Page:Voltaire (Hamley).djvu/59

 and Henry III.—Pope Sixtus V.—and Philip II. of Spain, one of the gloomiest of remorseless tyrants,—such were conspicuous among the chief personages of the time. Henry was a witness, almost a victim, of what is one of the most horrible crimes in history, in which queen-mother, king, and princes took part, and of which the Pope heartily approved; and living in an atmosphere of domestic treachery and murder, with a Reine Margot for a wife, and her mother and brothers, together with the infamous crew who formed their Court, for associates, it is astonishing that he should have preserved an ordinary share of the better feelings of humanity, and almost a miracle that he should have continued to show himself so manly and so sound of heart.

Upon the death of Charles IX., his successor Henry III. found two great parties opposed in France; that of the Huguenots, headed by Henry of Navarre—and that of the Guises, called the Holy League, which, encouraged by the Pope and supplied with auxiliaries by Spain, sought, under the veil of zeal for the Catholic faith, to supplant the king. Henry III., the "Valois" of the "Henriade," at first declared himself at the head of the League, but found that he was likely to be only a tool in the hands of the able and unscrupulous chief of the Guises. With the best reasons for distrusting each other, they took the sacrament together in solemn pledge of mutual faith—Guise, as he bent reverently over the sacred bread, planning the dethronement of Henry, who, in turn, was meditating the assassination of the other communicant. In this rivalry of treachery Valois prevailed, and caused Guise to be murdered in his presence at Blois—whose fate might be more commiserated had he not