Yearning for the Homeland: Pierre Bayle and the Huguenot

Yearning for the Homeland: Pierre Bayle and the Huguenot Refugees
Antony McKenna
This article concerns the plight of Huguenot refugees in the United Provinces after the
Revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685. “Plight” is perhaps too dark a word, since the
organisation of the Dutch Walloon Churches did its best to take care of the refugees and to
find places for the many Huguenot pastors who had been deprived of their parishes and been
given only a week to leave their homeland. The welcome extended to all French refugees was
generous and widespread,1 and many Huguenot intellectuals found work in the field of
publishing: books, periodicals, the printing-press, proof-reading, the networks of the wideflung Huguenot diaspora…, the field was abundant in interesting and lucrative jobs.
Nevertheless, for twelve vital years, from the Revocation to the Peace of Ryswick in 1697,
even the most prominent and successful Huguenot refugees yearned for their homeland, and
their political, religious and philosophical options were often determined by their vision of
how best they might return to France. The situation of French Protestant refugees, entailing
complex religious, political, moral and sentimental facets, is thus a test-case for the sense of
national identity among those who had been expelled from their homeland: we will discover
among the Huguenots a fierce sense of belonging to the French nation and culture, but also a
feeling of betrayal by the highest French authorities. The return to the homeland, and to
French nationality, symbolised for them a return to the “natural” course of events and the
“natural” state of things. Two rival political attitudes seemed to favour their return: either
loyalty to the Dutch Republican policy of peaceful and profitable commercial treaties with
France, or the forceful policy of William of Orange, who aimed to prevent an alliance
between Louis XIV and the new Catholic king of England, James II, by a “Glorious
Revolution” which would protect Dutch economic interests and force Louis XIV to accept the
return of French Protestant refugees. The Huguenot “Refuge” is in this sense a touchstone for
the sensitive question of political, cultural and religious aspects of national identity.
Moreover, I will argue here that this perspective weighed heavily on the bitter battle between
Pierre Bayle and Pierre Jurieu, and that this political context can help us undo the knots and
apparent contradictions in Bayle’s religious philosophy.2
Arrival in Rotterdam: Bayle, Paets and Jurieu
Bayle arrived in Rotterdam on 30 October 1681 after the closing down of the Protestant
academy in Sedan, where he had been teaching philosophy since 1675. In Sedan he had
appeared to his colleagues to be a protégé of Jurieu, teacher of theology in the same
institution since 1674. Both Bayle and Jurieu were to find themselves engaged by the
Illustrious School of Rotterdam, created on the initiative of Adriaan Paets, whose nephew,
Johannes van Zoelen, had been Bayle’s pupil in Sedan. Bayle quickly became the loyal ally of
his patron Paets and he was received in Paets’ family as an intimate friend, as is attested by
the fact that Paets’ second wife, Élisabeth van Berckel, in her will established on the 8th
February 1682 (three months after Bayle’s arrival in Rotterdam), bequeathed to Bayle the sum
of two thousand florins, four times his annual salary. Bayle’s intellectual, political, religious
and philosophical, alliance with Paets is a major fact, which can be regarded as a key to
subsequent events.
Born in Rotterdam in 1631 to a family of the most distinguished bourgeoisie, Adriaan
Paets3 lost both his parents early in life and was educated by Johannes Naeranus, a young
1
See D.F. Poujol, Histoire et influence des Églises wallonnes dans les Pays-Bas (Paris, 1902); Livre synodal
contenant les articles résolus dans les synodes des Églises wallonnes des Pays-Bas, t. I-II (La Haye, 1896-1904);
G.H.M. Posthumus Meyjes et H. Bots (éds), avec la collaboration de J. Roevelick, Livre des actes des Églises
wallonnes aux Pays-Bas, 1601-1697 (La Haye, 2005).
2
For greater detail, see L’Affaire Bayle. La bataille entre Pierre Bayle et Pierre Jurieu devant le consistoire de
l’Eglise wallonne de Rotterdam, texte établi et annoté par Hubert Bost, Introduction d’Antony McKenna (SaintEtienne: Institut Claude Longeon, 2006).
3
See Cornelia W. Roldanus, “Adriaan Paets. Een republikein uit de Nadagen”, Tijdschrift voor gechiedenis, 50
(1935), 134-166; F.R.J. Knetsch, “Jurieu, Bayle et Paets”, Bulletin de la Société de l’Histoire du Protestantisme
Français (BSHPF), 117 (1971), 38-61.
2
Arminian pastor. Paets was to remain an active member of the Arminian Church throughout
his life. After studying in Utrecht and Leiden, he became a lawyer in Rotterdam and very
quickly, in 1664, became a member of the town council (vroedschap), where he led a
successful political career under the colours of the republicans, who were then led by the
brothers Johan and Cornelis de Witt, to whom he was related. The invasion of the Netherlands
by Louis XIV in 1672 created a disturbance which was profitable to the allies of William of
Orange: the De Witt brothers were assassinated, but Paets escaped their fate because he was at
that time in Madrid with the official mission of negotiating an alliance with Spain against the
aggressive policy of Louis XIV. This mission was conducted to its laborious end, but Paets
returned to the Netherlands convinced that the Spanish alliance would be useless and eager to
negotiate directly for peace with France. To this end, on his return to Rotterdam, he made
contact with the French ambassador Jean de Mesmes, comte d’Avaux.
Paets’ importance as an interlocutor for the French is testified by diplomatic archives
which have been uncovered by Jacques Solé.4 In 1678, Paets played a role in the negotiation
of the terms of the Treaty of Nimwegen, favourable to Dutch commerce. From that date, he
was regarded by French diplomats as the principal representative of the Republican party and
conducted complex and dangerous negotiations with the comte d’Avaux, aiming to oust
William of Orange and reestablish the Republicans in power. Paets tenaciously defended the
interests of Dutch commerce, stipulating very specific terms concerning the dropping of the
French tariff barrier against Dutch goods. His status was well known and he was constantly
spied on by the Orangists, who regarded him as an enemy of the state, all the more so since he
revealed to d’Avaux the exact nature of Dutch negotiations with the English, drawing his
information, on the one hand, from Algernon Sidney, Cromwell’s former collaborator and
future victim of Charles II, and, on the other, from English Whigs with whom he maintained
contact through Benjamin Furly, established in Rotterdam since 1659. D’Avaux convinced
Louis XIV of the necessity to develop relations with Paets in order to counter the influence of
Conrad van Beuningen and to impede, by means of the opposition of the Amsterdam town
council, a possible Anglo-Dutch alliance. Etienne Le Moyne, theology professor in Leiden
and correspondent of Bayle, played a role in the political campaign conducted by Paets, who
succeeded in persuading the French to concede return to power of the Dutch Republicans as a
condition of their support for a Franco-Dutch peace treaty. Paets also attempted to change the
balance of power within the Rotterdam town council by persuading the French to exert
pressure on commerce conducted from the port of Rotterdam, and hoped to extend this policy,
requesting and encouraging French pressure on the United Provinces in order to overthrow the
Orangists. This was overstepping the mark and, from 1681, the French grew sceptical about
his reliability, so much did his political policy reflect Republican bitterness and desire for
revenge against William of Orange. Moreover, at that date, the aggravation of the French
campaign against the Huguenots in France, the dragonnades, weighed heavily in favour of the
Stadtholder. In 1685, the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes brought decisive discredit to the
French “Republican” policy in the United Provinces, and in 1688 the “Glorious Revolution”
brought a logical conclusion to the chain of events.
Bayle was perfectly conscious of this situation, as is attested by his correspondence. In
February 1684, Paets was prevented from attending a meeting of the town council because of
the interception of a coded letter to d’Avaux, containing Paets’ name, informing the French
diplomat of the refusal of the Amsterdam town-council to provide William with military
troops. Two months later, Bayle commented laconically on the political situation in a letter to
his younger brother Joseph:
Je ne sais pas si M. le prince d’Orange sera roi d’Angleterre, mais inter nos ces dernières
brouilleries qu’il a eues avec la ville d’Amsterdam ont fort diminué l’affection des peuples
à son égard, et son autorité par conséquent. M. Paets est tout à fait mal auprès de lui, et ne
s’en soucie pas.5
4
See F.R.J. Knetsch, “Jurieu, Bayle et Paets”, BSHPF, 117 (1971), 49, and above all Jacques Solé, “Les débuts
de la collaboration entre Adriaan van Paets, protecteur de Pierre Bayle à Rotterdam, et le gouvernement de Louis
XIV (1679-1680)”, in M. Magdelaine, M.-C. Pitassi, R. Whelan et A. McKenna (éds) De l’Humanisme aux
Lumières, Bayle et le protestantisme. Mélanges en l’honneur d’Elisabeth Labrousse (Paris: Universitas et
Oxford: The Voltaire Foundation, 1996) pp. 477-494.
5
Pierre Bayle to Joseph Bayle, 17 April 1684, Correspondance de Pierre Bayle, dir. Elisabeth Labrousse et
Antony McKenna (Oxford: The Voltaire Foundation, 1999) Lettre 261, vol. IV, p.86.
3
Let us draw a brief conclusion at this point: between 1679 and 1685, Paets was regarded as
one of the key Republican “regents” in favour of alliance with France and hostile to the antiFrench policy of William of Orange. And Bayle was in perfect harmony with his patron in
this field, as in others which will be discussed below.
However, although he had given up a university post in Groningen in order to teach at the
Illustrious School created by Paets in Rotterdam, Pierre Jurieu was, from the time of his
arrival in the United Provinces, heavily engaged with the Orangist party. It was probably his
aunt, Marie Du Moulin, who had lodged with the Jurieus in Sedan, who introduced them to
the Orangist Court at The Hague. According to Jurieu’s subsequent testimony, Paets had the
intention of using Jurieu to negotiate with William of Orange the return of the Arminians to
the main body of the Dutch Reformed Church:
Enfin, peu de mois après mon arrivée [declares Jurieu], je pris la liberté de proposer la
chose à Mr. le Prince d’Orange ; il m’écouta, il voulut bien même recevoir le projet que je
lui présentai. Il me donna là-dessus plusieurs audiences, mais enfin je trouvai que sa
pénétration allait infiniment plus loin que la mienne. Et ce fut par là que je commençai à
connaître que ses lumières pour la politique allaient bien plus loin qu’on ne croyait dans le
bas monde. Il me fit voir si clairement, que ce que je demandais était la ruine du bon parti
[des orangistes], que je n’en doutai nullement. Je compris fort bien que si les arminiens
rentraient dans notre corps, ils y seraient bientôt les plus forts et à l’aide des mécontents
qui y sont déjà, ils se rendraient facilement maîtres du gouvernement. Et c’était le but de
ceux qui me faisaient agir. Je rendis donc ma commission, de quoi ni Mr. Paets ni Mrs
d’Amsterdam ne furent pas contents. Depuis ce temps-là, l’union de Mr. Paets et de moi ne
fit que languir et cessa enfin entièrement à l’occasion de ses maximes sur l’indifférence des
religions et sur la nécessité d’un Stathouder dans cet État. Nous eûmes là-dessus des
conversations fort échauffées. Enfin, à son retour d’Angleterre, il rompit avec moi et je
renonçai avec plaisir à son commerce.6
Since Paets returned from England in Spring 1685 and was to die on October 8th of the
same year, the definitive break with Jurieu can be dated from that period. In August 1686,
Jurieu left for Cleves, where the Stadtholder and Frederick-William I of Hohenzollern, duke
of Prussia, the “Great Elector”, were to meet in order to strengthen their alliance. Jurieu
preached to the Court on that occasion and thus appeared as the main spokesman for
Huguenot interests at the Court of William of Orange. Jurieu was later to applaud the English
expedition of his patron and to support his claim to the throne of Britain after the flight of
James II in January 1689. This support represents a reversal of Jurieu’s former political
convictions. Indeed, faced with the political persecution of French Protestants by Louis XIV,
Jurieu had abandoned the doctrine of the absolute sovereign authority of the monarch in
favour of the theory of a “mutual pact”, limiting the sovereign’s power according to the
people’s interest. He now founded his doctrine on the principle: « Le salut et la conservation
du peuple est la souveraine loi ».7 The people may thus legitimately overthrow the monarch if
he acts against its interests. This was the “French” doctrine of the monarchomaques (Vindiciæ
contra tyrannos, 15798), the “English” doctrine invoked to justify the execution of Charles I,
and the “Dutch” doctrine espoused by the theoreticians of natural law (Grotius, Pufendorf and
Barbeyrac). This change of doctrine was all the more emphatic for Jurieu, since it gave a
theoretical foundation for the support he brought among the Huguenot community to
William’s claim to the throne of England.
6
Letter by Jurieu dated 4 October 1695 addressed to the Grand Pensionnaire Heinsius on the Elie Saurin affair,
quoted by Knetsch, p. 45.
7
Pierre Jurieu, Lettres pastorales, Robin Howells (éd.), ( Hildeshiem: Georg Olms Verlag, 1988), lettre XVI, p.
124, lettre XVII, p. 133.
8
This work, attributed to Hubert Languet with the possible collaboration of Duplessis Mornay, is translated in
1581 under the title: De la Puissance légitime du prince sur le peuple, et du peuple sur le prince; see the
facsimile edition presented by A. Jouanna, J. Perrin, M. Soulié, A. Tournon et H. Weber (Genève : Droz, 1979).
See also the article Bayle devotes to this work in his Projet de dictionnaire in May 1692, and the role Bayle
attributes to it in the diffusion of ideas denounced by the Avis aux réfugiés, Gianluca Mori (éd.), (Paris: Honoré
Champion, 2007).
4
His opposition to Paets, on this point, is obvious. At the end of 1685, a Latin letter by the
Rotterdam regent was published by Reinier Leers. It was addressed to Bayle and was
immediately translated by him – and again published by Reinier Leers – under the title :
Lettre à Monsieur B[ayle] sur les derniers troubles d’Angleterre, où il est parlé de la
tolérance de ceux qui ne suivent point la religion dominante. Paets strongly pleads the cause
of the Catholic king of England in the name of religious tolerance:
Pour moi, je ne doute point, quand je considère les commencements heureux de ce règne
[that of James II], la grandeur d’âme de ce Prince, et la religion qu’il s’est toujours faite de
tenir ce qu’il a promis ; je ne doute point, dis-je, en considérant cela, qu’il ne tienne la
parole qu’il a volontairement donnée, et qu’ayant plus de constance qu’aucun autre Prince,
il ne réponde aux désirs de ses sujets. Je ne doute point non plus qu’il n’oublie les injures
qu’il a reçues lorsqu’il était duc d’York ; car il est trop éclairé pour ignorer combien a de
force sur l’esprit de plusieurs personnes le zèle inconsidéré de religion, et combien il est
ordinaire que des gens assez modérés d’ailleurs soient à travers champs, dès que cette
sainte ferveur ou fureur s’est emparée de leur âme. C’est une espèce de taon ou de
tarentule qui donne mille agitations et mille transports à tous ceux qui en sont piqués. Il est
vrai que le roi d’Angleterre n’est pas du sentiment de ses sujets à l’égard de la religion, et
qu’il fait profession publique de la romaine : mais puisqu’il y a longtemps qu’il en a été
imbu, bien loin qu’une telle profession publique soit blâmable en lui, qu’au contraire il en
mérite des louanges. Car encore que ce qu’on nomme l’Église romaine présentement, et
que l’on voit établi dans plusieurs endroits de la chrétienté, ne soit point dans le chemin de
l’ancienne Église romaine, c’est pourtant une action de magnanimité digne d’être proposée
en exemple à toute la terre que de servir Dieu selon le rite dont on est persuadé.
Assurément il y a de la constance et de la grandeur à suivre les lumières de sa conscience,
lorsqu’on ne le peut faire sans risque.
It is easy to understand how such a text was to shock and enrage Jurieu. A few months later,
he was to discover, with renewed indignation, the same themes developed by Bayle in his
pamphlet Ce que c’est que la France toute catholique sous le règne de Louis le Grand9 and in
the Commentaire philosophique on the rights of the erring conscience.10
As we have seen, Jurieu had thus broken off his relations with Paets – with the Republican
in favour of a French alliance – and with the Arminian rationalist whom he regarded as a
Socinian. He was thus naturally disposed to denounce in his colleague Pierre Bayle, Paets’
protégé, his loyalty to French interests as politically suspect, and as heretical his defence of
the Arminian or Socinian doctrines of rationalism and tolerance. The innumerable
publications of these two intimate enemies were then to define the frontiers between two
radically opposed visions of the interests of the Huguenot refugee community: Bayle was
committed by his patron to the Republicans, who had defined the terms of the peace treaty of
Nimwegen in 1678, and who aimed at maintaining a stable peace with France in order to
favour Dutch commerce. Jurieu became a spy in the service of the Orangists, who favoured a
demonstration of defiant strength towards France and aimed at an alliance with Britain in
order to impose a new international order in which Dutch commerce could hold its own
against France, thus pre-empting an alliance between Louis XIV and the Catholic James II,
which would stifle Dutch trade. Although he was careful never to justify French repression of
the Huguenots, Jurieu approved the alliance of political and religious power and came to
regard William of Orange as an instrument of Providence by which God would allow
Protestants to overthrow the Catholic James II, who threatened to reinstate Roman
Catholicism as the official state religion in England. Jurieu was here closely following
9
“Et après cela, vous voulez qu’on croie que ces gens-là ont une religion, vous ne voulez pas qu’on vous dise,
que vous dégoûtez un honnête homme d’avoir du zèle, par le mauvais usage que vous faites du vôtre, supposé
que vous en avez.” Ce que c’est que la France toute catholique sous Louis le Grand, Elisabeth Labrousse (éd.),
(Paris: Vrin, 1973), p.65.
10
“Que la conscience erronée doit procurer les mêmes appuis à l’erreur que la conscience orthodoxe à la vérité”
De la tolérance. Commentaire philosophique, Jean-Michel Gros (éd.), (Paris: Presses Pocket (coll. Agora),
1992), p. 291. Bayle here develops an argument already substantially suggested in the Nouvelles lettres critiques,
lettre IX, “Sixième objection”, Œuvres diverses (OD), (La Haye, 1737), II, pp. 218b-228b.
5
Orangist propaganda, supporting the invasion of Britain for religious reasons, regarding
William of Orange as a new “David”, “the man after God’s own heart”, while that “Glorious
Revolution” realised the international political and economic ambitions of the Dutch
Orangists. Both Bayle and Jurieu saw their respective alliances and policies as the best
perspective for a return of the Huguenots to their homeland and thus for their reinstatement in
their “natural” and historical national identity.
Doctrinal consequences
The political alliances of Bayle and Jurieu may thus explain the violence of their bitter
opposition in the 1690’s. And their political alliances weighed heavily on their options
concerning vital philosophical and religious questions. Paets’ Lettre […] sur les derniers
troubles d’Angleterre covers all the main themes of Bayle’s compositions in the following
years : absolute sovereign rights, separation of the domains of religion and politics, rational
self-evidence of first principles, necessity of religious toleration, obligation to follow one’s
conscience, rights of the erring conscience:
Le royaume de la vérité est tout céleste, et n’a rien de commun avec les royaumes du
monde, que l’on possède par un droit humain ; et c’est être la peste des royaumes et des
républiques que de mêler la religion avec le monde, et que de suggérer aux princes qu’il ne
faut point souffrir les sujets de contraire religion ; ou aux sujets, qu’il faut éloigner du
trône les princes hétérodoxes. Il n’y a point de doctrine plus pernicieuse et aux souverains
et aux sujets que celle-là. C’est une doctrine qui ne peut venir que de la corruption du cœur
humain, qui s’est formé une idée de la religion favorable à ses désordres.11
Paets reduces religion to its essentials and its essentials to morality, discarding as of
secondary concern respect of rites and specific dogma. Morality, he deduces, requires us to
follow our conscience:
Je ne saurais regarder que comme les ennemis jurés de la vraie religion ces dévots
inconsidérés, qui exposent à mille traverses tous ceux qui ne suivent pas la religion
dominante. […] J’avoue que la violence peut faire croître le nombre des hypocrites et des
comédiens, également infidèles à Dieu et à leur prince ; mais elle ne sert de rien ni pour
établir la vérité, ni pour détruire l’erreur. Les armes qui réduisent les errants à l’obéissance
de la foi sont spirituelles ; ce sont des raisons, des arguments, des prières, et plusieurs
semblables moyens propres à fléchir le cœur…12
Tolerance of different beliefs and convictions is commanded by Christian doctrine, he
declares, and moreover, it contributes to social prosperity. The sovereign should therefore
concern himself only with the exterior conditions of civil and religious life: interior beliefs
“appartiennent à ce règne de Jésus Christ qui s’administre d’une façon spirituelle”.13 And
what is the nature of faith?
Il est tellement véritable que la foi ne se commande point, qu’elle n’est même pas soumise
aux ordres de la volonté. Le consentement ou l’affirmation de l’âme dépend beaucoup plus
de l’évidence des objets que de l’attention de l’esprit, et par conséquent il est manifeste
qu’il ne dépend pas de nous de croire ce que nous voulons. C’est un ordre de la nature que
comme l’œil le mieux disposé ne discerne les objets que par le moyen de la lumière ; ainsi
notre âme, quelque bien disposée qu’elle soit, ne consent à une proposition que lorsqu’elle
en sent la clarté. Or, comme cette clarté vient de la nature même de la chose proposée, qui
ne voit le peu de force de la volonté sur l’entendement ?14
Violence is thus excluded as an appropriate and legitimate means of persuasion in the domain
of religious faith. Paets’ terms will be those of Bayle himself: “une doctrine si inhumaine n’a
11
Adriaan Paets, Lettre […] sur les derniers troubles d’Angleterre (Rotterdam: Reinier Leers, 1686), p. 6. It is
quite possible that Bayle contributed to the composition of Paets’ Lettre: see OD, V, 1, p.xiii, and Gianluca
Mori, Bayle philosophe (Paris: Champion, 1999), p. 355.
12
Paets, pp. 7-8.
13
Paets, p. 24.
14
Paets, pp. 16-17.
6
pu avoir qu’une origine infernale”;15 “Dieu seul sonde les reins et les cœurs”; “le châtiment
des erreurs de bonne foi n’est pas de la compétence des juges du monde ; c’est l’affaire de
celui qui perce toutes les cachettes et les replis de l’âme”.16 The claims of the Catholics lead
him to an examination of the authority of the Church which follows the movement of Bayle’s
review of the works of Pierre Nicole and Jean Claude,17 and he takes a firm position in favour
of the self-evidence of the truths essential to salvation:
Quoi donc ! ne faudra-t-il rien admettre qui ne soit clairement contenu dans l’Écriture,
qu’il ne soit pas possible d’en douter ? Assurément, lorsqu’il faut l’admettre comme
nécessaire au salut ; car en fait de ces points-là, nous demandons une assurance qui nous
mette à couvert de toute erreur, et qui soit fondée non pas sur l’autorité parlante et
infaillible de l’Église, mais sur une évidence accompagnée du secours du saint Esprit.18
The comparison of this self-evidence with that of first principles heralds certain passages of
Bayle in the Philosophical commentary: despite the privileged status of the self-evidence of
first principles, Paets declares himself in favour of the self-evidence of faith:
Il en va comme de l’assurance qui nous persuade lorsque nous considérons la clarté des
notions communes et des vérités éternelles, que nous ne pouvons être trompés à leur égard.
Il est vrai que ces premiers principes remplissent tout autrement notre esprit de leur
lumière naturelle que l’évidence d’un passage, qui vient de l’arrangement de quelques
mots dont la signification dépend de l’usage, et non pas de la nature. Mais néanmoins on
ne peut nier qu’il n’y ait une si grande clarté dans les passages de l’Écriture dont
l’intelligence est nécessaire au salut qu’ils deviennent nettement intelligibles tant aux
ignorants qu’aux savants dès qu’on les médite avec une application favorisée du Saint
Esprit…19
And he concludes on a vision of the reunion of all religious communities:
Il faut prier le bon Dieu de fléchir le cœur des protestants, afin que, se défaisant de toute
partialité, ils se réunissent, non pas dans la vue de se rendre formidables à l’Église romaine
par leur nombre et par l’union de leurs forces, mais plutôt dans la pensée d’inspirer à cette
Église un saint désir de s’associer un corps si considérable et de réduire tout le
christianisme dans une seule communion animée et gouvernée par un esprit de charité, et
non pas par un esprit violent et tyrannique.20
A Postscriptum is devoted to the question of Transsubstantiation and it allows Paets to
underline the logical contradiction of the mystery as it is interpreted by Catholics :
Mais où tend tout ceci ? Uniquement à faire voir aux catholiques savants et modérés, dont
plusieurs déplorent la dureté que l’on a pour les pauvres réformés, qu’il est inouï que la
seule voie de pacification qu’on laisse de reste soit de renoncer au bon sens, et qu’à moins
de cela il ne faille jamais prétendre aux bonnes grâces de la communion de Rome.21
In this letter, composed a short time before his death in October 1686, Paets thus
associated a number of themes which were to be the leitmotiv of Bayle’s publications of that
period. It might be said that Bayle provided a philosophical foundation for Paets’ Arminian
convictions.
Jurieu attacked two fundamental aspects of Paets’ and Bayle’s political and religious
philosophy. At the end of 1683, he sketched the limits to sovereign power: “Les rois sont faits
pour les peuples et non pas les peuples pour les rois […] ce sont les peuples qui ont fait les
rois.”22 He thus announced the doctrine of “mutual pact” and popular rights which he was to
15
Paets, p. 19.
Paets, p. 20.
17
Paets, pp. 23-24. See Nouvelles de la république des lettres, novembre 1684, art. I.
18
Paets, pp. 28-29.
19
Paets, pp. 29.
20
Paets, pp. 35.
21
Paets, pp. 53.
22
Pierre Jurieu, L’Esprit de M. Arnaud (Deventer, 1684), tome II, p. 293.
16
7
develop in the Lettres pastorales.23 In 1687 he wrote, against the doctrine of tolerance and
rights of the erring conscience developed by Bayle in the Philosophical commentary, his
treatise Droits des deux souverains, of which the last chapter is devoted to “ce que les princes
peuvent faire légitimement pour détruire la fausse religion, en faveur de la bonne”. Quoting
the example of David, who “s’est si bien mêlé des affaires de la religion, qu’on peut dire qu’il
a donné la dernière main à la police ecclésiastique et à la discipline de l’Église ancienne”,
Jurieu manages to justify the ways of Providence: “On voit constamment partout que Dieu fait
entrer l’autorité pour établir la véritable religion et pour ruiner les fausses”.24 He thus
develops a fragile doctrine in which Bayle immediately saw the flaws. Indeed, the right of
sovereigns to persecute heretics is explicitly justified by Jurieu: “Je pose donc en fait comme
une chose constante et certaine, que les princes se peuvent servir de leur autorité pour
supprimer l’idolâtrie, la superstition et l’hérésie.”25
Against error, all measures are legitimate: the demonstration is drawn from the history of the
Church:
Mais enfin qu’est-ce que l’autorité peut faire contre la fausse religion ? Sans consulter la
raison, l’on n’a qu’à consulter l’histoire de l’Église pour le savoir : il faut voir ce qu’ont
fait les princes autorisés de Dieu et approuvés de toute l’Église ; les rois d’Israël ont abattu
les idoles, ont fait couper leurs bocages, ont aboli leurs hauts lieux, ont interdit le culte
idolâtre, ont chassé les étrangers qui séduisaient la nation. Les empereurs chrétiens ont
ruiné le paganisme en abattant ses temples, en consumant ses simulacres, en interdisant le
culte de ses faux dieux, en établissant les pasteurs de l’Evangile en la place des faux
prophètes et des faux docteurs, en supprimant leurs livres, en répandant la saine doctrine.
Ils ont aboli l’arianisme en ôtant aux ariens les Églises qu’ils avaient prises aux
orthodoxies, en chassant les faux évêques, et en substituant de bons et de saints en la foi.
Les princes réformés ont aboli le papisme dans leurs États en lui ôtant les chaires, en y
mettant des docteurs sains en la doctrine et purs pour les mœurs, en brûlant les images, en
faisant enterrer les reliques, en interdisant tout culte idolâtre. Bien loin qu’en faisant cela
ils aient fait contre la loi de Dieu, ils ont entièrement suivi ses ordres. Car c’est sa volonté
que les rois de la terre dépouillent la Bête et brisent son image. Jamais aucun protestant
jusqu’ici n’y a trouvé à redire, et jamais aucun esprit droit ne comprendra la chose
autrement. Les choses ont toujours été ainsi, et s’il plait à Dieu, elles iront toujours de
meme malgré nos libertins ou nos imprudents.26
Of course, there is a rule, provided by saint Paul: “Nous ne pouvons rien contre la vérité”, but
it is translated by Jurieu into a vicious circle: “Il n’y a aucun droit où il n’y a ni justice ni
vérité. Car c’est la justice et la vérité qui donnent le droit.”27Thus playing up the rigour of his
own definitions, Jurieu restricts tolerance to the orthodox … But the decisive event is the
“Glorious Revolution”, the invasion of England in November 1688 and the taking of power
by William III in January 1689.28 Jurieu adapts his prophecies to the political reality of the
moment and greets in the new king of England the elected instrument of divine Providence.
He takes care to underline the legitimacy of the usurper:
Il est plus clair que le jour que les peuples confèrent le pouvoir aux souverains non pour
faire plaisir aux rois et pour les rendre grands, mais pour être les conservateurs de la
23
Jurieu, Lettres pastorales, IIIe année, lettres XVI-XVIII (15 avril 1689 – 15 mai 1689).
Pierre Jurieu, Droits des deux souverains en matière de religion, la conscience et le prince (1687), Barbara de
Negroni (éd.), (Paris: Fayard, 1997), ch. 13, p. 147.
25
Jurieu, Droits des deux souverains, p. 149.
26
Jurieu, Droits des deux souverains, pp. 150-151.
27
Jurieu, Droits des deux souverains, p. 152.
28
William’s army landed in November 1688 at Torbay in Devon; he was crowned, with Mary, in London on 11
April 1689. See Jonathan I. Israel (éd.), The Anglo-Dutch Moment, Essays on the Glorious Revolution and its
world impact (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), pp. 105-162; Elisabeth Labrousse, “Les idées
politiques du Refuge: Bayle et Jurieu”, in Conscience et conviction. Etudes sur le XVIIe siècle (Paris:
Universitas et Oxford, The Voltaire Foundation, 1996), pp. 159-191; Hubert Bost, “Un exemple d’“histoire
immédiate”: la Glorieuse Révolution d’Angleterre”, in Pierre Bayle historien, critique et moraliste (Turnhout:
Brepols, 2006), pp. 177-185.
24
8
société. Ainsi quand un roi ruine la société, il va contre la fin de son établissement et tout
acte qui va contre sa fin, par soi-même, est nul de toute nullité et on n’est pas obligé d’y
avoir aucun égard.29
By means of the distinction between “absolute power” and “unlimited power” and by
insisting on the “arbitrary” power of James II, Jurieu concludes that any people threatened
with subservience can defend itself by force of arms: absolute non-violence is “une sévérité
outrée” and “une morale mal entendue”:30 “le droit de la conservation propre est un droit
inaliénable”.31 William appears as the new David, the instrument of divine will, for the
salvation of Protestants and of Europe: “Le succès que Dieu donne à ses entreprises vous doit
assurer que c’est celui dont Dieu se veut servir pour l’accomplissement de ses grands desseins
et pour l’établissement de la véritable religion.”32
Bayle’s reaction was to denounce the alliance of political and religious power, to refuse the
infringement of the principle of absolute sovereignty and to caricature the identification of
William of Orange with Christ’s ancestor David. First in the Réponse d’un nouveau converti à
la lettre d’un réfugié (February 1689), then in the notorious Avis aux réfugiés (January 1690),
he anonymously raged against the Protestant seizing of political power in England, taking as
his main target Jurieu’s Lettres pastorales. Like Catholics, he complained, Huguenots were
now showing their real nature : meek and submissive when in the minority, authoritative and
persecuting when in political power. They thus misconceived the nature of political
sovereignty but also that of true Christianity, which, according to the example of the first
Christians, never has recourse to political action. Bayle never admitted to writing the Réponse
and the Avis; indeed, his authorship has long been contested, so far does he go in the
denunciation of Protestant politics. But the critical edition established by Gianluca Mori33
demonstrates his authorship beyond any doubt. This text may be read as a turning-point in
Bayle’s attitude to religion. Until then, it seems, Bayle had maintained the hope of return to
France and regarded the Republican policy of peace with Louis XIV as the best means to that
end. His philosophical and religious doctrine, as expressed in his early works, was faithful to
Republican positions; it might even be said that he gave Republican policy a philosophical
foundation. William’s invasion of England went clearly against all the principles of Bayle’s
religious and philosophical doctrine. Moreover, Jurieu appeared as the main Huguenot
propagandist of Orangist policy, abandoning moral and religious principles according to
circumstance. The Avis aux réfugiés is thus an expression of Bayle’s exasperation with
Huguenot opportunism and of his despair of all Christian churches: a Church conforming to
Christian ideals is, in his eyes, no longer conceivable. The Glorious Revolution has shown up
Protestantism for what it really is: an authoritative sect which grasps political power in order
to impose its doctrine. 1690 is in this sense a breaking point: henceforth Bayle will pursue his
own philosophical, anti-Christian path. And it is significant that he then proceeds, in the
Dictionary, for the first time, to insist on the failure of rational theology and to brandish
sarcastically Pyrrhonian scepticism as the sole foundation for faith.
On the political level, Jurieu was convinced that Bayle was the author of this violent antiProtestant pamphlet. He had him denounced before the town council, in which the balance of
power had been overturned; in 1693, Bayle was deprived of his teaching post and survived by
devoting himself to the Dictionary, in which a number of articles target Jurieu’s
contradictions and variations with satire and ridicule, and in which the article “David” is a
long caricature of William of Orange.34 This article is severely criticised by the church council
in 1697, and Bayle promises to modify it; the second edition finally includes a censored
version and a complete version of that article in an appendix to satisfy popular demand for the
caricature of the “man after God’s own heart”. On 10 September 1697, the peace Treaty of
29
Jurieu, Lettres pastorales, IIIe année, lettre XVI, pp. 123b-124a.
Jurieu, Lettres pastorales, lettre XVI, pp. 121-122.
31
Jurieu, Lettres pastorales, IIIe année, lettre IX, p. 66. See also lettre XVI, p. 125 and lettre XVII, p. 130b.
32
Jurieu, Lettres pastorales, p. 72. See also lettre XVII, p. 131b on David as a model Biblical figure.
33
See note 8.
34
See Walter Rex, Essays on Pierre Bayle and on religious controversy (La Haye: M. Nijhoff, 1965).
30
9
Ryswick between France and the Dutch coalition paid no attention to the cause of Huguenot
refugees. It thus confirmed Bayle’s double defeat both as a Dutch Republican and as a
Huguenot refugee. His fellow Huguenots were massively persuaded by Jurieu’s propaganda.
Bayle was isolated and could find consolation only in the coherence of his own philosophical
“system”.
Conclusion: reason and faith
Bayle’s rationalism did not lead him to a definitive alliance with Arminians or Socinians.
After the breaking point of 1690, he rejected the Arminian position concerning the rational
self-evidence of the founding principles of religious faith (Paets’ position), and insisted on the
unending difficulties which face the philosopher in the definition of the basic articles of
religious faith: we all end up, he declares (CPD, §121), inevitably and necessarily, by the very
nature of reason, language and faith, as “non-conformists”. Nor did Bayle seize the
Eclaircissements in the second edition of the Dictionary as a chance to clarify things. On the
contrary, after reading those appendices, even his admirers were bewildered and Jurieu was
quite right to denounce Bayle’s intention to justify the scandalous articles of the Dictionary,
rather than to withdraw them or correct them. The only rational conclusion to be drawn from
those articles was that reason leads to atheism.
Bayle’s early moral rationalism (Pensées diverses, Commentaire philosophique) is, to my
mind, incompatible with the moral pyrrhonism which he shows (article “Pyrrhon” rem. B) to
be implicit in Christian doctrine. If this contradiction is understood as such, the only coherent
explanation is to consider the intellectual, political and religious contexts of Bayle’s
successive positions. His early works did not go beyond a rationalism palatable to his
Arminian patron Adriaan Paets. Paets died in 1686. In 1687, Bayle was exhausted by his work
as a journalist and went into depression. On recovery, in 1688-89, he was extremely sensitive
to the political and religious questions raised by the “Glorious Revolution” and published
anonymously the Réponse and the Avis aux réfugiés, works which enraged Pierre Jurieu, who
dragged Bayle before the council of the Walloon Church in Rotterdam and succeeded in
having him deprived of his teaching post at the Illustrious School in 1693. Bayle survived by
means of his contract with Reinier Leers and launched into the composition of his Dictionary.
In this enormous work, composed from 1693 onwards, he pushed rationalism, for the first
time, far beyond his original position, explicitly demonstrating in a number of key articles that
reason is incompatible with faith. Confronted with the indignation of the Walloon church
council, Bayle promised and finally composed his Eclaircissements, where, for the first time,
he declared that his own faith was founded on the submission of reason to the mystery of
religious doctrine. That is, he now adopted Jurieu’s position on the foundation of faith, a
position which had been the object of ridicule in his previous works. Jurieu’s attacks before
the church council were thus successfully parried and the procedure of Bayle’s examination
by Walloon church authorities dragged on and was eventually abandoned. Bayle was then free
to develop his own rationalist position, as he did in his last philosophical works, the
Continuation des pensées diverses and the Réponse aux questions d’un Provincial, adopting
anew the “blind faith” stance only in the Entretiens de Maxime et de Thémiste, which was his
defence against the rationalist critics Le Clerc and Jaquelot and in which he repeatedly
invoked Jurieu’s works to justify his own position. Bayle is thus, to my mind, a rationalist
who adopts the “blind faith” stance as a defensive strategy when necessary. Political and
religious context and vulnerability to Jurieu’s attacks in 1693 can explain Bayle’s successive
incompatible positions on the status of reason and faith.
But the Treaty of Ryswick in 1697 tolled the bell for the hopes of Huguenot refugees to
return to France. Bayle’s loyalty to Dutch Republican policy had led him to isolation within
the French community and he never admitted to being the author of the Avis aux réfugiés.
However, on the other hand, Jurieu’s choice to side with William of Orange also turned out to
be a cul-de-sac for the Huguenot refugees who yearned for the homeland and longed to
reaffirm and reassume their national identity. They were definitively abandoned to their fate
in exiles: the treaty of Ryswick confirmed the political meaning of the revocation of the Edict
of Nantes, and for another century, despite battles fought by recalcitrant jansenists and
persecuted Huguenots, French national identity was to remain emphatically and adamantly
10
Roman Catholic. The case of Bayle is all the more ironic, since he was, with Locke, one of
the main sources of the philosophical doctrine of religious tolerance, which was to found the
separation of Church and State.