Page:Cambridge Modern History Volume 2.djvu/334

 up (January 17). By this Edict, known as the "Edict of January," which was declared to be provisional pending the decision of a General Council, the Protestants were ordered to give up all the churches and other ecclesiastical buildings in their possession, and were forbidden to assemble in any building, or to assemble at all within the walls of any city. With these limitations the right of assemblage free of molestation was granted to them. Thus Protestantism for the first time in France obtained legal recognition. The Protestants were far from satisfied, but, acting on the advice of their leaders, they accepted the compromise. The Catholics were less submissive. It was not till after a long and obstinate resistance that the Parliament of Paris registered the Edict on March 6. By that date the issue to which events had been inevitably tending had already declared itself. The religious war had begun.