As already intimated, at the coronation ceremony Joan was not only present, but she assisted the Archbishop when the latter placed the crown upon the king's head. The inauguration was practically the work of Joan. It was the fulfillment of a prediction she had repeatedly made, that she would conquer the English and crown the French king in the City of Rheims. If she was a witch the coronation was invalid. The ceremony of the anointing of a king is one of the most solemn in the Catholic Church. The condemnation of Joan as a witch had not only stripped this ceremony of its sacredness, but it had also made it null and void, nay, more, a blasphemy. How could a king, anointed by the help of a witch, be the king of a Christian nation? To appreciate this argument we must remember how bigoted the people were in the Middle Ages. In self-defense, therefore, Charles VII was compelled to prove to the French, and to the whole world, that the woman to whom he owed his elevation to the throne was not a heretic. Let us recapitulate. The King of France ordered the Church to make out a new certificate for Joan. The Church obeyed the French king, even as the same Church twenty-five years earlier had obeyed the King of England and condemned Joan to death. When the English were masters of France, the Catholic Church pleased them by delivering up the conqueror of England to be burned alive; when the English were driven out of the country and the French were again in control this sentence was reversed and Joan was proven to have been a dutiful child of the Church. Thus it will be seen that the Church swung with the English when the English ruled the land, and she swung with the French when the French had driven the English out of the country. The Church was with England at one time, and she was with France at another--but never with Joan. I am milder in my criticism than the facts warrant. I am making strenuous efforts to speak with immoderation of an "infallible institution."