tion of the Protestant
bodies, form a very important landmark in the history of the followers
of Luther and Calvin. Persecuted by Louis XIV. and XV., they were
tolerated by Louis XVI.; they gained complete religious equality
in 1789, and after a few years of anarchy in matters of faith, they
found themselves suddenly and stringently bound to the State by the
organizing genius of Bonaparte.

In the years 1806-1808 the position of the Jews was likewise defined,
at least for all those who recognized France as their country,
performed all civic duties, and recognized all the laws of the State.
In consideration of their paying full taxes and performing military
service, they received official protection and their rabbis
governmental support.

Such was Bonaparte's policy on religious subjects. There can be little
doubt that its motive was, in the main, political. This methodizing
genius, who looked on the beliefs and passions, the desires and
ambitions of mankind, as so many forces which were to aid him in his
ascent, had already satisfied the desires for military glory and
material prosperity; and in his bargain with Rome he now won the
support of an organized priesthood, besides that of the smaller
Protestant and Jewish communions. That he gained also peace and
quietness for France may be granted, though it was at the expense
of that mental alertness and independence which had been her chief
intellectual glory; but none of his intimate acquaintances ever
doubted that his religion was only a vague sentiment, and his
attendance at mass merely a compliment to his "sacred
gendarmerie."[l60]

Having dared and achieved the exploit of organizing religion in a
half-infidel society, the First Consul was ready to undertake the
almost equally hazardous task of establishing an order of social
distinction, and that too in the very land where less than eight years
previously every title qualified its holder for the guillotine. For
his new experiment, the Legion of Honour, he could adduce only one
precedent in the acts of the last twelve years.

The whole tendency had been towards levelling all inequalities. In
1790 all titles of nobility were swept away; and though the Convention
decreed "arms of honour" to brave soldiers, yet its generosity to the
deserving proved to be less remarkable than its activity in
guillotining the unsuccessful. Bonaparte, however, adduced its custom
of granting occasional modest rewards as a precedent f