To the credit of England, the report of
these cruel persecutions carried on against our Protestant brethren
in France, produced such a sensation on the part of the government
as determined them to interfere; and now the persecutors of the
Protestants made this spontaneous act of humanity and religion
the pretext for charging the sufferers with a treasonable correspondence
with England; but in this state of their proceedings, to their
great dismay, a letter appeared, sent some time before to England
by the duke of Wellington, stating that much information existed
on the events of the south.’
The ministers of the three denominations
in London, anxious not to be misled, requested one of their brethren
to visit the scenes of persecution, and examine with impartiality
the nature and extent of the evils they were desirous to relieve.
Rev. Clement Perot undertook this difficult task, and fulfilled
their wishes with a zeal, prudence, and devotedness, above all
praise. His return furnished abundant and incontestible proof
of a shameful persecution, materials for an appeal to the British
Parliament, and a printed report which was circulated through
the continent, and which first conveyed correct information to
the inhabitants of France.
Foreign interference was now found eminently
useful; and the declarations of tolerance which it elicited from
the French government, as well as the more cautious march of the
Catholic persecutors, operated as decisive and involuntary acknowledgments
of the importance of that interference, which some persons at
first censured and despised, put through the stern voice of public
opinion in England and elsewhere produced a resultant suspension
of massacre and pillage, the murderers and plunderers were still
left unpunished, and even caressed and rewarded for their crimes;
and whilst Protestants in France suffered the most cruel and degrading
pains and penalties for alleged trifling crimes, Catholics, covered
with blood, and guilty of numerous and horrid murders, were acquitted.
Perhaps the virtuous indignation expressed
by some of the more enlightened Catholics against these abominable
proceedings, had no small share in restraining them. Many innocent
Protestants had been condemned to the galleys and otherwise punished
for supposed crimes, upon the oaths of wretches the most unprincipled
and abandoned. M. Madier de Montgau, judge of the cour royale
of Nismes, and president of the cour d’assizes of the Gard
and Vaucluse, upon one occasion felt himself compelled to break
up the court, rather than take the deposition of that notorious
and sanguinary monster, Truphemy: “In a hall,” says
he, “of the Palace of justice, opposite that in which I sat,
several unfortunate persons persecuted by the faction were upon
trial, every deposition tending to their incrimin ation was applauded
with the cries of Vive le Roi! Three times the explosion of this
atrocious joy became so terrible that it was necessary to send
for reinforcements from the barracks, and two hundred soldiers
were often unable to restrain, the people. On a sudden the shouts
and cries of Vive le Roi! redoubled: a man arrived, caressed,
applauded, borne in triumphit was the horrible Truphemy; he approached
the tribunal- he came to depose against the prisoners he was admitted
as a witness he raised his hand to take the oath! Seized with
horror at the sight, I rushed from my seat, and entered the hall
of council; my colleagues followed me; in vain they persuaded
me to resume my seat; ‘No!’ exclaimed 1, ‘I will
not consent to see that wretch admitted to give evidence in a
court of justice in the city which he has filled with murders;
in the palace, on the steps of which be has murdered the unfortunate
Bourillon. I cannot admit that he should kill his victims by his
testimonies no more than by his poignards. He an accuser! he a
witness! No, never will I consent to see this monster rise, in
the presence of magistrates, to take a sacrilegious oath, his
hand still reeking with blood.’ These words were repeated
out of doors; the witness trembled; the a house trembled; the
factious who guided the tongue of Truphemy as they had directed
his arm, who dictated calumny after they had taught him murder.
These words penetrated the dungeons of the condemned, and inspired
hope; they gave another courageous advocate the resolution to
espouse the cause of the persecuted; he carried the prayers of
innocence and misery to the foot of the throne; there he asked
if the evidence of a Truphemy was not sufficient to annul a sentence.
The king granted a full and free pardon.”
With respect to the conduct of the Protestants, these highly outraged citizens, pushed to extremities by their persecutors, felt at length that they had only to choose the manner in which they were to perish. They unanimously determined that they would die fighting in their own defence. This firm attitude apprised their butchers that they could no longer murder with impunity. Everything was immediately changed. Those, who for f our years had filled others with terror, now felt it in their turn. They trembled at the force which men, so long resigned, found in despair, and their alarm was heightened when they heard that the inhabitants of the Cevennes, persuaded of the danger of their brethren, were marching to their assistance. But, without waiting for these reinforcements, the Protestants appeared at night in the same order and armed in the same manner as their enemies. The others paraded the Boulevards, with their usual noise and fury, but the Protestants remained silent and firm in the posts they had chosen. Three days these dangerous and ominous meetings continued; but the effusion of blood was prevented by the efforts of some worthy citizens distinguished by their rank and fortune. By sharing the dangers of the Protestant population, they obtained the pardon of an enemy who now trembled while he menaced.
