St. Joan of Arc, the life-story of the maid of Orleans

Front matter

JOA-N LISTENING TO THE VOICES

ST. JOAN OF ARC

THE LIFE-STORY OF THE MAID OF ORLEANS

Chapter I Introductoby

Section 1. — Recent Studies

THE beatification of Joan of Arc by Pope Pius X five hundred years after her birth, has increased or emphasized the fame which was its cause. Never was a beatification more ardently desired, it has been said; nor more enthusiastically welcomed. The extraordinary popularity of the Maid, strangely deepening and expanding in our day, has stimulated the study of the sources of her history, and inspired the writing of new biographies. They have been produced by believers of various creeds, and by unbelievers in any creed. We do not, of course, refer to lives which dishonor the fair fame and the extraordinary career of the heroine — compositions so base and baseless, that they cannot arrest attention.

M. Quicherat 's publication, fifty years ago, of the twofold Process, the documents, namely, regarding the condemnation and the rehabilitation, or justification of Joan, placed in the

14 IlSrTRODUCTORY

hands of the student the official reports, which, curiously enough, are the chief sources of her history — curiously; for the condemnation, which occupies the larger place, was grossly unjust and murderously hostile; yet Providence would have it so, that the victim's answers were written, generally speaking, with substantial correctness.

Since Quicherat's time many new documents have been discovered, new light has been thrown on the actors in the drama, the fifteenth century has been more profoundly studied, many fancies and fallacies have been dissipated. With regard to these last, it has been proved, for instance, that the so-called double retraction of Joan before her execution cannot be sustained, that she never gave any ground whatsoever for supposing that her mission ended with the crowning of the king at Rheims; that this ''gentle Dauphin" was in reality a man of blameless life, as Joan clearly thought and said he was, until after she had been withdrawn.

In 1840 the Society of the History of France entrusted to one of its members, M. Jules Quicherat, the publication of the two Processes. He was a scholar of reputation, the director of the Ecole des Chartes ; that is to say, a specialist in paleography, or the deciphering of ancient manuscripts. The publication was continued from 1840 to 1849. The first three volumes were devoted to the Processes — the Condemnation and the Rehabilitation ; and in the remaining two volumes M. Quicherat published all the other documents known to him and considered by him the sources of the Maid's history. M. Quicherat came of a family of extreme revolutionary traditions and sentiments. He himself, though an upright and loyal man, and a sincere admirer of Joan of Arc, did not, however, share her faith; nor, it appears, any definite Christian faith at all. This mental condition influenced, unfortunately, his publication of the documentary evidence, and his own writings, regarding the heroine. He recommended the omission of several memoirs, and actually omitted them; because he considered them, as he said, theological or canonical. As a matter of fact, they were of great value, written by men of weight, learning and station. They not only furnish new matter, but they, perhaps chiefly, do justice to Joan's mission; and if their value be ignored, or underrated, her history becomes a misrepresentation. The authors of the memoirs, men of highest position in Church and State at the time, examined in the most serious manner the mission of Joan.

Such were the great prelate Pierre de Versailles, the saintly Cardinal Elie de Bourdeilles, Archbishop Gelu, the intimate friend of Charles VII, the distinguished Dominican Brehal, who were the soul of the Process of Rehabilitation. Of the writings of these men Quicherat gives a few inadequate passages, and occasional insufficient notes, not always laudatory. Nor is the work actually done by M. Quicherat always exact, especially in his publication of the Process of Eehabilitation, which, naturally, is more worthy of respect than the work of the murderous Sanhedrin of Rouen. Quicherat wished to abridge the manuscripts of the second trial or Rehabilitation, but, unfortunately, follows his prejudice in the selection; and omits the more important manuscripts for those of far less value. In fact, Quicherat was the first to attempt to reinstate — to some extent — the unworthy Bishop of Cauchon, leaving the impression that he followed methodically the procedure of the Inquisition; while M. Quicherat depreciates the Process of Rehabilitation. But it is especially in his later work, Apercus Nouveaux, that he disfigures the heroine whom he seems to admire. His omissions, his prejudices, his interposition of his own false theories and interpretations, do wrong to the noble cause which he treated. His work is incomplete on many grounds ; he should have selected his materials better, and have published them without prejudice. Nor was his judgment infallible with regard to the manuscripts in his hands. For instance, he rejected as not being of original authority the Chronique de la Pucelle, justly valued by his colleague Vallet, and shown by him to have been written by a secretary of Charles VII, Cousinot de Montreuil. Various other documents have since come to light. M. Quicherat himself published the charming composition of the Registrar of La Rochelle. Later came the delightful pages of the Vatican manuscript published by Delisle, the Belgian Chronicles, the Chronicle of the Cordeliers, the correspondence of Guistiniani in Morosini — all these were unknown when Quicherat edited his collection. There are many contemporary letters regarding Joan, written by the highest persons at the court of Charles VII; and of these not a few are in course of publication. There have been found various documents of local and general historical value, such as unedited lives of Joan, and an unpublished history of the University of Paris. Much work of investigation and publication remains to be done by scholars with intimate knowledge, historical, political, and religious, of the fifteenth century, who will edit the manuscripts with discretion, and with serious and adequate notes.

The most distinguished and conscientious work hitherto done is, unquestionably, that of Pere Ayroles, S.J. ; who, coming fifty years after Quicherat, has spent more than twenty years of life in investigating the true sources of the life of Joan — for him a work of love. The praise of the Bishop of Orleans is not excessive when he calls P. Ayroles *^the man best informed regarding Joan of Arc. ' ' His work has been declared by eminent French scholars to be, what it truly is, "an imperishable monument," of scrupulous authenticity. His fine volumes contain far more matter, and are far more serviceable, than those of M. Quicherat. P. Ayroles ' work is indispensable indeed. He shows, in particular, the nefarious part of the University of Paris, not only in the condemnation of Joan, but in the affairs of the Church at the time — its traitorous, destructive plots for fifty years before and twenty years after the execution of the Maid. No institution ever injured the Church more than did the decadent University of Paris. From its blows the Church has not yet recovered, and probably never will recover. Yet it was the University which declared itself the Church in the condemnation of the heroine ; and it was its officials and doctors, including Cauchon, who compassed her murder, without needing any instigation of Beaufort, Bedford, or Warwick.

In the interminable sess'ions of condemnation (the first trial), Joan revealed her whole soul and life. At the Eehabilitation, one hundred and twenty witnesses declared under oath, free of the terrors of Rouen, what they themselves had seen and heard. Thus the miraculous life is most luminous, authentic, and incontestable. In the words of Cardinal Pie, we have not only historical but juridical certitude as to the details. Her mission startled Christendom; and so we have a mass of contemporary writings — chronicles, histories, letters, poetry, municipal registers, etc., in France, Italy, Germany, Scotland. All these have been studied by Father Ayroles ; and much of the matter has been reproduced.

He has discovered much of first class value, as the Letters of Justiniani in Morosini, and the correspondence of Archbishop Gelu. He has translated the memoirs of the Rehabilitation; collected and arranged many documents neglected or misplaced in injudicious collections; thrown a flood of light on the authors and actors in the scene; and justly estimated the value of printed books. His purpose has been fully achieved — to dissipate the fallacies and fancies of those who have misrepresented the Maid and her mission. He has made fully understood the examination and proofs of her mission before the officials of Charles VII; and shows Joan in her true surroundings, amidst the hostility of a court bishop or two, of faithless politicians, and of military captains. And, finally, he has proved the falsity of the Acts added by the unjust judge Cauchon to the pretended abjuration of Joan in the cemetery of Rouen. Not in vain does he name the first large volume of the five — Jeanne before the Church of her Time; for there he manifests her surrounded by the enthusiastic loyalty of the real Church of France. He reveals her, too, in the wider import of her frustrated mission, which was far other than the mere expulsion of the English soldiers and king from the soil of France. The scrupulous exactitude, the indefatigable research of P. Ayroles, have won him the title given in the Acts of the Process of Beatification — ''the historian par excellence of Joan of Arc."

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Section 2. — Joan, Her Own Historian

Jean Hordal, professor of law at the University of Pont-a-Mousson, in his Latin history of his glorious relative Joan, cites, in 1612, the names, and gives extracts from the works, of some one hundred and fifty authors who had written of the warrior Maid. These were historians, theologians, lawyers, poets, physicians. Among them are illustrious names, eminent in knowledge. But Joan was her own best historian. Without a friend, without counsel or aid of any kind save from heaven, the frank and simple-hearted peasant maiden reveals her whole life and soul before the unjust judges, who eagerly sought in the most obscure events and details of her short life the proofs of evil, in order to condemn her to death by fire. This is unique in human history. Nothing could be more luminous. And by a strange and benignant disposition of Providence, the scribe who wrote the questions and answers was honest; and, except perhaps in a few important instances, substantially correct.

From the beginning, Joan was a sign to be contradicted. The plotting courtiers were never quite in favor of her ; the captains chafed under her leadership and success. The ''gentle Dauphin, ' ' whose cause she so chivalrously sustained, did not venture, or did not see his way, to adopt her bold program. The chronicles of her career were written by friends and foes.

The latter did not, and logically could not, accept her mission as supernatural ; yet they portray substantially the great warrior figure, and admit her triumphs and popular fame. So, in a later time, in the really extraordinary revival of the memory and honor of Joan ; in the great chorus of praise of Catholic, Protestant, and unbeliever ; in the multitudinous biographies issuing from the press, all are in fairly unanimous accord in exalting the virtues and exploits of La Pucelle.

Section 3. — The Church and Joan

It may be well, before approaching the actual career of Joan, to indicate some of the unjustifiable theories, or statements, made in her regard. One of these regards her relation with the Church in which she so fondly believed, and which she so devotedly obeyed. The light slur has frequently been uttered that the Church burned Joan. Again, that she was an illustrious example of free thought ; of the right, as it is called, of the individual conscience to follow its own way, independently of an authoritative creed proclaimed from without. Such careless or prejudicial declarations are unjust to religion and injurious to the heroine of France. To the Catholic Church Joan's allegiance never wavered. She began her mission with its solemn approval in the assembly at Poitiers. Throughout her whole career, nothing was more touching than the practice of her faith. To the

Church and its Head she constantly professed entire submission. Even in the dark day of her condemnation and death, she pitifully implored that the Sacraments should be given her. And she died with the prayerful confidence of her childhood, appealing to the Pope from Caiaphas-like Cauchon. Pseudo-theologians, "who impudently called themselves the Church;" a band of traitorous partisans ; foes of their king, their country, and the Church — such were the members of the Sanhedrin of Rouen. The University of Paris did.not represent the Church of France, although it certainly influenced its destinies. The University and its party were notorious for their efforts to destroy the Divine organization and prerogatives of the Church; they were the authors and defenders of schism; the creatures of antipopes, the fathers of Gallicanism. Rome denounced unhesitatingly the condemnation of Joan as soon as it could; that is, as soon as Charles VII began to move in the matter. And without this Roman Rehabilitation, the Maid would have remained a heroine of legend. Nothing was more imperatively demanded than this second sentence, which corrected the evidence and falsifications of Rouen ; and, from the irrefragable testimony of those who had known Joan in childhood, in camp, and in her trial, presented her to the world forever in a light too resplendent to be obscured.

Section 1. — General View

THE appalling condition of France in the days of Joan of Arc is a matter of history ; there was question of the existence of the nation. It had been chief amongst the Christian countries from the time of Charlemagne. Historically, through these ages, it had been the defender of the Church, and the heart of Christendom; and was so considered by European, and even by infidel, public opinion. There was question of preserving this France of Charlemagne and the Crusaders.

The assertions and life of Joan of Arc show that she was far more than a patriot ; or, if we wish, that she was a patriot of the truest and highest kind, who sought, not only the liberation of her native land from oppression, but, much more, its spiritual good, its moral and religious reformation. She was sent, she said, for the suffering and the poor, because of '^the pity which was in France." She came to remove the cause of this by restoring the rightful king and driving out the invader. But she aimed at far more. Her reformation of a profligate and cruel army, her infusing of the spirit of faith and religious practice amongst the people, her re-uniting of selfish and dissident leaders for the common good — all this was much nobler and far more difficult than the expulsion of the English. Her desire to unite England and France, her inspiring of all Christendom in a time of dire public need, the conviction of the Christian nations as to what her vocation really was, her own attestation, with the support it had in her actual achievements, proved that Christendom, after France, would have followed her, to do, as she said, a fairer deed than ever had been seen in European history. Here we have the need and the possibility, the power and the assurance, of success. Caiaphas, Herod, and Pilate, came together against her, and made her great mission fail.

Section 2. — The Supernatural in the Mission of Joan

To treat Joan's life as Renan does the Gospels is a violation of fact. To declare her life and work a natural phenomenon produced by the circumstances of the time is a direct contradiction of her own testimony and of the innumerable witnesses of her phenomenal deeds. We have unquestioned chronicles, judicial registers, letters, official documents civil and ecclesiastical, slow deliberate judgments of the chief minds of her age and country, the testimony of acquaintances of her younger and of her maturer years, the word of friend and foe, to discredit the light fancy of men, who, without hesitation or embarrassment, explain away everything. Her stainless and most cautious sanctity of life, the prophecies so frequent on her lips, the superhuman work which she performed, all lead up to the culminating point of her mission, the proclamation upon which she insisted, that there was no cure for war-born France save in the union of her people under the sovereignty of the Christ **who loved the Franks. ' '

Joan's professed mission was to have Charles WI rule his kingdom under the Christian law; or, in other words, she proclaimed ''her Lord" the true king of her country ; His social and political sovereignty was the ideal she proposed and toward which she strove. And what she proclaimed and desired for France, she would propose to all the Christian nations, then beginning to feel its need in face of national and religious dissensions, and of purely human or pagan ''reasons of state," instead of reasons of Christianity.

This is, of course, the Christian ideal and program, the reason of the Incarnation. Joan only insisted on it ; and she insists on nothing more constantly and emphatically. It is "her Lord" who sends her. She is entirely sure of His presence and of His assistance. She acts and commands in His Name. To Him she attributes her victories and all her gifts and graces.

His kingly name and" title are ever on her lips as in her heart. To the hard old soldier, Baudricourt, she says at her first visit "The kingdom does not belong to the Dauphin ; it belongs to my Lord. However, my Lord wishes that the Dauphin be made king, and hold his kingdom in trust. He will be made king in spite of all his enemies ; and it is I who will conduct him to receive his anointing." The Dauphin will be crowned, but by the aid and disposition of Heaven, and at the appointed time. The kingdom is given him to defend. In less than fifteen months the impossible thing was done. The king was crowned, and the tide of utter defeat turned to glorious victory.

Again, to the noble and gallant Jean de Metz she said, "Neither king, nor duke, nor the daughter of the king of Scotland (promised then to the French king's son), can recover the kingdom ; in me alone will France be saved. So my Lord wills, although it is not a deed to be hoped for from one of my condition ; and I would far prefer to remain spinning beside my mother. He (her Lord) wishes it, and I must do it." Arriving at Chinon she immediately announced all this to the king. The noble-hearted Duke d'Alengon was present at the long interview, with the unworthy La Tremoille. Joan requested the king to offer up his kingdom to the true Sovereign, the King of kings; and promised that His Divine Majesty would do for Charles VII the great things which He had done

THE MISSIOlSr OF JOAN 27

for liis predecessors. She asked, moreover, "many other things," which d'AlenQon had forgotten. It was, finally, in obedience to this heavenly command of vassalage, that Charles consented to be led to his coronation, before the eyes of astonished France and of the world, by the hand of a peasant girl, one of the most lowly of his subjects. All this was meant by Joan when she said her banner was dearer to her than her sword. With the banner she led the soldiers to victory. When it touches the fortress wall she said, the English will be quickly vanquished. Her banner represented her heavenly mission and the sovereignty of Christ, whose name it bore. Hence she held it displayed, majestically and symbolically at the coronation. What could prove her words better than that she, a child, should lead the hitherto humiliated and powerless king through the midst of a hostile land to be crowned at Rheims ?

The reforms demanded by Joan at the court of Charles VII are mentioned, in part at least, by the chroniclers — a general amnesty for all the dissentient French partisans; the administration of kindly justice to the poor and to the rich ; reparation for past crimes ; the practice of religion, beginning with the king and court (these n'oble personages Joan made go to Confession and exhorted to Holy Communion) ; the reformation of the soldiery and of communal administration; finally, obedience to the commands which Joan would receive from

''her Lord," Such was the program of the Maid — the Gospel applied to the government and the morals of the people of France. How the Maid greatens in this vision of her! And how different she is from the peasant girl of free thought, who dreamed dreams and was stimulated to military surprise by the sight of a village raid perpetrated by some robber captain! She bore no hatred to the English; but requested them to depart without bloodshed; and over their dead and dying she wept with all the tender pity of a woman. It is a profanation to reduce Joan to the stature of a mere patriot. Such was not the view of Christendom, astounded at her exploits and virtues. Warriors thronged to her banner, even from beyond the limits of France, foreshadowing a crusade. What would have been her fame if she had been allowed to take Paris! What enthusiasm and confidence she would have aroused if she had expelled the English completely and rapidly, as she proposed to do? Such victorious exploits would have given the noble-hearted Joan an opportunity of leading a united Christendom in a campaign far greater than that of the Loire.

Section 3. — Her Prophecies

The author who believes little in the existence or possibility of prophecy or miracle, and the outright unbeliever, will always try to explain in a natural manner the manifested foreknowledge and the apparently superhuman deeds of

JOAN SEES A VISION

Joan of Arc. Such explaining away often becomes trivial, and often entirely ridiculous.

Before referring to the prophecies of the Maid, it is well to premise that prophecy is not necessarily a permanent gift, and that by its nature it is limited. In it is embraced the knowledge of secrets. Its purpose — and nothing is more evident in the history of religion — is to manifest Divine Providence, to prepare the minds of men for coming events, to turn aside evils, to conciliate public esteem, to show Divine approval and mission — all things of supreme consequence, if not of absolute necessity, when there is question of an envoy of God, with great and supernatural things to be accomplished." Provided the person favored with prophecy is also distinguished by heroicity of virtue, that is, practises the Christian virtues habitually in a heroic manner, or with heroic perfection, this gift is a great indication of sanctity, and is one of the chief grounds of canonization.

Minimizing in the matter of prophecy is unjust to Joan of Arc. As a matter of clear fact, she had the gift of prophecy in a rare degree; the gift was astonishing, very frequent, and indubitable. To accept this statement it is necessary only to read her life frankly and attentively. In fact beyond the frontiers of France, she was probably considered a prophetess even more than a warrior. At Domremy, before beginning her career, and at Vaucouleurs when imploring the aid of Baudricourt, she prophesied in the most definite manner, tliat, before one year had elapsed, she would cause the king to be crowned; that she would do so in spite of his enemies— and they were many and irresistibly powerful — that at mid-Lent Divine assistance (through her) would come. On February 12th she announced the defeat of Rouvray at the moment it occurred one hundred leagues away. This it was that finally decided Baudricourt to help her. The guides and guard feared to undertake the dangerous journey from Vaucouleurs to Chinon. Joan foretold they would meet no serious obstacle — a thing which seemed miraculous enough. At Chinon she recognized the king whom she had never seen, even though he had disguised himself amidst the courtiers — however the light critics seek to deny the fact. She made known to Charles her knowledge of his supreme secret never revealed to any one, and uttered only to Heaven in a mental prayer. Other prophecies on that same occasion are recorded. To revictual Orleans in siege seemed a sheer impossibility.

We shall do it at our ease, said Joan, without one Englishman coming out of his intrenchments. The indication and description of her sword; the prompt deliverance of Orleans, with a hundred accompanying prophecies, of the crossing of the river, the foretelling of her wound, of the safety of her herald, the death of Glasdale, of the total flight of the English before five days, of the taking of the Tourelles after one assault and her return by the bridge ; her knowledge, too, of the secret council of the captains, and the losses at Fort St. Loup — such and so constant was the prophesying of Joan. At Jargeau, foretelling the victory she inspired the assault against the advice of the captains; and although hurled from the scaling ladder by a large stone, she immediately sprang up and took the town by storm. During the investment of Jargeau she saved the life of d'Alengon by warning him to remove from where he was standing; directly afterwards, another, taking his place, was slain. She had foretold, also, to the tearful wife of this young nobleman that she would bring him back safe and sound. She foretold in a picturesque manner, but exactly, the extraordinary victory of Patay, urging her soldiers to press on boldly. The prediction of the coronation at Rheims was one of the most extraordinary of all. On her way thither, she told the military council, which was about to turn back from Troyes, that, if the matter were left to her, the city would surrender in two or three days, as happened. The people of Rheims, she said, would come forth spontaneously to meet the king. In the most desperate and hopeless moment she predicted the capture of St. Pierre-le- Moustier. She foreknew the frustration of her mission, but assured that it would be accomplished after her death. Paris fell in 1436 ; the Duke of Orleans was released in 1440; Normandy and Guienne returned to their allegiance in 1450.

The prophecies of Joan wer-e not always fulfilled, because they were frustrated by disloyalty or opposition. Her program was not followed; her own efforts were hindered; and hence it would have been a miracle if the deeds which she alone could do had been done without her. If such a thing indeed happened, her mission and her genius would have been of little avail. Historically speaking, when Joan was unhindered, all went well ; when betrayed or set aside, things usually failed. And nothing could have been better or more admirable than this choice of a peasant girl to create and lead the armies of France, to the humiliation of a criminal and traitorous nobility.

Section 4. — Joan's Pre-eminent Sanctity

One of the great promoters of the beatification of Joan and of the revival of popular enthusiasm in her fame, Cardinal Pie, Bishop of Poitiers, called her "the largest and completest type of religion" — in the sense, namely, not only of personal Christian perfection, but, moreover, of confirmation of Christian morality and dogma by her life, and of the manifestation of Divine intervention in her great career. This is the important view of Joan; not the minutiae, sometimes despicable, of some biographers. Not the inspiring story of her brilliant campaigns ; not the touching drama of her martyrdom ; but the far higher and more important aspect of her life and mission — the re-establishment of the Christian constitution of states, justice, charity, piety, Christian law, and Christian ideals, such is the complete view of Joan, as of all saints, as of "her Lord" Himself.

In the brief span of her mortal course what contrasts of life, duty and occupation! From the pious solitude of her native village, from the utter simplicity and snowy innocence of her child life, she passed to court and camp, and there became the central figure. But she is ever the same — "simple as any peasant girl save in things of war." She who loved her little companions, Mengette and Hauviette, at Domremy ; who plied busily the distaff and needle, and led the placid animals to the village pasture, now speaks to king and nobles with an ease, confidence, and grace equal to their own. She loves the conversation of men of war. She mounts the war-horse and wields the lance in a manner which fascinates the proud old soldiers. She sways the royal council, prophesies victory, marshals the lawless but now reformed veterans, inspires them with a sense of all-conquering courage, and in bold attack and hard siege leads them to irresistible victory. And in all this strangest transformation, her prayers and tears are as assiduous as in her native fields or village church ; her angelic modesty more noticeable, noticed, and revered; her absolute detachment from any personal interest, unparalleled. What Christian virtue could have burned more brightly than it did in the heart •of Joan, her sublime faith, -her nearness to Heaven, her warm charity to all! Not an aspect of religion which was not seen in her — reverence for Divine worship and all things sacred, constant reception of the Sacraments, fear of oifending God, or failing in creed or law. Her stainless modesty seems miraculous. It extinguishes the flame of desire in the hearts of her hard-fighting soldier-companions, as, fully armed, she sleeps beside them on the field. Yet no timid and cautious virgin ever took more precautions as to her female companions, when possible, and as to her place of rest. Her courtesy is as delicate and exquisite as that of a princess, and not unmingled with charming humor. Her fortitude is unequaled by the hardiest warrior of the royal army. Baudricourt will not abasih her, nor the counsels of the captains dissuade, nor the unparalleled dangers of journey, march, or desperate attack, ever make her feel a thrill of terror. She will weep over the dead, and for a moment when she is wounded ; but this only shows she never lost the tenderness of the maiden. Her sobriety was so great that even at the close of the hard-fought day, she eats but a little bread steeped in wine. The people everywhere are intimately acquainted with all this ; and so they venerate her as a saint, and kiss the stirrup of her saddle and the hem of her robe, and ask her to touch their rosaries. But she laughingly returns them with the gay word, that it will do just as much good if thejT^ touch them themselves.