Events at Paris broke the treacherous calm throughout France. On the 4th of September, 1792, a body of armed men from Paris visited Meaux, inflamed the roughs of the town, and extorted from the Council the liberation of two debtors. They even demanded the names of other prisoners, or, by way of compromise, their immediate trial and death sentence at the hands of the Council itself. Such fantastic insolence being firmly resisted by the officers of the town, the mob took all on themselves, straightway seized the prison, and murdered seven priests and seven other captives. Perhaps some reader will find a fatal irony in the number fourteen, and remember the tragedy near two hundred and fifty years earlier. We may, however, heartily join with Carro, the historian of the town, in praising the sane moderation generally shown by its representatives during this giddy and spasmodic period. But these could not either ignore the Sansculottes de S. Martin, or arrest the general democratic tyranny; which not only exacted from all officials an oath of eternal hatred for Royalty, minted the Ecclesiastical vessels, shut up the Churches, and curiously turned the Cathedral into a Temple of Reason, but, further, treated each individual as a child, fixed prices and wages by law, and imposed excessive and arbitrary requisitions.

This political fashion was fortunately followed by one that paid attention to the real instruction of real children in the schools. The speedy relaxation of ignorant and ambitious methods soon led to the Royalist reaction, which itself again called forth a recrudescence of the Democratic inquisition. But the air was possibly clearer when the nineteenth century opened, and a sous-préfet was duly proclaimed at Meaux, under the brand new Consular Constitution.

M. Carro, to whose careful "Histoire de Meaux" I am deeply indebted, remarks with perspicacity that, though the people of that district have constantly reflected the influences of dominant power civil and religious, yet, when left to themselves, they have shown energy and goodness of heart: the latter in benefits to the unfortunate, the former in resistance to oppression and to foreign invasion. Since he wrote, yet another vast catastrophe has swept over this district, which neither of those qualities could in the slightest avert. The great international contest, of 1870 and 1871, filled this place with German foes for 377 days, and the city is thought to have lost in that year 1,500,000 francs.

11

from the Eastward. Early Seventeenth Century. The Portion to the left, showing an open place, is the Grand Marché.

NOTE 3:

SENIORITY OF THE MEAUX "REFORMED" CHURCH:-The phrase used in the text doubtless conveys a priority of importance. As regards priority of date it would seemingly be as fitting.

Although we may quite agree with Doctor Johnson, that the discovery of two apples and three pears in an orchard would not justify the assertion that there was fruit there,* yet the story related by Crespin, and confirmed by many writers, indicates that at Meaux was planted, if soon again uprooted, the first tree of a fruitful orchard.

As to the commanding influence of certain early preachings and discussions in the town and diocese of Meaux, historians seem agreed. The fact that this place was the cradle of the French Reformation is doubtless generally accepted; and so intimates a writer in the "Bulletin de la Société de l'histoire "du protestantisme français" (Tome: XV, p. 148). D'Aubigné's History of the Reformation contains constant allusions to Meaux as a central influence in France in early days. Baird's History of the Rise of the Huguenots traces the Reformatory movement in France to the University of Paris, whose remarkable teacher Lefèvre joined Briçonnet at Meaux. (Rise of the Huguenots, 1880, Vol. I, pp. 67 etc). Maimbourg says that certain of Briçonnet's subordinates had taken advantage of his authority to lay at Meaux the foundations of a LutheroZwinglian heresy, which had since unhappily spread through a great part of the kingdom. (Histoire du Calvinisme, 1682, pp. 12, 13). The "Luthériens de Meaux" were proverbial. (Histoire ecclés: des égl: réf:; Edition 1883 etc., Tome I, p. 67.) The Benedictine historian, Dom Toussaints du Plessis says, with obvious grief :-" Le diocèse de Meaux est le premier qui ait eu le malheur d'ouvrir son sein aur novateurs." (Histoire de l'Égl: de Meaux, Tome I, p. 325). Sismondi and Michelet, in the course of their several histories, indicate the importance they attach to that movement. (Sismondi "Histoire des Français," Tome XVI, pp. 113, 114). (Michelet Histoire de France," 1857, Vol. VIII, pp. 144, 180, etc.).

A passage in Baird (I. 253), introducing his account of the martyrdom, seems to imply that there had been several congregations in this diocese of Meaux. Doubtless there were several Gospellers' congregations of some kind in France at this time. Had they any organization or permanent plan? From the story told in the text, and cited by Baird, it would seem *Boswell's Life of Samuel Johnson. Edition 1823: Vol. II, pp. 96, 97.

not. At Meaux was adopted in 1546, by the congregation there, a definite scheme of organization modelled on that of the Refugee Church at Strasburg, which can be fairly described to day. [See text above, and notes hereafter.] Meaux was thus aligned with the great Strasburg movement. It should be remarked that the phrase used by the "Actiones et Monimenta Martyrum" is "Ecclesiola."

This adventurous act was immediately visited by the authorities with a crushing punishment. The reader will, however, find that the French movement went on and increased. There was a small and influential "Église" at Orleans from 1547 [Bulletin, Tome XVIII, p. 122.] And we are told that, at the end of the reign of Francis I, the reformation had penetrated to seventeen provinces or sub-divisions of provinces, and into about thirty-three towns. [Bulletin, 6th year, p. 171; where also may be found a list, headed by Meaux in the Champagne.] What organization each of these congregations adopted I cannot say. Eventually in 1555, (nine years after the Meaux affair,) a church, also on the Strasburg model, was founded at Paris; at which city in 1559 took place a great Synod of the "Reformed" Churches in France. [Cf. Hist. Ecclés. d. Égl. Réf., 1883, Tome I, pp. 119, 120 and footnote. Hist. du Synode Général, etc. Paris, 1872, p. XIII.]

To restore the ruins of the Meaux organization of 1546 was, after the foundation of the Paris church, undertaken by La Chasse, a missioner from Paris. (Hist. Ecclés. ibid. p. 121.)

The Society of the Waldenses, or Vaudois,* whether Calvin borrowed from it or not, must, with its own peculiar traditions, with its own reformation, be considered a somewhat distinct phenomenon. In a former age, these preachers of poverty and religion had spread their influence over a large part of Europe, but had, by persecution, been driven to use for some time a still precarious refuge, about the Alpine regions of Dauphiny and Piedmont. Early in the sixteenth century their deputies, Morel and Masson, attended a conference with German and Swiss reformers. In 1532 the Waldenses held a synod at Chanforans in the valley of the Angrogne. They then quite renounced the Roman authority, and assimilated themselves to the Swiss congregations. In 1545 they suffered a brutal massacre at the hands of Minier Baron d'Oppède. How far

*

Compare the Hist: Ecclés: as to the antiquity, and the 1541 confession, of the Vaudois (Edition 1883, Tome I, p. 47.) The origin of the Society is in some dispute. See Comba's History of the Waldenses of Italy, (English Edition,