Early Years and Education
Philippe de Mornay was born at Buhy, in the French Vexin on Nov. 5th 1549, two hours before the dawn, and was baptized the nth day of the same month. His father was Messire Jacques de Mornay, chevalier and lord of Buhy, and his mother was Dame Francoise de Bee Crespin, daughter of Messire Charles de Bee,1 viceadmiral of France, and of Dame Madeleine de Beauvillier, daughter of the Count of Saint- Aignan and of Antoinette de la Tr^mouille. His godfathers were Messire Philippe de Roncherolles, baron of Heuqueville, and his paternal uncle, Messire Bertin de Mornay, granddoyen of Beauvais and abbe" of Saumur au Boz near Boulogne. His godmothers were his maternal great-aunt, Madame Jehanne de Beauvillier, Lady of Puyset and of du Plessis Marly, and Dame de la Neuville, Lady of Morvillier. His nurse, whom I should be loth to forget, was Marguerite Madon, a native of Buhy, a woman of a sweet nature. The late M. de Buhy, his father, lived a blameless life to the age of forty-eight, never once failing to play his part in the wars and to do his service to his King. But the wars once over he retired to his own house, indifferent alike to court life and ambition, although opportunities for both were not lacking. He loved horses, and in peace,
1 Charles de Bee Crespin, Seigneur de Bourri and de Wardes, Vice- Admiral of France.
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as in war, always kept a good establishment ; he took his pleasure with his friends and neighbours and was considered by all to be a very honest and scrupulous man as times then were ; he was a devout worshipper in the Roman Church and brought up his children to be the same ; he loved the poor and was liberal to them ; above all things he hated lying and swearing ; and thus he lived in sweet and honest converse with all men. He died in the year 1559 on the last day of November. God gave him grace at his death to call to mind the many words of good purport which were daily spoken by his wife concerning the errors of the Roman Church which were not unknown to her, and he would have neither priest nor any superstitious ceremony, feeling full assurance of his salvation by the sole passion of Jesus Christ. He was visited, aided and admonished during his illness by M. d'Ambleville and M. de Villarceaux, father and son, his near relatives and bearing the same surname, and also by Master Antoine Quarr£, a doctor of Gisors and by Mademoiselle de Buhy, his wife, who had herself called them all in, knowing that they were instructed in the true faith. Thus he passed from this life into that of the blessed on the eve of St Andrew at the hour of noon. His body was buried at Buhy where it lies at rest till the last day. He made no will, telling Mademoiselle de Buhy, his wife, that he left his children and his house in her care in full confidence.
This same Dame Francoise de Bee, his wife, was thus left a widow at the age of twenty-nine, having been married at sixteen and having borne her husband tenchildren, of whom four sons and two daughters were living, all very young. Now for the past six or seven years she had had her eyes opened to the errors of the Papacy and had longed to profess the reformed religion. But the fires of persecution were still at that time alight in France and terror for the ruin of her house made her dissemble, the more so as M. de Buhy, her husband, was not of one mind with her. She often spoke with him on the subject and some-
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times he would find her reading the Bible or the Psalms or some other book, at which he never showed any displeasure ; merely warning her not to bring him into trouble seeing how cruel the times were. So now being a widow she had no wish to make any sudden change nor to declare herself openly before the funeral ceremonies and obsequies were over. And when the late M. d'Ambleville, father of M. de Villarceaux, cadet of the Mornay family, and Madame de Villarceaux, his daughter-in-law, told her how wrong she was, knowing the errors of Rome, to go on practising them and this all the more because her late husband had scorned its superstitions at his death, she replied that she had no mind to begin with the funeral ceremonies lest it should be said that she did it to save the twelve or fifteen hundred crowns they would cost her. This being so she observed all the ordinary mourning and ceremonies. Later on and little by little she left off going to mass, now on the pretext of her mourning, now on that of ill-health, but she continued to send her children, more especially the younger ones. At length warned by God in a grievous illness she and all her children made public profession in the year 1560, and ever after she persevered in the same faith in spite of wars, persecutions and massacres. Nor did she spare to do everything that lay in her power for even in the time of the St Bartholomew, when the Scripture was silenced throughout the land, it was still read in her house.
As for her family and household she had always ruled them with much honour and praise from all, and now in her widowhood she continued to spend all her time in building up and taking care of her children's welfare, in •* which she took a singular pleasure all the days of her life. She married one of the daughters left to her, Francoise de Mornay, to Anthony le S£ndchal, Seigneur d'Auberville, a scion of one of the oldest families of Normandy who professed the true religion, of which marriage there were several children. She has still two sons left to her and at this very hour when I write she is busied in
84 A HUGUENOT FAMILY
dividing the property of the late M. de Buhy and her own between them, they having come to an agreement together and having begged her to be their sole arbitrator, so that, when it should please God to call her, they can live in the same friendship which has lasted unbroken through her lifetime and can each retire to live in peace in his own house at her death.
The elder is M. Pierre de Mornay, Seigneur de Buhy, etc., who married Dame Anne d'Enlezy, sole heiress of a good family in Bourbonnais, and whose father owned a great deal of land in Normandy which she inherited. The second son is Philippe de Mornay, lord of Plessis, etc., my highly honoured lord and husband, about whom I have a mind to write, with God's help, as a means of strengthening our posterity in their fear of God and in their hope in Him after we are gone hence.