Part 2

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.