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It had been respected by Richelieu even in his victory over the Huguenots, and only lightly tampered with by Mazarin. But from the beginning of his reign Lewis had resolved to set aside its provisions, and his revocation of it at the end of 1685 was only the natural close of a progressive system of persecution. The revocation was followed by outrages more cruel than even the bloodshed of Alva.
But after the Revocation, emigration from France was strictly forbidden, under penalty of confiscation of the whole goods and property of the emigrant.
Public functionaries of all kinds should name their successors, subject to the approbation of their own superiors, and giving public notice of the nomination so long beforehand as to admit of discussion, and the timely revocation of a wrong choice. But, by the side of the temporal rulers, he places another authority, with no power to command, but only to advise and remonstrate.
But, after I have censured most severely, as I have ever done, those giddy girls, who have in the same hour, as I may say, that they have fled from their chamber, presented themselves at the altar that is witness to their undutiful rashness; after I have stipulated with Mr. But, how, on this revocation of my appointment, shall I be able to pacify him? How! Why assert the privilege of my sex!
Addressing himself by turns to the multitude and to individuals, he sometimes implored their mercy, and sometimes expressed his indignation; conjured them not to sully the fame of their immortal victories; and ventured to promise, that if they would immediately return to their allegiance, he would undertake to obtain from the emperor not only a free and gracious pardon, but even the revocation of the orders which had excited their resentment.
The country was not only exhausted to the farthest possible point, its recuperation had been made well-nigh impossible by the fatal Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, which, in circumstances of the utmost cruelty, had driven into exile the most industrious and independent portion of the population. Poverty, discontent, tyranny, fanaticism such was the legacy that Louis left to his country.
The strongest, most independent, and high-minded of the Huguenots, who would not be hypocrites, resolved passively to resist them, and if they could not be allowed to exercise freedom of conscience in their own country, they determined to seek it elsewhere. Hence the large increase in the emigration from all parts of France immediately after the Act of Revocation had been proclaimed.
Before this period, however, applications under the new regulation had been preferred to the number of 154, of which, on March 27, the date of its revocation, 87 were admitted.
At the Revocation, the Protestants packed up their tools and property, suddenly escaped across the frontier, near which they were, and went and established themselves in the Low Countries, where they might pursue their industries in safety.
Saurin secured the reputation of his powerful eloquence at the Hague; but in the French Church, Threadneedle street, London, he reached the summit of his splendid pulpit eloquence. Most of the Huguenots who fled to England for an asylum were natives of Normandy, Brittany, Picardy, and Guienne. Their numbers at the revocation may be calculated at eighty thousand.
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