For this inflexibility of character, this haughtiness of conduct, and eccentricity of manners, the pomp and brilliancy of Ferriol’s receptions, and his profound knowledge of the country in which he resided, were not sufficient compensation. Well informed of all the affairs of the Levant, he thoughtlessly compromised a precious experience by his impetuous decisions and utter absence of all propriety and decorum. The boldness of certain means attracted more than their illegality restrained him. Being entirely ignorant of the art of gradually smoothing down a difficulty, and, by using time as an auxiliary, of carefully managing obstacles, he blindly threw himself upon them, believing himself able to overcome them by a prompt and hazardous recourse to violence. There still remained in him much of the adventurous Candia volunteer. Nevertheless, in religious matters, Ferriol did not at first show himself so audaciously arbitrary as he was afterwards to become. This man, who subsequently allowed himself to be enticed by the missionaries into the most tyrannical and violent resolutions, endeavoured at the commencement of his embassy to restrain their imprudent and immoderate zeal. Everything, moreover, engaged him to it. Everything should have determined him to persevere in this policy of circumspection which the instructions received from Louis XIV., the character of the schismatic Armenians, and the blamable excesses of the Jesuits equally made a duty to him. “His Majesty orders you,” it had been written to Ferriol, “to accord to the Jesuit fathers a protection conformable to the zeal which they show for religion, to their disinterestedness, and to the regularity of their manners.... Nevertheless, you must beware of the inconsiderate zeal which the missionaries sometimes carry too far; religion often suffers more prejudice from imprudent undertakings or untimely demands than it acquires real advantages of success.”[234] Wise words, too soon disregarded both by him to whom they were addressed, and by the Prince in whose name they had been written, and which, singularly prophetic, announced seven years in advance the misfortunes which the forgetfulness of this judicious warning was to bring upon the Catholics.