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Daybreak in France
131
but for the “deadly sin” of his subjects who had dared to condemn
the mass.
In the great hall of the bishop’s palace the monarch appeared and
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in words of moving eloquence bewailed “the crime, the blasphemy,
the day of sorrow and disgrace,” that had come upon the nation. And
he called upon every loyal subject to aid in the extirpation of the
pestilent “heresy” that threatened France with ruin. Tears choked his
utterance, and the whole assembly wept, with one accord exclaiming,
“We will live and die for the Catholic religion!
“The grace that bringeth salvation” had appeared, but France,
illuminated by its radiance, had turned away, choosing darkness
rather than light. They had called evil good, and good evil, till
they had fallen victims to their wilful self-deception. The light that
would have saved them from deception, from staining their souls
with blood-guiltiness, they had willfully rejected.
Again the procession formed. “At short distances scaffolds
had been erected on which certain Protestant Christians were to
be burned alive, and it was arranged that the fagots should be lighted
at the moment the king approached, and that the procession should
halt to witness the execution.
There was no wavering on the part
of the victims. On being urged to recant, one answered: “I only
believe in what the prophets and the apostles formerly preached, and
what all the company of saints believed. My faith has a confidence
in God which will resist all the powers of hell.
Upon reaching the palace, the crowd dispersed and the king
and the prelates withdrew, congratulating themselves that the work
would be continued to the complete destruction of “heresy.”
The gospel of peace which France rejected was to be too surely
rooted out, and terrible would be the results. On January 21, 1793,
another procession passed through the streets of Paris. “Again the
king was the chief figure; again there were tumult and shouting;
again there was heard the cry for more victims; again there were
black scaffolds; and again the scenes of the day were closed by horrid
executions; Louis XVI, struggling hand to hand with his jailers and
executioners, was dragged forward to the block, and there held down
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13
D’Aubigne, bk. 4, ch. 12.
14
Wylie, bk. 13, ch. 21.
15
D’Aubigne, bk. 4, ch. 12.