But the determination of the Constituent Assembly to control the Church and force it into the political unity of the State was gradually nearing its climax, and was to close Talleyrand’s clerical career. It is hardly surprising that he did not take part in the debates. The issue was never really doubtful, and on the whole would not displease Talleyrand. His abstinence should be construed in his favour; no one could seriously expect him to stand for the autonomy of the Church. The priest was, in his opinion, a moral functionary (for the masses) or nothing, and his work was part of the nation’s life. His experience and his knowledge of history would tell him the danger of leaving the clergy “a State within a State.” He would regard with satisfaction the suppression (on the just conditions he had himself laid down) of the monastic orders and the redistribution of income. He would hardly resent the rearrangement of ecclesiastical divisions, the exclusion of the Pope, and the elective character of the new hierarchy. Certainly he must have foreseen the disturbances that interference in these matters would cause, but that was a concern of the executive. With the Archbishop of Sens (de Brienne), the Bishop of Orleans, the Bishop of Vivières, three bishops _in partibus_, and 66 curés, he took the oath and accepted the civil constitution of the clergy. Archbishop Dillon and 130 prelates refused to submit—the majority of them doing so, Dillon said, as gentlemen, not as theologians. The distinction is unfortunate, though necessary. They had plunged the country in a civil war which only a strict regard for their theology could have justified.