Yet it was then that he made the most fatal mistake of his life, the evil consequences of which pursued him to his death.  He revoked the Edict of Nantes, which Henry IV. had granted, and which had secured religious toleration.  This he did from a perverted conscience, wishing to secure the unanimity and triumph of the Catholic faith; to this he was incited by the best woman with whom he was ever brought in intimate relations; in this he was encouraged by all the religious bigots of his kingdom.  He committed a monstrous crime that good might come,—­not foreseeing the ultimate consequences, and showing anything but an enlarged statesmanship.  This stupid folly alienated his best subjects, and sowed the seeds of revolution in the next reign, and tended to undermine the throne.  Richelieu never would have consented to such an insane measure; for this cruel act not only destroyed veneration at home, but created detestation among all enlightened foreigners.

It is a hackneyed saying, that “the blood of martyrs is the seed of the Church.”  But it would seem that the persecution of the Protestants was an exception to this truth,—­and a persecution all the more needless and revolting since the Protestants were not in rebellion against the government, as in the tune of Charles IX.  This diabolical persecution, justified however by some of the greatest men in France, had its intended results.  The bigots who incited that crime had studied well the principles of successful warfare.  As early as 1666 the King was urged to suppress the Protestant religion, and long before the Edict of Nantes was revoked the Protestants had been subjected to humiliation and annoyance.  If they held places at court, they were required to sell them; if they were advocates, they were forbidden to plead; if they were physicians, they were prevented from visiting patients.  They were gradually excluded from appointments in the army and navy; little remained to them except commerce and manufactures.  Protestants could not hold Catholics as servants; soldiers were unjustly quartered upon them; their taxes were multiplied, their petitions were unread.  But in 1685 dragonnades subjected them to still greater cruelties; who tore up their linen for camp beds, and emptied their mattresses for litters.  The poor, unoffending Protestants filled the prisons, and dyed the scaffolds with their blood.  They were prohibited under the severest penalties from the exercise of their religion; their ministers were exiled, their children were baptized in the Catholic faith, their property was confiscated, and all attempts to flee the country were punished by the galleys.  Two millions of people were disfranchised; two hundred thousand perished by the executioners, or in prisons, or in the galleys.  All who could fly escaped to other countries; and those who escaped were among the most useful citizens, carrying their arts with them to enrich countries at war with France.  Some two hundred thousand contrived to fly,—­thus