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From Here to Forever
place of execution ... pleaded with resistless eloquence in behalf of
the gospel.
Protestants were charged with plotting to massacre the Catholics,
to overthrow the government, and to murder the king. Not a shadow
of evidence could be produced in support of the allegations. Yet the
cruelties inflicted upon the innocent Protestants accumulated in a
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weight of retribution, and in after-centuries wrought the very doom
they had predicted upon the king, his government, and his subjects.
But it was brought about by infidels and by the papists themselves.
The suppression of Protestantism was to bring upon France these
dire calamities.
Suspicion, distrust, and terror now pervaded all classes of society.
Hundreds fled from Paris, self-constituted exiles from their native
land, in many cases thus giving the first intimation that they favored
the reformed faith. The papists looked about them in amazement at
thought of the unsuspected “heretics” that had been tolerated among
them.
Printing Declared Abolished
Francis I had delighted to gather at his court men of letters from
every country. But, inspired with zeal to stamp out heresy, this
patron of learning issued an edict declaring printing abolished all
over France! Francis I presents one among the many examples on
record showing that intellectual culture is not a safeguard against
religious intolerance and persecution.
The priests demanded that the affront offered to high Heaven
in the condemnation of the mass be expiated in blood. January
21, 1535, was fixed upon for the awful ceremonial. Before every
door was a lighted torch in honor of the “holy sacrament.” Before
daybreak the procession formed at the palace of the king.
“The host was carried by the bishop of Paris under a magnificent
canopy, ... supported by four princes of the blood. ... After the host
walked the king. ... Francis I on that day wore no crown, nor robe
of state.
At every altar he bowed in humiliation, not for the vices
that defiled his soul, nor the innocent blood that stained his hands,
11
Wylie, bk. 13, ch. 20.
12
Ibid., bk. 13, ch. 21.