d the munitions
for such a combat. {203} Apart from the great independents, holding
themselves aloof from all religious controversy, the more intelligent
and enterprising portion of the educated class had gone over to the
enemy.

But the government did its best to supply the want of argument by the
exercise of authority. New and severe edicts against "the heresies and
false doctrines of Luther and his adherents and accomplices" were
issued. The Sorbonne prohibited the reading and sale of sixty-five
books by name, including the works of Luther, Melanchthon, Calvin,
Dolet, and Marot, and all translations of the Bible issued by the
publishing house of Estienne.

The south of France had in earlier centuries been prolific in sects
claiming a Protestantism older than that of Augsburg. Like the
Bohemian Brethren they eagerly welcomed the Calvinists as allies and
were rapidly enrolled in the new church. Startled by the stirring of
the spirit of reform, the Parlement of Aix, acting in imitation of
Simon de Monfort, [Sidenote: 1540] ordered two towns, Merindol and
Cabrieres, destroyed for their heresy. The sentence was too drastic
for the French government to sanction immediately; it was therefore
postponed by command of the king, but it was finally executed, at least
in part. [Sidenote: 1545] A ghastly massacre took place in which
eight hundred or more of the Waldenses perished. A cry of horror was
raised in Germany, in Switzerland, and even in France, from which the
king himself recoiled in terror.

Only a few days after his accession Henry issued an edict against
blasphemy, and this was followed by a number of laws against heresy. A
new court of justice was created to deal with heretics. [Sidenote:
October 8, 1547] From its habit of sending its victims to the stake it
soon became known as the Chambre Ardente. Its powers were so extensive
that the clergy protested against them as {204} infringements of their
rights. In its first two years it pronounced five hundred
sentences,--and what sentences! Even in that cruel age its punishments
were frightful. Burning alive was the commonest. If the heretic
recanted on the scaffold he was strangled before the fire was lit; if
he refused to recant his tongue was cut out. [Sidenote: June, 1551]
Those who were merely suspected were cast into dungeons from which many
never came out alive. Torture was habitually used to extract
confession. For those who recanted before