Note 846 — XV. OF THE PULPIT.831

In the original clercs, to which our author added a note in the first four editions to say that he meant “clergymen.” The whole paragraph alludes to the missionaries sent into the provinces to convert the Protestants. Did La Bruyère, in speaking of the “converts who had already been made for these clergymen,” hint at the dragonnades and at the other wretched and inhuman means employed to compel people to change their religion? I am afraid not, though he admits some persons could not be converted.