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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 45479 ***
+
+THE STORY OF JOAN OF ARC THE WITCH--SAINT
+
+By M. M. Mangasarian
+
+Lecturer Of The Independent Religious Society
+
+From "The Rationalist," October, 1913
+
+
+[Illustration: 0003]
+
+
+PAST NUMBERS OF THE RATIONALIST.
+
+No. 1. St. Francis, the Second Christ.
+
+No. 2. Marcus Aurelius.
+
+No. 3. Ships that Sink in the Night; or, God and the Titanic.
+
+No. 4. What has Christ Done for the World?
+
+No. 5. Lyman Abbott on Immortality.
+
+No 6. Voltaire in Hades.
+
+No. 7. The Gospel of Sport--What Shall I Do to Be Saved? Play!
+
+No. 8. A Poet's Philosophy of Happiness--Omar Khayyam.
+
+No. 9. A Rationalist in Home. (A Lecture in Three Parts.) Part 1
+
+No. 10. A Rationalist in Rome. (A Lecture in Three Parts.) Part 2
+
+No. 11. A Rationalist in Rome. (A Lecture in Three Parts,) Part 3
+
+No. 12. Jew and Christian According to Shakespeare.
+
+No. 13 and 14. Christian Science and Common Sense.
+
+No. 15. A Message From Abroad.
+
+No. 16. The First Modern Man.
+
+No. 17. The Monk and The Woman in The Garden of Allah.
+
+No. 18. The High Cost of Living and the Higher Cost of Superstition
+
+No. 19. The Debate between Three Clergymen and a Rationalist.
+
+No. 20. Rationalism and Crime.
+
+No. 21. Women and Crime.
+
+No. 22. Was Jesus a Socialist?
+
+No. 23. The Catholic Church and the Socialist Party.
+
+No. 24. What is the Trouble with the World?
+
+The above 24 lectures will be sent to any address upon receipt of $2
+
+
+Volume 2
+
+No. 1. Who Made the Gods?
+
+No. 2. Marriage and Divorce, According to Rationalism.
+
+No. 3. The American Girl.
+
+No. 4. The Catholic Church in Politics.
+
+No. 5. Christian and Turk.
+
+No. 6. The Gospel According to Bernard Shaw.
+
+No. 7 and 8. Morality Without God.
+
+No. 9. A Letter to My Flock.
+
+No. 10. A Missionary's Convert.
+
+No. 11. The Ex-Priest in Paris.
+
+The Rationalist
+
+Is published by the Independent Religious Society semi-monthly. Each
+number is to consist of a lecture by M. M. Mangasarian. Price of
+subscription, per annum, $2.00. Orders should be sent to
+The Independent Religious Society, 922 Lakeside Place, Chicago
+
+
+
+
+JOAN OF ARC
+
+This lecture on Joan of Arc, delivered some time ago, provoked a great
+deal of criticism in Chicago. The people who protested against it and
+wanted to punish its author were, naturally enough, the Roman Catholics.
+What interests me in Joan of Arc is not the fact that the story of her
+martyrdom and subsequent canonization could be used as a weapon
+against the Church of Rome, but because the story in itself is so very
+compelling. It is quite true that the story also illustrates how far
+from infallible the Catholic Church has been in its dealings with the
+Maid of Orleans--first, burning her at the stake as a witch, and, five
+hundred years later, beatifying her as a saint. The statement in my
+lecture which caused the greatest displeasure was to the effect that the
+same church which had burnt Joan of Arc as a witch in fourteen hundred
+thirty-one had sainted her in nineteen hundred and nine. The Catholics
+deny that they were at all responsible for the terrible death of
+the deliverer of France. This lecture will throw some light on that
+question.
+
+As related in a former lecture, it was at her shrine, in the Church of
+the Sacred Heart, in Paris, last summer, that I promised myself the
+task of presenting to the American people the truth about Joan of Arc.
+I shall speak very plainly in this lecture, but, I am sure, without
+any trace of bitterness in my heart toward anyone. I shall speak with
+feeling, of course, for it is impossible not to be moved to the depths
+by the events which brought a girl of nineteen to the stake--but my
+passion is free from anger or prejudice. I can weep for this young woman
+without gnashing my teeth on her fanatical persecutors. I am sure I can
+tell the truth without lying about the Catholic Church.
+
+But I do not wish to be sentimental, either. I have not forgiven the
+unrepentant destroyers of the innocent. To convert a heretic into
+a saint by trying to prove that she was not a heretic at all is not
+repentance; it is sophistry. To deny that Joan suffered death at the
+hands of, and by the authority of, the Vicar of Christ on earth is not
+a sign of regret for the past, but a defiance of history. When
+the Catholics shall admit that, through ignorance, and urged on by
+circumstances they could not control, they committed the act which they
+have since atoned for by offering her a heavenly crown--when, I say, the
+Catholics shall shed over her body tears as genuine as those which black
+Othello shed over the woman he had smothered--then we will forgive them.
+
+But the Catholic Church will have to choose between securing our
+forgiveness and retaining her infallibility. If she should repent of a
+single act ever committed by her officially, she would lose her claim
+to infallibility--for how can the infallible err? If, on the other hand,
+she should hold to her infallibility, how can she be sorry for anything
+she has ever done? If I had any influence with the Catholics I would
+advise them to sacrifice infallibility for the respect of humanity.
+It is much more divine to say, "I am sorry," than to say, "I am
+infallible." But the Catholic Church will not take my advice.
+
+The shrine of Joan in the Paris church is almost as eloquent as her
+stake in Rouen. I have seen them both--that is to say, I have seen the
+spot on which she was consumed, marked by a white slab; and I have seen
+the marble figure of Joan, as a girl, in the attitude of prayer, now
+in the Church of the Sacred Heart in Paris. As I stood at her shrine in
+this great white church it seemed to me that, even though Joan of Arc
+has, at last been made a saint, there was still a prejudice against her
+on the part of the people, as well as of the priests. This is only an
+impression, and I hope I am mistaken. But let me present the evidence
+on which I base my misgivings: In the first place, Joan is not given
+the preference in the shrine set apart for her. St. Michael, whoever he
+might be, occupies the whole front of the altar, and only on the windows
+and the side walls do we find any mention of Joan and the events of her
+heroic career. There is also, at one end of the enclosure, as intimated
+before, a small marble figure of Joan on her knees. Why does St. Michael
+usurp the place of honor over the altar? Who is he? What has he done for
+France? In the second place, there was not a single lighted candle at
+her shrine. St. Mary's altar, a little distance off, was ablaze. St.
+Joseph's, too, was honored by lighted candles. But no one was on her
+knees and no flame twinkled before the sainted Joan of Arc. They say
+that it is almost impossible to outlive the charge of heresy. In former
+times, quite frequently, even heretics who repented of their heresies
+were put to death, nevertheless. To have ever been accused, even, or
+suspected of heresy, is an unpardonable crime. Joan was suspected, at
+least, of rebellion against Rome, and it seemed to me, as I reflected
+upon what I observed in the church, that the Catholics had canonized
+this village maid reluctantly, and only under pressure, and after five
+hundred years of dillydallying.
+
+But before I left the Church of the Sacred Heart there was a lighted
+candle upon her altar. I lighted it. Approaching one of the candle
+tables, of which there are half a dozen in the building, I purchased a
+long, tapering candle, white as the lily, and I touched it with fire--I
+kindled it and set it in one of the sockets to burn before the kneeling
+Joan. I left my flaming candle in the Church of the Sacred Heart! I,
+a non-Catholic, offered my fire to Joan, not because she had been
+canonized--for I never wait for the consent or the approval of the Pope
+before paying homage to anybody--but because her sweet, sad story is one
+of the most moving of modern times, and her vindication one of the most
+stupendous conquests of modern thought.
+
+The Church of the Sacred Heart is one of the most beautiful in Paris. It
+is built on the highest point in the city and commands a wonderful
+view. As I have told you before, I have two friends who dwell on this
+summit--really, a superb location. It is approached by a long flight of
+stairs, or by a cog-wheel train. Before it, and all around it, sweeps
+the Paris of to-day, as did the Paris of Clovis and Charlemagne, nearly
+fifteen hundred years ago; the Paris of Julian, Emperor of Rome, older
+still; the Catholic Paris, when kings and parlements bowed low to kiss
+the great toe of the Italian Christ, or his vicar; the Paris of the
+Medici--red and bloody; the Paris of the Huguenots, of Henry of Navarre,
+of Conde and Colligny--sad, desolate, and in the throes of a new faith;
+and the Paris of the philosophers, whose smile softened its barbarities,
+lit up its darkness, and made it a city of light--_La ville Lumiere!_
+There, on that splendid elevation, live my two young friends. They are
+both at the age of nineteen. One of them a lad, the other a maid. The
+girl is housed; the boy is exposed. Joan of Arc lives in the church--the
+cathedral is her home. The Chevalier de La Barre stands on the edge of
+the hill, with sun and shower falling upon his head. The Catholic Church
+burnt them both at the stake--the boy and the girl; the one because
+he did not tip his hat to the priest at a street procession, the other
+because she believed in herself! But modern thought has vindicated
+both of these outcasts. Joan now dwells in a white church, perfumed and
+lighted; and the Chevalier crowns the brow of the hill with his youthful
+figure and appealing gesture. The chain which tied these children to the
+stake in a dark age has flowered! Is not that wonderful? I believe in
+the forces, the ideas, the movement--the thought that can cause a chain
+to flower!
+
+I am not going to speak this morning of the Chevalier de La Barre, to
+commemorate whose memory the nationalists of France have erected this
+monument, close to the Church of the Sacred Heart. He will be my theme
+on another occasion. In this lecture I shall confine myself to the story
+of Joan of Arc. And a strange story it is! A young girl of seventeen
+marches at the head of a dilapidated and demoralized army, and leads it
+on to victory against the best fighters of the world, the English, who,
+in the fifteenth century, were trying to annex France to England; she
+is captured by traitors, sold to the enemy for ten thousand pounds; and
+then she is handed over to the church to be tried for heresy. She is
+tried, convicted, and sentenced to be burned alive. This sentence, the
+most revolting on record, is carried out in all its literalness, and in
+broad daylight, and under the shadow of the Christian cross, and at
+the very doors of a great cathedral. All this transpired in the city of
+Rouen, on the thirtieth day of May, fourteen hundred thirty-one.
+
+In order that I may enter into the spirit of the thrilling events of
+which Rouen was the stage, I repaired to that city, and reverently
+visited the scenes of the trial and the martyrdom of this latest saint
+of the Catholic world. Words cannot convey to you the emotions which,
+like a storm, burst upon me suddenly as the conductor on my train called
+out, "Rouen!" It was then about a half hour to midnight, and, jumping
+into a carriage, I was quickly driven to my hotel. What thoughts, and
+how they crowded in upon me, as soon as I laid my head upon my pillow.
+My brain was too active to permit of sleep. I imagined I was living in
+_the year fourteen hundred thirty-one_, and that I had just reached this
+city on the eve of the martyrdom of Joan. "To-morrow," I whispered
+to myself, "Joan of Arc will be led to the stake." Again and again I
+repeated to my pillow this shuddering intelligence. "What," I exclaimed
+to myself, "a young woman who saved France by her courage is going to
+be committed to the flames in this very city _tomorrow!_" I could not
+believe it possible. I could not believe that there was folly enough,
+or hatred enough, or stupidity enough, in the world for so desperate a
+deed. But, alas, it was true. With my eyes closed, I fancied I saw
+the throngs marching through the streets--consisting of peasants, of
+merchants, of priests, of princes--to see a girl of nineteen burned in
+the fire, and in all that throng there was not one who had either a kind
+word or thought for her--her who had given them a country to live in.
+Abandoned, hated and spat upon, she was left to suffer the cruelest
+punishment that human _inhumanity_ could devise, or the most perverse
+imagination invent. A girl of nineteen burned alive! "Oh, God!" The
+words escaped my lips in spite of me. Then I turned about and called
+upon _Humanity_. But in the fifteenth century God and Humanity were both
+hard of hearing. Then I called upon _Science_ and _Reason_. But these
+were not yet born. "There is no help then," I whispered to myself, and
+my heart swelled within me with indignation, and I became desperate,
+realizing my helplessness.
+
+With my head upon my pillow during that first night I spent in Rouen,
+I tried to penetrate into the motives for the persecution of Joan. This
+brave girl was feared because she was superior to her age. She provoked
+the jealousy of her inferiors. Her independence and originality alarmed
+both the Church and the State. Her ability to take the initiative, and
+her courage to disagree with her spiritual teachers was a menace to the
+authority of the priest with the keys, and the king with the sword. The
+English would not admit that a mere girl, a Domremy peasant, tending
+her father's cows, could have the genius to whip them--the most powerful
+warriors of Europe. The Catholic Church, on the other hand, would not
+forgive Joan for distinguishing herself without their help. For a woman
+to eclipse the Holy Church and humiliate a powerful State, was a crime
+punishable by death.
+
+In less than two years' time Joan had saved France, after the prayers of
+the Church and the armies of the nation had failed ignominiously. In the
+opinion of the world of that day there was only one power, the devil's,
+that could outwit the Church. It was not denied that Joan had driven
+the victorious armies of the enemy out of France, and made a conquered
+people free again; but it was argued that she had achieved this triumph,
+not by the help of God, but by the instrumentality of the devil. In
+those days, anything, however praiseworthy, if accomplished without the
+permission and cooperation of the Church, was the work of the devil.
+Joan had consulted her own heart, instead of the village confessor.
+That was her heresy. Joan had seen visions and heard voices on her
+own account. That is the independence which, if encouraged, or even
+recognized, would overthrow the Catholic Church. No one is allowed to
+receive revelations at first hand. Even God is not permitted to speak
+except through his vicar on earth. In short, Joan was a _protestant_,
+inasmuch as she not only had direct relations with heaven, but she
+refused to allow the Church to be the judge as to whether her voices
+were from God or from Satan. During all the agony of her long trial,
+every effort was made to induce her to allow the Church to be the judge
+of the nature of her visions. Joan refused the test. There was no doubt
+about her heresy. She believed herself capable of judging. That was her
+unpardonable sin.
+
+Still imagining myself in Rouen, in the year fourteen hundred
+thirty-one, I said to myself, "I must arise early in the morning and go
+to the old market place to catch a glimpse of the wonderful woman when
+she leaves the tower for the stake." As the picture of what I would see
+on the following day arose before my closed eyes, I trembled. "I will
+not let them burn her," I cried passionately. But, alas, what could one
+man do against king, pope, and the mob! And I tossed in my bed like one
+in a cage who is conscious of his helplessness against iron bars.
+
+Suddenly, a thought struck me, as the lightning strikes a tree. "This
+is fourteen hundred thirty-one," I repeated to myself. "I must get up at
+once and repair to the palace of the Bishop of Beauvais, the priest who
+holds in the hollow of his hand the fate of the bravest maid in history.
+If I could only have a half hour with him," I said, "to pour into his
+ears my protest, my pleadings, my scorn, my prayers; or, if I could tell
+him of the time when Joan will have a shrine in a Catholic Church!--he
+might relent and hearken unto reason?" With these thoughts in my mind
+I jumped out of my bed, I lit the candle, I put on my clothes. Then, in
+haste, I walked out into the night, seeking my way in the streets of the
+strange city now deserted. By the help of the moon and the stars of
+that night in May, _fourteen hundred thirty-one_, I traced my way to the
+imposing Cathedral of St. Ouen, standing like a towering shadow in
+the cold light of the night, and close to which lived the Bishop of
+Beauvais.
+
+I knocked upon the Bishop's door. "Open, open," I cried, as in the dead
+of night I kept pounding upon the door. "I wish to come in," I cried. "I
+wish to save the Church from an indelible stain, I wish to protect the
+honor of humanity." "Open, open," I cried, again and again, and in the
+stillness of the night the noise of my blows reached far and wide.
+Louder and louder still I cried to the Bishop to open the door. "I wish
+to rescue France and England from committing an act of infamy; I wish
+to save history from an unspeakable shame. Let me in, Bishop! I come
+to protect you against the execration of posterity, against eternal
+damnation! Open, open the door!" I shouted. I kept pounding upon the
+door, long and loud, on the eve of that foul day in fourteen hundred
+thirty-one. I grew impatient with waiting for the door to open, and my
+voice, which a moment before swept up and down the whole gamut of hope
+and despair--pleading, shouting, sobbing--now became faint and feeble.
+
+I could not arouse the Bishop. He was fast asleep. Then I was silent
+myself. Suddenly I heard a far away whisper. It did not come from the
+Episcopal palace, nor from the Cathedral close by, yet I was sure
+I heard some one speaking. I listened again. I could now hear more
+clearly. "I am coming, I am coming," was repeated in caressing accents.
+"I am coming, to open the door, to awaken the Bishop, to usher in a more
+joyous day for humanity. I will extinguish the fires of persecution,
+turn executioners into teachers, disarm superstition, and make the whole
+world sane. In that day Joan will triumph over her foes and make their
+churches her mausoleum." It was the voice of Reason! But it took five
+hundred years for that faint whisper to swell into a mighty chorus,
+swinging around the globe. That prophecy has been fulfilled, the
+Bishop's door opened, and the Church yielded to the clamor of
+civilization, and changed Joan's stake into the shrine where I lit my
+candle in her honor, in the Church of the Sacred Heart. She is no longer
+a heretic, she has become a saint. Her tears have changed into pearls,
+her tomb into a cathedral, where she sleeps in pomp on the bosom that
+once stung her to death.
+
+But I was not in Rouen in fourteen hundred thirty-one; I was there five
+hundred years too late. The day after I arrived in the city, I went to
+the market place, but, instead of a procession with candles and torches,
+with stakes and fagots, I found commerce, industry, labor, in full
+possession of the great square. Prosperous looking men and women met
+and greeted one another pleasantly; farmers were selling fruit and
+vegetables; the women, flowers. Even the priests one came across smiled
+as they saw the happy countenances of the people. What a change! Common
+sense has sweetened human nature and flooded the mind with the light
+that destroys superstition and makes all men brothers. The guide pointed
+out to me the white marble slab marking the spot on which Joan of Arc
+met her death. "Upon this place stood the stake of Joan of Arc. The
+ashes of the glorious virgin were thrown into the Seine." This is the
+inscription on the slab which was placed there by the municipality in
+eighteen hundred ninety-one.
+
+Close to this same spot the citizens of Rouen have erected a fountain,
+in the form of a monument, to the same heroic maiden. I stood and
+watched the playful waters as they fell with a liquid plash into the
+marble basin below. Presently, a woman came along with her pitcher. The
+stake at which Joan of Arc was burned to death has become a fountain,
+to which the people now come to slake their thirst. Walking up to the
+woman, I said, "What fountain is this?"
+
+"Ah, monsieur," she exclaimed, "behold the fountain of Joan of Arc."
+
+"But she was a heretic," I remarked. I can never forget her smile. The
+sun had arisen in her eyes. "We live in the twentieth century," she
+replied. And, unconsciously, we both heaved a sigh of relief. I
+rubbed my eyes to be sure we were not living in the middle ages, when
+Rationalism was still a babe in swaddling clothes, and Theology was
+lord of all. This is the twentieth century--for we are drinking at the
+fountain of Joan of Arc instead of carrying fagots to her stake! One
+of the sunniest spots in my memory will be my meeting with this peasant
+woman, with her pitcher, at the fountain of Joan of Arc.
+
+But my object in this lecture is to help clear some obscure questions in
+connection with the trial, martyrdom and subsequent canonization of this
+girl of nineteen. I wish to bring about a more intelligent appreciation
+of the story of a young shepherdess, beginning from the day she left her
+home in Domremy, to the fiery scaffold; and thence to a place among the
+saints in the Catholic calendar. This is the only instance in Catholic
+history of a person once destroyed as a heretic who has afterwards
+received the highest honors within the gift of the Church. In fourteen
+hundred thirty-one an infallible body of ecclesiastics pronounced this
+young woman to be "a child of perdition, a sorceress, a seducer, a
+harlot and a heretic." Five hundred years after, another infallible
+body of ecclesiastics belonging to the same church pronounced the same
+"harlot" and "heretic" to be "angelic" and "divine." One infallible
+pope allowed her to be burned in fourteen hundred thirty-one; another
+infallible pope denounced her murderers as detestable criminals--which
+shows how fallible is infallibility.
+
+A great many untruths are being circulated to help clear this
+contradiction. The clergy are proclaiming from the housetops that it was
+not the church that tried and condemned Joan of Arc to torture and death
+in fourteen hundred thirty-one; on the contrary, it was the church, they
+say, which has just vindicated her memory and beatified her with superb
+ceremonies. History, however, gives a different version of the affair.
+Before proceeding to describe the trial and condemnation of Joan of Arc,
+let me state the attitude of the Rationalist toward Joan of Arc's claims
+to inspiration. We can do justice to a woman of her description without
+believing in miraculous predictions. Joan of Arc claimed to have seen
+visions and to have heard voices, which assured her of her divine
+mission. She was thirteen years of age, according to her testimony, when
+she felt her first thrill. The visions were repeated. One day, at about
+noon, in the summer time, and while working on her father's farm, close
+to the whispering trees, she saw a radiance out of which came a voice
+which she fancied was the voice of an angel or of a saint. It was not at
+all strange that she should hear voices. All her education had prepared
+her for them. She had been told how others had seen angels and heard
+voices. The literature of the Church was full of the miraculous in those
+days. It was the ambition of every believer to receive visits from the
+other world, and to be told secrets. Joan, the little Domremy girl,
+shared these ambitions. In her case the wish was father to the vision.
+She heard the voices and saw the faces which her heart coveted. How do
+we explain her "voices" and her "visions"? The question is a very simple
+one, unless we have a leaning for theology. The voices that Joan heard
+were those that came from her own heart. It was her own dreams she saw
+in the sunlight.
+
+The young woman had mused over the acts of brigandage of the invading
+army and their French allies; she had seen the smoke of the burning
+villages and had heard the wail of her peasant neighbors. The distress
+of her people had often melted her into tears and wrung many a sigh from
+her lips. She imagined the whole country summoning her to the rescue.
+So earnest was she that her thoughts assumed form and shape, and became
+vocal. Thus, out of the substance of her own soul she fashioned the
+visions which she beheld. She felt herself set apart to be the saviour
+of France. The brilliance of that thought darkened every other object in
+life--home, parents, money, marriage!
+
+To those who will not be satisfied with this explanation, I beg to say
+that if the voices were really supernatural, then they should be held
+responsible for the cruel death to which they led or drove the young
+woman. Why did her voices, if they were divine, desert her when she
+needed their help most? Why did they not save her from prison and the
+stake? And which of us would like to be guided to the chambers of the
+inquisition, and the flames of the stake by "heavenly voices"? Moreover,
+if these voices came from God, why did they not speak to the English
+king, or to the Roman pope, in behalf of Joan, when she called on them
+for help? Why did they not assume the responsibility for the acts for
+which she was destroyed? Voices and visions which induce a young girl to
+go to the help of a perishing country only to use her victories for the
+benefit of a depraved and imbecile prince like Charles VII, and desert
+the young woman herself to be "done" to death! Defend us against them!
+
+Returning to the question of the responsibility of the Catholic Church
+for the fate of Joan, there are these points to be touched upon. Being
+a matter of history that on the last day of May, fourteen hundred
+thirty-one, this young woman was publicly burned in the City of Rouen,
+in the square of the cathedral, the question arises: Who put her to
+death? Another important question is: Why was she put to death? And when
+we have answered these questions we will be in a position to discuss the
+much more important question of: Why Joan of Arc was recently translated
+into a saint by the pope.
+
+Twenty-five years after the burning of Joan, when the city of Rouen was
+restored to the French king, and the English were finally driven across
+the Channel, it was decided to review the evidence upon which the Maid
+had been convicted and put to death. This was done; and with the result
+that she was acquitted of all the charges of heresy, insubordination to
+the Church, adultery, witchcraft, etc. What do you think was the motive
+of this revision? The French king had begun to realize the disgrace to
+which he had been exposed by the condemnation of the Maid as a witch.
+Being exceedingly pious--piety and crime were united in him as in many
+others of that day--he was tormented by the thought that the young woman
+who had assisted him in his war against the English, and had been the
+means of securing for him the crown of France, and had also officiated
+at his coronation in the cathedral of Rheims, was condemned as an agent
+of satan by the Church; which, if true, it would make him not only the
+target for the ridicule and derision of the whole Christian world, but,
+also, an illicit king of the French, who might refuse their allegiance
+to him because he was made king by a witch and not by an apostle of
+God. It is no wonder that a superstitious man like Charles VII, in a
+superstitious age, trembled, not only for his crown, but, also, for
+his life. Therefore, in order to make his succession legitimate it was
+necessary to prove that Joan was not a witch, but a true messenger of
+God. For if Joan was a witch, Charles VII was not king "by the grace of
+God," but by a trick of the devil. In self-defense the king of France
+was not only compelled to reopen the case against Joan, now that he was
+free from English dictation, but he also indicated in advance to the
+ecclesiastics the conclusion they would have to arrive at. The
+king could not have allowed, and he would not have allowed, the
+ecclesiastical council, convened at his request, to arrive at any other
+verdict than the one which would prove to France and Christendom that
+he was made king at Rheims, not by a witch who was excommunicated by the
+Church and flung into the fire, but by a real and inspired apostle of
+God.
+
+Of course, it is a matter of history that it was by the help of Joan
+that Charles VII became King of France.
+
+As already intimated, at the coronation ceremony Joan was not only
+present, but she assisted the Archbishop when the latter placed the
+crown upon the king's head. The inauguration was practically the work
+of Joan. It was the fulfillment of a prediction she had repeatedly made,
+that she would conquer the English and crown the French king in the City
+of Rheims. If she was a witch the coronation was invalid. The ceremony
+of the anointing of a king is one of the most solemn in the Catholic
+Church. The condemnation of Joan as a witch had not only stripped this
+ceremony of its sacredness, but it had also made it null and void, nay,
+more, a blasphemy. How could a king, anointed by the help of a witch,
+be the king of a Christian nation? To appreciate this argument we
+must remember how bigoted the people were in the Middle Ages. In
+self-defense, therefore, Charles VII was compelled to prove to the
+French, and to the whole world, that the woman to whom he owed his
+elevation to the throne was not a heretic.
+
+Let us recapitulate. The King of France ordered the Church to make out a
+new certificate for Joan. The Church obeyed the French king, even as the
+same Church twenty-five years earlier had obeyed the King of England and
+condemned Joan to death. When the English were masters of France, the
+Catholic Church pleased them by delivering up the conqueror of England
+to be burned alive; when the English were driven out of the country and
+the French were again in control this sentence was reversed and Joan was
+proven to have been a dutiful child of the Church. Thus it will be seen
+that the Church swung with the English when the English ruled the land,
+and she swung with the French when the French had driven the English
+out of the country. The Church was with England at one time, and she was
+with France at another--but never with Joan. I am milder in my criticism
+than the facts warrant. I am making strenuous efforts to speak with
+immoderation of an "infallible institution."
+
+But why was it to the interest of the English to have Joan declared a
+witch? Their motives were as personal as those of the French king. The
+English felt humiliated to think that a mere woman had whipped them,
+and therefore they were determined to prove that she was more than a
+woman--an agent of the devil. There was no secret about this. Their
+motive was very plain. It was to their interest to show that Joan was
+the personification of satan, and that consequently the English should
+not be blamed for running away from her presence, because who could
+withstand the devil? The English army did not go down before a girl, but
+before a sorceress. Even as the King of France did not wish it said that
+he owed his victory over the English to a witch, or that he was made
+king by an apostate, the English did not wish it said that they were
+conquered by a saint, for that would make God the enemy of the English.
+One king wanted Joan damned, and the Church accommodated him by damning
+her; another wanted Joan beatified, and the Church beatified her.
+
+It is admitted that the English could not have burned Joan as a witch
+without the consent of the Church. They could have burned her as a
+prisoner, but that would not have answered their purpose--she must be
+declared a witch in order to vindicate the amour propre of the English
+people. It is the exclusive prerogative of the Church to decide
+questions of orthodoxy or heresy. No king has the right to admit or
+exclude any one from the communion of the Church. Whether or not Joan
+was a witch was a theological question and could only be decided by the
+ecclesiastical court. Neither could the King of France declare Joan of
+Arc innocent of heresy without the consent of the Church. It follows
+then that the principal actor in the trial, the condemnation and
+the death of the young woman under the English, and her subsequent
+vindication and beatification, was the Church of Rome, since without its
+consent the English could not have made a heretic of her, nor the French
+a saviour and a saint. A secular government may declare who shall be its
+military heroes, or who shall be court-martialed and disgraced, but only
+the Church enjoys the right to damn or to canonize. This point is so
+clinching that even the most zealous papist must admit that at one time,
+when all Europe was Catholic--England as much so as France--and the pope
+was as supreme in one country as in the other, a girl of nineteen, who
+had rendered heroic services to her oppressed country, could not
+have been declared a heretic and cast into the fire at the door of
+a cathedral, in the presence of bishops, priests, a cardinal and a
+representative of the holy Inquisition, without the knowledge and
+consent of the Holy Roman Catholic Church.
+
+An attempt has been made to throw the entire blame of the proceedings
+against Joan of Arc upon the English. There is no doubt about the
+anxiety of the English to punish the Maid who had robbed them of the
+spoils of their victory over the French and brought dishonor upon their
+arms. But a mere military punishment, as already intimated, would
+not have been sufficient to satisfy the English--she had to be
+excommunicated from Christendom as one possessed of the devil. That was
+the only way to save the English of the disgrace of having been beaten
+by a woman, and the records show that the Church, instead of reluctantly
+carrying out the wishes of the English, was more than pleased to
+bring Joan to the stake. Letters were written from the office of the
+Inquisition to the English king, complaining against his lukewarmness
+in the matter of prosecuting the young woman. The Catholic University
+of Paris, also, sent a special communication to King Henry of England
+to remind him of his duty to help the Church to put down heresy. The
+English were urged to hand Joan over to the bishop and the Inquisition,
+that the ecclesiastics might proceed with her trial without delay. And
+when finally Joan faced her judges, forty in number, every one of them
+was an ecclesiastic, and out of the forty, thirty-eight were Frenchmen.
+
+Moreover, the Archbishop of Rheims, who was also Chancellor of France,
+wrote a letter which is still in existence, in which he congratulated
+the French upon the capture of Joan of Arc, whom he denounces as a
+heretic--"a proud and rebellious child who refuses to submit to the
+Church." Being the superior of the Bishop of Beauvais, who was in charge
+of the trial, the Archbishop could have stopped the prosecution if
+he had the least sympathy or pity for the Maid. But to try to save
+a heretic would be the worst kind of heresy. That explains the utter
+desertion of Joan by all France--people, priest and king.
+
+In this connection a comparison should be made between the zeal of
+the clergy to bring Joan to trial for heresy and the slowness and
+indifference with which the Church proceeded to obey the summons of
+the King of France twenty-five years after to reinstate her into the
+fellowship of Catholic Christendom. The records show that it required
+considerable urging and manoeuvring on the part of the French government
+to bring about a revision of the ecclesiastical sentence against the
+Maid. As long as Nicholas V was pope nothing was accomplished. The case
+was reopened under Pope Calixtus. Not until it was realized that further
+delay in the matter would greatly irritate, not only the French king,
+but also the populace, now freed from English dominion and seeking to
+live down the evil reputation of having harbored an apostate in their
+midst, did Rome stir itself in the matter. It will be seen that it was
+not the pope nor the Church that took the initiative in behalf of Joan
+of Arc. The Church only yielded to the pressure from the State, that had
+now become powerful. Had the English remained in control of France the
+Maid of Orleans would never have been remembered by the Catholic Church,
+much less restored to honor and immortality.
+
+"We do not deny," answer the defenders of the Church, "that _some_
+bishops and even cardinals persecuted Joan of Arc to death. But is
+it just to hold the whole Church responsible for the crime of an
+insignificant minority?" This is the main defense of the Catholics
+against the arguments of the Rationalists and the facts of history. Be
+it noted that I am not trying to abuse the Catholics; I am only sorry
+that they should be unwilling, even at this date, to say, "We are
+sorry." To commit mistakes is human. But why should the Church move
+heaven and earth to prove that it has never committed a mistake? The
+attempt is also made to prove that the ecclesiastics who are responsible
+for the death of Joan were wicked men and have been repudiated by the
+Church. To this is added the further defense that it was the gold of the
+English which corrupted these priests. But such a defense, I regret to
+say, does not reflect credit upon the intelligence or the honor of the
+Church of Rome. In this day of general information it is impossible for
+anyone to wrap up the facts of history in a napkin, as it were, and put
+them away where no one may have access to them. The judges of Joan
+were all ordained ministers of the Church. The presiding priest was
+a bishop--the bishop of Beauvais. He was assisted by a cardinal, a
+vice-president of the Inquisition, and a number of other ecclesiastics
+who were connected with the University of Paris. Is it reasonable to
+suppose that the Inquisition and the Catholic University of Paris, and
+all the clergy of England and France represented only a discredited
+section of the Church?
+
+It is the pride of the Catholics that their church has never been
+divided or schismatic, and that it has been one and indivisible "always
+and everywhere." How is this claim to be reconciled with the excuse that
+a considerable portion of the Catholic Church in the fifteenth century
+openly ignored the authority of the pope and did as they pleased without
+incurring the displeasure of the Hierarchy for their insubordination?
+Furthermore, if only a part of the church persecuted the young woman,
+what did the rest of the church do to save her? We would like the names
+of the priests who interceded in her behalf. It does not give me a bit
+of pleasure to prove the Catholic Church responsible for this as for
+many other burnings at the stake, but it gives me pleasure to be able to
+show that any institution claiming infallibility, to defend that
+claim must persecute. And why do I take pleasure in proving this to be
+inevitable? It might open the eyes of the religious world to the danger
+of supernaturalism. If the Christians no longer burn people they do not
+like, it is not because their Bibles have been altered, but because they
+no longer believe in them as they used to. It is good news to report
+that supernaturalism is waning, for it means the progress of science and
+sanity.
+
+There is still another point to be touched upon: When all Europe
+heard of the fate that had befallen a girl of nineteen through the
+machinations, let us say, of a few naughty Catholic priests--what
+did Rome do to these same priests who had so disgraced their "holy"
+profession, as well as brought lasting shame upon civilization? Is not
+this a pertinent question? Joan's trial lasted for four months. Not only
+France and England, but all Christendom was interested in the outcome.
+During all this time not only was there not a word of protest from Rome,
+but what is more significant, shortly after the trial and condemnation
+of Joan, the pope rewarded her accusers and persucutors with
+ecclesiastical promotion. Again, I must hasten to explain that I am
+not interested in embarrassing the Catholics; my point is to strike at
+_dogma_--which turns hearts into stone, and makes of the intellect a
+juggler's instrument. Joan was sacrificed, nay,--the honor of France, of
+Europe, of civilization, of humanity--was flung into the fire with Joan,
+to save--what? Dogma!
+
+Not only did the church fail to punish a single one of the forty
+ecclesiastics who tried Joan, not to mention hundreds of others who
+cooperated with them to bring about her destruction, but, as intended,
+gifts were conferred upon the principal actors in this awful drama.
+Roussel, one of the ecclesiastics who figured prominently in the
+proceedings, was given the archepiscopacy of the city of Rouen--the very
+city in which a girl not yet twenty, and who had served France on the
+battlefield, and brought victory to her flag, was beaten and burnt to
+death. Pasquier, an ordinary priest when he was serving as one of the
+judges, was made a bishop after the execution of Joan. Two others,
+Gilles and Le Fevre, were also advanced to upper ranks in the church.
+Thomas Courcelles, one of the most merciless judges of Joan--who voted
+in favor of subjecting the prisoner to physical torture to compel her
+to admit she was a witch--this priest with the unenviable reputation was
+also promoted to a lucrative post in the famous church of Notre Dame, in
+Paris. Finally, the man who engineered the trial, who presided over
+the sessions, and to whom Joan said, "You are the cause of my
+misfortunes"--the Bishop of Beauvais, the man whom all Catholics justly
+execrate today--even he was rewarded by the "Holy Father"; he was given
+the episcopal seat of Lisieux. Does it look as though the crime against
+Joan were the work of a discredited minority in the Catholic Church? I
+repeat, it was dogma, it was revelation, it was infallibility, it
+was supernaturalism, and not this or that priest--that should be held
+guilty.
+
+To meet these arguments the Catholic apologists call attention to the
+fact that the church "has a horror of blood," and that it has never
+put anyone to death for any cause whatever. But this is true only in
+a Pickwickian sense. It is like the head saying to the hands, "I have
+never committed the least violence against anyone." The hands, it is
+evident, commit the acts, but whose hands are they? The hands only
+obey the head, and for the head to blame the hands for carrying out its
+orders, realizing its thoughts and wishes, would not even be amusing,
+much less convincing. It is the judge, or the court, that takes the
+life of the culprit, for instance, and not the executioner. The Catholic
+Church demands the death of the heretic. Is this denied? Read Thomas
+Aquinas, the most honored saint and theologian of Catholicism; read the
+decrees of the general councils of the church and the encyclicals of
+St. Peter's successors, and a thousand, thousand proofs will be found
+in them to substantiate the statement. It is the Bible that commands the
+death of the heretic. No church founded on the Bible can afford to be
+tolerant. The theory of Christianity as well as of Mohammedanism is that
+the sword which the king carries has been blessed and put in his hands
+that he may put down the heretics. The civil authorities then, in
+bringing Joan of Arc to the fire were carrying out the instructions of
+the forty ecclesiastical judges who condemned her to death. Had these
+judges found her innocent, the state could not have destroyed her life;
+it was the will of the priestly court that she should die, and the
+secular authorities fulfilled its wish.
+
+But was Joan a heretic? Strenuous efforts are made to show that she was
+not. This point is a vital one. The church, in self-defense, is bound to
+produce arguments to prove that Joan of Arc was an orthodox, obedient,
+and submissive child of the church. If she was not orthodox, then the
+church has sainted a heretic in the person of Joan of Arc. One of the
+questions they asked her at the trial was whether she would be willing
+to submit the question of her "visions" to the church; that is to say,
+would she consent to the findings of an ecclesiastical court concerning
+herself and her mission? To this the answer was that she held herself
+responsible only to God. This was considered a rebellious answer, and it
+was--from the church's point of view. According to Catholic theology
+the church is divided into two branches,--the church militant, which
+is composed of the pope, the priests and their flock; and the church
+triumphant, which is presided over by God and the saints in glory. Joan
+said she was prepared to submit to the church triumphant--the church
+on high, that is to say, to God, but to nobody else. This also was a
+heresy. Her clerical judges insisted that to be a good Catholic she
+must bow to the will of the church on earth--the pope and his
+representatives. Her heresy then was both real and serious. She appealed
+from the pope to God. She placed her own conscience above the authority
+of the church. She believed in private judgment, the exercise of which
+is forbidden by the church. In refusing to let the pope act as the
+middleman between God and herself she was threatening the very existence
+of the papacy. There is then no doubt that both by her independent
+conduct and by her original answers Joan attacked the very fundamentals
+of Catholicism. It follows, then, that the pope a few years ago made a
+saint out of a heretic.
+
+Although Joan was an uncultivated girl, able neither to read nor write,
+she was gifted with good common sense. She saw at a glance that if she
+were to submit to the church she would thereby be casting doubts upon
+the genuineness of her "visions." She preferred to go to the stake
+rather than do that. She was really between two fires: the priests
+threatened her body; God in her conscience threatened her soul. She
+decided to obey the voice within. The decision cost her her life.
+
+Some of the questions put to her and the answers which Joan made are
+really remarkable. They show the craft of her judges, on the one hand,
+and the courage and common sense of the victim, on the other.
+
+"Will you not submit to our holy father, the Pope?" they asked her.
+"Bring me before the Pope, and I will answer," she replied. In other
+words, they were trying to have her admit that she had no right to think
+for herself or to exercise any independence at all. But she was too
+serious and earnest a person to subscribe to any such doctrine. She had
+never understood that to be a Catholic meant to be a bondswoman. "Take
+care," she said, turning her fiery glance upon her inquisitors, "take
+care that you do not put yourselves in the place of God." By such an
+answer, the young woman, still in her teens, had shot the Catholic
+Church in the heart.
+
+The nature of the charges against Joan as formulated by her judges also
+goes to prove that she was considered a heretic and condemned to death
+for that offense. The eleventh charge against her reads: "She has adored
+her saints without taking clerical advice." Charge twelfth reads: "She
+refuses to submit her conduct and revelation to the church." When asked
+if she would obey the church, her reply was, "God first being served."
+Luther said no more than that--and the Catholic church was split in
+two. Everything goes to show that the Domremy peasant girl was a private
+thinker, that is to say, a heretic. Listen to this: "I will believe that
+our Holy Father, the pope of Rome and the bishops and other churchmen
+are for the guarding of the Christian faith and the punishment of
+heretics, _but as for me and my facts, I will only submit to the church
+of heaven_." To be sure that is insubordination; it is placing herself
+not only on an equality with the pope, but even above him. Of course,
+Joan was not a Rationalist--far from it--but she was an independent
+Catholic--that is to say--not subject to the church--and that is heresy.
+Is it any wonder that her sentence read: "Therefore we pronounce you
+a rotten limb, and as such to be lopped off from the church." And the
+reason this sentence gave satisfaction to the Catholics all over
+the world was because such initiative and self-respect as Joan had
+manifested, if tolerated, would bring about the collapse of the
+infallible authority of the church. The University of Paris wrote to the
+pope, to the king of England and the bishops, lauding the priests who
+had purged the church of this dangerous girl with her "I think so," or
+"I believe so,"--with the emphasis on the "I." In this same letter the
+Bishop of Beauvais, the evil genius of Joan, to whom she said, when she
+saw the stake awaiting her, "Bishop, I die through you!" is commended
+for "his great gravity and holy way of proceeding, which ought to be
+most satisfactory to all."
+
+It took five hundred years for the Catholic Church to discover that the
+young woman burnt as a heretic was really a saint. But the church did
+not make this discovery until modern thought, benign and brave, had
+taken the outcast girl under its protection. The French nation had
+already made a national heroine of her, when the Vatican decided
+to enroll her name among the hallowed ones in its calendar. The
+beatification of Joan was brought about ostensibly by the report that
+certain sufferers from cancer, and other incurable maladies, had been
+completely cured by praying to Joan of Arc for help. The Maid had become
+a miracle worker, and hence worthy to receive a medal, as it were, from
+the pope. Joan is now a new income as well as a saint.
+
+Joan owes her Vindication to the Rationalists of France. The man in
+recent years whose books, position and influence did more than anything
+else to bring about a new attitude toward Joan of Arc, was Marcelin
+Berthelot, who now sleeps in the Pantheon as one of the glories of
+his country. A few years ago, I received an invitation to visit him at
+Bellevue near Paris. To give you an idea of the great man who did so
+much to rejuvenate Europe and throw its whole weight on the side of
+justice to the Martyr--woman of France. I shall reproduce in this
+connection what I said about him after my interview with him:
+
+"Who are the Rationalists?" is one of the questions frequently asked.
+Well, they are the intellectual leaders of the world, as what I learned
+about Berthelot clearly shows. He was the man upon whom two European
+sovereigns had conferred the highest decorations in their power for
+services rendered to human progress,--whom his own countrymen had
+honored by making him a senator for life; who twice had been appointed
+minister of foreign affairs; who had been elected an honorary member
+of all the scientific associations of the world; upon whom the Royal
+Scientific Society of London has bestowed its most coveted honors; who
+is the perpetual secretary of the Academy of Science of Paris; a member
+of the Academy Française, and, therefore, one of the immortals; and
+whose volumes, inventions, discoveries and contributions have placed
+modern civilization under inexpressible obligations to him. With all
+these dignities and titles, richly deserved, M. Berthelot is as gracious
+in his manners, as unassuming, as childlike and modest, as one could
+desire. He displays all the charms of the real man of worth--the man of
+genius.
+
+Though in his seventy-sixth year, the sage and diplomat still possessed
+the vigor of a man of fifty, pursuing his studies and interesting
+himself in the politics of his time, with the ardor and fervor of youth.
+The accumulation of his years and his indefatigable labors had by no
+means impaired the faculties of his mind, being still regarded by his
+countrymen as one of the most fertile brains and sanest intellects of
+modern Europe.
+
+Two years previously all France, one might say, had met in Paris to
+celebrate at the Sorbonne the completion of Berthelot's fifty years of
+intellectual labor. It was on this occasion that the foreign potentates
+sent their delegates and decorations to him. Every civilized country
+was represented at the festivities by its foremost men of letters
+and diplomats, while all the senators of France, the president of the
+republic, the members of his cabinet, and all the heads of the colleges
+were assembled to applaud the _master_ whose half a century of study and
+service had so greatly augmented the horizon of man and increased the
+light of the world.
+
+When this distinguished scientist was admitted into the French Academy,
+Jules Lemaitre, in his address of welcome, declared that Berthelot was
+the real creator of the modern industrial era, which had multiplied the
+resources of man a hundredfold. He called Berthelot the discoverer of
+modern chemistry, which has in so short a time transformed the face of
+the earth, and which holds the secret of the solution of the social and
+economic problems of the day. "'Chemistry" declares Berthelot, "'is a
+new gospel, which brings tidings of great power to mankind.'" "It
+will put an end to the cruel struggle of classes, and make of warlike
+politics, now one of the scourges of nations, a lost art. It will do
+this by placing within the reach of all an inexhaustible wealth of food
+and raiment, thereby curing man forever of the disease of discontent."
+
+"There are only two things worth living for," said M. Berthelot, in an
+address at the Palais de Trocadero before six thousand Frenchmen--"the
+love of truth and the love of one's fellows."
+
+That _love of truth_ opened for Joan the doors of the Catholic Church,
+shut against her five hundred years ago and it opened to Berthelot the
+doors of the Pantheon--the Temple of the Immortals!
+
+A final word. I have as much compassion and sympathy for the Catholics
+as I have for the martyred girl--indeed more, since they need more. Joan
+has been vindicated by the broader and more benign thought of this! age.
+The same serene and sweet power will transform the Catholic Church
+and make it one of the most progressive forces of our America. I have
+delivered this lecture to hasten that lovely day!
+
+[Illustration: 0042]
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's The Story of Joan of Arc, by M. M. Mangasarian
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 45479 ***