in the heart, and all the foundations of faith in the truth of God's word, had long been removed by the presumptuous substitution of the alleged infallible authority of the Church of Rome, for the external historical evidences of Christianity, and its internal spiritual sanctions; and of the arbitrary decisions of the casuists pronounced in "the tribunal of penance," for the eternal principles of truth and holiness proclaimed by God himself in his holy word. The Romish Church had in the sixteenth century refused to be reformed; she had opposed to the remonstrances and the entreaties of those who could no longer brook her corruptions, nor hide under a bushel the light of God's truth which had broken in upon them, the deliberate affirmation of all the false principles on which her system was based, in the decrees of the Council of Trent, and the systematic endeavour to give to those principles a practical ascendancy in the affairs of Europe, by the establishment of the Jesuit Order. She was now in the eighteenth century made to eat the bitter "fruit of her own way; she who had" despised all reproof," was now filled with her own devices."

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And as the solemn lesson of the sixteenth, so has the terrible lesson of the eighteenth century been lost upon her. No sooner has she regained her footing in the land laid desolate by the iniquity that had issued forth from her, than she exhibits her determination to resume the position formerly occupied, and to renew the pretensions formerly advanced, by her. She has passed through the discipline of affliction, but she has not been exercised by it; she has received no correction. When in the train of the combined armies of Europe Louis XVIII. returned twice to the throne of his ancestors, under the ægis of the Holy Alliance, that mystical league of crowned heads in defence of the divine right of kings, the restored sovereign felt that the stability of his throne and the success of the royal mission entrusted to his hands by the providence of God, depended on his accommodating himself, as far as was consistent with right principles and with his own dignity, to the altered spirit of the times, and to the wayward humour of a generation cradled in anarchy and reared amidst the din of arms. But he was not permitted to follow in peace and unmolested that course of conciliation, which alone could render the application of remedial measures for the healing of the wounds of the nation possible. He was surrounded, and by public opposition, by private remonstrance, and by the dexterous management of his personal foibles, drawn in spite of himself into a line of policy, the fatal results of which he foresaw and deplored. So sensible was he of the violence done to his own principles of government, that when the line of policy advocated by his brother

was permanently forced upon him, he considered himself to have virtually abdicated the throne in his favour.

The reign of Charles X., therefore, virtually began at the identical period which M. Capefigue points out as the commencement of his ruin; the formation of the Villèle ministry at the close of the year 1821. For more than eight years, with the short intermission of the Martignac ministry, which had recourse, when it was too late, to conciliatory methods, and thereby aggravated the difficulties in which it had found the country, did the congregationist party try the patience of a highly inflammable people, which had sucked hatred to the principles of that party with its mother's milk, under the auspices of a prince, who with many qualities that would have adorned his character in a private station, combined that superstitious tone of mind, and that invincible obstinacy, which constitute the bigot. That he was, as has been confidently stated, regularly affiliated to the Jesuit order, is perhaps improbable; but that the system which he pursued was the system of that order, and that he pursued it not so much under the pressure of external influence, as by the impulse of a strong personal conviction, is indisputable. The character which this gave to the entire government of Charles X., is well described by M. Capefigue, whose testimony on this point may the more be relied on, as he is a decided partisan of the Romish Church, and an advocate, within certain limits, for her political ascendancy:

"Two causes principally contributed to the ruin of the crown; in the first place, the clumsily organized supremacy which it was intended to give to the clergy, and the incomplete and mongrel attempts to reestablish an aristocracy; in the second place, the pertinacity of Charles X. in retaining his ministry and the septennial chamber. The royal piety increased with advancing years; a time arrives when the fear of death seizes and dominates a weak soul; one has only to imagine clever and ambitious men turning to account this dread of a future life of torment and of anguish, bringing it face to face with some aberrations and follies of youth, and it is easy to understand how an ardent imagination may be carried away by the practices of religion, that sure refuge from the storms of life. I shall not repeat ignoble calumnies, and the rumours of sacred initiation and affiliation to the Jesuits, those lies which at a later period were reproduced in caricatures. Charles X. had a lively faith, a generous belief; he lost himself, but he was not a hypocrite*. I have already said what the congregation was at the accession of Charles X. it developed itself on a larger scale, attaching itself to the

We beg M. Capefigue's pardon for interrupting him; but does he mean to insinuate that, to become a Jesuit, a man must be a hypocrite? Einé Tig & avтwv, ἴδιος αὐτῶν προφήτης· ἀεὶ ψεῦσται.

court and the ministry; it was to be found in the council of state and in the privy council; it secured for itself a special minister; the Bishop of Hermopolis took the portfolio of worship, and although notions of gallicanism occasionally balanced the convictions of the prelate, his tendency was altogether favourable to the interests and opinions of the religious party. It will not be expected of me that I should pick up the thousand and one fooleries which have been hawked about France on the subject of the Jesuits; filthy pamphlets were published; every thing comes aright to the parties, provided they attain their purposes; I leave in the dirt all those 'confessions' and 'revelations' which were put forth; the factious need a bugbear; the Jesuits were flung down to the people; they were not only men of intelligence, activity and ardour, who obtained the mastery over society and over a royalty which they were about to bring to destruction, but in the eyes of the parties they were perverse men, and monsters in the category of human feeling. What then were these Jesuits, their statutes, their habits, their influence? What mysterious and mighty influence did they exercise over the government? A few fragments of the Jesuit order had united themselves together in France under the name Pères de la Foi. When Napoleon rebuilt the altars, their statutes, being reproduced from the ancient constitutions of the proscribed order, were denounced to the ministry of worship; an order of M. Portalis decreed the dissolution of their establishment. All hope, however, was not lost; the ingenious spirit of the Jesuits invented a thousand resources. Under the protection of Cardinal Fesch and of several bishops, they penetrated into the high saloons of the aristocracy and of the empire, as well as into the palaces of the old opposition of M. de Staël. At the restoration their position was changed; the piety of Louis XVIII. was not profound enough to induce him to give effectual protection to the order of St. Ignatius; nevertheless the royal ordinance which exempted the petits séminaires from the laws of the university, favoured the domination of the Pères de la Foi over the entire system of public education; they had houses at Dôle, at Bordeaux, at Sainte-Anne-d'Auray, at Montmorillon, at Aix, at Forcalquier, at Vitry, under the central direction of Mont-Rouge and Saint-Acheul. Their strength consisted chiefly in that hierarchy of affiliation, by virtue of which they had protectors and supporters every where. The clever and powerful founder of this institution had in a manner called upon the whole human race to second the congregation which he had established. Under the vulgar name of jésuites à robe courte any layman could be admitted to take a part in the life and the spirit of the society. I cannot tell how many noble lords and distinguished men were affiliated to the Jesuits: it has been affirmed in some pamphlets of Charles X. himself. I believe that he who once was the noble and graceful Comte d'Artois, might have given, at the deathbed of a former mistress, a chivalrous promise to return to religious principles and ardent faith; but between this repentance of the follies of youth, and an affiliation to the Jesuit order, a sort of donning of the religious

habit, there was a distinction which the parties were unwilling to make. It is true, however, that all who surrounded the king, his most pious servants, the Duke of Montmorency, the Marquis of Rivière, that host of bishops and priests who supported his throne, rendered admirable service to the institute of the Jesuits. All worked together to extend its ramifications; not only all the children of the court and of the highest families, but all the sons of public functionaries, and all who looked for advancement, were sent to be educated by the Jesuits; for as soon as it was ascertained that the Jesuits exercised an influence over the government, they were adored as favourites. Around this aggregation others formed themselves, which were real emanations from it, and served as complements to it. The young men who did not become professed members of the society, formed themselves, on leaving the Jesuit schools, into affiliated associations for sound studies under the pious direction of M. de Montmorency; at a more advanced age they were recommended to associations for sound literature; they were incorporated in the immense association for the propagation of the faith, a kind of congregation in which the poor and the rich alike contributed at the low rate of five centimes a week. Workmen had the offer of entering the affiliated association of St. Joseph. The prisons also had a congregation of their own. All this was connected together and kept in admirable order. Nevertheless, I must not fail to mention, the society of Jesuits had lost that high character of civilization and intelligence which had formerly called it to such high destinies. One of the principal causes which had contributed to enlarge the circle of its conquests, was their indisputably high state of education, their scientific superiority over all then existing institutions; an elevation to which the modern Jesuits were far from having attained. Still St. Acheul and Mont-Rouge more especially were visited by the most purely devout portion of the court; they went thither for religious retreats, for neuvaines, for recreations without number; there the fathers and the young novices were often seen around a rich billiard playing against noble antagonists, knights of the orders, or peers of the realm. Their protégés were every where; their affiliation extended to every branch of the government. The episcopate protected their order; the minister of ecclesiastical affairs, M. Frayssinous, lived with them almost on a footing of commensality; he used to go for retreats to Mont-Rouge. At court the Great Almonry was wholly theirs; M. de Latil favoured them openly. The friend and intimate confidant of royalty, M. de Latil had rapidly risen from an obscure position to the dignity of cardinal and the archbishopric of Reims. He was one of those prelates of ardent spirit destined to play a part in the great world, who in other times had troubled both the State and the Church. The chaplains of Princes, gentlemen such as MM. de Montmorency, de Blacas, de Rivière, loved the institute of the Jesuits; they would have looked upon the day of their public and avowed restoration as upon a great epoch in the annals of the monarchy: the sons of St. Ignatius had likewise brought under

their influence the woman who governed Louis XVIII., in order to have the mastery over the mind of the old monarch. In every ministerial department the Jesuits had placed one of their friends: near the president of the council they had M. de Renneville, a young man who filled an important official department, but who at the same time never failed to attend to any recommendation from the chiefs of the religious association; at the ministry of the interior they had M. Franchet; at the police, M. Delavau; in the royal household, M. de Doudeauville; at the foreign office, M. de Damas; at the post-office, M. de Vaulchier; and by these means all was connected together, and the government offices were peopled with their creatures. With singular tact they never lost sight of each other throughout life; the superiors kept their eyes upon every one, even the humblest of their pupils; they assembled them together on the great annual solemnities, never ceasing to mould them to their common purpose. Several members of the Chamber of Peers were affiliated members of the holy order; in the Chamber of Deputies the order had the majority. An invisible hand directed all these wires, and dictated to the government the views it should adopt and the political course it should follow. Hence all those projects and measures derived from one common inspiration, which carried France out of the orbit of her national character, and suffered not her indifference to be at rest. I consider this secret action as one of the great causes of the downfall of the dynasty, not only by reason of what it actually effected, but by reason of the suspicions to which it gave rise. It became the stalking-horse for every species of accusation against the kingly power; the Jesuits were laid hold of for the purpose of making the government unpopular, they were made the objects of attack, with a view to disguise the blows aimed at the monarchy."-Capefigue, Histoire de la Restauration, vol. iii. pp. 364–368.

The origin of this fatal influence reaches high up in the history of the restoration; the machinations, of which the Pavillon Marsan formed the head-quarters, and which as early as 1818 assumed the audacious character of a conspiracy having for its object to obtain the abdication of Louis XVIII., were followed up with all the wiliness and perseverance which at all times have characterised the movements of the Jesuits. They overcame, after many ineffectual struggles, the better judgment and sounder principles of the elder Bourbon; and when his death placed the pupil of the Jesuits on the throne, the mask was prematurely thrown off in a moment of unguarded exultation. It was then that the various projects, which had been adjourned from time to time, for restoring to the clergy generally, and to the monastic orders in particular, and among them especially to the Jesuits, their ancient powers and privileges, were pressed forward; it was then that it was proposed to remove every remaining restriction (for much had already been done in this direction) by which the