h prelates at Poissy.]

While the States General were occupied at Pontoise in considering the
means of relieving the king's pecuniary embarrassments, Catharine had
assembled at Poissy all the bishops of France to take into consideration
the religious reformation which the times imperatively demanded. The
Pope as yet delayed the long-promised oecumenical council, and there
was little hope of obtaining its actual convocation on fair and
practical terms unless, indeed, he should be frightened into it by the
superior terrors of a French national council, which might throw France
into the arms of the Reformation. Tired of the duplicity of the pontiff,
alarmed by the rapid progress of religious dissensions at home, not
unwilling, perhaps, to make an attempt at reconciliation, which, if
successful, would confirm her own authority and remove the anxieties to
which she was daily exposed--now from the side of the Guises, and again
from that of the Huguenots--the queen mother had yielded to the
suggestion frequently made to her, and had consented to a discussion
between the French prelates and the most learned Protestant
ministers.[1063]

[Sidenote: Invitation to all Frenchmen,]

[Sidenote: and particularly to Beza.]

[Sidenote: The couriers of Rome stripped.]

Accordingly, on the twenty-fifth of July an invitation had everywhere
been extended by proclamation at the sound of the trumpet, to all
Frenchmen who had any correction of religious affairs at heart, to
appear with perfect safety and be heard before the approaching assembly
at Poissy.[1064] Even before this public announcement, however, steps
had been taken to secure the presence of the most distinguished orator
among the reformed, and, next to Calvin, their most celebrated
theologian. On the fourteenth of July, the Parisian pastors, and, on the
succeeding days, the Prince of Conde, the Admiral, and the King of
Navarre, had written to Theodore Beza, begging him to come and thus take
advantage of the opportunity offered by the favorable disposition of the
royal court.[1065] Similar invitations were sent to Pietro Vermigli--the
celebrated reformer of Zurich, better known by the name of Peter
Martyr--a native of Florence, now just sixty-one years of age, whose
eloquence, it was hoped, might exercise a deep influence upon his
countrywoman, the queen mother.[1066] So earnest, indeed, was the court
in its desire to bring about the conference, that Catharine, well aware
that