Soon after, the Sorbone gravely decided, that a long beard was contrary to sacerdotal modesty.[86] At the same time the clergy, by an edict of the parliament of Toulouse, were forbidden to wear their beards.[87] But persecution strengthens what it is eager to destroy: the beards triumphed in their turn; people even went so far as to give them a more agreeable form; they wore them frizzled, as appears by the order of the clergy of Burgundy against frizzled beards. Anthony Hotman wrote at that time his _Pogonias_, or dialogue on heads of hair and beards; he concludes with the elogy of the latter. In 1576 there was a poem in quatrains printed, intitled: _Eloges des barbes rousses_. In 1539, there was a book published, intitled _la Pogonologie_, by R. D. P. printed at Rennes, in 8vo. and Gentian Hervet wrote three essays on beards. We see, by these different writings, that, in those days, people were more taken up with their beards, than now. Footnote 86: The 1st of July 1561, this celebrated assembly ordered all the members of their university, doctors, bachelors, &c. to wear their beards shaved, &c. _Non deferant barbas & veniant tonsi._ Footnote 87: The author of a book intituled Pogonologia, says on this occasion, that those, who wished to take advantage of the equivocation in this edict of the French verb _porter_ (which signifies to _carry_ as well as to _wear_) had their beards _carried_ by their servants. As the best things have their traducers, the beard met with one in this Gentian Hervet, a learned Orleanese. He wrote a Latin discourse against beards; but in a little time, being staggered by the forcible reasons of his adversaries, he wrote a second, in which he advanced, that it was indifferent whether a priest wore his beard or not; in short, carried away by the force of truth, he at length wrote a third, in which he ably maintains that a priest absolutely ought to have a long beard on his chin.[88] Footnote 88: The first of these discourses is intitled, _de radendâ barbâ Oratio_; the second, _de vel alendâ vel radendâ barbâ_; and the third, _de alendâ barbâ_. Notwithstanding its success, its numerous apologists, and powerful partisans, the beard had still enemies; the provinces especially were the theatre of secret cabals, where, far from the court and the bearded powers, plots of vengeance were easily contrived, and their effects often broke out in provincial councils; and most of these councils, actuated by contrary sentiments, contradicted each other in their decisions.