[Illustration:  Erasmus——­194]

The attorney-general of the Parliament ordered one of his officers to go and make an examination of Berquin’s books as well as papers, and to seize what appeared to him to savor of heresy.  The officer brought away divers works of Luther, Melancthon, and Carlostadt, and some original treatises of Berquin himself, which were deposited in the keeping of the court.  The theological faculty claimed to examine them as being within their competence.  On being summoned by the attorney-general, Berquin demanded to be present when an inventory was made of his books or manuscripts, and to give such explanations as he should deem necessary; and his request was granted without question.  On the 26th of June, 1523, the commissioners of the Sorbonne made their report.  On the 8th of July, Peter Lizet, king’s advocate, read it out to the court.  The matter came on again for hearing on the 1st of August.  Berquin was summoned and interrogated, and, as the result of this interrogatory, was arrested and carried off to imprisonment at the Conciergerie in the square tower.  On the 5th of August sentence was pronounced, and Louis de Berquin was remanded to appear before the Bishop of Paris, as being charged with heresy, “in which case,” says the Journal d’un Bourgeois de Paris, “he would have been in great danger of being put to death according to law, as he had well deserved.”  The public were as ready as the accusers to believe in the crime and to impatiently await its punishment.

It was not without surprise or without displeasure that, on the 8th of August, just as they had “made over to the Bishop of Paris, present and accepting” the prisoner confined in the Conciergerie, the members of the council-chamber observed the arrival of Captain Frederic, belonging to the archers of the king’s guard, and bringing a letter from the king, who changed the venue in Berquin’s case so as to decide it himself at his grand council; in consequence of which the prisoner would have to be handed over, not to the bishop, but to the king.  The chamber remonstrated; Berquin was no longer their prisoner; the matter had been decided; it was the bishop to whom application must be made.  But these remonstrances had been foreseen; the captain had verbal instructions to carry off Louis de Berquin by force in case of a refusal to give him up.  The chamber decided upon handing over the bishop’s prisoner to the king, contenting themselves with causing the seized books and manuscripts to be burned that very day in the space in front of Notre Dame.  It was whilst repairing to the scene of war in Italy, and when he was just entering Melun, where he merely passed through, that the king had given this unexpected order, on the very day, August 5, on which the Parliament pronounced the decree which sent Berquin to appear before the Bishop of Paris.  There is no clear trace of the vigilant protect, or who had so closely watched the proceedings against