The Online Library of Liberty

A project of Liberty Fund, Inc.

• Foreword
• Translator’s Preface
• Judgments On History and Historians
• I: Antiquity
• 1.: Ancient History and Its Scope
• 2.: On the Intellectual Indispensability of Studying Ancient History
• 3.: The Limits of Civilization and Barbarism
• 4.: Why Today’s “educated Man” Can No Longer Understand Antiquity
• 5.: The Historical Significance of Egypt
• 6.: The Phoenicians As the Earliest Creators of πóλεις ( Polis )
• 7.: On Carthage
• 8.: Athens
• 9.: Rome and Its Mission In World History
• 10.: On the Roman Empire In Its First Two Centuries
• II: The Middle Ages
• 11.: On the Middle Ages
• 12.: On Early Christianity
• 13.: Christianity As a Martyr Religion
• 14.: On Asceticism and Its Position
• 15.: The Spread of Nicene Christianity
• 16.: The Church
• 17.: Julian and the Prospect For a Restoration of Paganism
• 18.: Western European Arianism and the Jews
• 19.: The Breakup of the Western Empire
• 20.: The Achievement of Clovis I
• 21.: Mohammed As the Founder of a Religion, and Islam
• 22.: The Despotism of Islam
• 23.: Islam and Its Effects
• 24.: The Two Main Realities For the Papacy of the Eighth Century
• 25.: Charlemagne
• 26.: The Normans
• 27.: The Byzantine Empire and Its Mission
• 28.: On the Iconoclastic Controversy
• 29.: On the Crusades
• 30.: The Sorrows and Sacrifices of the Crusades
• 31.: On the Evaluation of the Later Middle Ages
• III: History From 1450 to 1598
• 32.: The Period From 1450 to 1598 and the Nineteenth Century’s View of It
• 33.: England In the Late Middle Ages
• 34.: On Richard Iii
• 35.: On the Wars of the Roses and On Scotland
• 36.: Burgundy
• 37.: Charles the Bold of Burgundy
• 38.: France and the Idea of Unification
• 39.: Louis Xi
• 40.: The German Imperial Power Under Frederick Iii
• 41.: The Ottomans
• 42.: The Republic of Florence
• 43.: On the War of 1494
• 44.: On the Power of the Papacy
• 45.: Italy and the Rest of Europe
• 46.: Spain and Portugal
• 47.: The Beginning of the Reformation: General Considerations
• 48.: On Luther
• 49.: On the German Reformation: Its Causes and Spiritual Consequences
• 50.: On the Reformation: Protestantism and Tradition—the Intolerance of the New Doctrine
• 51.: On the Reformation: the Establishment of So-called Spiritual Freedom
• 52.: On the Reformation: the Masses, Their Motives and Consequences—luther
• 53.: On the Reformation: Governments—confiscation of Property and Dogmatism—church and State
• 54.: The Origin of the Territorial Churches
• 55.: On the Reformation After 1526: The Inevitable Caesaropapism
• 56.: On the Coming of the Reformation: the Reformation and the Fate of Art
• 57.: On the Situation of the Catholic Church: the Direct Effect of the Reformation
• 58.: On Zwingli’s Later Period
• 59.: Charles V and Francis I
• 60.: On Charles V
• 61.: On Henry Viii
• 62.: Gustavus Vasa
• 63.: The Community of the Elect
• 64.: On Calvin
• 65.: On Protestantism In France
• 66.: German Culture Around 1555
• 67.: On Camoëns’ Lusiads
• 68.: On the Counter Reformation
• 69.: St. Ignatius Loyola
• 70.: The Jesuits
• 71.: The Jesuits and the Papacy
• 72.: The Third Council of Trent (1562–1563)
• 73.: The Popes of the Counter Reformation
• 74.: On the German Counter Reformation
• 75.: France In the Year 1562
• 76.: After St. Bartholomew’s Night
• 77.: Murder As an Expedient
• 78.: The Special Character of the French Court
• 79.: On the Conversion of Henry Iv
• 80.: Holland
• 81.: Mary Stuart
• 82.: On Elizabeth of England
• 83.: The Age of Elizabeth
• IV: History of the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries
• 84.: Introduction to the History of the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries (1598–1763)
• 85.: The Character of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries
• 86.: The Huguenots Under Henry Iv
• 87.: Gomarists and Arminians
• 88.: Powers and Society In Europe Before the Thirty Years’ War
• 89.: Italy In the Seventeenth Century
• 90.: Richelieu
• 91.: On Germany’s Situation Before the Thirty Years’ War
• 92.: The Swedes In Germany
• 93.: On Wallenstein’s End
• 94.: The Great Elector
• 95.: England Before the First Revolution
• 96.: English Royalty and Its Task
• 97.: Cromwell
• 98.: The Fronde and the French Aristocracy
• 99.: The Fronde and the Parlement of Paris
• 100.: On Mazarin
• 101.: Styles of Life and Art Around 1650
• 102.: Sweden Under King Charles X Gustavus
• 103.: The Age of Unlimited Princely Power
• 104.: On Louis Xiv
• 105.: Louis Xiv As Lord of the Church
• 106.: The French Spirit of Uniformity and the Huguenots
• 107.: Louis Xiv Prior to the War of the Spanish Succession
• 108.: On the Second English Revolution
• 109.: England’s Defense Against Militarism
• 110.: On the Characteristics of the Seventeenth Century
• 111.: Russia
• 112.: England After George I
• 113.: Frederick the Great
• V: The Age of Revolution
• 114.: Introduction to the History of the Age of Revolution
• 115.: The Period of Reform From Above
• 116.: Absolutism In the North
• 117.: On the North American Revolutionary War
• 118.: England
• 119.: On Small States
• 120.: On the Dissolution of the Jesuit Order
• 121.: The Intellectual Situation Prior to 1789
• 122.: German and French Intellectual Development In the Eighteenth Century
• 123.: On Rousseau and His Utopia
• 124.: The Political Situation In France Before the Revolution
• 125.: The Destiny of the French Revolution
• 126.: On Mirabeau
• 127.: The Clergy
• 128.: The Legislative Assembly and the Clubs
• 129.: On the 10th of August, 1792
• 130.: On the September Massacres
• 131.: Before and After the Dissolution of the Convention
• 132.: On the Trial of Louis Xvi
• 133.: Girondists and Jacobins
• 134.: The Omnipotence of Utterly Unscrupulous Parties
• 135.: How a Government Becomes Exceedingly Strong
• 136.: Socialism? Communism?
• 137.: The Innermost Core of the Revolution
• 138.: Rousseau’s Concept of Music and the Destruction of Churches
• 139.: On Robespierre
• 140.: Before the 9th Thermidor (july 27, 1794)
• 141.: On the Mutual Destruction of the Revolutionary Factions
• 142.: On the 18th Fructidor (september 4, 1797)
• 143.: Bonaparte and the 18th Fructidor
• 144.: How Aristocracies and Princes Succumb
• 145.: On the Invasion of Switzerland By the French
• 146.: Old Bern and Why It Is Hated
• 147.: On the 18th Brumaire (november 9, 1799) and the Consulate
• 148.: On Napoleon
• 149.: Napoleon I and His Russian Campaign

76.

After St. Bartholomew’s Night

The refugees and pamphleteers recognized only a religious intention of the action and devised an agreement with the pope and Spain for the eradication of Protestantism as a whole.

However, the action had been aimed at the Huguenots, who were allied with the politiques, as a political party, especially at Coligny, not as Protestant, but as party head. If the intent had been merely religious, Navarre and Condé would not have been spared.

Regarding the murders in the provinces, it may be remarked that they did not occur at all in precisely those provinces administered by the Guises and their followers—in Picardy, Champagne, Brittany, Dauphiné, Auvergne, Languedoc, Provence. Nothing happened anywhere in the open country.

Where murders were committed, this was because people in the cities concerned had feared armed uprisings and raids by Huguenots with which religious wars had always started. Especially in Lyon people were worried about this. Following the news of the defeat of Mons, a list of the Protestant citizens and their servants was made in Lyon, and those who were not citizens were ordered to leave the city. Governor Mandelot was completely loyal to the king. After the decision of Mons the governors of the most important towns, almost all fortified ones, were commanded to provide for their safety.

To be sure, here, too, the fanatical rabble interfered and continued even after the king had ordered a stop; thus it was in Meaux, Orleans, Bourges, and Lyon. In Rouen and Toulouse the persecution did not break out until the middle of September. In the entire country there were maybe 20,000 casualties. The number of communities decreased little; as late as 1576 there were 2000.

Only if one does not lose sight of the essentially political character of the massacre of St. Bartholomew does one comprehend the following: that the French government did not join with Philip II; that it did not pass into the hands of the Guises whom Charles continued to hate; that Charles IX in the Declarations of August 26 and 28, in which he takes the responsibility for everything, declares that the Edict of St. Germain remains in force. But the Huguenot ritual practices were curtailed, “for the protection of the Protestants themselves from mob excesses,” as was explained for the benefit of foreign countries. The Montmorencys remained in the royal council. Philip and Alba for the time being were pacified by the court’s complete dissociation from Coligny’s Netherlands activities; but the desire for Flanders continued, with only its fulfillment postponed. Geneva, in its concern over Savoy and Spain, was hastily assured of French protection, and soon negotiations with Orange were being carried on again. The project of a marriage between Elizabeth of England and François d’Alençon, the brother of Charles IX, continued on its course. Where is it that one reads about Elizabeth receiving the French envoy in mourning? She was the first to congratulate Charles IX on the averted danger!

In Poland the French court constantly leaned on the Protestant faction in order to accomplish the election of the Anjou. To frustrate this became a major assignment of the refugee Huguenot writers, especially in Geneva: Hotman, Donneau. They painted the conduct of the royal house and the Guises in the most horrible colors.

That the king took everything upon himself and asserted categorically that the Guises and others had acted on his orders was a formal French practice, on account of the prevalent idea that nothing could happen except by royal order. He fabricated a four-year premeditation on top of that.

Later, when the Huguenots had gained the upper hand again and the court had turned against the Guises (1576), Charles’s share was decreased again and the action itself disavowed. Later still, under the Bourbons, the Valois were treated with consideration and left out of the picture, and the murder plan was laid at the door of the Guises.

The main sorrow in the period of 1572, however, did not pertain to the number of casualties or the perfidy of the proceedings, but to the frustration of the great seizure of power by the party which had been about to seize the crown, take Belgium, and push Catholicism back over the Alps and the Pyrenees. This frustration was la grande trahison [the great betrayal].

Instead of this, the court continued with the policies of Henry II: repression of Protestantism at home and Protestant alliances abroad.

The court thought it had by no means committed a “crime” that would have to be palliated, neither Charles nor Anjou nor Catherine de Medici nor the Guises and the fanatical citizens of Paris. No one denied his participation, except the court later, and then for political rather than moral reasons.