After a detailed and almost complacent enumeration of all these executions, we find in the _Journal d’un Bourgeois de Paris_ this paragraph: “The rumor was, in June, 1535, that Pope Paul III., being advertised of the execrable and horrible justice which the king was doing upon the Lutherans in his kingdom, did send word to the King of France that he was advertised of it, and that he was quite willing to suppose that he did it in good part, as he still made use of the beautiful title he had to be called the Most Christian king; nevertheless, God the Creator, when he was in this world, made more use of mercy than of rigorous justice, which should never be used rigorously; and that it was a cruel death to burn a man alive because he might have to some extent renounced the faith and the law. Wherefore the pope did pray and request the king, by his letters, to be pleased to mitigate the fury and rigor of his justice by granting grace and pardon. The king, wishing to follow the pope’s wishes, according as he had sent him word by his letters patent, sent word to the court of Parliament not to proceed any more with such rigor as they had shown heretofore. For this cause were there no more rigorous proceedings on the part of justice.” [_Journal d’un Bourgeois de Paris,_ p. 456.] Search has been made to discover whether the assertion of the Bourgeois de Paris has any foundation, whether Pope Paul III. really did write in June, 1535, the letter attributed to him, and whether its effect was, that the king wrote to Parliament not to proceed against the Reformers “with such rigor.” No proof has, however, been obtained as to the authenticity of the pope’s letter, and in any case it was not very effectual, for the same _Bourgeois de Paris_ reports, that in September, 1535, three months after that, according to him, it was written: Two fellows, makers of silk ribbons and tissues, were burned all alive, one in the Place Maubert and the other in St. John’s cemetery, as Lutherans, which they were. They had handed over to their host at Paris some Lutheran books to take care of, saying, ‘Keep this book for us while we go into the city, and show it to nobody.’ When they were gone, this host was not able to refrain from showing this book to a certain priest, the which, after having looked at it, said incontinently, ‘This is a very wicked book, and proscribed.’ Then the said host went to the commissioner of police to reveal that he had such and such a book of such an one, the which sent forth with to the house of the said host to take and carry off the said two fellows to the Chatelet. Being questioned, they confessed the state of the case. Whereupon, by sentence of the said commissioner, confirmed by decree, “they made honorable amends in front of the church of Notre-Dame de Paris, had their tongues cut out, and were burned all alive and with unshaken obstinacy.” Proceedings and executions, then, did not cease, even in the case of the most humble