Henry M. Baird · 306 of 379

CHAPTER XI · The French prelates at Poissy.

While the States General were occupied at Pontoise in considering the means of relieving the king's pecuniary embarrassments, Catharine had assembled at Poissy all the bishops of France to take into consideration the religious reformation which the times imperatively demanded. The Pope as yet delayed the long-promised œcumenical council, and there was little hope of obtaining its actual convocation on fair and practical terms unless, indeed, he should be frightened into it by the superior terrors of a French national council, which might throw France into the arms of the Reformation. Tired of the duplicity of the pontiff, alarmed by the rapid progress of religious dissensions at home, not unwilling, perhaps, to make an attempt at reconciliation, which, if successful, would confirm her own authority and remove the anxieties to which she was daily exposed—now from the side of the Guises, and again from that of the Huguenots—the queen mother had yielded to the suggestion frequently made to her, and had consented to a discussion between the French prelates and the most learned Protestant ministers.