Page:Great Men and Famous Women Volume 1.djvu/249

 GASPARD DE COLIGNI 165 The father of Coligni was head of an ancient and noble house, and was the seigneur of Chatillon-sur-Lion. At his death, in 1522, he left three sons, then of tender years, all of whom became eminent in French history, and all of whom embraced the Protestant doctrines, though trained up in the Romish Church. The elder brother, who is known as the Cardinal de Chatillon, was raised to that high ecclesiastical dignity by Clement VII., in 1533. Chiefly through the influence which his- younger brother exerted over him, he became a convert to the tenets of the Reformers in his middle age, and took part in the early scenes of the civil wars. After the reverse which his party sustained at the battle of St. Denys, he fled to England, where he died in 1571. The younger brother, Dandelot, was the first of the three who became a Protestant. He was a skilful and gallant soldier, and signalized himself repeatedly by his enterprise, his inexhaustible resources, and undaunted spirit, as a commander of the Hugue- not forces from the first outbreak of the religious wars until his death soon after the battle of Jarnac, in 1569. Gaspard, the great Coligni, or the Admiral (as he is often termed, from having held the titular office of Admiral of France), was the middle one of the three brothers, and was born at Chatillon-sur-Lion, Febru- ary 1 6, 1517. He served with distinction in the later wars of Francis I. against Spain ; and with his brother Dandelot received knighthood on the field of battle at Cerisoles. He was afterward raised to the important post of colonel-general of the French infantry, and in 1^52 was nominated by Henry II. Admiral of France. He was taken prisoner at St. Ouentin by the Spaniards, and underwent a long captivity in Spain before he regained his liberty by payment of a heavy ransom. During the long hours of solitude and compulsory inaction which he passed in his Spanish prison, he meditated deeply and earnestly on religious subjects ; and after his return to France, the conversation of his brother Dandelot, who had already joined the Huguenots, confirmed the bias to the Protestant doctrines, which his own studies and deliberations had created. Coligni now resigned all his appointments and preferments, except the nominal rank of admiral, and re- tired to his estates, where he passed his time in fervent devotion, and in the en- joyment of the calm happiness of .domestic life. But the cry of suffering which rose from his fellow-Protestants, against whom the pernicious influence of the Princes of Lorraine in the French court kindled the fires of persecution through- out France, soon drew him from his blameless and cherished repose. He at first sought to provide for them a refuge from oppression, by founding colonies of French Protestants in America ; but his projects proved unsuccessful ; and as the tyranny of the violent party among the French Catholics grew more and more alarming, Coligni deemed that both honor and conscience required him to stand openly forward in behalf of his co-religionists. No class of men ever were more long-suffering, or showed more unwilling- ness to rise in arms against their domestic tyrants, than the much-calumniated Huguenots of France. When we read the hideous edicts that were promulgated against them, and which were not mere empty threats, but were carried into exe-