Page:Readings in European History Vol 2.djvu/480

 442 Readings in European History Definition of nonjuring clergymen. overthrow the constitution preclude the supposition that these said ecclesiastics desire to unite in the social compact ; considering that it would compromise the public safety longer to regard as members of society men who are evidently seeking to dissolve it ; and in view of the fact that the laws are without force against men such as these who, operating upon the conscience in order to seduce the people, nearly always conceal their criminal maneuvers from those who might repress and punish them, decrees as follows : i. The deportation of nonjuring ecclesiastics shall take place as a measure of public security and of the general police power, in the cases and according to the forms here- inafter set forth. 2. All those shall be considered as nonjuring ecclesiastics who, being subject to the oath prescribed by the law of December 26, 1790, shall not have taken it; those also, not included in the said law, who have not taken the civic oath since September 3, last, the day when the French constitu- tion was declared completed ; finally, those who shall have retracted either oath. 3. When twenty active citizens of the same canton shall unite in a demand for the deportation of a nonjuring eccle- siastic, the directory of the department shall be required to pronounce the deportation if the opinion of the district directory is in conformity with the petition. . . . 15. When an ecclesiastic against whom deportation has been pronounced is enjoying no pension or revenue, he shall receive three livres for each day's journey of ten leagues, as far as the frontiers, in order to support him on the way. These charges shall be borne by the public treasury and advanced by the treasury of the district in which the said ecclesiastic resides. 16. Those ecclesiastics against whom deportation has been pronounced who shall remain in the kingdom after announcing their retirement, or who shall return again after crossing the boundary, shall be condemned to imprisonment for ten years.