Page:Coubertin - France since 1814, 1900.djvu/81

 and accepted Martignac, a Liberal. And then he found himself so popular that he thought he could do anything he pleased ; so he realised his long-cherished desire of entrusting power to his favourite Polignac. We shall see how the insurrection provoked by that Minister became a revolution.

The laws proposed by the Villèle Ministry, after the accession of Charles X., would have been quite enough to weaken a régime with a less inviolate and venerable principle behind it. Under the increasing pressure of the ultras, the Cabinet proposed, first, the ridiculous law of sacrilege, by which special penalties were instituted for robberies committed in churches. (That law was obviously based on the doctrine of the Real Presence, and thus dogma was introduced into legislation.) Then came the law opening a credit of a thousand millions of francs to indemnify the emigrés; it was a wise measure in itself, and as it in a manner sanctioned the confiscations of the Revolution, it was calculated to reassure the holders of so-called " national property " ; but the public discussion of it also helped to revive all the old passions and grievances of the past. Lastly, there was the " Droit