The efforts of the enemy had thus far touched only unauthorized congregations. There were still many orders which lived in the possession of full authorization and which according to the existing laws had nothing to fear from the hatred of the anti-clericals. In this, however, they were very much deceived. A new bill directed at all religious teaching orders, of whatever kind or description, was introduced in the Chamber on February 29, 1904. Its first article, declaring the suppression, asserted "teaching of every order and of every nature is interdicted in France to the congregations." It was adopted by a majority of eighty-seven votes on March 14. The second article stated that from the date of the promulgation of the law the teaching congregations could not receive new members, and that their novitiates must be dissolved. This article also--with the exception in favor of congregations destined for foreign schools--was adopted. It was decided, moreover, in article fourth, that novitiates for foreign missions could not maintain any of the dissolved congregations. The law was carried before the Senate, towards the end of June. It became a law of the land, with the official signature of M. Loubet, on July 8, 1904. The triumph of anti-Christianism was thus complete, and the death sentence had been pronounced against the very existence of the monastic life in France. It might be of interest to introduce here some appreciations of the Premier who had done so much harm to France and who was soon to begin the first scenes in the last act of our sorrowful drama. M. Emile Faguet, though not a Catholic, nor inspired by any definite admiration for Catholic principles, thus characterizes M. Combes in his _l'Anticlericalism_: M. Combes, considered unanimously as the protege and choice--no one knows with what secret designs of M. Waldeck-Rousseau; ... M. Combes taken up--no one knows by what weakness--by M. Loubet, who felt for him the very contrary of sympathy; M. Combes, a minister who was incapable according to the opinion and avowal of everyone, nevertheless maintained himself in office as long, and even longer than Waldeck-Rousseau, in spite of mistake after mistake, in spite of co-laborers as incapable as himself, despite the procrastination systematically employed as an instrument of his rule, only because he was a determined anti-clerical, headstrong and brutal, whom nothing could arrest in the pursuit of his design and precisely because, as he had said himself, 'he had accepted his office for that alone' and because he was absolutely incapable of seeing anything else in the government of France and in all modern history. [Illustration: PRESIDENT FALLIÈRES.] _L'Echo_, (Lyons), with admirable brevity thus summarizes the salient points in the character of the Premier and his policy: