This, according to the cardinals, "is scandalous, temerarious, impious,
and erroneous."

The acceptance of the Bull was a great stumbling-block to many churchmen.
Louis XIV. forced it upon the French bishops, who were entertained at a
sumptuous banquet given by the Archbishop of Strasbourg and by a large
majority decided against the Quesnelites. It is unnecessary to follow the
history of this controversy further. France was long agitated by it, and
the Church of Holland was and is excommunicate from Rome mainly on account
of its refusal to accept the Bull _Unigenitus_, which was called forth by
and so unjustly condemned Quesnel's famous book.

In connection with the history of this Bull we may mention the work of one
of its most vehement opponents, Pierre Francois le Courayer, of the order
of the canons regular of St. Augustine, who wrote a book of great interest
to English churchmen, entitled _Dissertation sur la validite des
Ordinations Anglicanes_ (Bruxelles, 1723, 2 vols., in-12). This book was
condemned and its author excommunicated. He retired to the shelter of the
Church whose right of succession he so ably defended, and died in London
in 1776.

Few authors have received greater honour for their works, or endured
severer calamities on account of them, than the famous Florentine preacher
Savonarola. Endowed with a marvellous eloquence, imbued with a spirit of
enthusiastic patriotism and intense devotion, he inveighed against the
vices of the age, the worldliness of the clergy, the selfish ease of the
wealthy while the poor were crying for bread in want and sickness. The
good citizens of Florence believed that he was an angel from heaven, that
he had miraculous powers, could speak with God and foretell the future;