together to 
 assist them in earning an independent living. This 
 anecdote may give some idea of what the faithful were 
 already called to endure, while as yet liberty of worship 
 for all, Catholics included, was recognized by the State. 
 
 But family division, with all its bitter consequences, 
 was not the only result of the baneful influence exerted 
 by the schismatic cures. The true pastors, driven from 
 the churches, could celebrate the august mysteries only 
 in isolated places or in chapels attached to the chateaux 
 of the gentry. The people came in crowds, and Mass 
 was said with closed doors. But their enemies were 
 ever on the watch, and oftentimes a band of National 
 Guards, who were continually scouring the country, 
 would burst in upon them before warning could be 
 
Outrages on Catholics. 
 
 1 1 1 
 
 given of their approach, and, firing upon such as 
 attempted to escape, would drag all they seized to 
 prison. Thus many were killed or maimed, the chapels 
 were plundered, and their owners shamefully maltreated. 
 Not unfrequently these raids were headed by the intruded 
 priest in person. Such acts of violence, however, were 
 done in contravention of the existing laws, and accor- 
 dingly the directories resolved to adopt what they were 
 pleased to style preventive measures — measures the pro- 
 fessed object of which was to repress disorder, but which 
 were to consist, as we shall shortly see, not in punishing 
 the perpetrators of the outrages, but in restricting the 
 liberties of the legitimate pastors, on whom was laid the 
 blame of all that had occurred. 
 
CHAPTER VTIL 
 
 Decrees agamsttke Ckrgj. Tie persecution legalized. 
 
 - - .-i .:' the sim^e • : had 
 
 :: . i - r - ?irf.t;--:r. tit oltrry be 
 . t tT Z - :: . i ' i - : - - 2 r - : - ; - trest-t iivrev- the 
 
 dad noit enable t&e schismatics to bring any penal 
 n»H linwi to bear upon tfaem ; al tneyconlddo Vas to 
 t"t~ ~ — -7 t-'iiav;,^rg :: -~-,t. their 
 
 -''-'-^ £ - rtend *e cansanr:^: "iCzs. i_ : the 
 ^' :;5 ' 1: '" > - 1 -- - ------ - hatred. = hatred 
 
 *^ -- :t - 5 --- -T - ; tial eremAcrt ti. -- ■ 
 
 ~y ~ ^---•:---ilt : hftt.it to tieh assumption of 
 parochial aiBthcritj m tbe altarhrnent of the people to 
 ~" - : '- ; ; :rf - -~- i- from the presbyteries Trithorrt 
 = ~ v" 5 "' 1 * : ----- is to remove their personal 
 
 7^ _ enra* »s ne base seen, did not abandon 
 mar sacral change, On the contrary, they conrinned to 
 ~^~ z ~' rr ~-'- r ~- ts.trz.:z£ to rnamtain their 
 
 -'*-.-"" 7 ^ £ • This nas an mtolertile oreoce 
 n me eyes of the u i lmritrs , nfckh, indeed, they were not 
 
 " ~* " ~~~ ~~ Z ~ ' ' r tmsmtg "*itt 1 St— I 'jLZ. Ot of 
 
 elite; of the 
 q vhich they 
 Holy Jather. 
 rti-: ot the 
 
The Bishops and the Pope. 113 
 
 timidity or had been surprised into an acquiescence which 
 their maturer judgment condemned. The desertion of 
 such men was a severe blow to the schism, for they may 
 be said to have formed its sole respectable members. 
 The bishops sitting in the Assembly had, on the 3rd of 
 May, addressed a reply to the Sovereign Pontiff, in which 
 they declared themselves ready for all sacrifices ; they 
 did not desire to trouble the civil order, they had used 
 all their endeavours to induce the Assembly to have the 
 projected changes invested with canonical forms, but 
 all their overtures had been rejected, and they had 
 met with nothing but insult and injustice. However, 
 they begged the Holy Father not to give a thought 
 to them, but to consult only the interests of the Church. 
 Accordingly, they laid their resignations at his feet, 
 in order that without hindrance he might adopt the 
 measures best calculated to ensure peace. This letter 
 was subscribed by all the other bishops, and afforded the 
 most evident proof of the disinterestedness and modera- 
 tion of the men who were daily branded as fanatics and 
 conspirators. Yet this very document was made an 
 item in the list of accusations brought against them ; nay, 
 it was denounced as the climax of their offences. 
 Pius VI. did not accept their resignation. He knew 
 well that such a measure would in no way conduce 
 to the restoration of peace, and would only be a source 
 of triumph to the revolutionists, who sought, not a mere 
 change in some points of discipline, but the destruction 
 of the Church and that of Christianity itself. When the 
 Pope's Briefs had become publicly known, as well as the 
 pastorals of the bishops, all Paris was in a ferment, and on 
 the next day, the 4th of May, an effigy of the Holy Father 
 was borne to the Palais Royal, where a mock trial was 
 held, in which the ' criminal intentions ' of Joseph-Ange 
 Braschi, as the Vicar of Christ was styled, having been 
 1 25 
 
ii4 The Jacobin Chib. 
 
 certified, the effigy was condemned to be bumed and its 
 ashes scattered to the winds. The sentence was executed 
 accordingly, and the figure of the Pope, with his Brief 
 in his hand, was consumed amid the deafening shouts of 
 the mob. After this scene at the Palais Royal, the 
 position of the bishops and clergy became more insup- 
 portable than ever. Such of the prelates as had not 
 already retired were speedily driven from their dioceses, 
 either by formal orders emanating from the authorities 
 or by the outrages of the rabble. A like treatment befell 
 the faithful priests throughout France, who were com- 
 pelled either to fly or to hide themselves, and celebrate 
 the sacred mysteries in secret 
 
 At the period which we have now reached all the ties 
 which bind together the political and social fabric had 
 been virtually dissolved, the National Assembly which 
 had wrested the sovereign authority from the hands 
 of the King, was every day, in its turn, becoming more 
 powerless, while the Jacobin Club was proportionately 
 gathering strength and usurping its place; it was there 
 that the decrees pending before the Assembly were 
 discussed, it was thence that orders were issued to that 
 body, and the club could at a moment's notice summon 
 its army, the mob, to enforce them. The provinces 
 were more or less in the same condition ; for the muni- 
 cipalities, which were generally composed of revolu- 
 tionists, constituted so many centres of authority, which 
 interpreted the law at their pleasure ; when they did 
 not go fast or far enough, the sovereign people, led by 
 some demagogue, would take the matter into its own 
 hands. France, in fact, was in a direful state of anarchy. 
 The aristocracy were flying the country, and emigration 
 was becoming general ; but the clergy kept their posts as 
 long as it was possible for them to remain. The 
 Assembly, indeed, had at last passed some important 
 
Decrees against the clergy. 115 
 
 decrees, with the alleged object of obviating for the 
 future such disorders as had disgraced Paris during the 
 Easter of that year whenever the Catholics had attempted 
 to fulfil their religious duties. 1 They were to be per- 
 mitted to hire buildings in which they could celebrate 
 their own worship; but this permission was hampered 
 with conditions which rendered the pretended boon 
 illusory. For instance, it was enacted that these buildings 
 should be closed if anything were said in them which 
 was opposed to the Constitution, and in particular to the 
 Civil Constitution of the Clergy. The preacher was 
 also liable to prosecution before the tribunals as a 
 disturber of the public peace. Anyhow, the law remained 
 a dead letter, for, as we have said, it was the Jacobin 
 Club, and not the Assembly which ruled, and it took 
 care that Catholics should find it impossible to avail 
 themselves of the liberty which was nominally ceded 
 to them. Under the pressure of this new power, which it 
 had itself fostered and encouraged for its own purposes, 
 but which had now completely outgrown its control, the 
 Assembly continued its evil course, and, on the 19th of 
 June, passed a decree which ordered the public accusers 
 (jprocurenrs du roi, as they were called), under pain 
 
 1 It is only fair to Talleyrand to mention that he exerted himself 
 successfully at this time to obtain a fresh recognition by the Assembly 
 of that liberty of worship which was already laid down in the Consti- 
 tution as one of the ' rights of man.' He also succeeded in obtaining 
 an enactment that no non-juring priest could be hindered from saying 
 Mass in any church whatever. Talleyrand's penetration and natural 
 sagacity had by this time enabled him to judge what were the prospects 
 of the Constitutional Church. He saw its hollowness and its absurdity, 
 and, well persuaded that its warm supporters would soon turn against 
 it and upset it, he, like the rat who leaves the falling house, resigned 
 his bishopric and returned to civil life. The AbM Goutter joyfully 
 accepted the reversion, an act which he had reason to repent. For, 
 three years later, he was arrested as a royalist and confined in the 
 Conciergerie, without being allowed time even to take away his clothes. 
 Sentenced to death by the Revolutionary Tribunal, he was executed on 
 March 26, 1794. 
 
n6 
 
 Persecuting measures. 
 
 of deprivation, to pursue as disturbers of the peace all 
 those ecclesiastics- who, after they had been displaced 
 and their successors installed, or even after due notifica- 
 tion received of their appointment, should continue to 
 discharge any parochial functions. 
 
 To what straits this law reduced the clergy may be 
 readily conceived, bound, as they were, by a sacred duty 
 to discharge these functions in behalf of their parishioners 
 when needed ; as, for instance, to celebrate their mar- 
 riages, which would otherwise have been invalid in 
 the eye of the Church ; yet by so doing they at once 
 exposed themselves to prosecution by the civil power, 
 whose agents eagerly seized every opportunity of harass- 
 ing the recusants. The decree was accordingly carried 
 out with rigour, and the faithful priests were continually 
 arrested and taken before the tribunals. Many about 
 this time betook themselves to a voluntary exile, and 
 amongst them some of the Breton clergy, reserving them- 
 selves, as they hoped, for better days. But we have 
 already seen that active persecution had not awaited this 
 decree of the Assembly. Thus, previous to the 19th of 
 June, the Directory of Ille-et-Vilaine had taken upon itself 
 to order all non-juring priests to remove to four leagues' 
 distance from their parishes as soon as the constitutional 
 cure arrived. That of Finisterre, not satisfied with this 
 measure of restriction, had assigned to them a place 
 of compulsory residence, after the fashion of Italian and 
 German Liberalism at the present day. This was as early 
 as the 21st of April, and on the 1st of June it confirmed 
 the decision of the municipality of Brest, which took upon 
 itself to imprison seventy priests in the Carmelite convent 
 of that town. The Directories of Morbihan and the 
 Loire Inferieure soon followed the example thus set them ; 
 but the Directory of the Cotes-du-Nord surpassed the 
 rest in fanaticism. On the 19th of June, it banished all 
 
Persecuting measures. 117 
 
 priests to a distance of six leagues from their parishes as 
 soon as the constitutional cure should make his appear- 
 ance, and wherever they were located they were to be 
 subjected to the close supervision of the municipality, 
 which could remove them to a still greater distance if it 
 pleased. Every priest who administered a sacrament 
 was made liable to six years' imprisonment, and the 
 recipient to six months, while those who circulated the 
 Pope's briefs or the Bishops' pastorals were threatened 
 with like penalties. In this last provision, the Directory 
 had the authority of the Assembly; in all the rest it 
 had acted in flagrant opposition to the decrees of that 
 body, which at the time allowed the non-juring priests 
 to say Mass in any church, even though it had been 
 dedicated to the official worship. No risk, however, 
 was incurred in dealing thus with recusant priests, and, 
 in fact, on the very day on which the Directory pro- 
 mulgated this decree, the Assembly was passing a law 
 which, as we have seen, would invest it with the fullest 
 sanction. Many of those who had lent themselves 
 to these tyrannical measures were by no means men 
 of extreme opinions, and, taken individually, would have 
 been inclined to use their powers with moderation ; but 
 they were urged on by the more violent spirits. One of 
 the chief instigators in this work of persecution was the 
 club of Saint-Brieuc, composed of fanatical ' patriots ' 
 and of men who were entirely under their control, and 
 stimulated to action by a constitutional priest con- 
 spicuous for his revolutionary principles and the absence 
 of any other, whether moral or religious. 
 
 It will be remembered that the oath was at first 
 imposed only on bishops, vicars-general, superiors of semi- 
 naries and the professors, on the principals of colleges, 
 and the parochial clergy; but on the 15th of April, 
 1 79 1, a new decree required the oath to be administered 
 
1 1 8 Hospital of the Incurables. 
 
 to all priests indiscriminately who were charged with the 
 office of public instruction, and to all professors, even 
 laymen, as well as to the chaplains of hospitals and 
 prisons. This last measure was a most disastrous blow 
 to the Church of France, and may be said to have com- 
 pleted its disorganization. Hopes might have been 
 entertained that the utility of the services rendered 
 by ecclesiastics who devoted themselves to the education 
 of the lower classes, and to ministering in hospitals and 
 prisons, might have obtained for them the privilege 
 of being overlooked, the highest favour which could 
 then be hoped for. But the Assembly recoiled from no 
 act, however oppressive in its character or cruel in 
 its effects, which might serve to destroy the influence 
 of the Church, and deliver over to that abstraction 
 called ' the nation ' all authority, whether civil or reli- 
 gious. Persecution henceforward spared neither the 
 homes of the indigent nor the asylums of the sick 
 and suffering. Many of these poor people generously 
 confessed the faith by refusing to communicate with the 
 schismatical priests. This was enough to bring down 
 upon them the vengeance of the civil power, and cause 
 their expulsion from the asylums which Christian charity 
 had opened to them. The poor in the Hospital of the 
 Incurables at Rennes especially distinguished themselves 
 by their firmness. This was the more admirable in their 
 case, because the head chaplain of the General Hospital, 
 of which that of the Incurables was a dependency, had 
 taken the oath, and was anxious to draw them into 
 the schism. Encouraged by two faithful priests, these 
 poor creatures held out boldly for the faith, and neither 
 entreaties nor menaces could move them. It was 
 thought that possibly the constitutional bishop might be 
 able to overcome their resolution. Le Coz was accord- 
 ingly induced by one of his vicaires, the Abbe' Lanjuinais, 
 
The Madeleine at Nantes. 1 1 9 
 
 an ardent revolutionist, to pay a visit to the hospital. 
 He first presented himself to the Sisters who tended 
 the sick, and Lanjuinais, who accompanied his chief, 
 exhorted them to do him honour as their pastor ; but, 
 far from complying, the Superioress, Mdlle. Dubreil, 
 answered that she recognized in Monsieur the principal 
 of the College of Quimper, because he had occupied that 
 post prior to his intrusion into the see of Rennes, and 
 so long as the visit lasted she persevered in addressing 
 Le Coz only by the title of ' Monsieur le Principal.' 
 Le Coz then passed on to the wards, where he found 
 only those whose infirmities rendered them unable to 
 move from their beds ; the rest had absconded or had 
 hid themselves in garrets and out-of-the-way corners. 
 Amongst the sick there was one poor creature who 
 was suffering acute pain. The intruder, at Lanjuinais' 
 suggestion, drew near to give him his blessing, but 
 the man, rallying all his strength, sat up in his bed, 
 and energetically told Le Coz that he wanted none 
 of his maledictions. The false pastor, baffled, had to 
 withdraw, but punishment was not slow to follow. The 
 municipality of Rennes ordered the chapel of the hospital 
 to be closed, and, at eleven o'clock that night, the head 
 chaplain of the General Hospital came, accompanied 
 by four soldiers, to remove the Blessed Sacrament, and 
 set a seal on the tabernacle. 
 
 The communities of women throughout Brittany 
 displayed a courage equal to that of the Sisters who had 
 nursed the Incurables. There were very few defections 
 from amongst them, and their houses up to the time 
 of their suppression were subjected to vexations of the 
 most harassing description. Their inclosure was no 
 longer respected, and, under the pretext of searching for 
 concealed priests, bands of armed men were continually 
 making forcible entrance, to the consternation of the 
 
120 /// repute of the schismatics. 
 
 Religious, who were at the same time plied with every 
 conceivable argument to persuade or compel them to 
 conform. None were put to a severer trial than the 
 inmates of the Madeleine at Nantes. This convent 
 offered an asylum to penitent women, who desired to 
 repair the errors of their past life, and the civil 
 authorities disgraced themselves so far as to endeavour 
 to induce these women to become the accusers of the 
 nuns who directed them, calumniating these ladies most 
 vilely in presence of their charges ; nay, more, there 
 were members of the administration who actually advised 
 some of these poor women to return to their former evil 
 courses, promising them protection; but, to the confusion 
 of these tempters, out of a hundred penitents not one 
 was found who had the meanness to say a word against 
 their superiors, or who would hearken to the proposals 
 made to them. Then Minee used his endeavours to 
 persuade the community, or the penitents at least, to 
 acknowledge his jurisdiction, but his delegates met with 
 as little success as had the civil authorities. All declared 
 that they would live and die in communion with 
 Mgr. de La Laurancie ; first of all, because they regarded 
 him as their legitimate pastor, and next, because, as long 
 as it was in his power, he had always been to them a 
 generous benefactor. The constancy of their penitents 
 drew down various persecutions on the nuns, but for 
 the present no violent measure was employed against 
 them. 
 
 Notwithstanding all the exertions of the authorities, 
 and their unscrupulous use of the power they possessed, 
 the Constitutional Church was establishing itself very 
 slowly and laboriously in Brittany. There were not 
 enough schismatic priests to fill all the cures, and accord- 
 ingly in many of the parishes, during the greater part 
 of the year 1791, the true pastors were still able to 
 
Their scandalous lives. 121 
 
 exercise their ministry with tolerable freedom. Yet the 
 intruded bishops, who were as active as the civil 
 authorities in beating about for recruits, were by no 
 means nice or hard to satisfy in the matter of qualifica- 
 tions ; indeed, they were ready to accept all who pre- 
 sented themselves ; priests who had been suspended for 
 some grave fault, or whose notorious ignorance and 
 incapacity had hitherto excluded them from the sanc- 
 tuary j religious who had broken their vows and become 
 the scandal of their Order, all were welcome to the 
 constitutional net. These hirelings soon showed them- 
 selves in their proper colours, giving themselves up to 
 intemperance or licentiousness, sometimes to both 
 conjoined. Their own partisans — such, at least, as 
 retained a remnant of moral sense — were ashamed of 
 them. ' These jurors, it must be owned, are a sorry 
 lot,' exclaimed a municipal officer of Nantes one day 
 in a large assembly. ' If they could only have played 
 the hypocrite for a single year, people would have 
 attended their Mass, and the Constitution would have 
 gone on swimmingly. How is it the good sort of 
 people do not take the oath?' So strong, indeed, was 
 the persuasion that all ecclesiastics of doubtful reputa- 
 tion would conform, that the authorities were unfeignedly 
 astonished when they met with a refusal from a bad 
 priest. An ecclesiastic of the diocese of Rennes, 
 notorious for his irregular life, was summoned by the 
 municipality to take the oath. He declined, and, per- 
 ceiving a look of surprise in the countenances of the 
 officials, he said, ' I see very well what is passing in 
 your minds, but let me tell you that, bad as I am, I 
 have not lost my faith, and that is why I cannot take 
 the oath.' 
 
 Not only, however, did the greater part of the con- 
 stitutional clergy lead scandalous lives, many of them 
 
122 
 
 Pulpit invectives. 
 
 entertained the wildest political opinions. The ancien 
 regime was the object of their bitterest invectives, 
 because they conceived that it was owing to its tyranny 
 that they had been left in the obscurity which, indeed, 
 they justly deserved. From their pulpits they were ever 
 declaiming, not against abuses, for these had all been 
 swept away along with much that was both valuable 
 and venerable, but against those good institutions which 
 still remained and which the Revolution was labouring 
 to destroy, as well as against all that was most eminent in 
 the clerical body. At Nantes, the sermons of Minee, 
 who had a glib tongue, were made up of a vapid 
 eulogy of the Constitution and its founders, laudation of 
 his partisans and colleagues, and not a little of himself, 
 together with fierce denunciations of the Catholic clergy, 
 especially of the bishop, Mgr. de La Laurencie, against 
 whom he never wearied of repeating the foul slanders 
 which schismatical malice had invented. Nor was it only 
 from the pulpit that the intruders inveighed against the 
 faithful clergy. They were not ashamed to appear also 
 at the clubs, where the demagogues habitually indulged 
 in language of the most ribald description. Thus it 
 may be truly affirmed that the greater part of the vexa- 
 tions and persecutions which the Catholics had to 
 endure in 1791 was provoked by the constitutional 
 clergy with the hope of weakening the influence of the 
 legitimate pastors. But in this expectation they were 
 disappointed, for their injustice to these innocent and 
 virtuous men, their own disreputable conduct, their con- 
 tempt of the most sacred rules of ecclesiastical discipline, 
 which they carried so far as often to be seen eating 
 and drinking before going up to the altar — all, in a 
 word, combined to disgust and repel the true children 
 of the Church ; and as for those who were ranked 
 among its adversaries, although for the present they 
 
The flight to Varennes. 123 
 
 supported the schism as furthering their ulterior pur- 
 poses, the disgraceful behaviour of their confederates, men 
 who after all called themselves Christians, and who had 
 received the sacerdotal unction, only served to desecrate 
 still more and degrade in their eyes the religion they 
 had themselves renounced, and were banded together 
 to destroy. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 Imprisonment of priests. Sufferings of clergy and 
 laity. 
 
 It was at this time that a great event came to absorb 
 the whole attention of the public mind. Louis XVI., 
 a virtual prisoner in his palace, deprived of all authority 
 and forced to witness horrors which he was powerless 
 to prevent, fled secretly from the Tuileries with his family 
 on the night of the 20th of June, intending to take refuge 
 in Montme'dy, a strong fortress of Lorraine, but, from a 
 concurrence of unfortunate circumstances which seemed 
 to follow this unhappy monarch in every step of his 
 life, he was recognized, arrested at Varennes, and brought 
 back to Paris. The priests at that time were held 
 accountable for everything which went amiss. Of course, 
 therefore, they had plotted and brought about this 
 attempted escape of the King : such was the cry raised 
 in Brittany and throughout the provinces generally. 
 ' The Breton " patriots " pretended,' says a contemporary 
 writer, ' that the whole Catholic clergy were accomplices 
 in this project, which was to upset the Constitution, 
 and they found means to get the charge at once believed, 
 absurd as it was, by numbers of persons of all classes.' 
 No sooner did the news reach Nantes than the priests 
 
124 Priests arrested and maltreated. 
 
 became the objects of a violent persecution. Their 
 houses were searched under the pretext of ascertaining 
 if they contained concealed arms, inflammatory docu- 
 ments, or secret correspondence with the enemies of the 
 State. At the same time they were themselves assailed 
 with menaces and insults and held up to popular exe- 
 cration in songs, as scurrilous as they were profane, 
 which were bawled about the streets. But these things 
 were but an indication of what was quickly to follow. 
 Bands of National Guards, reinforced sometimes by troops 
 of the line, proceeded to hunt out the priests, both in 
 town and country. The arrests were generally made in 
 the night, and those whom they could seize were dragged 
 ignominiously to prison. This operation was performed 
 almost simultaneously throughout the diocese, the depart- 
 mental authorities issuing orders that all priests when 
 arrested should be transferred to Nantes. 
 
 These confessors had much to suffer on the way. 
 To excite the populace against them, they had been 
 everywhere denounced as traitors to their country, and 
 at all the towns and villages along the road mobs were 
 collected, who no sooner descried the cortege approaching 
 than they began vehemently shouting, 'A la lanterne! 
 alalanterne! — Death to aristocrats and traitors!' The 
 guards also, among whom often were bad men from 
 their own parishes, spared them neither humiliations 
 nor ill-usage. Many were forced to make the whole 
 journey on foot, notwithstanding their advanced age 
 and infirmities ; others were mounted, only the better 
 to render them objects of derision. Thus two priests 
 would be set back to back upon an ass, and exposed 
 in this situation to the brutal merriment of the rabble. 
 In some cases their hair was torn from their heads, 
 and they were otherwise cruelly maltreated. As the 
 parties severally arrived in Nantes from all directions, 
 
Their condition in prison. 125 
 
 the captives were taken, amidst the insulting shouts of 
 the populace, to the seminary, which was turned into 
 a prison, and were placed under the supervision of an 
 apostate Carmelite whom the schismatics had appointed 
 as superior. Sentinels were then posted at the doors 
 and even in the dormitories. 
 
 When the prisoners saw themselves all assembled 
 together, one of them, raising his voice, said to his 
 brethren, ' See, we have all entered the lists ; let not 
 one of us lose his crown ; ' and all, in fact, proved 
 steadfast under trial. Notwithstanding the efforts made 
 by the pretended superior to shake the constancy of 
 some among the younger priests, he did not succeed 
 in making a single pervert ; indeed, they would not so 
 much as listen to him. The wretched man then endea- 
 voured to render the condition of his prisoners as 
 intolerable as possible, and, dreading the effect which 
 their example might have on some five or six students 
 (so to call them), youths deficient alike in talents and 
 morality, but who formed the whole hope of the infant 
 Church, he preferred the most abominable charges 
 against them, in consequence of which they were trans- 
 ferred, some to the prison of Bouffay, where they were 
 associated with common felons, and the rest to the 
 Castle. Their removal, too, was effected in the most 
 inhuman manner, priests who were in the height of 
 fever being dragged from their beds at the risk of their 
 lives. Those who were confined in the Castle were for 
 the most part crowded together in a garret, which, from 
 its situation, was infected with a fetid odour, while 
 during the day it was exposed to the full blaze of the 
 sun and during the night to all the vicissitudes of the 
 weather, for it would seem that the windows were not 
 even glazed. The historian of the Breton persecution 
 makes mention, in particular, of two worthy priests, both 
 
126 
 
 Priest-hunters. 
 
 seventy years of age, MM. de La Marre and Le Roux, 
 who were consigned to this vile prison after having been 
 led through the town on a holiday, when the streets 
 were thronged with a low rabble which vociferously 
 clamoured for their heads. Thither also was conducted 
 M. Herbet, the Vicaire of Paimbceuf, on an ass, bound 
 back to back with M. Be'cavin, a young subdeacon, 
 who was to perish in the massacre at the Carmes in 
 the September of the following year. M. Herbet was 
 at first cast into a dungeon full of filth and vermin, 
 where he was left without food for twenty-four hours, 
 and, strange to say, it was his own uncle to whom he 
 was indebted for this treatment. Two other rectors, 
 those of Bouvron and La Trinite'-de-Machecoul, had to 
 suffer much ill-usage ; the first, M. Delamare, nearly 
 dying from its effects. M. Muaud, a missionary priest, 
 having been detected under the disguise of a gardener, 
 was seized and subjected, during a journey of many 
 miles, to continued insults and blows. He was then 
 thrown into the common prison. Touched with the sad 
 lot, spiritual as well as temporal, of his fellow-captives, 
 the good man began to instruct the criminals, teaching 
 them how to pray, and exhorting them to patience and 
 repentance ; but this was a work so hateful in the eyes 
 of the schismatics, that M. Muaud was removed to a 
 solitary cell where he could hold communication with 
 no one. 
 
 It is not possible to ascertain the exact number of the 
 priests incarcerated in the prisons of Nantes at that 
 time, but it must have been considerable, for most dili- 
 gent search had been made to discover the retreats of 
 all who had concealed themselves about the country ; the 
 usurpers of their cures were also forward in the work 
 of priest-hunting, and it was to their presbyteries that 
 the National Guards used to repair, in the first instance, 
 
Priests imprisoned at Brest. 127 
 
 to obtain the information they needed. The schismatic 
 incumbent would often put himself at their head, and 
 the effect of his presence was rather to increase than 
 to moderate the violence of these men, especially in the 
 houses of those good people whom he knew to be averse 
 to his ministrations. 
 
 The department of Finisterre rivalled, nay, exceeded, 
 that of Nantes in ferocity. It will be remembered that, 
 even previous to the passing of the law of the 19th of June, 
 they had imprisoned many priests in the Carmelite con- 
 vent at Brest. Not a few of these arrests were attended 
 with revolting acts of barbarity. Confinement in such 
 a city as Brest was in itself a cruelty and a peril to the 
 ecclesiastics, for it contained a very corrupt and disor- 
 derly population, which had been rendered peculiarly 
 mischievous by a diligent revolutionary propaganda. 
 This rude and ignorant rabble were ready to lay mur- 
 derous hands on any one denounced as being hostile 
 to the Revolution, and such all the priests brought into 
 Brest were represented to be. No effort was made by 
 their escort to shield them from menace and insult ; on 
 the contrary, they were ostentatiously paraded through 
 the town, the mob pursuing them to the very doors of 
 the prison with yells and clamours for their immediate 
 execution, intermingled with that song of ill omen, the 
 'Marseillaise,' and the terrible ' Ah fa ira,' the herald 
 of death to so many victims of revolutionary fury. The 
 Pere Elisee, Superior of the Discalced Carmelites, a man 
 remarkable for his piety and virtues, and even for the 
 services he had rendered to the town of Brest, narrowly 
 escaped being massacred, along with two other eccle- 
 siastics, on his way to prison. M. Squazen, Cure of 
 Saint-Pierre-Quilbignan, a neighbouring parish, was on 
 the very point of being hanged by the sovereign people. 
 They had seized him, and were already drawing down 
 
128 A courageous printer. 
 
 the lantern, to pass the cord round his neck, when his 
 guards succeeded with some difficulty in rescuing him 
 from their hands and getting him into the Carmelite 
 convent. The names of other priests are recorded whose 
 lives were imperilled on this occasion. In the month 
 of July there were no less than seventy confessors 
 huddled together in this one house in Brest ; they were 
 guarded by armed men, who dogged their steps wherever 
 they went, following them into the chapel and into their 
 very rooms, so that they were never alone ; while the 
 populace, excited to madness by the false accusations 
 circulated against them, would gather in crowds in front 
 of the building, threatening to break in and put the 
 traitors (as they called them) to death. The magistrates 
 of Brest, becoming alarmed, informed the departmental 
 administrators that they could not answer for the lives 
 of the prisoners, and begged that they might be removed 
 to a quieter locality. The administrators themselves 
 were not ill disposed to hearken to so reasonable a 
 request, but Expilly, who was then at Paris, being con- 
 sulted on the subject, replied that the priests were very 
 well at Brest ; so at Brest they remained. This trait of 
 resentful cruelty shows how completely the revolutionary 
 spirit had quenched all humanity in the breast of this 
 miserable man. 
 
 The people also had their share of suffering in these 
 days of tribulation, but their faith seemed to wax all 
 the stronger as the persecution increased in intensity. 
 Liberty of the press, which had been decreed as early 
 as August 24, 1789, had proved a fruithful source of 
 corruption by deluging France with publications subver- 
 sive of all moral and religious principles ; but, on the 
 other hand, the friends of religion and order had largely 
 profited by it to issue a number of good books suited to 
 the capacities of all classes and calculated to furnish 
 
Devotion to the Sacred Heart. 129 
 
 an antidote to the poison which was being so widely 
 diffused. A printer of Saint-Brieuc, Jean-Marie Prud- 
 homme by name, deserves honourable mention for his 
 laudable exertions in publishing works written in defence 
 of the faith, or for the instruction and encouragement of 
 the people. He was himself a fervent and courageous 
 Christian, and it was to him that the Vicars-General of 
 Quimper were in the habit of applying to print and 
 circulate their manifestos, which they were unable to do 
 in the episcopal city. He also printed the protests of 
 other bishops and ecclesiastical bodies, and shrank from 
 no labours by which he could serve the Church. No 
 wonder that he became the object of the hatred and perse- 
 cution of the revolutionists ; the wonder is how he should 
 have escaped the guillotine during the Reign of Terror. 1 
 But not only were the faithful instructed and fortified 
 generally through the medium of the press, they were 
 also exhorted individually to be constant in offering their 
 prayers and penances to God to move Him to have 
 compassion on His afflicted Church. A quarantaine of 
 pious exercises which comprised a daily recitation of 
 the Miserere and a touching prayer for mercy, accom- 
 panied by fasting, was in very frequent use among 
 Christian families during this year ; while the devotion 
 to the Sacred Heart of Jesus began to be cultivated 
 with a spontaneity and a fervour which seemed to be 
 the effect of a special inspiration, as though Heaven 
 would teach this faithful people that at this Fountain 
 of Divine Love were to be sought those healing waters 
 which would restore and save France. By the enemies 
 of religion this beautiful devotion was hated with an 
 instinctive and deadly hatred; they saw, or feigned to 
 see, in the little prints and pictures of the Sacred 
 
 1 This worthy man survived until the year 1832, when he died at 
 the age of eighty-seven. 
 
 J 25 
 
f30 Brutality to women. 
 
 Heart which were distributed, a token and a symbol 
 of a counter-revolution ; and to be discovered with 
 such a symbol about the person was soon to be equi- 
 valent to a sentence of death. Catholics needed, indeed, 
 all that supernatural consolation which prayer and 
 devotion could afford amidst the woes which weighed 
 so heavily upon them. Impiety everywhere triumphant, 
 schism forcibly established, the bishops in exile, the 
 clergy imprisoned or obliged to keep themselves con- 
 cealed, ecclesiastical property put up to auction, many 
 churches closed and many desecrated, religious houses 
 suppressed, distress and destitution prevailing among the 
 lower orders, public morals becoming more and more 
 corrupt from the want of any restraining curb, and the 
 Revolution daily assuming a more terrible and sanguinary 
 aspect — such was the scene of desolation presented to 
 their eyes, while personally they were every day experi- 
 encing greater difficulty in fulfilling the essential duties 
 of religion and incurring greater peril in the manifesta- 
 tion of their faith. 
 
 How real this peril was the following instances may 
 serve to show. The civil authorities had not deprived 
 the communities of women (hitherto spared) of then- 
 chaplains, but they were not allowed to admit any secular 
 person to their sacred offices ; and the better to ensure 
 compliance with this prohibition, the entrances to their 
 chapels from the street had been nailed up. A few 
 women of Rennes, in order to enjoy the consolation of 
 being present at Mass, so far as possible, had collected 
 at the door of the Carmelite chapel one Sunday 
 morning, and were looking through some cracks in the 
 door which gave them a glimpse of the priest at the 
 altar. Here they were observed by a band of National 
 Guards, who, seizing hold of them, flogged them on the 
 spot in a manner both cruel and indecent. A female 
 
Brutality to women. 131 
 
 servant, one of the group, happily escaped their hands, 
 and ran home in a state of the utmost excitement. Her 
 mistress, the mother of three priests, all exiled from 
 their parishes, was so affected by the sight of the poor 
 girl's distress and by the revolting story she had to tell, 
 that she fell down insensible and died a few days after- 
 wards. These wretches, with a dastardly brutality, always 
 singled out the weakest and most helpless — captive 
 priests and defenceless women — as the objects of their 
 vengeance. Here follow two examples of their exploits 
 in this line. 
 
 A poor woman was going one day to hear Mass at 
 a parish in which the legitimate pastor, as was usual, 
 had been permitted to remain until his successor 
 was appointed. On her way she met a party of men 
 who, knowing or guessing her intentions, treated her 
 so cruelly that the poor creature died shortly after of the 
 injuries she had received. Again, in a village six 
 leagues distant from Rennes lived a woman remarkable 
 for the firmness of her faith. The schismatic had taken 
 possession of the cure, and had the support of a con- 
 siderable number of the parishioners, who were able to 
 intimidate the half-hearted and irresolute. Possibly this 
 may have been one of those places, already mentioned 
 as being in this neighbourhood, where the priests had 
 failed to give that edifying example which builds up a 
 flock in the solid love of their faith. Be this as it may, 
 so it was that, from one motive or another, almost all 
 attended the intruder's Mass. But this woman, in spite 
 both of threats and entreaties, persevered in going every 
 Sunday to hear Mass in an adjoining parish which had 
 not yet been deprived of its pastor. Her constancy was 
 to be put to a severe trial. One market day, the National 
 Guards, bent on procuring themselves one of those dia- 
 bolical amusements in which they delighted, rushed to 
 
132 
 
 The wolf. 
 
 this woman's house, dragged her into the market-place, 
 where they shaved her head before all the people, and, 
 setting her on an ass with her face to the animal's tail, 
 paraded her through the streets, singing lewd songs as 
 they went and assailing their victim with both execrations 
 and blows. 
 
 God who supported the primitive Christians in the 
 days of Pagan persecution, ministered strength to these 
 Breton women under the indignities and barbarities 
 which they were called to suffer, so that they exhibited 
 a spirit of confessorship truly heroic. In some cases, 
 indeed, attachment to their faith led them to brave their 
 persecutors at times when duty did not require its 
 manifestation. Thus a girl of Loudeac, meeting the 
 schismatic cure in a lane, threw her apron over her 
 face, and ran away screaming, ' The wolf ! the wolf ! ' 
 Some of these poor people could give on occasion very 
 pertinent answers. At Ploumiliau, in the diocese of 
 Treguier, was a woman remarkable for her readiness in 
 this way. Having ceased to go to church from the 
 moment the intruder arrived, and being questioned by 
 some of her fellow-villagers, not so well grounded in the 
 faith, who had been cajoled into attending, as to why 
 she had deserted them, she replied, ' Do you think that 
 the Church is that mass of stones you see there? The 
 Church is the assembly of faithful Christians, united in 
 one faith and then she referred them to the words of 
 the Catechism to show that it was she who had adhered 
 to the Church while they had forsaken it. 
 
 Rarely did their attachment to their religion impel 
 these Breton women to any act of violence, but there 
 were, it must be allowed, some few exceptions. In 
 several parishes the women collected together to 
 receive the 'wolf with a shower of stones, which 
 made him take to his heels as fast as they could carry 
 
A castigation well deserved. 133 
 
 him. Indeed, as a rule, the women showed them- 
 selves bolder than the men and more regardless of 
 consequences, as was exemplified in the conduct of 
 some washerwomen of Rennes, of whom the following 
 story is related. They were down by the river engaged 
 in their usual employment when, as his ill luck would 
 have it, the Sieur Bazin, Le Coz's episcopal vicar, took 
 a walk in that direction. He was specially obnoxious 
 to all good Catholics, for, not only had he taken the 
 oath, but he had enticed one of his cousins, a Carmelite 
 novice, to abandon her convent and join the schism ; 
 and, to crown his misdeeds, he had contracted a civil 
 marriage with her. It was an out-of-the-way place, where 
 there were but few passers by, and the opportunity 
 proved too tempting; so these stout dames pounced 
 on the unhappy man, flogged him soundly, and then 
 ducked him in the stream, telling him that, if his mother 
 had been mindful to correct him in that fashion when 
 he was a child, he would never have disgraced himself 
 by taking the oath. Without exactly approving of this 
 act of lawless retribution, we frankly confess that we 
 do not grudge the Sieur Bazin a castigation which he so 
 richly deserved. 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 The amnesty. Renewal of the persecution. 
 
 The fever of excitement into which Paris was thrown 
 by the flight and capture of the unhappy Louis was 
 shared by every party in the Assembly, where the ultras 
 clamoured for the King's deposition and the immediate 
 proclamation of the Republic. The time, however, was 
 not yet ripe enough for such extreme measures, and 
 the moderate party succeeded in forcibly putting down a 
 popular rising organized by the Jacobins and dispersing 
 the mob gathered in the Champs-de-Mars ; showing 
 thereby what might have been easily effected at an early 
 stage by a little show of firmness and timely severity. 
 The Assembly, however, to content the Jacobins so far 
 as might be, suspended the King's powers until the Con- 
 stitution which had been in process of elaboration ever 
 since 1789 should be completed and ready to be presented 
 to Louis for his signature. This empty formality took 
 place on the 3rd of September, and, ten days later, the King 
 accepted the Constitution by a message to the Assembly, 
 which he concluded by requesting that an amnesty 
 might be proclaimed which should include all offences 
 connected with the Revolution. The Assembly con- 
 sented, and, in virtue of this favour, the priests incar- 
 cerated throughout France were legally entitled to their 
 liberty. It was not, however, without much reluctance 
 that many of the provincial directories could bring 
 themselves to let go their prey; and, in fact, that of 
 
Protest in the Assembly. 
 
 135 
 
 Finisterre, which was under Expilly's influence, did not 
 release the prisoners until the 24th of September, just ten 
 days after the proclamation of the decree, and then not 
 without again assailing them with the coarsest invectives 
 and coupling their liberation with the most rigorous 
 conditions. They were forbidden to return to their late 
 abodes, and were ordered also to remain at a distance 
 of twelve miles from their former parishes. They were 
 further compelled to provide themselves with passports, 
 to obtain which they had to traverse Brest from one end 
 to the other, exposed to every insult and outrage at the 
 hands of a populace which vied in ferocity with that 
 of Paris or Marseilles. But this peril past, a sweet 
 consolation awaited them ; for scarcely had they issued 
 from the town when they were met by numbers of the 
 good peasants of the Bas-Leon, who, approaching with 
 every mark of sympathy and respect, offered them an 
 asylum in their houses and a share of their daily bread. 
 
 The Constituent Assembly had now completed its work, 
 and its dissolution was fixed for the 30th of September, 
 1 79 1. The conscientious men whom it counted amongst 
 its members, but who had always constituted the minority, 
 resolved that they would not appear to consent by their 
 silence to the many iniquitous acts which that body had 
 sanctioned. Accordingly, on August 31, one of their 
 number disclaimed before the Assembly all participation 
 in the encroachments which, during the last two years, 
 had been made upon religion, the royal authority, the 
 constitutional principles of the monarchy, and the rights 
 of property. Two hundred and ten deputies imme- 
 diately arose and gave their adhesion to this declaration. 
 Not content, however, with a general verbal protest, the 
 sounder portion of the clerical members drew up another 
 of their own, which embodied a lucid exposition of true 
 principles in regard to religion, monarchy, and liberty. 
 
136 The Legislative Assembly. 
 
 One hundred and fifty deputies, amongst whom were 
 twenty-six bishops, signed this declaration. It was all 
 they could now do; but from the moment that they 
 consented to take part in the deliberations of an 
 Assembly which arrogated to itself the right to discuss 
 and regulate matters which appertained to the ecclesias- 
 tical and spiritual power, the clergy of France had 
 accepted a false position, as they had now learned by 
 bitter experience. 
 
 A new Assembly was convened without loss of time. 
 It was called the Legislative Assembly and it met on the 
 1 st of October. Its members had been elected while the 
 whole country was still in the state of intense ferment 
 caused by the King's attempted flight. He was falsely 
 represented as having intended to join the emigrants 
 and return with a foreign army to re-establish the 
 ancien regime. Hence the general irritation. In all 
 parts of France the revolutionists had been loud in 
 declaring that, for the security of the countiy and the 
 preservation of liberty, none but thorough-going patriots 
 must be chosen, men devoted to the Constitution ; and 
 unfortunately they had it fully in their power to control 
 the elections. The nobility had either emigrated or 
 took no part therein ; the persecuted clergy, of course, 
 could not show themselves ; the demagogues, in short, 
 were complete masters of the situation. Most of the 
 deputies elected were obscure individuals, generally 
 of very ordinary capacity, or young hot-headed men, 
 known only for their revolutionary exploits or extreme 
 opinions ; and well-nigh all were alike without religion 
 and without experience. An imprudent law had ex- 
 cluded every one from re-election who had sat in the 
 Constituent Assembly. Compared to the new men, 
 ' the old members,' says the Abbe Jager, ' were angels. 
 Democracy had made immense progress; those whose 
 
Persecution recommenced. 137 
 
 subversive principles would have placed them on the 
 left in the Constituent Assembly now formed the extreme 
 right.' On the other hand no advantage, but rather the 
 reverse, accrued from the exclusion of those violent 
 democrats who had sat in the late Assembly, such as 
 Robespierre, Marat, Danton, and the like; for instead 
 of returning to the places whence they came and resum- 
 ing their former occupations, they remained in the 
 capital and betook themselves to the clubs of the 
 Jacobins and Cordeliers, where they exercised a much 
 more powerful influence than they had ever possessed 
 in the Chamber. With such an Assembly as had now 
 been got together what could the Government do ? What 
 could the King do? He was a king without subjects, 
 to whom even the outward forms of respect were denied. 
 Yet it is from this moment that Louis XVI. begins to 
 assume an aspect of moral dignity which he had hitherto 
 lacked in our eyes, for he was henceforward to display 
 in matters of principle and conscience a firmness which 
 goes far to atone for his many former acts of weakness 
 and reprehensible compliance. 
 
 Although the amnesty granted by the Constituent 
 Assembly had restored the incarcerated priests to liberty, 
 it did not free them from persecution, which soon recom- 
 menced more hotly than ever. This was to be expected ; 
 for the Civil Constitution of the Clergy continued in full 
 vigour, and the same provincial administrators who were 
 determined to impose it on the people were still in 
 power. The system of calumniating the clergy and 
 denouncing them to the Assembly, where every accusa- 
 tion against a priest was greedily welcomed, proceeded 
 as before. Every movement or disturbance which 
 spontaneously arose from the resistance of the Catholic 
 populations to the innovations forced upon them was 
 represented in exaggerated proportions and always attri- 
 
138 
 
 A threatened conflict. 
 
 buted to the instigation of the priests. One instance 
 may suffice. M. Ruello, the Rector of Loudeac, who 
 had sat in the Assembly, had been weak enough to take 
 the oath, but he redeemed his error by a courageous 
 retractation. Alarmed at the dangers which during the 
 month of April threatened the clergy in Paris, he 
 returned to his parish, where he was joyfully welcomed. 
 Very soon the oath was again tendered to him and he 
 again rejected it. The civil authorities, a few months 
 later, bethought themselves of providing a successor 
 by the usual means of a sham election. The choice 
 fell on an unfrocked monk, Le Breton, who had been 
 Prior of the Abbey of Redon, and had taken an active 
 part in the preparation of the Civil Constitution. 1 On 
 the first Sunday in October, a courageous Catholic 
 stood forth after Mass and asked the people which of 
 the two they would have for their cure, M. Ruello 
 or the new one who was about to be sent to them. 
 'We will have M. Ruello,' shouted aloud almost the 
 entire congregation. The peasants who had come in 
 from the country round with their sticks in their hands 
 now hastened out of the church and drew up in the 
 neighbouring square, with the obvious determination of 
 showing fight to the ' patriots.' The National Guards 
 rushed to the spot with loaded muskets, but at this junc- 
 ture some of the townspeople intervened and succeeded in 
 prevailing on both parties to separate without bloodshed. 
 M. Ruello had withdrawn from the neighbourhood before 
 
 1 Tresvaux, who had seen a portrait of the prior, says that he was 
 represented with long hair, after the fashion of the day, and in quite 
 worldly attire. Le Breton had always averred, from the very com- 
 mencement of the Revolution, that he had entered the Benedictine 
 Order purely from human motives, and even made it his boast that he 
 had never been a fervent religious. After his appointment to the cure 
 of Loudeac, he distinguished himself by giving a ball at the presbytery 
 on All Saints Day. In 1793 he abandoned his priestly functions and 
 enrolled himself among the National Guard. 
 
Irritation of the peasantry. 
 
 139 
 
 all this occurred, and was far too peaceable and moderate 
 a man to have counselled any violent measure, had 
 he been on the spot; yet he was denounced to the 
 Assembly as having excited sedition in his parish, and 
 the accusation went the round of France. 
 
 Other parallel cases might be quoted. Disturbances 
 naturally arose, but those who accused the Catholics 
 of fomenting them were themselves the real authors of 
 the troubles. It was they who seized the churches and 
 installed the schismatic cures, and if the Catholics retired 
 into a barn or private house to celebrate Mass, they 
 pursued them thither, imprisoned or drove away the 
 priests, and ill-treated the families which had harboured 
 them. It was by proceedings such as these, and by 
 countless other vexations, that the populations were 
 sometimes irritated beyond endurance and rose against 
 the authorities, who to them were ministers of injustice, 
 or roughly handled the schismatic intruders themselves. 
 With such manifestations of popular indignation the 
 priests had no more to do than they had with the 
 ducking of Le Coz's vicar. Most of them were at a 
 distance, and their very absence was one of the main 
 causes of the popular irritation, while those who still 
 lingered, concealed in or near their parishes, although 
 they used all their influence to maintain the Christian 
 perseverance of their flocks, were foremost in enjoining 
 moderation and forbearance ; moreover, they were the 
 persons best able to ensure the quiet demeanour of the 
 people. But this influence was, in fact, the very grava- 
 men of their offence. The revolutionists vainly flattered 
 themselves that, if the legitimate pastors could be com- 
 pletely disposed of, their flocks would submit to the 
 inevitable, take up with the State clergy, attend their 
 Mass, and give no further trouble. They were simple 
 enough to believe this, because, being themselves devoid 
 
140 Tyrannical proceedings. 
 
 of faith, they knew not its power over those who possessed 
 it. It was in order, then, to get rid of the Catholic 
 priests that they thus persistently denounced them as 
 the disturbers of public tranquillity. 
 
 All this while the law, it must be remembered, ex- 
 pressly recognized the freedom of religious worship, 
 nevertheless similar tyrannical proceedings were taking 
 place throughout France. The schismatics, protected by 
 the Government, were in possession of presbyteries, 
 schools, episcopal palaces, and churches. The Catholic 
 clergy, stripped of everything, were compelled, if they 
 would say Mass, to retire to oratories and private chapels ; 
 too happy if even there they might be left in peace. 
 But no; the populace, especially in the towns, excited 
 by the clubs, would leave them no retreat They assem- 
 bled in crowds, and fell upon the congregation as they 
 quietly entered or left their place of worship, and cruelly 
 ill-treated them; the women in particular, as we have 
 seen. When such disturbances were reported, the autho- 
 rities, instead of punishing the rioters and protecting the 
 Catholics in the exercise of their just rights, saw no 
 better way of preventing their recurrence than by closing 
 the chapel or oratory, which, in official language, was 
 styled removing the provocation. Scenes of this descrip- 
 tion were again frequent at this time in Paris, where, 
 after the disorders which had disgraced the capital during 
 the Easter of that year, the effervescence had subsided, 
 and there had been a temporary lull. The Paris Directory, 
 indeed, had made some commendable efforts to obtain 
 the observance of the law as regarded liberty of worship ; 
 by no means, it is true, with entire success, yet with 
 sufficient result to render the practice of their religion 
 possible to Catholics in general, without any serious 
 danger. Where the directories in the provinces were 
 disposed to moderation, tbe same line had been pursued, 
 
Isnard' s speech. 
 
 141 
 
 but this was very far from being their usual character ; 
 moreover, when they did not go with the stream, the 
 directories themselves were often violently thwarted by 
 the municipalities and the clubs. This was especially 
 the case after the Legislative Assembly had passed the 
 decree of the 29th of November, of which we are about 
 to speak. 
 
 The subject of the so-called refractory priests had been 
 taken up almost immediately by the Assembly, which 
 accepted without examination all the denunciations for- 
 warded to it from the provinces. The troubles which 
 were beginning to manifest themselves in the Angoumois 
 drew forth a furious declamation from Isnard,' 2 the deputy 
 of the Var, who declared that impunity was the sole 
 cause of this social disorganization, and asked whether 
 men would only begin to feel the dangers of leniency 
 when French blood should dye the waves of the ocean. 
 At another sitting this fanatic exclaimed, that where it 
 was question of political liberty, to forgive was a crime ; 
 and he proposed, as the only measure adequate to meet 
 the emergency, the banishment of all the priests from 
 France. So violently irreligious was this man's speech, 
 that even Le Coz, who had been chosen as one of the 
 deputies to the new Assembly, and who, as a constitu- 
 tional bishop, was not squeamish in the matter of free 
 opinions, was moved to indignation, and said that Isnard 
 had promulgated a code of atheism. Isnard, smarting 
 under the accusation, thought it worth his while to excul- 
 pate himself from the charge in a letter to one of the 
 journals, in which he said : ' I have studied nature ; I 
 am not a fool ; I must therefore believe in God.' This 
 
 2 Isnard, the son of a perfumer, belonged to the party of the 
 Girondists, then in the ascendant, the leaders of which were before long 
 all to perish on the scaffold. Isnard alone managed to escape, and 
 having lain in concealment during the Reign of Terror, was, in the 
 mercy of God, ultimately led to repentance. 
 
142 New penal enactment. 
 
 was about the sum of his belief and that of his Voltairian 
 associates, who were called together to legislate for 
 Catholic France. The Assembly, however, was as yet 
 not quite prepared for so sweeping a measure as the 
 general exile of a whole class of citizens, although this, 
 its first suggestion, was received with thunders of applause 
 by the Left. After the debate had been prolonged for 
 fifteen days, a law was passed, on the 29th of November, 
 containing a preamble of eighteen articles, the substance 
 of which was as follows — 
 
 All non-juring priests must present themselves every 
 eight days to the municipality to take the civic oath. 
 Those who should refuse were to receive no further 
 pension. By the mere fact of their refusal, also, they 
 were to be suspected of rebellion and of evil intentions 
 against their country, and, as such, placed under the 
 special supervision of the authorities. If present in a 
 commune where troubles arose of which religious opinions 
 were the cause or the pretext, non-juring priests were to 
 be subject to temporary removal by the Directory, upon 
 the advice of the district ; and, if reason should appear, 
 they were to be denounced to the tribunals. In case of 
 disobedience to the injunction of the Directory they were 
 to be prosecuted, and punished with imprisonment 
 Every ecclesiastic convicted of having provoked dis- 
 obedience to the law and constituted authorities was to 
 be subject to two years' imprisonment. The churches 
 and edifices employed for the State worship could not 
 be used for any other. But citizens might hire other 
 churches or chapels for the exercise of their religion 
 under the control of the police; this permission, how- 
 ever, was not to be extended to ecclesiastics who had 
 refused the civic oath. The Directory of every depart- 
 ment was to draw up a list of such recusants, with obser- 
 vations on their behaviour, to be transmitted to the 
 
The civic oath. 
 
 143 
 
 Legislative Assembly, which would thereby be enabled 
 to come to a resolution with regard to an ultimate measure 
 for the extirpation of rebellion. The preamble set forth 
 that the civic oath was a pledge of fidelity to the law 
 and of attachment to society, which every citizen ought 
 to give, and that the minister of any worship who should 
 refuse to take it would thereby show that his intention 
 was not to respect established order, and, failing thus to 
 recognize the law, he voluntarily forfeited the advantages 
 which it guaranteed to him. The rest of the preamble 
 was occupied with pointing out the source of the late 
 disorders, namely, the dark machinations of the priests. 
 
 We may here observe that the civic oath was not the 
 oath to maintain the Civil Constitution of the Clergy, as 
 some historians have erroneously supposed. Whoever 
 took the civic oath simply swore fidelity to the nation, to 
 the law, and to the King, and engaged to maintain the 
 Constitution with all his power. Some ecclesiastics 
 thought that this oath might be conscientiously taken, 
 but the great majority of the clergy judged odierwise, 
 and regarded it as a snare. For how, in fact, could any 
 one attached to his faith swear fidelity to that anti- 
 catholic piece of legislation which the late Assembly 
 had concocted ? How engage to maintain with all his 
 power a Constitution which declared, for instance, that 
 religious vows were contrary to the natural rights of man, 
 as well as any other binding promise made by man to 
 God. The non-juring priests of Paris addressed the 
 King, imploring him to exercise his right of veto against 
 the unjust and tyrannical law of November 29. The 
 appeal was not needed. Louis bitterly repented the 
 sanction he had given to the imposition of the previous 
 oath upon the clergy, now especially that he beheld its 
 evil effects. The Holy Father's condemnation was also 
 present to his mind, and his own religious principles 
 
144 Harsher measures proposed. 
 
 made him recoil from tearing up Catholicism by its last 
 remaining roots. Accordingly he made this noble reply : 
 ' I will die rather than sanction such a measure.' 
 
 The directories of the Breton department, although they 
 had been forced to comply with the letter of the amnesty 
 by releasing the priests, had soon recommended active 
 proceedings against them. The dispositions evinced by 
 the Legislative Assembly were too much in harmony 
 with their own for them not to take full advantage of 
 them ; nay, they ran ahead of that body by adopting a 
 course of persecution which had not as yet received its 
 sanction, and in recommending further measures of a still 
 severer character, which as yet the Assembly had not 
 discussed, although, as we have seen, it was very soon to 
 hint at their probable adoption. ' When it is question of 
 saving the country,' says the administrative council of the 
 Finisterre, in an address to the Assembly, dated the 18th 
 of November, ' we must not limit ourselves to measures 
 of strict justice. Be assured, the evil is at its height. 
 Knowing, therefore, its magnitude, you will frame a 
 rigorous decree. The amnesty having restored liberty to 
 the incarcerated priests, their presence in their parishes has 
 created fresh disorders. The most efficacious law would 
 be one which would banish them from the soil of France.' 
 Some days later a memorial, couched in still more violent 
 language, was sent up, complaining of the intimidation 
 exercised against the constitutional clergy, accusing the 
 non-juring priests of preaching rebellion, and specifying 
 an intention of arresting the ecclesiastical disturbers of 
 the peace, a measure which had become necessary, and 
 which, it was hoped, would be approved by the Assembly. 
 Expilly had a worthy assistant in an episcopal vicar 
 called Gomaire, who likewise belonged to the depart- 
 mental administration of Finisterre, and fully equalled 
 his principal in hatred of the faithful clergy. He was 
 
Prisoners at Brest. 145 
 
 originally from Lorient, but had incurred suspension in 
 the diocese of Vannes. He had then passed into that of 
 Leon, where he had somehow succeeded in obtaining 
 the post of chaplain in a private family at the time when 
 the oath to the Civil Constitution of the Clergy was 
 imposed. Such a priest was, as we may say, made to 
 order for the new Church; he accordingly pushed himself 
 forward, and his ' patriotic ' zeal won him the confidence 
 of Expilly. This man had recently been made president 
 of the department, and he it was who drew up, or 
 dictated, the violent address sent up to the Assembly. 
 Later on he contracted two or three civil marriages, and 
 gave so much scandal as to fall into general contempt. 
 
 The department of Finisterre had not waited for 
 the sanction of the Assembly to begin to act; indeed 
 it had already begun to act when it forwarded its 
 request for approval. On the 22nd of November it 
 had issued decrees of arrest against two priests, which 
 were followed, only four days later, by a general order 
 to arrest all non-juring priests and detain them in the 
 Castle of Brest. An active persecution now commenced; 
 the priests were taken up and treated as so many male- 
 factors wherever the authorities could lay their hands 
 upon them. The arrests continued during the whole 
 of December, and at its close there were fifty confessors 
 imprisoned in the Castle, eleven of whom had been 
 transferred from the seminary of Quimper. These latter 
 arrived at Brest on the 6th of December, at six o'clock in 
 the evening, and were marched off to the Castle amidst 
 the yells and execrations of the rabble, who, pressing 
 violently on the file of guards which formed a hedge on 
 either side, endeavoured to seize and take summary 
 vengeance on the prisoners. Some screamed 'A la 
 lanteme P others shouted that they should be flung into 
 the sea. At last they were safely consigned to the 
 K 25 
 
146 Prisoners at Brest. 
 
 Castle under the convoy of the Procureur-Syndic of the 
 district and two members of the municipality, one of 
 whom never ceased loading them with abuse, and 
 threatening them with the utmost rigours of the law; to 
 which M. Boissiere, who had been secretary to the late 
 Bishop of Quimper, Mgr. de Saint-Luc, calmly replied 
 that, so long as the laws were opposed to the interests of 
 religion, their consciences forbade obedience, and that 
 they were ready, with God's help, to suffer all things, 
 even death itself, rather than yield compliance. Once 
 lodged in the Castle, they were informed that they would 
 not be permitted to speak with any one from without 
 except in the presence of the sentinel and in the French 
 language, and that only for the space of a quarter of an 
 hour ; neither would they be allowed the use of pen, ink, 
 and paper, but would be provided with the necessary 
 materials when they wished to write ; in other words, 
 their letters were to be inspected, and the contents re- 
 ported to the authorities. 
 
 Not satisfied with imprisoning the clergy, the depart- 
 ment continued to send up address after address to the 
 Assembly, dictating the course to be pursued, in terms 
 like the following : — ' There is no better means for 
 inspiring priests with respect for the law than to punish 
 their disobedience by fines, and these ought to be levied 
 at once.' Thus, after being despoiled of their benefices, 
 the faithful clergy were to be robbed of their last slender 
 resources ; and these were slender indeed, for the 
 Government allowed them but a very small pension, and 
 paid it also in assignats, that is, in paper currency of a 
 very depreciated value. Their needs were great, for 
 their captivity was a hard one, and their diet very scant ; 
 nevertheless, no one was admitted to see them, or allowed 
 to supply their necessities. At last an elderly lady, who 
 had long been in the habit of visiting the prisons, 
 
Prisoners at Qtiimper. 147 
 
 obtained access to them, and profited by the opportunity 
 to furnish additional food and clothes to those who were 
 most in want. In another part of the Castle a number 
 of criminals were imprisoned; these men wrote a joint 
 letter to the priests who undeservedly shared their im- 
 prisonment, recommending themselves to their prayers 
 and soliciting alms ; and these generous confessors, for- 
 getting their own needs, made a little collection amongst 
 themselves to enable these poor creatures to have a better 
 meal than usual, accompanying the contribution with a 
 letter full of kindness. 
 
 As a last resource the incarcerated priests appealed 
 from the tyranny of the local authorities to the justice of 
 their sovereign. How they succeeded in preparing and 
 safely transmitting their letter we are not informed ; 
 perhaps their gaolers allowed it to pass, knowing how 
 fruitless any such application must prove. We are told 
 that the King shed tears when he read it, but he was 
 well-nigh as powerless as the imprisoned priests, and 
 utterly unable to effect their liberation. 
 
 Brest was not the only place of detention in the Finis- 
 terre ; Quimper also had its prison. Here the Abb^ 
 Dulaurents, Canon and Vicar-General of the diocese of 
 Quimper, having also formerly been Rector of the 
 University of Paris and Grand Master of the College of 
 Navarre, was confined. He was now past eighty, and 
 almost completely blind, yet, in spite of his age and 
 bodily affliction, he could not obtain leave to retire to his 
 relatives in the country until they had made reiterated 
 applications for his release. Another canon and vicar- 
 general, the Abbe Guesdon, who was as old as the Abbe 
 Dulaurents, and was deprived of the use of his legs, 
 shared his captivity, but was not so fortunate as to obtain 
 his liberation ; in his case the administrators were in- 
 flexible. It must not be supposed that the priests were 
 
148 Close of the year iygi. 
 
 unmolested at this time in the other departments of 
 Brittany ; very far from it ; but, as before, Finisterre 
 distinguished itself by its zeal and activity in the bad 
 cause. Nothing, indeed, could exceed the passionate 
 eagerness which the authorities of Quimper displayed in 
 calumniating and persecuting the non-jurors. Yet in the 
 documents of the time, when everything which could be 
 discovered to the disadvantage of the clergy would have 
 been gladly recorded, not a trace can be found of any 
 offence committed by them, nor even of any act of 
 imprudence. Their whole crime consisted in their 
 inviolable attachment to their faith, and their rejection 
 of the schism, a rejection which was interpreted as 
 disobedience to the law. 
 
 We have now arrived at the close of the miserable 
 year 1791, only to begin another still more miserable, at 
 least more full of horrors ; but these horrors were the 
 legitimate outcome of the work which had been done in 
 the three preceding years, a work of impiety and destruc- 
 tion on which the year 1791 had set its seal. 
 
CHAPTER XL 
 
 Enforcement of the Civic Oath in defiance of the 
 Royal Veto. 
 
 Up to this time the main accusation brought against the 
 priests was that they were the instigators of the troubles 
 which had arisen in their parishes. But the beginning 
 of the year 1792 was to see a fresh order of charges 
 prominently arrayed against them. They were accused 
 of obstructing the payment of the taxes, and the sale 
 of corn, of holding communication with the enemy, and 
 enlisting soldiers for the army of the emigrant princes. 
 Bread was very dear, the insecurity of the times interfered 
 with the free circulation of grain, and the sovereigns on 
 the other side of the Rhine were preparing to invade 
 France. All these calamities were laid at the door of 
 the clergy, and a hungry, impoverished, and excited 
 populace, which had been led to expect the beginning 
 of a golden age, believed these calumnies, absurd as they 
 were, which the revolutionists disseminated as proved 
 and recognized facts. Moreover, every device was 
 adopted for bringing odium on the priests. The 
 following stratagem adopted at Nantes may serve as 
 an instance. 
 
 It would appear that in some places the non-juring 
 clergy were still allowed to say Mass in churches 
 which had been seized by the State for the official 
 worship. Such a practice is in itself open to much 
 
150 A plot defeated. 
 
 objection, at least in ordinary times, but these were 
 not ordinary times, and the clergy were ready to accept 
 for their poor bereaved flocks any advantage which con- 
 science did not absolutely forbid. Nor was there any 
 danger of a misapprehension, such as might arise in 
 seasons of tranquillity, from the habit of officiating in 
 the same edifice with heretics and schismatics. One 
 day, the faithful who were accustomed to assist at the 
 Mass of a legitimate priest, at a certain hour, in one 
 of the churches of Nantes, were much surprised to find 
 the false pastors occupying the altar. They turned 
 hastily to leave the church, but were headed back by 
 armed men. It was in the midst of the confusion caused 
 by their efforts to escape and their loud remonstrances, 
 mingled with the threats and blasphemies of the National 
 Guards, that the apostates went through with their sacri- 
 legious Mass. But they failed not afterwards to accuse the 
 Catholic clergy of having collected the people together, 
 with the object of raising a disturbance and obstructing their 
 ministrations. In consequence of this imputed offence, 
 most of the churches were now closed to them; but 
 this did not content the ' patriots.' A secret plan was 
 arranged for seizing some of the clergy, but it was not 
 communicated until late at night to those who were to 
 be the active agents. Thus it was hoped that no tidings 
 of the plot would reach the ears of the priests, but that 
 they would come at their usual time, on the following 
 day, to a church at which they were still allowed to 
 officiate. Accordingly, by the appointed hour, the 
 sacristy was crammed with 'patriots,' but their malice 
 was doomed to disappointment, for some of the National 
 Guards had enough conscience or compassion remaining 
 to warn the intended victims of the trap laid for them, 
 and they thus escaped for a season the imprisonment 
 that awaited them. 
 
Prisoners at Dinan. 
 
 The Directory, which was the accomplice in all these 
 acts of injustice, now promulgated a decree which obliged 
 all priests in the department to come to reside at Nantes, 
 that they might be placed under the supervision of the 
 civil authority. The Directory of the C6tes-du-Nord went 
 still further, and, on the 15th of February, decreed the 
 seizure and imprisonment of all the priests in the depart- 
 ment. The order was carried out in the most cruel way. 
 There was at Dinan an old fortress which, having been 
 turned to no purpose since it had served as a place 
 of confinement for the prisoners taken during the last 
 war between France and England, had fallen into com- 
 plete decay. This wretched building was selected as 
 a fit prison for the priests. Hither, accordingly, they 
 were hurried, sometimes in fetters, sometimes accoutred 
 in mocr.ery as National Guards, sometimes in company 
 with common malefactors. The Abbe Tresvaux says 
 that he iumself saw a priest forced to follow after a 
 horse, to vhich he was tied as one animal might be 
 fastened tc another. A gendarme was mounted on 
 the horse, md the priest was surrounded by a group 
 of young miscreants who added to their insults the 
 accompaniment of a violin, just as they might have 
 done had they been parading a monkey or a bear. At 
 Jugon, a little town near Dinan, the priests were treated 
 with peculiar nhumanity, being obliged to pay for the 
 dinner of their guards, as well as their own, and confined 
 at night in a dirgy place, which was a receptacle for all the 
 filth of the town with a scanty allowance of straw thrown 
 into it to serve for their beds. At Dinan their persons 
 were searched, aid many of them robbed of such articles 
 as they had about them. Here also they had to pay 
 for their own food, although they were owed arrears of 
 the small stipend allowed them by Government, besides- 
 having to make heir gaoler a large remunera^i^ for 
 
 [MAR 5 19 
 
152 Prisoners at Dinan. 
 
 acting as their cook : and when some persons offered 
 to perforin this office at a cheaper rate, they were 
 refused and sent away. The heartless man, likewise, 
 exacted payment for the most trifling commission he 
 might be asked to execute, and for all this did not 
 spare them insults and abuse. They suffered the same, 
 and worse, at the hands of the municipality, who had 
 them repeatedly searched, stripping them for the purpose 
 in a most immodest way. Pen, ink, paper, manuscripts, 
 relics, devotional pictures, and even some of their prayer 
 books, had been taken from them, and they could not 
 speak or write to any one without permission, and then 
 only in presence or subject to the inspection of their 
 guards. Secular persons detected in endeavouring to 
 converse with them, or manifesting sympathy for their 
 sufferings, or so much as suspected of doing so, were 
 imprisoned. The bad, close atmosphere of that part 
 of the Castle in which they were confined having caused 
 the sickness and death of one of their number who 
 arrived by the first convoy, the prisoners were after- 
 wards allowed, at the discretion of the gader, to walk 
 on the platform of one of the towers, but this indulgence 
 was dearly purchased by the insults they received, not 
 only from himself and his subordinates, but from 
 passengers in the streets below. More than once even 
 shots were fired at them. But all these sufferings were 
 doubtless light to these confessors of the nith, compared 
 to what they experienced from the fall jf one of their 
 brethren, who had the weakness to give my and purchase 
 his liberty by an act of apostasy. With this sad excep- 
 tion, they all nobly persevered and supported unshaken 
 the rigours of their captivity unto the md. How close 
 and vexatiously minute was the watci kept over the 
 non-juring clergy at this time may te exemplified by 
 the treatment of M. Rouault, the Rector of Vezin, who 
 
Domiciliary visits. 153 
 
 had retired to Rennes after his expulsion from his cure. 
 Having been sent for by one of his parishioners who 
 lay dangerously ill, he visited him, and gave a catechism 
 to a child. On his return to Rennes, he was seized and 
 taken back to Vezin, chained to the bookseller who had 
 sold the catechism, in order to be confronted with the 
 sick man and the child. 
 
 In all these acts the authorities, nothing loath, were 
 urged on by the constitutional priests, who, furious at 
 seeing their services unattended, were always provoking 
 the interference of the civil power and soliciting measures 
 of merciless severity against those priests who continued 
 secretly to minister to their flocks. Hence it was very 
 difficult to remain concealed even in country places. 
 The constitutional clergy had their spies everywhere, who 
 kept a watchful eye on those Christian families which 
 were known to be devoted to their religion. On the 
 least suspicion of a priest being hidden in any of these 
 homes, a domiciliary visit was made, and every corner 
 searched, every outhouse and barn ransacked, the 
 gendarmes plunging their bayonets into the hay or 
 straw, without any concern as to what injury they 
 might inflict on those whom they suspected of being 
 concealed amongst it. The chateaux were also explored 
 in the same fashion under the pretence of looking for 
 arms ; and, if a priest were found, he was dragged to 
 the nearest town amidst the yells of the rabble that 
 always attended these proceedings. Such was the 
 spectacle presented throughout France, but especially 
 in the departments of the west. 
 
 Pius VI., deeply grieved by the deplorable state into 
 which the Church of France had fallen, issued a Brief 
 on March 19, addressed to all the clergy and people 
 of the kingdom, with the double object of supporting 
 and encouraging them under their trials and moving, 
 
154 Papal Brief. 
 
 if possible, the schismatical bishops and priests to return 
 to Catholic unity. The contempt into which the State 
 Church had fallen had already produced several retracta- 
 tions among the second order of the clergy, but some 
 even of the constitutional bishops were known to be 
 inwardly torn with remorse, and, indeed, it is said that 
 several of them were in secret correspondence on the 
 subject with the Holy See. This circumstance must 
 have encouraged the Holy Father to hope that his 
 Brief might determine them to renounce their schism, 
 and seek reconciliation with the Church ; but, notwith- 
 standing the union of paternal tenderness with Apostolic 
 firmness which was displayed in the document, it pro- 
 duced no effect upon the leaders of the schism. Those 
 few among them who were well disposed probably lacked 
 the courage to retract, and as for the great bulk of their 
 colleagues, no hope could be entertained of men many 
 of whom, such as Mine'e, for instance, sinking day by 
 day into lower depths of iniquity, were probably already 
 meditating the abandonment of their sacred profession ; 
 while others, such as Le Coz, Expilly, and Le Masle, 
 were so eaten up with pride, that to confess themselves in 
 the wrong would have been almost a moral impossibility ; 
 others, again, of whom Jacob may be taken as the type, 
 seemed too stupidly ignorant either to realize their own 
 position or to feel what was implied in the weight of the 
 Church's censures. 
 
 But if the Brief of the 1 9th of March was powerless to 
 touch the hearts and consciences of the schismatics, it 
 irritated their tempers beyond measure, and became a 
 fresh pretext for pursuing all, whether lay or clerical, 
 who were known to be attached to the faith. The diocese 
 of Rennes was the theatre of many cruel proceedings, 
 of even a worse character than the one to which we 
 have alluded. Towards the close of Lent a couple of 
 
Maratidiitg bands. 155 
 
 hundred ruffians, who had accoutred themselves as 
 National Guards, made an inroad on several parishes 
 which, owing to the difficulty of finding substitutes, still 
 possessed their legitimate pastors. These men scourged 
 women and girls, drank to excess, and carried off the 
 peasants' bread, killed their fowls under the pretence 
 that their owners were aristocrats, drove away the priests, 
 and closed the churches. At Moutier the aged rector, 
 a man greatly respected, narrowly escaped being hanged 
 by these miscreants ; yet he had received them charitably 
 when they invaded his house, giving them all the 
 provisions he had by him, and sending to buy more 
 when they had emptied his larder. In return for his 
 hospitality, they required him to take the oath. 1 No, 
 gentlemen, no oath ; never, never,' was his reply. Then 
 they abused and threatened him, and were actually pre- 
 paring the cords to string him up, he declaring all the 
 while that he was ready to die, as he had lived, for the 
 Catholic faith. Whether or no these ruffians found little 
 sport in hanging a man who was willing to be hanged, 
 so it was that they desisted, and contented themselves 
 with pushing him out of his house and flinging his 
 furniture into the street. To a complaint of the parish- 
 ioners, the district administrators replied that this expedi- 
 tion ought to have taken place a year sooner. Another 
 band of these marauders drove away the Cure of Acigne, 
 and gave themselves up to many excesses in the parish, 
 destroying the mayor's furniture and hacking a crucifix 
 to pieces with an axe. A detachment of National 
 Guards was on this occasion sent from Rennes to put 
 a stop to these disorders, but on their arrival they found 
 the leaders of the band to be such ' excellent patriots,' 
 that they allowed them quietly to depart, only remarking 
 that their civism was perhaps a trifle too enthusiastic. 
 While the authorities were thus indulgent, the con- 
 
156 Farmer Chantebel. 
 
 stitutional priests found matter of pleasure and amuse- 
 ment in exploits of this sort. During Passion Week, 
 a troop of the same description invaded the parish of 
 Martigne-Ferchaud and its neighbourhood, attacking 
 and rifling the houses of the peasants who did not 
 attend the schismatic Mass. This was a plea for every 
 act of depredation. In the house of a farmer they 
 found a little catechism compiled to enlighten the 
 faithful and warn them against the schism. This was 
 quite enough to condemn honest Jean Chantebel, so 
 he was dragged off to prison. The next day a sort 
 of committee was held, which ordered the catechism 
 to be burned. Fagots were piled before the prison 
 door, and the National Guards, with their colonel, were 
 present at the ceremony. Chantebel was brought out, 
 and commanded to commit his catechism to the flames. 
 ' My catechism is a good one,' replied the sturdy farmer ; 
 ' you may do what you please with me, but I will never 
 consent to burn a book which contains the true principles 
 of the faith.' He was now assailed with every manner 
 of threat and insult, and the colonel, taking the lighted 
 torch, held it to Chantebel's hand and scorched it. All 
 was in vain, for this good Christian evinced an un- 
 flinching courage which showed that he was ready 
 himself to be committed to the flames rather than 
 betray his faith by the smallest act of compliance. The 
 disconcerted demagogues now took counsel together, 
 and decided on parading their prisoner through the 
 streets of Martigne mounted backwards on a horse and 
 holding the tail in his hand. To this he made not the 
 slightest objection, and rode through the town with an 
 air of as much tranquillity as if he had been receiving 
 an ovation instead of being made an object of mockery 
 and scorn. Many of the spectators were move! to 
 tears ; but Chantebel's wife, who was among them, 
 
Redoubled persecution. 157 
 
 cried out to him, ' Hold firm ; it is for the good 
 God, and He will reward you.' The National Guards, 
 at last, feeling that they were getting the worst of it, 
 abandoned their cruel sport, and made off. 
 
 Another peasant, a labouring man, whose name is 
 unrecorded, showed a like magnanimous spirit. The 
 soldiers, unable to get him to walk to the church, 
 determined to drag him the whole way. There were 
 twenty-eight ec/ialiers 1 between his house and the town, 
 and at each of these his captors stopped and, making 
 him lay his head on the cross beam, threatened to cut 
 it off if he continued to resist. Thus this noble Christian 
 may be said to have suffered in will twenty-eight martyr- 
 doms in the course of an hour. The legitimate pastors 
 who were still permitted to remain, because their places 
 were not yet filled, had themselves often to endure very 
 rigorous treatment. The Cure' of Saint-Sulpice, for 
 having given his flock instructions on the marks of the 
 true Church, was condemned to be shaved and to wear 
 the carcan for four hours. The carcan was an iron ring 
 attached to a stake, and fastened round the culprit's 
 neck, who was thus subjected to a species of pillory. 
 This degrading punishment was to be followed by 
 imprisonment for six years. The Rector of Noyon- 
 sur-Vilaine was sentenced to three years' detention for 
 having preached on the unity of the Church, and upon 
 his appealing to the tribunal of Saint-Malo he was given 
 his choice between publicly retracting his doctrine or 
 undergoing imprisonment for life. He chose the latter, 
 as did also his vicaire. 
 
 On the approach of Easter the fury of the persecution 
 was redoubled, the schismatics being aware that the 
 Catholics would be anxious to perform their Paschal 
 
 1 Rude fences, made of the boughs of trees placed transversely and 
 resting on posts, to keep the cattle from straying. 
 
158 A tyrannical injunction. 
 
 duties, and that the priests who remained concealed 
 about the country would use every effort on their part 
 to enable them to fulfil their obligation. Here was a 
 motive for increased watchfulness and more stringent 
 severity. Early in April the department of the Ille-et- 
 Vilaine issued an injunction for all priests who had 
 been superseded to bind themselves by oath neither 
 to say nor to do anything in contravention of the Con- 
 stitution ; if not willing to enter into this engagement, 
 they were to repair to Rennes within fifteen days after 
 the publication of the decree ; they were also on their 
 arrival to give in their names, as well as the names and 
 addresses of those with whom they lodged, to the secre- 
 tary of the municipality. The priests could not in con- 
 science take this oath ; many of them, therefore, obeyed 
 the injunction and repaired voluntarily to Rennes ; others 
 would not leave their desolate flocks, and preferred 
 running the risk involved in disobedience, to aban- 
 doning their sheep to the wolf. As soon as the fort- 
 night had expired, the gendarmes and national guards 
 began scouring the country for the purpose of hunting 
 out and seizing the refractory clergy. Every day priests 
 might be seen arriving at Rennes in the most deplorable 
 condition, many of them only half-clothed, for often they 
 had been hurried off with such precipitation that they 
 were not able to take even needful apparel. Among 
 them were aged men, eminent for their virtues, whose 
 grey hairs could not protect them from the grossest 
 insults ; others sick or infirm, and scarcely able to drag 
 themselves along, yet compelled to make the whole 
 journey on foot. Christian families opened their houses 
 to these confessors, and here at first they had the con- 
 solation of privately saying Mass ; this was also a great 
 boon to the faithful of the city, whose cures had been 
 banished to a distance of twelve miles. But soon the 
 
The interned priests. 159 
 
 schismatics perceived that the people resorted to these 
 houses, and were all the more angry that their own 
 churches remained deserted. Whereupon, they proceeded, 
 as usual, to rouse up the clubs, which, in their turn, 
 brought their influence to bear on the department, 
 demanding the incarceration of the priests. But in this 
 they were not for the time being altogether successful, 
 though the Directory charged the municipality to renew 
 its exertions in repressing all disturbance of the public 
 order ; an injunction which was quite sufficient to en- 
 courage every manner of persecution. 
 
 Accordingly, every house in which a priest had found 
 an asylum had now a mark of suspicion set upon it, 
 as had all who frequented it, who were often subjected 
 to barbarous ill-treatment. Heavy fines were inflicted 
 on priests for saying Mass, as well as on those who 
 attended it. Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament was 
 likewise interdicted. But these were by no means the 
 only vexations. The priests, with a view to economy, 
 were in the habit of having their meals in common ; 
 this practice was now forbidden, and at the same time 
 they were prohibited from associating together, whether 
 indoors or out of doors, in any number exceeding three, 
 on pain of imprisonment. Soon they were debarred 
 the liberty of walking beyond the city, and were required 
 to present themselves twice a day before the municipality 
 at appointed times. When the heat became excessive, 
 they were allowed the shelter of a small apartment, so 
 small that it was often crammed to suffocation, and in 
 this stove-like atmosphere they had not unfrequently to 
 wait whole hours. Yet, if they showed themselves in 
 the streets, it was only to encounter insult, and they 
 could rarely reach the municipality without having to 
 run the gauntlet of a derisive crowd. If one of them 
 was too ill to leave his lodging, a municipal would make 
 
160 The interned priests. 
 
 his appearance and compel him to get up and, if unable, 
 or, indeed, in any case, assail him with a volley of abuse. 
 Such for four months was the condition of two hundred 
 and fifty ecclesiastics belonging to Rennes and the 
 neighbouring districts. By-and-by it was to become 
 still more intolerable, preparatory to their final imprison- 
 ment and deportation. The priests at Nantes were treated 
 in a similar manner. It will be remembered that, by a 
 decree of January 25, the ejected cure's in the depart- 
 ment had been compelled to return to that city. Here, 
 also, they were restricted from walking in the country, 
 lest they should take occasion to minister to the spiritual 
 needs of persons living in the neighbourhood, and were 
 not permitted to go more than a mile and half from the 
 cathedral. Like their brethren at Rennes, they were 
 obliged to attend a muster-roll at the municipality twice 
 a day, the way to which was lined with a crowd of 
 people who loaded them with the coarsest abuse. This was 
 encouraged by their enemies in the hope that they might 
 be betrayed into some expression of irritation which 
 could be used against them ; but, these tactics having 
 failed, persons were suborned to approach them with 
 pretended tokens of sympathy and compassion, which 
 others, posted for the purpose, were to resent as an 
 affront to the authorities, and so get up the semblance 
 of a riot, which might be made matter of accusation 
 against the priests. 
 
 We have already related how Mgr. de Herce, Bishop 
 of Dol, had found himself compelled to retire from his 
 diocese to his relatives in the adjoining department 
 of Mayenne. That department formed one of the 
 new constitutional bishoprics under the name of Laval, 
 its chief town, and, together with those of Angers 
 and Mans, had been joined to the five bishoprics of 
 Brittany retained by the new arrangement, and placed 
 
Insult to Mgr. de Herce". 
 
 161 
 
 under the metropolitan of the North West, that is, 
 the schismatic bishop installed at Rennes. The ad- 
 ministration of Laval was not more tolerant than its 
 neighbours, and, indeed, had preceded that of Ille-et- 
 Vilaine in the race of persecution by summoning all 
 the non-juring priests habitually residing in the depart- 
 ment to repair to Laval within eight days. Unjust as 
 was this law, Mgr. de Herce - prepared to obey it, not- 
 withstanding the remonstrances of his family. ' God 
 forbid,' he said, ' that I should suffer so precious an 
 opportunity to escape me of confessing the Name of 
 Jesus Christ. I owe this example to the priests, and 
 shall be too happy to be their leader in captivity ; ' and 
 so he went with his brother, the Abbe' de Herce', and 
 M. Desvauponts, who were his two Vicars-General. 
 At Laval he met about four hundred priests of the 
 dioceses of Mans and Angers, who had been found 
 domiciled in the department of Mayenne. At first 
 they were simply forbidden to go beyond the limits 
 of the town, which thus became their prison, but they 
 were required to report themselves daily to the authori- 
 ties, and the official who presided on these occasions, 
 in calling out the names in succession, took particular 
 care, when the bishop's turn came, to style him plain 
 Herce. But this was by no means the only affront which 
 the prelate received ; on the contrary, he seemed to be 
 specially singled out for contemptuous treatment, of 
 which the following incident may be cited as an example. 
 Like the rest of the clergy, he had been compelled by 
 a new law to give up the sacerdotal dress, but had 
 still retained his pectoral cross. The eyes of the 
 ' patriots ' were offended at this symbol of episcopal 
 rank, and one of them had the insolence to bid an 
 infamous woman who was standing by go and tear it from 
 his neck. From this indignity, however, he was saved 
 l 25 
 
1 62 Royal mandates disregarded. 
 
 by the ecclesiastics who surrounded him; it was the 
 sole occasion upon which they resisted any act of 
 violence, for mere personal outrages they bore, not only 
 patiently, but willingly. The faithful of Laval, who had 
 vied with each other in showing these ecclesiastics all 
 the respect that was their due, would fain have shielded 
 them from maltreatment, even at the peril of their lives, 
 and numbers of times these worthy citizens came forward 
 to offer Mgr. Herce and his companions their protection 
 against the insults of the mob. But these generous 
 soldiers of Christ would not consent to lose one particle 
 of the glory of suffering in such a cause. ' Leave them 
 alone,' they would reply ; ' they know not the pleasure 
 they give us in adding to our merit as confessors of 
 the faith.' 
 
 All these proceedings, it should be observed, were 
 unauthorized by the existing law. It is true that they were 
 sanctioned by the Assembly's decree of the 29th of 
 November, but the King had refused to sign that decree, 
 and had also sent frequent proclamations into the pro- 
 vinces, enjoining perfect freedom of religious worship ; 
 but these royal mandates had met with no respect, except 
 in quarters where order was still preserved owing to 
 the circumstance that the departmental administrations 
 still numbered among them good and faithful men ; else- 
 where they seemed to serve no other purpose than that 
 of irritating the local authorities, who loudly denounced 
 them as obstructing the execution of measures which 
 were absolutely necessary for the maintenance of public 
 security. 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 The Legislative Assembly. Its antichristian 
 measures. 
 
 We are now approaching the time when the persecution 
 was to enter on a new and more terrible phase ; and it 
 could not be otherwise, considering the antichristian 
 character of the Assembly sitting in the capital. The 
 Constituent Assembly had, it is true, included in its 
 ranks men most hostile to Christianity, but the time had 
 not yet come for them to take the lead, or even to 
 manifest all their designs. The majority of that body, as 
 was before observed, did not aim at the destruction 
 of religion. Even men who were imbued with the 
 Voltairian philosophy, and were themselves unbelievers, 
 still reckoned that some religious faith and worship was 
 good for the people, but they desired that it should be a 
 religion and a worship which was subject to the control 
 of the State. This object the Assembly hoped it had 
 accomplished by framing the Civil Constitution of the 
 Clergy, but it had encountered an invincible obstacle in 
 the fidelity of the bishops and of the vast majority of the 
 priests, as well as in the repugnance of the masses. The 
 Assembly, then, had failed in creating a Church ; it had 
 only produced a schism. Now, however, circumstances 
 were changed. The Catholic clergy were crushed — 
 dispersed, imprisoned ; the members of the present 
 Assembly, with very few exceptions, were the avowed 
 
164 Project to destroy Christianity. 
 
 enemies of Christianity, the populace of the great towns 
 had been trained to impiety, and were ripe for any deed 
 of violence. No serious resistance was to be appre- 
 hended. As for what was styled the fanatical portion of 
 the community, it must be indoctrinated with new prin- 
 ciples or put down by force of arms. 
 
 Any one who had followed the debates in the Legis- 
 lative Assembly at that time would have clearly seen 
 that nothing less than the destruction of Christianity was 
 resolved upon. It is not to be supposed that that body 
 really believed in the culpability of the clergy, though it 
 suited its purpose to appear to credit the denunciations 
 taxing them with factious and seditious conduct. A few 
 may have been so far blinded, but the great majority 
 knew perfectly well the true state of the case, and 
 that the troubles in the provinces arose from the perti- 
 nacity with which it was attempted to force the con- 
 sciences of the people and impose on them a religion 
 which they abhorred. Some of the deputies, indeed, 
 free-thinkers as they were, but men of candour and 
 common sense, had the courage openly to declare their 
 conviction on this point, and to indicate the true sources 
 of the disturbances. The Assembly could not gainsay 
 their arguments, for they knew that this was the simple 
 truth ; but another motive was at work, which all such 
 reasoning failed to reach. What matter the guilt or 
 innocence of these men ? Christianity must be destroyed. 
 What to put in its place they had not as yet resolved, but 
 it was about this time that we begin to hear of ' the 
 Great Being,' the ' religion of nature,' ' civic altars,' and 
 meet with frequent allusions to a new worship, such as 
 primitive man was supposed to have offered before a 
 ' monstrous theocracy ' had been set up for the misery 
 and enslavement of the human race. 
 
 But to get rid of Christianity, the Catholic priests must 
 
Stppression of teaching bodies. 165 
 
 be got rid of, and so long as they remained on French 
 soil, this was clearly impossible ; the very sight of them 
 kept up the memory of the old faith. As for the new- 
 clergy, no one thought of them ; they would offer no 
 impediment. Accordingly the destruction of the ancient 
 clergy was a thing absolutely determined upon and 
 ostentatiously avowed by the Jacobins, for the clubs 
 were always more out-spoken than the Assembly. We 
 find the butcher Legendre, during a discussion on the 
 subject at the Jacobin Club, exclaiming in true slaughter- 
 house style, ' Let the refractory priest carry his head 
 to the scaffold or his body to the galleys.' With him 
 deportation was too mild a punishment. ' You exter- 
 minate noxious vermin,' he said ; ' you do not merely 
 remove them out of the way. When the gardener sees a 
 caterpillar, he puts his foot upon it.' 1 Such, then, was 
 the project of which we mark the development in the 
 beginning of the year 1792 — the extirpation of Chris- 
 tianity by the death or banishment of the whole priest- 
 hood of France. The troubles were simply a pretext, as 
 those who alleged them well knew, but it was necessary 
 to ^accuse and malign men whom it was resolved to 
 exterminate. The King, no doubt, would not consent to 
 sacrifice the clergy, therefore he too must go. 
 
 Besides the non-juring priests, however, there were the 
 teaching bodies, whom the existing laws did not affect 
 — Christian Brothers, who conducted primary education, 
 priests of the Oratory, who directed colleges, and the 
 Congregations of St. Sulpice and St. Lazare, who formed 
 the young clergy in the seminaries. Again, there were 
 learned ecclesiastical bodies, such as those of the Sorbonne 
 
 1 Legendre subsequently adopted more humane sentiments, and on 
 the final triumph of the Convention over the Terrorists, who, after 
 the fall of Robespierre, made several violent attempts to regain the 
 command of the Assembly, even proposed a law for restoring to the 
 families of innocent victims their confiscated property. 
 
1 66 Stippression of teaching bodies. 
 
 and of Navarre, and a great number of Congregations of 
 nuns devoted to the instruction of youth and the care of 
 the sick and poor. The Constituent Assembly had 
 excepted all educational and charitable congregations 
 when it had decreed the suppression of the religious 
 orders, though from the terms of the decree it appeared 
 that this toleration was only provisional. The Congrega- 
 tions of men devoted to higher education had, however, 
 become completely disorganized on account of the 
 refusal of their superiors and professors to take the oath, 
 and the Lazarists and Sulpicians were in the same con- 
 dition. All that could be said to be in practical opera- 
 tion were the Congregations dedicated to primary 
 instruction, the Christian Brothers and the communities 
 of women. Great efforts were made, as we have seen, 
 by the constitutional clergy, after their installation, to 
 prevail on these religious communities to acknowledge 
 their authority, but in this they had signally failed. The 
 continued vexations to which they had been since 
 exposed had not shaken the courage of these religious 
 women ; but although as yet no legislative enactment 
 had been passed against them, the authorities afforded 
 them no protection. Municipal officers entered their 
 convents at all hours under one pretext or another ; the 
 nuns were continually obliged to appear in person before 
 the tribunals in order to obtain a certificate that they 
 were alive and entitled to their pension ; next they 
 were deprived of their chaplains, and schismatic priests 
 were sent to say Mass in their chapels ; but the religious 
 invariably absented themselves and practised their devo- 
 tions apart. Nor were other and more violent measures 
 spared. The history of those times abounds in examples ; 
 as, for instance, at La Rochelle, where bands of armed 
 men burst into the convents, summoning the nuns to 
 take the oath of fidelity to the schismatic bishop, and, 
 
Stippression of teaching bodies. 167 
 
 on their refusal, brutally insulting and even flogging 
 them. But what is strangest of all is to find the lower 
 orders lending themselves as instruments in the attack 
 on those holy women who had been their special bene- 
 factors, devoted, as they were, to the service of the sick, 
 the poor, and the fatherless. Thus the daughters of 
 St. Vincent de Paul had been compelled to abandon 
 fifty of their houses in consequence of the increasing 
 persecution and outrage to which they were exposed. 
 
 In the eyes of the present Assembly the Congrega- 
 tions which imparted religious instruction to the children 
 of the poor were specially obnoxious, because they 
 were engaged in implanting the very principles which 
 it aimed at extirpating. True, these poor women could 
 not be accused of exciting religious disturbances, never- 
 theless the question of their suppression was declared 
 to be one of ' urgency for public order,' or, as a deputy 
 more frankly stated the case, it was urgent to suppress 
 these Congregations, because they diffused through the 
 country and instilled into the minds of children 'the 
 poison of aristocracy and fanaticism ;.' that is, they taught 
 a religion which it was desired to destroy. And so, on 
 the 6th of April, a decree of the Legislative Assembly 
 abolished all Congregations, whether of men or women, 
 engaged in education, as well as all that were devoted to 
 the care of the sick. To his credit, be it said, the schismatic 
 bishop of Ille-et-Vilaine, Le Coz, raised his voice against 
 this measure of wholesale destruction. ' Surrounded as 
 we are with ruins,' he exclaimed, ' will you destroy still 
 more?' To which a deputy replied that there was no 
 question as to the suppression, but simply as to the mode ; 
 meaning that the measure itself had been definitively 
 resolved upon long before. ' You deprive six hundred 
 thousand children of the means of learning how to read 
 and write,' retorted Le Coz; but he was told that the 
 
1 68 Ecclesiastical dress prohibited. 
 
 Directory would see to that. On the same day, which 
 was Good Friday, a law was passed forbidding the 
 wearing of any ecclesiastical and religious dress. It was 
 proposed by Tome, the constitutional bishop of Bourges, 
 formerly a Court preacher, now an enthusiastic Jacobin. 
 He said that this abolition was a matter of political 
 importance, though superficial persons might regard it as 
 ' a paltry question of toilet.' If, when the religious 
 bodies had all been suppressed, people were to see 
 these costumes gliding about, they would seem like so 
 many shades. Would not these posthumous decora- 
 tions be so many stepping-stones to the counter-revolu- 
 tion ? This mingled imagery of gliding costumes, 
 shades, posthumous decorations, and stepping-stones 
 threw the Assembly into a fever of enthusiasm. Vociferous 
 cries demanded an immediate vote, and when a member 
 gravely remarked that they could not vote before they 
 had time to reflect, a sentiment so antiquated evoked 
 only bursts of laughter. Another deputy ventured to 
 suggest some prudential reasons against the measure, but 
 he was speedily talked down, and the abolition was voted 
 almost unanimously. Fauchet, the schismatic bishop 
 of Calvados, hastened to take off his calotte (clerical cap) 
 and to put it in his pocket, and Gaivernon, the schisma- 
 tic bishop of Limoges, laid his pectoral cross on the 
 bureau, as a patriotic gift, while Tome indicated by signifi- 
 cant gestures his regret that, not having his own about 
 him, he was unable to make a similar offering. At the 
 same time, the priests took off their bands. All this was 
 done amidst a tumult of applause. 
 
 It was well known that the King would not sanc- 
 tion the late decrees, but this was only an additional 
 motive for enacting them. The Assembly desired to 
 extract another veto from him in furtherance of their 
 own designs. In the meantime his consent was practi- 
 
Decree of deportation. 169 
 
 cally dispensed with, and the law was punctually obeyed 
 in those departments and communes where the Jacobin 
 party was master. Indeed, many departments had been 
 beforehand with the law ; for instance, the Lazarists of 
 Vannes had already, without any assignable reason, been 
 turned out of doors, in the depth of winter, at eight o'clock 
 in the evening ; but the decree of the Assembly came to 
 give a fresh impulse to the zeal of the authorities. All 
 who remained of the teaching bodies were speedily 
 dispersed, and the children of the poor abandoned to 
 ignorance and vice. Still the clergy had to be got 
 rid of, and fresh calumnies must be invented, fresh crimes 
 laid to their charge, to authorize more decisive measures 
 against the non-jurors ; the land must be swept clean 
 of their presence. The King would certainly again inter- 
 pose his veto ; so much the better. The clubs and 
 revolutionary press would be lashed into fury by his 
 refusal, and thus the ruin of the throne, as well as of the 
 altar, would be facilitated. The programme was carried 
 out. On May 24, we find a Breton deputy, a doctor of 
 Morlaix, declaring that, at the instigation of the priests, a 
 man had murdered his wife, his children, and his father- 
 in-law because they followed the constitutional cure'. It 
 is needless to say that this absurd accusation was but a 
 text for declaiming against the faithful clergy. Several 
 severe measures were suggested by different deputies, 
 amongst whom figured two Breton lawyers. The pro- 
 posal of Guadet, deputy of Bordeaux, an avowed unbe- 
 liever, was finally accepted. Deportation was decreed 
 on the denouncement of twenty citizens, provided the 
 opinion of the district were in accordance therewith. If 
 not, there was to be an examination by the department, 
 in order to verify the assertion that the presence of these 
 ecclesiastics was prejudicial to public tranquillity. 
 
 The King, although he had lately manifested his 
 
170 
 
 The King's veto. 
 
 habitual weakness by consenting to the disbanding of 
 his own guard, a body of six thousand men, thus leaving 
 himself helplessly exposed to the rage of his enemies, had 
 the courage to refuse his sanction to this persecuting 
 law, although he was importuned and even menaced by 
 his ministry. The murmurs of the revolutionists were 
 now heard on all sides, and the Directory of Morbihan 
 had even the impertinence to write to Louis, taking him 
 to task for his opposition to a salutary law, universally 
 demanded by the public safety. They concluded by 
 telling him that even were they to perish victims of the 
 insufficiency of the law, they would have the courage to 
 supply for its absence until the King consented to 
 accede to the general desire by sanctioning the decrees 
 of the 25th and 26th of May. It did not require much 
 courage to brave the powerless monarch or to persecute the 
 unresisting priests. But such was the style of the day. It 
 attained its object; for none are more credulous than 
 the ignorant populace, none more ready to believe in the 
 existence of horrible conspiracies and of traitors in 
 disguise; and the unreasoning panic of the multitude 
 is the too frequent prelude of violence and bloodshed. 
 Every measure had been taken to pull down the feeble 
 barriers which still surrounded the throne, and Louis, 
 seeing his ministry constantly assailed, had sought pro- 
 tection by throwing himself into the party of his enemies, 
 and choosing his administration from among the Giron- 
 dists, in the hopes of either gaining them over or lessen- 
 ing their influence by opposing them to the Jacobins, in 
 all which he completely failed. In this ministry there are 
 only two names which have been much remembered; that 
 of Roland, who was completely under the influence of his 
 wife, the famous Madame Roland — both, however, equally 
 animated by a deep hatred against Christianity — and that 
 of Dumouriez, who was the best man of the set. He was 
 
Fury of the Jacobins. 
 
 171 
 
 an energetic and courageous general, and at that moment 
 immensely popular for having caused war to be declared 
 against Austria. Dumouriez honestly desired to protect 
 the King, as, indeed, did two or three more of the 
 ministers, who, brought into near relations with him, 
 could not withhold their personal esteem. On Louis 
 sending for Dumouriez to consult him as to the forma- 
 tion of a new ministry, he reminded the King that a 
 sanction of the decree of deportation was but the con- 
 sequence of the law to which he had formerly consented. 
 Bitter, indeed, to Louis must these words have been. 
 He did not attempt to excuse himself. ' I committed a 
 great fault then,' he said ; ' and I reproach myself with 
 it.' Dumouriez represented to him that by his refusal 
 he would not save religion, but would endanger himself, 
 his crown, and his family. Louis was affected even to 
 tears, but this time he held firm. ' I expect death,' 
 he replied sadly; 'and I forgive my enemies before- 
 hand.' 
 
 The terrible 20th of June, that day of mortal agony to 
 the royal family, when the mob invaded the Tuileries, 
 was soon to follow, but it does not come within the 
 scope of this narrative to describe the horrors enacted in 
 the capital. All through the provinces the Jacobins 
 were exciting a furious agitation against 'refractory 
 priests,' whom the King's veto, they said, was shielding 
 from punishment. Everywhere they were hunted out, 
 ill-treated, and imprisoned. The south of France espe- 
 cially was the scene of many cruel deeds. Men went 
 about armed with scourges of ox-tendons, beating and 
 laming priests, women, and even children. In some 
 places they fired upon such as they saw entering any 
 Catholic chapel. The Cure of Sainte-Marguerite was 
 slain at the foot of the altar, and another priest of the 
 same place was likewise murdered. Many citizens were 
 
172 Priests imprisoned at Rennes. 
 
 also butchered for attempting to check these outrages. 
 But we must limit ourselves to Brittany. The Jacobins 
 were not idle there. At their instigation the department of 
 Finisterre passed a fresh law on the 1st of July, which left 
 the priests the sole alternative of deportation or imprison- 
 ment. It quoted the recent crime committed, as it said, 
 at their instigation, which had been brought before the 
 Assembly as a proof of their fanaticism. The accusation 
 was the more preposterous that the man in question had 
 acted under the delirium of fever, and was acquitted, on 
 trial, of having had any deliberate or voluntary purpose. 
 Other calumnies, equally absurd, were propagated, and 
 the entrance of the Prussian armies furnished a fresh 
 source of invective, as every priest was held to be a 
 sympathizer with the enemies of the nation. 
 
 But, great as was their present suffering, the position of 
 the priests was to be far worse after the 10th of August, the 
 day on which Louis XVI., a dethroned king, was con- 
 signed, with his family, to the prison of the Temple. The 
 protection with which the sovereign's name surrounded 
 the clergy had been but feeble, yet it had acted as some 
 check on the rage of their enemies, as was proved when 
 the royal authority was annulled. No sooner had the 
 news reached Rennes, on the 12th, than the fury of the 
 mob exhibited itself in the most terrible menaces against 
 the priests. Their death was loudly demanded that 
 evening at the Jacobin Club, and when, on the following 
 morning, they found the streets full of troops as they pro- 
 ceeded to the Hotel de Ville to answer their daily 
 summons, they immediately apprehended that they were 
 themselves the objects of this military demonstration. 
 A joiner had usually called the muster-roll, but on this 
 occasion he was replaced by a ci-devant doctor, holding 
 some municipal office. He kept them long enough to 
 allow a crowd to collect, and then in a short and brutal 
 
Their sufferings. 
 
 173 
 
 speech taunted them with disorderly conduct and breach 
 of the law, after which, rising abruptly, he bade them 
 follow him. They did so, ignorant of their destination, 
 and, passing through a bristling hedge of National 
 Guards, issued into the street. After having been 
 paraded about the town, making long halts at different 
 places, they were lodged, two hundred and fifty in 
 number, in the Abbey of Saint-Melaine, which had been 
 converted into a prison. The place was empty of every- 
 thing, provisions included, and many had not yet broken 
 their fast. They had long to wait for any food, but 
 what they felt more than any bodily privation was their 
 being denied the liberty of saying Mass. The muni- 
 cipality decided that there was no room for deliberation 
 on this point. They were also refused the very neces- 
 sary refreshment of air in the abbey garden, and cannon 
 was planted close to the building, the sentinels 
 receiving strict orders to fire on any who should even 
 show themselves at the windows facing the town. It 
 was the height of summer, and the daily arrival of other 
 prisoners to occupy the already crowded space was a 
 great aggravation to their sufferings. Add to this, that 
 every effort was made to embitter their captivity. Muni- 
 cipal officers and soldiers would enter to insult them 
 while they were collected at meal-time ; and, what was 
 worse, their guards seem to have conspired together 
 to deprive them of sleep at night, by singing obscene 
 songs and shouting out hideous blasphemies in their 
 hearing, mingled with threats of death, especially against 
 two of their number well known in the place for their 
 abundant alms. They would also fire off their muskets, 
 or rap loudly on planks placed there for the purpose. 
 One of these ruffians was overheard one evening saying 
 to his companion, who was yelling with all his might, 
 ' Hold your tongue ; wait till they have gone to bed. 
 
174 Priests arrested and instdted. 
 
 If you tire yourself now, we shall not be able to keep 
 them awake.' They would even enter the dormitories 
 at night, and go round, lantern in hand, which they 
 would put close to the faces of the captives as they 
 slept or were striving to sleep, taking a fiendish plea- 
 sure in startling them, and telling them, with bursts of 
 derisive laughter, that they had come in to see if they 
 were comfortable. At last the abbey would contain no 
 more, and then the Church of Saint-Melaine was also 
 used as a prison. 
 
 The patriots of Nantes were similarly excited by the 
 events of the ioth of August. There also the populace 
 clamoured for blood. The number of the imprisoned 
 was soon swelled by the arrival of nearly four hundred 
 ecclesiastics from the departments of Sarthe and Maine- 
 et-Loire. They had been cruelly ill-used on the road, 
 particularly at Angers, and robbed of nearly all they 
 had about them. They were tied two and two together, 
 and thus marched along, the commander of the troop 
 ordering his soldiers to load their muskets and fire on 
 any who deviated from the straight line. No attempt 
 was made to shield them from the gross insults of the 
 mob, which, indeed, was got together for the very object. 
 At Ancenis, where they were shut up in a small chapel 
 for the night, an ingenious cruelty had suggested the 
 painting of death's heads and poniards on the walls, 
 coupled with sanguinary inscriptions. About midnight, 
 two members of the Jacobin Club burst into the chapel, 
 one of whom was at the head of forty armed men, who 
 were ordered to mount into the gallery and load their 
 muskets with three balls ; the other meanwhile ascended 
 the pulpit, where he gave vent to the most appalling 
 blasphemies against God, and the vilest insults against 
 the priests. They were constrained to listen in silence. 
 A word, a gesture, would have been the signal of death to 
 
The September massacres. 
 
 175 
 
 them. The National Guard, stationed to receive them at 
 Nantes, were animated by some feelings of humanity. 
 They loosened their bonds, and received them kindly. 
 Shut up in the Castle, a municipal officer visited them to 
 propose to them to take the oath of liberty and equality, 
 but neither threats nor promises could move them. This 
 new oath had been decreed by the Assembly subse- 
 quently to the King's dethronement, in order to prepare 
 men's minds for the establishment of the Republic. It 
 was thus worded : ' I swear to be faithful to the nation, 
 and to maintain liberty and equality to the utmost of 
 my power.' Some theologians considered that this oath 
 might be taken without injury to conscience, but the 
 greater number absolutely rejected it. 
 
 The fury of the revolutionists in Paris now knew no 
 bounds, exasperated as they were by the advance of the 
 foreign armies and the news of the siege of Verdun 
 by the Duke of Brunswick. Levies were being rapidly 
 made, and the Jacobins insisted that the citizens march- 
 ing towards the frontier ought not to leave behind them 
 the enemies of liberty. The detestable project was then 
 formed of massacring the clergy and the 1 aristocrats ' 
 detained in the different prisons of the capital. The 
 incarcerated priests were very numerous, for a great 
 many had flocked in from the country, believing that 
 they would find greater facilities for concealment in 
 so large a city. The monsters who had resolved on 
 their death thirsted for gain as much as for blood, and 
 accordingly they suggested to them that it would be well 
 to provide themselves with all the money they could 
 procure, as they were about to be deported. The 2nd 
 and 3rd of September were the days fixed for the horrible 
 butchery, which took place in all the prisons of Paris, 
 and continued even during the following day. Many 
 Breton priests were numbered among the martyrs, and 
 
176 
 
 Ejection of nuns. 
 
 two 2 were among the few who escaped ; but into the 
 details of these frightful scenes we shall not enter. 
 Suffice it to say that the victims of the September 
 massacre, reckoning priests and religious alone, are 
 estimated at no less than one thousand and eighty-six. 
 
 The terrible days of September coincided with the 
 meeting of the electoral bodies for choosing deputies to 
 the new Chamber, which, under the name of the Con- 
 vention, was to supersede the Legislative Assembly. It 
 can easily be imagined that, aided by the excitement of 
 recent events and the influence of the all-powerful clubs, 
 the most advanced revolutionists were elected. It was 
 under these gloomy auspices, which the future was too 
 fully to verify, that the Convention commenced its 
 sittings on the 21st of September, and its very first act 
 was to decree the abolition of royalty in France. 
 
 When the Constituent Assembly had proscribed 
 religious vows and dissolved the monasteries, it had 
 permitted those religious who still desired to live in 
 community to remain in some house belonging to their 
 Order, not allowing them, however, to retain more than 
 one house in each department. This state of things 
 continued until the month of August, 1792. But the 
 Revolution had made fearful progress since the period 
 when this indulgence had been granted. On the 4th, 
 a deputy had proposed a decree for the evacuation and 
 sale of the religious houses. It was adopted, and by 
 this barbarous enactment fifty thousand persons (to 
 reckon nuns alone) who had devoted themselves to the 
 service of God, and who believed that they had secured 
 an asylum for the rest of their days, were thrown helpless 
 
 2 One of these, M. Le Roux, was saved by giving his watch to a 
 National Guard ; the other, M. de Kerevenant, also confined at the 
 Carmes, contrived to escape and hide himself in a loft. Both of these 
 priests returned to France when religion was restored. 
 
Their utter destitution. 177 
 
 and destitute on the world. True, a small pension had 
 been promised to them, but soon it was to become 
 impossible for them even to claim this pittance, for 
 an oath repugnant to their consciences was made the 
 condition of its payment. No attempt was made to 
 provide these women with so much as a temporary 
 shelter, nor were they allowed to take away even the 
 most necessary articles which belonged to them. Many 
 were so aged, that they had no longer living relatives 
 with whom they could seek a refuge ; others had none 
 who were accessible. Such was the case of a Canadian, 
 an Ursuline of Vannes, who, ejected from her convent, 
 knew not whither to turn. She sat down sadly on a stone ; 
 providentially a charitable lady observed her, and com- 
 passionately took her to her own home. The expulsion 
 of most of the communities took place in October. 
 Many of the nuns in Brittany sought an asylum in farm- 
 houses inhabited by good Christians, where they laboured 
 with their hands, edifying all who knew them by their 
 virtues. Their conscientious observance of their religious 
 rule, so far as circumstances permitted, gave the lie to 
 the assertions of the revolutionists, who had represented 
 them as captives sighing for their liberty. Their con- 
 sequent irritation against these holy women was to 
 manifest itself later, when they were to be sought out 
 and cast into prison. The Urbanist of Fougeres, well 
 known under the name of Soeur Nativite, was amongst 
 the ejected nuns of Brittany. Ten years before the date 
 of the Revolution, at a time when no one would have 
 credited its possibility, this holy girl had visions of the 
 persecution which religion was to undergo in France. 
 She made them known to her confessor, who committed 
 them to writing at the time. The only community of 
 women spared for the present were the Hospitalieres, 
 whose care of the sick rendered their services very valu- 
 m 25 
 
178 Deportation of priests. 
 
 able, but soon revolutionary fanaticism was to disregard 
 every consideration, not only of individual right, but of 
 public utility, and they were to be forced to abandon 
 the hospitals where, at the cost of every sacrifice save 
 that of conscience, these generous-hearted women had 
 persevered in their arduous labours so long as it was 
 possible for them to remain. 
 
 On the 7th of September, the priests imprisoned at 
 Rennes were given their choice between taking the oath 
 of liberty and equality and deportation. One and all 
 refused it ; even the aged and infirm, whom the law of 
 deportation had expressly excepted, preferred sharing 
 expatriation with their brethren to profiting by their 
 temporary exemption. Although the priests earnestly 
 begged for a delay of twenty-four hours to arrange their 
 affairs, they were mercilessly hurried off to Saint-Malo 
 at once, most of them by tens and tens on carts such 
 as were used for conveying criminals, and exposed during 
 the whole journey to the insults, not only of the rabble, 
 but of their guards, who tortured their ears with 
 obscenities and blasphemies. On Friday they were 
 offered only flesh meat, but, suffering as they were in 
 the cause of the Church, they would not, even under 
 such circumstances, hold themselves dispensed from 
 observing her precepts, and, save for the kindness of 
 some of the good people of Tinteniac, they must have 
 kept an absolute fast that day. On the morrow, when 
 halting at mid-day at Chateauneuf, the prisoners were 
 placed on the glacis in a blazing sun and offered no 
 refreshment. The inhabitants were afraid to notice 
 them. At last, a woman approached them with some 
 provisions, and then others took courage and followed 
 her example. Such are mere specimens of the studied 
 inhumanity with which these priests were treated, but 
 many a time they had reason besides to expect imrae- 
 
Deportation of priests. 179 
 
 diate death, a fate which befell numbers of their brethren 
 in other parts of France on their way to the ports. 
 Indeed, in the capital there was a regular plot among 
 the Jacobins to get them assassinated on their road 
 by the ferocious hordes which they had at their disposal, 
 and the passports with which they were furnished were 
 jocularly called by the sanguinary Manuel, 3 'passports 
 of death.' And so they proved to many, who were 
 cruelly murdered, some being literally hacked to pieces, 
 while others, again, were wantonly mutilated. 
 
 The Breton prisoners, however, reached Saint-Malo 
 alive, and were immediately shipped on board two 
 vessels, the captains of which were almost compelled 
 by the authorities to put to sea in spite of the stormy 
 weather. Before embarkation, they had been again 
 searched, and the rest of their money taken from them, 
 bills of exchange on Jersey being given them instead, 
 but, as these were not at once negotiable, they arrived 
 in that island in a state of complete destitution. The 
 priests of the C6tes-du-Nord, detained in the Chateau 
 of Dinan, were also sent off to Jersey. After the 
 September massacres in Paris, the particulars of these 
 horrible events were read to them, and they were 
 menaced with the same fate. Under this expectation 
 they remained until the 20th, when thirty-eight were 
 selected, and hurried off for embarkation at Saint-Servan. 
 The vessel encountered a tremendous storm, and, being 
 dragged from its anchors in the roads of Dinan, was in 
 great peril during the night of driving upon the rocks. 
 With the return of day the tempest abated, but the con- 
 dition of the priests, huddled together and shut down in 
 the hold, where they were nearly stifled for want of air 
 and utterly exhausted by sea-sickness, moved the com- 
 passion of the captain, who, believing them unable to 
 
 3 Procureur-Syndic of the Commune of Paris. 
 
180 Deportation of priests. 
 
 make the voyage without some previous rest, desired to 
 put them ashore for a while at Saint-Malo. But the 
 authorities would not permit the vessel to enter the port, 
 and even threatened to fire upon and sink it if it did 
 not pursue its course. The captain then steered for 
 Saint-Servan, where the poor captives were allowed to 
 disembark, and were kindly provided for by the in- 
 habitants. They were finally landed at Jersey on the 
 26th. Thither the priests continued to flock during the 
 months of September and October, for many who were 
 still at large voluntarily sought refuge in that island on 
 account of its vicinity to France. They cannot at that 
 time have been far short of a thousand in number. 
 Later, the priests collected in Jersey amounted to no 
 less than four thousand. They were received with the 
 utmost kindness, and had the consolation of finding one 
 of their own bishops, Mgr. Le Mintier, settled in the 
 island, God in His goodness seeming thus to have pro- 
 vided them with a helpful resource in the hour of their 
 utmost need. 
 
 Space forbids us to follow the confessors in their exile. 
 Many, as is well known, found a refuge in England, and 
 Catholic France has never forgotten her debt of gratitude 
 to this country for the generosity and hospitality which 
 it extended to her priesthood. Many a prayer has in 
 consequence ascended for England to the throne of 
 mercy, and has powerfully helped, we doubt not, to 
 bring down the numerous graces of conversion which 
 have been witnessed in our day. The priests detained 
 at Nantes, who were professedly at liberty to choose 
 their place of exile, desired to be taken to England, but 
 their wish was disregarded, and they were transported, 
 four hundred in number, to Spain. Those exempted 
 from deportation through age or infirmities remained in 
 the Castle, where they were afterwards among the victims 
 
Deportation of priests. 1 8 1 
 
 of Carrier's ferocity. Spain became the asylum also of 
 the priests of Vannes, and of many others who volun- 
 tarily sought shelter there. The respect, nay, veneration 
 with which they were received by the populations of that 
 Catholic land must have contrasted strangely with the 
 treatment to which they had been used of late. The 
 bishops and clergy of Spain showed them all sympathy 
 and kindness, and supplied their wants with an exceeding 
 charity. Many found a refuge in other lands, but the 
 greater number congregated either in Jersey or in the 
 parts of Spain bordering on France, for they were under 
 the mistaken impression that the present violent state of 
 things could not last, and wished to be at hand to re- 
 enter their country as soon as circumstances might 
 permit. 
 
CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 The Reign of Terror. 
 
 It would be difficult adequately to describe the affliction 
 of the faithful Catholics of France when they saw their 
 pastors departing and themselves deprived of all those 
 means of grace and of spiritual consolation which the 
 Church provides for her children through their ministry. 
 Brittany especially, notwithstanding the persecution, had 
 up to this period continued to enjoy, albeit under great 
 difficulties, the ministration of many of her priests, for it 
 had been impossible hitherto to provide schismatical 
 cure's for all the parishes, and thus a good number of the 
 rural districts had been able to preserve their true shep- 
 herds. Hither Catholics from other parts resorted for 
 the supply of their spiritual needs, but when the proscrip- 
 tion became general this resource was no longer available. 
 The desolation of so Catholic a country as Brittany 
 under these circumstances may be readily conceived. 
 There were even persons, we are told, who actually went 
 out of their minds from grief or who sank and died 
 under the crushing affliction. Nevertheless, the number 
 of clergy who still remained in France was considerable, 
 and in Brittany there were perhaps few parishes of any 
 great size which did not harbour one non-juring priest, 
 sometimes more. Needless it is to say that they were 
 obliged to observe the utmost precautions. In the 
 country, woods, caves of the earth, abandoned quarries 
 
Priests in hidi}ig. 
 
 183 
 
 and mines, often served them for shelter, at other times 
 the humble cottage of some peasant or the out-house 
 of a farm ; while by day a field of standing corn or the 
 rushes of some stagnant pond would afford them its 
 friendly cover when the priest-hunters were prowling 
 near. In the towns concealment was more difficult, 
 for their enemies were Argus-eyed and never rested ; but 
 here also the ingenuity of the faithful devised many 
 hiding-places in the walls, ceilings, chimneys, and even 
 in the furniture of their houses, which many a time 
 defied the closest search of the domiciliary visitors. 
 
 The priests were always carefully disguised, and it was 
 usually only by night that they went out to administer 
 the sacraments. When Mass was said anywhere, it was 
 generally an hour or two before the first streaks of dawn 
 were visible. The Abbe Tresvaux relates how he had 
 often been present when the Adorable Sacrifice was 
 offered in some cottage, either in a garret the roof of 
 which was in a complete state of decay, or down 
 in a cellar ; a table such as is usually found in the 
 peasants' cots serving as the altar, with a sheet hung up 
 behind it instead of a reredos ; 1 these, with the neces- 
 sary vessels for the Holy Sacrifice reduced to a portable 
 form, were the sole furniture of the improvised chapel. 
 The faithful in repairing to the place made long circuits 
 to avoid notice, none spoke above their breath, and they 
 took their departure in the same stealthy way. When 
 danger was less apprehended these meetings would some- 
 times be held in the daytime, but always with the strictest 
 
 1 Father Sweeney, in his Lecture on the present persecution in Swit- 
 zerland, gives a picture of a similar scene at Porrentruy, where the 
 Catholics, driven from their own parish church by an infidel Govern- 
 ment, assembled, to the number of 4,000, and heard Mass in a barn 
 outside the town. 'A table served as an altar, and the only decoration 
 was a white sheet nailed against the wall to serve as a reredos' (Switzer- 
 land in iSj6, p. 32). 
 
I 84 
 
 The Vendean rising. 
 
 care to elude observation. The windows were carefully 
 darkened, so that the feeble light of the candles burning 
 on the altar might not be visible outside. It was under 
 circumstances such as these, which recalled the worship 
 of the primitive Christians in the Catacombs of Rome, 
 that the priests of France, for well-nigh ten years, cele- 
 brated Mass at the peril of their lives, and thus kept 
 alight the torch of faith in their unhappy country. So 
 great was the devotion of these generous men, that the 
 same Abbe' is able to declare that he knew not one who 
 ever thought of abandoning his position, while, on the 
 other hand, he was acquainted with several who, having 
 been deported in September, returned, towards the close 
 of the year, to share the labours and perils of their 
 brethren. 
 
 Although open persecution had now begun against 
 the Catholic clergy, yet there were few victims in Brittany 
 before the beginning of the year 1793. The revolu- 
 tionists believed that they had made a total clearance of 
 the ' refractory priests,' and that all whom they had not 
 shipped off had betaken themselves to voluntary exile, so 
 sedulously had those who remained concealed their in- 
 tention and subsequent hiding-places. One of these 
 happening to die about this time caused a worthy family 
 at Saint-Brieuc which had harboured him much embar- 
 rassment. They were afraid, and with good reason, of 
 reporting his death, so they placed his body by night 
 at the corner of a street with his name affixed, and thus 
 avoided compromising themselves. 
 
 The trial and execution of the King excited profound 
 indignation among the Breton people, and added to the 
 hatred they already felt for the revolution and its abettors 
 on account of the many vexations and sufferings which 
 they had personally endured. We are now approaching 
 the time of the Vendean rising, in which, however, 
 
A conspiracy detected. 185 
 
 Brittany took but a partial share, those districts which 
 bordered on the scene of the conflict alone being actively 
 implicated. The incidents of this heroic struggle have 
 found several historians, whose narratives, of course, 
 include the events which took place on the soil of 
 Brittany. Our object, however, being to record the 
 sufferings of the many Breton martyrs and confessors, 
 especially of those who, not having figured on the 
 political or any other public stage, have left no record 
 save in tradition or in the narratives of some of their 
 contemporaries, we shall not follow the course of those 
 events except so far as they are connected with our 
 immediate undertaking. As regards even the horrors 
 perpetrated by Carrier at Nantes we shall be brief, 
 because they may be found amply detailed in so many 
 histories of the time. A conspiracy conceived and orga- 
 nized by a Breton gentleman, M. de la Roirie, failed 
 owing to his death occurring while he was staying at the 
 house of his friend, M. de la Guyomarais. An indiscreet 
 confidence made by a young man who had gone to Paris 
 placed the secret of the plot in the hands of Government, 
 and led to the apprehension of M. de la Guyomarais, 
 together with his family and several friends, who were 
 all sent to the capital to be arraigned before the Revolu- 
 tionary Tribunal which the Convention had lately insti- 
 tuted, and which, during the sixteen months of its 
 existence, was to shed so much innocent blood. La 
 Guyomarais with his wife was condemned to death, the 
 children being spared, as too young to be accused of 
 plotting against the State. Fourteen persons, all Bretons 
 except one, suffered under the same charge, including 
 the priest who acted as preceptor to the children, and 
 two young ladies, one of whom, Madame de la Fonchais, 
 had not been in any way connected with the conspiracy. 
 It was a sister-in-law who had taken part in it, but 
 
1 86 The priests and the Vendeans. 
 
 Madame de la Fonchais could not exonerate herself 
 without implicating her, and preferred to die. 
 
 Although La Roirie's plot had been thus defeated, 
 risings took place throughout all that region included 
 between Nantes and the Poitou, which is designated as 
 Le Bocage. The district round Pontivy took up arms 
 about the same time, as also did that of Lamballe. It 
 has been the habit of historians who were partial to the 
 principles of the Revolution, and would fain gloss over 
 some of its most execrable deeds, to palliate the atrocious 
 treatment of the priests by attributing the war in La 
 Vendee and in Brittany to their instigation. Assuredly, 
 if ever insurrection were justifiable, it was that of La 
 Vende'e, directed as it was against the impious and 
 sanguinary men who had usurped the authority of the 
 State, had murdered the legitimate sovereign, and were 
 labouring to abolish Christianity throughout the land; 
 but, as a matter of fact, the charge is utterly untrue, as a 
 moment's reflection might show. The greater number 
 of the clergy were in exile, many in prison, while those 
 who were at large sedulously concealed themselves, their 
 hiding-place being known only to a few discreet persons. 
 The Abbe says that he saw many a concealed priest 
 during those terrible days, but never did he meet with 
 one who had any relations with the insurgents save for 
 the purposes of his sacred ministry. To emerge from 
 their retreats was, indeed, almost certain to cost them 
 their lives. Witness the case of M. Cran, the Vicaire of 
 Boue. He had remained hidden in his parish, secretly 
 ministering to the spiritual needs of his flock, when he 
 was urged by the leaders of the Catholic army to go to 
 Savenay and bless a white banner. He behaved on that 
 occasion like a worthy member of the Church, exhorting 
 the youth in arms to bring no dishonour on their cause 
 by an evil life, and ever to show compassion and a 
 
Republican atrocities. 
 
 187 
 
 forgiving spirit. He then returned to his asylum, but 
 it had now become known to the revolutionists, who 
 arrested him and conveyed him to Nantes, where he was 
 condemned and executed on the same day. Some 
 priests, of course, accompanied the Vendean army : how 
 should it be otherwise ? These Christian heroes, who 
 fought for the cause of faith and justice, could not be 
 deprived of spiritual aid ; accordingly, they had chaplains 
 with them to whom they ever manifested the greatest 
 respect. Moreover, when the Vendean army passed to 
 the right bank of the Loire, the mass of the population 
 followed in their train in order to escape from the 
 barbarity of the republican soldiers, who were ravaging 
 the country with fire and sword. No alternative was 
 left to the concealed priests but to do as the rest or 
 remain to meet certain death. 
 
 It is much to be deplored that some acts of shocking 
 cruelty disgraced the rising in Brittany in a few of the 
 cantons. The treasured wrath of these ill-used popu- 
 lations, outraged in all they held most dear and sacred, 
 found vent in some terrible reprisals, but, with the excep- 
 tion of these crimes, committed in the exasperation of 
 the first outbreak, few acts of inhumanity are recorded 
 of the insurgents, while those of the republicans were 
 so horrible, that the pen, as our authority, the Abbd 
 Tresvaux, tells us, often refuses to describe them. About 
 this time, two priests of the diocese of Saint-Malo, M. Le 
 Moine and M. Barre, were butchered by the republican 
 soldiers. They were together in the bourg of La Chapelle- 
 Bouexic when the alarm was given of the approach of 
 an armed band. They hastened to seek shelter in a 
 neighbouring wood, but the soldiers caught a sight of 
 them running across the high road and fired at them. 
 M. Le Moine dropped, wounded in the shoulder, and 
 wished his companion to pursue his flight, but M. Barre 
 
i88 
 
 Republican atrocities. 
 
 refused, saying, ' We will die together.' The two priests 
 were completely disguised, but when M. Le Moine was 
 questioned by the soldiers, he replied at once that he 
 was Vicaire of the parish of Carente. They extracted 
 the ball, which had only lodged in the fleshy part of the 
 shoulder, but this must have been solely for the sake 
 of recovering it, for they left the wound unbandaged and 
 bleeding. M. Barre refused to state either his name or 
 his profession. M. Le Moine was taken to the neigh- 
 bouring chateau of Muce by some of the troops, who 
 also apprehended on the way a joiner, living hard by, 
 who had been denounced as a suspected person. A 
 rosary and a catechism found upon him served as his 
 death-warrant. He and the priest were shot together 
 on the following morning in the forest, a grave being 
 first dug to receive their bodies. M. Le Moine was so 
 weakened by the loss of blood that he was unable to 
 stand when he was executed. M. Barre had been taken 
 to the bourg of Maure, the inhabitants of which were 
 careful to say nothing to compromise him, and when 
 a soldier of the detachment recognized him as a priest, 
 one of the good people endeavoured to persuade the 
 military that he was a farmer of the neighbourhood, but 
 M. Barre, when called upon to confirm the assertion, 
 would not save his life by a falsehood, and replied that 
 he was a priest. He was put to death with circumstances 
 of refined barbarity. His cheeks as well as the fleshy 
 parts of his arms and legs were chopped off, so that his 
 whole body was one ghastly wound. He could still 
 stand, and fell only when they hamstrung him. Thus 
 they literally hacked him to pieces in the inn garden, 
 and then paraded his limbs through the place on the 
 points of their bayonets. Details still more horrible the 
 Abbe consigns to silence. Not a complaint escaped the 
 martyr's lips during this death of torture. All he was 
 
The Girondists. 
 
 heard to say was, 'My God, have pity on me !' Writing 
 in the year 1845, the Abbe Tresvaux says that his 
 memory was still held in veneration at Maure. 
 
 The sacrilegious spoliation of the churches now began. 
 They were rifled of all their sacred vessels, sacerdotal 
 ornaments, crosses, reliquaries ; the civil officials em- 
 ployed as agents in this work not seldom appropriating 
 to themselves precious objects which the Government 
 designed to convert into money. Tresvaux says that he 
 often saw the district administrators carrying away arm- 
 fuls of chalices and ciboriums, which were defaced and 
 broken into fragments by paviors' clubs in order to be 
 taken to the mint. Chasubles, copes, and church-linen 
 1 were sold by auction for the lowest sums, as the people 
 generally abstained from bidding, in order to avoid 
 having any share in the work of spoliation. The paro- 
 chial churches were at first partially excepted from 
 plunder, for worship was still carried on in them, but 
 this was not to last long. 
 
 Two parties in the Convention were at this time 
 struggling for the ascendancy, the Jacobins and the 
 Girondists. So long as they had been united in a 
 common purpose, a semblance of unanimity had existed, 
 but no sooner were the republicans in undisputed pos- 
 session of power than the fight for mastery began between 
 the factions. The Jacobins were the most numerous ; 
 they were known as the Mountain, and desired to rule 
 by means of blood and terror. The Girondists, led by 
 the Bordeaux deputies, were regicides also and unbe- 
 lievers, but they were less ferocious than the Mountain, 
 and outside the Assembly were favoured by all the more 
 moderate revolutionists. But the Mountain had for 
 its ally the all-powerful municipality of Paris, the Com- 
 mune, as it was called, and was supported by incendiary 
 writers, such as Marat and Hebert. This is equivalent 
 
190 
 
 Execution of priests. 
 
 to saying that they had the Parisian rabble at their 
 command. On the 31st of May the Convention was 
 invested by 30,000 armed men, who demanded the 
 arrests of twenty-five deputies, the leaders of the Giron- 
 dist party. The Assembly tamely submitted to intimi- 
 dation, but the protestation published by the proscribed 
 deputies created much excitement throughout France, 
 and led to what was called federalism, which was, in fact, 
 an armed rising against the Mountain. It met with 
 much sympathy in Brittany, and the departments of 
 Ille-et-Vilaine, Morbihan, and Finisterre even levied 
 troops to free the Convention from the oppression of 
 the Commune of Paris. These troops were beaten and 
 dispersed before reaching the capital. A terrible ven- 
 geance was soon to be exacted by triumphant Jacobinism. 
 
 It may be observed in passing that, notwithstanding 
 the violence of the persecution and the exile of the 
 bishops and most of the clergy, the dioceses were not 
 left without government. They had administrators ruling 
 them in the bishops' names and communicating, as they 
 were able, with them ; and it was sometimes from the 
 depths of a prison that the vicars-general continued to 
 exercise their spiritual authority. The law which con- 
 demned returned emigrants to death within twenty-four 
 hours was extended, by a law of the 1 7th of September, 
 to all priests who had been sentenced to deportation 
 or who had voluntarily obeyed that decree. Two priests 
 of Vannes, MM. Despre's and Racape, were executed at 
 Redon in virtue of this law. M. Despres suffered on the 
 28th of October. M Racape's behaviour before his 
 judges was full of Christian boldness, and he did not 
 fear to express the horror he felt for the schismatic oath. 
 The scaffold had no terrors for him, and, as he walked 
 to the place of execution on All Saints' Day, he sang 
 the canticle well known in Brittany, having been com- 
 
Carrier at Nantes. 
 
 posed by the Ven. Grignon de Montfort : ' Allons, mou 
 amc, allons an bonhenr veritable? The people of Redon, 
 much attached to their faith, collected with reverence 
 the martyr's blood and preserved it. The executioner 
 was so touched by the piety and gentleness of both the 
 sufferers, that he loudly expressed his regret for the part 
 he had taken in their death, renounced his profession, 
 and died soon after inconsolable for the crime he had 
 committed in shedding innocent blood. 
 
 Although all now trembled and crouched before the 
 power of the Convention wielded by the Jacobins, with 
 the exception of La Vendee, which was making an heroic 
 resistance to its tyranny, this hateful Assembly feared 
 lest its authority should not be sufficiently respected 
 in the provinces, particularly since the outbreak of 
 federalism. It accordingly sent commissioners — repre- 
 sentatives of the people they were styled — whom they 
 chose from amongst the most ardent of the Jacobin 
 deputies, which is all one with saying the most inhuman 
 and bloodthirsty, and invested them with unlimited 
 powers. The directories and municipalities of the 
 provinces had been guilty of many acts of flagrant in- 
 justice and oppression, but the horrors perpetrated by 
 these proconsuls were to throw all preceding barbarities 
 into the shade. Carrier, an obscure lawyer of Auvergne, 
 and Le Carpentier, a man of lower origin, were sent into 
 Brittany. Carrier's name will go down with execration 
 to the latest posterity as one of the most appalling 
 monsters of cruelty which even the French Revolution 
 nursed into being. One of his theories — for these men 
 of blood were full of theories — was that France was too 
 populous for a republic, and required thinning. This 
 sentiment he openly broached, and it must be allowed 
 that his practice corresponded with his theory, which is 
 not invariably the case with those who are in the habit 
 
192 
 
 The noyades. 
 
 of cherishing pet views. He was charged by the Con- 
 vention to carry on a war of extermination against La 
 Vendee, and he faithfully fulfilled the injunction, 
 executing all, whether royalists or suspected of being 
 such, who fell into his hands, men, women, and children. 
 The guillotine was at work daily on the Place-du-Bouffay 
 at Nantes, and, as Carrier did not think it got on fast 
 enough, he would have some five hundred shot every 
 night. 
 
 Passing over these and similar horrors, we must not 
 omit to mention the death of the old and infirm priests 
 who, as we have said, had been excepted from deporta- 
 tion and were detained in the prisons of Nantes. They 
 were first removed to the Entrepot, a building heretofore 
 used for mercantile purposes, where all the victims 
 devoted to death were huddled together, and were then 
 put on board a vessel on the Loire, having below the 
 water two plug-holes which could be opened at pleasure. 2 
 The priests had been rifled of all they had about them, 
 which, however, they were told would be restored to 
 them at a chateau to which they were to be taken. 
 Then they were left to their fate, bound two and two 
 together with cords. They knew well that they were 
 doomed to die, and made their confessions to each 
 
 2 No less than fifteen thousand victims are said to have perished at 
 the Eyitrepot alone, including those who were taken there for the 
 noyades and the numbers who died of the pestilential epidemic pro- 
 duced by the dense overcrowding within its walls. Four hundred little 
 children, some of whom were quite infants, perished in these noyades. 
 A design was on foot to save these innocents. Carrier sent for the 
 promoter of this humane object : ' So, you want to save these children,' 
 he said. ' Wretch ! I will have you guillotined ; ' and he sent the 
 children that very evening to the noyade. A detailed description of this 
 terrible Entrepot and of the horrors perpetrated by the infamous Carrier 
 will be found in Lamartine's History of the Girondists, bk. liii. This 
 monster is said to have given up to death more than 30,000 persons. 
 Vengeance overtook him at last. He was guillotined with two of his 
 chief accomplices, Pinard and Grandmaison, in December, 1794. 
 
Abolition of piiblic worship. 193 
 
 other. Carpenters stationed in boats were meanwhile 
 removing the planks from the holes. The water entered 
 rapidly, and the vessel soon sank with all on board. 
 Four of the priests had succeeded in escaping, and had 
 got on board a Dutch galliot, but they were seized and 
 drowned the next day. M. Brianceau, a priest of Nantes, 
 although aged and tightly bound, managed to free him- 
 self from the cords and, being a good swimmer, reached 
 the bank. He found temporary refuge in a house ; 
 the inmates were kind to him, but begged him to depart 
 before daylight lest their own safety should be compro- 
 mised. Seized with a panic, they next day reported to 
 the district authorities what they had done. Search was 
 immediately made, M. Brianceau was retaken, and once 
 more condemned to be drowned, his hands being pre- 
 viously chopped off to prevent him from again delivering 
 himself. One priest alone out of the ninety-four escaped 
 with his life, M. Landeau, Rector of Moisdon. This 
 noyade took place on the night of the 14th of November. 
 It was followed by another, on the 9th of December, 
 of seventy-four priests, forty-eight of whom had been 
 lately sent from Angers ostensibly for deportation. 
 Carrier, indeed, in hideous sport, called these drownings 
 of priests his ' vertical deportations.' These horrible 
 executions were due, doubtless, to the personal ferocity 
 of Carrier, but they were in full accordance with the 
 spirit which reigned in the Assembly, to which he wrote 
 in boastful style of his achievements. 
 
 Never had hatred of religion been carried to such an 
 excess. The tribune of the Convention rang continually 
 with the most frightful blasphemies. The all-powerful 
 municipality of Paris had, at the request of their Pro- 
 cureur, Chaumette, abolished all public worship in the 
 capital, and ordered the destruction of every monu- 
 ment which recalled the memory either of Christianity 
 
 N 25 
 
194 Abjurations of priesthood. 
 
 or of the monarchy, and the melting down of all the 
 gold and silver vessels of the churches, which, after 
 being thus sacrilegiously plundered, were now closed. 
 This was the completion of the act of spoliation in the 
 preceding June. Some of the vilest of the populace, 
 dressed up in the rich vestments of the church of Saint- 
 Germain-des-Pre's, defiled in procession before the Con- 
 vention, followed by a bier with its mortuary pall, a 
 ceremony intended to figure the interment of religious 
 worship in France. Dubois, deputy of one of the Paris 
 sections, presented himself at the bar of the Assembly 
 and proposed an oath by which all should bind them- 
 selves to have no other worship than that of reason, 
 liberty, equality, and the republic. The oath was taken. 
 It was on the 22nd of November, 1793, that religion was 
 thus formally abolished. The 7th of the same month 
 had witnessed the abjuration of Gobel, constitutional 
 bishop of Paris, and of a number of his clergy, who with 
 him renounced their sacerdotal character. In its ardour 
 to encourage these abjurations, the Convention went so far 
 as to offer pensions to those who should make them, and 
 a register was opened in Paris to receive the declarations 
 of all who wished to unpriest themselves (se deprctriser). 
 Throughout France the same scene was enacted. No 
 less than thirty of the intruded bishops gave a like 
 scandal, and eleven of them married. Thus was for ever 
 dishonoured that schismatical Church which had boasted 
 of restoring the fairest days of Christianity, and to obtain 
 whose triumph the Catholic priests had been so cruelly 
 persecuted. But the object of the enemies of religion 
 had, as they conceived, been attained, for the consti- 
 tutional clergy had only been a tool in their hands for 
 the subversion of the faith. The Abbe" Royou relates 
 how, as early as the close of 1791, a deputy of the 
 Assembly who was deeply initiated in the designs of the 
 
Profanation of churches. 195 
 
 revolutionists, being one day reproached with the degra- 
 dation brought upon religion by ministers so contemptible 
 as were the State clergy, replied, ' Why, that is just 
 what we want ! When the people have become dis- 
 gusted with these wretched apostates, we shall say to 
 them, " You are great fools to pay for maintaining 
 ministers whom you despise. Leave them to those 
 who desire their services." We shall have on our 
 side Jews, Protestants, deists, atheists, and even good 
 Catholics. We shall have the majority of the nation 
 with us, which will be glad to rid itself of an intolerable 
 burden.' 
 
 The example of the Terrorists of Paris was followed 
 in the provinces, and Brittany was not behindhand. 
 Although no actual law had been passed decreeing the 
 spoliation and closing of the churches, they had never- 
 theless been plundered and closed by the orders of the 
 commissioners, an act sometimes accompanied with 
 shocking profanations. At Saint-Goueno, the revolu- 
 tionists, including an apostate monk, took the chalices 
 of the church to the public house and used them as 
 drinking-cups at their breakfast. Having seized a pious 
 girl of the place, called Anne Plesse, they tried to 
 compel her to join in their profanation, but neither 
 solicitations nor menaces could overcome her resistance ; 
 so they took her away with them, and had her cast into 
 prison, where she was frequently threatened with death ; 
 and her turn would probably have come at last, had not 
 Robespierre's fall and execution occurred in time to save 
 her and many more from the guillotine. At Quimper, a 
 revolutionary commissary of the name of Dagorne, after 
 placing all the garrison under arms, in the presence of 
 from eight to ten thousand of the country people, who 
 had come into the town to celebrate the feast of the 
 patron saint of the diocese, took the sacred vessels out 
 
196 Demolition of ancient shrines. 
 
 of the cathedral, and applied them to the most abomin- 
 able purposes both in the church and in the public 
 square. 
 
 Le Carpentier, Carrier's worthy colleague, was specially- 
 active in the work of destruction. He was animated by 
 the most furious hatred against religion, and made it his 
 boast that he had buried the Sunday. The church bells, 
 of which there were many beautiful chimes in Brittany, 
 were broken up for the sake of the metal, as were also 
 the altar balustrades and even the iron railings of the 
 cemeteries. To this period must be referred the destruc- 
 tion of the Calvary of Pont-Chateau in the diocese of 
 Nantes, erected by the Venerable Grignon de Montfort, 
 and an object of pious resort from all parts of Brittany. 
 During the first months of the year 1793 the revolutionists 
 continued to prosecute their course of sacrilege and demo- 
 lition, sparing no work of art, however beautiful, and no 
 memorial of antiquity, however venerable. Pictures were 
 pierced and torn, statues destroyed, painted windows 
 smashed to atoms. At Nantes the crucifix which had 
 stood in the Cour des Comptes was dragged through the 
 streets, and the rich tapestry which had decorated its 
 walls was publicly burned. In the same city the image 
 of Notre Dame de Bon Secours, dear to the piety of 
 the Breton sailors, was broken to pieces and the chapel 
 desecrated. The cathedral was left utterly bare, and 
 even the tombs were violated, Mine'e not only per- 
 mitting, but actively seconding the work. Similar 
 devastation took place in the other large towns of 
 Brittany • crucifixes, holy images, and the relics of the 
 saints being subjected to the same sacrilegious treat- 
 ment as they had met with at the hands of the Pro- 
 testant Reformers of the sixteenth century. The image 
 of Ste. Anne d'Auray, so much venerated in Brittany, was 
 burned, and that of Notre Dame de Roncier incurred 
 
Impiety and blasphemy. 197 
 
 the same fate. The people looked on with shuddering 
 indignation, but the Reign of Terror had crushed all 
 active spirit of opposition. Nevertheless, in one instance, 
 namely at Morlaix, where the 'patriots' wanted to 
 demolish the image of Notre Dame du Mur, which 
 was much venerated by the inhabitants, the civil authori- 
 ties interfered, dreading the excitement which would 
 have been caused in the place. Many precious relics 
 were concealed, those of the church of St. Pierre at 
 Nantes so carefully that they have never been found to 
 this day. 
 
 But it was not the cathedrals or churches of the towns 
 alone that suffered. Even the rural churches and chapels 
 did not escape the axe of the devastators, who also des- 
 troyed the many way-side crosses for which Brittany was 
 remarkable, and which, having not seldom been erected 
 in memory of historical events, were an irreparable loss. 
 But the mania to destroy and obliterate every vestige of 
 Christianity was so strong, that Tresvaux says he had seen 
 men climbing on to the roofs at considerable personal 
 risk to tear off the crosses which the slaters in that 
 religious land were in the habit of fixing there. They 
 would even force their way into private houses to deface 
 or destroy any devotional object they could discover. 
 He saw an old woman led off to prison because a picture 
 of the Sacred Heart of Jesus had been found in her 
 prayer-book, and poor girls similarly treated for having 
 been surprised saying the Rosary. ' Who could repeat,' 
 he continues, ' the blasphemies which were continually 
 issuing from the mouths of these impious men, or 
 describe the infernal joy they manifested in destroying 
 all that religion had consecrated to the worship of God ? 
 I have still a vivid recollection of the fury of a sergeant 
 whom I saw breaking open the tabernacle on the 
 High Altar of a parish church, and tearing out the 
 
198 Corrttfttion of morals. 
 
 velvet with which it was lined. One possessed with the 
 devil could not have worn a more frightful aspect.' It 
 is true that the wretched man was a Protestant, and, 
 as such, was animated by the usual hatred of his sect 
 against Catholicism, but the rebel children of the Church 
 were equally filled with rage against their mother, and 
 displayed a fanatical frenzy not surpassed by that of the 
 early Calvinists. Many valuable liturgical books perished 
 at this time, being torn up and used for cartridges. 
 
 But if it is sad to recall all this destruction of holy 
 and venerable objects, the moral ruin which was being 
 effected throughout France presents a still more painful 
 picture. The enemies of every religious symbol and 
 memorial were also the sworn foes of purity, of virtue, 
 and of all that is good and true. Not satisfied with their 
 own detestable practices, they tried to authorize and 
 legalize vice by offering premiums for its encourage- 
 ment. Thus it will scarcely be credited that fifty francs 
 were awarded to women for every illegitimate male child 
 whom they should bring into the world. The law of 
 divorce had already been passed by the Legislative 
 Assembly, but the Convention gave it further develop- 
 ments, by which the marriage-tie was rendered still less 
 binding. The solemnities of Holy Church had been 
 replaced by feasts after the Pagan model, accompanied 
 by profane dances and orgies. Every effort, in short, 
 was being made not only to destroy the religion of the 
 people but to corrupt their morals. In Brittany these 
 efforts signally failed, save as regarded the populace of 
 the cities ; the great mass of the population took no 
 part in the national feasts, but preserved their faith and 
 their morality alike untainted. The most deplorable 
 evil of all, however, because it affected future generations 
 and not the present alone, was the want of a Christian 
 education for childhood and youth. All those estab- 
 
Apostasy of schismatics. 199 
 
 lishments which had hitherto provided it were sup- 
 pressed, and in the new elementary schools which had 
 replaced them, the teaching of religion was positively- 
 proscribed. Happy those children whose parents had 
 preserved the faith, and who transmitted it to their 
 offspring. As for those who did not enjoy this blessing, 
 they were doomed to grow up knowing God and His 
 holy law only through the blasphemies which were 
 continually meeting their ears. It is to this cause, 
 which was in operation for so many years, and which 
 affected all branches of education, that is chiefly 
 attributable that rank growth of impiety, ignorance, 
 and indifference which has been the bane and curse 
 of France even down to our own time. 
 
 Mine"e, as was to be expected, had hastened to divest 
 himself of his priestly character and to abjure any small 
 remnant of Christianity which he might hitherto have 
 preserved. He had adopted every phase of the Revolu- 
 ticn, and had shrunk from none of its worst excesses ; 
 as, indeed, may be inferred from the fact that he had 
 merited the eulogium of the monster Carrier, who, on 
 the occasion of his abjuration of ' sacerdotal impostures,' 
 called him 'le brave Minee.' Many of his associates 
 also lost no time in renouncing their priesthood, and 
 eight of them contracted civil marriages with women 
 of the lowest class, bringing forward the hitherto con- 
 cealed children of their illicit unions to be legitimized. 
 Some of these men made this disgraceful parade for the 
 purpose of avoiding suspicion, for, on the 12th of August, 
 the arrest of ' suspected persons ' had been decreed by 
 the Convention without any definition of the precise 
 import of the term. Under this law, such of the nobility 
 as had not yet fled, all the religious who had refused the 
 oath, many relatives of deported priests, and, generally 
 speaking, those, in whatever class, who had manifested 
 
20O 
 
 A brutal commissioner. 
 
 hostility to the principles of the Revolution or had made 
 open profession of attachment to the faith were deprived 
 of their liberty and consigned to the houses of detention, 
 of which there were one or more in every town, the 
 convents being commonly applied to that purpose. 
 Here they had much to suffer, and, indeed, at Nantes, 
 where, owing to the devastating war, great scarcity 
 prevailed, they were all but starved. 
 
 Carrier on his arrival in Brittany had visited the 
 Convent of La Trinity, at Rennes, where were detained 
 those priests who had been exempted from deportation, 
 but had subsequently been arrested. After brutally 
 apostrophizing them, he exclaimed, ' Who will rid me 
 of these calotinsl , ' i to which the commandant of tha 
 National Guard, who had given proof of his revolu- 
 tionary zeal by flogging a woman to death, because she 
 was in the habit of going to hear Mass at Montgermont, 
 replied, ' Citizen, with twenty men it would be but half- 
 an-hour's job.' The prisoners thought that they heard 
 their death-knell, and one of them contrived to make his 
 escape before Carrier left the house, by getting down 
 into a dry well, which, as it happened, had an external 
 aperture. This was M. Duval, the Rector of Pleurtuir, 
 who long survived these terrible days. The other priests, 
 numbering one hundred, were taken to Mont-Saint- 
 Michel. On leaving Pontorson, the last halt on their 
 miserable journey, word was brought that the tide was 
 rising, so that crossing was impossible. ' Well,' replied 
 the brutal commissioner in charge, ' if they swallow a 
 good draught of water, it won't hurt them.' The 
 National Guard, however, refused to be parties to such 
 a murderous act. They had orders, they said, to take 
 
 3 An abusive term derived from the calotte, or cap, worn by the 
 clergy. 
 
Le Coz arrested. 
 
 20I 
 
 the prisoners to Mont-Saint-Michel, not to drown them 
 on the strand (sur la greve), and they obliged the com- 
 missioner to turn back to Pontorson. 
 
 Amongst the captives was the schismatic bishop, 
 the notorious Le Coz, once the idol of the 'patriots,' 
 now disowned by them and classed with those very 
 men against whom he had excited so much persecu- 
 tion ; for the schismatic clergy who did not abjure their 
 priesthood and give some pledge of irreligion, such as 
 marrying or loudly blaspheming, were regarded with 
 nearly as much suspicion as the true confessors, although 
 they were not so much hated or as hardly dealt with. 
 Le Coz was making his way from Rennes when he was 
 arrested ; compelled to alight from his horse and chained 
 to some Catholic priests just seized, he was taken to 
 La Trinite and afterwards to Mont-Saint-Michel. Jacob 
 and Le Masle were also imprisoned, as were other priests 
 who had not taken the oath of abjuration. Many of 
 these gave far from edifying examples in their several 
 houses of detention, although they subsequently made 
 a great parade of their sufferings in the cause of the 
 faith. Le Coz was not immoral, but, unhappily, he did 
 not repent. Pride and vanity were his bane, and he 
 now looked upon himself as a glorious confessor, and 
 even composed some verses of a religious kind, appro- 
 priate to the occasion. He was much better treated, 
 however, than were the faithful priests, for he was 
 assigned the whole town as his prison, where he could 
 poetize at ease, while they were nearly dying of misery 
 and starvation in close confinement. When the Vendean 
 army entered Brittany and were about to lay siege to 
 Granville, they sent a detachment to liberate the captive 
 priests at Mont-Saint-Michel. Three only ventured to 
 profit by the precarious advantage, MM. Delaunaye, Prior 
 of Rille, Le Mercier de Montigny, Vicaire of Taillis, and 
 
202 
 
 Rout of the royalists. 
 
 M. Faligant, Vicaire of Acigne, 4 and they had afterwards 
 reason to repent of having done so. Le Coz, not 
 believing that the Vendeans would take the same lively 
 interest in his lot, thought it well to hide himself while 
 the royalist soldiers were there, so the gaoler obligingly 
 lowered him into a deep vault, throwing down some 
 large galettes h at night to keep him alive. Among 
 other rodomontades of Le Coz in after times, he 
 declared that he overheard a consultation between the 
 Vendeans and the priests as to what should be done 
 with him, and that it was decided that he should be 
 taken to headquarters and burned alive. How Le Coz 
 could overhear anything in that underground dungeon 
 it is hard to understand, but the story is in every way 
 too absurd to need confutation. He told other palpable 
 falsehoods as to his own behaviour at this time, the 
 object of all of them being self-glorification. 
 
 After many successes leading to no practical result, 
 the royalist army was utterly routed at Savenay on the 
 22nd of December, 1793. Those who escaped the 
 carnage of that day sought refuge in the forest of 
 Gavre and in the parishes on the banks of the Vilaine, 
 where the inhabitants gave them cordial hospitality. 
 An historian of the Vendean war, himself a Vendean, 
 
 4 M. Faligant alone escaped death, but he was subsequently arrested 
 and confined in the Chateau of Saint-Malo, where he heard the con- 
 fessions of a hundred Vendeans before their execution. Amongst these 
 royalists was a Carmelite of Poitou, who, addressing the president of 
 the sanguinary tribunal before which they were arraigned, summoned 
 the unjust judge to appear before the tribunal of God in three days. 
 This man, who was more cowardly than cruel, and who did evil from a 
 motive of fear, was seized with fever as he left the court, and died at 
 the close of the three days. Another judge replaced him, who had the 
 courage to be more humane. The condemnations were in consequence 
 henceforward less numerous, and thus M. Faligant was spared, but he 
 was taken back to Mont-Saint-Michel, where he suffered imprisonment 
 until the year 1795, when the priests were all released. 
 
 5 A kind of cake commonly eaten in France. 
 
Priests guillotined. 
 
 203 
 
 thus extols the generous devotion of the Breton peasantry: 
 'So long,' he writes, 'as La Vendee shall preserve its name 
 and the memory of its misfortunes, so long will it 
 recall with sentiments of the liveliest gratitude the kind- 
 ness it received from these good Bretons, who were 
 the instruments employed by Providence to save the 
 precious remnants of the avengers of the throne and 
 the altar.' The scattered Vendeans after a while united 
 together in small bands, which under the name of 
 ' Chouans ' continued for some years to wage a partisan 
 warfare and to harass the republican troops. Too 
 feeble to attempt any important enterprize, unassisted 
 as they were by foreign support, their prolonged 
 resistance only served to keep up the irritation of the 
 republicans, and thus occasion the shedding of much 
 innocent blood, particularly that of the priests, to whom 
 every popular disturbance was always imputed. 
 
 In the December of this year Rennes had to deplore 
 the execution of a worthy and well-known priest, M. de 
 Rengerve. Zeal for the salvation of souls led him to 
 accede to the solicitations of some Breton emigrants 
 about to join the Vendean army, who, desiring to 
 secure his services as chaplain, induced him to return 
 in their company to Brittany. He was arrested on the 
 road, together with three of his friends, and transferred 
 to Rennes, where they all suffered on the 18th of the 
 month. On the 23rd another priest, M. Chanterel, who 
 belonged to the diocese of Angers, was also guillotined 
 at Rennes. At Nantes, the noyades and the guillotine 
 not doing their work fast enough to content Carrier's 
 greed for blood, he had ordered, as we have said, other 
 subsidiary massacres ; fusilades, in which several priests 
 perished whose names are unrecorded. Tresvaux 
 mentions other victims who were personally known to 
 him ; among them was a venerable old man, eighty 
 
204 Priests guillotined. 
 
 eight years old, the Abbe" of La Roche-Saint-Andre". 
 He was living quietly at his own house, when he was 
 seized and taken to Nantes, where he was condemned 
 for having been found in a country which was in a state 
 of insurrection, and executed on the same day. As he 
 ascended the scaffold he sang with a firm voice the 
 Psalm, Latatus stem in his, 6 expressive of his joy at 
 going to Heaven. A few days after, the military com- 
 mission at Savenay condemned to death M. Gohier, 
 a priest of the diocese of Nantes, who had been arrested 
 at Clisson while engaged in the discharge of his sacred 
 functions. Five other martyred priests are also men- 
 tioned by Tresvaux, two of whom were massacred by 
 the republican troops without form of trial. At Vannes 
 M. Le Fellic, who had remained ministering to his 
 parishioners in concealment, suffered also on the nth 
 of this same December. 
 
 Several enemies of religion, by a just retribution, also 
 met their doom towards the close of the year 1793. 
 Coustard, the persecutor of the worthy Bishop of Nantes 
 and the ferocious supporter of Minee, had been sent as 
 deputy to the Convention. Cruel as he was, he recoiled 
 from voting for the King's death. He thus incurred 
 the hatred of the Jacobin terrorists. Accused of being 
 a federalist, he fled to Nantes, where Carrier soon found 
 him out, and sent him back to Paris. There he was 
 guillotined in company with Philippe Egalite'. Coustard, 
 who had shown himself so blustering a bully to defence- 
 less men and women, was almost lifeless with fear at 
 the sight of the scaffold. A few days previously another 
 Breton partisan of the constitutional clergy, Le Hardy, a 
 doctor of Dinan and deputy for Morbihan, was guillotined 
 also on the charge of federalism, but in reality for the 
 same unpardonable offence, the not having voted for 
 
 s Psalm exxi. 
 
Revolutionary tribunals. 205 
 
 the death of the ' tyrant Louis Capet,' but only for his 
 detention in prison. 
 
 The law against emigrants, condemning them to death 
 if they returned, was enforced at this time with great 
 rigour, and a reward was promised to any one who 
 should denounce them. The consequence was that 
 in places where the authorities would have humanely 
 connived at their presence, they were often drawn into 
 notice through the cupidity of vile informers. Thus 
 it was that young Kerambrun perished on the scaffold 
 at Saint-Brieuc. He had only received the tonsure, but 
 his piety and attachment to the faith had made him 
 specially obnoxious to the ' patriots.' For security he 
 passed over into Jersey, where he acted as tutor in an 
 emigrant family, but the desire to see his parents led him 
 to return and visit Treguier. The authorities turned a 
 blind eye to his presence, but the thirty francs' reward 
 tempted a miserable wretch, who had been formerly 
 acquainted with the young man, to betray him. He 
 first went to see him, and, embracing him, expressed 
 great joy at so unexpected a meeting. He then hastened 
 to denounce him. This traitor became an object of 
 detestation in the neighbourhood, and his life was made 
 a burden to him. In his last illness he was haunted by 
 the memory of his crime, and complained that young 
 Kerambrun was stifling him. By a law passed on the 
 28th of December, the criminal tribunals were authorized 
 to proceed after the manner of the Revolutionary Tri- 
 bunal of Paris, which did not allow the accused any 
 legal defence. These tribunals, being always composed 
 of ardent revolutionists, were, as a general rule, most 
 merciless, and those of the five Breton departments were 
 as cruel as the rest. The streets of Rennes sometimes 
 literally ran with blood from the numbers guillotined 
 at the same time. Nantes, where Carrier urged on the 
 
206 Goddess of Reason. 
 
 work of death, was a positive charnel-house, and the 
 waters of the Loire became so tainted by the corpses of 
 the drowned as to be unfit to drink. 
 
 It was thus, in the midst of blood and terror, that the 
 year 1793 was drawing to its close. The execution of 
 Louis XVI. marked its commencement, and from that 
 date the most atrocious laws, the most sanguinary acts, 
 and the wildest extravagances of impiety followed in 
 rapid succession. It was the year in which Voltaire's 
 diabolical desire seemed about to be realized, for, so 
 far as the malice of man could reach, Christianity was 
 abolished throughout the land. On the 10th of 
 November, the worship of reason had been set up in 
 its place, and inaugurated in the capital; an actress, 
 personating the Goddess of Reason, being borne in 
 triumph through the streets and seated in the cathedral 
 of Notre Dame on the altar of the Living God, to 
 receive the homage of her insane worshippers. 7 The 
 madness of impiety could not well go further. The 
 Terrorists strove to extend this abomination to the 
 provinces, and the smallest town in Brittany had its 
 statue of the Goddess of Reason. It was often an 
 image of the Blessed Virgin transformed into the 
 revolutionary idol by having the red cap of liberty 
 put on its head and a pike in its hand. 
 
 7 The Pere Beauregard, preaching in Notre Dame towards the end of 
 the reign of Louis XV., seemed to have a sudden vision of the days of 
 sacrilege which were drawing nigh, and, to the amazement of his hearers, 
 who thought he had lost his wits, exclaimed, ' The time approaches 
 when an infamous Venus will be enthroned in the place reserved to the 
 Saint of Saints.' 
 
CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 Martyrs and Confessors. 
 
 The first martyred priest of whom we find mention 
 in the year 1794 was M. de Montigny, one of the three 
 who had profited by the presence of the Vendean army 
 to regain their liberty. He might have saved his life by 
 pleading compulsion, but he would not purchase it by a 
 falsehood. Shortly after, MM. Be'rard, Pontgerard, 
 Herbert, and Deslongrais also shed their blood. M. Berard 
 had returned from Jersey out of pure love for souls. He 
 was detained some time in prison, apparently because he 
 was seized with an epidemic which was raging there. 
 During this interval he reconciled to God many victims 
 condemned to die. As soon as his health was sufficiently 
 restored, he was put on his trial, and sentenced to death, 
 not only as a refractory priest, but because he had about 
 him certain symbols of rebellion, as they were styled. 
 These were little pictures of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, 
 so odious to the revolutionists. M. Deslongrais had lain 
 concealed at Rennes, and there had continued to exercise 
 his ministry with great zeal. He was at last captured, 
 loaded with blows, and carried off to prison. Here 
 he found a constitutional priest of the name of Picard, 
 whom Le Coz had ordained. This man, noting the 
 peace which shone on the confessor's countenance, while 
 he himself was gnawed with remorse, opened his heart to 
 him, and abjured the schism. When M. Deslongrais 
 
2o8 Death of M. Deslongrais. 
 
 returned from the tribunal, his face was radiant with joy, 
 and he said to his fellow-prisoners, ' To-morrow by this 
 hour I shall have ceased to live ; I am happy at shedding 
 my blood for my God.' He took part in the evening 
 recreation of his companions with a tranquillity which 
 surprised them all. The next morning he received Holy 
 Communion, the Blessed Sacrament having been secretly 
 conveyed to him, breakfasted cheerfully, and, after making 
 his private devotions, had the prayers for the agonizing 
 recited for him. All around were in tears, whatever their 
 belief or unbelief. This finished, seeing that he had a 
 little time to spare, he conversed awhile with his com- 
 panions. An hour before he was led to death he 
 resumed his devotions, and on the way to the scaffold, 
 which was erected in the square of the palace, ceased 
 not to speak of God to the people. On arriving, he saw 
 a pile of lighted faggots, and, thinking he was going 
 to be burned alive, a momentary shudder came over him. 
 The fire, however, was lighted for the purpose of con- 
 suming the sacred objects which had been found about 
 him, when arrested, including the holy oils. This pro- 
 fanation caused him intense pain. The executioners, 
 being tired with their morning's work, handed him over 
 to some youths who were being taught how to manage 
 the guillotine in order to inure them to deeds of blood, 
 a common practice at that time. 1 These scholars in the 
 science of butchery performed their office so clumsily, 
 that they caused the martyr terrible suffering, and it was 
 only at the third attempt that they succeeded in decapi- 
 tating him. 
 
 The military commission, established at Savenay after 
 the Vendean defeat, was continuing its bloody work, and 
 
 1 Even children were thus employed ; some, it is averred, at their 
 own urgent request. One little boy at Nantes, however, is said to have 
 been beaten by his father because he shrank from shedding blood. 
 
A military commission. 209 
 
 amongst the victims condemned to be shot were several 
 priests. One of these was M. Judic, belonging to the 
 diocese of Nantes, who, when the non-juring priests were 
 driven from their cures, had returned to his native place, 
 where he secretly ministered to the faithful. Arrested in 
 a field while saying his office, he was dragged before the 
 sanguinary tribunal together with a young subdeacon 
 of the name of Orain, who had been seized the same 
 day. Both had been cruelly maltreated on the way to 
 Savenay. Being asked who they were, they replied, 
 ' We are the disciples of Him whom you persecute.' 
 ' Well,' rejoined the judge ironically, 'since you belong 
 to Jesus, you have no reason to be uneasy, as He has 
 millions of angels at His command : ask Him to send 
 some to your rescue.' ' No doubt but that He could 
 rescue us,' replied the confessors ; ' but nowhere is it 
 written that He is pledged to do so. We are content to 
 die for Him, and all we ask of Him is that He would 
 sustain our courage and recall you to Himself. You 
 are about to send us to death ; we do not dread it. You 
 judge us now, but one day God will judge you.' M. Orain 
 was young and tall, and had a very engaging counten- 
 ance. The military who sat on the commission promised 
 to save him if he would enlist in the republican army, 
 but he steadfastly refused, saying, ' My heart has 
 remained faithful, and my hands pure. I would rather 
 die than fail in this fidelity and give up this purity.' 
 M. Richard, Vicaire of Pont-Chateau, was another of the 
 victims at Savenay. Notwithstanding the decree of 
 deportation he had remained concealed in his own parish, 
 and the respect entertained for this excellent priest was 
 shared even by the ' patriots ' of the place. The very 
 gendarmes, meeting him one day, allowed him to pass, 
 with a friendly word of advice to use more precautions. 
 But they were not all so kindly disposed ; and one 
 o 25 
 
2io Executions and massacres. 
 
 of these men, whose animosity against the priests was 
 notorious, surprised him at last when engaged in the 
 work of his ministry. He had just time to confide the 
 Sacred Species, which he had with him, to a Sister of the 
 third Order of St. Francis before he was seized, bound, 
 and taken to Savenay. 
 
 The republican troops, however, were by no means 
 always at the trouble to hand over the priests they 
 captured to the tribunals, but often massacred them 
 on the spot where they had found them, or at no great 
 distance from it. Such was the fate of M. Bouvion, 
 Rector of Maumusson, venerable alike for his age and 
 virtues. He was seized one evening at the house of 
 his brother-in-law, whither he had gone after visiting a 
 sick person. Both were taken to a neighbouring village, 
 receiving blows and insults the whole way. As the 
 soldiers were preparing to shoot them, M. Bouvion 
 requested to die last, in order that he might be able 
 to exhort his brother-in-law to make a holy death. His 
 petition was granted, but when he raised his hand in the 
 act of giving absolution, one of the soldiers barbarously 
 slashed it with his sabre. The insurrectionary state of 
 the department of Morbihan caused the search for con- 
 cealed priests to be very hot in that district. Several 
 were arrested and sent to Lorient, where they were con- 
 demned and executed. The persecution was no less 
 violent in the C6tes-du-Nord, and during the months of 
 January and February several priests suffered at Saint- 
 Brieuc. On the 16th of March, M. Riou, Rector of 
 Labahan, was guillotined at Quimper. He had been in 
 prison since the beginning of the year, and some members 
 of the tribune, wishing to save him, tried to make him 
 pass for a sexagenarian and, as such, exempt from the 
 law of deportation. The president lent himself to the 
 artifice, for, when the prisoner replied to the customary 
 
M. de Gcnoiiillac. 211 
 
 question concerning his age that he was fifty-nine, 
 the magistrate told him that he was mistaken. ' We 
 studied together,' he said ; ' you were my senior, and, as 
 I am now fifty-nine and two or three months over, you 
 must be sixty. But M. Riou's love of truth was too 
 strong to allow him to save his life by a falsehood. He 
 Avas not sixty, he replied ; and was accordingly sentenced 
 to death and executed. 
 
 The military commission which the so-styled repre- 
 sentatives of the people had established at Saint-Malo 
 was at first not expeditious enough to please them ; they 
 reproached it for its laxity, and soon no room was left 
 for further complaints. In the space of little more than 
 a month six priests were executed as ' Vendean brigands ; ' 
 the simple fact being that they had been apprehended 
 in districts through which the royalist army had marched, 
 having been necessitated for self-preservation to follow 
 in its wake. To these six must be added a venerable 
 Carthusian, a native of Angers, named De Genouillac, 
 concerning whom some interesting particulars are 
 recorded. He belonged to an ancient family, and in his 
 youth had adopted the military career. At the siege of 
 Bergen-op-Zoom, in 1747, being a captain of infantry in 
 a regiment selected to lead the way in storming the 
 breach, he promised God that if he came safe out of 
 this danger he would consecrate himself to His service as 
 a Carthusian. All the men composing the forlorn hope 
 which he headed were either killed or wounded. He 
 alone escaped unscathed. A ball had struck him, but 
 had been flattened against a New Testament which he 
 had about him, and inflicted no injury. At the con- 
 clusion of the war in 1749, M. de Genouillac hastened to 
 fulfil his vow, notwithstanding the remonstrances of his 
 family, who were desirous to obtain him a dispensation 
 from the Holy See. He entered the Carthusian Order, 
 
212 
 
 Last farewells. 
 
 in which he continued for forty years, until the religious 
 were expelled from their houses. He then took up his 
 abode with his brother, but when the latter emigrated he 
 would not accompany him, and remained at the house of 
 a farmer, a tenant of his brother, in La Vende'e. Com- 
 pelled, for his own safety, to follow the royalist army 
 into Brittany, he fell into the hands of the republicans 
 after the battle of Antrain. Being condemned, he was 
 shot, with nearly thirty others, on the Greve of Saint- 
 Malo. He was in his seventy-sixth year, and died with 
 much courage, but he was so enfeebled by the fatigues he 
 had undergone, that he had to be carried to the place of 
 execution. 
 
 Several priests of the Cotes-du-Nord who had volun- 
 tarily obeyed the law of deportation had been intercepted 
 at sea and, after being robbed of all they possessed, 
 brought back and detained in prison ever since, first at 
 Saint-Brieuc and afterwards at Guingamp, in flagrant 
 violation, not only of justice, but of law. It was now 
 resolved to send as many of them to Guiana as age or 
 infirmities did not render utterly unfit to bear the voyage, 
 this colony having been lately chosen by the Convention 
 as the place of deportation for the ' refractory.' Twenty- 
 six were selected, and the 16th of March was fixed for 
 their departure. The last farewells between these 
 brethren were very touching. Companions during months 
 of suffering, they were now to be parted for the remainder 
 of their sad journey, but they mutually encouraged each 
 other to patience and constancy by those motives of 
 faith which had hitherto sustained them in their afflic- 
 tions, looking to a blessed reunion in Heaven. As usual, 
 the prisoners suffered much on the road from the hard- 
 heartedness of their guards, but the good people of the 
 towns and villages through which they passed did their 
 best to alleviate their privations. At Brooms, indeed, 
 
Threats and insults. 213 
 
 some charitable persons were put in prison for having 
 attempted to assist them. Montauban is mentioned as 
 having nobly distinguished itself, and even the mayor 
 of the place generously joined in showing kindness 
 to the sufferers. In the larger towns their reception was 
 very different. When they reached Nantes about mid- 
 night, a numerous guard was at the barriers to admit the 
 convoy, and these men, on learning that the prisoners 
 were priests, raised shouts of ferocious joy. They were 
 shut up for the night in an empty hall in the Hotel de 
 Ville and the next morning were taken before the revolu- 
 tionary commission. Carrier, denounced by one of his 
 accomplices, had been lately recalled to Paris, but his 
 spirit still ruled at Nantes. The priests were kept stand- 
 ing until one o'clock, uncertain of the fate reserved 
 for them, and having tasted no food for twenty-four 
 hours. At last a man with a sinister countenance made 
 his appearance, and, after addressing them with the 
 customary threats and abuse, marched them off with 
 a strong detachment of soldiers to the banks of the river 
 which had been the grave of so many of their brethren. 
 The populace, exasperated by all they had undergone, 
 which they had been taught to impute to priests and 
 royalists, could hardly be held back from tearing them in 
 pieces. They expected, at any rate, to witness a noyade, 
 but in this they were disappointed. 
 
 The confessors were all shipped on board a Dutch 
 galliot anchored a little way off shore. It already con- 
 tained fifteen priests from the diocese of Angers, and 
 more than fifty from the department of the Nievre. The 
 former were all superannuated, and, amongst the latter, 
 one was eighty years old, six were past seventy, twenty- 
 five were above sixty, and twelve were disabled through 
 infirmities. In defiance of the laws, they had been sent, 
 by the orders of the representatives of the people at 
 
214 
 
 A floating prison. 
 
 Nevers, to Nantes in order to their deportation to 
 Guiana. Their passage from Angers to Nantes had been 
 marked by studied cruelty. Taken out of their prison at 
 twelve o'clock on a cold March night, they were left on 
 the quay, bound two and two together, like so many 
 packages ready for embarkation, until six in the morning, 
 when they were huddled, along with the fifteen old 
 priests from the Angers diocese, into a boat, which 
 dropped down the river to Nantes. Nothing could 
 exhaust the patience of these confessors, which even 
 excited the astonishment of their heartless escort. For 
 instance, a soldier, snatching a crucifix from one of them, 
 struck him with it savagely in the face, at the same time 
 uttering horrible blasphemies, but they were as dumb 
 men, following the example of Jesus in the hands of His 
 tormentors. During the whole of their two days' 
 passage they had nothing to eat except some small 
 pieces of mouldy bread ; the commissioner charged with 
 their sustenance appropriating the money to himself 
 under the pretence of buying shirts for the most neces- 
 sitous, which, it need scarcely be added, he never did. 
 Arrived at Nantes, they were taken to the Dutch vessel 
 and placed at the bottom of the hold. The infirm had 
 to be lowered with cords, and this was done with such 
 cruel negligence that many fell, and one broke his arm. 
 Shut up in this dark hole, they passed the night, and 
 when, owing to a leak in the vessel, the water began to 
 enter, they thought it would be their last on earth. 
 Meanwhile the soldiers, who had closed the only aperture 
 through which air could penetrate, had got drunk, and 
 were dancing and singing ribald songs on the deck. 
 When the guard was relieved in the morning, the priests 
 were permitted to pump the water out of the hold, but 
 for the next eight days they were nearly famished. A 
 National Guard, opening the air-hole, said that if they 
 
Protracted privations. 
 
 215 
 
 would give him twenty-five francs he would procure them 
 some bread. Although they had been often searched 
 yet amongst them they contrived to raise the sum, but the 
 promised food they never saw. At last their repeated 
 solicitations obtained for them a little bad bread and 
 rice, but so great was their exhaustion, that two expired 
 after partaking of this slender meal. Fever soon 
 developed itself amongst them ; no doctor would come 
 near them, and when the vessel became so infected that 
 even the guards recoiled from taking their turn of 
 service, as many as were able to move were allowed to 
 go on deck during the day to wash themselves and their 
 clothes. While these were drying the owners had to 
 keep a watchful eye on them, or they would have been 
 stolen. Such was the deplorable state of the priests 
 of Nievre and Angers when, as has been said, those of 
 the C6tes-du-Nord were put on board. At the sight 
 which met their eyes these last almost shrank back with 
 dismay, but their poor dying brethren relieved their 
 hunger by sharing their own meagre rations with them. 
 
 The priests from the C6tes-du-Nord were removed in 
 a few hours, for the vessel could not possibly hold all, 
 and were passed on to another, where, during the 
 twenty-five days of their sojourn, they were regaled by 
 their guards with an account of Carrier's ncyades and 
 of the way in which men, women, and children had been 
 stripped naked, bound two and two together, and cast 
 into the water. Many of the bodies, indeed, were still 
 floating on the surface. Here, as usual, the prisoners 
 were very ill fed, for, though the faithful sent abundant 
 supplies, little was allowed to reach their hands. One of 
 their number died from exhaustion, and as for the 
 fifteen old priests from Angers in the other boat, only 
 one survived at the end of the month ; two also of the 
 Nievre priests succumbed under their protracted priva- 
 
A storm at sea. 
 
 tions. None uttered a complaint, but died blessing God 
 that He had deemed them worthy to suffer for His 
 Name. However, it was not always that their guards 
 were equally inhuman, and on two several occasions they 
 had enjoyed the inexpressible happiness of being able to 
 say Mass at the bottom of the hold ; they had also 
 the consolation of reconciling to the Church two schismatic 
 priests who shared their confinement. 
 
 New victims were soon added to those already 
 detained on the Loire. In the beginning of the year 
 1793, Savoy had been annexed to France, under the 
 name of the department of Mont-Blanc, and from the 
 diocese of St. Francis de Sales and others adjoining 
 many good and zealous priests were sent to Nantes for 
 deportation. Thence they were all to be forwarded to 
 different ports ; those of the C6tes-du-Nord to Rochefort, 
 those of Mont-Blanc to Lorient, and those of the Nievre 
 to Brest. Fifteen of the last, being too weak to move, 
 were left behind to perish. The brigs containing their 
 brethren were fifteen days reaching Brest, and on the 
 passage three of their number died. During a terrible 
 storm which they encountered, the priests alone pre- 
 served their calmness. Touched by the sight of their 
 virtues and persuaded of their power with God, the 
 sailors came and begged their prayers. Presently the 
 wind subsided, and they reached their destination, but 
 only to undergo the same hard usage. They were taken 
 to the sailors' prison, where, owing to the close confine- 
 ment and want of food, so serious a sickness broke 
 out among them that the doctors insisted on ten of their 
 number being removed to the Marine Hospital, which, 
 notwithstanding the Reign of Terror, was still served 
 by the Filles de la Sagesse. 
 
 The priests from the C6tes-du-Nord were more for- 
 tunate for a time. They were shipped on board a 
 
A blasphemous crew. 
 
 2 1 7 
 
 corvette commanded by a humane captain and, after 
 reaching Rochefort, were transferred to the commandant's 
 ship, where they also met with kind treatment. But 
 this interval of rest was not to last long. Early in June 
 orders arrived to transfer them to a vessel which lay 
 there, called Les Deux Associes. Knowing from report 
 what they would have to endure in this floating prison, 
 they received the news as a sentence of death, a lingering 
 death of torture. Their personal sufferings did not fall 
 short of their expectations, but the pain inflicted by the 
 sacrilegious acts they witnessed and the impious language 
 to which they were forced to listen was harder still to 
 bear. The men who guarded them made a sport of 
 trampling on the crucifix and any other sacred object or 
 symbol of devotion on which they could lay their hands, 
 and, to use the words of a survivor, Hell itself could not 
 utter anything more dreadful than their imprecations. 
 The priests of Mont-Blanc were subsequently added to 
 their number, with twenty-nine from Finisterre and 
 seventeen from Morbihan ; so that more than four hun- 
 dred human beings were now crowded together in this 
 narrow space. Here for the present we must leave them, 
 for martyrdoms in Brittany are meanwhile pressing thick 
 upon us. 
 
CHAPTER XV. 
 
 T/ic Revolutionary tribunals. TJicir victims, clerical 
 and lay. Horrors of the floating prisons. 
 
 No special notice has yet been taken of one of the most 
 horrible tribunals set up during the Reign of Terror, that 
 of Brest, whose judges appear to have been selected for 
 their signal vices and brutality. The president, Ragmey, 
 had been a member of the Revolutionary Tribunal of 
 Paris, and the public accuser, Donze'-Verteuil, was an 
 apostate religious ; both being notorious for their blood- 
 thirsty disposition. These men made a practice of 
 addressing the prisoners before them in a tone of taunt- 
 ing irony, which was soon exchanged for menaces of 
 the most frightful character. On either side of the 
 accused stood a gendarme with drawn sword, while 
 another was posted immediately in front of him in a 
 threatening attitude. He was sternly forbidden to look 
 at any of the audience, and was placed in a chair so 
 constructed that its occupant was unable to lean or rest 
 himself in any way, a bar on a level with his chest 
 keeping him perforce in a constrained position. He was 
 not permitted to answer more than yes or no to the 
 questions put to him, however important to his case it 
 might be to give explanations. By such a process any 
 one could be made to condemn himself. No priest, 
 however, had a chance of escape, so that any explana- 
 tions he could offer would not have been of the slightest 
 avail. 
 
Martyrs, clerical, and lay. 219 
 
 The first two victims were guillotined in March, one of 
 whom, M. Devre's, had been exempted from deportation 
 on account of his great age. These were speedily fol- 
 lowed by two priests belonging to the diocese of Le"on, 
 who had devoted themselves to the spiritual needs of the 
 faithful in the neighbourhood ; they were executed at 
 Lesneven in Holy Week. It would seem as if this 
 sacred season had been specially chosen for these deeds 
 of blood ; for M. Bromelle, of the same diocese, was 
 guillotined on Maundy Thursday, and he had been in 
 prison several months, as had also one 'of the other 
 martyrs. Shortly before his death, he composed a 
 pathetic canticle deploring the woes of France, and 
 expressing his own resolve to die for the faith. Four 
 more priests were executed during the months of May 
 and June, one of whom, M. Chapalin, priest of Plouguin, 
 was with his sister when he was taken ; she shared his 
 fate. If so near a relative was not spared, we may 
 easily believe that other devout women who harboured 
 priests ran equal risks with the proscribed. For instance, 
 M. Clec'h, a priest of the Treguier diocese, was concealed 
 in the house of two poor Canadian workwomen, Anne 
 and Anastasie Le Blanc, mother and daughter, the 
 former eighty years of age. They were both condemned 
 by the merciless tribunal of Brest and suffered along 
 with M. Clec'h on the 12th of July. 
 
 There was a secular community of pious women at 
 Treguier, known as Paulines, of which Sister Marie 
 Gigant was a member. When the Revolution broke out 
 she was expelled from the house, together with her 
 associates, and retired to Taule, a place not far from 
 Morlaix, where she soon became obnoxious to the 
 schismatic cure on account of her influence with the 
 people. This cure' was a renegade monk, a Recollet, 
 known as Pere Hyppolite, but more commonly nick- 
 
2 20 Martyrs, clerical and lay. 
 
 named in his parish Frere Hypocrite. Mdlle. de Kerle'an, 
 a charitable lady of Taule, having been denounced, was 
 being led on foot, in sabots, by two gendarmes to the 
 prison at Morlaix. They passed the house where the 
 Sister lodged, who, touched with compassion at seeing 
 the young lady in this condition, came out to express 
 her sympathy and to offer her a staff with which to 
 support her steps along the bad road she had before 
 her, for it was the depth of winter. The false pastor, 
 who witnessed the circumstance, immediately pointed out 
 Sister Gigant to the gendarmes, telling them that it 
 would be as easy for them to take charge of two aristo- 
 crats as one ; so she also was led to prison. Her family 
 were recommended to abstain from taking any steps 
 to obtain her liberation, for that her best chance lay 
 in being forgotten, but they would not be guided by 
 this prudent advice and presented a petition in her 
 favour, the only effect of which was to draw attention to 
 her. Questioned as to the motives of her compassion 
 for Mdlle. de Kerle'an and her attachment to the religion 
 of a fanatical priesthood, her answers were sufficient to 
 convict her ; accordingly she was sent to Brest to appear 
 before its inexorable tribunal, and suffered courageously 
 on the 9th of July. 
 
 A cantor of the church of Morlaix, a poor hosier, was 
 executed during the same month. He had been put in 
 prison for having torn the national cockade out of a 
 cap and thrown it on the ground. This offence had 
 been committed at least two years previously, but the 
 revolutionists had good memories. A venerable Capuchin 
 missionary named Le Mevel, Pere Joseph in religion, 
 had been exempted from deportation on account of his 
 age and infirmities. He had found an asylum with a 
 widow lady at Morlaix, Madame Lesaulx. There he 
 was arrested together with his hostess, two religious 
 
Martyrs, clerical and lay. 221 
 
 women, and a young lady named De Forscantz. Appar- 
 ently Pere Joseph was saying Mass for them, as no other 
 reason can be assigned for their arrest. He was so 
 infirm that he was obliged to be supported on his way to 
 prison, and had to rest on a stone half-way. They were 
 all transferred to Brest, and on the 30th of July were 
 executed. Mdlle. de Forsgantz, who was strikingly 
 handsome, might, it is said, have saved her life at the 
 expense of her honour ; needless to say, she preferred 
 death. One priest alone, M. Le Meur, is mentioned as 
 having escaped. He had been sentenced to death by 
 the military commission sitting at Brest, when a lawyer 
 of the place, who had been his fellow-student, generously 
 undertook to save him, although he had himself been 
 classed with the suspected. Through the help of an 
 influential friend he succeeded in inducing the Com- 
 mission to commute the sentence of death into that of 
 deportation. M. Le Meur was long detained in prison, 
 but was finally released. 
 
 It was only on the 22nd of April that the Convention 
 extended capital punishment to those who harboured 
 priests, but many of the Breton tribunals had not waited 
 for the passing of this law. Thus M. de La Billias, a 
 gentleman who lived quietly in his chateau, and often 
 gave hospitality to priests, was executed at Nantes on 
 the nth of January, 1794. There was no actual proof 
 against him, with the exception of a portfolio containing 
 the register of many baptisms and marriages which was 
 found in his house. His demeanour was so calm that 
 those who saw him return from the tribunal imagined 
 that he had been acquitted. Madame de La Billias and 
 her two unmarried daughters were all three guillotined 
 in March, the ostensible accusation against them being 
 that they had insulted the constitutional cure during a 
 procession, and distributed pictures of the Sacred Heart 
 
222 
 
 Expilly executed. 
 
 among the peasantry. They denied the first charge, 
 which was a sheer invention, but they candidly owned 
 to the last. At the foot of the scaffold they embraced 
 each other, and then the mother begged to die last, that 
 she might have the consolation of knowing that her 
 daughters had made a worthy sacrifice of their lives. 
 Almost all the Breton tribunals treated the harbouring 
 of priests as a capital offence before any law was passed 
 to that effect. Thus we find a poor girl of Plaintel, with 
 whom M. Dujardin, Canon of Morlaix, had taken refuge, 
 executed at Saint-Brieuc early in this same year, and on 
 the xoth of January the mayor of Pluherlin and the 
 registrar of Limerzel, in whose house the priest of the 
 parish had been discovered, were guillotined together 
 with him at Lorient. On the 20th Madame de Malansac 
 also suffered for having concealed priests; and on the 
 14th Marguerite Passal, a servant-maid, was sent to the 
 scaffold for having helped the priest of Quistinic to 
 escape from his pursuers. 
 
 The cruelty with which the tribunal of Brest treated 
 both clergy and laity has already been described; it 
 remains to mention its wholesale condemnation of the 
 directory and council of the department of Finisterre, 
 which had openly sympathized with federalism. It is 
 a subject of unalloyed pain, for of the twenty-seven men 
 who were condemned without the opportunity of self- 
 defence, and the preparations for whose immediate 
 execution were made before they were put on their trial, 
 none can be said to have given any sure token of 
 penitence. They went to the scaffold singing the ' Mar- 
 seillaise,' and amongst them were several whose death 
 must be regarded in the light of a just judgment of God. 
 Of this number was Expilly, constitutional bishop of 
 Finisterre. Whether he had any true contrition must 
 for ever remain doubtful. A lawyer who undertook the 
 
A sacrifice to fraternal charity. 223 
 
 defence of the federalists, the same, apparently, as had 
 saved M. Le Meur, saw Expilly on the previous day and 
 said that he was in a very dejected state. Well might 
 he be so, and, if his conscience at that late hour was 
 truly awakened, his remorse must have been excruci- 
 ating. The circumstances of his execution and that 
 of his companions were such as to render death still 
 more bitter, paraded as they were through the city in 
 two carts, a military band preceding. What a contrast 
 to his pompous entrance into Brest three years before 
 amidst the applause of the revolutionists ! When the 
 contents of the first cart had been despatched, the 
 executioner cruelly arranged the heads in such a manner 
 as to be visible to the survivors. Expilly suffered last. 
 He is said to have heard the confessions of several of 
 the condemned, and given them all his blessing at the 
 foot of the scaffold ; whether he ever made his own 
 confession does not appear, but he is said to have 
 observed before his trial, the result of which he too 
 surely foresaw, ' It is a serious thing to have to appear 
 before the tribunal of man and that of God on the same 
 day.' 
 
 In the space of four months twelve priests were 
 guillotined at Rennes. We cannot mention all their 
 honoured names, but a few particulars which have been 
 preserved concerning some of them may here find a 
 place. M. Bouttier gave his life, not for the faith only, 
 but as a sacrifice to fraternal charity. He was in 
 concealment when he heard that his brother, who was a 
 peasant at Mezieres in the diocese of Rennes, had been 
 apprehended, and informed that he would not be liberated 
 until the priest they were in search of should give 
 himself up. Notwithstanding the remonstrances of his 
 friends, who represented that he was going to certain 
 death, M. Bouttier did not hesitate to surrender himself. 
 
224 Martyr priests. 
 
 On his way to execution, which took place in the 
 cemetery of Saint-Etienne, he sang the Litany of the 
 Blessed Virgin and recited the prayers which the Church 
 offers for the dead at their interment. Some youths 
 who were employed to shoot him caused this good 
 priest much needless suffering. 
 
 M. Oreve was hidden in the secluded parish of 
 Cintre, but no place escaped the vigilance of the priest- 
 hunters. One day, seeing a troop of soldiers at the door, 
 he had only time to conceal himself under a bed. The 
 chief of the detachment was in outward manner rough 
 and even savage, but, in reality, he was not a bad man ; 
 his desire was to allow the priests to escape, and he was 
 the means of saving more than one. His method was 
 to leave his men at the door and enter the house 
 swaggering and swearing in true republican fashion, 
 then, after making a pretended search, he would return 
 to his troop saying there was no calotin there, and 
 perhaps rate his men for not having kept a good look- 
 out, and so allowed the priest to slip by while he was 
 in the house. He had pursued this plan in M. Oreve's 
 case, and the danger seemed over, but, unfortunately, 
 among the party was a man of the true revolutionary 
 stamp, who chose to go in and take a look himself. 
 Spying the priest's legs under the bed, he called to his 
 comrades, triumphantly announcing his success, when 
 the soldiers rushed in and, dragging M. Oreve from 
 his place of concealment, wantonly maltreated him by 
 cramming hay into his mouth. He was guillotined 
 along with several nuns, with whom there is reason to 
 conclude he had sought an asylum. 
 
 M. Poirier, who belonged to one of the best families 
 in Becherel, and was priest of the parish, remained there 
 in concealment. One evening he inadvertently fell in 
 with a patrol of gendarmes. These men would have let 
 
Death of M. Poirier. 
 
 225 
 
 him pass unnoticed, but here again there was one ill- 
 disposed individual, an inhabitant of the place, who 
 thwarted the more humane inclinations of the others, 
 and insisted on the priest being arrested. M. Poirier 
 is described by a lady 1 who saw him from her window, 
 as he passed to the tribunal, as a tall old man, with 
 grey hair and a most dignified and heavenly counten- 
 ance. She witnessed at the same time a circumstance 
 which is worth recording, as giving an idea of the 
 barbarity with which the prisoners were treated. The 
 guillotine at Rennes, as in most other places, stood 
 permanently in the public square, all covered with blood, 
 and sometimes with heads exposed upon it. The 
 gendarmes were in the habit, as they went by, of calling 
 the attention of their prisoners to it, and making them 
 look at the fatal scaffold which they were so soon to 
 ascend. ' Look there,' said one of them to M. Poirier; 
 'take a look at Madame Guillotine.' The venerable 
 old man seemed to take no notice and did not turn his 
 face as directed, but walked modestly along. Upon 
 which, the gendarme, offended, doubtless, by his com- 
 posure and disregard of his order, immediately struck 
 him a severe blow on the face, saying, ' Will you not 
 look there when I tell you ? You will soon be there 
 yourself.' These words were reported by persons who 
 overheard them, but the blow which she saw given was 
 never effaced from that lady's memory. M. Poirier, in 
 his last moments, gave an example of true Christian 
 
 1 Mother of Mgr. Brute. She had apartments in the Parliament 
 house of Brittany, under the former chapel of the palace. In the room 
 immediately underneath the sanctuary, now profaned, being part of the 
 office of the Revolutionary Committee, the family had a secret altar, 
 where two venerable priests, one a Dominican religious, the other a 
 Capuchin, offered the Holy Sacrifice daily for nearly two years, during 
 all which time they remained concealed in this same room. It was 
 from one of the windows of her apartments that Madame Brutd saw 
 M. Poirier led to the tribunal {Life of Mgr. BruU, pp. 44, 45). 
 P 25 
 
226 
 
 Martyrs at Remies. 
 
 charity by entreating his relatives to show no ill-will 
 to the man who had caused his death, but even to 
 befriend, when needful, both himself and his family. 
 
 M. Emery, another of the afore-mentioned priests, 
 had been in the habit of saying Mass on the wild landcs 
 of Brittany for thousands of the peasantry, some being 
 posted at a distance to give the alarm in case of danger. 2 
 Bouassier, the President of the tribunal which con- 
 demned him, was an old schoolfellow of his. After 
 sentence of death had been pronounced, M. Emery 
 addressed him in Latin, reproaching him with his crimes, 
 and reminding him of the tribunal of an outraged God 
 before which he must one day appear. The judge 
 turned pale and seemed much agitated, but called on 
 the gendarmes to silence him. In prison he was the 
 support and consolation of his fellow-captives, exhorting 
 them to die with joy, and himself setting them the 
 example by singing the Te Deum as he ascended the 
 scaffold. Thence he would fain have addressed the 
 people, but his voice was drowned by a roll of drums. 
 
 A striking contrast was exhibited between the feelings 
 of the country folk and those of the townspeople on the 
 occasion of the death of M. Crosson. It was fixed for 
 the day on which there was to be a fair at Rennes, the 
 guillotine being erected in the very field where the fair 
 would be held. When the peasants who had flocked 
 in from the country found what was about to take place 
 
 2 Souvestre gives an instance of a remarkable device adopted by this 
 religious people in order not to be deprived of the blessing of Mass. It 
 was celebrated off the coast near Crozon, which place was at the time 
 occupied by the soldiery. After midnight, a bell from a small vessel, 
 moored at a good distance from the shore, gave the people notice, and 
 hundreds of fishermen's skiffs, bearing the whole population of the 
 neighbourhood, men, women, and children, might be observed putting 
 out to sea and all converging to the same point, the vessel in question, 
 where a priest stood prepared to offer the Adorable Sacrifice in the 
 midst of the watery waste [Les Derniers Bretons, p. ii. c. iii.). 
 
Martyrs at Lorient. 
 
 227 
 
 they were much distressed, and immediately dispersed, 
 giving no further heed to the fair. M. Tostivint was 
 one of those priests who had generously returned from 
 Jersey to the post of danger. He was recognized and 
 denounced by a man whom he had formerly prepared 
 for his first communion, and was seized along with his 
 host, M. Bede'e. Chained together, they were taken to 
 Montfort to wait until Madame Bedee had also been 
 apprehended, when all three were passed on to Rennes. 
 Before dying, M. Bedee wrote a touching letter to his 
 son. ' When you receive my letter,' he said, ' you will 
 no longer have either father, mother, or preceptor. 
 Your property will be taken from you, but the grace of 
 God will still be yours ; be faithful to it.' Both husband 
 and wife behaved with great fortitude in prison ; a 
 constitutional priest endeavoured to thrust his ministra- 
 tions upon them, but met with such a repulse that he 
 never again ventured to offer his services to any of the 
 condemned. They were, however, greatly appalled at 
 the sight of the guillotine, and M. Tostivint, who had 
 been about to surfer first, begged that he might be 
 allowed to follow his friends, in order to be able to 
 support their courage. His petition was granted, and 
 he continued his exhortations to the last, when he 
 himself received the stroke of death. 
 
 The criminal tribunal of Lorient was as cruel as that of 
 Ille-et-Vilaine. Its president, Hannoyer, was one of 
 the vilest of men, and had disgraced every profession 
 he had followed. He had been a religious, and on the 
 revolutionary outbreak entered the army, from which, 
 however, he deserted and became a sailor ; he ended 
 his naval career by turning pirate. Such was the man 
 selected to sit in judgment on faithful priests and fervent 
 Catholics. During the month of May, this tribunal 
 sent to the guillotine M. Brien, priest of Saint-Maurice, 
 
228 Martyrs at Saint-Brieuc. 
 
 and, along with him, a poor weaver of Saint-Vincent- 
 sur-Oust, a pious girl of the same parish, and the mayor 
 of the commune, the only offence alleged against them 
 being that of having afforded hospitality to priests. They 
 were followed by another priest of the diocese of Saint- 
 Malo, M. Mayeux. Two poor women of Serent, in the 
 diocese of Vannes, where they had all been seized, who, 
 no doubt, had given him shelter, were guillotined with 
 him ; indeed, we continually find priests suffering in 
 company with one or two women who had befriended 
 them. Thus M. Carel, Vicaire of Guegon, whose execu- 
 tion at Lorient is the next on record, had for his asso- 
 ciate in death Anne Lemaitre, in whose house he had 
 been discovered. Four more priests, one being also a 
 Carthusian, met a similar fate in the course of the months 
 of June and July. The commission at Savenay was 
 meanwhile continuing to shoot Vendeans as fast as they 
 were brought before it, together with an occasional priest 
 who had been necessitated to follow the army on its 
 march into Brittany. Thus perished M. Auffray, in 
 company with a pious couple named Bernard who had 
 harboured him. 
 
 The department of Finisterre was so completely dis- 
 organized by the annihilation of Federalism that the 
 search for priests was rather less active than elsewhere 
 during the year 1794. We find only the names of two 
 executed at Quimper, M. Riou and M. Raguenez, the 
 latter being taken while administering a sick person ; he 
 was guillotined on Palm Sunday. Many priests, as we 
 have seen, suffered at Brest, but they belonged mostly to 
 the dioceses of Leon and Treguier. The numerous 
 executions at Saint-Brieuc in the early part of 1794 had 
 rendered the proscribed more cautious in that district, 
 and accordingly there is an interval between the months 
 of February and May unmarked by the death of any 
 
Ur stile Taupin. 229 
 
 priest ; but during the latter month the execution of 
 three ecclesiastics caused deep sorrow in the districts 
 where they had ministered. Two of them, named 
 Lageat and Le Gall, were young priests whom compas- 
 sion for the bereaved state of the Catholics of Treguier 
 had led to return from Jersey. They had been hospi- 
 tably received by a woman named Ursule Taupin, whose 
 husband was in England, being valet to Mgr. Le Mintier, 
 the exiled Bishop of Treguier. A marriage celebrated 
 by one of them in the month of April was the cause of 
 their arrest, a republican peasant having discovered, by 
 adroitly questioning the bridegroom, that the ceremony 
 had been performed by a Catholic priest. The autho- 
 rities, to whom this wretched man carried the information, 
 were speedily on the track, and on the 30th of May 
 the two priests were seized, together with their charitable 
 hostess. As they were both dressed like laymen, Madame 
 Taupin was advised to say that she had received them 
 as lodgers in ignorance of their profession, but she at 
 once replied, ' God forbid that I should preserve a 
 mother to my children who had given them the example 
 of a falsehood !' So far, then, from seeking any evasion, 
 she said to the military present, ' I knew these gentle- 
 men to be ecclesiastics, and my house was open to 
 them, as it is to all like them.' They were sent before 
 the tribunal of Saint-Brieuc at Lannion, to which place 
 it had removed, and were all condemned to death. The 
 priests were guillotined on the same day that they were 
 judged. They recited the Miserere on the way to death, 
 and strove to address the people when they reached the 
 scaffold, but the noise of the drums rendered their voices 
 inaudible. They then gave each other absolution, and 
 met the final stroke with courage. 
 
 The poor woman was doomed to a longer agony, for 
 she was taken back to be executed at Treguier. As 
 
230 Ur stile Taupin. 
 
 soon as the priests had undergone their sentence she 
 was bound and placed on a horse, the guillotine, yet 
 reeking with the blood of the martyrs, immediately 
 preceding her. About three miles from Treguier was 
 an inn, kept by Lageat, the father of one of the 
 slaughtered priests. The military who were escorting 
 Madame Taupin stopped at this inn, causing the cart 
 containing the guillotine to be drawn up before the door. 
 They then forced the master of the house to supply with 
 drink the man who had just executed his son, and 
 themselves drank to enthusiastic cries of Vive la Re- 
 publiquc. The ingenious cruelty with which the men of 
 the revolution tortured their victims, instances of which 
 meet us at every turn, is more revolting even than their 
 ferocity ; for, while the latter was akin to that of the 
 wild beast, the former may be said to have been simply 
 diabolical. The effect produced by this scene on the 
 mind of one of the priest's brothers was so terrible that 
 he lost his reason. During this halt, which lasted above 
 an hour, Ursule Taupin remained bound upon the 
 horse's back, having under her eyes the fatal instrument 
 which was so soon to cut short her own life. She was a 
 young mother, with several children of a tender age. 
 Perhaps it was only to try her, for it seems unlikely that 
 they had the power to reverse a judicial sentence of 
 death, but some agents of the revolutionary authorities, 
 we are told, seized this occasion to remind her of her 
 little ones. ' Swear fidelity to the Republic,' they said, 
 ' and you will be saved.' ' Never,' she replied. ' You 
 are an unnatural mother, then,' they rejoined; 'your 
 children will be destitute ' (the property of the condemned 
 being always confiscated), ' and will die of hunger. They 
 will be orphans, since their father is an emigrant and 
 cannot return to France.' ' My children have a Father 
 in heaven,' was the answer of this generous woman ; ' and 
 
Death of M. Androuct. 231 
 
 to Him I commend them. I die for religion ; God will 
 not abandon them.' She put on white garments when 
 she went to execution the next day, and suffered without 
 betraying the least sign of weakness, crying out Vive le 
 Itoi/vfhen in the act of laying down her head under the 
 knife. All Treguier deplored her death. Her husband, 
 on returning to France some years later, was seized and 
 deported to Guiana. 
 
 The reader will remember M. Androuet, the zealous 
 priest who walked out of the church at Plumaugat when 
 the rector took the oath. Shortly afterwards that un- 
 worthy man read from the pulpit on a Sunday a pastoral 
 of Jacob, the schismatic bishop of the C6tes-du-Nord, 
 and was publicly reprimanded by M. Androuet, whose 
 zeal could not endure to see the people beguiled into 
 error. He was in consequence denounced and impri- 
 soned, but was liberated at the time of the amnesty. 
 He continued to exercise his priestly functions secretly 
 at Plumaugat until 1794, when the republicans, pursuing 
 the remnants of the Vendean army, discovered and ar- 
 rested him. He was brutally treated, being struck on 
 the face with his breviary, and again with a crucifix so 
 violently as to shiver the latter into fragments. At Saint- 
 Meen they clothed him in sacerdotal vestments and 
 paraded him through the place, and, not content with 
 making him thus an object of public scorn, they endea- 
 voured to asperse his spotless character by reading to 
 the assembled people a list of hideous crimes drawn 
 up by themselves, but which they declared had been 
 found in his house and affected to regard as his general 
 confession. The people, however, knew their pastor too 
 well to be duped by this vile calumny. Arrived at 
 Rennes, the authorities sent him to Saint- Brieuc to be tried. 
 The confessor had thus to undertake a second journey 
 fraught with renewed suffering and ignominy. Seeing 
 
232 
 
 M. Saint-Pez. 
 
 a little boy crying from pity at the sight, he said to 
 him, ' My child, it is a happiness to suffer for the 
 faith:' words which so enraged his guards that they 
 began to strike him, calling out, ' See what he is doing ! 
 He is trying to make fanatics of innocent children.' At 
 Bois-Gervilli they shaved him, and, in doing so, cut off 
 some of the skin of his head. He only remarked mildly, 
 ' You make me suffer a great deal.' He was then bound 
 so tightly that he was unable to use his hands to take 
 the food which some charitable persons brought him, 
 and they had to put it into his mouth. In this condition 
 he was compelled to go all the way on foot, tied to a 
 horse's tail and blinded with dust. He terminated his 
 protracted martyrdom on the 30th of May. 
 
 A Benedictine nun, niece to Mgr. Le Mintier, suffered 
 soon after. A party of soldiers presented themselves 
 one day, and asked her if she regretted the ancien regime. 
 She was too sincere to dissimulate or conceal her sym- 
 pathies for the Bourbon family, and she answered accord- 
 ingly. This was enough ; she was condemned and 
 executed for making what were called counter-revolu- 
 tionary speeches. A fortnight later, a poor joiner of 
 Loude'ac was guillotined for having harboured a priest. 
 
 The execution of M. Saint-Pez at Saint-Malo was a 
 subject of poignant grief to all who were acquainted with 
 his extraordinary merits. He belonged to a respectable 
 peasant family and had been much valued by Mgr. Herce, 
 the Bishop of Dol, who made him cure' of Aucaleuc. 
 With a generous devotion he had returned from Jersey 
 to labour in the desolated vineyard, and fixed himself 
 at Roslandrieux, his native place. Here his life was 
 that of an apostle. Returning one day from visiting a 
 sick person, as he was passing through Carfentain with 
 a young man who habitually accompanied him, he en- 
 countered a party of gendarmes. He made his escape, 
 
His cruel death. 
 
 233 
 
 but, hearing a cry, he thought that they were murdering 
 the youth who had been with him, and was so affected 
 as to faint on the spot. He was thus easily retaken, 
 and met with the usual savage treatment from his cap- 
 tors. In prison his zeal never allowed him to be idle, 
 and, short as was the time he passed there, he had the 
 happiness of bringing many of his fellow-sufferers to 
 repentance, and all made their confessions to him. One 
 of his nieces, who was also his god-child, was in the 
 prison with him, having been arrested for being found 
 in possession of a catechism. When she saw her uncle 
 arrive, bound with cords, his clothes all torn and his 
 face covered with bruises, she was much distressed, but 
 he met her with a smile and showed great pleasure at 
 seeing her. He was condemned to death by the military 
 commission on the 13th of May. When the executioner 
 came to shave him in preparation for the guillotine, 
 the man had the inhumanity to cut his ears off also. 
 M. Saint-Pez did not utter a word. On his way to 
 death, observing that the two gendarmes on either side 
 of him pressed very closely against him, he said, ' Do 
 you think I am meditating an escape ? No ; forward ! 
 I do not fear the guillotine.' His spirit seemed already 
 in Heaven. When some one offered to aid him in 
 mounting the scaffold, he told him that he needed no 
 help. ' I always go to the altar,' he said, ' by myself.' 
 The executioner, when fastening him to the plank, struck 
 him several heavy blows with his knees, shouting, ' Calo- 
 tin, you'll not get loose now.' The cords were pulled 
 so tight that a cry of pain escaped his lips, but it was 
 quickly followed by the ejaculation, Vive Jesus! Vive 
 Marie! Vive le Roi ! Whether from awkwardness or a 
 refinement of barbarity, the executioner, at the first 
 lowering of the knife, only cut off a part of the martyr's 
 face ; at his next attempt he severed but a portion of the 
 
234 
 
 Sceur Bertelot. 
 
 head. A cry of indignation then rose from all around, 
 and an officer, advancing sword in hand, said to the 
 man, ' You rascal, if you do not finish your work, I will 
 plunge my sword into your body.' It was only at the 
 third essay that the martyr's head fell. The executioner 
 got off with a punishment of twenty-four hours' imprison- 
 ment, his judges telling him that priests were certainly 
 to be guillotined, but not in that fashion. The virtues 
 of M. Saint-Pez and the courage with which he died 
 inspired so deep a veneration for him, that many 
 Catholics invoked his aid, and four priests who were 
 concealed in the same place, and in hourly danger of 
 detection, believed that they owed their deliverance, which 
 seemed little short of miraculous, to his intercession. 
 
 Although Carrier had left Nantes in March, and the 
 military commission for trying the Vendeans had also 
 ceased its functions about the same time, that unhappy 
 town still continued to be the scene of frequent exe- 
 cutions. Sceur Bertelot, an Ursuline of the city, who 
 had retired into La Vendee, probably her native country, 
 was sentenced to death on the double charge of refusing 
 the oath of liberty and equality, and of having been 
 found teaching the Catechism to some children. She 
 showed great firmness before her judges, and, when 
 reproached with having given instructions in Christian 
 doctrine, she answered that she was bound by vow to 
 do so, and must fulfil her obligation whenever she had 
 the opportunity. The Ursulines do, in fact, add this 
 engagement to the usual religious vows. She was so 
 enfeebled by the privations she had endured that she 
 had to be carried to the scaffold, but her spirit had lost 
 none of its strength. She had a very sweet and melo- 
 dious voice, so that people used to go on purpose to 
 hear her when she sang in the choir. On reaching the 
 place of execution she raised this sweet voice of hers 
 
Priests murdered by soldiers. 235 
 
 for the last time on earth, and, to the astonishment both 
 of the executioner and of the spectators, began singing 
 a canticle to our Lady. 'A moment after,' says the 
 Abbe Tresvaux, 'she doubtless went to finish it in 
 Heaven.' A fille de la Sagesse suffered about the same 
 time. Sceur Bertelot's superioress, Mme. Davesne, and 
 five of her nuns would all probably have shared the 
 same fate but that the epidemic which raged in the 
 prison where they were detained spared the guillotine 
 its work and carried them all off. They had previously 
 undergone a martyrdom of pains and privations. Starved, 
 infested with vermin, and forced to associate with the 
 vilest criminals, whose polluted talk was perpetually 
 offending their chaste ears, nothing could disturb their 
 equanimity. They had a fervent desire to shed their 
 blood for the faith, and assured some of their sisters, 
 with whom they were occasionally able to hold commu- 
 nication, that they were filled with interior consolations. 
 
 Many a priest, as we have said, was put to death 
 without any judicial formality. Such was the fate of 
 M. Royer, Cure of Dompierre-du-Chemin, who had re- 
 mained in spite of the decree of deportation. A detach- 
 ment of soldiers met him one day near Fougeres and 
 bade him shout Vive la Republique ! We are told that 
 one must have lived in those dreadful times to realize 
 the horror which good people felt for that cry. M. Royer 
 could not bring himself to utter it ; on the contrary, he 
 exclaimed Vive la Religion! to which he added Vive le 
 Roil and was immediately thrust through and through 
 by the bayonets of the enraged soldiery. Not a word 
 of complaint escaped his lips; he only murmured two 
 or three times, ' I forgive you my death.' Six of his 
 parishioners were also murdered by these men a few 
 days later, and their heads suspended from the steeple 
 of the church of Dompierre. The National Guards 
 
236 Priests mtirdered by soldiers. 
 
 committed similar atrocities. Tresvaux mentions a young 
 deacon who was shot by them, and also the parish priest 
 of Saint-Pe'ran, M. Le Me'e, together with an inhabitant 
 of the place. M. Le Mee was buried where he had 
 fallen, and his parishioners, having gone during the 
 night, which was very dark, to exhume his body, beheld 
 themselves surrounded by a remarkable light as soon as 
 they had removed the soil, and this light accompanied 
 them to the cemetery, which was a mile and a half 
 distant. M. Brasseur, priest of La Chapelle-Chaussee, 
 had a wonderful escape. Perceiving a band of priest- 
 hunters, he hid himself in a field of standing corn, but 
 not before he had been observed by a soldier who, 
 coming up close to him, discharged his musket at him. 
 At the same time a ball from one of the man's comrades, 
 who was at his heels, struck the priest on the head. 
 From the rest of the troop he received several bayonet 
 thrusts. They ended with cutting off one of his ears, 
 and, after rifling his pockets, left him weltering in his 
 blood and, as they thought, dead. Some good neigh- 
 bours, however, on removing the body, perceived that 
 he still breathed, and carried him to the house of his 
 father, who was a surgeon in the place and a great 
 partisan of the Revolution. Nevertheless, he had still 
 a father's feelings, and was deeply affected at the sight 
 of his son thus cruelly mangled. He dressed his wounds, 
 nursed him carefully, and ultimately cured him ; and, 
 when the republicans some time after came to his house 
 to seize M. Brasseur and lead him to death, he declared 
 that they should only reach his son by passing over his 
 own dead body. His resolution seems to have daunted 
 them. Anyhow, this good priest survived with his glo- 
 rious scars to fill his post at La Chapelle-Chaussee for 
 ten years. He knew very well the men who had tried 
 to murder him, and used to say, ' If they were to pay 
 
Death of M. Cormeaux. 
 
 237 
 
 me a visit, I would wait on them at table with great 
 pleasure.' Two other priests are mentioned as having 
 been murdered by the soldiery in the C6tes-du-Nord. 
 
 The martyrdom of Breton priests was not confined 
 to their own country; for, besides those who perished 
 in the capital, several were executed in the neighbouring 
 departments. Some of those who died for the faith had 
 been far from inimical to the Revolution in its early 
 stages. Plausible reasoners had represented the move- 
 ment as being solely directed to the reformation of 
 abuses, and it has been seen how not a few of the 
 country priests, unsuspicious of evil and ignorant of the 
 world, believed what was thus confidently asserted and 
 were beguiled into lending it their strenuous support. 
 The good rector of Plaintal, M. Cormeaux, was of the 
 number, and so favourably was he disposed towards the 
 innovations which were first introduced, that he was 
 made president of the council in the department of the 
 C6tes-du-Nord ; but his eyes were soon opened to 
 perceive the real aim of the pretended reformers and 
 he broke with them at once. He thus incurred their 
 special hatred and found himself forced, after concealing 
 himself in his parish for some months, to fly the neigh- 
 bourhood. He went to Paris, where he managed to 
 escape notice during the whole of the year 1792 and 
 a great part of 1793; yet his zeal never left him idle. 
 Called to Pontoise, in the August of that year, to 
 administer the sacraments to a dying man, he was 
 stopped at Franconville on his way back because he 
 was not provided with a passport, which was rigorously 
 required in those days, even for the shortest journey. 
 Taken before the mayor, M. Cormeaux, who was of 
 a singularly frank and open disposition, immediately 
 declared that he was a priest, the Rector of Plaintel 
 in Brittany, and that he had been expelled from his cure. 
 
238 Le Carpentier at Saint- Malo. 
 
 The mayor, who had neither required nor desired this 
 piece of information, was much annoyed at receiving it. 
 ' Why did you tell me what I did not ask to know ? ' he 
 said, reproachfully, in an undertone, in order not to be 
 overheard by those about him. ' I saw very well that 
 you were a priest, and wished to save you.' But the 
 mischief was done, and the mayor thought himself 
 obliged to send the good man to prison. He was 
 transferred a fortnight later to the Convent of Recollets 
 at Versailles, then used as a house of detention. As 
 he passed through Saint-Germain-en-Laie, he spoke so 
 touchingly of God to many of the inhabitants whom 
 curiosity had collected round him, that they wanted to 
 liberate him. His imprisonment at the Recollets was 
 a blessing to many, for he did the work of an apostle 
 during his nine months of confinement there. Thence 
 he was removed to the common prison of Versailles, and 
 thence again to one near Saint-Cloud, and was finally 
 brought before the Revolutionary Tribunal. The thirst 
 for blood exhibited by the monsters who composed it 
 seemed like a positive passion, or a sort of hideous 
 mania, for they often sent to the guillotine men con- 
 cerning whose imputed offences they did not care to 
 inquire, and of whose very names they were ignorant; 
 indeed, many of the members of the tribunal went 
 habitually to its sittings in a state of drunkenness ; 
 among whom was an apostate priest, Joachim Vilate, 
 whose ferocity fully equalled that of his colleagues. As 
 it may be supposed, M. Cormeaux did not escape con- 
 demnation ; he was guillotined on the 9th of June. 
 
 At this time the prisons of Paris contained many 
 Breton men and women, guilty of no offence but their 
 high birth and their virtues, and more were soon to 
 be added to their number. During his stay in the 
 province Le Carpentier, Carrier's associate, had fixed 
 
Mdlle. de Saint- Luc. 
 
 239 
 
 his residence for some time at Saint-Malo, filling that 
 unhappy city with consternation and mourning. The 
 heads of Vendeans and priests fell in such numbers by 
 his orders, that he boasted, when writing to the Con 
 vention on the nth of February, or the 23rd Pluviose, 
 as it was called in the new revolutionary calendar, that 
 100,000 francs had been realized by the death of these 
 'brigands.' But Saint-Malo contained several rich and 
 distinguished families which had not emigrated, and Le 
 Carpentier was determined to bring them also under the 
 axe of the guillotine and their money into the State 
 treasury. As, however, they were much respected in 
 the town, he probably dreaded an outbreak of popular 
 indignation if they were executed there ; so he sent them 
 up to Paris to be judged. Thirty persons were thus 
 despatched in the beginning of June, of whom several 
 were ladies of good birth and remarkable for their virtues 
 and charity to the poor. Amongst their fellow country- 
 women already imprisoned there was a niece of the 
 late Bishop of Quimper, Mdlle. de Saint-Luc. She had 
 joined the Society of the Dames de la Retraite in the 
 year 1782. This was not, strictly speaking, a religious 
 community, since its members did not take vows, but 
 only a pious association which laboured with much zeal 
 for the salvation of souls. 3 When schism made its 
 entrance into the diocese of Quimper, Mdlle. de Saint- 
 Luc wrote an excellent letter of remonstrance to Le Coz, 
 which, like other similar attempts, made no impression 
 
 3 The foundress was Mdlle. Catherine de Francheville, sister of 
 Claude de Francheville, seneschal and chief magistrate of Vannes. The 
 object of the institute was to provide a house of retreat for women who 
 desired to withdraw for a while from the distractions of the world. 
 Before her death she had the consolation of seeing four similar houses 
 established in Brittany — at Rennes, Saint-Malo, Quimper, and Saint- 
 Pol-de-Leon — all of which acknowledged her as their foundress, although 
 her humility would not permit her to be chosen superior of any of them 
 {Through Brittany, by Mrs. Macquoid, p. 91). 
 
240 Arrest of aged priests. 
 
 on his proud spirit. She was more successful, however, 
 with another ecclesiastic, whom she persuaded to retract 
 the oath which he had been seduced into taking. The 
 association of which she was a member was suppressed 
 along with the religious communities, and Mdlle. de 
 Saint-Luc then returned to her family. Her devotion to 
 the Sacred Heart of Jesus led to her arrest. She shared 
 with many other devout persons the conviction that this 
 Adorable Heart would take pity on the woes of France, 
 and accordingly she used to paint pictures of It for 
 distribution, in order to increase and spread the devotion 
 amongst good Catholics. She had given one of these 
 pictures to M. Tremaria, which served, as already men- 
 tioned, to send him also to the scaffold. The family 
 of Saint-Luc were arrested in October, 1793, at the time 
 when the nobles generally were imprisoned, and four 
 months later Mdlle. de Saint-Luc was transferred to 
 Quimper and put in the common prison with the women 
 confined for theft and other criminal offences, who 
 robbed and cruelly beat her. Here she remained for 
 the rest of 1793, and was still there in March, 1794, 
 when M. Riou, Rector of Labahan, heard her confession 
 on the morning of his execution. She was afterwards 
 sent to the Conciergerie at Paris, as were also her father 
 and mother. Condemned by the Revolutionary Tribunal, 
 they suffered together on the 19th of July. She begged 
 to die first ; then, bidding her parents farewell, she said 
 to them, ' You have taught me how to live and, by God's 
 grace, I will teach you how to die.' Ten other Bretons 
 perished at the same time, amongst whom were two 
 sisters of M. Tremaria, two gentlemen of Saint-Malo, 
 both octogenarians, and a boy of seventeen, who was 
 guillotined along with his mother. Neither old age nor 
 youth found mercy in those days. 
 
 It might have been supposed that the laws against the 
 
Les Deux Associis. 241 
 
 clergy had attained their utmost possible rigour, but this 
 was not so. In many parishes there were still residing 
 faithful priests whose extreme old age or great infirmities 
 had hitherto shielded them from molestation. Many of 
 these were quite decrepit and even bed-ridden. Yet a 
 deputy, a lawyer named Bezard, was found inhuman 
 enough to propose to the Convention that these afflicted 
 men should be arrested. The Assembly adopted the 
 proposal, and enjoined all these priests, under pain of 
 death, to present themselves within two decades — for 
 weeks no longer existed in the republican calendar — at 
 the chief town of their department, in order to their 
 incarceration. It was a pitiable sight to see cartloads of 
 these infirm and aged men arriving from all quarters 
 at the houses of detention, there to endure every pri- 
 vation, with the lack of all that care which their invalid 
 and often helpless state required. 
 
 But, if the lot of these incarcerated priests was hard, 
 it was tolerable in comparison with what their brethren 
 endured aboard that accursed vessel at Rochefort. 
 Several narratives were afterwards written by survivors, 
 and all agree in describing their position as truly horrible, 
 and their gaolers, that is, the captain and crew, as- 
 monsters of cruelty. But all, from a motive of Christian 
 charity, forebore giving the names of their tormentors. 
 The merchant vessel, Les Deux Associe's, had originally 
 been a slave-ship. The deck was divided into two 
 nearly equal portions, the after-part as far as the main- 
 mast being allotted to the crew, and the fore-part to 
 the prisoners. An oaken palisade, eight feet high and 
 garnished with sharp spikes, separated them ; it ran right 
 across the deck, but there were two doors of communi- 
 cation, defended by guns charged with grape-shot and 
 pointed forward so as to sweep the end occupied 
 by the priests, under the pretext of preventing an out- 
 Q 25 
 
242 Les Deux AssociSs. 
 
 break, which their guards affected to dread. Four 
 culverins besides defended the barrier and commanded 
 likewise the whole fore-part of the ship. At each door 
 were stationed sentinels, who were strictly charged to 
 watch every movement of the prisoners ; moreover, a 
 warning was posted up menacing with chains and death 
 the slightest departure from the rules laid down. 
 Amongst these was a prohibition against passing through 
 the doors, and orders were issued to fire on any one 
 who should even look through them at the crew. 
 
 Four hundred and nine prisoners had to be lodged in 
 a vessel which, indeed, had often carried large cargoes 
 of negroes, and how cruelly those poor creatures were 
 packed together is known to every one : the priests 
 fared no better. The between-deck allotted to their 
 so-called beds, which were mere planks loosely nailed 
 together, was only four or five feet high, yet, shallow 
 as was this space, it was divided into two tiers, so that 
 the occupants thus piled one above the other might be 
 said to be literally entombed ; only eleven inches of 
 width being allowed to each. They were also compelled 
 to lie so that the feet of one row should touch the 
 heads of those in front, and, by a gratuitous piece of 
 barbarity, the planks were slanted in such a way that 
 every one's head was lower than his feet. 'We were 
 so closely jammed together,' says one of the sufferers, 
 ' that we could not lie on our backs— but only on our 
 sides, and many had the feet and legs of five or six 
 others upon them. In order to leave no intervals, we 
 were interlaced together so that one had his feet where 
 another had his head. The whole plank was thus 
 covered with bodies, which exactly filled the whole 
 space.' The centre part of the between-deck was 
 crammed with hammocks, in which the rest were stowed 
 away as in so many sacks. The horrors of fourteen 
 
Les Deux Associds. 243 
 
 consecutive hours passed in this stove, during the 
 summer heats, by a number of human beings squeezed 
 tightly against each other and receiving air only through 
 one small aperture, which had a trellis of thick wood- 
 work over it, may be rather imagined than described. 
 No wonder that many died positively stifled from want 
 of air. Add to this the torment they endured from the 
 vermin which devoured them and of which they could 
 not rid themselves through their deficiency of linen — for 
 they had been left only two shirts and two pocket- 
 handkerchiefs apiece — as also from the intolerable stench, 
 aggravated as it was by the presence of so many sick 
 and dying men, and the wonder is that any of their 
 number survived to tell the tale of their appalling 
 sufferings. 
 
 A report at last got abroad that the plague had broken 
 out in the vessel, and a sanitary officer was sent to 
 ascertain the truth. It is to the same narrator we owe 
 the knowledge of this fact; he tells us that the officer 
 vainly attempted to penetrate between decks. The heat 
 and effluvia were more than he could bear, and, fearing 
 to be suffocated, he hastily regained the deck, saying, 
 that if four hundred dogs had been confined down there 
 they would all have been smothered before morning 
 or have gone raving mad. ' Death, by diminishing our 
 numbers,' says the writer of the journal, 'might also 
 have abated the heat which tortured us, but this allevia- 
 tion, sad as it was, was pitilessly denied us, and they 
 had the cruelty to refuse us the space which our brethren 
 by dying had left us, in order to keep us massed together 
 as before.' The visit of this officer, however (he tells us), 
 had the effect of putting an end to this system of filling 
 up the vacancies, which had been continued for four 
 months. During the day the priests might go on deck, 
 but their numbers were so great that it was impossible 
 
244 Les Deux Associds. 
 
 for them to move about. Their food was as scanty as 
 it was bad, and, indeed, was barely sufficient to keep 
 them alive. Such as it was, the crew often stole a 
 portion, and some of them were so gnawed with hunger, 
 that they would look into the tubs which had contained 
 the refuse for the pigs, to see if any morsels remained. 
 
 This is but a very slight and imperfect description 
 of their physical sufferings; the mental torture they 
 endured was still more excruciating. The Holy Name 
 of God was incessantly blasphemed in their hearing ; 
 indeed, it seemed as if the men who surrounded them 
 could not speak without uttering an oath, and to oaths 
 was added language the most revolting. Twice a day 
 they collected to sing or, rather, to shout in chorus that 
 sanguinary hymn of the Revolution, the ' Marseillaise.' 
 This might be called their act of devotion, but to the 
 priests every external manifestation of their religion was 
 strictly prohibited. Even the moving of their lips in silent 
 prayer would call down a very shower of curses and 
 blasphemy, and one of their number was put in irons 
 for having secreted a rosary ; their breviaries and books 
 of devotion had been all previously taken from them. 
 Thus debarred from uniting in any common act of 
 worship, their whole occupation, when on deck, was the 
 washing of their linen for which they had only sea-water, 
 and the destroying of the vermin with which they were 
 infested ; to which must be added the tasks imposed 
 upon them by the sailors, who thus discharged themselves 
 of much of their labour and chiefly of what was most 
 disagreeable and distasteful to them. To complain was 
 worse than useless, of which the following painful proof 
 occurred. With the permission of the captain, tacitly, at 
 least, accorded, they drew up a petition to the authorities, 
 signed by one priest from each department represented 
 amongst them, but when it was shown to the captain he 
 
Lcs Deux AssociSs. 245 
 
 flew into a violent passion, and put in irons the twenty- 
 seven priests who had appended their signatures. M. 
 Romage're, who was in after-years Bishop of Saint-Brieuc, 
 and who originated and drew up the petition, continued 
 to the day of his death to suffer from the wound in his 
 leg inflicted by the galling fetters. 
 
 Amidst this complication of sufferings, sufficient to 
 crush the spirit of the bravest, God supported His 
 servants in a most wonderful manner, not only giving 
 them a patience which seemed invincible, but filling 
 their hearts with spiritual consolations. The memorable 
 words of one of these glorious confessors, M. Dubignon, 
 well express the feelings of his brethren generally. 
 ' It is true,' he said one day to a companion who was 
 tempted to repine, ' it is true that we are the most 
 miserable of men, but we are the happiest of Christians.' 
 The look of holy peace which illuminated their pale 
 and wasted faces bore testimony to the joy with which 
 they suffered ; it was a marvel to behold them, one of 
 those marvels which Grace alone can achieve. Another 
 marvel for which they were indebted to the good 
 Providence of God was that, notwithstanding the rigorous 
 searches to which they were all subjected, and especially 
 the new-comers, the Blessed Sacrament which many of 
 the latter brought with them, was never discovered, 
 nor the holy oils with which they anointed the sick 
 amongst them, nor a relic of the True Cross which they 
 possessed. 5 
 
 5 No one who has read Father Weld's History of the Suppression of 
 the Society of Jesus in the Portuguese Dominions can fail to note the 
 close resemblance between his narrative of the terrible sufferings endured 
 by the deported Fathers and the account given above. It may be hoped 
 that the Fathers were spared the foul blasphemies with which the French 
 priests were assailed, but with this exception the circumstances in both 
 cases were so very similar that the same description might well-nigh 
 serve for either ; the only difference being that the agents in the former 
 persecution were Christians and Catholics, and in the latter men who 
 for the most part had renounced the Christian name. 
 
246 Lcs Deux A stories. 
 
 In speaking of the patience of the sufferers we must 
 except the schismatic priests, of whom there were a good 
 many, chiefly from the departments of Meuse and 
 Moselle. A deputy of the Convention, sent into those 
 parts, had arrested indiscriminately all the clergy, good 
 and bad alike, on whom he could lay his hands, and had 
 despatched them to Rochefort for deportation. They 
 were at first confined in the Washington, another slave- 
 ship, moored alongside of the Les Deux Associes, to 
 which last they were transferred as vacancies occurred 
 from death. Several of these schismatics had entirely 
 abjured the faith and two of them had married. Neither 
 the good example of the faithful priests nor the pressure 
 of their common misery seemed to work any good effect 
 on these hardened men, who behaved unkindly and 
 maliciously to their fellow-sufferers and sneered at them 
 for their fidelity to their religion. When sickness, 
 however, began to decimate the ranks of the prisoners 
 several of their number retracted the oath and some 
 made a Christian death. Others, when the danger was 
 passed, speedily retracted their retractations. 
 
 The ever increasing number of the sick at last 
 rendered their removal imperative. Two boats were 
 accordingly moored near the vessel, into which the 
 diseased and the dying were transferred. It would be 
 a misnomer to style these boats a hospital, wanting as 
 they were in everything necessary for the relief or 
 accommodation of the sick. Here these afflicted men 
 lay upon rugged planks, tossed about by every move- 
 ment of the waves and lacking even necessary food. 
 No doctor visited them, nor would any of the crew go 
 near them, regarding with horror all contact with the 
 occupants of these infected boats. Upon the imprisoned 
 priests, therefore, devolved this charge, which they 
 undertook with the tenderest and most self-sacrificing 
 
The Filles de la Sagesse. 247 
 
 charity, sharing with their suffering brethren their own 
 meagre rations, performing every office for them while 
 living, and burying them, when dead, on an adjacent 
 island. 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 Revolution of the gth Thermidor. The persecution 
 uninterrupted in the Provinces. 
 
 The priests of Nievre, who were detained at Brest, met 
 with no better treatment than their brethren at Rochefort, 
 but their sufferings were more endurable because they 
 were on land, and those who fell sick had the advantage 
 of being tended at the Marine Hospital by the Filles 
 de la Sagesse. It may seem strange that in the height 
 of the Reign of Terror, and in a stronghold of the 
 Revolution like Brest, nuns should have been permitted 
 to continue their ministrations, and this in spite of their 
 having persistently refused to take every oath which 
 had been proffered to them. It was certainly owing to 
 no indulgence on the part of the civil authorities that 
 they had been spared, for several times attempts had 
 been made to enforce against them the decree of the 
 Convention which excluded from the hospitals all women 
 suspected of being 'aristocrats.' But the sick sailors, who 
 well knew that the citoyennes who would be sent to 
 replace them would be ill substitutes for the tender 
 nurses and mothers they possessed, had always mani- 
 fested their strong determination to keep them, and had 
 even threatened to set the hospital on fire if they were 
 deprived of their services. It was, in fact, owing to the 
 resolution of these poor men that the community was 
 indebted for the exceptional privilege of weathering 
 out the revolutionary storm. 
 
248 Hospitalicres of Saint- Yves. 
 
 The nuns of the Misericorde de Jesus, who served 
 the Hospital Saint-Yves at Rennes, were not so fortunate. 
 They had been a mark for persecution during the whole 
 of the years 1792 and 1793, the most absurd accusations 
 being successively brought against them. One of their 
 number was imprisoned on a charge so ludicrous that 
 we cannot refrain from mentioning it. She had been 
 seen presenting a crucifix to a dying person, and it was 
 pretended that she was giving absolution, faculties for 
 granting which, it was alleged, had been conferred on 
 herself and her companions by Mgr. de Girac. She was 
 kept in prison for twenty days, and was released only 
 through the protection of her shoe-maker, now a muni- 
 cipal officer — for such was the class into whose hands 
 authority had descended — who was induced to exert his 
 influence in her behalf. The Hospitalieres of Saint-Yves, 
 in spite of all the vexations to which they were subjected, 
 maintained their position until the spring of 1794. The 
 superior even succeeded in eluding the vigilance of their 
 guards, for they were most closely watched, and in 
 procuring for herself and her community the opportunity 
 of fulfilling their Paschal duties. This spiritual refresh- 
 ment came to strengthen them for enduring the long 
 trials to which they were to be subjected. The stroke fell 
 upon them on Good Friday, when they were offered the 
 alternative of taking the oath, required of them as 
 'public functionaries,' or of going to prison. None 
 hesitated, and nine of their number were accordingly 
 incarcerated, the remainder being left for the present 
 in the hospital, where their services were indispensable ; 
 but these also were subsequently imprisoned. The 
 sufferings of these pious women in the different gaols 
 to which they were consigned were very great. To 
 relate them in detail would be almost a repetition of 
 much which has already been recorded concerning 
 
Peasant hospitality. 249 
 
 the priests. One remarkable instance, however, occurred 
 of the respect which their self-sacrificing charity inspired 
 even in the case of the vile populace of Rennes ; for 
 when, on their transfer from a house of detention to the 
 common prison of that city, they were paraded through 
 the principal streets with the view of exposing them to 
 derision, the mob, albeit constantly excited to hatred 
 of religion and of all who were specially consecrated to 
 the service of God, kept silence, and allowed these 
 women who had devoted their lives to the succour of 
 the suffering poor to pass without an insult. The 
 Hospitalities, long deprived of the consolations of 
 religion, had at last the opportunity of making their 
 confession to a priest who was about to be guillotined, 
 as will be related when we come to speak of that 
 martyr's death. 
 
 Evil seemed now to have reached its climax ; terror 
 had invaded every home, where no one felt secure of 
 liberty or life for a single hour j yet never were there 
 wanting zealous men who, in defiance of every danger, 
 devoted themselves to the offices of their sacred ministry, 
 and they were often wonderfully shielded from harm. 
 Tresvaux says that while Carrier was decimating the 
 population of Nantes he knew an instance in which a cure 
 of the diocese, M. Cosmel, passed into a house where 
 arrests were in the act of being made, bearing the Blessed 
 Sacrament to a dying woman, and that in the face of 
 four gendarmes who were guarding the door. This is 
 but one example which fell under the notice of a single 
 individual ; but how many more must have been 
 unrecorded and are now forgotten on earth ! The 
 self-sacrifice of good Catholics in concealing priests at 
 the risk of their lives was no less admirable than that of 
 the proscribed themselves. Of this MM. Le Roux and 
 Costiou, of the diocese of Leon, had a touching proof. 
 
250 
 
 Martyrs to truth. 
 
 They were hid during the Terror at a peasant's house 
 in a secluded situation. As troops, however, were con- 
 stantly passing through the district, they feared com- 
 promising their host, who had a wife and children, and 
 resolved to leave. Having apprised the peasant of their 
 purpose, he begged them to wait while he spoke to his 
 wife. The man soon returned accompanied by his 
 wife, and, kneeling before the priests, they said, ' Let 
 what God wills befall us, but you have obtained for 
 us such precious graces, that we cannot consent to be 
 deprived of them ; we therefore wish you to remain 
 with us.' God rewarded the generosity both of the 
 priests and of this good family. The former were never 
 discovered, neither were the latter molested. Devoted- 
 ness of this sort was very common in Brittany, but it 
 specially abounded in the diocese of Saint-Malo, where 
 the country-people were remarkable for their simple faith 
 and piety. In the parish of Saint-Thurial a man named 
 Pierre Aubin had often as many as thirteen or fourteen 
 priests in his house, and it was thither that they used to 
 resort on Holy Thursday to fulfil their Paschal duties. 
 
 Many instances of heroic virtue also are recorded of 
 good Catholics in those trying times, such as that of 
 dying rather than stain their souls with an untruth. 
 Examples amongst the priesthood have been already 
 cited, but they were frequent also amongst the laity. 
 Witness a young man of Nantes, named Sagory, who, 
 although eighteen, looked much younger and might 
 easily have passed as under age, but he preferred death 
 on the scaffold to lending himself to a falsehood. Baltais, 
 a builder of Fougeres, acted in a similar way when 
 denounced to the Revolutionary Commission for having 
 superintended the hoisting of the white flag on the 
 steeple of Saint-Le'onard. For once in a way the 
 members of that sanguinary tribunal were disposed to 
 
Robespierre. 2 5 1 
 
 mercy, and desired to be cheated. Interest had been 
 made for the accused with Defienne, the agent for the 
 representatives of the people, and he had agreed to save 
 the man if he would deny his complicity in the act. 
 Accordingly, when Baltais appeared before his judge, 
 the latter said, ' Did you help in setting up the white 
 flag?' 'Yes,' replied the accused boldly. 'Freely?' 
 'Yes, freely.' 'Still, you did it under some compul- 
 sion?' 'No, I was not compelled.' 'You know that 
 this is a crime which the law punishes with death. 
 The Commission desires to save your life if you will 
 but say that you acted under compulsion.' ' I cannot 
 say so, since I acted freely. I will not save my life 
 by a lie.' Then Defienne gave him up, and said to 
 the members of the Commission, ' Your Baltais has 
 done for himself, in spite of all my efforts to save him. 
 He would not tell a falsehood, so I have condemned 
 him.' A few days after, he was guillotined with twelve 
 or thirteen other victims. Truth, then, as well as faith 
 had its martyrs in Brittany. 
 
 Never, not even in Pagan times, was Christian virtue 
 seen in stronger contrast with surrounding wickedness 
 than in those days, and this was particularly the case in 
 Paris, where the men in authority, the most execrable 
 perhaps whom the world ever saw, not only made a 
 parade of their vices and impiety, but were labouring 
 with all their might to make the French a nation of 
 atheists. The fear of God being banished from hearts, 
 the most scandalous immorality had begun to pervade 
 all classes. No curb existed save that of terror, but it 
 was not the evil-doers whom it was used to restrain ; for 
 rulers in those days were a terror to the good not to the 
 evil. In the midst of this chaos of disorder and irreligion, 
 there was a man all-powerful at this time, whom memory 
 specially associates with the Reign of Terror, but who 
 
252 Festival of the Supreme Being. 
 
 ventured to pronounce a name prohibited for more than 
 a year save as an object of blasphemy : that man was 
 Robespierre, and that name was the Name of God. He 
 had never advocated atheism ; nay, he had even en- 
 dangered his popularity by making mention one day of 
 Providence at the Jacobin Club ; but his god was not 
 the God of the Christian, and the vanity of becoming the 
 head of a new religion, coupled probably with the per- 
 ception that no authority could have any permanence 
 which did not possess the support of some kind of 
 religious belief, was, no doubt, his chief incentive when 
 he rose and proclaimed before the Convention the 
 existence of a Supreme Being and the immortality of 
 the soul. The days were gone by when men could 
 dare to object to what the implacable Robespierre 
 might be pleased to favour, and so his proposal was 
 received with deference, and even with applause, not 
 only in the Assembly but in the Jacobin Club itself, 
 where his speech was read in the evening, and it was 
 decreed that on all those buildings which were employed 
 for the celebration of national festivals the words 'Temple 
 consecrated to Reason ' should be effaced and their dedi- 
 cation to the Supreme Being recorded instead. 
 
 The cathedrals as well as the parochial churches in 
 Brittany underwent in some places the same transforma- 
 tion. Chapels, however, were often deemed sufficient 
 for the new worship, and so, indeed, they were ; for the 
 people, who took no part in any of the revolutionary 
 follies, avoided with special horror this Pagan ceremonial. 
 None attended save officials, a few ardent patriots, and 
 those who were dragged thither against their will. Such, 
 at least, was the case on the Festival of the Supreme 
 Being kept in the month of June, 1794, in imitation of 
 the imbecile and profane ceremony which had been 
 celebrated in Paris on the 12 th of May, Robespierre 
 
The gth Thermidor. 
 
 253 
 
 himself playing the part of pontiff. His authority seemed 
 now firmly established ; he was virtual dictator, for 
 terror had silenced all opposition. There were many 
 atheists in the Convention, but fear had led them, as 
 we have seen, to join in the applause with which his 
 declaration of belief in the being of a God had been 
 received ; and he knew this well. By some it is 
 supposed that his desire, after ridding himself of his 
 sanguinary associates, and of all who could pretend to 
 compete with him, was to reign, like another Augustus, 
 with moderation and clemency. Be this as it may — 
 and it may well be doubted whether that hard and 
 merciless man could ever have learned to practise 
 clemency — it is certain that it was Robespierre's 
 object to establish a regular government, of which he 
 should himself be the absolute head ; and for this 
 purpose it was necessary for him to destroy the men who 
 were combined in maintaining a system of extermination 
 which was assuming more terrible proportions every 
 day. What with the help of the Mountain he had 
 done against the Girondists he now designed to effect 
 against the Mountain itself, and send to the scaffold 
 such monsters as Collot d' Herbois, Billaud-Varennes, 
 Carrier, and many more, whose atrocities had made 
 the Revolution infamous. But his intention was per- 
 ceived, and his heretofore accomplices, now marked 
 out as victims, banded together to destroy him, in which, 
 as is well known, they succeeded. 
 
 It would be a mistake, then, to suppose that the 
 revolution of the 9th Thermidor (July 27) was a rising 
 of humane men against this bloodthirsty tyrant. Far 
 from it ; for many of those who conspired to crush 
 Robespierre were as bad as himself ; some were even 
 worse, although this may be thought by many to be 
 impossible. It was an instinct of self-preservation which 
 
254 Conversion of La Harpe. 
 
 led to the combination against him, and thus, although 
 the 9th Thermidor ' inaugurated a less sanguinary era 
 of the Republic,' as the historian Gabourd observes, 
 ' the victors were worthy neither of esteem nor of 
 gratitude ; they obeyed the instincts of fear, they fought 
 in order not to die, and, although their own punishment 
 would have appeared only just, they triumphed and 
 survived their formidable rival. Robespierre perished, 
 not because he was the agent and inventor of the system 
 which was being brought to a close' — though such he 
 pre-eminently was- — 'but because he had meant to lay 
 the basis of his power on the dead bodies of his 
 accomplices.' 1 The death of Robespierre and of his 
 adherents, hailed as it was with universal exultation, 
 necessarily produced a reaction in favour of clemency, 
 and his fall was the beginning of a new epoch in Paris. 
 The daily executions ceased; soon the prisons were 
 opened, and a great number of the captives were 
 released. Amongst these was Mgr. de Bellescize, 
 Bishop of Saint-Brieuc. He had been the means, while 
 confined in the Luxembourg, of converting La Harpe, a 
 man of literary celebrity and a former friend of Voltaire. 
 During his detention he had leisure to reflect on the 
 evil fruits which the modern philosophy had produced, 
 and, while these thoughts were tending to open his 
 eyes, the sweetness and patience with which he saw 
 Mgr. de Bellescize bear the tortures of gout touched 
 his heart and led him to seek counsel and instruction 
 from that prelate. He ended by making his confession 
 to him, and from that moment became an intrepid 
 defender of the faith which he had hitherto contemned. 
 If religious persecution, then, did not altogether cease 
 in the capital, it was much moderated, and we find 
 only two executions of priests in Paris after the 9th 
 
 1 Histoirc de France, torn. xix. p. 237. 
 
Angilique G 'latin. 
 
 2 55 
 
 Thermidor. It was there that about this time died a 
 Breton priest of much talent and merit, M. Be'rardier, 
 whom, not being a martyr, we mention only on account 
 of a curious fact associated with his memory. He had 
 formerly been head of the College of Louis le Grand, 
 and, being by nature very indulgent, he had wanted 
 the firmness required for the maintenance of discipline 
 in that establishment. Many of the students, amongst 
 whom were Robespierre and Camille-Desmoulins, were 
 noted for their excesses from the earliest days of the 
 Revolution j Camille-Desmoulins, however, preserved a 
 regard for his old superior and saved him from the 
 September massacres. What is more surprising still 
 in a man of his character is that he should have chosen 
 to be secretly married by him during the Reign of 
 Terror. 
 
 But if in Paris the persecution of the clergy was 
 suspended, no change took place in the provinces, where 
 the local authorities, not being replaced at the tyrant's 
 death, continued unrelentingly the same sanguinary 
 course. News had already reached Rennes of Robes- 
 pierre's fall when M. Cottire, of the diocese of Saint- 
 Malo, was executed. The next day, the 4th of August, 
 witnessed the execution of P. Barthelemi, a priest and 
 religious (a Recollet), well known for his zeal and 
 charity. He had a most heroic companion in death, 
 Ange'lique Glatin. She had been formerly a servant 
 to Madame de Vieux-Chatel, whose confidence she had 
 merited and won. At her mistress's death she had 
 given herself up wholly to works of charity, and was 
 employed by many rich ladies to convey their alms 
 to the poor. Her house was open to the proscribed 
 priests and P. Barthelemi was its permanent inmate. 
 There he discharged the functions of his ministry in 
 behalf of the numerous good Christians of Saint-Malo. 
 
256 AngUique G latin. 
 
 At last he and his hostess were denounced by a 
 treacherous woman who hawked about second-hand 
 articles, and who, peeping through a key-hole, saw 
 them at table together. Adversity only served to 
 display more conspicuously Mdlle. Glatin's greatness 
 of soul. During the few weeks she spent in prison 
 her cheerfulness was unfailing. The good father was 
 ready to shed his blood for Christ, but he was some- 
 times much depressed. Cases were accordingly here 
 reversed, and this woman became the instrument which 
 the goodness of God had provided to sustain and fortify 
 the gentle and sensitive nature of the priest. Her 
 presence of mind before the tribunal was very striking ; 
 it was she who was chiefly interrogated, and her replies 
 were worthy of the martyrs of primitive ages. ' How 
 long has this enemy of the country been hidden in 
 your house ? ' 'I cannot precisely say how long I have 
 have had the happiness of possessing this good religious 
 as my guest, but I know that it has been for a con- 
 siderable time.' 'What used he to do in your house?' 
 ' He has done, and I have helped him to do, all the 
 good in his power. He has baptized, heard confessions, 
 solemnized marriages, and given many first communions, 
 and I have facilitated these pious ministrations with all 
 the means at my disposal' ' Imprudent woman ! Did 
 you not know to what you exposed yourself? The law 
 forbade these things.' ' Yes, the law which is your law, 
 but the law of my God commanded me to do them.' 
 
 They were both, of course, condemned. M dlle. Glatin 
 heard her sentence without showing the slightest emotion, 
 and returned to the prison blessing God. When the 
 hour for execution arrived she was the first to step forth, 
 and marched to death with a firm step and a cheek 
 unblanched by fear. ' Father,' she said aloud to P. Bar- 
 the'lemi, ' entone the Te Deum in thanksgiving that we 
 
Betrayal of M. Marichal. 257 
 
 are going 'to die for Jesus Christ;' and it was thus, 
 together chanting that canticle of praise, that they 
 reached the foot of the scaffold. She chose to die last, 
 doubtless that the Father, who had less strength of mind 
 than herself, might be spared the pain of seeing her 
 blood flow. Thus perished this admirable woman, who 
 was deeply regretted and long remembered at Saint- 
 Malo. The mixed crowd who witnessed her execution 
 returned sad and silent from the scene ; even republican 
 ferocity was subdued, and we are told that the officer 
 appointed to preside on the occasion could not touch a 
 morsel of food the whole of that day. He was heard to 
 say several times, ' There was something divine about 
 that woman. I never saw firmness equal to hers.' 
 
 A few days later another priest went to death, 
 M. Marechal. He had been concealed in the house 
 of two noble ladies named De Renac, whose father was 
 in Jersey. A wretched man, who had previously 
 betrayed to death another priest, M. Crosson, who was, 
 as related, guillotined on a fair day at Rennes, played 
 the same execrable part on this occasion. Suspecting 
 that M. Marechal was concealed in the demoiselles 
 de Renac's house, he went there one morning feigning 
 that he came as a friend to apprise them in haste that a 
 plot was on foot to set their hotel on fire, so that 
 they had best remove at once as well as the priest whom 
 they had with them. One of the ladies who was lying 
 ill in bed, believing this false information, exclaimed in a 
 voice of consternation, ' O sister ! ' her eyes at the same 
 time instinctively turning in the direction of the priest's 
 hiding-place. This was enough. The traitor now knew 
 that his prey was there, and instantly called in the men 
 who were waiting outside. All three were taken to 
 prison, and were guillotined the same day. M. Mare'chal 
 had passed into Jersey in 1792, but, returning to France, 
 R 25 
 
258 The sisters De Renac. 
 
 had lain hidden in several places. He resided for some 
 time with an old lady at Tinteniac, where he arrived 
 disguised as a National Guard, and passed for her 
 nephew. As he used to mount guard with the rest, 
 no one suspected him, until one day, when they were 
 summoned to assist at the schismatical priest's Mass on 
 occasion of some public ceremonial, M. Marechal refused 
 to attend, saying that he had not come to Tinteniac 
 to go to Mass. Suspicions were thus aroused, on per- 
 ceiving which he fled, and remained at Rennes until 
 his arrest at the house of the De Renacs. 
 
 Mgr. Brute, 2 who was an eye-witness of the trial, 
 recalled in after years many of its circumstances : the 
 self-possession, moderation, and courtesy which distin- 
 guished the priest's bearing and replies during his short 
 interrogatory, as well as the firmness with which he stated 
 his principles. He remembered well the figures of the 
 two gentle ladies, wearing black caps and mantles, 
 according to the fashion then in vogue at Rennes ; both 
 tall, slender, pale, and with mild and interesting counten- 
 ances. He observed that Bouassier, the President who 
 knew those ladies well and was fully conscious of the 
 injustice and horror of the sentence he was pronouncing, 
 was evidently moved, for his countenance and speech 
 became frightfully altered. His health, indeed, was ever- 
 after vitally affected, and his pallid face, hollow voice, 
 and frequent sighs betrayed the mental anguish he 
 endured. A few years afterwards he was passing along 
 the Promenade La Motte-a Madame, when suddenly he 
 heard himself called by his name twice. Seeing no one, 
 he asked who called him, but no reply came. Pre- 
 
 8 He was then a boy of fourteen. His family used often to send him 
 to attend the criminal court and bring them back information, his 
 youth exempting him from suspicion ; for grown-up people seldom 
 dared to go. 
 
Death of M. Saqnet. 
 
 259 
 
 sently the call was repeated as before, and some one who 
 was walking under the trees, hearing him again say, 
 'Who called me?' replied, 'Do you not see that it is 
 the demoiselles de Renac ?' At these words the miser- 
 able man was seized with a fit of trembling, went home, 
 and died in a few days. On his death-bed he would fain 
 have called in a priest, but his son, who had been 
 brought up in the school of Voltaire and Rousseau, would 
 permit none to approach him. 3 
 
 Another excellent ecclesiastic was executed on the 
 same day as M. Marechal ; this was M. Saquet, Rector 
 of Saint-Martin of Rennes. He was much beloved in 
 his parish, where he had remained concealed in the 
 house of a good peasant. On hearing that he had been 
 denounced he left his retreat, in order not to jeopardize 
 the life of his benefactor, and hid himself in a field 
 of wheat. Here, after diligent search, he was discovered. 
 He is described by Mgr. Brute' as having behaved on his 
 examination with a singular mixture of dignity, self- 
 possession, and mildness. After the sentence of death 
 had been passed, it was found that the executioner was 
 absent. Returning in about half an hour, the man pro- 
 ceeded, with affected hurry, to prepare his victim for the 
 scaffold in a most brutal manner, roughly cutting away his 
 hair together with the collar of his coat, so as to lay his neck 
 bare for the knife ; after which he tied his hands behind 
 his back, and threw his coat loosely over his shoulders. 
 As the martyr passed along the corridor of the court- 
 house to the guillotine, which stood hard by, the blood 
 trickled down over his breast from the wounds which in 
 his cruel haste the executioner had inflicted. ' No words,' 
 says the same eye-witness, 'could better express his 
 tranquillity and composure than these — that he looked 
 at that moment as he used to look when he was following 
 
 3 Lift of Bishop Bruti, pp. 68 — 73. 
 
260 Capture of M. Bur lot. 
 
 the processions of the people of his parish on the solemn 
 festivals of the Church. 4 These circumstances are the 
 more remarkable because he was constitutionally timid, and 
 had much dreaded being taken, but, when the hour came, 
 grace triumphed over the infirmity of nature. He recited 
 the Miserere as he went to death, and the words were 
 still on his lips as the knife fell. 
 
 A desultory warfare continued to be waged in Brittany 
 between the royalists and the republicans. Detachments 
 of the latter were frequently scouring the country in 
 pursuit of their adversaries or for the purpose of hunting 
 out concealed fugitives. One of these moveable columns 
 marched on the 13th of September from Loude"ac to 
 Mur, a parish distant about four miles, the inhabitants of 
 which were deeply attached to the faith. Among the 
 priests hidden there was M. Burlot, who was a native of 
 the place, and had sought refuge with his mother, who 
 was eighty years of age. Whether or no the troops 
 suspected his presence there, they proceeded straightway 
 to Madame Burlot's house. Her son had just time to go 
 and hide himself in a hay-loft, but unfortunately he left 
 his snuff-box and pocket-handkerchief on a bench, and 
 these betrayed him. Rigorous search was everywhere 
 made, and one of the men, plunging his bayonet into the 
 hay, wounded the priest, who uttered an involuntary cry 
 of pain. Dragged from his hiding-place, he was treated 
 with the usual inhumanity, and the soldiers threatened 
 to carry off the whole family to prison. M. Burlot, 
 whose thoughts were all in heaven, strove to console his 
 weeping relatives, and, after embracing his aged parent, 
 accompanied the soldiers, who contented themselves 
 finally with seizing his brother. They arrived early at 
 Loudeac, where the Abbe Tresvaux, who saw them both 
 as they were led through the public square, says M. Burlot 
 
 4 Ibid. pp. 39 — 42. 
 
Three martyr priests. 2 6 1 
 
 was very calm, and seemed to have a deep gash on his 
 left hand. He was executed at Saint-Brieuc, on the 19th 
 of September. His brother died shortly after in prison. 
 Three days previous, M. Restif, another concealed priest, 
 was executed at Rennes. Two servants of a rich lady, 
 to whom, on account of her great age, they could not 
 venture to intrust the secret, had received him into her 
 house. These two women were also condemned to 
 death, but they appear to have succeeded in hiding 
 themselves, and so escaped their destined fate. 
 
 In the beginning of October there were executions on 
 three consecutive days in that same city, which had 
 already seen the blood of so many martyrs flow. The 
 first victims were MM. Robert and Le Roux, both of 
 the diocese of Saint-Malo, and M. Gortais, a chaplain of 
 the Rennes diocese. The two former had studied at 
 the same seminary, had received the priesthood on the 
 same day, and had ministered in adjoining parishes. 
 A tender friendship subsisted between them. M. Robert 
 is described as having quite an angelic countenance, 
 which did not belie his heart. M. Le Roux was remark- 
 able both for his virtues and his learning. Led by two 
 villains, a party of soldiers had been directed to the 
 house in the village of Labinais in which the three 
 priests were living. M. Le Roux escaped in the first 
 instance, the others were taken, and, after receiving 
 every manner of insult, were so tightly bound that the 
 cords cut into the flesh. They had also to witness some 
 revolting acts of sacrilege perpetrated in the church, 
 where, it seems, the Blessed Sacrament was privately 
 reserved. Part of the column then went with their 
 prisoners to Bain, while the rest proceeded to ravage a 
 neighbouring parish. In the course of their raid they 
 discovered M. Le Roux, and brought him to Bain. 
 When M. Robert saw his friend, who he hoped had 
 
262 
 
 Death of M. Bodin. 
 
 escaped, in the hands of the republicans, he was so 
 struck with grief as to be unable to utter a word, but 
 M. Le Roux strove to console him, expressing the joy 
 he felt at sharing martyrdom with him. The confessors 
 were bound two and two with some lay prisoners and 
 sent to Rennes, but the state in which they arrived there 
 baffles description, bruised as they were from head to 
 foot with the blows they had received from the bayonets 
 and sword-flats of the soldiers. Cruel as they were, the 
 judges could not help feeling some regret in condemning 
 M. Le Roux, whose high character and abilities were 
 well known. ' It is a pity,' they said, ' to condemn such 
 a man to death ; but then, no doubt, he would do more 
 mischief than others of less capacity. He must die.' 
 They were all three executed on the 7 th of October, 
 M. Gortais singing on the way to the scaffold a pious 
 Lament which he had composed. 
 
 On the following day M. Bodin, Rector of the Chapelle 
 Saint-Aubert, was guillotined. He had never left his 
 parish, where, with two other ecclesiastics, he had found 
 an asylum in the house of three sisters, the demoiselles 
 La Graciere. A tiler, employed to repair the roof, 
 caught a sight of the priests and denounced them at 
 Fougeres. A worthy man, who got intelligence of this 
 treacherous act, hastened to warn the priests of their 
 peril, but, unfortunately, M. Bodin regarded it as a false 
 alarm, and remained. He was accordingly seized to- 
 gether with the three ladies. When placed on the cart 
 to be carried to Rennes, four hundred people of the 
 place congregated together and wanted to rescue them 
 forcibly from their guards, but the priest earnestly en- 
 joined them to use no violence. They obeyed, and 
 were constrained to content themselves with bewailing 
 their loss with many demonstrations of grief. M. Bodin 
 was well worthy of their regret, as were also his three 
 
M. J our din and the Hospitalicres. 263 
 
 parishioners, whose whole time and fortune had been 
 devoted to the service of the poor, and whose house, 
 ever since the breaking out of the Revolution, had been 
 a refuge for God's faithful ministers. They all suffered 
 together. A young man named Tual was executed on 
 the same day. He had only received the tonsure, and 
 was not therefore liable to deportation, although dis- 
 obedience to the law which enjoins it was made the 
 ground of his offence; but the real cause of his con- 
 demnation was a book which he had written, entitled, 
 ' Principles and Rules of Conduct to be observed during 
 Times of Schism and Persecution.' Being questioned 
 regarding the authorship, he not only courageously owned 
 it, but added that he continued to hold the principles 
 advocated in the work. The next day, the 9th, witnessed 
 the death of M. Jourdin, the Vicaire of Janze. He was 
 arrested at Rennes and speedily condemned. Confined 
 in the Tour le Bat, in a room contiguous to one in which 
 were imprisoned the Hospitalieres of Saint-Ives, already 
 mentioned, he had the fortitude to hear all their confes- 
 sions with calmness and attention, while expecting every 
 moment to be summoned to the scaffold. It was a great 
 act of charity, for these poor women had everything to 
 fear, as they might themselves have to appear at any 
 moment before a tribunal which knew neither justice nor 
 mercy. There was a crack in the wall, through which 
 the nuns were able to speak to him, but he had no 
 means of reaching the aperture except by inserting his 
 feet, which were charged with the weight of heavy fetters, 
 in two holes, supporting himself with great difficulty. 
 But he did not acquaint the nuns with his position, 
 neither did he let them know the fate which momentarily 
 awaited him. On the scaffold he exclaimed, ' Please 
 God that I may be the last victim!' and his prayer seems 
 to have been heard, for he was the last priest who shed 
 
264 Martyrs at Quimper. 
 
 his blood for the faith at Rennes during the Reign of 
 Terror. 
 
 Throughout Brittany this reign had been prolonged, 
 as it was at Rennes, after its cessation in the capital, for 
 at Quimper we find two ecclesiastics of the diocese of 
 Ldon guillotined after the fall of Robespierre, namely, 
 M. Le Gall, Rector of Plouenan, and M. Coirigou, 
 former chaplain of the Ursulines of Saint-Paul. They 
 were both harboured by the widow of a rich farmer, 
 named Le Saint, whose house was open to the pro- 
 scribed. Denounced by a shoemaker, whom M. Le 
 Gall had employed, they were both apprehended on the 
 evening of the 7th of September, M. Le Goff, who long 
 survived as Cure of Saint-Paul-de-Le"on, having left the 
 house only two hours before. Anne Le Saint, a religious, 
 who lived with her sister-in-law, Madame Le Saint, was 
 present when the priests were arrested, and, desirous to 
 save her relative's life and spare her young family so sad 
 a loss, took upon herself the whole responsibility of their 
 being in the house, saying that it was she who had 
 received and lodged them. This devoted woman ac- 
 cordingly shared their fate, and was executed with them 
 on the 1 6th of September. Amongst the martyrs of this 
 period must also be reckoned M. Morel, of the diocese 
 of Dol, who had pursued his apostolic labours during 
 the whole of the year 1793 and up to the time of his 
 murder in November, 1794, when he accidentally met a 
 party of soldiers, by one of whom he was recognized, and 
 who, after inflicting the most cruel tortures on him, put 
 him to death solely because he was a Catholic priest. 
 Such crimes not only went unpunished in those days, 
 but passed altogether unnoticed by the authorities, partly 
 because France was in a state of so much confusion and 
 misrule, and partly because the priests were regarded as 
 outlawed men, who might be killed wherever they were 
 found, like so many noxious animals. 
 
Hospitalieres imprisoned. 265 
 
 If the fall of Robespierre had not availed to stop the 
 execution of the priests in Brittany, neither had it checked 
 the persecution of the religious. Some, indeed, who had 
 hitherto escaped incarceration, as had the Hospitalieres 
 who served the Hotels Dieu at Lannion and Treguier, 
 were now thrown into prison. If the latter had been 
 enabled to pursue their vocation so long in spite of 
 countless difficulties, it was, as in the case of their sisters 
 at Brest, owing to the determination of the sick to retain 
 them, not to any forbearance on the part of the authori- 
 ties. They had bestowed the tenderest care on the 
 soldiers of the battalion of Etampes, whom sickness had 
 decimated, as if by a judgment of God, ever since their 
 profanation of the cathedral. Bad as these men were, 
 they knew how to appreciate the devoted charity and 
 attention of their nurses, and, so long as they remained 
 in Treguier, the magistrates could not venture to meddle 
 with the nuns ; for no sooner did these soldiers espy any 
 municipals approaching the house of the community, 
 which was attached to the hospital, than they collected 
 together and swore that, if the religious were removed, 
 they would set all the four quarters of the town on fire. 
 After the battalion left Treguier the Hospitalieres were 
 soon sent to prison, where their sisters of Lannion were 
 already immured. The nuns of Carhaix in the same 
 department were also imprisoned and very rigorously 
 treated. The women sent to replace the religious as 
 hospital nurses were both dishonest and ill-behaved, and 
 had soon wasted the resources of these charitable insti- 
 tutions. Linen, medicines, everything rapidly disap- 
 peared, and at Treguier they even broke up a staircase 
 to provide themselves with fire-wood. Both the hospital 
 physician and the municipal officers now joined in 
 soliciting from the administration the recall of the nuns, 
 but fanatical hatred of religion prevailed over the pressing 
 
266 Inspection of floating prisons. 
 
 calls of humanity and even the obvious dictates of 
 economy, and the petition was rejected. 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 Pacificatio7i of La Vendee and of Brittany. Renewed 
 efforts of the schismatics. 
 
 The 9th Thermidor brought no immediate relief to the 
 priests on board the vessels at Rochefort. The sick, 
 however, before long derived a certain amount of benefit ; 
 for the Convention, having selected some moderate men 
 from their body to act as its delegates, sent them into 
 different parts of France with the view of remedying 
 a portion of the evils inflicted during the Terrorist regitne. 
 Rochefort accordingly was visited, and the deputies, on 
 learning the frightful condition to which the priests sen- 
 tenced to deportation had been reduced, appointed 
 commissioners to go on board and inspect the vessels. 
 Descending between decks, the sight which met their 
 eyes made them recoil with horror. There they beheld 
 a mass of human beings, extenuated by famine and 
 disease, covered with rags and vermin, their hair in 
 disorder, their beards long and matted, for their cruel 
 gaolers had denied them the use both of razors and of 
 soap. Moved to pity by their deplorable state, the 
 commissioners spoke a few words of kindness and con- 
 solation to the prisoners, the more welcome as it was 
 long since they had been addressed with anything but 
 invectives and curses. A hope was even held out to 
 them of release from their sufferings, but the commis- 
 sioners did not inform them that France had been de- 
 livered from her tyrant, probably in order not to raise 
 expectations which they knew would be premature, and 
 
State of the inmates. 
 
 267 
 
 it was not till long after that the priests learned what had 
 occurred. Doctors followed the commissioners, who 
 ordered the removal of the sick from the boats in which 
 they lay to the adjacent islet of Aix, where they were 
 placed under tents. Here they had the comfort of 
 mattresses and pure air • but they did not long enjoy 
 these advantages, for no sooner were they somewhat 
 restored in health than they were remanded to the 
 floating prison. Their number was sadly reduced, ten 
 of the Breton priests alone having died during the month 
 of August, some on the island, others immediately after 
 re-embarkation. The same causes continued necessarily 
 to produce the same effects, and it speedily became 
 evident that the sick must be again removed to the land. 
 
 By this time a slight change for the better had taken 
 place in the behaviour of the officers. They brought 
 Les Deux Associes nearer in shore, and moored her close 
 to the mouth of the Charente, where is a small island, 
 known heretofore as He Madame, but which had now 
 received the name of He Citoyenne, its former appella- 
 tion sounding far too aristocratic to be tolerated by 
 republican ears. Here, about the close of August, the 
 sick were established in tents. A considerable number, of 
 whom five were Bretons, died during the month of 
 September — and no wonder ; for, when we speak of im- 
 provement in the treatment of the priests, a diminution 
 of actual ill-usage must alone be understood, as the sick 
 on the island were left in want of everything that could 
 have contributed to their recovery, food, medicine, and 
 proper clothing, while the convalescent were denied all 
 exercise. Five more Bretons died in the month of 
 October, and, as winter approached, bringing frequent 
 rains and violent gales of wind, tents became totally 
 unfit for habitation and, indeed, very unsafe, as on more 
 than one occasion they were nearly blown down. Once 
 
268 Abatement of persecution. 
 
 more it became necessary to re-embark the sick, but 
 another vessel, L'Indien, was now set apart as a hospital, 
 where they were to meet with much kinder treatment. 
 
 Although hitherto the persecution had raged as hotly 
 as ever we find that several deported priests returned 
 about this time to Brittany. Possibly it was the very 
 desire to bear a part in the deadly conflict which actuated 
 these heroic men, who were eager, like good soldiers, 
 to fill up the ranks of the fallen. A letter to the 
 Convention from Boursault, one of the delegates who 
 visited Brittany after the 9th Thermidor, and who 
 appears on the whole to have acted humanely, acquaints 
 us with this fact, and in language which manifests the 
 inveterate prejudice still entertained against the clergy. 
 He had, he said, caused the arrest of ' several non- 
 juring priests whom England had vomited forth to 
 keep alive the civil war.' Guezno, a deputy of the 
 Finisterre, who was also charged with a mission in 
 Brittany, was more liberal than Boursault, and on the 
 13th of January, 1795, issued an order directing that 
 no one should be troubled in the peaceable exercise of 
 his own worship. It was from the date of this order 
 that the persecution began to abate, and the judges to 
 act with less severity, ceasing to send priests to the 
 scaffold. Public opinion was also undergoing a change 
 in the commencement of the year 1795, which encouraged 
 those magistrates who were disposed to moderation to 
 be more lenient than hitherto ; for men had often been 
 cruel simply from abject fear. 
 
 A feeling of indignation was now springing up at 
 Rochefort with regard to the disgraceful treatment of the 
 prisoners detained in the vessels ; a strong proof of which 
 occurred one day at a popular meeting of the club of that 
 place. No sooner did the captain of Les Deux Associes 
 enter the room than a general cry arose of ' Out with 
 
Change in popular feeling. 269 
 
 him ! Out with the priest-slayer ! ' He wished to mount 
 the tribune in order to justify himself, but the way to it 
 was blocked up by the crowd, from which the cry of 
 ' Down with the murderer of priests!' was reiterated with 
 such increasing vehemence that the captain was advised 
 to make his retreat ; which, indeed, he only effected just 
 in time, as words were on the point of being converted 
 into blows. He returned on board his boat greatly 
 dejected, and not a little alarmed by the insult which 
 he had received, dreading probably a day of reckoning 
 such as had overtaken in the capital so many who had 
 figured during the Terror as men of blood. He had 
 now the meanness to solicit from his captives, the horrors 
 of whose position he had for months striven to aggravate 
 in every possible way, a certificate which might protect 
 him from the charge of cruelty. He even went down on 
 his knees to implore this favour at their hands. The same 
 charity which sealed their lips in after times with refer- 
 ence to the names of their tormentors induced the greater 
 part of the priests to accede to this shameless request, 
 at least so far as a vague and general certificate might 
 extend. The claims of truth could hardly admit of more. 
 The subaltern officers, and even the common sailors, 
 were eager now to obtain similar testimonials. The 
 captain of the Washington, who made a like application, 
 had also behaved with much inhumanity to his prisoners, 
 especially during the rigorous winter of 1795. For 
 instance, the priests had been forced to receive their 
 daily rations of food on the open deck, where, imper- 
 fectly clothed as they were, they used to be kept waiting 
 in all weathers during half an hour for the poor aliments 
 which were distributed to them. Several of their number, 
 in fact, perished from cold, amongst whom was a Breton 
 priest of the diocese of Quimper, M. Le Bis. 
 
 The day of deliverance came at last. For a short time 
 
270 
 
 A woeful march. 
 
 they had no longer been treated with so much severity, 
 and were even allowed to assemble together for prayer 
 without molestation. The young captain of L'Indien 
 was, indeed, extremely kind to the sick who were trans- 
 ferred to that vessel. He seems to have formed a happy 
 exception to his fellow officers, and Tresvaux regrets not 
 being able to record his name. In the course of the 
 month of January, a gendarme presented himself on 
 board the vessels and signified to the priests that they 
 were to be set on shore as soon as the ice which blocked 
 the mouth of the river should have broken up. Accord- 
 ingly, on the 6th of February, the two hundred and 
 twenty-three priests who alone survived of the seven 
 hundred and sixty who had entered those fatal vessels 
 were taken up the river to Charente, where they had to 
 spend a night of bitter cold in the boats. After this 
 they had two days' march before reaching Saintes. It 
 was now raining in torrents, and they had nothing but 
 their old tattered garments to cover them. Debarred 
 also for the space of ten months from exercise and 
 enfeebled by all their sufferings and privations, many of 
 them could scarcely totter along. Some, indeed, were 
 wholly unable to walk, and these were placed on cars ; 
 all were faint with exhaustion, for, when put on shore 
 from the boats, they had not received a morsel of food 
 since the previous morning, when each had been pro- 
 vided with one sea-biscuit. As they neared Saintes they 
 descried with some uneasiness a great crowd gathered at 
 the door of the Convent of Notre Dame, their destined 
 prison, for they naturally apprehended a renewal of the 
 insults to which they had been subjected so frequently 
 in the previous year on their way to Rochefort ; but, to 
 their surprise and joy, they found that this multitude had 
 assembled to do them honour and to testify their love 
 and reverence by every service which they could render 
 
Reception at Saintes. 
 
 271 
 
 them ; helping the sick to descend from the carts, solicit- 
 ing the favour of taking some of them to their own 
 homes, and manifesting the greatest pleasure when they 
 had obtained permission. Moreover, they found the 
 convent itself crowded with persons who had come to 
 minister to their necessities and comfort. But we cannot 
 do better than give the scene as described by one 
 who was a sharer in it. 
 
 'Words fail me,' writes M. Michel, 'to depict the 
 touching spectacle which met our eyes on entering the 
 convent. It was filled with persons of all classes who 
 had come to contribute, according to their several means, 
 to the relief of our misery. Some brought coats, shirts, and 
 other things to replace our wretched clothes, which were 
 full of vermin ; others, anticipating our extreme hunger, 
 distributed bread, wine, meat, vegetables, &c. ; others 
 had brought cart-loads of wood, and by kindling fires in 
 all the rooms restored vital warmth to our bodies, which 
 seemed to have lost all their natural heat. You might see 
 persons even of the highest distinction carrying sheets, 
 mattresses, and coverlets, which they left in each sleeping 
 room; physicians, surgeons, hastened to give the assis- 
 tance of their art to all who stood in need of it ; barbers 
 had come to offer to rid us of beards which served as a 
 receptacle to myriads of tormenting insects ; washer- 
 women inquired what there was among our rags which 
 might still be of use to us, for the purpose of washing it 
 after putting it in an oven to exterminate its strange 
 occupants ; every one, in short, showed the most lively 
 eagerness to offer us assistance of every kind : the gene- 
 rosity of the people of Saintes did not suffer them to 
 forget anything ; it overcame the natural repugnance which 
 our very aspect was calculated to inspire; and the dis- 
 gusting filthiness which was enough to drive every one 
 away from us only served to augment their courage and 
 
272 Treaty of La Jaunais. 
 
 charity. As for ourselves, we were so bewildered by this 
 sudden change in our condition, that we were actually 
 struck dumb and could not utter a word. All that we 
 beheld seemed like a dream, and we could not credit the 
 testimony of our eyes.' 
 
 The priests had not enjoyed the comforts of their 
 new position for more than a fortnight when God called 
 one of their number to his reward, M. Julien, Vicaire of 
 Glomel. During their hard captivity he had evinced an 
 unwearied charity in ministering to the needs, bodily and 
 spiritual, of his fellow-sufferers, of whom he had day and 
 night been the indefatigable infirmarian, and now, having 
 reached a haven of repose, he sank from an inflamma- 
 tion of the chest, apparently contracted during the journey 
 just described, which he performed on foot and drenched 
 with rain. His death reduced the number of the Breton 
 priests to thirty-six, the survivors of seventy-three who 
 had been confined in the Rochefort vessels. After two 
 months' detention at Saintes they were all set at liberty, 
 through the interest exerted in their behalf by some kind 
 person whose name they never learned. They were 
 now able to return to their families, but so changed in 
 appearance by what they had endured that their very 
 relatives could scarcely recognize them. Many of them 
 also had contracted the germs of fatal maladies which 
 later carried them off. The priests at Brest recovered 
 their freedom about the same time, but of sixty-one who 
 had left Nevers only twelve remained. 
 
 The war in La Vende'e had never ceased. Charette 
 kept it up in the Bas Poitou and Stofflet in Anjou. 
 That portion of the Nantes district which lies on the 
 right bank of the Loire, as well as other parts of 
 Brittany, was also in a chronic state of disturbance. 
 On both sides, however, a desire had arisen to put an 
 end to this harassing state of things, for the species of 
 
A mere truce. 
 
 273 
 
 warfare carried on led to no definite result while it 
 inflicted countless evils on the country which was its 
 theatre. The struggle had flagged a good deal ever 
 since the 9th Thermidor, and the Republic, anxious to 
 bring the war to a close, had, on the 2nd December, 
 proffered an amnesty, which was to include the officers 
 as well as the peasants. But the Vendeans would not 
 accept a pardon, and the independent spirit they mani- 
 fested made their foes respect them all the more and 
 feel the more solicitous to bring about an accommoda- 
 tion. After a few non-official preliminaries and private 
 negotiations on the part of the Commissioners of the 
 Convention, a regular treaty was at last concluded, on 
 the 27th of February, 1795, at the Castle of La Jaunais, 
 and soon after ratified by the Government. The 
 Republic not only conceded religious liberty to the 
 insurgents, but engaged to indemnify them for the 
 expenses of the war to the extent of two millions of 
 francs ; several other very favourable conditions were 
 added, the Vendeans, on their part, entering into an 
 engagement not to bear arms again against the Republic. 
 
 It was made matter of accusation by some against 
 Charette that he thereby abandoned the cause of the 
 Crown, but it must be remembered that the submis- 
 sion to the Republic was in point of fact only nominal. 
 The Convention was determined to make peace, which 
 it eagerly desired, if it were only in order to have 
 more available troops to send to the frontier, but on no 
 other ground could the Government publicly make peace 
 but that of submission to the Republic. The Vendean 
 leaders, however, insisted on the restoration of the 
 monarchy, as well as of Catholic worship. Some secret 
 conditions were accordingly agreed upon, and certain 
 promises held out with reference to the future, which 
 made the treaty provisionally acceptable to Charette, 
 s 25 
 
274 Public worship resumed. 
 
 who was well aware that his jaded troops required rest. 
 Whether or not the Commissioners of the Convention 
 exceeded their powers in the engagements into which 
 they privately entered, or that the Convention deliberately 
 deceived Charette — if deceived he was — as we may easily 
 believe that it would not have scrupled to do, all tends 
 to prove that the so-called treaty was virtually a mere 
 truce, necessary to both sides, but hollow and unsatisfac- 
 tory from its very nature. On the part of the Vendeans 
 it was but a provisional toleration of a state of things 
 which they still hoped to see changed. Meanwhile they 
 had substantially obtained that for which they had taken 
 up arms, the free exercise of their religion ; for this, and 
 not the cause of monarchy, however intimately in their 
 estimation associated therewith, had been the object 
 of the rising and its primary aim. 
 
 The pacification of La Vende'e preceded by more than 
 a couple of months that of Brittany, where the royalists, 
 known as Chouans, refused at first to follow Charette's 
 example ; conferences, however, were held at Mabilais, 
 near Rennes, between the royalist chiefs and ten repre- 
 sentatives of the people, and, on the 21st of April, 
 the latter gained their point in the same manner as 
 had the Commissioners who negotiated with the Ven- 
 deans : namely, by the help of favourable stipulations 
 which the Convention had neither the wish nor the 
 power to fulfil. As one of these conditions, however, 
 was the re-establishment of religion, the treaty had a 
 very beneficial effect on the position of the priests 
 throughout Brittany. The persecution had, indeed, 
 already ceased ; the religious had been released, and the 
 old and infirm ecclesiastics, imprisoned during the 
 previous year, had been set at liberty in the course of the 
 month of March. Those priests who had been in conceal- 
 ment did not even wait for the close of the conferences 
 
Chouan bands. 
 
 275 
 
 of Mabilais to show themselves and celebrate Mass in 
 public. A cure of the diocese of Quimper, named 
 Jamin, announced his purpose of saying Mass on Easter 
 Sunday on a common in the parish of Saint-Caradec, and 
 an immense crowd in consequence assembled, many 
 having come a distance of three or four leagues. A kind 
 of canopy was erected, under which the priest offered the 
 Adorable Sacrifice in the open air in presence of this vast 
 multitude. It might have been easy for the enemies 
 of religion to see how utterly wasted had been all their 
 endeavours to make the Breton people abandon their 
 faith. The eagerness of the Catholic priests to show 
 themselves was, however, fatal to one of them in the 
 vicinity of Rennes, for some republican soldiers, irritated 
 probably at beholding him publicly exercising his func- 
 tions, shot him dead at the altar. 
 
 Those constitutional priests who had been imprisoned 
 were not the last to recover their freedom — indeed, they 
 were released before the Catholic priests — and the first 
 use they made of their liberty was to endeavour to revive 
 and perpetuate the schism. Although no religion whatso- 
 ever had now the official recognition of the State, 
 nevertheless the revolutionists, sympathizing as they 
 did with the schismatics, willingly gave them their pro- 
 tection and facilitated their re-occupation of the cathedrals 
 and parish churches. Fortunately they were far from 
 being able to fill the latter. In Brittany their number had 
 never been sufficient for the purpose, and apostasy during 
 the Terror had further considerably thinned their ranks. 
 Not a few of them also were to pay dear for their renewed 
 intrusion. Enraged against the men who had been the 
 bitter persecutors of their own pastors and the ardent 
 upholders of the Revolution, bands of Chouans would 
 assemble by night in small detachments, arrest them 
 in their own houses, and, after granting them a few 
 
276 
 
 Churches re-opened. 
 
 minutes to recommend their souls to God, shoot them 
 on the spot. A good many schismatic priests thus dis- 
 appeared in the C6tes-du-Nord during the spring of 
 1795. These intruders had made themselves so 
 obnoxious by the abandoned lives which the greater 
 part of them led, and by their persecution of the true 
 pastors, many having played the part of spies in hunting 
 them out and giving them up to insults and death, that, 
 although the Breton people had no share in these mur- 
 derous deeds, they manifested neither sympathy nor 
 regret for the fate of the sufferers. It is needless to say 
 that the faithful priests whose wrongs the Chouan bands 
 took on themselves to avenge would have been the first 
 to reprobate such acts of sanguinary reprisal. We have 
 seen what was the forgiving charity of the martyrs to 
 their persecutors, and can therefore have no doubt upon 
 that point. No justification, indeed, can be offered for these 
 crimes ; all that can be urged in extenuation is that the 
 anarchy of the times, and the total divorce which had 
 existed for so long between law and justice in the 
 country, must have tended to throw men's minds back 
 upon those rude notions of natural right which, in the 
 absence of all legitimate government, seem to lend a 
 kind of sanction even to the worst excesses. 
 
 The churches throughout France were now being re- 
 opened, particularly in Brittany, where the favourable 
 terms of the late treaty rendered the restoration of 
 divine worship easier; the civil authorities merely 
 requiring priests to declare in what place they designed 
 to celebrate Mass. There would appear to be nothing 
 in compliance with this formality to alarm the most 
 sensitive conscience, nevertheless some discussion on the 
 subject arose among the clergy, and a few of their 
 number, entertaining an invincible repugnance to holding 
 any communication with the Government, continued 
 
Efforts of the schismatics. 277 
 
 to keep aloof and even discouraged the faithful from 
 attending the churches. Soon, however, an oath of sub- 
 mission to the laws of the Republic was to be imposed, 
 which was due to the intrigues of the schismatics. The 
 deputy Lanjuinais, a fierce partisan, as it will be remem- 
 bered, of the constitutional clergy— who, however, ought 
 no longer be called by that name, since the Convention 
 had, in the decree requiring the submission in question, 
 expressly repudiated all recognition of a State Constitu- 
 tion of the Church — would have perished on the scaffold 
 with the other Federalists had he not contrived to escape 
 and to keep himself concealed during the remainder of 
 the Reign of Terror, but he had now re-appeared on 
 the political scene, and proposed this law to the 
 Assembly, which, as it was subsequently worded, served 
 to renew the persecution against the faithful clergy, but 
 which in no form could offer any difficulty to men who 
 were ready to swear to anything in order to maintain 
 their position. The oath was at first couched in general 
 terms and did not necessarily imply more than a pas- 
 sive submission to the existing order of things ; it was 
 even stated in the decree that the oath had no reference 
 to the past political opinions of any one ; nevertheless it 
 became an occasion of scruples to not a few, and excited 
 discussions in spite of all the efforts of the ecclesias- 
 tical authorities to allay them. It was not long before 
 all ambiguity on this subject was removed, and the oath 
 administered became as potent an engine of persecu- 
 tion as its predecessors had been. Meanwhile the 
 tenacity of the old constitutional party, headed by the 
 ever-active Le Coz, in opposing the restoration of 
 Catholic unity, retained in the schism their old partisans 
 in Brittany, who were chiefly to be found in some cantons 
 of the diocese of Rennes and Quimper. They also, as 
 has been said, held the cathedrals, but upon what title, 
 
278 
 
 A call to arms. 
 
 since the State professed no longer to support them, 
 it would be hard to say. The Catholics, it is true, also 
 enjoyed liberty of worship, but it was very precarious 
 even during this temporary interval. 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 The Disaster of Quiberon. 
 
 During the summer of the year 1795 took place the 
 disastrous landing of the emigrants at Quiberon. It was 
 in every way an unfortunate and inopportune attempt, 
 grounded on mistaken views with respect to the co-opera- 
 tion to be expected and the real position of affairs. 
 The Convention, it is true, was very unpopular throughout 
 France; and, although it had succeeded in ridding itself of 
 the leaders of the Mountain, it was continually torn with 
 factions and had become the perpetual battle-field 
 between hostile parties. The French princes and royalist 
 refugees in England, and the English Government itself, 
 thought therefore that the occasion was favourable for 
 an armed descent on the coast. Yet, apart from the 
 mismanagement which ensured its failure, the attempt 
 itself cannot be considered as otherwise than very 
 ill-timed. Had the emigrants, assisted by the English, 
 landed while the Vendeans were making their victorious 
 march through Brittany, the result might have been very 
 different. Brittany, thus animated, would have probably 
 risen, as the Vendeans had hoped it would when they 
 crossed the Loire ; a hope in which they were disap- 
 pointed, the insurrection never having assumed any large 
 proportions in that province, nor did any army ever take 
 the field there as in La Vendee. But as this pro- 
 ceeded from no lack of sympathy with the cause of the 
 
Hostilities recommenced. 279 
 
 monarchy, as was abundantly proved by the favour shown 
 by the people to the Chouans, foreign assistance of any 
 considerable amount would, no doubt, have encouraged 
 action of a more combined and decisive character, and 
 the annihilation of the Vendean army, as well as of the 
 multitudes which had followed it over the Loire, and 
 the noyades and fusilades of Nantes might have been 
 thus averted ; the royalists might then have, at least, held 
 their ground until the fall of Robespierre and his 
 adherents and the increased moderation of the Conven- 
 tion had prepared the way for a favourable accommoda- 
 tion. As it was, even after all their crushing reverses, we 
 have seen what good terms the Vendeans succeeded 
 in extracting from the Republic. This object had just 
 been secured, and the pacification of Brittany was in 
 progress towards attainment, when the call to arms of the 
 Bourbon princes came to rouse these devoted popula- 
 tions to fresh and worse than fruitless sacrifices. 
 
 Scarcely had Charette signed the treaty of La Jaunais 
 when he received a letter from the Comte de Provence 
 calling upon him to take arms again for the royal cause, 
 and telling him that his exploits had rendered him the 
 second founder of the monarchy. This was quite enough 
 to stir the loyal soul of Charette, who now held himself 
 prepared to renew hostilities when the time should come, 
 and to stake all on a fresh venture with undiminished 
 zeal, although he was deeply disappointed that the coast 
 of Poitou was not chosen for the intended landing. 
 Brittany had been judged to offer the best prospects, 
 mainly because the insurrection could not be said to 
 have as yet ceased in that quarter. Hostilities of an 
 irregular and disjointed character had long been kept up 
 (as already observed) by the bands of Chouans scattered 
 throughout the country, and had helped to retard the paci- 
 fication of the province. The peninsula of Quiberon on 
 
280 Landing at Quiberon. 
 
 the coast of Morbihan was fixed upon for the descent. 
 Several regiments of emigrants had been formed and 
 provided with chaplains, some of whom were Breton 
 priests ; Mgr. de Herce*, the Bishop of Dol, being ap- 
 pointed to accompany the expedition with the title of 
 Vicar-Apostolic in Brittany. The brother of the vene- 
 rable prelate, who shared his spirit of self-sacrifice, was 
 associated with him in his hazardous enterprize ; they 
 well knew to what peril they were exposing themselves ; 
 but they had counted the cost and were prepared to pay 
 it. ' My brother and I,' said the Abbe de Herce, ' have 
 no other desire, no other ambition, than to evangelize 
 our land, to bedew with our sweat and, if need be, with 
 our blood, the soil of our unhappy country. We do not 
 hide from ourselves the dangers which will encompass us. 
 We shall march from one village to another, from one 
 district to another, until we are arrested in some city by 
 our erring brethren, there to perish under the knife of the 
 guillotine. But blessed be the Lord ! ' 
 
 The fleet arrived in the Bay of Quiberon on the 26th 
 of June, 1795, and the landing was effected without diffi- 
 culty. No sooner had the neighbouring country become 
 aware of its approach than the people crowded to the 
 coast and welcomed the royalists as liberators. These 
 good peasants might be seen coming in procession, with 
 priests at their head, bearing the Banner of the Sacred 
 Heart, and singing the Church's hymns. They were at 
 a loss how to testify their joy sufficiently at seeing their 
 countrymen arrive, as they hoped, to put an end to the 
 misery which the Revolution had inflicted on them, the 
 women even wading into the water to assist in the dis- 
 embarkation. You might have believed that it was a 
 meeting of some great family, the members of which 
 were mutually embracing each other and weeping for 
 very joy. ' Good Bretons,' exclaims an eye-witness of 
 
Successes and disasters. 281 
 
 this touching scene, ' I shall never forget the spectacle I 
 beheld. You are the purest and most virtuous people 
 on the earth, and never during the whole time I spent 
 amongst you did I see you belie this fair character.' But 
 the delight and enthusiasm were heightened beyond 
 measure when the venerable Bishop of Dol landed with 
 sixteen ecclesiastics all vested in their sacerdotal robes. 
 Then the cries of Vive Dieu ! Vive la Religion / Vive le 
 Roi ! burst afresh from the mouths of all, soldiers and 
 people alike kneeling to receive the pontifical blessing. 
 During the crossing, news had reached the squadron of 
 the death in the Temple of the unfortunate son of 
 Louis XVI. ; it was therefore one of the first acts of the 
 royalists on landing to proclaim the Comte de Provence 
 king as Louis XVIII. The troops were formed into 
 a great square at Carnac, within which a tent was fixed 
 where Mgr. de Herce said Mass ; he then addressed a 
 discourse to the assembled multitude, at the conclusion 
 of which more than ten thousand voices made the shores 
 resound to the shout of Le Roi est mort I Vive le Roi ! 
 After this he caused the desecrated church of Carnac to 
 be re-opened and purified, and the same was done in the 
 churches of the neighbouring villages. They were re- 
 blessed, to cleanse them from the profanations committed 
 in them, and, provisional altars being erected, the offices 
 of the Church were once more celebrated within their 
 walls, thanksgiving and prayers being offered for the 
 success of the undertaking on which the destinies of 
 France were pending. 
 
 Success at first attended the royalist arms ; multitudes 
 of Chouans flocked in from all quarters, and, in the course 
 of three days, nearly 20,000 muskets had been served 
 out. The Blues, as the republican troops were called, 
 were falling back in all directions, and the Chouans were 
 eager to push their advantages without delay. Boldness 
 
282 A verbal convention. 
 
 and rapidity, indeed, give perhaps the only chance of 
 success to an invasion of this kind ; but, unhappily, this 
 was not the course adopted. To the loss of precious 
 time and to the resolution taken by the emigrants of 
 fortifying themselves in the peninsula of Quiberon as a 
 basis of operation, instead of marching at once into the 
 heart of the country, the disastrous end of this chivalrous 
 but ill-conducted enterprize must perhaps be imputed 
 more than to any other cause. It was decided to await 
 the arrival of the regiment led by the Comte de Som- 
 breuil and of the English contingent. Meanwhile, the 
 Fort of Penthievre having been captured, the royalists 
 had the inconceivable imprudence to allow the republican 
 troops who had surrendered, and had expressed a desire 
 to enter their ranks, to form a portion of the garrison of a 
 post so all-important to their security. Hoche, the re- 
 publican general, perceiving that the invaders did not 
 advance, now assumed the offensive. Leaving Rennes, 
 he marched to Vannes, and thence to Auray, driving the 
 royalists out of that place. He then took up his position 
 before the peninsula of Quiberon, so as to intercept their 
 communication with the main land, and there entrenched 
 himself. Before long, through the treachery of the re- 
 publican soldiers of the garrison, he had obtained pos- 
 session of the Fort of Penthievre. 
 
 Shut up in the peninsula, no hopes of escape now 
 remained to the royal army save that of effecting a re- 
 embarkation. Sombreuil, who had landed on the 17th 
 of July, could lend no help except that of protecting the 
 retreat on board the English ships. While women and 
 children and the wounded were being crammed into the 
 boats, from eight to nine hundred gentlemen, led on by 
 their young chief, courageously devoted themselves to 
 making head against the advancing enemy. A report 
 was unfortunately circulated amongst them that, if they 
 
The brothers De HercS. 
 
 283 
 
 laid down their arms, they would be honourably treated 
 as prisoners of war, and this hope tended to enfeeble 
 their resistance. Better to have sold their lives dearly 
 and died with arms in their hands, than to have trusted 
 the treacherous promise which, on the 21st of July, was 
 verbally given them that their lives would be spared. 
 Perhaps not better, however, when we consider their 
 glorious end, which they had time to prepare to meet, 
 not merely as heroes, but as Christian martyrs. Som- 
 breuil and his followers, however, surrendered on the 
 faith of this promise. Historians favourable to the Revo- 
 lution have denied the existence of any convention or 
 engagement, and the two representatives of the people, 
 Tallien and Blad, afterwards affirmed that none had ever 
 been made ; but, when we remember that both these 
 men were regicides, and that Tallien especially had 
 rendered his name infamous by his cruelty, it is im- 
 possible to give much credit to their assertions. How 
 little to be trusted were promises made under similar 
 circumstances, the Vendeans had made ample experi- 
 ence. The royalists were so fully persuaded that a 
 capitulation was really granted, that a young Breton had 
 the courage to brave a sea lashed by storm to swim to 
 an English corvette and stop its fire on the republicans. 
 The latter now threw themselves on the royalists, rifled 
 them, and took them into the Fort of Penthievre ; but 
 they were finally removed to Auray. 1 
 
 Mgr. de Herce had been provided with the means of 
 escape ; a boat was ready to convey him and the Abbe 
 
 1 The historian Gabourd is of opinion that the exact truth with respect 
 to the surrender of the royalists will, in all probability, never be known. 
 But he adds that, whether a formal capitulation was agreed upon, or 
 simply a hope held out of an amnesty based on considerations of cle- 
 mency, the vengeance exercised in the name of the Convention and by 
 its orders was none the less criminal, and will be for ever reprobated by 
 posterity {Histoire de France, torn. xix. § iv.). 
 
284 
 
 A military commission. 
 
 de Herce" on board a frigate near the shore, but his charity 
 prompted him to refuse. ' Shall we,' he said, addressing 
 his brother, ' shall we leave without spiritual consolation 
 and aid these unfortunate wounded soldiers, our country- 
 men and our companions in misfortune ? We can now 
 be more serviceable to them than ever. Ah ! my brother, 
 let us not forsake them ; but let us sacrifice, if need be, 
 the life of our bodies for the benefit of their souls.' The 
 two brothers then embraced each other, and, returning to 
 the hospital in which the wounded lay, found it already 
 in the hands of the republicans. They were themselves 
 immediately arrested, together with eleven other eccle- 
 siastics, and conducted to Auray. 
 
 For a few days the royalist prisoners were not treated with 
 any special rigour. The volunteers and private soldiers 
 were shut up in the devastated church of Saint-Gildas, 
 where the good inhabitants of Auray were not hindered 
 from supplying them with what they needed. The ladies 
 of the place distinguished themselves by their sympathy 
 and charity ; they used also to visit the Bishop of Dol in 
 his prison, and esteemed themselves happy to obtain his 
 benediction. But all illusive hopes were soon to be dis- 
 sipated. Tallien had repaired to Paris to give his own 
 garbled account of what had occurred, and the Comite 
 de Salut Public, faithful to its sanguinary habits, pro- 
 nounced a virtual sentence of death against all the 
 prisoners, by decreeing that, as emigrants and rebels 
 taken with arms in their hands, they should be brought 
 before a military commission, a tribunal which judged 
 and condemned without any forms of law. The adminis- 
 trators of the district of Morbihan were not one whit 
 more humanely disposed than was the central govern- 
 ment, and affected to be convinced that safety could not 
 be ensured but by the death of all the prisoners. Some 
 of the leaders had already appeared before a commission 
 
Royalist prisoners. 
 
 at Auray, to whom the Comte de Sombreuil so trium- 
 phantly proved the existence of an agreement to which 
 he could bring the testimony of three hundred repub- 
 licans who were within hearing when the promise was 
 given, that the commission declared itself incompetent to 
 pronounce any sentence. Blad, the deputy of Finisterre, 
 who was as cruel as Tallien, when he heard of this decla- 
 ration immediately appointed a fresh commission com- 
 posed of men better disposed to carry out his desires. 
 He also set up two at Vannes, where he himself was. 
 Then began that series of executions which never ceased 
 until there remained no more victims to strike. The 
 number of the sufferers is computed to have been about 
 eight hundred. 2 
 
 The Bishop of Dol had been eight days in prison at 
 Auray when a republican officer presented himself to 
 transfer him, together with the twelve priests who shared 
 his captivity, and the leaders of the royalist army to 
 Vannes. A few minutes after the prelate had been sum- 
 moned he made his appearance, his countenance beaming 
 like that of a just man going with joy to receive the 
 crown of martyrdom, when by one simultaneous move- 
 ment all the officers threw themselves on their knees. 
 He blessed them, and addressed a few consolatory words 
 to them, bidding them abandon themselves to the mercy 
 of God. Thirty priests are reckoned to have been 
 attached to the expedition, without counting several who 
 followed it charged with other special functions. Of 
 these thirty, fifteen or sixteen only were able to regain 
 the English squadron. The Abbe Poulpiquet, of the 
 
 2 When the executions had proceeded for a week, and five hundred 
 had been already shot, the presiding commissioners threatened to acquit 
 the remainder. They were accordingly dismissed, and persons of more 
 accommodating temper chosen in their places. But, to their credit, it 
 may be stated that none of the republican officers would consent to take 
 any further part in the proceedings (Hill's Story of La Vendtle, c. xiii.). 
 
286 Executions at V amies. 
 
 diocese of Quimper, and afterwards its bishop, had a 
 very narrow escape, having remained to the last moment, 
 hearing the confessions of the wounded, and refusing to 
 leave until he had finished. He then threw himself into 
 the sea and succeeded in reaching an English frigate. 
 The Abbe de Kerloury had the means of escape provided 
 for him, but he would not desert the young Vicomte de 
 La Houssaie, who was wounded, and whose virtues de- 
 served the interest he felt for him. At Vannes, Mgr. de 
 Herce, who, as well as his companions, had already 
 appeared before the military commission at Auray, and 
 had been sentenced to death, was put along with M. de 
 Sombreuil into a condemned cell, where formerly crimi- 
 nals had been used to await their execution. The priests 
 were shut up in the parish church of Saint-Patern, where 
 they passed the night, and the emigrants already confined 
 there saw them from the very early morning hours pre- 
 paring themselves by prayer for their last sacrifice. 
 
 At seven o'clock the condemned were all led forth, 
 with their hands tied behind their backs, to the Garenne, 
 the public promenade of Vannes, which had been selected 
 as the place where they were to be shot. The bishop, 
 who preserved his admirable peace of mind, said to the 
 people who followed him on the way bewailing him, 
 ' My good children, we did not come to conquer, but to 
 convert you.' Arrived at the spot where he was to die, 
 he begged that his hat might be taken off that he might 
 make his last prayer with the more reverence. As a 
 grenadier was about to comply with his desire, the Comte 
 de Sombreuil, who with MM. de Broglie and de La Lan- 
 delle was among the condemned, bade him desist, saying, 
 ' You are not worthy,' and with his teeth, not having his 
 hands at liberty, removed the bishop's hat. A few in- 
 stants more, and the venerable prelate had entered on 
 eternity. Thus died, on the 30th of July, 1795, at the 
 
Prisoners at Atiray. 287 
 
 age of sixty-nine, one of the most virtuous bishops whom 
 Brittany had ever possessed. His whole episcopal career 
 had been one of self-devotion, and his end was like unto 
 it. He had, as we have seen, made the voluntary sacri- 
 fice of his life by refusing the means of safety offered to 
 him ; and, although suffering from illness during the 
 whole time of his imprisonment, he was the consolation 
 of his companions in misfortune, cheering and supporting 
 them by his edifying conversation. The twelve priests 
 who were shot with him met their death with the same 
 Christian courage as their bishop ; amongst them was his 
 brother, the Vicar General of Dol, and six others of the 
 Breton clergy. These were not, however, all the priests 
 who suffered in this affair. Three more, at least, are 
 mentioned, one of whom was shot at Auray with some 
 other prisoners, whose confessions he was hearing up to 
 the last moment ; another had rendered the same service 
 to the royalists at Vannes 5 the third was the preceptor 
 of young De Rohan, who was taken prisoner along with 
 him in one of the encounters. 
 
 If the disaster of Quiberon is melancholy in one point 
 of view, it rejoices the heart in another. Many of the 
 military were men exemplary in the discharge of all then- 
 Christian duties, but there were others who had been 
 remiss and negligent ; in these, however, the stroke of 
 adversity which had fallen on them, and the near approach 
 of death, worked a salutary change, and religion was seen 
 to resume all its power over their souls. Among the 
 first mentioned, the Comte de Soulanges, of Montaigu in 
 Poitou, was as remarkable for his virtue and piety as he 
 had proved himself to be for his military talents. He 
 led all the pious exercises by which the prisoners pre- 
 pared themselves for death while detained at Auray. 
 Another nobleman, the Comte de Kergariou de Loc- 
 maria, near Lannion, an elderly man and a naval officer, 
 
288 Conduct of the prisoners. 
 
 emulated De Soulanges in devotion. He had a young 
 nephew of the name of De Volude, the fervour of whose 
 piety made him an object of special interest to his com- 
 panions. As he looked almost a boy, they assured him 
 that he could easily pass himself off as two years younger 
 than he really was. The idea did not approve itself to 
 him, but he consulted his uncle. ' Is life,' he asked, ' of 
 an equal value with truth ? ' ' Better die,' replied M. de 
 Kergariou, ' than purchase it at the expense of a false- 
 hood.' This was sufficient to confirm the young man in 
 his resolution to perish rather than betray the truth. 
 Those emigrants who had been selected to be first 
 executed, after having appeared before the military com- 
 mission at Auray, were confined in a chapel which had 
 formerly appertained to a community of religious women, 
 but which the republicans now called the 'antechamber of 
 death.' MM. de Soulanges, de Kergariou, and de Volude, 
 having been removed there with many others, prepared 
 for death in the spirit of Christians and of martyrs. 
 Straw had been offered them to lie down on, but they 
 declined it, preferring on this last night of their life on 
 earth to spend it in prayer, so they begged instead to be 
 allowed to have a light. There were forty prisoners in 
 all, composed of emigrants, of servants who had followed 
 their masters on this expedition, and royalists of the 
 country who had joined them. The emigrants almost all 
 belonged to the navy, and collected together in one 
 corner of the room, where M. de Kergariou recited the 
 office for the dead, all the rest devoutly kneeling and 
 striking their breasts vehemently as they made their 
 responses. Young De Volude was deeply affected. His 
 sensitive frame made him suffer intensely from the pros- 
 pect of death, but his Christian sentiments triumphed 
 over all. His boyish face was pale and worn, and his 
 tears flowed abundantly, but they were tears of penitence, 
 
Their piety and devotion. 289 
 
 not tears of mere sorrow. No one, indeed, could doubt 
 his ardent love of God, or his willingness and even glad- 
 ness to part with life, though by a road so painful to 
 flesh and blood, who noted the long and passionate 
 looks which now and again he raised towards heaven. 
 It was an eye-witness who afterwards described the 
 bearing and behaviour of this youth, which, he said, 
 recalled to mind what we picture to ourselves of those 
 young Christian martyrs of primitive times, whose heroic 
 deaths have consecrated their memory. 
 
 Some of the prisoners early in the night felt to need 
 some sustenance, and expressed a wish to that effect ; 
 but the austere De Kergariou simply replied, ' Let us 
 occupy ourselves with our souls ; ' and it was then that 
 he began the office for the dead. When he had finished, 
 M. de Soulanges, still on his knees, spoke with all the 
 fervour of his heart to his fellow-prisoners, the better to 
 dispose them for their approaching end. Then his servant 
 also addressed them, and that in words of such moving 
 eloquence that his hearers were as much surprised as 
 touched. The mind of this man had been nourished 
 with the study of the Sacred Scriptures, and the nearness 
 of death seemed only to inflame his zeal. Both master 
 and servant implored their unfortunate associates to for- 
 give their assassins, and almost all spent a portion of the 
 night in supplicating God in their behalf. They even 
 pushed their Christian generosity so far as to collect the 
 little money and some few articles of value which they 
 still had about them, and give them to the soldiers who 
 were on guard before the window, begging them to 
 accept the present as a token of reconciliation, and 
 charging them to tell their comrades that they forgave 
 them for the death they were about to receive at their 
 hands. As evening closed in, they had been surprised 
 by the entrance of a venerable-looking ecclesiastic. It 
 t 25 
 
290 Magnanimity of royalists. 
 
 was M. Erdeven, the Rector of Sauzon, who had come 
 to offer them the aid of his ministry. The royalist 
 prisoners, however, had enjoyed the blessing of receiving 
 the sacrament of penance in the prison of Auray before 
 their removal to the chapel, where one of the chaplains 
 of the army prisons spent a whole night in hearing their 
 confessions and fortifying their souls with all those con- 
 solations which religion so abundantly supplies. Among 
 their number one alone had not had the opportunity of 
 making his confession ; he knelt down accordingly before 
 the old man, but suddenly started up in alarm, for the 
 thought had occurred to him that their unexpected visitor 
 was a constitutional priest. M. Erdeven, however, quickly 
 undeceived him, telling him who he was, and how the 
 commissary of police had come in search of him on the 
 part of the commandant, who had been earnestly solicited 
 by the ladies of the place to allow him to see them. All 
 the prisoners hastened to make excuses for the abrupt- 
 ness of their companion, for which, as may be supposed, 
 the good priest did not require any apologies. This 
 little incident serves to show the repulsion which the 
 faithful laity felt for the schismatics, whose ministrations, 
 even in articulo mortis, we find them always firmly 
 rejecting. 
 
 They were now all prepared to make a generous 
 sacrifice of their lives. De Volude was not the only 
 one who had refused to save his life by a compromise 
 of truth. The two young Lasseynie of Limousin, 
 brothers, and knights of Malta, as was also De Volude, 
 the eldest only seventeen and the second sixteen years 
 of age, had manifested the same fidelity to conscience 
 before the Auray commission. Being asked if they had 
 not been compelled by their parents to accompany them, 
 they answered that they would not save their lives by a 
 falsehood, and declared that they had served the royal 
 
Executions at Auray. 291 
 
 cause both from feeling and from duty. Similar was 
 the conduct of young Coetudavel of Morlaix, a lieu- 
 tenant in the navy, when brought before the Vannes 
 commission. His engaging countenance and youthful 
 appearance interested the president, who said to him, 
 ' As for you, of course you are under age.' ' I perceive 
 your intention,' replied M. Coetudavel, ' and am obliged 
 to you for it, but I will not ransom my life by a lie.' 
 The uprightness, magnanimity, and charity of these 
 noble victims meet us at every turn. We have seen 
 how warmly the prisoners in the chapel at Auray 
 testified their forgiveness of their murderers, but one 
 of them confined in the prison of that town surpassed 
 them in the charity which he showed to his enemies, 
 even at the expense of his friends. The prison was 
 guarded by a feeble detachment of twelve soldiers, and 
 some of its inmates had formed a plan of falling upon 
 them suddenly and so effecting their escape. But when 
 an old officer belonging to the regiment of La Chatre 
 was informed of this design, he condemned it as criminal, 
 and even conceived himself bound in conscience to 
 apprise the republican authorities of the danger, who 
 immediately took measures to render any such attempt 
 impossible. 
 
 The dawn of day found the prisoners in the chapel 
 still engaged in their devotions ; but soon a gendarme 
 appeared, who, holding in his hand a list of the con- 
 demned, proceeded to call by name about half of their 
 number, who were ordered for immediate execution, and 
 now these men, who but an instant before were deploring 
 with tears the sins of their past life, might be seen 
 preparing with a calm and collected air to march to 
 death. They were bound two and two together, 
 and, persevering to the last in their considerate kindness 
 and charity, they stripped themselves of their coats and 
 
292 
 
 A pious valet. 
 
 gave them to the soldiers, that they might have them 
 before they were pierced with bullets and stained with 
 blood. That gallant gentleman, M. de Kergariou, then 
 said to his companions, ' You need no example how 
 to die, but, as your elder, I claim the honour of leading 
 the way.' He obtained his desire. When they were 
 being bound, he exclaimed, ' Let us do still better ; let us 
 walk barefoot, in imitation of the Passion of our Saviour.' 
 So saying, he took off his stockings, and many did the 
 same. On account of his age, a cart was offered to 
 convey him to the place of execution, which was a 
 good mile and a half distant, but he declined its aid. 
 M. de Soulanges was also of the number selected for 
 execution that morning. It seems hardly credible that 
 in so Christian a place as Auray, the greater part of 
 whose population had zealously favoured the expedition, 
 any individuals should have been found mean and cruel 
 enough to insult the victims on their way to death ; yet 
 so it was : for a group of wretches followed them with 
 hootings and revilings to the fatal field. There they 
 were made to kneel down on the edge of a deep ditch, 
 the soldiers taking close aim at them from the opposite 
 bank. Their fallen bodies were immediately thrown into 
 the ditch, and a little earth was shovelled in to cover 
 them ; for no care was ever taken to ascertain whether 
 the sufferers had ceased to breathe. 
 
 This execution was followed by many others, which 
 took place daily at the same hour, until the prisons 
 of Auray had been emptied. Young De Volude and 
 the two Lasseynie brothers were executed on the second 
 day. The prisoners left in the chapel were well aware 
 that their turn must soon come, and continued to 
 prepare themselves for death. One of them, who 
 succeeded in escaping, we are not told by what means, 
 gave a touching description of the scene in the prison. 
 
Emigrants servants. 
 
 293 
 
 They used all to gather on their knees round one who 
 was chosen to fill the office which would have been 
 discharged by a priest had any been amongst them ; 
 this was no other than M. de Soulanges's valet already 
 mentioned. He was able to render them most essential 
 service, for he knew many prayers by heart, and besides, 
 as our informer tells us, was better instructed than they 
 were in the religious duties incumbent upon them at 
 this solemn time. All listened to his voice and received 
 his pious exhortations with deep attention and recollec- 
 tion. To the last moment this remarkable man, who, 
 notwithstanding his humble extraction and lowly station, 
 had thus became as a father and master to his fellow- 
 captives of gentle birth, so far his superiors in the eyes 
 of the world, continued his assiduous ministry; but before 
 long he too was led away to die. 
 
 While this good servant was helping to dispose the 
 royalist gentlemen to make a Christian end, an old 
 Breton officer, M. Harscouet, of Plouha, was performing 
 the same charitable office for the unfortunate servants 
 of the emigrants, who, although they had only followed 
 their masters and had never borne arms, were included 
 in the same iniquitous sentence. These poor creatures 
 were in a state of great despair, and could not resign 
 themselves to die. M. Harscouet, however, by his 
 pathetic exhortations succeeded, not only in reconciling 
 them to their fate, but in leading them to regard death 
 in such a cause as a glorious martyrdom. The prisoners 
 were confined in a kind of barn awaiting the hour of 
 their execution. Here they spent the time in prayer, 
 the old Breton often reading to them, or charging the 
 other officers to do so in their turn, a chapter out 
 of the ' Imitation of Christ,' the only book they had 
 among them. Thus consoled and fortified, these poor 
 men went to death with the same courage as their 
 masters. 
 
294 ' Field of the Martyrs.' 
 
 The republican authorities carried their unsparing 
 cruelty to such lengths as to have even the wounded 
 royalists who were unfit to be moved executed within 
 the precincts of the prison where they lay. Among 
 them perished a noble Breton, belonging to an ancient 
 family of Treguier and a lieutenant in the navy, whose 
 name, M. de Portzampare, deserves a record for his 
 strong faith and piety, of which he left a memorial in 
 an admirable will written by him a year previous, in 
 which he addresses his wife and children in language 
 worthy of a saint. He was borne on the mattress as 
 he lay into the courtyard of the prison of Auray and 
 there shot. So deep was the impression made on the 
 people by the greatness of soul and the Christian 
 sentiments of the royalists immolated under their eyes, 
 that they conceived a profound veneration for their 
 memory and honoured them as the friends of God. 
 The field which was watered by their blood became 
 a place of pilgrimage, and received the name of the 
 ' Field of the Martyrs/ which it has preserved to this 
 day. In the year 1816, the Curd of Saint-Gildas of 
 Auray, M. Deshayes, collected the bones of those who 
 had suffered there and in the neighbourhood, and had 
 them deposited in the ancient Carthusian church, which 
 is not far from the chief scene of their martyrdom. 
 Later, a chapel was added, to contain their honoured 
 remains, and a marble monument was erected over 
 them. 
 
 One hundred and fifty of the royalists were taken to 
 Vannes, and their end was as admirable as that of their 
 companions in misfortune at Auray. Shut up, as we 
 have seen, in the church of Saint-Patern, when night 
 came they used to fasten their single candle to one of 
 the pillars of the nave, and then all on their knees would 
 chant the De Profundis and the Miserere, pray for the 
 
The Abbt Poulain. 
 
 295 
 
 welfare of France, and beg God to forgive their enemies. 
 It was a touching sight to behold amongst them veteran 
 generals awaiting their death with that calm resignation 
 which religion alone inspires ; and, indeed, so striking 
 was the whole spectacle, and so awe-imposing the sound 
 of united prayer from the lips of these doomed men, that 
 the soldiers on guard, from whose hearts every effort 
 had been made to eradicate all belief, felt their old 
 faith once more revive within them and, uncovering 
 their heads, assisted at the devotions with the greatest 
 respect. But they were not long to profit by this 
 edifying sight. Already, on the 30th of July, the day 
 on which Mgr. de Herce, with the priests and M. de 
 Sombreuil, was executed, twelve prisoners were sum- 
 moned from the chapel. The Abbe Poulain, chaplain 
 to one of the emigrant regiments, was engaged at that 
 moment in hearing confessions. He rose, and called 
 out aloud, ' French chevaliers, ever faithful to God and 
 to the king, make an act of contrition : your sins are for- 
 given you;' and he gave them all a general absolution. 
 The prisoners felt themselves at once sensibly strength- 
 ened with divine assistance, and twelve of their own 
 accord came forward to take their place between the 
 files of soldiers. They were shot that very evening. 
 The Abbe Poulain was spared for a short time longer, 
 being transferred to the prison of the town. But he 
 was not forgotten ; one day they came to fetch him, and 
 he too was led forth to death. He was about thirty 
 years of age and a very holy priest. God, in His mercy, 
 seems to have provided the opportunity of confession in 
 one way or another to all the victims, some of whom, 
 but for the disaster which had overtaken them, might 
 have continued for years, and possibly even have died, 
 in the neglect of that sacrament. Its marvellous effect 
 in restoring peace to their souls and arming them to 
 
296 
 
 A marvellous escape. 
 
 meet death with fortitude is instanced in a case recorded 
 by the Baron d'Antrechaus, who had the good fortune 
 to escape. He was an intimate friend of the Vicomte 
 de La Villevolette, a naval officer, as he was himself. 
 This gentleman was anything but resigned to the fate 
 which awaited him, and was tempted to murmur against 
 Providence. One day the baron found him in quite a 
 different state of mind, and, struck with the serenity 
 of his countenance, he questioned him as to the cause 
 of so sudden a transformation ; to which M. de La Ville- 
 volette, with almost an inspired air, replied, ' My good 
 friend, I have just been to confession ; I die content.' 
 'To confession?' rejoined his friend, 'and how have 
 you managed that?' 'Do you see? go there,' said 
 La Villevolette, pointing to the end of the nave. This 
 was in the church of Saint-Patern of which we have 
 been just speaking. M. d'Antrechaus followed his friend's 
 recommendation ; at the end of the nave he found a 
 priest, himself destined to perish, preparing the other 
 prisoners for death, and becoming to them the instru- 
 ment of those marvels of grace of which the relater of 
 this incident was himself speedily to make experience. 
 Whether this priest was the Abbe Poulain, Tresvaux, 
 on whose authority we relate this anecdote, does not 
 say. 
 
 We cannot do better than conclude this account of 
 the victims of Quiberon by relating the marvellous 
 escape of a young Breton, due to the signal protection 
 of the Blessed Mother of God. Several youths of about 
 sixteen years of age had joined the royalists when they 
 landed. Among them was young Briant, of Peillac, near 
 Redon, who had brothers serving in the army. He 
 reached Quiberon only in time to bear a part in the 
 fatal battle of the 21st of July. Taken with arms in 
 his hands, he was speedily condemned to death along 
 
A marvellous escape. 297 
 
 with his young companions, and led out with them to be 
 shot. They were all placed on their knees in front of 
 the soldiers who were charged with the execution. 
 This youth was very devout to Mary, and in this his 
 extremity he invoked her with fervour. The men fired, 
 and he heard a ball whistle close to his ear, but he was 
 himself untouched. Considering how near the muzzles 
 of the muskets always were to the victims, so that it 
 would seem utterly impossible for those who held them 
 to miss their aim, this may be regarded as little short of 
 miraculous. Young Briant, however, fell forward with 
 the rest, whether designedly or through the shock he 
 had received we are not told. It was late in the 
 evening, and the soldiers after fulfilling their barbarous 
 office quitted the field immediately, leaving the bodies 
 of their victims where they had fallen, without even 
 attempting to give them partial burial. As soon as 
 night had closed in, the young man rose from amidst 
 the bloody corpses of his friends, and made his way 
 for the distance of three miles through the country. 
 After escaping several perils and crossing a deep ditch 
 full of water, no easy undertaking to one whose arms 
 were tied behind him, he reached at eleven o'clock at 
 night the door of a farmhouse, which his well-known 
 voice soon caused to be opened to him. He afterwards 
 married, and his children always preserved a grateful 
 remembrance of the marvellous deliverance which their 
 father owed to the protection of the Blessed Mother 
 of God. 
 
CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 The moveable columns. Their murderous deeds. 
 
 The wholesale slaughter of the royalist prisoners of 
 Quiberon is sufficient to show that even after Robes- 
 pierre's fall the revolutionary spirit was as cruel and 
 implacable as ever, while the execution of the priests 
 who had followed the expedition solely in the exercise 
 of their sacerdotal functions, proves the unabated hatred 
 of religion which still animated the authorities. For this 
 latter measure no possible excuse could be advanced, 
 for these priests were men who had submitted to the law 
 of deportation, and that law was now revoked ; even 
 those who had disobeyed it and remained in the country 
 being nominally tolerated by the State. We say nominally, 
 because they could not be said to enjoy the protection 
 which full toleration implies. They might rather be said 
 to be let alone for the present, although the State affected 
 to place every kind of worship on a level, recognizing 
 none, and favouring none more than another. This, 
 however, was far from being the case. The partiality 
 of the Government for the so-called constitutional clergy 
 was as marked as was its dislike of the Catholic priests. 
 This disposition on the part of the authorities encouraged 
 Le Coz and his colleagues in their endeavours to re- 
 establish their schismatic Church. Le Coz, in particular, 
 laboured at this work with an indefatigable pertinacity 
 worthy of a better cause. He would fain have induced 
 
Death of M. Le Moine. 
 
 299 
 
 the Catholic priests to join the ranks of the schism and 
 thus fill up the gaps which apostacies and numerous 
 retractations had left in its body, and when they showed 
 themselves deaf to his advances he had the hypocritical 
 effrontery to tax them with a want of love for peace and 
 unity. 
 
 While the schismatic clergy thus enjoyed as much 
 practical encouragement as could be expected from an 
 utterly godless government, the smallest circumstance 
 was sufficient to rekindle the slumbering hatred with 
 which the true pastors were regarded by their enemies. 
 The death of the excellent Vicaire of Gomene, M. Le 
 Moine, in the August of this year, furnishes an instance. 
 He had remained in the country, and, during the terrible 
 years of 1793 and 1794, had the good fortune to elude 
 pursuit. A curious example occurred in his case, of life 
 being saved by that very love of truth which was ready 
 to offer it in sacrifice. Some of his parishioners having 
 consulted him as to whether it was lawful to tell a lie 
 to save oneself from death, or to deliver a friend from 
 some imminent danger, he replied that death must 
 always be preferred to falsehood. It was not long before 
 he was called upon to put his own rule of morality in 
 practice. Having chanced to meet a band of republican 
 soldiers, one of them asked him if he was not Le Moine, 
 the priest of Gomene. ' Yes, I am,' he answered boldly, 
 with a face of perfect tranquillity. 'That cannot be 
 true,' exclaimed the other, ' you are a liar • if it was true 
 you would not say so;' and they let him go. As soon 
 as the churches were re-opened in 1795, M. Le Moine 
 hastened to celebrate Mass publicly in that of his parish, 
 but his flock was not to possess him long. He was 
 known to have been in communication with three young 
 men who, being summoned to serve in the army, refused 
 to join it; this circumstance drew upon him the hatred 
 
300 Gloomy prospects. 
 
 of the republicans. The young men were arrested and, 
 being found provided with pistols and ammunition, they 
 were at once executed, and M. Le Moine was denounced. 
 He was saying Mass at Gomene when several of the 
 faithful came to warn him of the approach of the troops, 
 but he would not interrupt the Holy Sacrifice. ' If my 
 last hour is come,' he said, ' there is all the more reason 
 why I should not shorten my devotions or cease from 
 offering the Holy Sacrifice for those who are assisting at 
 it, and who perhaps will not have any near opportunity 
 of profiting by this grace.' He finished, and left the 
 church as the soldiers entered the town, and had already 
 climbed the neighbouring heights when he was overtaken 
 by the band. They took him back and led him to the 
 cemetery, where, after causing him to make the circuit 
 of the church, when he came in front of the sacristy 
 window they killed him by a bayonet thrust. 
 
 Good priests could ill be spared at that time, for their 
 ranks had been sadly thinned, nor was there any hope at 
 present of filling their places. Ordinations had been 
 interrupted now for several years, the colleges and semi- 
 naries were closed. No vocations for the priesthood 
 manifested themselves, and it was hardly possible under 
 present circumstances that they should. The military 
 profession was absorbing well-nigh the whole youth of 
 the country, for, whether willingly or unwillingly, nearly 
 all enlisted. It is true that numbers of the faithful 
 clergy were still in exile, who might be able to return 
 when a brighter day dawned, but they, too, were daily 
 drooping and dying, and many had already gone to their 
 rest. To one who regarded things from a merely human 
 point of view the time therefore seemed fast approaching 
 when the whole Catholic priesthood of France would have 
 died out. Gloomy, however, as were these prospects, 
 they were soon to become darker still. The interval 
 
A new constitution. 301 
 
 of comparative tranquillity enjoyed by the Catholics 
 was to be brief indeed. The Convention had at last 
 come to the determination of dissolving itself, but before 
 laying down its authority it was desirous of placing the 
 national representation on a fresh basis. A new consti- 
 tution was accordingly elaborated, to which fidelity was 
 sworn with as much apparent ardour as to its prede- 
 cessors. These political changes might have been of 
 little consequence to the interests of religion but for a 
 law regarding the freedom of worship. It was proposed 
 by Genissieu, a lawyer of Dauphine and deputy for the 
 Isere, a man well known for his hatred of the clergy, 
 and the Convention adopted it in its sitting of the 7th 
 Vende'miaire, 4th year of the Republic, that is, on the 
 29th of September, 1795. preface set forth at length 
 its object, which was not to interfere with the domain of 
 thought, with which civil laws had nothing to do, being 
 exclusively concerned with the superintendence of 
 measures of police and of public security; accordingly 
 the civil authority was bound to protect the freedom of 
 worship, and to punish those who disturbed its cere- 
 monies or outraged its ministers in the discharge of their 
 functions, while it exacted from the ministers themselves 
 a purely civil guarantee against the abuse which they 
 might make of their office to excite persons to disobey 
 the laws of the State. It was in view of this last object 
 that the law now enacted required of all ministers of 
 religion before entering on the exercise of their functions 
 the following declaration, which was moreover to be 
 posted up conspicuously in every building devoted to 
 any kind of religious worship : ' I recognize the community 
 of French citizens as sovereign, and I promise submission 
 and obedience to the laws of the Republic' 
 
 It must be manifest at once that this declaration could 
 not be conscientiously subscribed by the Catholic clergy. 
 
302 
 
 Persecution renewed. 
 
 It was no longer question of a mere passive submission to 
 the existing order of things, but of obedience to the laws of 
 a government which was not only unrecognized as yet by 
 the other powers of Europe, but many of whose laws 
 were manifestly opposed to Christian morality. More- 
 over, they were called upon to decide upon a very grave 
 point, that of the sovereignty of the people, and against 
 the rights of their legitimate monarchs. This was too 
 much to demand of men who had already made so many 
 sacrifices to conscience, and in their meetings to examine 
 the new form of submission the priests were unanimous 
 in rejecting it. Tresvaux says he does not remember 
 that there was a single dissentient voice, at least in 
 Brittany. The Convention before separating had pro- 
 ceeded to enforce the tyrannical act of the 29th of 
 September by a decree passed on the 24th of October, 
 ordering the execution within twenty-four hours of the 
 laws against refractory priests, that is to say, sentence of 
 death against all who should refuse to take the civic oath 
 now imposed. But the faithful priests in Brittany had 
 not awaited the passing of this last decree to provide for 
 their safety. As soon as that of the 7 th Vendemiaire had 
 become known, they retired from the churches which 
 they served, and the Catholics, after a few months of 
 consolation, had the grief to see the sacred buildings 
 once more abandoned and profaned which they had 
 hastened to repair and adorn. They also marked with 
 dismay that the men who had taken the most active 
 share in the work of persecution, but who had kept quiet 
 of late while the Government showed itself more favour- 
 able to religion, were again openly manifesting that same 
 bitter hatred against the clergy for which they had been 
 allowed free scope as long as the Reign of Terror lasted. 
 
 Persecution, then, was evidently again impending, and 
 the new government was not likely to be slow in pro- 
 
Moveable columns. 303 
 
 moting its renewal. It entered on its powers on the 
 4th Brumaire, the 26th of October, the national repre- 
 sentative body being again styled the Legislative 
 Assembly, which now, however, was composed of two 
 councils, the one entitled the Council of the Ancients, 
 and the other the Council of the Five-hundred. The 
 Convention had ensured the transmission of its sanguinary 
 and oppressive spirit in a manner reprobated by all 
 except those who were selfishly interested in its main- 
 tenance, by decreeing that two-thirds of its own members 
 should constitute a portion of the new legislature. A 
 Directory composed of five members was charged with 
 the executive department, who would therefore neces- 
 sarily possess much influence. The first five Directors 
 named by the Legislative Assembly were regicides, from 
 which circumstance it might easily be concluded what 
 would be their animus towards religion. 
 
 The year 1796 opened in Brittany under the most 
 sinister auspices. Civil war still smouldered on, for the 
 royalist bands scattered throughout the province had 
 resumed their arms almost immediately after the pacifi- 
 cation of Mabilais, and this state of things was most 
 prejudicial to the safety of the concealed priests, as their 
 enemies continued to accuse them of fomenting disturb- 
 ance in favour of the royal cause. The late attempt at 
 Quiberon had, no doubt, helped not a little to furnish a 
 fresh stimulus to this calumny, which was nevertheless 
 utterly groundless. The priests were certainly in heart 
 attached to the monarchy, and had preserved their 
 fidelity to the ancient dynasty of their kings, but, above 
 all, they were devoted to the Church, and sought peace 
 as being most in accordance with her interests, the 
 weapons of their warfare being only prayer and self- 
 sacrifice. The republican soldiers, who were continually 
 scouring the country, of which they were the terror and 
 
304 Moveable columns. 
 
 the curse, were animated by a special ferocity against 
 them. These men were embodied in moveable columns, 
 as they were called, being detachments selected from the 
 different garrisons — for the smallest towns in Brittany at 
 that time were garrisoned — and sent to visit the neigh- 
 bouring districts, including the most retired. They lived 
 at free quarters on the inhabitants, whom they always 
 pillaged and often killed. If they discovered a priest, 
 they would either murder him on the spot or bring him 
 back with them to head-quarters, rarely returning without 
 good store of booty. Besides these marauders, the 
 country was afflicted with another pest, pretended 
 National Guards, who had assumed the name of Contre- 
 Chouans, and were in the habit of entrapping the people 
 by wearing rosaries at their button-holes and affecting 
 Christian and royalist sentiments. These men were 
 drawn from the lowest dregs of the populace and, as it 
 may be inferred, were capable of the vilest acts. 
 
 The first victims of the moveable columns was the 
 Pere Toumois, a Capuchin. When the religious were 
 expelled from their houses he had retired to his native 
 district, where he continued to labour actively in secret, 
 and when religion enjoyed a short interval of liberty, in 
 1795, he fixed himself in the parish of Lehon, near 
 Dinan, which had lost its pastor, he having died in 
 prison. The people regarded Pere Toumois as a saint, 
 and used to flock to him from all quarters. The renewal 
 of the persecution did not make him leave his post, he 
 persevered in visiting the district round Dinan, but his 
 self-devotion rendered him an object of special animosity 
 to the republicans. He knew this well, and expected 
 sooner or later to meet death at their hands. But the 
 thought caused him no fear ; he would often say that he 
 should forgive his murderers, and had only one wish, 
 and that was not to be arrested within the walls of any 
 
Their first victims. 
 
 305 
 
 house, lest he should compromise the inmates. His 
 charitable desire was to be satisfied. On the 23rd of 
 January, as he was preparing to say Mass in a house at 
 Saint-Solain, word was brought him that a troop of 
 soldiers was in the neighbourhood. He immediately 
 went out, accompanied by two young men who habitually 
 served him as guides. They had gained a common, 
 when the soldiers descried them in the distance, and 
 called out to them to stop. Pere Tournois turned round 
 and advanced to meet them, followed by his two com- 
 panions. The soldiers searched them, and took every- 
 thing which they had about them. Then an officer who 
 had manifested some interest in their behalf told them 
 that they might go free, but they had scarcely walked ten 
 paces when a volley from the whole troop killed them 
 all three. The soldiers then cut off the priest's right 
 hand and clave his skull in two, scattering the brains on 
 the ground; afterwards, as if they enjoyed their murderous 
 work, they remained sitting close to the bodies during 
 the whole of the day. In the night the people of 
 Quevert, in which parish the ruthless deed was done, 
 gave them burial on the spot, but in 181 7 their remains 
 were disinterred and solemnly committed to consecrated 
 ground. 
 
 About the same period M. Gauron, the Rector of 
 Lanrelas, who was nearly eighty years of age, was also 
 put to death. After suffering a long imprisonment, he 
 had returned to the parish which he had served for 
 thirty years, and resumed his sacred avocations. A 
 moveable column appeared there one day and inquired 
 for him. The captain said that he wished to speak to 
 him, but that no harm was intended. This he protested 
 on his conscience. As men of this class appeared to 
 have long parted with such an encumbrance as a con- 
 science, the protestation would seem to have had little 
 u 25 
 
306 MM. Crespel and Tiengou. 
 
 value in the estimation of the good people of Lanrelas, 
 for no one would inform the inquirer where their rector 
 was to be found. The column therefore departed, but 
 only to return suddenly on the morrow, when they sur- 
 prised M. Gauron, who had remained notwithstanding 
 the alarm of the previous day. They kept him prisoner 
 in the church until nightfall, when they brought him out, 
 and pretended that they were going to take him to 
 Eroons, but as soon as they were clear of the place they 
 shot him and thrust him through with their bayonets. 
 Another priest of the diocese of Saint-Malo, M. Hazard, 
 perished during the same month. He exercised his 
 ministry secretly in a parish near Becherel, and was 
 concealed in the bourg of Saint-Maugand, where he 
 believed he had a safe asylum, but his abode was dis- 
 covered and reported to the government commissioner, 
 who sent a detachment to invest the house by night ; he 
 was shot as he was endeavouring to escape by a back 
 door. 
 
 In the month of February two more priests of the 
 diocese of Saint-Malo were cruelly murdered at Medre'ac. 
 That parish was without its pastor, but M. Crespel 
 supplied all its spiritual needs with untiring zeal. Young 
 and vigorous, and endowed with a dauntless, joyous 
 spirit, no danger could appal him, no fatigue seemed to 
 try his strength. A band of soldiers in pursuit of priests 
 and Chouans, arriving at the bourg, seized and shot him, 
 leaving him, as they believed, dead, but he was only 
 wounded and had fainted. He soon came to himself, 
 and, seeing near him some women who had come to 
 render him assistance, he asked who had killed him. 
 'The Blues,' they replied. 'Blessed be God!' he ex- 
 claimed; 'and may He forgive them!' He seems to 
 have been permitted to revive only to add to his merits 
 by making this act of Christian forgiveness, for the 
 
M. de Rabec. 
 
 307 
 
 lamentations of the women, when they beheld the blood 
 flowing copiously from the wound he had received, were 
 overheard by one of his assassins, who returned to 
 complete the work of blood. As he drew his sword to 
 deal the fatal blow one of the women screamed out, ' Do 
 not strike him ! He is a priest ! ' 'I know that very 
 well,' retorted the man, and immediately clave the 
 martyr's head with his sabre. The other priest who 
 was murdered in the same place and at the same time 
 was M. Tiengou. He was old and infirm, and on 
 being released from prison had retired to his brother's 
 house. After arresting him, the soldiers left him alone 
 for a few minutes, and he profited by the opportunity 
 to take refuge among some ruined buildings. Here 
 he began quietly to say his office, but he was soon 
 recaptured and, as the cemetery was hard by, the soldiers 
 took him to it, dug a grave before his eyes, and then, 
 knocking him on the head, threw his body into it. All 
 these atrocities took place in the department of Ille-et- 
 Vilaine. 
 
 Deeds of the same sanguinary character were perpe- 
 trated in the C6tes-du-Nord. Amongst the martyrs there 
 M. de Rabec is well worthy of notice. He was one of 
 those priests who had beheld with pleasure the dawn 
 of the Revolution, but was soon undeceived, and, per- 
 ceiving that the real object of the professed reformers 
 was the destruction both of religion and of monarchy, 
 he henceforward devoted his whole energies to preserve 
 all whom he could influence from being inveigled into 
 error. He had no cure of souls at that time, for he had 
 been compelled to give up his parish in the diocese of 
 Mans in consequence of the debts in which his lavish 
 generosity to the poor had involved him; debts, how- 
 ever, which one of his relatives liberally discharged. 
 Nevertheless, he did not remain inactive, but moved 
 
308 Death of M. de Rabec. 
 
 about from place to place wherever his zeal and charity 
 could find scope for their exercise, taking no precautions 
 for his own safety. A friend at Dol having one day 
 advised him to beware of malicious persons who were 
 likely to denounce him, he replied, ' I fear nothing, and 
 if I must die for God and for the Church, I willingly 
 give my life for so holy a cause.' He made himself very 
 useful in the parish of Megrit, whose pastor had been 
 obliged to fly and was afterwards imprisoned in the 
 Rochefort boats. During the Reign of Terror M. de 
 Rabec was also imprisoned along with the old priests of 
 the department, but was released in 1795, upon which 
 he returned with ardour to the exercise of his ministry, 
 and on the renewal of the persecution, when some friends 
 recommended him to adopt a few precautions, he replied 
 that his duty as a priest was to sacrifice himself for the 
 salvation of souls, and if to preserve his life he abandoned 
 his ministry, he should have far more cause to dread the 
 vengeance of God than he now had to fear the malice of 
 men. He continued, therefore, to spend himself fearlessly 
 for the spiritual good of the faithful, and to devote the 
 little he possessed to the relief of the poor, for alms- 
 giving had still the same attraction for him as ever. It 
 was not long before the fears of his friends were realized. 
 Every locality in Brittany — and it was probably the same 
 elsewhere — contained at that time its priest-haters and 
 priest-hunters, impious men who made it their business 
 not only to seek them out, but to urge on the authorities 
 when they were not themselves eager in the work of 
 persecution. It was, doubtless, at the instigation of such 
 individuals that a column of fifty men left Broons one 
 day and proceeded to Megrit. M. de Rabec had just 
 finished saying Mass when he was informed of the 
 approach of the band. ' O my God,' he exclaimed, ' the 
 moment is now come when I am to appear before 
 
Abbey of Bernardins. 309 
 
 Thee !' The soldiers had soon burst open the door and 
 rushed in with their usual impetuosity. They found the 
 priest in the first room they entered ; he received them 
 very calmly, and, thinking they looked hot and tired with 
 their march, he kindly offered them some refreshments. 
 This act was characteristic of the man j it was no device 
 to propitiate his visitors, of whose errand he was well 
 aware, but was dictated by that pure spirit of loving 
 charity which seemed ever welling up from his heart. 
 Had it been otherwise he would have been disappointed 
 in his object, for the men showed no gratitude, and, 
 after pillaging the house, carried him off with them, 
 striking him brutally with their bayonets. They had 
 scarcely issued from the avenue leading to the house 
 when the captain, impatient to shed the blood of his 
 victim, bade them halt, and called out four of his band 
 to shoot the priest. The holy martyr, who had borne 
 all their ill-usage without complaint, only again and again 
 calling on God to forgive them and to have mercy on 
 him, when he heard the sentence of death pronounced, 
 thus addressed the men who were preparing to execute 
 it : ' Soldiers, before you shoot me, come and embrace 
 me ; I forgive you my death.' These words so touched 
 one of their number that he declared he would not fire ; 
 the priest was not an enemy, and rather than shoot him 
 he would prefer being shot himself. The three others, 
 however, inaccessible to pity, discharged their muskets 
 at M. de Rabec, and, after giving him fourteen bayonet 
 thrusts before he expired, stripped and mutilated his 
 body, leaving it on the road in a state of complete 
 nudity. When these savages had departed, the farmers 
 of the place came with their servants, and, taking up the 
 body, buried it in the churchyard of Me'grit. 
 
 A few days later another horrible crime was committed 
 by the revolutionists of Lamballe. Not far from that 
 
3io 
 
 Slaughter of monks. 
 
 town there was an abbey of Bernardins, that of Saint- 
 Aubin-des-Bois, founded in 1 137. Situated in the Forest 
 of Hunaudaie, it had probably not been considered a 
 profitable purchase by the speculators in Church property, 
 for the building had remained unsold. The religious, 
 accordingly, had obtained leave to re-occupy their old 
 house, on the condition'of paying rent for it to Govern- 
 ment. There they lived in the quiet observance of their 
 rule so far as was possible, ministering to the spiritual 
 needs of the lonely dwellers in the forest, and eking out 
 by self-denial their own very slender resources to relieve 
 the poverty of the numerous poor of the district. They 
 were thus useful members of society, even in the eyes of 
 unbelievers. However, in the beginning of 1796, some 
 armed bands of royalists took refuge from their pursuers 
 in the forest, but it does not seem that they penetrated 
 as far as Saint-Aubin-des-Bois. But, even if they had, 
 these defenceless religious had no means at their dis- 
 posal for resisting their entrance. Nevertheless, the 
 supposed presence of these royalists in the abbey was 
 made a pretext for the destruction of its inmates. Some 
 young men from Lamballe, belonging mostly to rich or 
 well-to-do families, but hot-headed republicans, under the 
 pretence of fighting the royalists, proceeded to the forest 
 and, on the evening of the 3rd of March, arrived at the 
 door of the abbey. After discharging a volley they burst 
 it open, and rushed headlong into the cloister, shouting, 
 1 Aux Chonans ! Aux Chonans!' A servant came forward 
 and assured them that there were no Chouans there, but, 
 regardless of his asseverations, they pushed on and, enter- 
 ing the cells of the religious, murdered every one of 
 them ; after which they stripped them of their clothes 
 and pillaged the house, rifling the sanctuary of its sacred 
 vessels and breaking or tearing to pieces what they were 
 unable or did not care to carry away. Having thus 
 
Lay martyrs. 311 
 
 glutted their rage and their greed, they returned to 
 Lamballe. The magistrates of the canton drew up a 
 prods verbal of the crime and its circumstances, but 
 nothing was done to bring the offenders to punishment. 
 It was sufficient that the victims should be priests or 
 religious for their assassins to enjoy perfect immunity. 
 
 About this time two other murders were committed in 
 the same department. The sufferers were laymen, but 
 both were well known to be warmly attached to their 
 faith. The one was a notary of Laurenan named Le 
 Rey, who had frequently rendered good service to the 
 priests, to whom he was heart and soul devoted. Soldiers 
 seU from Loudeac went straight to his house, had him 
 out, and shot him without further ceremony. The other 
 martyr was a peasant of Ple'met, Olivier Congretelle by 
 name, who had shown himself firmly opposed to the 
 schism, and given to the inhabitants of the canton a 
 fearless example of Christian fidelity. Moreover, he had 
 made no attempt to conceal his royalist sentiments. 
 Deceived and entrapped by some Contre-Chouans, he 
 was taken by them to the bourg of Ple'met, and put to 
 death. After being pierced by their bullets he was 
 thrown alive into a ditch, where they broke his legs with 
 the blows of a spade. During this cruel torture the 
 martyr never ceased, so long as he breathed, to implore 
 the mercy of God for himself and forgiveness for his 
 murderers. In the department of Morbihan it was not 
 entirely to the soldiers that the work of killing priests 
 W£.s committed ; the guillotine was again in full activity, 
 the criminal tribunal of Lorient, now transferred to 
 Vames, applying to them the barbarous laws which had 
 been in force during the Terror. In the month of March 
 alone no less than seven priests of the diocese of Vannes 
 perished on the scaffold, but they were not the first, for 
 M. Levenas had been guillotined on New Year's Day at 
 
312 
 
 M. Rogue. 
 
 Lorient. Amongst those who suffered during the month 
 of March, M. Rogue, a priest of the seminary of Vannes, 
 whose character for sanctity had been long established, 
 was peculiarly regretted. He had never been beguiled 
 by the false promises of the Revolution, but had with- 
 stood them from the first, and had the happiness to deter 
 several ecclesiastics from falling into the guilt of schism. 
 The parish of Notre-Dame-du-Me'ne was served from the 
 church of the seminary, the superior of which was also 
 its curd M. Le Gal, who at that time governed the 
 seminary, knew well the zeal of M. Rogue, and how he 
 spent in the confessional almost the whole time which 
 his office of professor left at his disposal. He would not 
 therefore go into exile before he had assured himself that 
 M. Rogue would replace him in his absence, and render 
 to the parishioners of Mene" all the spiritual a;d in 
 his power. M. Rogue promised, and kept his word. 
 He escaped all the perils of the terrible years 1793 and 
 1794, and continued until the close of 1795 in the un- 
 remitting exercise of his ministry ; but on Christmas Day, 
 as he was returning late in the evening from administer- 
 ing a sick man, he was met by an inhabitant of the place 
 who recognized and arrested him. This man might well 
 know him, for to his kindness he owed his situation :n 
 life, and at that very time his children were being chari- 
 tably assisted by M. Rogue's mother. The traitor took 
 the priest before the members of the departmental admi- 
 nistration, who knew M. Rogue equally well, and wlo, 
 it would seem, would have been well pleased to albw 
 him to make his escape, for they left him at liberty for a 
 considerable time while the denouncer was gone by their 
 orders in quest of the gendarmes. M. Rogue did not 
 attempt to fly, but profited by the time to consume the 
 Sacred Species which he had with him. He apprised 
 those about him of his wish, saying, ' I bear or. my 
 
His death. 
 
 313 
 
 person my God and your God ; I desire to perform a 
 religious duty, and I request your permission.' Having 
 obtained it, he retired into a corner of the room and 
 communicated himself. No disrespect was shown ; it is 
 even said that all present bowed their heads. M. Rogue 
 was detained for three months, the coldest of the year, 
 in a damp and unwholesome room ; meanwhile a plan 
 was being devised for his escape, but, fearing that the 
 other priests imprisoned with him would be treated in 
 consequence with greater rigour, he declined to profit by 
 it. His arrest caused a general lamentation in Vannes ; 
 even republicans regretted it, and his denouncer was 
 regarded with indignation and contempt by men of all 
 parties. Nevertheless, at the beginning of March this 
 holy man was brought before the criminal tribunal and 
 condemned to death together with two other priests. 
 
 The place where the tribunal held its sittings was 
 the old chapel of the house used for the retreats, 
 of which M. Rogue had been the director. As soon as 
 he heard his sentence pronounced, he fell on his 
 knees and thanked God aloud for having judged him 
 worthy, not only to die for the faith, but to receive 
 his summons to death in a place where he had so 
 often announced the divine word and exercised his 
 sacred ministry. A young sergeant who was in charge 
 of him was so struck by the calmness which his 
 prisoner preserved, that on returning he sought out a 
 priest and made his confession, protesting that hence- 
 forth he would love and practise religion as much as he 
 had hitherto hated and persecuted it ; for in La Vendee 
 his conduct had been marked by much violence and 
 cruelty. One of the two letters written by M. Rogue 
 the night before his execution was to his mother, in which 
 he entreated her not to cease relieving the family of his 
 betrayer. The other was addressed to the clergy concealed 
 
3H 
 
 Murder and sacrilege. 
 
 at Vannes, recommending himself and the two priests 
 who were to suffer with him to their prayers. He said 
 that God had added to the cross He had been pleased 
 to lay upon him that of not being able to embrace them 
 once more ; and another also, that of beholding his poor 
 mother at the tribunal, whither she had come like a true 
 ' mother of dolours.' Her sentiments, however, were all 
 that he could desire, and he besought them to pray for 
 her. M. Rogue died pronouncing the words, ' In manus 
 tuas, Domine, co?nme?ido spiritum meum,' There must 
 have been something singularly striking about this 
 martyr, for the soldiers who led him to execution 
 returned declaring loudly that it was not a man but an 
 angel who had been put to death. The veneration for 
 him at Vannes was so great that many persons were 
 observed approaching the scaffold, as soon as he had 
 been executed, for the purpose of dipping pieces of linen 
 in his blood, which were afterwards distributed as relics. 
 
 Besides the seven priests who were guillotined at 
 Vannes, another also perished who had succeeded in 
 escaping from prison, but was overtaken and killed on 
 the spot. About this time also, it would seem, M. Feu- 
 tray, one of the concealed priests who had been formerly 
 attached to the cathedral, was cruelly butchered. He 
 was returning from visiting a dying man, and bore about 
 him the Blessed Sacrament, when he was recognized by 
 three republicans, who instantly set upon him and 
 stabbed him to death with their knives. Tresvaux men- 
 tions six more priests who were murdered in the diocese 
 of Vannes in the course of the spring, as also a young 
 deacon, in the diocese of Saint-Malo, who was living in 
 retirement with his family, and had been serving Mass in 
 a private house when the republican soldiers entered the 
 place. The priest succeeded in escaping. Several of 
 the clergy met a similar fate in the C6tes-du-Nord and in 
 
Reprisals. 
 
 315 
 
 Ille-et-Vilaine. In two instances a terrible sacrilege was 
 superadded to the crime of murder. The priests of whom 
 he speaks were bearing the Holy Viaticum to the dying, 
 and Tresvaux tells us that the assassins were guilty of the 
 most revolting profanations. They then paraded the 
 clothes of their victims in triumph on the points of their 
 bayonets, and afterwards burned the images and over- 
 turned the altars in the church of Guenroc, where they 
 passed the night. 
 
 The troubles which still continued in Brittany, and 
 which the clergy were falsely accused of fomenting, 
 excited against them the special animosity of the repub- 
 lican soldiery, who, as we have seen, put them to death 
 wherever they could lay hands upon them. Emigrants 
 met with as little mercy as priests ; indeed, the search 
 was directed against the partisans of the monarchy as 
 much as against the ministers of religion, but, as it 
 does not come within the scope of our plan to narrate 
 all the miseries which civil strife inflicted on Brittany, we 
 cannot enter into any details respecting the sufferings 
 of the royalists. It can be no matter of wonder that 
 such of them as remained should have been irritated 
 beyond endurance by the cruelties perpetrated by the 
 republicans and been occasionally provoked into making 
 reprisals. The names of three intruded priests said to 
 have been killed by them about this time are men- 
 tioned by Tresvaux, who, however, says that he can 
 neither affirm nor deny the truth of the report, as it 
 came to him only through the organ of the schismatics, 
 the ' Annales de la Religion/ a journal whose pages 
 abounded in exaggerations and calumnies. Notwith- 
 standing the efforts of that party, headed by Le Coz, the 
 co-called Constitutional Church languished more and 
 more in Brittany. It could not well be otherwise. 
 When it had the whole force of the State at its back 
 
3 1 6 Character of apostates. 
 
 it had been unable to fill the churches it had seized, 
 and now that the motive of fear was withdrawn, 
 together with active official patronage, the desertion in 
 which the false pastors generally found themselves, 
 especially in rural districts, may be said to have been 
 complete. Besides, wherever the armed royalists came 
 they would not suffer them to officiate, which was the 
 least evil they might apprehend from their presence. 
 Most of them, accordingly, took refuge in the larger 
 towns, where they were personally secure, but lived in 
 great destitution, neglected and despised. The Abbe 
 Tresvaux, who speaks as an eye-witness, says that, in 
 addition to the odium which attached to them as 
 apostates, their behaviour was not such as to excite 
 any compassionate interest in their behalf. Many of 
 them had fallen into the lowest depth of degradation, 
 keeping company only with the common soldiers and 
 being habitually in a state of intoxication. He could 
 have named, in particular, two renegade Capuchins, who 
 constantly gave this scandalous spectacle to the town in 
 which they lived ; and, indeed, it is worthy of note that 
 the apostate religious were almost invariably the worst 
 amongst those who made themselves conspicuous for 
 immorality, no less than for cruelty, in those days of law- 
 lessness and crime. But whatever the constitutional 
 priests may have suffered from the disturbed state of 
 the province, their position was, at any rate, far more 
 tolerable than that of the faithful and proscribed clergy, 
 who were environed with perils everywhere and could 
 find a safe refuge neither in town nor country. More- 
 over, the good shepherd, unlike the hireling in this as 
 in all else, does not flee at the approach of danger, but 
 gives his life for his sheep. 
 
 Many instances of heroic courage on the part of the 
 Breton clergy have been here recorded, crowned, in the 
 
M. Orain. 
 
 317 
 
 case of the greater number, with martyrdom ; but there 
 were a few who successfully braved the fury of persecu- 
 tion and remained at their posts during all those terrible 
 years. The names and labours of these devoted men 
 deserve a passing record. 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 Remarkable Escapes. 
 
 Amongst those priests who weathered out in Brittany 
 the stormy years of persecution, M. Orain, of the Nantes 
 diocese, must ever hold a foremost place. His name has 
 been immortalized by a splendid act of Christian charity, 
 in which he risked his own life by returning to save that 
 of one of his pursuers who was in imminent danger of 
 drowning. The good man never himself alluded to the 
 circumstance, the memory of which might have perished 
 but that fortunately there were eye-witnesses who were able 
 to depose to its having actually occurred. M. Orain had 
 been officiating for seven years as vicaire at Fegre'ac, 
 a small bourg about a mile and a half from Redon, when 
 the Revolution broke out. He not only refused to take 
 the oath but exerted himself so vigorously to preserve 
 his parish from schism, that not a single individual 
 belonging to it fell away. On the very day when the 
 electors were assembled to choose constitutional priests 
 for the district, he delivered a most energetic discourse to 
 his people on the dangers besetting their faith, which 
 left an indelible impression on their minds. He was 
 blamed by not a few for thus openly compromising 
 himself, and, indeed, some of his own brethren did not 
 approve of his conduct, for even amongst the priests 
 
3i8 
 
 M. Eon. 
 
 were to be found timid men who, although they would 
 not directly countenance error, shrank from openly con- 
 demning it, sheltering their cautious reserve under a pre- 
 text of worldly prudence. But there were other and 
 nobler spirits, who justified and commended the freedom 
 with which M. Orain had spoken, esteeming silence as 
 cowardice when the wolf was about to break into the 
 fold. When the decree was issued for the non-juring 
 clergy to leave their parishes, the Rector of Fegreac 
 complied, in order to avoid imprisonment, but M. Orain 
 remained, saying that, as the parishioners had always 
 shown themselves good Catholics, they ought not to be 
 deprived of spiritual succours. Fortunately the curd 
 chosen by the electors refused to take the oath, and 
 would become no party to the schism • so Fegreac was 
 spared this infliction. The life of its pastor during 
 the ensuing years reads like one continued tale of daring 
 adventure, while all that he attempted and effected 
 for the spiritual welfare of his flock, and especially for 
 the religious education and training of the children, 
 while holding his life daily, so to say, in his hands, almost 
 surpasses belief. He survived the Revolution many 
 years, and died in 1829 rector of Derval, where his 
 meritorious labours are no less deserving of record than 
 his perilous ministry at Fegreac during the closing decade 
 of the previous century. 1 
 
 In the diocese of Saint-Malo another priest displayed 
 an equally persevering courage. This was M. Eon, 
 vicaire of Montauban at the beginning of the Revolution. 
 He remained in that town as long as he was able, but 
 his post became at last so extremely dangerous as to 
 render removal imperative. He then adopted the plan 
 
 1 It is in contemplation to publish a life of this remarkable man, for 
 which ample materials exist in his own memoirs as well as in the formal 
 depositions of forty old men of Fegreac and other survivors. 
 
His courage and zeal. 
 
 319 
 
 of visiting in rotation twelve or fifteen abandoned 
 parishes, hearing confessions, celebrating Mass in barns 
 or secluded places, and preparing children for their first 
 communion. Stables, straw-ricks, and fields of high 
 broom, such as are common in Brittany, were his usual 
 refuge, when he took a few hours' rest, but he could 
 seldom venture to spend two consecutive nights in the 
 same spot. Denounced to the authorities, who were 
 everywhere on the look-out for him, precaution was all 
 the more needful in his case, because his short stature 
 was sufficient to betray his identity in spite of any 
 disguise which he might assume. He appeared ten 
 times before the tribunals, and was once in prison for 
 twenty-four hours. How he escaped condemnation it is 
 difficult to conceive, but God brought him safe through 
 all these perils. Brave as he was, the precarious life 
 which he unremittingly led weighed painfully on him, 
 and he felt the bitterness of his situation, especially at 
 the time when so many priests of Saint-Malo were 
 perishing on the scaffold. Their numbers were so much 
 diminished that M. Eon could hardly find any to whom 
 to make his confession. But the thought that he might 
 soon be called to share their fate did not dishearten him. 
 1 1 shall have to die to-morrow/ he used to say to him- 
 self ; ' then I must work to-day.' And, humanly speak- 
 ing, except for the devoted attachment of the people 
 amongst whom he laboured he could not have escaped 
 the guillotine. 
 
 The diocese of Saint-Malo was, as has been observed, 
 remarkable even in Catholic Brittany for the faith and piety 
 of its inhabitants, of which these good peasants furnished 
 a striking example. They continued to observe most 
 strictly all the prescribed fasts of the Church and used 
 frequently to assemble in some chapel or at the foot of 
 a cross to pray together, especially on Sundays, when 
 
320 
 
 M. Eon. 
 
 one of them would read out the Gospel and other 
 portions of the Mass for the day, and a chapter of the 
 Catechism by way of instruction. Avoiding the schis- 
 matic clergy as they would the plague, they were ready 
 at any time to walk twenty or thirty miles to find a 
 Catholic priest. ' When I noticed this,' observed 
 M. Eon, ' I felt ready to sacrifice myself daily for them.' 
 But the prudence and caution they exhibited in guarding 
 their clergy from danger were as remarkable as their attach- 
 ment to them. All were discreet, old and young alike, 
 even to the children, whom nothing could induce to say 
 that they had seen a priest. The very dogs at the farm- 
 houses seemed to know them and understand the neces- 
 sity of secrecy, for they are said to have refrained 
 from barking at their approach. Often had M. Eon 
 occasion to notice the signal protection of God in his 
 behalf. One day the republicans were in hot pursuit of 
 him from morning till night, and on four occasions they 
 were so near as to be able to fire at him, but they 
 missed him each time. The next day he heard that 
 they had apprehended four priests and put ten young 
 men to death. For three successive months he had not 
 one quiet night, so pressing was the danger and so 
 perpetual the alarms. He is described as having become 
 as dry as a piece of wood. Yet, notwithstanding the 
 fatigues and privations undergone during these trying 
 times, this excellent priest lived to the age of eighty. 
 He died in the year 1838, having been after the Con- 
 cordat appointed cure of Gael and subsequently of 
 Beaussaine. He never ceased to show the same zeal for 
 the salvation of souls and the same overflowing charity to 
 the poor which had made him brave the terrors of the 
 persecution ; indeed, he is said to have reserved almost 
 nothing for his personal needs, making himself poorer 
 than the poorest. 
 
His presence of mind. 321 
 
 The habit of living in the midst of constant danger 
 made the concealed priests and those who harboured 
 them very ingenious in their devices for blinding the 
 eyes of their pursuers, or diverting their attention, if we 
 might not rather believe that it was God Who in His 
 goodness inspired them with ready invention and pre- 
 sence of mind. One day M. Eon was hearing the con- 
 fessions of some children, whom he was preparing for 
 their first communion, in a house at Montauban. All of 
 a sudden he heard some one shouting outside to the 
 mistress of the house, ' Open your door, you have got 
 some suspected people in there.' The woman called 
 her husband, and meanwhile the uproar increased. 
 There was not a moment to lose, for the house was 
 surrounded with soldiers. M. Eon, who feared for his 
 hosts much more than for himself, hastily changed his 
 coat and, going out by a back door, boldly presented 
 himself in the court-yard in the midst of the troop with 
 an ink-horn and pen in his hand as if for the purpose of 
 taking down what might be required. 'What do you 
 want?' he said to one of the men. 'I want to get in 
 there,' was the reply. ' I'll go in a moment and open 
 the door for you,' he quietly said. Then to another, 
 ' And what do you want ? ' 'I want my breakfast.' ' I 
 will bring it to you directly, and a very good one, too/ 
 The cool assurance of M. Eon threw the soldiers com- 
 pletely off their guard ; they could not imagine that this 
 busy obliging personage was a priest, and after a while 
 they took their departure. Another time, he was sitting 
 by the fire in a house in the country when the soldiers 
 suddenly made their appearance and crowded in. The 
 mistress of the house entered the room at the same 
 moment, and with admirable presence of mind snatched 
 up a switch and, hitting M. Eon with it, cried out, ' You 
 little rascal, so you've not yet gone to look after the 
 v 25 
 
322 Pire Joseph of Lo7idiac. 
 
 cows ! ' He rose, and went off whimpering. The 
 soldiers, seeing the woman still following and striking 
 him, were actually moved to pity, and begged her not to 
 be so hard upon the poor fellow. ' Ever since the 
 morning,' she continued in the same angry voice, ' I've 
 been bidding him go and look after the cows, and 
 there he stays idling.' In after days M. Eon used often 
 to relate this anecdote with much zest. 
 
 A Capuchin, of the diocese of Saint-Brieuc, named 
 Herve, but known in religion as the Pere Joseph of 
 Loudeac, was another of those priests who escaped all 
 the dangers of the persecution, throughout which he 
 laboured with a zeal that never flagged. He had 
 retired to his native country when the religious were 
 expelled from their houses, and in the spring of 1793 
 was condemned to death as contumacious by the Criminal 
 Tribunal of the C6tes-du-Nord for alleged participation 
 in the insurrectional movement which the Chevalier de 
 Boishardy had organized in the environs of Lamballe. 
 Under the double accusation of being a refractory priest 
 and a royalist insurgent, he became the object of very 
 diligent and frequent search on the part of the repub- 
 licans, who used to call him the Capuchin of Roqueton, 
 from the name of his native village, and hated him 
 mortally. Tresvaux says that this religious told him 
 that for eighteen months together he never slept in a 
 bed. Ditches by the hedge-side, furrows among standing 
 corn, broom fields, and haylofts formed his usual refuge 
 for the night. Dogs had even been trained to track 
 him ; but his was not the only instance of this kind, 
 for they had been employed in the case of M. Eon and 
 other concealed priests. 
 
 Another religious, Pere Noirot, a Dominican, was not 
 less courageous or less fortunate than Pere Joseph. He 
 came from Franche Comte, but had been sent by his 
 
A strange hiding-place. 323 
 
 superiors to the house of their order at Nantes. Named 
 procurator of the monastery of Morlaix, he remained in 
 that city during the Revolution to labour for the salva- 
 tion of souls. His coolness and presence of mind often 
 saved his life. He was also the means of saving the 
 lives of several other priests, by providing hiding-places 
 for them which were never discovered. He was one day 
 on the point of being seized, and owed his escape to a 
 curious device which occurred on the moment to an 
 old lady in whose house he was then staying. He 
 was conversing with his hostess in a room close to the 
 front door, when a knock was heard ; some soldiers had 
 come to make a domiciliary visit. There was no time 
 for flight : what could be done ? Now, the old lady was 
 extremely fat, and had a large cloak on, so she bade 
 Pere Noirot sit down, and forthwith seated herself in 
 his lap, throwing back her cloak over him so as com- 
 pletely to conceal him from view. The soldiers entered, 
 and the lady received them with perfect self-possession, 
 excusing herself for not rising on account of her age and 
 infirmities, which made moving difficult to her, but the 
 maid-servant, she said, would show the visitors all over 
 the house. It was in this singular fashion that Pere 
 Noirot was delivered from a peril out of which there 
 seemed to be no possible escape. The Abbe Tresvaux 
 heard the circumstance from his own lips. 
 
 Another trait of the same character is no less remark- 
 able. The demoiselles Esnault, sempstresses at Rennes, 
 were entirely devoted to the faithful clergy, and often 
 harboured them. Sitting at supper one evening with a 
 concealed priest, Mdlle. Esnault heard a knock at the 
 door : a commissioner much dreaded at Rennes as a 
 fierce republican was come to institute a search. There 
 was no issue from the apartment except through the 
 door at which this man was standing. All that the priest 
 
324 Feminine resources. 
 
 could do was to get behind a piece of furniture, a poor 
 hiding-place if once the lynx-eyed official made good his 
 entrance. This Mdlle. Esnault was determined he should 
 not do, for, having recognized the man as soon as she 
 opened the door, she clutched hold of him by his hair, 
 and, like one scared and out of her wits with terror, 
 began screaming with all her strength, ' A thief ! a 
 thief! ' In vain did the official tell her he was no thief, 
 but the town commissioner : ' No,' she retorted, ' you 
 have no scarf; you have come in the middle of the 
 night to attack a poor lonely woman.' Then she began 
 screaming afresh, never loosing her hold of his hair. 
 Wearied out at last, the commissioner, who was perhaps 
 ashamed of being found engaged in a squabble with a 
 woman, or preferred giving up his search to having more 
 to do with such a termagant, was glad to be released and 
 take his departure. 
 
 Madame de Rengerve, mother of one of the guillo- 
 tined priests, displayed a like presence of mind. M. Mas- 
 son, a priest belonging to the parish, that of Pipriac, was 
 denounced at Bain, and a detachment of five hundred 
 men was sent to surprise him at night in Madame de 
 Rengerve's house. She rose and went to wake the 
 priest, recommending him to go down to the kitchen and 
 mingle among the servants. Then she had the door 
 opened, asked the soldiers whence they had come, com- 
 passionated them for their fatigue, and invited the com- 
 mandant and all the officers to partake of supper. 
 Madame de Rengerve was a very agreeable woman, and 
 she behaved with such exceeding politeness to these 
 military men, and was so thoroughly at her ease in 
 manner, that they retired quite charmed with their recep- 
 tion, and made no search, saying that there was nothing 
 suspicious there. Fortunately the informer did not 
 venture in, for he would have been sure to recognize 
 
M. Masson. 
 
 325 
 
 M. Masson notwithstanding his disguise, being from the 
 same part of the country. This faithful priest had never 
 left the neighbourhood. He was serving a chapel in 
 Pipriac when the Revolution broke out, and for a con- 
 siderable time was overlooked. He profited by this 
 circumstance to render many services to the Catholics 
 of the canton, and had the happiness of fortifying several 
 of his brethren who were hesitating whether they should 
 take the oath. 
 
 In the Easter of 1793, when the authorities summoned 
 him to take it, he replied, ' You have power over my 
 head but not over my conscience ; you may deprive me 
 of life, but, by God's grace, I will never take the oath.' 
 He soon became the object of persecution, not only as 
 a 'refractory' priest, but because he had harboured 
 royalists who were making their way out of the country. 
 The search for him became so active, that on one occa- 
 sion, not knowing whither to go, he passed a whole day 
 hidden in a field covered with fern. Not having had 
 a morsel to eat, he sought at night-fall a house left in 
 charge of a person on whose Christian principles he 
 believed he could depend ; but the panic was so great 
 that he could with difficulty obtain permission to pass 
 the night under its roof, and had to leave very early the 
 next morning, the only food given him being a little 
 broth. That day he had to betake himself again to the 
 hedges and the brushwood. Towards evening he ven- 
 tured into a field where there was a stack of hay, but 
 a storm came on which drenched him to the skin, so 
 he was obliged to seek refuge under some trees for the 
 night. Such was the miserable life he led for several 
 days, not liking to ask for admission in any house lest 
 he should compromise the inmates. At last he was 
 received by a good farmer of Pipriac. Fear had not 
 closed the heart of this worthy man or of his family, 
 
326 
 
 Pcre Cornilti. 
 
 and they welcomed the priest gladly. He was not the 
 only one to whom they generously gave shelter during 
 the days of persecution, and, when friends warned them 
 of the peril to which they exposed themselves, father, 
 mother, and children would all reply that they should 
 reckon it a great happiness to give their lives in so holy 
 a cause. The sacrifice was never required ; God re- 
 warded and blessed them for their good will. M. Masson 
 also himself escaped. An act of Christian charity on 
 his part must not be omitted. A battle had taken place 
 between the royalists and republicans near Pipriac, in 
 which the latter were beaten, leaving several of their 
 number on the field. In the evening, some one having 
 come to tell M. Masson that among the dead there was 
 a wounded man who still breathed, and to ask whether 
 it would be well to finish him, ' What ! ' he exclaimed, 
 ' murder a man ? certainly not.' ' But he is an enemy 
 of yours.' ' What does that matter ? Take me to him 
 at once.' Then, like the good Samaritan, he had the 
 wounded soldier removed to a house, furnished him with 
 linen, procured him a doctor, instructed him, heard his 
 confession, and never left him until he saw him quite 
 convalescent, full of joy at having been able to show 
 his love for an enemy by saving both his body and his 
 soul. 
 
 To these generous examples of charity combined with 
 great presence of mind we will add a few instances 
 of the marvellous Providence of God displayed in the 
 protection of some of His faithful servants. Thus at 
 Nantes, Pere Cornille, a Cordelier, having left his hiding- 
 place one day to go and visit a sick person, was recog- 
 nized on the quay by a porter and several other persons, 
 who at once began to shout, 1 Here is the calotin ! let us 
 seize him.' A gardener, who had been showing P. Cor- 
 nille the way, took to his heels when he saw the tumult, 
 
A wonderful preservation. 327 
 
 ran to the house in which the Father resided, and, still 
 trembling with fear, told the inmates that M. Masson 
 was arrested, for that he had left him in the midst of 
 an angry mob. A few minutes after, the holy man 
 surprised them by walking in quietly with his usual 
 imperturbable calmness. He had preserved it during 
 the whole of the turmoil, which for some unexplained 
 reason had subsided, his enemies having either miracu- 
 lously lost sight of him, or almost as miraculously aban- 
 doned their purpose. Three priests of the diocese of 
 Saint-Malo, who were hidden at a place called La Touche 
 in the parish of Plelan, had been denounced to the 
 gendarmerie in the bonrg. Having reason to suspect 
 that they were in danger, they thought it prudent to leave 
 tae place during the night. The sky was cloudless, and 
 the full moon shone with all its lustre. Suddenly they 
 perceived the gendarmes advancing towards them. The 
 pith was narrow, there was no possibility of escape, and 
 not a chance of concealment. All that the three priests 
 co lid do — Tresvaux, indeed, thinks there were more 
 than three, for that several of their concealed brethren 
 hac joined them — was to draw up side by side against 
 the hedge and allow the soldiers to pass, remaining 
 perfectly still, while inwardly recommending themselves 
 to [esus and Mary. Strange to say, the gendarmes 
 passed close to them, almost brushing them with their 
 elbcws, yet not one of the troop noticed their presence, 
 although naturally they could not have failed to see 
 them. As soon as the soldiers had passed on some 
 little way, the priests threw themselves on their knees 
 and thanked God for the signal mercy He had vouch- 
 safed them. One of them, M. Georges, who died cure 
 of Saint-Servan, often related this incident, and the Abbe 
 Tresvaux learned it from an ecclesiastic who had heard 
 it from M. Georges's' own lips. 
 
328 Searchers at fault. 
 
 The reader will remember young Briant, whom our 
 Blessed Lady saved at one of the fusillades at Vannes. 
 A brother of his who had served with the royalists lay 
 hid in a barn adjoining his father's house. Here a 
 detachment of soldiers arrived one day to seize him. 
 He had only time to cover himself up with hay ; as there 
 was very little of it he was but ill concealed, and the 
 slightest search must have led to his discovery. But 
 M. Briant shared his brother's confidence in Mary, and 
 called upon her to protect him in this perilous emer- 
 gency ; nor was his appeal made in vain. The soldiers 
 came into the loft, and upset everything that they found 
 there. His sister, who accompanied them, and who 
 believed him to be concealed elsewhere, was on the 
 point of turning over the hay, but for some reason she 
 abstained, and no one so much as touched it. 
 
 Some pious ladies, named Coaridoux, living near 
 Saint-Meen, were in the habit of receiving priests in 
 their house. One day they were unexpectedly visited 
 by a company of soldiers, who came to search die 
 premises. At that moment there happened to be a box 
 in which were the sacred vessels and priestly vestments 
 standing unlocked in an ante-room. The men went 3ver 
 the whole house, and examined everything with the 
 minutest care, with the exception of this box, which 
 nevertheless was in full sight, and the contents of which 
 at that epoch would have sufficed to condemn the whole 
 family to the guillotine. 
 
 These detached facts, which we have stated on the 
 authority of the Abbe Tresvaux, are gathered from 
 various periods of the persecution. But how many more 
 such marvellous deliverances may have occurred during 
 these gloomy times which have found no pen to record 
 them ! We now return to take up the thread of events. 
 
CHAPTER XXL 
 
 The Directory. Its project for extirpating religion. 
 
 In the midst of their troubles the hearts of the perse- 
 cuted clergy were cheered by two notable retractations 
 on the part of their schismatic brethren ; the more 
 notable because they were made by men who had 
 travelled far on the road of error, and at a time when 
 it required considerable courage to retrace their steps. 
 The first was that of M. Gobil, Rector of Louvigne, in 
 the diocese of Rennes. He was its legitimate pastor, 
 but had taken the oath and recognized the intruded 
 bishop of Ille-et-Vilaine. He had gone so far as even 
 to renounce his priesthood during the Reign of Terror, 
 when many of the schismatic clergy were guilty of this 
 impiety, and delivered up their letters of ordination with 
 a view of guarding themselves from suspicion and 
 escaping imprisonment. He now published his retracta- 
 tion, which contained a noble avowal of his faults and 
 in which he humbly craved pardon for all the grievous 
 scandals he had given. The other retractation was that 
 of the constitutional bishop of Mont-Blanc, M. Panisset. 
 He was a Savoyard cure, and had been induced to usurp 
 the episcopal see of Chambery by Gregoire, whom the 
 Convention had sent to Savoy as representative of the 
 people at the time of its annexation in 1793. He had 
 even uttered and printed words of blasphemy against 
 the Catholic priesthood. But grace was nevertheless 
 not silent in his heart, and, after remaining for two years 
 
330 The Directory. 
 
 in a state of uncertainty, hesitating between duty and 
 interest, he retired into Switzerland, where he met several 
 French refugees, and, among them, the celebrated Count 
 de Maistre. He it was who drew up Panisset's retracta- 
 tion, after having had, doubtless, no small share in 
 moving him to a sincere repentance. Le Coz, perceiving 
 the injury which these publications, and especially that 
 of the Bishop of Mont-Blanc, must inflict on his party, 
 had speedily taken pen in hand and warned the ' citizens,' 
 his ' dear brethren,' priests of the diocese, to be on their 
 guard against the snares and precipices which surrounded 
 them. His letter was, as usual, a mass of undigested 
 erudition and shallow argument ; indeed, it would have 
 been difficult to find any solid reasons to support so bad 
 a cause. The production was promptly and ably re- 
 futed, but Le Coz's pride made him impervious to con- 
 viction, and refutations, however complete, only led to 
 multiplied replies on his part. 
 
 While Le Coz and his colleagues were free to do and 
 say what they listed, the Catholic clergy were far from 
 enjoying a like advantage. Even such as on account of 
 their age and infirmities had been originally exempted 
 from deportation were now once more thrown into 
 prison. Those priests who were still at liberty were 
 obliged to remain in strict concealment, as in the days 
 of the Terror, emerging from their hiding-places chiefly 
 at night to render spiritual assistance to the faithful, and 
 even then at extreme peril. The Directory, bitterly 
 hostile to religion, adopted for its extirpation means 
 which, if less sanguinary than those employed by the 
 Convention, were not less destructive. The following 
 passage quoted from an instruction given to the national 
 commissioners exhibits its deadly hatred of the priests. 
 ' Weary out their patience,' it said, ' besiege them with 
 your surveillance ; let it disquiet them by day, let it 
 
Its hostility to religion. 
 
 33i 
 
 disturb them by night ; do not allow them a moment's 
 respite ; without seeing you, let them feel you everywhere 
 at every moment.' These commissioners, often as wicked 
 men as the regicide Directors, carried out their instruc- 
 tions only too faithfully. The Directory was also 
 seconded by the Council of Five Hundred, which shared 
 its animosity against the clergy. Among their most 
 active enemies in that body was Drulhe, an apostate 
 priest. Charged with the office of drawing up a report 
 on the 'refractory' clergy in May, 1796, he painted them 
 in the blackest colours, as the foes of peace and social 
 order, dangerous and sanguinary rebels. He concluded 
 by calling for severer laws against them, and demanded 
 that they should be all subjected to deportation. The 
 proposal was favourably received and, but for its re- 
 jection by the Council of Ancients, would have passed 
 into law. 
 
 The Council of Five Hundred continued, nevertheless, 
 to occupy itself with the subject, but the few friends 
 whom the priests possessed in that body were using their 
 best endeavours to obtain some alleviation of their posi- 
 tion. Dubruel, a deputy of the Aveyron, warmly advo- 
 cated their cause, and strove to introduce a measure 
 by which a provisional liberty under the eye of the local 
 authorities should be accorded to the incarcerated priests, 
 the sole condition imposed being an act of submission 
 to the laws, with the penalty, in the case of refusal, of 
 simple detention as a matter of precaution for public 
 security. The Council was about to accept this propo- 
 sition when it received two messages from the Directory, 
 pointing out the danger of restoring liberty to men who 
 would instil fanaticism into the people's minds and revive 
 the hopes of the Chouans. This was quite sufficient to 
 defeat the project. Lanjuinais, an ardent supporter, as 
 we have seen, of the Constitutional Church, had bestirred 
 
332 
 
 Brighter prospects. 
 
 himself actively to incite the Directors to this interference. 
 Freedom restored to so many Catholic priests would 
 only throw a fresh difficulty in the way of that tottering 
 body, which, in spite of all the efforts of its partisans to 
 galvanize it into life, was daily losing ground. In the 
 autumn of this year, a Benedictine of Rennes, Dom 
 Hamart-la-Chapelle, made a most edifying retractation, 
 in which he humbly confessed all his crimes and deplored 
 the scandal he had given, for he had not only renounced 
 his priesthood, but had seduced a young lady and con- 
 tracted a sacrilegious union with her. The constitutional 
 priests at Rennes were extremely irritated at this publi- 
 cation and wished to have Hamart arrested, under the 
 pretext that it was opposed to the principles of the 
 Government, and the printer prosecuted. For the 
 present the generous penitent was able to evade pursuit, 
 but later he was arrested and died under sentence of 
 deportation in the Isle of Re. Rennes, which had seen 
 the blood of so many martyrs flow, was to behold another 
 priest mounting the scaffold at the close of the year 1796. 
 This was M. Bougerie, a highly gifted ecclesiastic, who, 
 having hitherto escaped detection, was now arrested, 
 condemned to death on the 7th of December, and exe- 
 cuted immediately. 
 
 The year 1797 began with somewhat better prospects. 
 According to the constitution of the year iii. of the 
 Republic, a third part of the legislative body was to be 
 renewed yearly. A very general feeling of dissatisfaction 
 existed in the minds of the better disposed portion of 
 the community with the injustice and tyranny of the 
 Government, and efforts were being made to guide the 
 electors to a more prudent choice of deputies. The 
 first step towards this end was to make the people who 
 acted in the primary assembles understand the impor- 
 tance to their welfare and that of France of electing 
 
Hopes disappointed. 
 
 333 
 
 worthy persons, as upon these men devolved the responsi- 
 bility of choosing the deputies. In consequence of these 
 exertions, four departments of Brittany which were 
 included amongst those which had to send representa- 
 tives for the year 1797 selected very good members, 
 some of whom were royalists, while others were, at least, 
 moderate and rightly intentioned individuals. In other 
 parts of France good representatives were also chosen, 
 and this healthy infusion could not but exercise, it was 
 hoped, a happy influence on the counsels of the legis- 
 lative body. They took their seats at the end of May, 
 and soon found themselves, not only in direct and open 
 opposition to the predominant revolutionist faction, but 
 objects of the scarcely disguised hostility of the Direc- 
 tory. A state of things was thus created which was 
 sure to bring on a crisis before long. Notwithstanding, 
 however, its ill-will towards the moderate party, the 
 Directory thought it prudent at first to relax something 
 of its rigorous treatment of the priests. Those who were 
 detained in prison were released. The churches in 
 Brittany were re-opened and public worship was once 
 more celebrated in them. But this point had been won 
 by the new representatives with great difficulty. Dubruel 
 had never ceased labouring for the repeal of the penal 
 laws against the clergy, and, even before the elections, 
 had brought forward a fresh project of law to that effect j 
 and now that the accession of moderate deputies furnished 
 him with several active associates, there appeared to be 
 a fair prospect of success. It was even hoped that the 
 legislature might be induced to abrogate the form of 
 submission to the laws of the Republic, which was 
 repugnant to the conscience of many of the faithful 
 clergy and introduced an element of dissension amongst 
 them. A favourable vote was obtained on the 16th of 
 July, but, to the disappointment of all good men, when 
 
334 A pseudo-council. 
 
 submitted to scrutiny on the morrow, the resolution 
 was declared to be rejected by a majority of six. The 
 joy of the revolutionists, which burst forth in cries of 
 Vive la Rcpublique ! cries which were echoed by the 
 galleries, clearly proved that they hailed the result as 
 another victory of impiety over religion. 
 
 The recall of the exiled priests had, however, been 
 voted, but coupled with a condition from which most 
 of them were likely to shrink. Meanwhile the consti- 
 tutional clergy had been preparing to hold what they 
 styled a National Council in the Cathedral of Notre 
 Dame. Brittany furnished its contingent to this con- 
 ciliabulum, and Le Coz was appointed its president. 
 It met at the beginning of August. The object of the 
 schismatics, of course, was to invest their Church with 
 some seeming importance and thus confirm their waver- 
 ing followers, a precaution by no means superfluous, 
 for at that time a large number of the constitutional 
 clergy of the capital were returning to Catholic unity, 1 
 recognizing again the authority of their lawful pastor, 
 Mgr. de Juigne', the Archbishop of Paris. There were 
 also retractations in Brittany, particularly at Nantes, where 
 the intruded bishop, Minee, after abjuring his priesthood, 
 had never resumed his functions. 2 One of the great 
 weapons of warfare employed by the schismatics was 
 to decry the ' Roman Church' and the Holy Father on 
 all occasions, although at the same time they feigned 
 to acknowledge the Pope as their head and professed 
 
 1 Retractations were numerous at this time all over France, and not 
 unfrequently were made in public, with most lively signs of contrition. 
 Thus we are told by Mgr. Brute 1 {Life, chap, iii.) that at Grenoble one of 
 these prevaricators, after speaking for a while with great and increasing 
 fervour, was so overcome by excess of grief that he actually died in the 
 pulpit while performing this exemplary act of reparation and penance. 
 
 1 This wretched man contracted a sacrilegious union, and fixed his 
 abode at Paris, where he set up as a grocer in the Rue de l'Arbalete. He 
 died in the year 1808, at the age of sixty-nine. 
 
A meditated coup dUtat. 
 
 335 
 
 to hold the Catholic, Apostolic, and Roman faith. The 
 enemies of that faith knew well the mendacity of this 
 pretension, as they sufficiently proved by leaving the 
 constitutionalists entirely unmolested. The Republic 
 was at this time making war on the Holy See, and its 
 armies, led by Napoleon and marching from victory to 
 victory, were penetrating into the Pontifical States. It 
 was a good opportunity for Le Coz, who cordially hated 
 the Vicar of Christ, to give vent to his malice in a 
 so-called pastoral, in which he inveighed against that 
 venerable authority which had condemned him and his 
 adherents. Indeed, ever since Rome had been menaced 
 the sectaries were mad with joy. Into the details of 
 the proceedings at their pretended council we have no 
 need to enter; suffice it to say that they had the 
 impertinence to publish what was styled a 'decree of 
 pacification,' in which they offered peace to the Catholic 
 priests, whom, as it may be imagined, they would have 
 welcomed with pleasure if only they would have con- 
 sented to partake of their schism, but, as this was a 
 hope which they could scarcely entertain, they were 
 glad at least to affect to throw upon them the blame of 
 continued separation. 
 
 Towards the end of August, the Council of Ancients 
 confirmed the resolution of that of the Five Hundred 
 for the recall of the exiled priests, which now passed 
 into law and filled with joy the hearts of all good 
 Catholics. Everything gave reason to hope that tranquil 
 days for religion were at last about to dawn upon France. 
 Several deported priests, counting on the successful issue 
 of the discussion, had already returned to their country 
 before it was terminated. But a terrible disappointment 
 was impending. The violent republican faction, being 
 extremely discontented at the moderate line which was 
 in course of adoption by the legislative body, in conse- 
 
336 The 1 8th Frudidor. 
 
 quence of the introduction of better disposed members 
 at the late elections, were meditating a coup d'etat, which, 
 in fact, they shortly brought about. The President, La 
 Reveillere-Lepaux, a man noted for his impiety, and 
 two other members of the Directory, Merlin de Douai and 
 Barras, were the chief movers in the conspiracy, which 
 drew to itself the most violent members of the late Con- 
 vention, who had seats in the Council of Five Hundred 
 or in that of the Ancients. General Augereau was now 
 summoned by the Directors to Paris at the head of a 
 body of troops, a step which was in direct opposition 
 to the constitution. Augereau was a man of the lowest 
 extraction, who owed his fortune and elevation entirely 
 to the Revolution, and was therefore its ready tool. On 
 the 1 8th Fructidor (the 4th of September), the faction 
 headed by the three Directors caused the arrest of all 
 those deputies who had shown themselves the most 
 zealous for the interests of religion and had professed 
 the soundest political views. The two other Directors, 
 Barthe"lemi and the famous Carnot, were of the number 
 of the proscribed, which included no less than fifty-three 
 members of the two Councils, who were all condemned 
 to deportation without any form of law. The represen- 
 tatives of forty-eight departments, that is, of more than 
 half of France, were thus summarily set aside, and the 
 elections were declared to be annulled. The successful 
 conspirators now recalled into operation the law of the 
 7th Vendemiaire, 1785, rendering it, however, more 
 severe by substituting for the oath then required that of 
 hatred to royalty and anarchy, and of attachment and 
 fidelity to the Constitution of the year iii. Every 
 returned emigrant was allowed fifteen days to leave the 
 country, after which period, if found on French soil, 
 he would be taken before a military commission and 
 executed within twenty-four hours. 
 
Its deplorable results. 
 
 337 
 
 The deplorable effects of this re-action were soon felt. 
 Twenty Breton ecclesiastics who had hastened to return 
 from Spain, to which country they had been deported, 
 were arrested at Rochefort, where they landed in total 
 ignorance of the events of the 18th Fructidor. They 
 were immediately consigned to the common gaol, along 
 with the worst malefactors, and were soon joined by 
 numerous companions in misfortune from all parts of 
 France, who were brought to Rochefort for deportation. 
 Amongst these were a few constitutional priests, some 
 even married ones. They had given offence in some way 
 to the Executive, and were thus included in the sweeping 
 proscription of the Directory, whose President, desirous 
 of founding a religion of his own, to be styled that of 
 the Theophilanthropes, hated the very name of a priest. 
 The treatment experienced by the prisoners was very 
 cruel. They had at first but one meal in the twenty-four 
 hours, and that of the worst and most insufficient des- 
 cription, and were so crowded together both by day and 
 by night that they could scarcely breathe. One of them 
 having opened part of a window which was protected 
 with iron bars, in order to obtain a breath of pure air, 
 was fired at by the sentry. The ball missed its intended 
 victim and hit the ceiling, but had enough force remain- 
 ing to inflict serious injuries on an old priest's head, 
 which it struck in its rebound. These few details 
 sufficiently prove that the revolutionists still hated the 
 clergy with the same cruel hatred as ever, and that, 
 if they showed themselves less inhuman before the 18th 
 Fructidor, it was only because it was expedient to 
 accommodate themselves to circumstances. 
 
 In November, an English priest whom Tresvaux calls 
 by the name of Gruchy, 3 was executed at Nantes. Born 
 
 * The name as given is certainly not English. Possibly, being a 
 native of Jersey, his family was originally of French extraction. But, 
 
 w 25 
 
M. Gruchy. 
 
 of Protestant parents in the Isle of Jersey, he was, when 
 quite a youth, taken prisoner during the American War 
 of Independence and confined in the Castle of Angers. 
 Falling ill, he was transferred to the hospital, where he 
 was nursed by the Sisters of Charity. Touched by the 
 care he received at their hands, all his remaining pre- 
 judices vanished, and he abjured Protestantism. He 
 was now set at liberty but remained in France, knowing 
 to what persecution he would be exposed if he returned 
 home. A merchant with whom he found employment 
 valued him so highly that he offered to bestow on him 
 his daughter in marriage, but the virtuous young man 
 had devoted his life to celibacy. He accordingly 
 declined this advantageous offer ; he even left the 
 business, and, through the assistance of a rich and pious 
 widow, was enabled to learn the trade of a joiner. Being 
 employed at this lady's chateau in Poitou, he became 
 acquainted with the curd, who taught him Latin. He 
 made such progress in his studies in the course of the 
 next three years as to be able to enter the seminary of 
 Lucon, where he followed the usual course of theology. 
 He was always a pattern of regularity and, after receiving 
 holy orders, was sent by the Bishop of Lucon to officiate 
 successively in several parishes of his diocese. When 
 the Revolution broke out M. Gruchy refused the oath, 
 and was compelled to leave the country. He went over 
 to Jersey, where he was ill received by both his family 
 and his compatriots, who seemed to have no toleration 
 for a convert, and who literally drove him out of the 
 island. He had succeeded, however, in converting his 
 sister, but had to leave that of his mother incomplete. 
 In 1795 he returned to France with M. de Beauregard, 
 
 whether or no Tresvaux may have erred in the spelling of the name, it 
 is plain that he was thoroughly acquainted with the particulars of the 
 case. 
 
His seizure and death. 339 
 
 who was charged by Mgr. de Herce with a mission to 
 La Vendee, and resumed his ministerial labours in the 
 parish of which he had been vicaire. He soon recalled 
 the inhabitants to the practice of their duties by the 
 force of his holy example as much as by his exhortations; 
 but the thought of his mother was always present to him, 
 and he longed to revisit Jersey in order to complete the 
 conquest of her soul. M. de Beauregard, however, who 
 was Vicar-General of Lugon, repeatedly refused his 
 consent, fearing for him the dangers of the journey, but, 
 when affairs had summoned that ecclesiastic elsewhere, 
 M. Gruchy deemed himself at liberty to execute the 
 project on which he had set his heart. He accordingly 
 went to Nantes and asked for a passport, styling himself 
 a joiner. It was being prepared when a municipal officer, 
 who was a married priest, came in and asked to see it. 
 When he read ' Mathieu Gruchy, joiner,' he looked at 
 him and said, ' You lie ; you are a priest.' ' I am both 
 the one and the other,' answered Gruchy. ' You are a 
 priest,' resumed the apostate ; ' you returned to France 
 after being banished, and have merited death.' ' Well, 
 then, give it me,' replied the accused mildly. He was 
 immediately consigned to prison, where he was a source 
 of edification to all his fellow-captives. On his trial 
 he was defended by an able lawyer of Nantes, who, 
 however, failed to obtain his acquittal. As soon as he 
 was condemned, M. Gruchy wrote a touching letter to 
 his mother, which, one cannot but hope, must have 
 accomplished the object for which her son had sacrificed 
 his life. On the way to execution, this holy priest, 
 having a crucifix in his hand, said to the leader of the 
 escort, ' The last requests of the condemned, when 
 harmless, are not usually denied them. I should like 
 to speak to the officer who denounced me.' The 
 wretched man could not refuse compliance with the 
 
34-0 The sisters Ergault. 
 
 summons, but came forward pale and trembling. 'Sir,' 
 said M. Gruchy, ' do not imagine that I feel unkindly 
 towards you for having brought about my death. He 
 Whom I adore on this cross commands me to forgive 
 you, and has Himself set me the example. I do forgive 
 you ; and if God receives me into His bosom, as I hope, 
 I will pray for you.' This said, he walked to his death 
 barefoot and with a firm step. The execution of a priest 
 was a triumph to the revolutionists, who paraded him 
 through the streets of Nantes before leading him to the 
 place where he was to be shot. ' Is it here?' he calmly 
 asked, when arrived at the ditch already dug to receive 
 his body. Being answered in the affirmative he knelt 
 down, but whether it was from reluctance on the part 
 of the soldiers or from their taking unsteady aim, the 
 first discharge did not touch him. The next only 
 wounded him. It was not until the third that his 
 martyrdom was completed. 
 
 This was the third time since 1792 that the persecution 
 had broken out afresh, but nothing could exhaust the 
 patience of the confessors or damp the generous courage 
 of those faithful souls who devoted themselves to watch 
 over their safety and facilitate the exercise of their 
 ministry. Three sisters of the name of Ergault are men- 
 tioned as having especially distinguished themselves by 
 the services they rendered to the proscribed priests. One 
 of them was a nun belonging to the hospital at Vannes, 
 but had been driven out for remaining faithful to her 
 vows and refusing to take the civic oath. In the house 
 of these pious women, M. Touchet, Rector of Saint-He'lier, 
 a parish in the suburbs of Rennes, lay concealed. In 
 moments of extreme peril, when a domiciliary visit was 
 imminent, he would go out disguised as a National 
 Guard, accompanied sometimes by one of the sisters, 
 who was possessed of remarkable presence of mind. 
 
The republican decadi. 
 
 341 
 
 When the decree which punished with death all who 
 should harbour priests came to his knowledge, he re- 
 solved to leave the house and, as he told them, go 
 and hide himself in the fields, the woods, the ditches, 
 rather than be the occasion of destruction to his en- 
 tertainers. But they assured him that they should be 
 too happy to die with him, and, as they could only 
 die once, they had sent word to their friends that if any 
 of them were afraid of the new penalty they might send 
 them any priests they had in concealment, and they 
 would themselves cheerfully receive and shelter them ; 
 that they had all made their wills, and even got ready 
 the white garments in which to mount the scaffold. To 
 which the good nun added gaily, ' I have sewn into 
 the hem of my dress a flint, a match, and a candle, 
 so that when we are left alone in our dungeon I may 
 have light enough to say my office for the last time.' 
 So, however, it happened, in the merciful Providence of 
 God, that, although these sisters had often three priests 
 hidden in their house at the same time, they were never 
 discovered or apprehended, and, when the persecution 
 was over, M. Touchet resumed his duties, and died 
 Rector of Saint-Augustin about the year 1806. 
 
 Although, as has been observed, a certain number of 
 schismatic priests had been sent to Rochefort, this was 
 quite an exceptional occurrence, for the persecution did 
 not touch them as a body, and they were able to close 
 their pretended council at Paris without the slightest 
 molestation. This immunity they continued to enjoy, 
 and they owed it to their accommodating consciences, 
 by which they were enabled to suit themselves to every 
 change of rule and to swear allegiance and fidelity to 
 any laws, however impious. No previous Government 
 had been more strongly bent on the destruction of reli- 
 gion than the Directory, but it aimed at its accomplish- 
 
34 2 Deported priests. 
 
 ment chiefly by unrelenting ill-treatment of those priests 
 whom it was able to seize. This was a measure of 
 extermination less popularly odious than the guillotine, 
 and almost as certain. But the persecution was by no 
 means confined to the clergy. Emigrants who had 
 secretly entered France to arrange their affairs were 
 taken and shot ; tradesmen, peasants, and the working 
 population generally, were grievously harassed in the 
 matter of keeping the Sunday, for one of the means 
 adopted by the revolutionists for the extirpation of reli- 
 gion was the introduction of their new calendar, and the 
 forcible observance of every tenth day in place of the 
 Christian Sunday, of which they hoped thus to destroy 
 the very memory. The republican calendar, as the 
 Directory itself publicly declared, was one of those 
 institutions most surely calculated to obliterate the last 
 traces of the royal, noble, and sacerdotal regime. Fairs, 
 markets, vacations, all were regulated by the new mode 
 of reckoning time, and every effort was made to oblige 
 the people to work on Sundays and eat flesh on Fridays. 
 Penalties, even, were decreed against those who should 
 sell fish on days of abstinence, or refuse to sanctify the 
 republican decadi by resting from labour on that day. 
 Although the decadi has long been forgotten, yet the 
 miserable effects of the deadly blow thus aimed at all 
 religious observances survive to this day in France, 
 especially in the towns. The country people in Brittany, 
 however, made no account of these impious innovations, 
 which became a source of numerous vexations to them 
 and a very hurtful impediment to trade, particularly 
 during the year 1798, when they were stringently en- 
 forced. 
 
 The successes which the Directory gained in arms 
 against the Holy See emboldened it in its anti-christian 
 projects. Rome had been seized, and the Pope was a 
 
Their cruel treatment. 
 
 343 
 
 prisoner at Siena. On all sides there was nothing but 
 distress and affliction for Catholics, beholding as they 
 did the Head of the Church a captive and the prisons 
 crowded with the faithful priests, who were unremittingly- 
 pursued and hunted down by the troops. On the 12th 
 of March, 1798, a frigate named the Charente left the 
 port of Rochefort bearing a hundred and ninety-three 
 prisoners to French Guiana. A hundred and fifty-five of 
 these were either priests, religious, or clerics, and thirty- 
 one of them were Bretons. The Charente having run 
 aground in making its escape from an engagement with 
 an English vessel, it became necessary on account of the 
 damage sustained to transfer its living cargo to another 
 frigate, the Decade; the prisoners suffered greatly by the 
 change, as the captain and crew did not share the 
 humane feelings evinced by those of the Charente. Their 
 condition, indeed, was very similar to that of their 
 brethren, four years before, on board the floating prisons 
 at Rochefort. Here also they were confined in the 
 between-deck, and crowded together in a pestilential 
 atmosphere for more than twelve hours of the twenty- 
 four, their hammocks being so piled one over the other, 
 and so closely packed, that the occupants ran the risk 
 either of being themselves smothered or smothering those 
 beneath. A hundred and one priests and some laymen 
 were shipped off later in the corvette La Bayonnaise. 
 These were subjected to the same abominable treatment, 
 stifling confinement at night and exposure by day to a 
 burning tropical sun on the forepart of the deck, at 
 the same time being supplied with a miserably scanty 
 diet. Landed at Cayenne, the governor, a hard and 
 cruel man, drove the exiles into the desert lands of 
 Konamana and Synamari, which had already become the 
 grave of so many unhappy Frenchmen, banished to the 
 colony by the Legislative Assembly and the Convention. A 
 
344 d generous English sailor. 
 
 few survived to return and tell the hideous tale of what 
 they had endured; but we cannot follow this subject into 
 its details, the scene of our narrative being almost wholly 
 limited to the province of Brittany. We must not omit, 
 however, to record one circumstance peculiarly interest- 
 ing to us as Englishmen, which occurred in connection 
 with the corvette La Vaillante, which was bearing to 
 Guiana twenty-five priests, seven of whom were Bretons, 
 together with an equal number of malefactors. What 
 these ecclesiastics had to suffer, especially during the first 
 night, huddled up as they were with all these criminals 
 in a very narrow portion of the hold, it would be im- 
 possible to describe. They were literally heaped one 
 upon the other, but their wails and groans, which con- 
 tinued through the whole of that night, failed to move 
 the compassion of the officers, who took not the smallest 
 notice. The Vaillante ploughed its way across the Atlantic 
 for eight days, when, fortunately for the sufferers, it was 
 captured by an English frigate. The captain, whose 
 name was Pellew, 4 now stepped on board to visit his 
 prize. His eye was at once attracted by the costume 
 of the priests, and he inquired of M. Bodinier, one of 
 their number and a Breton ecclesiastic, who they were. 
 He replied that they were five-and-twenty priests whom 
 the Directory had caused to be deported to Guiana. The 
 captain immediately took off his hat, saluted them, and 
 said with emotion, ' I am happy at being able to deliver 
 men who were being sent to certain death. Gentlemen 
 you are the richest prize which I ever made.' Then he 
 inquired if they had any complaint to prefer against the 
 officers who had been in charge of them ; but these holy 
 confessors, forgiving and forgetting all the evil done 
 them, did not permit themselves to bring any accusation 
 
 4 Tresvaux calls him Sir Edward Pellew, the accuracy of which desig- 
 nation we have not the means of ascertaining. 
 
Rochefort prisons. 345 
 
 against those who had so grossly ill-treated them. The 
 English captain now gave orders that, in consideration of 
 these ecclesiastics, the crew should be allowed to retain 
 and carry away all that belonged to them. He expressed 
 the horror he felt at seeing the ministers of the altar 
 mixed up with malefactors, and had the latter put in 
 irons, with the intention of landing them on some part 
 of the French coast, while the crew were to be taken as 
 prisoners of war to England. The priests alone were 
 left at liberty on board the Vaillante, the captain pushing 
 his courtesy so far as to select for manning the prize 
 such of his crew as were Catholics. It can be readily 
 understood, observes Tresvaux, how such delicate atten- 
 tions on the part of a foreigner, attentions which so 
 strongly contrasted with the barbarity of Frenchmen 
 towards their own countrymen, expatriated solely for 
 their steadfast attachment to their faith, touched the 
 hearts of these good priests, and it was with much regret 
 that they bade adieu to the noble-minded sailor, their 
 tears and their blessings expressing better than any words 
 they could utter their gratitude for the generous treat- 
 ment they had experienced at his hands. They were 
 landed at Plymouth, and the sympathy and kindness of 
 which, in common with the other refugee priests, they 
 became the objects in England, soon made amends for 
 their sufferings in the Isle of Re and in the hold of the 
 corvette. 
 
 In spite of the numbers shipped off to Guiana, the 
 prisons of Rochefort were as full as ever ; sickness was 
 the inevitable result, and several died. Now, although 
 the object of the Directory was thus directly answered, 
 it was unwilling to allow that object to be too palpably 
 apparent ; it had accordingly removed those priests who 
 were either infirm or, from serious illness, were as yet 
 unfit for deportation, to a citadel in the Isle of Re". 
 
346 MM. Duval and Cochon. 
 
 Including some laymen, there were at one time not less 
 than twelve hundred on that island. The space being 
 insufficient, they were really no better off than in the 
 Rochefort prisons, and the food supplied to them was 
 equally poor and bad. As an instance of their cruel 
 treatment it may be mentioned that, flesh meat being 
 given them once in the course of the decade, the Friday, 
 when possible, was always in preference selected as the 
 day of distribution. 
 
 Several priests met their death during this same year 
 at the hands of the soldiers, who, as we have seen, 
 scoured the country in the form of moveable columns. 
 The Abbe Tresvaux mentions the names of six of these 
 martyrs. One of them, named Duval, Rector of Laignelet, 
 had been hidden five years either in his parish or in the 
 neighbourhood, and had preserved every individual in 
 his flock from schism, so that, when the intruded priest 
 arrived, he could not find one person willing to serve his 
 Mass. Having gone, in the evening of the 9th of 
 February, to baptize a newly-born child in the adjoining 
 forest, M. Duval was betrayed by a young man whom he 
 had loaded with benefits, and waylaid by some Contre- 
 Chouans on his return, the traitor pointing him out to 
 them while in the very act of saluting him. M. Duval 
 was immediately shot. On the following day his servant 
 had the body removed to the presbytery, which was 
 vacant. A surgeon employed, we know not why, to 
 open the corpse, found to his surprise that it exhibited 
 no signs of death, and the blood flowed fresh at the first 
 incision. His sister-in-law personally attested the truth 
 of this fact, which was regarded as a mark of his sanctity. 
 His memory was long held in veneration in the canton. 
 
 Another, M. Cochon, of the diocese of Saint-Malo, was 
 concealed in the parish of Plumieux at the house of a 
 baker, who was a good Catholic. He was in the garden 
 
A 1 dry guillotine? 
 
 347 
 
 one evening, and the servant-girl had just taken him his 
 supper, when a moveable column from the Loudeac 
 garrison, passing at that moment, overheard her saying, 
 as she left him, ' Good night, sir.' This was enough to 
 arouse their suspicions ; they entered the garden and, 
 seizing the priest, led him away to Loudeac. A short 
 time before, the captain of the garrison had been beguiled 
 into an ambush by the royalists ; his lieutenant had sworn 
 to avenge his fate ; and the seizure of M. Cochon seemed 
 to furnish this cruel man with the desired opportunity. 
 The prisoner was accordingly treated with great barbarity. 
 He was handcuffed so tightly that the blood ran down 
 over his hands. ' Do not bind me so tight,' he said, ' I 
 shall not attempt to escape ; ' to which the locksmith 
 savagely replied, ' What is the use of your complaining ? 
 You will meet with worse things on your road.' As they 
 passed by Pontgant the soldiers led him to the house of 
 a schismatic priest, who told him that if he would take 
 the oath he could assure him that his life would be saved. 
 ' No, no,' replied the prisoner firmly ; ' I have not suffered 
 so much up to this hour to go and damn myself now.' 
 The troop marched on, and, when they had reached the 
 spot where their comrades had been betrayed into the 
 ambush, they shot him. 
 
 Meanwhile, death was busy with the deported priests 
 in Guiana. One of the few survivors, M. Beauregard of 
 Lucon, who has been already mentioned, subsequently 
 published a detailed account of what he and his com- 
 panions had to endure. Well might an indignant member 
 of the legislative body call the lingering tortures to which 
 they were consigned ' a dry guillotine.' These tropical 
 wildernesses of burning sand were doing the same work 
 most surely, and only needed time to make that work 
 complete. But the Church of Brittany not only had to 
 deplore the loss of many of her faithful clergy amongst 
 
348 Sad state of the provinces. 
 
 the deported, thirteen perishing in less than six months, 
 biit others were dying off in the different countries in 
 which they had taken refuge, while no means of recruiting 
 their failing numbers existed. The year 1798 closed and 
 1799 began without any improvement in the prospects of 
 Catholics, for the same Government was still in power, 
 and its hatred of religion was so notorious that no hopes 
 could be entertained of any relaxation in the severity 
 with which the clergy were treated. In the course of 
 the first six months of the year 1799, no less than thirty- 
 five Breton priests and one deacon were transferred to 
 the citadel of Re', whence, since the capture of the Vail- 
 lante, no fresh cargo had been despatched to Guiana. 
 The continuation of the profitless civil war in Brittany, 
 which led to the maintenance of strong garrisons in the 
 smallest towns, and maintained the hatred of the repub- 
 lican soldiers against the calumniated clergy, was a great 
 misfortune to that province ; for it was almost impossible 
 to escape their vigilance. A person, indeed, must have 
 lived at that hateful epoch, Tresvaux tells us, to conceive 
 the minute and multiplied precautions which the faithful 
 had to take in order to fulfil their religious duties without 
 compromising their priests, or to understand the terror in 
 which good Catholics spent these days. As for the tepid 
 and indifferent, they had abandoned every external prac- 
 tice of religion and lived pretty much as heathens. The 
 constitutional priests more than once boasted that they 
 were the means of preserving religion at that time in 
 France, and they put this forward as a justification of 
 their schism, as if it could ever be lawful to do evil that 
 good might come ; but it was anyhow an empty vaunt, 
 for they had too little credit, even amongst their own 
 partisans, to exercise any salutary influence on the people. 
 If they enjoyed an exemption from persecution, every 
 one knew" that it was owing to the community of senti- 
 
Death of M. Gavard. 
 
 349 
 
 ments which existed between them and the revolutionists. 
 If some few were deported to Guiana or to the Isle of 
 Re, this was merely from an excess of zeal on the part of 
 some governmental agents, who, in their blind animosity to 
 priests, had failed to distinguish between constitutionalist 
 and Catholic ; and it was a mistake which did not con- 
 tinue to occur. 
 
 In the month of February we find two fresh victims in 
 the diocese of Vannes. They were discovered through 
 the indiscretion of a maid-servant who had been sent to 
 make some purchases in the small neighbouring town of 
 Locmine'. She returned with the provisions exposed to 
 view. Suspicions were aroused in the minds of some 
 gendarmes, who followed her to the house, where three 
 priests were concealed. Two they murdered, the third 
 escaped. Another victim in the course of this year was 
 M. Gavard, an ecclesiastic of the diocese of Rennes. 
 He had passed in safety through all the years of the 
 Revolution, although no danger ever daunted him when 
 it was question of the good of souls. He was denounced 
 at last by a perfidious man who feigned himself desirous 
 of going to confession on the following day. Having 
 ascertained that M. Gavard, who was suffering from fever, 
 would be detained for the present in the house where he 
 was staying, he went in search of a detachment of 
 soldiers, who immediately arrested him. The officer in 
 command did his best to save his prisoner. He bade 
 him keep close to his side, as his soldiers were all drunk 
 and were not under control. He treated him with 
 marked respect and had him to dinner, assuring him 
 that, if he was himself employed to conduct him to 
 Rennes, he would be as safe as if he had remained in 
 his hiding-place. Others, unfortunately, were differently 
 minded. At three o'clock the following morning a 
 detachment of soldiers came to fetch M. Gavard out of his 
 
350 M. Levesque condemned to death. 
 
 prison and, after marching with him some way, shot him 
 on the road which leads to Servon. 
 
 Some political changes which took place in the month 
 of June led to the retirement of La Reveillere-Lepaux 
 and of Merlin de Douai, but it produced no amelioration 
 in the condition of the Catholic clergy. Sieyes, the new 
 President, followed the same system in their regard, and 
 contented himself with releasing some schismatics de- 
 tained in the Isle of Re. On the other hand, twenty 
 Breton priests were relegated thither during the last half 
 of the year 1799. Although the law no longer awarded 
 capital punishment in the case of priests, yet, as a matter 
 of fact, the local authorities occasionally passed sentence 
 of death upon them. M. Levesque, Rector of Asserac, 
 had a very narrow escape of the guillotine. The passions 
 of the republicans were much excited in the autumn of 
 this year, for the royalists, encouraged by a new coalition 
 of foreign powers, were rising again in La Vende'e, and 
 the priests were, as usual, accused of being the instigators 
 of the disturbances. Groundless as was the charge, these 
 prepossessions powerfully influenced the minds of the 
 partial judges before whom they had to appear. M. 
 Levesque was accordingly condemned to be executed at 
 Nantes on Sunday, the 20th of October. His family 
 obtained a respite of twenty-four hours, and that respite 
 saved him. Dupre, a royalist leader, to whom the 
 surname of Tete-Carre'e was given, had shared the same 
 prison with the Rector of Asserac, but was set at liberty 
 in the course of the preceding week. Before leaving, he 
 promised M. Levesque that he would come and deliver 
 him. It would not seem that the priest counted much 
 on the fulfilment of the promise ; at any rate, he made 
 his last dispositions as one who was certain to die. He 
 rewrote his will, in which his paternal solicitude for his 
 flock and his Christian charity shone conspicuous. No 
 
His forcible liberation. 
 
 35i 
 
 virtue, indeed, is more constantly exhibited by the 
 martyrs of the Revolution than their heroic love of their 
 enemies. After the example of St. Cyprian, and from a 
 motive of gratitude to those who were to hasten his 
 admission into life eternal, this good priest bequeathed 
 three francs to each of the soldiers, and to all who should 
 have had any share in his death. In a codicil he added, 
 lest he should forget it at the last moment, that he 
 desired to embrace his executioner and to give him also 
 three francs. He ended with an adieu to his good 
 friends till they should meet in Paradise. 5 But Tete- 
 Carre'e had not forgotten his promise. At the head of 
 six thousand men, collected in the neighbourhood of 
 Nantes, he entered that city, which was but ill guarded, 
 on the night of the 19th of October. He went straight to 
 the Bouffay prison, where he freed M. Levesque, together 
 with two royalists condemned to death, two others 
 sentenced to deportation, and three more who were 
 awaiting their trial. He also liberated three sailors, 
 limiting himself strictly to political offenders, and leaving 
 the felons to their fate. Having thus effected their bold 
 coup de main, with the dawn of day the royalists 
 departed. M. Levesque survived thirty years, and died 
 in his rectory of Asserac. 
 
 5 Tresvaux says he saw the will, the particulars of which he gives. 
 
CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 The Consulate. Freedom of worship restored. 
 
 On the 9th of November, 1799, Napoleon Bonaparte, 
 leaving his army in Egypt, returned to Paris and seized 
 on the reins of government. In concert with Sieyes he 
 dissolved the Directory, and, assuming to himself the 
 part of a dictator, set up an entirely new constitution in 
 its place, with three consuls at its head, of which he was 
 the first and chief. In the articles of the new constitu- 
 tion not a word was said on the subject of religion or its 
 ministers. It might, therefore, have been concluded that 
 freedom of worship was no longer to be withheld from 
 Catholics, but the revolutionists in Brittany did not thus 
 understand the matter, and at the close of the year we 
 meet with another victim to the fury of the soldiery in 
 the person of M. Loncle, a young priest of Plouguenast 
 in the diocese of Saint-Brieuc. His death was commonly 
 attributed to the malignant hatred of a constitutional 
 priest, who was the terror of the canton from the 
 animosity with which he pursued the Catholic clergy. 
 This wretched man never went up to the altar without 
 being armed with two pistols and having a loaded gun 
 placed close at hand. It is said that before his death he 
 repented of his crimes. As for M. Loncle, he made the 
 generous sacrifice of his life as soon as he beheld himself 
 in the hands of the soldiers, and prepared to meet death 
 with a calmness which won the admiration even of these 
 callous-hearted men. His father also died a martyr to 
 
Liberty of worship proclaimed. 
 
 Christian duty. He was ordered to convey some goods 
 on the Sunday. ' No,' he replied, ' this is the Lord's day 
 of rest ; I must not work ; the law of God forbids me ; 
 my servants shall observe that law as well as myself.' 
 Enraged at this reply, they levelled their muskets at him, 
 and he fell riddled with balls. It was believed that he 
 had an additional motive for his refusal in the suspicion 
 he entertained that the goods he was required to 
 transport formed part of the ill-gotten spoils of these 
 marauding bands. 
 
 One of the first objects which occupied the attention 
 of Bonaparte was the distracted state of Brittany and La 
 Vende'e, and he commissioned General He'douville, an 
 able man of moderate principles, to appease the troubles 
 of those districts. An armistice was shortly concluded 
 with the royalists, and an amnesty granted to the de- 
 partments of the West. If hostilities did not entirely 
 cease at once, they were henceforth confined to a few 
 cantons of Brittany. Aware that it was in defence of 
 their religion that the insurgents had taken up arms, the 
 new Government hastened to adopt measures quite oppo- 
 site to those of the Directory, and before the close of 
 the year 1799 had changed the formula of the oath 
 imposed on public functionaries and on the ministers of 
 religion to one of a more simple and inoffensive character. 
 It ran thus: 'I promise fidelity to the constitution.' 
 This promise was made by many of the priests at Re 
 and Oleron, who were in consequence released, but 
 others, to the number of eighty, preferred a prolongation 
 of their captivity to an engagement which was repugnant 
 to their consciences, and to which many of the bishops 
 were opposed. Simultaneously with the amnesty had 
 also been issued a proclamation of liberty of worship, 
 which the magistrate was not to be permitted to infringe, 
 the Consuls at the same time expressing a confident 
 x 25 
 
354 Local intolerance. 
 
 hope, couched in Christian language — language which 
 was a novelty in any governmental declaration of late 
 years — that the ministers of a God of peace would be 
 forward in promoting reconciliation and concord. ' Let 
 the temples,' it said, 'be opened to them once more, 
 and let them, together with their fellow citizens, offer the 
 sacrifice which shall expiate the crimes of war and the 
 blood it has caused to flow.' 
 
 For the present this restitution of the sacred edifices 
 was rendered to a great degree illusory, and chiefly 
 profited the so-called Constitutional Church. The priests 
 of this schismatic body, the assermcntes as they were 
 called, that is, those who had taken the oath, had 
 succeeded only in forming a clergy without flocks. 
 Under the favour of the late Government they had, in 
 spite of this deficiency, installed themselves in cathedrals 
 and parish churches, and were thus, so far, in possession 
 of the ground. In Brittany, it is true, many parishes 
 had never received a schismatic pastor, partly from the 
 difficulty of finding substitutes for the expelled cures and 
 partly from the discomforts and discouragement attendant 
 on the position of priests, not only without flocks, but 
 exposed to the ill-will and contempt of the populations 
 upon which they had been forced. The Breton clergy, 
 however, did not hasten to show themselves in public, 
 or to return to their churches, not only because, under 
 the influence of their exiled bishops in England and 
 Germany, they were unwilling to make an act of sub- 
 mission to the Constitution, but because, notwithstanding 
 the tolerance of the central government, the local 
 authorities often acted towards them in the most arbi- 
 trary manner, a circumstance which continued for some 
 time to keep the faithful clergy in very much the same 
 position as during the persecution, for they still lived in 
 concealment, and celebrated Mass only in private houses. 
 
Cartes de surety. 
 
 355 
 
 In February, 1800, the Consuls permitted the exiled 
 priests to return on the condition of their making the 
 following engagement : 1 1 promise not to trouble the 
 civil order, to submit to the civil and just laws of the 
 country, and not to oppose the government under which 
 I live. It is in this sense that I promise fidelity to the 
 Constitution.' This promise — for it amounted to no more 
 and was so worded as to exclude anything beyond a 
 passive acquiescence in the existing order of things — 
 became the occasion of much disagreement amongst the 
 Catholic clergy. Some of the bishops considered that it 
 was permissible, and under their sanction, coupled with 
 the silence of the Holy See, a certain number of priests 
 considered themselves justified in making this qualified 
 promise. But other bishops were strongly opposed to 
 it, particularly those who had taken refuge in England 
 and Germany, such as Mgr. de La Marche, Bishop of 
 Leon, and Mgr. Le Mintier, Bishop of Treguier, the 
 latter of whom pushed his objections so far as even to be 
 unwilling that any should accept the cartes de sitrete which 
 General Brune, who had been sent to pacify Brittany, 
 had offered to the clergy ; indeed, he had treated them 
 very favourably, releasing unconditionally those whom he 
 found detained in prison at Rennes and at Vannes, and 
 giving them permission to celebrate divine worship. These 
 cartes de surete were thus worded : ' N. commander-in- 
 chief of the army of the West. The citizen N. a Catholic 
 priest, can officiate publicly and peaceably both in town 
 and country. I exhort him to aid by means of his 
 ministry in maintaining peace, order, and submission to 
 the laws.' There appeared to be nothing in this formula 
 to alarm the most delicate conscience ; nevertheless, 
 Mgr. Le Mintier considered its acceptance as equivalent 
 to making the promise of fidelity, and the promise of 
 fidelity he regarded as equivalent to an oath of allegiance. 
 
356 M. Godard and Mgr. de La Marc he. 
 
 Now (he argued), as priests could not permit themselves 
 to swear allegiance to the new Government, neither ought 
 they to consent to any act resembling it. On the other 
 hand, the prelates who had remained in the kingdom, 
 and who were well acquainted with the difficulties of the 
 situation, thought differently on this point. A vicar- 
 general of Bourges, M. Godard, published a small work 
 on the subject under discussion, in which, without pre- 
 suming to draw any confident conclusion, which it 
 appertained to higher authority to pronounce, he gave 
 eight reasons in favour of the act of submission. This 
 work was followed by another, in which the meaning to 
 be attached to a promise of fidelity was fully discussed, 
 and the question of its legitimacy, as made to the actual 
 Government, was resolved in the affirmative. As soon 
 as these works became known to the venerable Bishop of 
 Leon, he hastened to indite a reply. He argued, in the 
 first place, that the Consular Government could inspire 
 no confidence ; that since the Revolution words had no 
 longer any value ; that, in fact, two curds who had made 
 this promise, believing that it bound them only to a 
 passive submission and to abstention from participation 
 in any conspiracy, had been threatened and harassed, 
 the one for having censured a purchaser of national 
 goods — in other words, of Church property — who con- 
 sulted him on his death-bed, and the other for having 
 condemned divorce. But he moreover contended that 
 the legitimacy of such a promise was doubtful, and con- 
 sequently that there could be no hesitation as to the 
 unlawfulness of making it ; that persons were bound to 
 go, not by their private opinions, but by authority, and 
 that, as the majority of the French bishops then in exile 
 had declared against the act of submission, it was the 
 duty of ecclesiastics to obey their decision. 
 
 It must be remembered, in order to make due allow 
 
Attittide of tJie emigrant bishops. 357 
 
 ance for the extremely rigid views of the exiled bishops, 
 that they were devotedly attached to the Bourbons, and 
 recoiled from any act which appeared like a betrayal of 
 their cause ; they also firmly believed that there was no 
 real hope for the restoration of religion save in that of 
 monarchy ; in their minds the throne and the altar were 
 indissolubly united, and the Revolution was but a pro- 
 longed rebellion against both, which success could never 
 justify. Accordingly, they considered all the acts of any 
 government owing its origin to that rebellion to be 
 marked with nullity in their very essence ; a kind of 
 original sin attached to it, which could not be condoned 
 or expunged. It is needless to observe that the Holy 
 See has never encouraged a pertinacious opposition of 
 this character, but, considering the antecedents, it is 
 hardly surprising to meet with this rooted prejudice 
 against any compromise on the part of a large portion of 
 the French episcopate and clergy with a government 
 which was the offspring of the Revolution. We see 
 things now in the light of what we know was coming, 
 whereas they viewed it in connection with what had 
 passed under their eyes. Every successive form of 
 government which the Republic had assumed had been 
 hitherto bitterly hostile to religion and persecuting in its 
 practice ; but, in point of fact, although its name and 
 form survived, the Republic came to an end on the 
 famous 1 8th Brumaire. It had succumbed to a Dictator, 
 on whose will henceforth were to depend the turn of 
 affairs and the policy adopted. Now this man had his 
 projects, which for their development awaited only the 
 firm establishment of his power. 
 
 The Consular Government, meanwhile, was gradually 
 abrogating the barbarous enactments against the priests 
 which it had found in vigorous operation ; nevertheless, 
 no great confidence could be as yet practically felt, 
 
358 Policy of Government. 
 
 not only because of former grievous disappointments 
 but because, although the new rulers, so far from follow- 
 ing up the system of persecution adopted by their pre- 
 decessors, professed opposite principles, nevertheless they 
 were very far from according any substantial protection 
 to the Catholic clergy. They simply tolerated them, as 
 it seemed, from mere political motives ; and there was 
 the more reason to judge thus of their conduct because 
 it was chiefly in those parts of the country which had 
 recently been in a state of insurrection that they were 
 treated with indulgence. The Government, in fact, 
 understood that the best way to keep these districts 
 quiet was to refrain from harassing the Catholic priests, 
 and had come to see that they exercised a salutary 
 influence on the population amongst whom they dwelt. 
 The prefect of Nantes, the regicide Le Tourneux, 
 acknowledged as much in a letter to the minister of 
 police, in which, speaking of the country people of the 
 Loire Infe'rieure, he said, ' Such is the stupid blindness 
 of these people, that they cannot be kept quiet except 
 they can enjoy freedom of worship, and have their 
 non-juring priests.' It was something, and a great deal, 
 too, that this fact should begin to be perceived, and that 
 the priests should no longer be regarded as fire-brands 
 and the instigators of civil war ; nay, more, that they 
 should be acknowledged as capable of contributing 
 powerfully to the re-establishment of order and peace. 
 Bonaparte was soon convinced of this, but he appears 
 to have feared shocking the prejudices of the revolu- 
 tionists by showing an interest in the fate of the pro- 
 scribed clergy. 
 
 Thus the Government took no steps during the 
 greater portion of the year 1800 to recall the exiles from 
 Guiana. It was not until the 6th of September that 
 a decree was issued to that effect, and then under the 
 
Guiana exiles recalled. 359 
 
 strict condition that they should be relegated to the 
 Isle of Re, where also the priests who had refused to 
 make the act of submission were detained during the 
 whole of the year. There were others also still confined 
 in different houses of detention. The popular wishes, 
 however, were daily becoming more and more manifest, 
 especially in Brittany, and the new prefect of the Loire 
 Infe'rieure, little disposed as he personally was to favour 
 the cause of religion, thought it prudent, in consequence 
 of the numerous petitions that kept pouring in, not to 
 oppose the public celebration of divine worship which 
 had already commenced in his department, although the 
 priests had made no act of submission. Thus at Nantes, 
 as also at Vannes, many priests officiated without being 
 molested, a large concourse of the faithful attending, but 
 in both places only in private houses, the churches which 
 had been opened having been taken possession of by 
 the constitutionalists. Throughout the province, the 
 state of things varied according to the humour of the 
 local authorities, for arbitrary caprice, one of the worst 
 evils of the Revolution, still subsisted, and the men 
 in power could at pleasure vex and harass, and even 
 imprison, priests under the slightest pretexts. 
 
 But these acts were becoming more rare, and blood, 
 at least, had ceased to flow. The last recorded martyr- 
 doms were those of M. Baron, Rector of Carnac, in the 
 diocese of Vannes, whom the soldiers killed in his own 
 house either at the close of 1799 or the commencement 
 of 1800, and of M. Meheust, who, with M. Andre, 
 the Rector of Morieux, whose vicaire he was, lodged 
 with a farmer named Josset, who was in the habit 
 of harbouring priests and destitute persons with exceed- 
 ing charity. The two ecclesiastics, being warned that a 
 moveable column from Saint-Brieuc was approaching the 
 house, hastened to leave it, in order not to compromise 
 
3 6 ° 
 
 The last martyr. 
 
 the family ; but the column was upon them almost 
 immediately. M. Andre, however, had time enough to 
 conceal himself in a deep ditch covered with brambles. 
 Here he remained entirely unperceived, although a soldier 
 was posted close to the spot. M. Meheust was over- 
 taken and captured in a narrow lane down which he had 
 turned, and taken to the neighbouring chateau of Ville- 
 Gourio. Another column of volunteers from Lamballe, 
 which arrived at that juncture, was very desirous to 
 have him handed over to them, with the object, it is 
 believed, of saving his life, but the commandant of 
 the Saint-Brieuc column steadily refused, pledging him- 
 self, however, for the safety of his prisoner, and declaring 
 that he would answer for it with his head. But he had 
 far other intentions. He required M. Meheust to give 
 up all he had of value about him before leaving the 
 chateau, assuring him ironically that nothing would be 
 lost ; the priest handed to him his watch and thirty 
 francs, but he well understood what fate was in store for 
 him. He therefore begged the leader of the troop not 
 to put him to death within the precincts of the parish 
 of Morieux, where they still were. The troop began its 
 march, and, on reaching the bounds of the parish, 
 M. Meheust knelt down, as he was wont to do, before a 
 cross planted on the hillock of Boulboute'. The com- 
 mandant seized this moment to signal to his men to fire. 
 M. Meheust fell pierced through and through with balls. 
 Thus perished, on the 3rd of February, 1800, the last 
 martyr priest of Brittany. Saint-Brieuc had in 1791 
 furnished its first martyr in the person of M. Le Clerc, 
 the young priest of Moncontour, and now it gave the 
 last. M. Me'heust, preaching in the environs of Lam- 
 balle but eight days before his death and remonstrating 
 with his hearers on the diminution of their piety, had 
 addressed these words to them : ' Yet a little while, and 
 
The civil promise. 
 
 you will wish to have ministers of the Lord. I am 
 well-nigh the only one who remains to you in this 
 district, and me you will no longer have.' These words, 
 which excited little attention at the time, were remem- 
 bered afterwards and regarded as a prophecy. 
 
 Although, therefore, the year 1800 had been, nega- 
 tively at least, a great improvement on its predecessors 
 through the absence of persecution, it could not be con- 
 sidered as very favourable to religion ; nevertheless, 
 Catholics were beginning to take heart. The exiles in 
 foreign lands were gradually returning in the spring of 
 the year 1801, although it was not without difficulty that 
 such as were unwilling to make the act of submission 
 could effect their entrance into the country. It was now 
 that the deported priests of Guiana, such, at least, as 
 had survived, once more landed on the soil of France. 
 This increase in the number of true pastors in Brittany 
 helped to diminish the already thin ranks of the 
 adherents of the sectaries. Even the indifferent began 
 to prefer the men who had made such sacrifices for 
 the preservation of the faith to those unprincipled pre- 
 varicators who had accommodated themselves to every 
 phase of the Revolution, however impious it might be. 
 Abandoned by the Government, to which they had sold 
 themselves body and soul, and receiving no salaries, 
 many of them were reduced to great straits, yet the 
 heads of the party laboured on to the very last by every 
 means in their power — by synods, and councils, and 
 so-called pastorals — to perpetuate schism in the land. 
 But the days of the Constitutional Church were num- 
 bered. About this time died the miserable Jacob, the 
 schismatic bishop of the C6tes-du-Nord, without any 
 sign of penitence for his multiplied sacrileges. A short 
 time before, a very different personage had passed away, 
 the venerable Bishop of Treguier, Mgr. Le Mintier. 
 
362 Treaty with the Pope. 
 
 After his death, the Vicars-General of the diocese 
 declared themselves in favour of the required promise. 
 About this time also, Mgr. de La Marche, Bishop of 
 Le'on, authorized the priests under his jurisdiction to 
 
 make it, using the following form : ' I, N. minister 
 
 of the Catholic worship, professing myself a stranger 
 to every political discussion, present myself to give to 
 the temporal power a guarantee of submission, saving 
 nevertheless the Catholic religion, of which the law 
 guarantees the free exercise. On this condition, I pro- 
 mise fidelity to the Constitution of the year viii." 
 Accordingly, in the course of May, 1801, thirty-one 
 priests of the diocese of Leon arrived in their country 
 from England. Others followed their example in making 
 the promise of submission ; those who had hitherto been 
 opposed to it, as were most of the priests of Brittany, 
 taking care distinctly to express that the act was one 
 purely civil, reserving all the rights of the Catholic, 
 Apostolic, and Roman religion. From the priests of 
 those districts which had been recently in a state of 
 insurrection no submission was exacted, the Govern- 
 ment fearing to furnish a pretext for the renewal of civil 
 war. 
 
 The opposition to the promise had, however, greatly 
 decreased since it had become known that negotiations 
 had been set on foot between the First Consul and the 
 newly-elected Pontiff, Pius VII., for a Concordat which 
 was to put an end to the sufferings of the Gallican 
 Church. Bonaparte, who desired to consolidate his 
 power, for which end it was essential that tranquillity 
 should be restored to the country, had the sagacity to 
 perceive that the best means which he could adopt to 
 attain his object was to restore the salutary influence of 
 religion, and had accordingly entered into a treaty with the 
 Pope concerning the framing of a new organization for 
 
Napoleons policy. 363 
 
 the Church of France. The plenipotentiaries of the Holy 
 See and those of the French Republic finally signed, on 
 the 15th of July, 1801, a Concordat which restored to 
 the Catholic Church a legal existence in France. It 
 was ratified by the Sovereign Pontiff on the 15th of 
 August. The negotiations for this Concordat, which 
 had been concluded under circumstances of most 
 peculiar difficulty, were conducted with such secrecy 
 that its provisions did not become publicly known for 
 eight months after its ratification. There is no denying 
 that it required considerable courage on the part of 
 Napoleon to plan and carry into effect a negotiation of 
 this nature, surrounded as he was by so many powerful 
 and bitter enemies of religion, but he skilfully availed 
 himself of the preponderance which he had acquired by 
 the late victory of Marengo, and his credit was strong 
 enough to close their mouths at this critical juncture. 
 If the act was a bold one, it was, no doubt, one also 
 of high policy on his part, yet we must not withhold 
 from him a certain meed of praise, neither need we 
 deny that he may have retained some religious senti- 
 ments and impressions, however vague and imperfect — 
 recollections of childhood, seldom effaced from any 
 Catholic heart — which combined with motives of poli- 
 tical prudence to form in his mind a fixed desire to 
 reconstitute the Church of France. Still, while conceding 
 this much, we must add, what from first to last his 
 behaviour towards the bishops and, above all, towards 
 the Sovereign Pontiff abundantly proved, that the 
 Church he wished to see constructed was one that should 
 be docile and disciplined to his hand, a Church which 
 should never become an obstacle in his path, but 
 should be the pliant instrument of his own ambitious 
 purposes. 
 
 Our task is now concluded. To enter into any 
 
364 Re-distribution of sees. 
 
 details respecting the Concordat and the difficulties and 
 troubles which attended the reconstitution of the Church 
 of France would be to embark on a new subject which, 
 to do it any justice, would require a special treatment of 
 its own. 1 A few subsidiary remarks must suffice. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 The Concordat. 
 
 The Concordat, which gave a new existence to the 
 Church of France, radically destroyed the pseudo- 
 ecclesiastical organization which the National Assembly 
 created when it decreed the Civil Constitution of the 
 Clergy. Not that, considered in itself, the Concordat 
 was advantageous to religion. It involved many painful 
 sacrifices. Two-thirds of the episcopal sees of France 
 and of its annexed territories were suppressed ; Brittany, 
 which had possessed nine, lost four, those of Dol, Saint- 
 Malo, Leon, and Treguier. Moreover, the concessions 
 which, pushing its condescension as far as the essential 
 rights of the Church permitted, Rome had agreed to 
 make to the civil power, were very onerous. Neverthe- 
 less, on account of the difficult circumstances in which 
 the Catholic religion was placed at that time in France, 
 the Concordat was welcomed as an inestimable boon. 
 The members of the so-called council which the schis- 
 matics were holding in Paris understood that the knell 
 of their Church had sounded, but, to save their self- 
 importance, they affected to make a generous renuncia- 
 
 1 The negotiations that took place between the Holy See and the 
 First Consul on the subject of the Concordat will be found amply and 
 ably treated in the Life of Pope Pius the Seventh, which forms the 
 sixteenth volume of this series. 
 
Obstinacy of scJiismatics. 365 
 
 tion in quitting their sees, which they could not retain, 
 and which, in fact, the Government was on the point 
 of requiring them to vacate. Accordingly, after cele- 
 brating the feast of the Assumption in Notre Dame they 
 separated never to meet again. By a Brief, dated the 
 same day, and sent to Mgr. di Spina, the Pope's envoy 
 at Paris, the Holy Father, in a tone of paternal gentle- 
 ness, invited those archbishops and bishops who during 
 the Revolution had occupied the episcopal sees without 
 receiving institution from the Holy See, to return to 
 Catholic unity. The pride of Le Coz was irritated 
 beyond measure by this Brief, and he was especially 
 wroth with Mgr. di Spina for not giving him the title 
 of Metropolitan of Rennes in forwarding that document 
 to him. So far from feeling his heart touched, he con- 
 sidered himself as personally insulted by an offer of 
 reconciliation. ' To accept absolution,' he said, ' would 
 be to declare to millions of Frenchmen who have 
 hitherto placed their confidence in me that I have 
 been, and that I am, an impostor.' Then followed 
 an enumeration of his sufferings and his services, which 
 would be ludicrous if it were not lamentable. 1 
 
 1 Le Coz had for sonic time called himself metropolitan of Rennes, 
 instead of metropolitan of the North West, as he was termed in the Civil 
 Constitution ; a practice generally adopted by his schismatic colleagues, 
 who felt the absurdity of being styled bishops of rivers, mountains, 
 and points of the compass. He valued himself much upon hav ing had 
 the boldness to oppose on several occasions the inroads of impiety, at a 
 time moreover when such conduct involved no little risk. For instance, 
 in September, 1793, not long before his arrest, he advocated the 
 celibacy of the clergy, which he had also defended from his place 
 as deputy in the Assembly. He wrote also against the desecration 
 of the Sunday and the substitution of the decadi. It is only fair to give 
 him what credit may be his due for these and similar acts of courage, 
 but, unhappily, they were all marred by the vice of his position and 
 by the taint of that inordinate pride which in any case would have been 
 incompatible with genuine purity of intention. To figure before the 
 world was his delight ; hence he had always pen in hand, and s 
 described by his contemporaries as possessed with a veritable scribo- 
 manie. Trcsvaux says that he considered himself the Bossuct of h s 
 age 
 
3 66 
 
 The Papal legate. 
 
 The Holy Father had debated the matter some time 
 before he resolved to accept the responsibility before 
 God and before the Church of a new diocesan circum- 
 scription of France, which, reducing by two-thirds the 
 number of the Sees, set aside the rights of so many 
 bishops, but, taking into consideration the urgent neces- 
 sity of the case, and the pressing interests of religion, he 
 did not shrink from an exercise of his power, certainly 
 not exceeding its competency, since that power is 
 supreme, but hitherto unprecedented in ecclesiastical 
 history, at least on so large a scale. Pius VII. ac- 
 cordingly wrote to each of the legitimate Bishops of 
 France on the 15th of August to ask them to resign 
 their sees. It was a sacrifice which the preservation of 
 unity and the re-establishment of the Catholic religion in 
 France demanded at their hands, and he begged them 
 therefore to make it freely. After giving them various 
 reasons to move them to consent, he added that the 
 necessity of the time, of which he himself felt the 
 pressure, obliged him to require their answer in the 
 course of ten days ; and that, if within this interval he 
 received no positive reply, he would be compelled to 
 consider them as having resigned. A few days later he 
 sent Cardinal Caprara into France with legatine title and 
 powers to terminate the arrangements concerning eccle- 
 siastical affairs. The bishops of the annexed territories 
 all gave in their resignations. As for the ancient bishops 
 of France, out of eighty-one who still survived, forty-five 
 hastened to accede to the Holy Father's desire. Amongst 
 these were Mgr. Cortois de Pressigny, Bishop of Saint- 
 Malo, and Mgr. de Girac, Bishop of Rennes. The latter, 
 however, while personally ready and even desirous to 
 resign, joined his remonstrance with that of thirty-six of 
 his brethren in the Episcopate, who, collectively or indi- 
 vidually, addressed their respectful expostulations to the 
 
Episcopal pi'otcsts. 
 
 367 
 
 Pontiff on the subject, and meanwhile withheld their 
 consent. The Bishops of Leon, of Vannes, and of 
 Nantes were of this number. In the objections made 
 by the bishops who refused to give in their resignations 
 before they had been heard and their reasons weighed, 
 albeit they were couched in terms of much reverence 
 for the Head of the Church, whose supremacy they 
 freely confessed, we cannot but discern a subtle spirit 
 of Gallicanism, a spirit which infected the minds and 
 warped the judgment of so many even good and great 
 men in those times. When, however, it is remembered 
 that those bishops had all generously offered to resign 
 their sees some years before, in order to leave the Pope 
 more free to come to some arrangement with the 
 National Assembly, we must acquit them of being in- 
 fluenced by any merely personal or selfish motive in 
 the attitude they now assumed, and attribute it rather 
 to their imperfect grasp of the prerogative of the Holy 
 See. They thought that they ought to have been 
 consulted, if not convened to debate, on a measure of 
 such paramount importance. But circumstances pre- 
 cluded delay, and it was well that the Church possessed 
 in its Head a power of prompt and vigorous action, 
 in an emergency like the present, which the formalities 
 required by Gallican prejudices would have rendered 
 impossible. The result of their refusal is sufficient 
 in itself to prove that these prelates, with all their 
 virtues, and in spite of all they had suffered for the 
 faith, erred greatly in the line they adopted, for that 
 refusal became the source of a schism which lasted for 
 thirty years under the name of the Petite Eglise. It is 
 but justice, however, to these bishops to add that they 
 were themselves far from countenancing the separation ; 
 on the contrary, many of them had recommended their 
 former flocks to recognize the new bishops and submit 
 
368 
 
 Le Coz. 
 
 to their authority ; but there were wrong-headed priests 
 who took up the question with an ill-directed enthusiasm 
 and, setting themselves against the Concordat, drew a 
 number of ignorant persons to their way of thinking, and 
 thus succeeded in giving consistency to the new sect. 
 It prevailed much in the diocese of Vannes, in some 
 cantons of that of Rennes, and, to a certain degree, in 
 Saint-Brieuc. 
 
 If the persecution was now at an end, we must not 
 therefore suppose that days of trouble and vexation had 
 ceased for the Church of France or of Brittany in par- 
 ticular. It would be overstepping our limits to enter on this 
 subject, but we may observe in passing that one of the 
 fruitful causes of mischief and of disturbance was the large 
 admixture, amongst the now recognized pastors of the 
 Church, of the constitutional clergy, men who had never 
 cordially retracted their errors. Moreover, by the terms 
 of the Concordat, the privilege of nominating the bishops 
 had been conceded to the First Consul, subject, of 
 course, to the approbation of the Holy See, and Bona- 
 parte had selected fifteen of the number from amongst 
 the constitutionalists. The Pope, to whom it was a 
 painful sacrifice to admit these men under any circum- 
 stances to so high and responsible an office in the 
 Church, but who, in view of the imperious temper with 
 which he had to deal and of the interests at stake, 
 conceded all that he could conscientiously concede, 
 consented to admit them, but only with the express 
 condition that they formally renounced the Civil Consti- 
 tution of the Clergy, which was the principle of their 
 schism. Le Coz was amongst the fifteen episcopal 
 nominees, having for its affliction been elected to fill 
 the Archiepiscopal See of Besancon. Now, we all 
 know how obstinately attached this man was to his 
 opinions, and how next to impossible it would have 
 
His contumacy. 
 
 369 
 
 been to get him to think and, above all, to own that 
 he had ever been in error. Others were more or less 
 actuated by the same spirit of indomitable pride. The 
 Cardinal Caprara, the Pope's Legate, was unfortunately 
 a man of little strength of character, and very ill fitted 
 to cope with Napoleon's domineering temper, which 
 would endure no opposition, or to be proof against the 
 seductions of his cajolery, which at other times he 
 brought to bear upon the feeble diplomatist who repre- 
 sented an authority so sacred and interests so all- 
 important. Deficient alike in penetration and firmness, 
 the Papal envoy failed to detect the traps laid for him, 
 and, trusting implicitly to the report of two individuals 
 in whom he confided, suffered himself to be deceived 
 as to the dispositions of the constitutionalists instead 
 of assuring himself personally of their retractation. 
 
 Charitable people imagined, when they saw a man of 
 Le Coz's antecedents treated so favourably by the Holy 
 See and enjoying such high promotion, that he had 
 abjured his past schism and formally returned to the 
 bosom of the Church ; but he had the unblushing 
 effrontery himself to quash any such benevolent suppo- 
 sition, and to apprize all the world through the public 
 journals that he was entirely unchanged. In a letter 
 addressed to one of his former warm partisans at Rennes 
 he used these words : ' If certain men obstinately assert 
 that I have made any retractation, or signed some declara- 
 tion contrary to the principles which I have professed, 
 tell them openly that they are asserting what is untrue.' 
 He held much the same language in his first pastoral to 
 the clergy and faithful of the diocese of Besancon, 
 where he speaks, as he always continued to do, of his 
 former ecclesiastical subjects at Rennes, as if he had 
 ever been anything but a usurper of that see. His 
 conduct was in keeping with his language. He sur- 
 
37° Forced siibmission of Le Coz. 
 
 rounded himself with former schismatic bishops, whom 
 he styled demissionaires, that is, bishops who had given 
 in their resignations, a title to which they had no claim ; 
 he harassed and persecuted the faithful clergy, and 
 always gave a marked preference to those of his own 
 party. When Pius VII. came into France at the close 
 of the year 1804 to crown Napoleon, the Archbishop of 
 Besancon was about to present himself before him. 
 The Sovereign Pontiff, however, refused to receive him 
 until he had signed a certain formula, which was also to 
 be presented to all those constitutional bishops who 
 had as yet made no retractation. These were its terms : 
 ' I declare, in the presence of God, that I profess 
 adhesion and submission to the judgments which have 
 emanated from the Holy See and the Catholic, Apostolic, 
 and Roman Church with respect to the ecclesiastical 
 affairs of France. I beg his Holiness to grant me his 
 Apostolic benediction.' Le Coz refused to sign, as did 
 also one other bishop. But when Napoleon heard of 
 their contumacy he threatened to withdraw his protection 
 from them if they persisted in their opposition. This 
 threat had the desired effect. Both Le Coz and his 
 colleague complied with what the Pope required. It is 
 to be hoped that an act which to all appearance was 
 dictated by the fear of man may have been performed 
 with sufficient sincerity to avail in the sight of Him 
 who sees in secret and reads the conscience. Le Coz 
 never seems to have done anything else to repair the 
 scandals he had given. He died in 181 5, in conse- 
 quence of the fatigues he underwent during the hundred 
 days in preaching a kind of crusade against the allies 
 who were come to replace Louis XVIII. upon the throne. 
 Such was the characteristic end of a man who, but for 
 the prominent part he played in the Breton persecution 
 
Collapse of the schism. 371 
 
 and his active promotion of the schism, would have called 
 for no further notice. 
 
 It will be obvious how great were the support and 
 encouragement which the priests in Brittany who had 
 formerly taken the oath received from the attitude of 
 the late schismatic occupant of Rennes in their rebellious 
 behaviour towards the Catholic bishops to whom they 
 were now subject. Had they listened to the voice of 
 conscience, or even followed the dictates of reason, 
 instead of manifesting the obstinacy which distinguished 
 the greater number of them, they would have eagerly 
 profited by the condescension of the Holy See in their 
 regard to return promptly to Catholic unity ; but pride, 
 which so often leads the way to error, tends most power- 
 fully to retain men in its toils when they have once 
 become entangled therein. Like Le Coz, they were 
 ashamed to acknowledge their faults, and sought vain 
 pretexts to avoid the necessity of any humiliating admis- 
 sion. They were always looked upon unfavourably by 
 good Catholics, who, as much as they could, avoided 
 assisting at their Masses. They have now long dis- 
 appeared from this mortal scene, and with them also 
 have vanished all traces of that schism which inflicted 
 so many woes on the Church of France. It exists no 
 longer save in history, for even the generation which 
 could remember it has passed away. Eternal truth has 
 prevailed, and the Church of France survives to sustain 
 fresh combats with the same indomitable energy and 
 the same sublime faith and patience, and — who knows ? 
 — perhaps to add fresh martyrs to the glorious list which 
 it has already supplied, and to which Catholic Brittany 
 furnished so noble a contingent.