liament, which has ever since remained the steadfast advocate of Gallican liberties. The kings, however, were not equallj' steadfast in their opposition to the demands of the popes, and often made concessi(in.s in the hope, with the aid of the popes, of increasing their power at home. Tluis the new Pragmatic Sanction, which tlio Council of Bourges (q. v.) established in 1438, was soon set aside by the succeeding kings. In all the great ecclesiastical movements of the ]Middlc Ages France took a prominent part. Most of the ef- forts made either to overthrow the papacy for tlie pur- pose of restoring a purer form of Ciiristianity [see Waldexses; Albigenses], or to reform the Church from within, either centred in France, or found there the most vigorous support.
(2.) Ilistori/ of the Roman Catholic Church since the beginning of the IGth Century. — At the beginning of the 16th centur}' Francis I concluded a concordat, Aug. 18, 1516, in which he sacrificed man}' of the liberties of the Gallican Church. After the rise of the Reforma- tion the Eoman Church succeeded in securing Iicr : s- cendencj' by long-continued and cruel persecution (see below. History of the French Reformed Church'). Hen- ry IV, when contesting the throne of France, found the public sentiment so strongly in favor of the old Church tliat he thought it expedient, from political reasons, to change his faith. Henceforth the ascend- ency of the Eoman Church over Protestantism was secured, and the reformatory movements of the Jan- senists (q. v.) and others were likewise suppressed, at the request of the popes, by the secular arm. The Golden Age of France, under Louis XIV, produced also in the Church some master minds, as Bossuct, Fcnelon, Bourdaloue, and many others, who were ornaments of their Church, but were not able to staj' the ris- ing tide of an infidel philosophy. The episcopate, under the leadership of Bossuet, reaffirmed the liber- ties of the Gallican Church at the famous assembly held in 1082. Tliis assembly, which consisted of eight archbishops, twenty-six bishops, and thirty-eight otlier clergymen, unanimouslj' affirmed the principles of the Regale (the Pragmatic Sanction of 1438), announc- ing them in the form of four propositions, which were registered bj' the Parliament of Paris March 23, 1082. Though the popes often succeeded in enforcing obe- dience to their decrees, most of the great theolcgians of the 17th and 18th centuries adhered to Gallican doctrines, and the Regale continued in force until the revolution of 1789. Monasticism, in the same period, reached the climax of literary culture in some congrega- tions of the French Benedictines and Oratorians. Nev- ertheless, the ver}' foundations of the Roman Church were gradually undermined by the spread of French philosophy, and the success of the French Revolution seemed for a time to sweep away the entire Church of France. The National Assembly decreed (Nov. 27, 1790) that all ecclesiastical officers, xnider penalty of losing their offices, should take an oath for the civil constitution of the clergj', which Pius VI declared (April 13, 1791) inadmissible. Bishops were chosen in accordance with the new law, and consecrated with- out having the confirmation of the pope. In 1793 Christianity itself was declared to be abolighed. Na- poleon, though perhaps personally indifi^erent towards all churches, regarded the re-establishment of the Ro- man Church as the religion of the state as indispensa- ble to the tranquillity of the countr}-, and therefore concluded in 1801 a concordat [see Concordat], the introduction of which was solemnized in 1802. Napo- leon adiled to the concordat certain organic laws, which make the promulgation of papal decrees dependent on the authorization of the government, establish an ap- peal to the Council of State against the abuses of ec- clesiastical power, and bind the theological seminaries to the four propositions of the Gallican clergy of 1682. Two A'ears later Napoleon was crowned emperor bj' the pope. "When, however, the States of the Church
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were taken possession of bj' the French (1808), and when tlie pops declared every one who laid his hand upon the patrimony of St. Peter excommunicated, Na- poleon had tlie pope arrested and brought to France. An attempt to render, by means of a sj'nod convoked at Paris (1811), the French Church independent of Rome, failed. In 1813 Napoleon extorted, in a new concordat, some important concessions from the im- prisoned pope ; and when the pope revoked all he had done. Napoleon published the concordat as the law of the empire on the very next day (March 25). After the overthrow of Napoleon (1815), Louis XVI II recog- nised the Itoman Church as the religion of the state, though granting religious toleration to every form of public worship. Powerful efforts were made to re- establish among the French the belief in the doctrines of the Roman Church, and the leaders in this contest — Lamennais (q. v.), de Maistre (q. v.), and the "priests of the Mission" (q. v.) — attached themselves more closely to the papal than to the Galilean school. Gal- licanism, at least in its ancient form, began to die out. The Apostolic Congregation, though in opposition to the inclinations of the prudent king, obtained a con- cordat (1817) by which the concordat of 1801 was re- voked, and that of 151G substituted for it. So decided, however, was the opposition of pnlilic opinion that it was never laid before the Chamber of Deputies. AVith- out the consent of the Chambers, the government of Louis XVIII, and still more that of Charles X, did as much for the Church as was iu their power, although, to appease public excitement, a royal ordinance (June 16, 1828) had to close the schools of the Jesuits. The revolution of 1830 was connected with some outbreaks of popular indignation against the Church, which lost the prerogative of being the religion of the state. Yet Louis Philippe made as great concessions to the Church as the origin of his own authority would allow. Lamennais, Lacordaire, Montalembert, and others an- ticipated great results from a union between ultramon- tanism and democracy, but the condemnation of their organ, IJJren'u; by the pope, put a stop to their novel schemes, and drove Lann-nnais out of the Church. An attempt, made by the abbe Chatel in 1830, to found a new French Catholic C'lurch in the s])irit of an ex- travagant liberalism, and without any Christian basis, was an utter failure. A plan of national education, which placed (1833) the public schools under the super- intendence of the universitj^ was violently assailed by the Church, yet the government never ceased to seek a reconciliation, or at least a compromise, with the Church ; and when Thiers called up in the Chamber of Deputies the laws still in existence against the Jes- uits, the government executed them with the utmost possible mildness. To the Republican Revolution of 1848 the Church offered no opposition, and the priests did not hesitate to bless the tree of libcrt}' and pray for the sovereign people. The Church received almost everything she had l)een in vain demanding during the reign of Louis Philippe. Nevertheless, the dread of the Red Republic made most of the clergj- and of the leaders of the Catholic party partisans of Louis Napoleon. Having become emperor. Napoleon III attached a majority of the bishops and of the ul- tramontane school to his interests by increasing the salaries of the bishops, raising tlieir influence in the supreme educational and political boards of the state, and by permitting the bishops to revive the provincial councils which had been in desuetude for more than a hundred years. The ultramontane school, headed bj' the Unlvers, readily approved of all the measures of the government l)y which the political liberties of the na- tion were curtailed, and manj' hoped that the emperor would realize their boldest dream — the restoration of a politico-ecclesiastical theocracj^ under the rule of the pope. Yet many leading men in the Church, es- pecially among the laity, dissented from this view, and organized a moderate school, which not only op-