their shops. Protestant advocates were forbidden to plead before the
courts. Protestant doctors were forbidden to practise medicine and
surgery. The _sages-femmes_ must necessarily be of the Roman Catholic
religion.

The cruelty was extended to the family. Protestant parents were
forbidden to instruct their children in their own faith. They were
enjoined, under a heavy penalty, to have their children baptized by
the Roman Catholic priest, and brought up in the Roman Catholic
religion. When the law was disobeyed, the priests were empowered to
seize and carry off the children, and educate them, at the expense of
the parents, in monasteries and nunneries.

Then, as regards the profession of the Protestant religion:--It was
decreed by the King, that all the Protestant temples in France should
be demolished, or converted to other uses. Protestant pastors were
ordered to quit the country within fifteen days after the date of the
Revocation of the Edict of Nantes. If found in the country after that
period, they were condemned to death. A reward of five thousand five
hundred livres was offered for the apprehension of any Protestant
pastor. When apprehended he was hung. Protestant worship was
altogether prohibited. If any Protestants were found singing psalms,
or engaged in prayer, in their own houses, they were liable to have
their entire property confiscated, and to be sent to the galleys for
life.

These monstrous decrees were carried into effect--at a time when
France reigned supreme in the domain of intellect, poetry, and the
arts--in the days of Racine, Corneille, Moliere--of Bossuet,
Bourdaloue, and Fenelon. Louis XIV. had the soldier, the hangman, and
the priest at his command; but they all failed him. They could
imprison, they could torture, they could kill, they could make the
Protestants galley-slaves; they could burn their Bibles, and deprive
them of everything that they valued; but the impregnable rights of
conscience defied them.

The only thing left for the Protestants was to fly from France in all
directions. They took refuge in Switzerland, Germany, Holland, and
England. The flight from France had begun before the Revocation of the
Edict of Nantes, but after that act the flight rapidly increased. Not
less than a million of persons are supposed to have escaped from
France in consequence of the Revocation.

Steps were, however, taken by the King to stop the emigration. He
issued a decree ordering that the p