The first Protestant to cast doubt on the fable was David Blondel. A minister of the Reformed Church, Professor of History at Amsterdam, in 1630, he was held by his co-religionists to be a prodigy of learning in languages, theology, and ecclesiastical history. In his _Fable de la Papesse Jeanne_, with invincible logic and an intelligent application of the true canons of historical criticism, he demonstrates the absence of foundation for the story, the tottering and stuttering weakness of its early years, the suspicions which stand around its cradle; and, instead of disputing how far the Pope Joan story was believed or credited in this or that century, shows that by her own contemporaries she was never heard of at all; the whole story being, he says, "an inlaid piece of work embellished with time." Blondel was bitterly assailed by all sections of Protestantism, and accused of "bribery and corruption," the question being asked, "How much has the pope given him?" Blondel's work brought out a crowd of writers in defence of Joan, foremost among whom was the Protestant Des Marets or Maresius, whose labors in turn called out the _Cenotaphium Papessae Joannae_ by the learned Jesuit Labbe, the celebrity of whose name drew forth a phalanx of writers in reply. But the worst for Joanna was yet to come. Another Protestant, undeterred by the abuse showered upon Blondel, gave Joan her _coup de grace_. This was the learned Bayle, who, with rigid and judicial impartiality, sums up the essence of all that had been advanced on either side, and shows unanswerably the altogether insufficient grounds on which the entire story rests. More was not needed. Nevertheless, Eckhard and Leibnitz followed Bayle in the extinguishing process, and made it disreputable for any scholar of respectability to advocate the convicted falsehood. {13} There was no dearth of other Protestant protests against Joan. Casaubon, the most learned of the so-called reformers, laughed at the fable. So did Thuanus. Justus Lipsius said of it, "Revera fabella est haud longè ab audacia et ineptis poetarum." [Footnote 6] Schookius, professor at Groningen, totally disbelieved it. Dr. Burnet, Bishop of Salisbury, said, "I don't believe the history of Pope Joan," and gives his reasons. So, also, Dr. Bristow. Very pertinent was the reflection of Jurieu, (a fanatical Protestant, if ever there was one--the same noted for his controversy with Bayle, who was a "friend of the family"--so much so, indeed, as to cause the remark that Jurieu discovered many hidden things in the Apocalypse, but could not see what was going on in his own household,) in his _Apology for the Reformation_, "I don't think we are much concerned to prove the truth of this story of Pope Joan." [Footnote 6: "In truth, it is a fable not much differing from the boldness and silly stories of the poets."]