An eminent French historian says: "During the reign of Francis I, within the space of twenty-three years, there had been eighty-one executions for heresy. During that of Henry II, twelve years, there were ninety-seven for the same cause; and at one of these executions Henry II was present in person on the space in front of Notre Dame, a spectacle which Francis I had always refused to see." He states also that during the reign of Henry II, and the year before his death, "fifteen capital sentences had been executed in Dauphiny, in Normandy, in Poitou, and at Paris," and that, within that period, the penal legislation against heretics had been greatly increased in severity.[46] Francis II was distinguished for nothing so much as for his uncompromising animosity to the Reformation, to all its legitimate fruits, and to those who professed Protestantism. He was entirely under the dominion of the Guises, who were the bloodiest and most unrelenting persecutors in France. To signalize his submission to them, he issued a royal proclamation, which they dictated, for razing to the ground and demolishing the houses in which the Protestants met for religious worship. Protestant assemblages were declared unlawful, and those who attended them were punishable with death, as were also those who sheltered and protected them. In about five months of this merciless reign, "eighteen persons were burned alive for heresy"--that is, for having professed the Protestant religion.[47] In this condition France opened a broad and attractive field of operations for the Jesuits. Keeping steadily in view the principal and primary purpose of their organization--the suppression of the Reformation--they must have thirsted for an opportunity to bring their peculiar tactics into practice, not only for the accomplishment of this cherished object, but to reduce the Gallican Christians into such obedience to the papacy as would subject the temporal affairs of France to the dominion of Rome, when they expected to become, through the influence of Loyola over the pope, the chief agents in executing the papal mandates. The Cardinal of Lorraine--one of the Guises--was in full sympathy with them; and as he had been instrumental in dictating the persecuting policy of Henry II and Francis I, he must have rejoiced at the opportunity of obtaining Jesuit assistance in a work so congenial to himself and them. He was "inordinately vain; intensely selfish; an adept in the art of dissimulation, which he used without scruple,"--and these qualities must have commended him to the Jesuits, as they, on account of possessing the same, were doubtless commended to him. That he was ambitious and a special favorite of the pope is indicated by the multiplicity of offices he filled at the same time. Besides being cardinal, he held two archbishoprics, six bishoprics, and was abbot for each of four monasteries.[48]