self!" and then spurned with his foot that venerable face, which when living had been the terror of all the murderers of France. That head was embalmed, and sent to Rome. When the general massacre had begun, Charles took a carabine and fired from his window at those who were struggling in the river. When the city was made noisome by corpses, the same Catholic king repeated the words of a heathen emperor: "there is no more grateful odour than that of an enemy's carcase." The court ladies came down to gloat upon the dead bodies which were spread in the paved court. Secret orders had been sent to the provinces; the number of the slain is variously given; by papists as 30,000, by others as 100,000. These orgies were called the Parisian Matins, in allusion to the Sicilian Vespers, of 1281.*

The downfall of the Huguenots was accomplished by a series of persecutions which lasted at least fifteen years. The court first assailed them with vexatious lawsuits, and sought to extirpate them as heretics. They proceeded to deprive them of all civil and military offices, and even of the masterships of trades. They harassed them by missionaries, who overran the kingdom, entered churches to ridicule or silence the pastors, and invaded the family circle and forced away their little ones. In 1681 it was enacted that the children of the Reformed, "were, at seven years of age, capable of reason and discernment in an affair of such importance as that of their salvation." Even infants were unmercifully beaten and bruised, in order that they might be made Roman Catholics. But a principal means of destruction was aimed at the ministers. After incurring various disabilities from year to year, they were at length absolutely silenced, and many of them brought to the scaffold. Then followed the R‹• cation and the Dragonades. Soldiers were quartered upon the Reformed, churches were pulled down, and the people were summoned, by the police of their respective towns, to abjure their faith. Upon their refusal, they were given over to the soldiery, who seized every passage, and reduced the places to the condition of sacked towns. The details of murder may be read in Laval, in Quick, or in the little book before us; they are too extensive and too dreadful to be dwelt on here.t

It has not fallen within our plan to say much of the great theologians of France, and time would fail us to give a com

* Laval, iii. lib. v.

VOL. XII. NO. I.

† Laval, book viii. Quick, cxxxviii., cli,

12

plete list even of their names. Yet it would be unjust to this distinguished church if we were not to say, that for erudition, eloquence, argumentative skill, and piety, the Reformed theologians of France were second to none in the world. The form of their theology was derived from Calvin. Viret is named, and one of his letters recorded, in the minutes of the Church. Theodore Beza was moderator of the Synod of Rochelle in 1571. These men and their coevals lived in days of peril, and some jeoparded their lives unto the death in the high places of the field. Pierre Merlin, a learned commentator, and chaplain to Coligni, escaped in a singular manner from the great massacre. When the alarm was given he leaped out of a window, and hid himself in a hayloft, where a hen came and laid an egg for three days successively, by which he was sustained until he could fly unobserved. Six years after this he was moderator of the Synod of St. Foy, and five years later presided in that of Vitré.* No French protestant was more relied upon by his party than Daniel Chamier. "He was," says Bayle, "no less a minister of state to his party, than a minister of the church." He was said to have drawn up the edict of Nantes. The historian of that edict says, "he was one of those fools of the Synod (a court nickname) whom the king did not love, one of those untractable men who connot be prevailed with; one of those stiff persons who are proof against fear and hope, the strongest engines of the court." His Panstratia, in four volumes folio, was the great polemical arsenal of the next generation. It was edited by Benedict Turretine and abridged by Frederick Spanheim.t Like ancient armour, it is

too unwieldly for our day. The manner of his death serves to characterize the times, and will remind our reader of the arrow directed to Philip's eye, as well as the adage of the Prince of Orange, Every bullet hath its billet. For Chamier was killed at the siege of Montauban by a cannon ball marked with the letter C, as being the hundredth discharge on that day. Bochart, Daillé, Blondel, and Rivet, are names which perpetually recur in these church records, and which the church will not willingly let die. As long as Rivet lived, and even when he was in another country, he was employed by the French Synod as the ablest and most accurate defender of contested points. His dying scenes (as we have them in Middleton) are almost without a parallel, unless in the dissolution of the protomartyr Stephen.

Quick, i, 125.

† Buddeus, Isagage, p. 372.

+ Quick.

There were some distinguished Scotsmen among the French clergy. Such were Welsh, Primrose, and Cameron. John Welsh was the son-in-law of John Knox, and was long settled as a pastor at St. Jean d' Angely. It is he whom Rutherford calls "that heavenly, prophetical and apostolic man of God;" adding that he had it from witnesses of his life, that he often gave a third of his hours to prayer. During his last illness, he was so overcome with heavenly joy, that he was overheard to say, "Lord, hold thy hand, it is enough; thy servant is a clay vessel and can hold no more. Primose and Cameron were professors, the one at Saumur, the other at Bordeaux. It was with direct reference to them that Louis XIII. signified his will that no foreign minister should be settled in France. As to John Cameron, he was an errorist, though not in so great a degree as might be hastily inferred. from the tenets of his followers at Saumur. He was held to be, and his works prove it, one of the greatest theologians of his day. The misfortune was that he affected novelty, and especially to be as unlike the School of Geneva as possible. He loved to think and dispute rather than to write. The Theses Salmureinses, which still circulate among us, evince his acumen, ingenuity, and dialectic address. Amyraud and Capellus were propagators of his doctrines touching universal grace. It was said that the former carried matters so far as to copy a certain motion of his head and his Scotch accent, so that Louis XIII. observed the foreign pronunciation.

But we must reserve biographical sketches for future occasions. We have, in part, been induced to dwell at such length on the French churches, by their having been, to serve to purpose, claimed again and again, as a looser sort of Presbyterians; in other words, as tending to Congregationalism. No such tendency can be discovered, and we challenge the proof. That like ourselves, they were sometimes visited by brethren of this persuasion, appears from the following record, in 1645: Upon report made by certain Deputies of the maritime Provinces, that there do arrive unto them from other countries, some persons, going by the name of Independents, and so called, for that they teach that every particular church. should of right be governed by its own laws, without any dependency or subordination unto any person whatsoever in ecclesiastical matters, and without being obliged to own or

Fleming's Fulfilling of the Scriptures. Quick, i. 324. Laval, vi. 877. Quick, i. 314, 413; ii. 95, 101, 260, 430, 508.

acknowledge the authority of Colloquies or Synods in matters of discipline and order, and that they settle their dwellings in this kingdom, a thing of great and dangerous consequence, if not in time carefully prevented: Now this assembly, fea ing lest the contagion of their poison should diffuse itself insensibly, and bring with it a world of disorders and confusions upon us; and judging the said sect of Independentism not only prejudicial to the church of God, (because as much as in it lieth, it doth usher in confusion, and openeth a door to all kinds of singularities, irregularities, and extravagances, and barreth the use of those means, which would most effectually prevent them,) but also is very dangerous unto the civil state; for in case it should prevail and gain ground among us, it would form as many religions as there be parishes and distinct particular assemblies among us:”* therefore, &c. &c. This is strong language; too strong, we are persuaded, to be subscribed by any Presbyterian even of our harsh communion, but very decisive as to the historical question, in reference to which alone we cite it. There were many points of French Presbyterianism which are not agreeable to our views, chiefly those which were caused by the political relations of the Huguenot party. But the history of these churches is so rich in suggestions respecting polity, discipline, and doctrine, that we feel surprised at the neglect into which it has been allowed to fall.

ART. V.-Report of the Presbyterian Church Case: the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, at the suggestion of James Todd and others, vs. Ashbel Green and others. By Samuel Miller, Jun., a Member of the Philadelphia Bar. Philadelphia: William S. Martien, 8vo. pp. 596.t

THE parties that so lately convulsed the Presbyterian church in the United States now form two distinct and inde

* Quick, ii. 467.

In publishing the following article, the conductors of the Princeton Review have been led to depart from their usual rule of publishing nothing which does not express in all respects their own opinions. This article, which they have received from a member of the Bar, embraces the discussion of legal questions, in relation to some of which there exists much diversity of opinion; and were it possible so to modify it as to make it express entirely the views of the conductors of this work, it would not be just to the author thus to destroy the entireness of his argument and mar the ingenuity and force of his reasoning.

pendent religious societies. Whatever may be the issue of their controversy in the civil courts, to which it has been referred for judgment, the separation is complete, and, unless a voluntary re-union should take place, must be final. The knowledge of this fact has no doubt had a most happy influence in quieting the excitement and soothing the ardent feelings, which the ecclesiastical perhaps more than the civil controversy had aroused; and which the anticipation of further strife in the deliberative assemblies of the church, as much as actual collision, warmed and animated. A calm has settled over the scene of recent agitation: whether the subsidence of the troubled waves is decisive of peace among the elements, or promises but a respite, certainly to human sight, the crisis seems to have passed;-the storm has spent its violence, though it may yet again ruffle the waters. The season of repose should not go by unimproved. Though but the commencement of long continued and unbroken peace, we may with great profit look back upon the momentous struggle, review our own conduct therein, and examine well the ground on which we now stand. Thus the lesson of experience may be impressed more deeply, and we may be the better able to bear an enlightened testimony, before all the world, of the principles which we hold, and the consistency of our conduct with those principles. And if the day of trial has not yet finally passed away, much more need have we of all the lessons of experience; much more important is it that we should understand fully our present position; that we should estimate aright its exigencies, and our own strength.

Of the different questions involved in this controversy, that which its introduction into the civil court has perhaps rendered the most prominent and engrossing, regards the legal rights of the respective parties. No duty is more plainly inculcated in the word of God than that of obedience to civil authority-to the public laws under which we live; and some have invoked that sanction from the belief that the legal question is of paramount importance; as if the party against which the courts of justice should determine must be considered as violators of the law. But this arises from a mistaken view of the subject. Our condemnation at a civil bar would not necessarily have proved us contemners of the law, or even unwillingly obedient to its mandate. Had the highest tribunal, before which the case could be brought, decided against us, any resistance to the execution of its deeree