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A furious dispute between the jansenists and jesuits, concerning grace, free-will, and other abstract points in theology, had distracted France in the brightest days of Lewis XIV. Many able men employed their pens on both sides. But the jansenists, supported by the talents of a Nicole, an Arnaud, and a Pascal, had evidently the advantage both in raillery and reasoning. The controversy, however, was not to be determined by such. weapons. The jesuits were supposed to be better catholics; and as the conscience of the king had always been in their keeping, the leaders of the jansenists were persecuted, and thrown into prison, or obliged to abandon their county. The jesuits, in order to complete their triumph, and the ruin of their religious antagonists, at length obtained the king's consent (through the influence of father le Tellier, his confessor) to refer the disputed points to the decision of the pope. They accordingly sent to Rome one hundred and three propositions for condemnation; and the holy office, in 1713, found one hundred and one of those to be heretical.

The bull declaring the condemnation of the opinions of the jansenists, commonly known by the name of UNIGENITUS, from the word with which it begins, instead of composing the pious dispute, threw all France into a flame. The body of the people, the parliaments, the archbishop of Paris, fifteen other prelates, and many of the most respectable among the inferior clergy, violently opposed it, as an infringement of the rights of the Gallican church, and of the laws of the realm; as well as an insult on their private judgment. But the king, who was wholly governed by the jesuits, and spurred on to violent measures by his confessor, enforced its reception; and the whole kingdom was soon divided into acceptants and recusants. The death of Lewis XIV. put a stop to the dispute. And the duke of Orleans, while regent, ordered the persecution to cease, and at the same time enjoined the recusant bishops to accept the bull, accompanied with certain explications. They found

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themselves under the necessity of complying. Even the good cardinal de Noailles, archbishop of Paris, was induced to do violence to his sentiments, in 1720, for the sake of peace.

From that time to the year 1750, the bull unigenitus though held in execration by the people, occasioned no public disturbance. Then it was resolved by the clergy to demand confessional notes of dying persons; and it was ordered that those notes should be signed by priests adhering to the bull, without which no viaticum, no extreme unction, could be obtained. And these consolatory rites were refused without pity to all recusants, and to such as confessed to recusants. The new archbishop of Paris engaged warmly in this scheme, and the parliament no less warmly in the cause of the people. Other parliaments followed the example of that at Paris; and all clergymen, who refused to administer the sacraments to persons in their last moments, were thrown into prison. The church complained of the interposition of the civil power; and Lewis XV. by an act of his absolute authority, forbid the parliaments to take cognizance of such matters.

These parliaments, as I have formerly had occasion to observe are only the supreme courts of justice, not the states of the kingdom, or proper legislative body: yet have they continued, since the abolition of the national assemblies, to be the faithful guardians of the rights of the people, and to check the despotism of the crown, by refusing to register its oppressive edicts, as well as by remonstrating against them 4. They have frequntly interposed their authority, with advantage, in matters of religion.

4. No royal edict can have the force of a law, until registered in parliament; and although the French parliaments cannot absolutely refuse to register such edicts, if the royal authority be exerted in all its fulness, that is to say, when the king holds personally in parliament what is called a bed of justice; yet they may, even in that case suspend the registry some time, and likewise remonstrate against the edict itself. These remonstrances, and their beneficial effects have deservedly gained the French parliaments the highest veneration among the people.

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The heads of the parliament of Paris, which has ever stood foremost in repressing both regal and ecclesiastical tyranny, therefore took the liberty on this occasion, to remind the king, That their privileges, and the duty of their station, obliged them to do justice on all delinquents. They accordingly continued in the exercise of their several functions, without regard to the king's prohibition, and had actually commenced a prosecution against the bishop of Orleans, when they received from Versailles a letter de cachet, accompanied by letters-patent, which they were ordered to register, commanding them to suspend all prosecutions relative to the refusal of the sacraments. Instead of obeying these orders, the different tribunals of the parliament presented new remonstrances; and being referred for answers to the king's former declarations, they had the spirit to resolve, "That whereas, certain evil-minded persons have pre"vented truth from reaching the throne, the chambers re"main assembled, and all other business must be suspen "ded." The king, by fresh letters-patent, renewed his orders, and commanded the parliament to proceed to business; but all the chambers, far from complying, came to another resolution more bold than the former, importing, that they could not obey this injunction without violating their duty and their oath.

Matters being thus brought to extremity, the king banished to different parts of the kingdom, in 1753, the members of all the chambers of the parliament, except those of the great chamber; and they, proving no more compliant than their brethren, also were banished. New difficulties and disputes ensued. In order to prevent an entire stop being put to the administration of justice. by this violent measure, Lewis XV. established by his letters-patent, what was called a royal chamber, for the prosecution of suits civil and criminal. But the letterspatent, constituting that new court, ought to have been registered by the parliament of Paris, which had no longer an existence. To remedy this difficulty, application was made to the inferior court of the chatelet which refused

fused to register the letters in question, even after one of its members had been committed to the bastile, and ano ther obliged to abscond. Intimidated, however, by such a bold exertion of despotic power, the remaining mem bers allowed the king's officers to enter the letterspatent on their register. But they thought proper, on more mature deliberation, to retire from business, leaving an arret on the table expressing their reasons for so doing.

The royal chamber was now the only court of law in Paris. The judges assembled, but they could find no advocates to plead. They were held in universal contempt, and the whole kingdom was filled with such a total suppression of justice, as threatened anarchy and confusion. Meanwhile the clergy seemed to enjoy their victory amid the public disorder, and entered into associations for the support of their authority. But the king ceased to countenance them. At length become sensible of their pride and obstinacy, as well as of the evils it had occasioned, he exhorted them to more moderation. He also recalled the parliament, which returned in triumph to Paris, in 1754, amid the acclamations of the people, who celebrated the event with the most extravagant demonstrations of joy. And the

archbishop, who continued to encourage the priests in refusing the sacraments, was banished to his seat at Conflans. The bishops of Orleans and Troyes were, in like manner, banished to their country seats.

A temporary quiet was by these means produced; but it proved only a calm before a more violent storm. The archbishop of Paris, in retirement, continued his intrigues. He was banished to a greater distance from court. But the dispute in regard to the bull unigenitus, which he had revived, did not subside. The clergy persisted in refusing the sacraments, and the civil power in prosecuting them for such refusals; so that nothing was more common in those distracted times, than to see the communion administered by an arret of parliament!

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The king, a second time drawn over to the ecclesiastical side of the question, referred the dispute to the pope. Benedict XIV. though a mild and moderate man, could not retract a constitution regarded as a law of the church; he therefore declared, in a circular letter or brief, to all the bishops of France, that the bull unigenitus must be acknowledged as an universal law, against which none could make resistance "without endangering their eternal salvation."

The parliament of Paris, considering this brief as a direct attack upon the rights of the Gallican church, suppressed it by an arret or decree. The king, enraged at their boldness, as well as at their refusal to register certain oppressive taxes, resolved to hold a bed of justice. He accordingly went to the parliament on the 13th day of November, in the year 1756, attended by the whole body of his guards, amounting to ten thousand men, and ordered an edict to be read, by which he suppressed the fourth and fifth chambers of inquest, the members of which had been most firm in opposing the brief. He then commanded that the bull unigenitus should be respected, and prohibited the secular judges from ordering the administration of the sacraments. And he concluded with declaring, that he would be obeyed! Fifteen counsellors of the great chamber lodged their resignation at the office next day. One hundred and twenty-four members of the different courts of parliament followed their example, and universal mumurings prevailed in the city and throughout the kingdom.

In the midst of these murmurings, the desperate fanatic Francis Damien, stabbed the king in the manner already related; not, as he declared, with an intention of killing his sovereign, but only of wounding him, that God might touch his heart, and incline him to order the administration of the sacraments at the time of death. What effect this declaration had upon the mind of Lewis XV. it is impossible to say: but it is certain he a second time banished the archbishop of Paris, who had been recalled, and found it expedient to accommodate matters

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