This was not mere theory, or the enforced logic of men in thrall to mediæval antecedents. Under the most carnal and unchristian king, the Vaudois of Provence were exterminated in the year 1545, and Paul Sadolet wrote as follows to Cardinal Farnese just before and just after the event: "Aggionta hora questa instantia del predetto paese di Provenza a quella che da Mons. Nuntio s'era fatta a Sua Maestà Christianissima a nome di Sua Beatitudine et di Vostra Reverendissima Signoria, siamo in ferma speranza, che vi si debbia pigliare qualche bono expediente et farci qualche gagliarda provisione.--È seguito, in questo paese, quel tanto desiderato et tanto necessario effetto circa le cose di Cabrieres, che da vostra Signoria Reverendissima è stato si lungamente ricordato et sollicitato et procurato." Even Melanchthon was provoked by the death of Cromwell to exclaim that there is no better deed than the slaughter of a tyrant; "Utinam Deus alicui forti viro hanc mentem inserat!" And in 1575 the Swedish bishops decided that it would be a good work to poison their king in a basin of soup--an idea particularly repugnant to the author of _De Rege et Regis Institutione_. Among Mariana's papers I have seen the letter from Paris describing the murder of Henry III., which he turned to such account in the memorable sixth chapter: "Communicò con sus superiores, si peccaria mortalmente un sacerdote que matase a un tirano. Ellos le diceron que non era pecado, mas que quedaria irregular. Y no contentandose con esto, ni con las disputas que avia de ordinario en la Sorbona sobre la materia, continuando siempre sus oraciones, lo preguntò a otros theologos, que le afirmavan lo mismo; y con esto se resolviò enteramente de executarlo. Por el successo es de collegir que tuvo el fraile alguna revelacion de Nuestro Señor en particular, y inspiracion para executar el caso." According to Maffei, the Pope's biographer, the priests were not content with saying that killing was no sin: "Cum illi posse, nec sine magno quidem merito censuissent." Regicide was so acceptable a work that it seemed fitly assigned to a divine interposition.
When, on the 21st of January 1591, a youth offered his services to make away with Henry IV., the Nuncio remitted the matter to Rome: "Quantunque mi sia parso di trovarlo pieno di tale humilità, prudenza, spirito et cose che arguiscono che questa sia inspiratione veramente piuttosto che temerità e leggerezza." In a volume which, though recent, is already rare, the Foreign Office published D'Avaux's advice to treat the Protestants of Ireland much as William treated the Catholics of Glencoe; and the argument of the Assassination Plot came originally from a Belgian seminary. There were at least three men living far into the eighteenth century who defended the massacre of St. Bartholomew in their books; and it was held as late as 1741 that culprits may be killed before they are condemned: "Etiam ante sententiam impune occidi possunt, quando de proximo erant banniendi, vel quando eorum delictum est notorium, grave, et pro quo poena capitis infligenda esset."