Protestantism in France From Death of Henry IV to the Revolution - James Aitken Wylie

worshipped they were punished.
But perhaps the most extraordinary means
employed was the creation of a fund for the
purchase of consciences. This fund was fed from
the resources of vacant bishoprics, which were the
right of the crown, but which the king now made
over to this fund. In every case, when a see became
vacant, a year's revenue was thus applied, but sees
were often kept vacant for years that the fund for
conversions: might profit thereby.
Pellisson, by birth a Calvinist, but who, having
gone over to the king's religion, from a convert
became a zealous converter, presided over this
fund. It was, in truth, a great mercantile
establishment, organized according to the rules and
wielding the machinery of other mercantile
establishments. It had its head office in Paris, and
branch offices in all the provinces. It had its staff of
clerks, its correspondents, its table of prices, its
letters of credit, and its daily published lists of
articles purchased, these articles being the bodies
and the souls of men. A curious circular letter
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