IN EXITU ISRAEL.

IN EXITU ISRAEL

AN HISTORICAL NOVEL

BY

S. BARING-GOULD, M.A.

Author of ‘Curious Myths of the Middle Ages,’ ‘Origin and Development of Religious Belief,’ ‘The Silver Store,’ &c., &c.

VOL. I

London MACMILLAN AND CO. 1870

OXFORD:

BY T. COMBE, M.A., E. B. GARDNER, E. P. HALL, AND H. LATHAM, M.A.,

PRINTERS TO THE UNIVERSITY.

DEDICATED

TO

THE MEMORY OF THE LATE

COUNT CHARLES DE MONTALEMBERT

BY

ONE WHO, FROM A DISTANCE, HAS LOVED AND ADMIRED HIS LIFE, HIS PRINCIPLES, AND HIS WRITINGS.

PREFACE.

There is a side to the History of the French Revolution which is too generally overlooked—its ecclesiastical side.

Under the ancien régime, the disadvantages of an Establishment produced a strong party of liberal Catholics prepared for a radical change in the relations between Church and State.

It was this party which organized that remarkable Constitutional Church, at once Republican and Catholic, which sustained Religion through the Reign of Terror, and which Pope Pius VII and Napoleon I combined to overthrow.

My object in writing this story is to illustrate the currents of feeling in the State and Church of France in 1789, currents not altogether unlike those now circulating in our own. It was my good fortune, during a recent visit to Normandy,[viii] to collect materials for a history of a representative character of that eventful period,—one Thomas Lindet, parish priest of Bernay. In writing his story, I do not present him to the reader as a model. He had great faults; but one can forgive much on account of his enthusiastic love of justice, and faith in his cause.

That my story may be taken to convey a moral, is possible. But let me disclaim any intention of preaching a lesson to the aristocracy; I believe that they do not need it. In France, the crown supported the nobility; in England, the nobility support the crown. The French aristocracy was a privileged class, exempt from the burden of taxation. In England, the heaviest burden falls on the holders of landed property. With us, the privileged class is that of the manufacturer and trader. The French nobility never made common cause with the people against the encroachments of the royal prerogative. The English barons wrung Magna Charta from reluctant John. Henry VIII would never have been able to consolidate the power in his despotic hands, had not the civil wars of the Roses broken the strength of the aristocracy.[ix] Since then the nobility have made the cause of right and liberty their own, and a limited monarchy is the result.

The moral, if moral there must be, is this: In times when the relations between Church and State are precarious, coercive measures are certain to force on a rupture.

Of late, repression has been employed freely on a portion of the community, and this has suddenly created a liberation party which three years ago scarcely existed within the Church and the ranks of the clergy.

The English curate is as much at the mercy of the Bishop as was, and is still, the French curé; and this he has been made painfully aware of.

In the Wesleyan revival, a body of earnest men who moved for a relaxation of the icy bonds of Establishmentarianism were thrust forth into schism. The first Tractarians were driven to Rome by the hardness of their spiritual rulers. At present, a party, peculiarly narrow, and rapidly dying, by means of a packed Privy Council, are engaged in hunting out and repressing the most active section of the Church.

[x]

Worship is the language of conviction. To a large and rapidly increasing body of Anglicans, Christ is not, as He is to Protestants, a mere historical personage, the founder of Christianity, but is the centre of a religious system, the ever-present object of adoration for His people. A passionate love of Christ has floreated into splendour of worship. To curtail liberty of worship is to touch the rights of conscience; and to interfere with them has ever led to disastrous consequences—such is the verdict of History.

A feverish eagerness to dissever Church and State has broken out among clergy and laity, and a schism would be the result, were the chain uniting Church and State indissoluble; but, as events of late years have made it clear, that with a little concerted energy the old rust-eaten links can be snapped, there will be no schism, but a united effort will be made by a body of resolute spirits within the Church to tear asunder crown and mitre. The disestablishment of the English Church will present a future absent from that of the Irish Church. In the latter case, there was an unanimous opposition to the measure by all[xi] within it; but, in the event of the severance of the union in England, it will take place amid the joyous acclamations of no inconsiderable section of its best and truest sons.

If, from the following pages, it appears that my sympathies are with the National Assembly, and those who upset the ancien régime, it does not follow that they are with the Revolution in its excesses. The true principles of the Revolution are embodied in the famous Declaration of the Rights of Man. ‘Write at the head of that Declaration the name of God’ said Grégoire; ‘or you establish rights without duties, which is but another thing for proclaiming force to be supreme.’ The Assembly refused. Grégoire was right.

Robespierre, Danton, and his clique made force supreme—as supreme as in the days of the Monarchy, and trampled on the rights, to protect which they had been raised into power.

A Republic is one thing: the despotism of an Autocracy or of a Democracy is another thing.

I propose following up this historical romance by a life of the Abbé Grégoire, which will illustrate[xii] the position of the Constitutional Church, of which he was the soul.

I have chosen the form of fiction for this sketch, as it best enables me to exhibit the state of feeling in France in 1788 and 1789. That is no fiction; the incidents related and the characters introduced are, for the most part, true to History.

S. B-G.

Dalton, Thirsk, March 25th, 1870.

[1]

IN EXITU ISRAEL.

CHAPTER I.

The forests that at the present day cover such a considerable portion of the department of Eure, and which supply the great manufacturing cities on the Seine with fuel, were of much greater extent in the eighteenth century. The fragments of forest which now extend from Montfort to Breteuil were then united, and stretched in one almost unbroken green zone from the Seine to the Arve, following the course of the little river Rille. A spur struck off at Serquigny, and traced the confluent Charentonne upwards as far as Broglie.

The little town of Bernay is no longer hemmed in by woods. The heights and the valley of the Charentonne are still well timbered, and green with copse and grove; the landscape is park-like; here and there a fine old oak with rugged bark and expanded arms proclaims itself a relic of the ancien régime; but the upstart poplars whitening in the wind along the river course spire above these venerable trees. The roads lie between wheat and potato fields, and the names of hamlets, such[2] as Bosc, Le Taillis, Le Buisson, Bocage, La Couture, &c., alone proclaim that once they lay embedded in forest foliage.

On the eve of the Great French Revolution, Bernay was a manufacturing town, that had gradually sprung up during the middle ages, around the walls of the great Benedictine Abbey which the Duchess Judith of Brittany had founded in 1013, and endowed with nearly all the surrounding forest. The town was unhealthy. It lay in a hollow, and the monks had dammed up the little stream Cogney, which there met the Charentonne, to turn their mill wheel, and had converted a portion of the valley into a marsh, in which the frogs croaked loudly and incessantly.

When the abbot was resident, the townsfolk were required to beat the rushes and silence the noisy reptiles every summer night; but now that the Superior resided at Dax, this requirement was not pressed.

After a heavy downfall of rain, the rivulet was wanting to swell into a torrent, overflow the dam, and flood the streets of Bernay, carrying with it such an amount of peat that every house into which the water penetrated was left, after its retreat, plastered with black soil, and, in spring, smeared with frog-spawn.

The mill was privileged. No other was permitted in the neighborhood. When M. Chauvin erected a windmill on the hill of Bouffey, the monks brought an action against him, and[3] made him dismantle it. All the corn that grew within five miles was ground at the Abbey mill, and every tenth bag was taken by the Fathers in payment for grinding the corn indifferently and at their leisure. At certain seasons, more wheat was brought to the mill than the mill could grind, because the water had run short, or the stones were out of repair, consequently many thousands of hungry people had to wait in patience till the Cogney filled, or till the mill-stones had been re-picked, whilst the gutted windmill of M. Chauvin stood in compulsory inaction.

The great and little tithes of Bernay went to the Abbey; and out of them the monks defrayed the expense of a curate for the parish church of S. Cross. This church had been built by the town in 1372, by permission of the Abbey, on condition that the parish should bear the charge of its erection, and the abbot should appoint the curate; that the parish should be responsible for the repair of the fabric and the conduct of divine service, and that the Abbey should pay to the incumbent the portion congrue of the tithes. The incumbent of Bernay was, throughout the middle ages and down to the suppression of the monastery, a salaried curate only, without independent position, and receiving from the Abbey a sum which amounts in modern English money to about fifty pounds, and out of this he was required to pay at least two curates or vicaires. This sorry pittance would have been miserable enough, had[4] the curé been provided with a parsonage-house rent free; but with this the Abbey did not furnish him, and he was obliged to lodge where he could, and live as best he could on the

crumbs that fell from the abbot’s table.

The parishioners of Bernay had made several attempts to free their church from its dependence, but in vain. The monks refused to cede their rights, and every lawsuit in which the town engaged with them terminated disastrously for the citizens. The people of Bernay were severely taxed. Beside the intolerable burdens imposed on them by the State, they paid tithes on all they possessed to the monks, who assessed them as they thought proper, and against whose assessment there was no appeal, as the abbot of Bernay exercised legal jurisdiction in the place, and every question affecting ecclesiastical dues was heard in his own court. The corn was tithed in the field, and tithed again at the mill. The Abbey had rights of corvée, that is, of claiming so many days’ work from every man in the place, and on its farms, free of expense. The townsfolk, who were above the rank of day labourers, escaped the humiliation only by paying men out of their own pockets, to take their places and work for the Fathers.

It was hard for the citizens, after having been thus taxed by the Church, to have to expend additional money to provide themselves with religious privileges. Bernay might have been[5] a far more prosperous town but for the Abbey, which, like a huge tumour, ate up the strength and resources of the place, and gave nothing in return.

The Abbey was also en commende; in other words, it was a donative of the Crown. Whom he would, the king made superior of the monks of S. Benedict at Bernay,—superior only in name, and for the purpose of drawing its revenues, for he was not a monk, nor indeed was he in other than minor orders. Louis XV, whose eye for beauty was satisfied with a Du Barry, having been fascinated by the plump charms of Madame Poudens, wife of a rich jeweler at Versailles, attempted to seduce her. The lady estimated her virtue at a rich abbey, and finally parted with it for that of Bernay, which was made over in commendam to a son, whether by Poudens or Louis was not clearly known, but who, at the age of seven, in defiance of the concordat of Francis I with the Pope, was made abbé of Bernay, father superior of Benedictine monks, and entitled to draw an income of fifty-seven thousand livres per annum, left by Duchess Judith to God and the poor. The case was by no means uncommon, Charles of Valois, bastard of Charles IX and Marie Fouchet, at the age of thirteen was

invested with the revenues of Chaise-Dieu, and Henry IV bartered an abbey for a mistress.

Thomas Lindet was curé of S. Cross.

The introduction of the power loom from England had[6] produced much want and discontent in Normandy, and in Bernay many hands were thrown out of work. The sickness and famine which had periodically afflicted that town of late years became permanent, and the poor priest was condemned to minister in the presence of want and disease, without the power of alleviating either, whilst the revenues of the Church were drained to fill the purse of the non-resident abbé, and by him to be squandered on luxuries and vanities.

Lindet had more than once expressed his opinion upon the abuses regnant in the Church. In 1781, in a discourse addressed by him to the general assembly of his parish, he had said:—‘We desire that justice should be brought to bear upon these abuses, which outrage common sense and common right, at once. But is there any hope in the future of an accomplishment of our desires? At present, all is dark; but never let us despair. We groan under oppression. But be sure of this,—wrong-doing revenges itself in the long run. We wish to abolish the intolerable privileges which burden some, that others may trip lightly through life. Alas! the privileged classes are jealous of our jealousy of them. They scarce permit us to pray the advent of a rectification of abuses, which will prove as glorious to religion as it will prove beneficial to society. Who will put salt upon the leeches, and make them disgorge the blood of the poor?’

For having used this language the curé had been severely[7] reprimanded by his bishop; for bishops were then, as they are frequently now, the champions of abuses.

At the present date, Lindet was again in trouble with his diocesan. For three days in succession the sanctuary lamp in his church had remained unlighted. The reason was, that the curé’s cruse of oil was empty; and not the cruse only, but his purse as well. He had neither oil by him, nor money wherewith to buy any; the lamp therefore remained dark. Lindet hoped that some of his parishioners would come forward, and furnish the sacramental light with a supply of oil, and this eventually took place; but, in the meantime, three days and nights of violation of the rubric had elapsed. The officiel or inquisitor of the bishop heard of this, and called on Thomas Lindet, the day before the opening of this tale, to inform him that it was at his option to pay down twenty-five livres for the misdemeanour, or to be thrown into the ecclesiastical court.

Under the ancien régime, a large portion of a bishop’s revenues was derived from ecclesiastical fines imposed by his court, and into this court cases of immorality, heresy and sacrilege among the laity, and of infringement of rubrical exactness, and breach of discipline among the clergy, were brought. As the prosecutor was also virtually the judge, it may be supposed that judgment was usually given against the defendant, who might appeal to the archbishop, or from[8] him to the pope,—all interested judges, but who was debarred from carrying his wrong before a secular tribunal.

The sun was declining behind the pines, and was painting with saffron the boles of the trees, and striping with orange and purple the forest paths, as Thomas Lindet prepared to part from his friend Jean Lebertre, curé of the pilgrimage shrine of Notre Dame de la Couture, at the brow of the hill where the path to the Couture forked off from the main road to Bernay. At this point the trees fell away towards the valley, and the shrine was visible, lit in the last lights of evening which turned the grey stone walls into walls of gold.

La Couture is a singularly picturesque church, with lofty choir rising high above the nave roof, and with numerous chapels clustered about the chancel apse. The spire of lead with pinnacled turrets, in that setting glare, seemed a pyramid of flames.

The priest of Bernay was a tall thin man of forty-five, with colourless face, sunken cheeks, and restless, very brilliant eyes. His face, though far from handsome, was interesting and attractive. It beamed with intelligence and earnestness. His long hair, flowing to his shoulders, was grizzled with care rather than with age,—the care inseparable from poverty, and that arising from the responsibilities attending on the charge of a number of souls. His brow was slightly retreating and wanted breadth, his cheek-bones were high. The nose[9] and mouth were well moulded, the latter was peculiarly delicate and flexible. The thin lips were full of expression, and trembled with every emotion of the heart.

Lindet’s hands were also singularly beautiful—they were narrow and small; a lady would have envied the taper fingers and well-shaped nails. Malicious people declared that the priest was conscious of the perfection of his hands, and that he took pains to exhibit it; but this was most untrue. No man was more free from vanity, and had a greater contempt for it, than Thomas Lindet. He had contracted a habit of using his right hand whilst speaking, in giving force to his words by gesture, and whilst thinking, in plucking at the cassock-buttons on his breast, but this trick was symptomatic of a highly-strung nervous temperament, and was in no degree attributable to personal vanity.

Lebertre was somewhat of a contrast to Lindet. He was a middle-sized, well-built man, with a face of an olive hue, hazel eyes, large, as earnest as those of his friend, but not like them in their restlessness; they were deep, calm wells, which seemed incapable of being ruffled by anger, or clouded with envy. His black hair was flowing and glossy, without a speck in it of grey. ‘I would not do so,’ said he, holding Lindet’s arm; ‘you should bear meekly, and suffer patiently.’

‘Bear and suffer!’ repeated the curé of S. Cross, his eyes lightening and his lips quivering; ‘True. “Suffering is the[10] badge of all our tribe.” What the English poet puts into the mouth of a Jew is a motto meet for a French curé. But, my brother, tell me—are not wrongs and sufferings crushing us, destroying our self-reliance, ruining our independence, and obliterating our self-respect? How can a priest be respected by his flock when he does not respect himself; and how can he respect himself when he is trodden like dirt under the feet of his spiritual superiors?’

‘Bearing wrongs and suffering injustice without a murmur is the badge of a Christian; above all, of a priest. He who suffers and endures uncomplainingly is certain to obtain respect and reverence.’

‘A pretty world this has become,’ exclaimed Lindet; ‘the poor are ground to powder, and at each turn of the wheel we are bidden preach them Christian submission. They look around, and see everywhere labour taxed, and idleness go free. Toil then like a Christian, and pay, pay, pay, that the king may make fountains for his garden, the nobles may stake high at cards, and the bishops and canons may salary expensive cooks. Say the little farmer has a hundred francs. Out of this he is obliged to pay twenty-five for the taille, sixteen for the accessories, fifteen for his capitation, eleven for tithe. What remains to him for the support of his family, after he has paid his rent? Truly of this world may be said what is said of hell: “Nullus ordo, sempiternus horror inhabitat”’

[11]