The Church of France was no worse than many other portions of the Roman fold. So long as the people themselves were ignorant, the ignorance of the priesthood did not trouble them; but immediately their own eyes were opened, they became conscious of the deficiencies of their pastors. And it would have been well for them had ignorance been the worst failing of the clergy: they were vicious also. A contemporary manuscript tells us that “many are so ignorant that they can not interpret what is said in the course of divine service, and are unable to read or write; so negligent that they have left off preaching altogether.... They take delight in worldly pleasures, and spend the greater part of the day in taverns, drinking, gambling, and toying with women, and keep a _truande_ in their houses.”[4] How the priests abused the simple confidence of their flocks is evident from the pious frauds they practiced, particularly in the matter of relics. Of one instance of this tampering with the religious feelings of the people, it was said, “that either the Virgin Mary must have had two mothers, or her mother must have had two heads.” A feather from the angel Gabriel’s wing, or a bottle of Egyptian darkness, were silly but harmless deceptions; but there were others which to name is impossible.[5] In the field thus prepared for the truth, the new doctrines spread rapidly, one great help to their diffusion being the use of the French language, while the orthodox clergy stuck so obstinately to their Latin, that Antony de Mouchi, surnamed Demochares, felt it necessary to apologize for using the vernacular in a work he had written in answer to a Huguenot pamphlet.[6] At first the converts were more numerous among the educated and high-born, than among the low and unlettered multitude. They early received the baptism of fire. In 1524, while Francis I. was in captivity at Madrid, the Parliament of Paris revived an edict of Louis XII. concerning blasphemy, and nominated a commission to try Lutherans and other heretics. In the following year, a brief of Clement VII. ratified this encroachment on the rights of the Church, approving of the commissioners or inquisitors appointed, permitting them to enter upon their duties “with apostolical authority,” and ordering them to try their prisoners “without noise and without form of judgment, as is the custom in such cases.”[7] This bull, besides condemning heretics to be punished in body and goods, forbade all persons to supply them with corn, wine, oil, or other merchandise, under pain of being treated as accomplices. That this bull was something more than an empty threat, is evident from a letter written by Clement to congratulate the Parliament of Paris on the way in which they had carried it out, adding “that the new errors were as opposed to the State as to the Church.” We need not stop to show that the kingdom which has always put itself forward as the champion of Popery, both in