This Policy Of Exclusiveness, Was Vigorously Denounced By The
Leading Historian Of Canada, F. X. Garneau, In 1845.
"The poorly expressed request, for fifteen hundred colonists to take the
place of those who had joined the army, remained unanswered - unattended
to.
Though at the very time the Huguenots solicited as a favour permission
to settle in the New World, where they promised to live peaceably under
the shadow of their country's flag - which they could not cease to love - it
was just when they were denied a request, which had it been granted would
have saved Canada and permanently secured it to France. But Colbert's
influence," says Garneau, "at Court had fallen away; he was on his death-
bed. So long as he was in power he had protected the Calvinists, who had
ceased to disturb France and who then were enriching it. His death which
took place in 1684, handed them over to the tender mercy of the Chancellor
Le Tellier and of the fierce Louvois. The dragonnades swept over
the protestant strongholds, awful heralds of the revocation of the edict
of Nantes. The king, said a celebrated writer, exhibited his power by
humbling the Pope and by crushing the Huguenots. He wished the unification
of the Church and of France - the hobby of the great men of the day,
presided over by Bossuet. Madame de Maintenon, a converted Calvinist, and
who had secretly become his wife (1685) encouraged him in this design and
suggested to him the cruel scheme of tearing away children from their
parents, to bring them up in the Roman Catholic faith.
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