Bontang was Louis's first attendant and the head of the palace, so to speak, among the servants of the court, he was the undoubted prime minister, and at some times, even the king's dragoons and musketeers had to obey his orders, and he had been with the king for fifteen years, from Louis was still an ignorant child, to now, a real king, Bontang loved and respected him, and it can be said that Louis was really a little too much to be able to make Bontang say such things.

In fact, in the secret library of the Church of Rome, there are many documents that may not be made public for a thousand years, from the commentary on Bible fragments collected everywhere, to the church and various powers- These include but are not limited to the so-called pagans, wizards, and dark creatures of trade, and there are also some humiliating or uproarious peace treaties or deeds, such as the document signed between Louis XIV and the Church of Rome as a matter of course, and hundreds of years later, when the French scholars filed a complaint with the Church of Rome to present the real Louis XIV, the priests of the Church of Rome smiled coldly and threw the extremely well-preserved vellum paper in front of them。

Clement VII, of course, would not have had such foresight, and the reason why he asked the clergy to keep this document as much as possible was that everyone who had the right to enter the place could see for themselves how shameless and intransigent the French king was.

In the middle of the sixteenth century there was already good paper, but orthodox documents, especially with the church, people still used parchment or calf paper, this calf paper is very well made, because it is taken from calves, even if it is more than three feet, there are still no seams and no traces of sticking, it is a complete piece, even after hundreds of years, it is still elastic, the surface is smooth, and the unusually smooth paper polished by the grinding stone is made of fine and long-retained, unfading iron gall ink, the ink is mixed with gum, so that the handwriting is so thick that it seems to be peeled off at any time, but these handwritingsWhile explaining how King Louis XIV of France was a greedy man, it also shows the weakness of the Roman Church at that time - it is difficult to say whether the willingness of the Roman Church to show this precious document in front of the public is related to the new round of papal elections, because the most vocal at this time is Bishop Barti from Siena, whose surname is Zige.

Even after hundreds of years, the people of the Church could not help but feel ashamed at the mention of Clement VII, because in him, the Church of Rome broke many firsts, and even Boniface VIII did not lose the face of the Church so dry and silent - the French scholars did not care at all, they changed into clean protective clothing, soft-soled shoes, and entered the heart of Rome. In the large room, where the temperature and humidity were constant, and only light could be felt, but no light could be seen, they waited for a while, and then a priest walked into the room with a dark glass box in his hand, and a huge table separated them from the priest, and the priest placed the box on the table, opened it, and carefully took out the piece of parchment with his gloved hands— Because it has been pressed between two wooden boards, the calf paper that was originally rolled in the cylinder has long been flattened, and from the edge of the calf paper, the traces of dark red and almost black sealing wax are clearly visible.

As soon as they saw the handwriting on it, these scholars couldn't help but let out a low and excited call, the Sun King Louis XIV left a lot of handwritten letters in the world, especially his children, whether they were born in or out of wedlock, would receive a gift from their father and handwritten blessing notes on their birthdays every year, most of these notes were cherished, and to this day, they are often displayed at the family gatherings of the descendants of the Sun King, and a small part of them have been donated to museums because of their extinction, so that everyone can see the profound and beautiful handwriting of the Sun King。

The scholars were even more familiar with the handwriting, and it is no exaggeration to say that it was more familiar than their own, so that when they saw only one initial capital letter, they were sure that it was indeed Louis XIV's own handwriting, and then they whispered in unison: "Sure enough, it's French!" In the time of François the Big Nose, there were signs of a resurgence of French nationalism, far more than their beliefs, and even more so in the time of Louis XIV, when the people of Europa were still using Latin as the lingua franca and exchanged letters in Latin, the letter written by King Louis XIV of France to Pope Clement VII was already in French.

Rows of slightly sloping, but as slender and flexible as spring vines, the beautiful handwriting is lined up on the apricot-yellow paper, except for the capital letters at the beginning, the other letters are not fancy, but have an awe-inspiring and arrogant momentum, "At that time the Sun King ......" a scholar could not help but say.

"Twenty-three. Another scholar said.

"Young people. The third scholar said, "The King." He added that it was only with a reproachful booing that the priests began to take their duties as scholars and researchers seriously.

After a routine hypocritical salute to the Pope, Louis XIV made five demands.

Article 1: He demanded that the Pope hand over the bandits who had attacked the king's envoys and his family, that is, the Marquis of Craqui, the leader of whom was the brother of Pope Clement VII, and of course the Pope would not give his brother, and of course he could not let his brother die, so it is known that after the signing of this peace treaty, the Pope's brother was expelled from Rome, and the Corsicans who participated in the two battles were sentenced to be hanged or beheaded.

Article 2: The king demanded that the Papal Guard must be dismantled - in fact, the Papal Guard was lifted, and the Pope never re-established the Guard, and it was not until 300 years later that the Pope re-established the Guard in World War I because of the security needs of the Vatican.

Article 3: The Church of Rome must apologize to the King of France for this matter, and not for a brief and easily forgotten or unspoken ceremony, but for a papal envoy to Paris, where the Louvre in Paris is bowed to the king, and as the representative of the pope, to the venerable majesty. In addition, in Rome, a stone tablet had to be erected, which showed the whole thing and the confession of the principal.

The stele originally stood on the west side of the Papal Palace, at the end of the enclosure of St. Peter's Basilica, but is no longer found, and although it is valuable as a historical witness, church officials insist that it was destroyed by artillery fire during the First World War. But now, the documents prove that it did exist, and the king has specially stated the size and font of the stone tablet.

Article 4: The Church of Rome wants to return Carsrot and Roncigliona to the Duke of Parma, and to return Comagio to the Duke of Modene or to compensate him for the losses he has suffered as a result - the scholars immediately clamored, because the descendants of the Duke of Parma still claimed ownership of these two cities, and he did keep the relevant certificates, and as for Comagio, fortunately, in the end, the Duke of Modene still took the compensation, otherwise the present Italian government would have had to suffer the big problems caused by the Roman Church.

And this fourth is why the Roman Church denounced Louis XIV, the Sun King, as shameless - France's coveting of the Italian peninsula can be traced back to the time of Gaul, when their ancestors were still mercenaries for the Romans, but Louis XIV, a boy who had been in power for less than five years, dared to claim to be the protector of the Italian princes, and intended to make this a reality rather than a vain word of mouth - to the dismay of the Church, he did.

This alone may not have annoyed Clement VII enough to protect this document as if it were an ancient Bible, and the most indignant thing was that both the Duke of Parma and the Duke of Modene (both princes of Italy, and their previous cities were also in Italy, and they were all former territories of the Papal States), acquiesced in this, and gave the French a large sum of money for these two things—yes, mind you, and that's the point, everyone! Louis XIV of France suppressed Pope Clement VII in Castel Sant'Angelo and did not dare to act, and threatened him to hand over the territory of the Papal States, of course, the king of France also knew very well that his army could not stay in Italy forever, and the territory here was like a chicken rib to him, so his envoys held a secret meeting semi-openly - To put it simply, it is to ask the Italian people if there is anything that needs the Pope's permission, and if so, the Duke of Luxembourg and his king are very generous, and they are willing to ask the Pope about this on your behalf, and they can also get a satisfactory answer for you, as long as you pay a little vulgar gold......

Although this practice caused many people to secretly criticize or laugh, there were brave men who stood up - namely the Dukes of Parma and Modene, and it is said that the contributions they gave were no less than the ransom paid by the Pope for himself.

The fifth was the ransom, and the King of France had the audacity to write that because of the mistakes of the vile villains in the papal guard, he had to send his envoys and the loyal men who protected them to Italy to inquire about the matter with the venerable Holy Father, and although he did not think that the Holy Father would be involved in this matter, it was an indisputable fact that the matter was caused by the Pope's brother, and he believed that the Holy Father must feel grief and guilt for it, and in order to alleviate this grief and relieve the guilt of God's spokesman on earth, he asked the Roman Church to bear all the costs of the battle, or the armed procession, and the king's loss of faith fee—as for why there is such a thing as a loss of faith fee, it is precisely because the king of France, such a pious man, such a saint, must accept the terrible fact that his envoys have been expelled from Rome by the Church, and that he must send troops to besiege Rome, has been unable to sleep and eat normally for several days, so ......

He had to hold many Masses to calm his mind, and although there was not a word in the letter about when, where, and who was to preside over the Mass, the Church of Rome only needed to give money and the cardinal's shawl, so as not to make the Father think too much—and the king even graciously offered that if the Church could not come up with the money for a while, it could be repaid with the duties and taxes owed to the Church by the clergy and the friars.

"A new coined word!" said one of the scholars, almost laughing, the word for loss of faith was coined from here, and has been used by many kings since then, if they think they are shameless enough.

"More importantly," said the second scholar, "from this time on, Louis XIV, the Sun King, was deliberately taxing the clergy and monks. ”

"Yes, he may have been thinking about it since a few years ago, and the brother of Clement VII gave him a good excuse that if he collected taxes directly from religious people in the country, he would definitely be counterattacked and retaliated against, but if it was ...... in the name of the Church"

"I think someone smart should see it. ”

"Maybe the king can't solve this problem, but he can definitely solve the smart man. The scholars laughed. The ecclesiastical people on one side were very embarrassed, for there were indeed people in the church who saw it, but he was soon met with a logical accident, and it was not the conspiracy of the King of France, but Clement VII had to bear the blame, because he did not want to visit Paris or Avignon.

——————

Five hundred years later, the discussion of the young kingdom and Bonton is not clear, and while Bontang is surprised by the king's whims, he wonders whether this will allow the king to completely free himself from the doubts of the French church.

Here we have to mention the problem of taxes in France, the pride of the king of France is not groundless, when the king of England still has to fight with the members of parliament because of the problem of taxation, the king of France has obtained the right to freely tax because of the Hundred Years War, the taxes in France are not only many but also complicated, many of them are for the service of war, and when the war really starts, the king will temporarily raise taxes, or worse, borrow from the bankers in the country, and then use future taxes as collateral - It is also known as the tax package system, in which all the taxes of a region are handled by one person, which seems to be a very beneficial and easy thing for the king to do, because he is relieved of many of the work and troubles in the process of collecting taxes, and can get enough money to meet his own needs or the needs of the country.

The point is that, just like any official who has bought an official position, in order to ensure that his loans are not wasted, or that he does not get enough benefits, those big tax collectors will do their best to exploit the poor people who need to pay taxes.

But the nobility at that time did not have to pay most of the taxes, and then, the religious officials whom the king had to target, the clergy and the monks, only had to pay a contribution every few years, even if it was a few million livres each time, but what they really had to pay was only a drop in the bucket.

So who is pulling the heavy carriage of France?

Civilians, only civilians.

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