Synodicon in Gallia reformata, or, The acts, decisions, decrees, and canons of those famous national councils of the reformed churches in France being I. a most faithful and impartial history of the rise, growth, perfection and decay of the reformation in that kingdom, with its fatal catastrophe upon the revocation of the Edict of Nants in the year 1685 : II. the confession of faith and discipline of those churches : III. a collection of speeches, letters, sacred politicks, cases of conscience, and controversies in divinity, determined and resolved by those grave assemblies : IV. many excellent expedients for preventing and healing schisms in the churches and for re-uniting the dismembred body of divided Protestants : V. the laws, government, and maintenance of their colleges, universities and ministers, together with their exercise of discipline upon delinquent ministers and church-members : VI. a record of very many illustrious events of divine providence relating to those churches : the whole collected and composed out of original manuscript acts of those renowned synods : a work never be extant in any language.

SECT. XLIV.

But this Storm did not fall only upon the Commons, but Noblemen, and Gentlemen of the best Quality are exposed to it. They also have Souldiers Quartered upon them, who do rage and spoil them every way as much as the Citizens and Peasants. Their Houses are pillaged and plundered, their Goods dissipated and wasted, their Castles rased, their Woods felled, and their very Persons affronted with the Insolencies and Barbarity of the Dra∣goons. They spare neither Sex, nor Age, nor Quality. They practise their Violences upon all Persons, who are non-compliant with their Com∣mands of changing their Religion. Several Officers and Members of Par∣liament

underwent the very self-same Fate. For they were first deprived of their Offices, and then the Military Officers, who were actually in ser∣vice, are ordered to quit their Posts, and to come and Quarter upon them, that they may by these new Apostles be necessitated to turn Catholicks.

Many Gentlemen, and Persons of great Quality, and many aged Ladies of ancient and noble Families, seeing all these Outrages, retired unto Paris, and hoped, that in that Forest of Houses, and so near the Court, they might find a safe retreat. But this hope soon vanisheth. For a Decree of Council is Published, Commanding them to leave Paris in fifteen days, and to return back again without tarrying, unto their own homes. And whereas some presumed to Petition his Majesty to stop the current of this violent Storm and Injustice, they were immediately sent Prisoners to the Bastile.

The French King about the 6th of October 1685. was heard to say, That he hoped by that time his Grandson, the Duke of Burgundy, came to years of Ʋn∣derstanding, he should never know what an Hugonot was in France, but by History.

In Sedan (a Principality by the Kings Edict annexed but of late unto the Crown) the Desolation by the Dragoons is unspeakable. The Fami∣lies of Protestants being inforced to pay unto these Guests Quartered upon them, from ten to fifty and sixty Crowns a day, till they were totally beggar'd.

There have been rare and great Examples of Patience and Constancy among these Suffering Protestants. I shall produce a few Instances.

In Guyenne, Monsieur de Bergues Lord of Feus, ever since the Dragoons came into the Province, hath had seventy of them continually lodged up∣on him at Free Quarters, where they made a total Consumption, devour∣ing all that he had, even to the very Stones and Walls, and not content with ruining him, they compelled his poor Tenants to contribute also to their Livelyhoods. After they had by main force dragged his Lady and Children to the Popish Church, they Imprisoned them in several Nunne∣ries: and as for that Pious Lord, having by their Cruelties and ill usages confined him to his Bed, yet they continued their Torments of him in his Sickness, four Souldiers guarding him night and day, as if he had been some Notorious Traytor, and those brutal Wretches treating him with ex∣cessive Indignities. However they could not shake the Constancy of this Noble and Religious Gentleman.

Five Citizens of Sedan, after these Missionaries had tryed their skill upon them, by destroying and eating up all their Substance and Estate, and other Hellish ill usage in Prison, to induce them to renounce their Religion, and not prevailing, they at last Condemn'd them to the Gallies. Unto which they went most Couragiously, Rejoycing at their great Afflictions for the Gospel.

Two ancient Gentlewomen of Sedan, one being the Widow of Mon∣sieur Dreall Seneschal of the City, and the other the Relict of Monsieur de Beaulieu, who in his Life time had been Pastor and Professor in that Church and Academy, they both yielding up their Houses and Estates (which were very considerable) to be spoiled and plundered by these Dragoons, did for some weeks hide themselves from their Violence, by climbing from the Tops of Houses, from one House unto another, and indured those hardships, which would have been the bane of others younger and stronger than themselves; but hereby being worn out and quite spent with the labours and fatigues of their frequent removes, they fell sick, and were both seized on by their Persecutors, who banished them unto Rheims, and are now doing penance for their Heresie (as the Papists call it,) and you may be sure a severe Penance it is, that will be inflicted on them by the bigotted Nuns in their Con∣vents.

The Lady Vielle Vigne, ne••r Nantes in Brittany, being accused of holding a Conventicle in her house, that is, for keeping a day of Prayer, was im∣mediately arrested, and all that had been found at that Religious Meeting were carried to prison, where this Excellent Pious Lady abides in Du∣ress.

Monsieur de Rosemont, formerly Pastor of Giens, having through humane Infirmity fallen with the Multitude, fell sick in danger of death; the Priest of his Parish comes to visit him, and offers to administer the Popish Sacra∣ments, Extream Unction, and the Eucharist unto him; but the poor Man refuses them, and declares his mind boldly against them, and in particular against their Sacrilege in robbing the People of the Cup. Finally, it pleas∣ed God that he recovered of his distemper; and being in perfect health, he was demanded whether the words he had spoken, and the discourse he had held in his Sickness were the effects of his Fever and Delirium, or of his fixed and settled Judgment. He answered couragiously, that what he had spoken in his Sickness he would stand to in his Health, that they were his present Thoughts and Faith; and expressing a great deal of Remorse and Sorrow for his Fall, he begg'd pardon of God for it: whereupon he was brought before a Judge, who condemn'd him forth-right unto the Gallies, there to be hung till he was dead.

Monsieur Bayley, Minister of Carla in the County of Foix, and who was in June 1685. seized on by the Provost of Montauban, and thrown into a Dungeon in the Castle of Trumpet at Bordeaux, not one of his Friends or Relations being ever permitted to visit him, or to know the cause of his Im∣prisonment; died the 12th of November following, but with that Constan∣cy as became a Martyr of Jesus Christ, praising and blessing God for his Sufferings. These Sufferings of his had been very great and exceeding grie∣vous: He lay a long while together sick without any relief or assistance; yea, they were so barbarously cruel to him as to deny him a Cup of cold Water to quench his burning Thirst; his merciless Guards treating him in his very malady with all manner of Barbarities, that by those Torments he might be enforced to apostatize from the Truth; but this excellent man of God held stedfastly to the last, and by his Faith and Patience conquered the Cruelties of his Tormentors, and died triumphantly. He was a Person of great Worth and Learning, all which was communicated by him to the Edification of his Flock. His Brother, one of the rarest Scholars of this Age, is that famous Author of the Republique des Lettres.

The Widow of Monsieur Fremont, that rich famous Banker of Paris, to∣gether with her two Sons, left above 200000 Liveres in their House and e∣scapt most fortunately their Persecutors. Monsieur Fremont putting him∣self and six more into the Habits and Arms of the Life-Guard, and himself as an Officer in the head of them, coming upon the Frontiers to the Guards, demands whether none had passed them lately? To which they replied Yes, some had done it a little before with Pass-ports. But this new Officer tells them they were counterfeited, and he was ordered to pursue these Counterfeits, and so saved himself and Company.

In Poictou the Houses of the Gentry are demolished, and excessive Cru∣elties by the Mission to make them renounce their Religion. The Lady of a Person of Quality, who for his Constancy was imprisoned, after that his House had been pulled down, was clapt up between four Walls, where, though she was big with child and very near her time, yet she was starved to death with Cold and Famine.

In the Burrough of Torique three Leagues from Niort, Frances Aubin, a Country Woman, declaring her resolution to persist unchangeably in the Protestant Religion; they first squeezed her Fingers to pieces with Iron Skrews, and then hung her up by her Arm-pits, smoaking and forcing her

to suck in with her Nostrils Tobacco and Brimstone: afterward these bloody Villains tied her Legs unto a Horse, who drew her upon burning Faggots. Her own Brother, of the same name, was an Eye-witness of all her Suf∣ferings, who also was tortured by them, but in another manner. And forasmuch as none of these Cruelties could make them either loose their Resolutions or their Lives, they flung them both into a low Ditch, whence they were taken out almost knee deep in Mud and Water.

Another Inhabitant of the same place called Fountayne, was hung up also by the Arms, smoakt with Tobacco, her Fingers burnt by a light fire, and then thrust into a Dungeon to die of Cold and Hunger, as a Man of S. Maixant had done before her.

A Gentleman of Augumois they tormented to death, by pouring into his Mouth boiling Aqua Vitae, and Wines, and Water.

They gagged two Gentlewomen of the same Province, and had almost killed them by a great quantity of Wine which they forced down their Throats.

Another Lady of Quality, whilst they consum'd her Goods before her face, they, watching her by day and night, forced her to turn the Spit without any Rest or Intermission: and this hath been an ordinary practice to keep people so long waking, 7, 8, 9. days and nights together, the Dragoons watching by turns, till these poor Creatures having lost their Senses, and not knowing what Questions are put them, or Answers they make unto them, are intangled, carried to a Popish Church, and two Witnesses swear∣ing they saw this (though a delirious) Person at Mass, if afterward, by Sleep or Food they came to themselves again, and declare that they be Pro∣testants, they are condemned for Relapse, and burnt to death without Mercy.

An Eminent French Minister gave the Writer hereof this Relation, That Jan. 23. 1685. a Woman had her sucking Child snatch'd from her Breasts; and put into the next Room, which was only parted by a few Boards from hers. These Devils incarnate would not let the poor Mother come to her Child, unless she would renounce her Religion and become a Roman Catho∣lick. Her Chiled crys and she crys; her Bowels yearn upon her poor mi∣serable Infant; but the Fear of God, and of hell, and losing her Soul, keep her from Apostasie: however she suffers a double Martyrdom, one in her own person, the other in that of her sweet Babe, who dies, in her hearing, with Crying and Famine before its poor Mother.

Monsieur Elias Boutonnet, a Merchant of Marans near Rochell, was mar∣tyr'd by these bloody Miscreants, after this manner, They hung him up by the Heels to a Post of his own House, and smoak'd him to death with wet Straw set on fire.