The History of Freedom, and Other Essays. Acton John Emerich Edward Dalberg Acton, Baron

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their policy adopted only for their destruction, and that the murder of Coligny and his followers was a long premeditated crime. Catholics and Protestants vied with each other in detecting proofs of that which they variously esteemed a sign of supernatural inspiration or of diabolical depravity. In the last forty years a different opinion has prevailed. It has been deemed more probable, more consistent with testimony and with the position of affairs at the time, that Coligny succeeded in acquiring extraordinary influence over the mind of Charles, that his advice really predominated, and that the sanguinary resolution was suddenly embraced by his adversaries as the last means of regaining power. This opinion is made plausible by many facts. It is supported by several writers who were then living, and by the document known as the Confession of Anjou. The best authorities of the present day are nearly unanimous in rejecting premeditation.

      The evidence on the opposite side is stronger than they suppose. The doom which awaited the Huguenots had been long expected and often foretold. People at a distance, Monluc in Languedoc, and the Protestant Mylius in Italy, drew the same inference from the news that came from the court. Strangers meeting on the road discussed the infatuation of the Admiral.16 Letters brought from Rome to the Emperor the significant intimation that the birds were all caged, and now was the time to lay hands on them.17 Duplessis-Mornay, the future chief of the Huguenots, was so much oppressed with a sense of coming evil, that he hardly ventured into the streets on the wedding-day. He warned the Admiral of the general belief among their friends that the marriage concealed a plot for their ruin, and that the festivities would end in some horrible surprise.18 Coligny was proof against suspicion. Several of his followers left Paris, but he remained unmoved. At one moment the excessive readiness to grant all his requests shook the confidence of his son-in-law Téligny; but the doubt vanished so completely that Téligny himself prevented the flight of his partisans after the attempt on the Admiral's life. On the morning of the fatal day, Montgomery sent word to Walsingham that Coligny was safe under protection of the King's Guards, and that no further stir was to be apprehended.19

      For many years foreign advisers had urged Catherine to make away with these men. At first it was computed that half a dozen victims would be enough.20 That was the original estimate of Alva, at Bayonne.21 When the Duke of Ferrara was in France, in 1564, he proposed a larger measure, and he repeated this advice by the mouth of every agent whom he sent to France.22 After the event, both Alva and Alfonso reminded Catherine that she had done no more than follow their advice.23 Alva's letter explicitly confirms the popular notion which connects the massacre with the conference of Bayonne; and it can no longer now be doubted that La Roche-sur-Yon, on his deathbed, informed Coligny that murderous resolutions had been taken on that occasion.24 But the Nuncio, Santa Croce, who was present, wrote to Cardinal Borromeo that the Queen had indeed promised to punish the infraction of the Edict of Pacification, but that this was a very different thing from undertaking to extirpate heresy. Catherine affirmed that in this way the law could reach all the Huguenot ministers; and Alva professed to believe her.25 Whatever studied ambiguity of language she may have used, the action of 1572 was uninfluenced by deliberations which were seven years old.

      During the spring and summer the Tuscan agents diligently prepared their master for what was to come. Petrucci wrote on the 19th of March that, for a reason which he could not trust to paper, the marriage would certainly take place, though not until the Huguenots had delivered up their strongholds. Four weeks later Alamanni announced that the Queen's pious design for restoring unity of faith would, by the grace of God, be speedily accomplished. On the 9th of August Petrucci was able to report that the plan arranged at Bayonne was near execution.26 Yet he was not fully initiated. The Queen afterwards assured him that she had confided the secret to no foreign resident except the Nuncio,27 and Petrucci resentfully complains that she had also consulted the Ambassador of Savoy. Venice, like Florence and Savoy, was not taken by surprise. In February the ambassador Contarini explained to the Senate the specious tranquillity in France, by saying that the Government reckoned on the death of the Admiral or the Queen of Navarre to work a momentous change.28 Cavalli, his successor, judged that a business so grossly mismanaged showed no signs of deliberation.29 There was another Venetian at Paris who was better informed. The Republic was seeking to withdraw from the league against the Turks; and her most illustrious statesman, Giovanni Michiel, was sent to solicit the help of France in negotiating peace.30 The account which he gave of his mission has been pronounced by a consummate judge of Venetian State-Papers the most valuable report of the sixteenth century.31 He was admitted almost daily to secret conference with Anjou, Nevers, and the group of Italians on whom the chief odium rests; and there was no counsellor to whom Catherine more willingly gave ear.32 Michiel affirms that the intention had been long entertained, and that the Nuncio had been directed to reveal it privately to Pius V.33

      Salviati was related to Catherine, and had gained her good opinion as Nuncio in the year 1570. The Pope had sent him back because nobody seemed more capable of diverting her and her son from the policy which caused so much uneasiness at Rome.34 He died many years later, with the reputation of having been one of the most eminent Cardinals at a time when the Sacred College was unusually rich in talent. Personally, he had always favoured stern measures of repression. When the Countess of Entremont was married to Coligny, Salviati declared that she had made herself liable to severe penalties by entertaining proposals of marriage with so notorious a heretic, and demanded that the Duke of Savoy should, by all the means in his power, cause that wicked bride to be put out of the way.35 When the peace of St. Germains was concluded, he assured Charles and Catherine that their lives were in danger, as the Huguenots were seeking to pull down the throne as well as the altar. He believed that all intercourse with them was sinful, and that the sole remedy was utter extermination by the sword. "I am convinced," he wrote, "that it will come to this." "If they do the tenth part of what I have advised, it will be well for them."36 After an audience of two hours, at which he had presented a letter from Pius V., prophesying the wrath of Heaven, Salviati perceived that his exhortations made some impression. The King and Queen whispered to him that they hoped to make the peace yield such fruit that the end would more than countervail the badness of the beginning; and the King added, in strict confidence, that his plan was one which, once told, could never be executed.37 This might have been said to delude the Nuncio; but he was inclined on the whole to believe that it was sincerely meant. The impression was confirmed by the Archbishop of Sens, Cardinal Pellevé, who informed him that the Huguenot leaders were caressed at Court in order to detach them from their party, and that after the loss of their leaders it would not take more than three days to deal with the rest.38 Salviati on his return to France was made aware that his long-deferred hopes were about to be fulfilled. He shadowed it forth obscurely in his despatches. He reported that the Queen allowed the Huguenots to pass into Flanders, believing that the admiral would become more and more presumptuous until he gave her an opportunity of retribution; for she excelled in that kind of intrigue. Some days later he knew more, and wrote that he hoped soon to have good news for his Holiness.39 At the last moment his heart misgave him. On the morning of the 21st of August the Duke of Montpensier and the Cardinal of Bourbon spoke with so much unconcern, in his presence, of what was then so near, that he thought it hardly possible the secret could be kept.Скачать книгу