Barnes. Pdf

Bartholomé Chassenée, Jurist 
Réplique des habitans 
Gentlemen, it does me honour to appear again before your solemn court, to plead for justice as did that poor offended mother 
who appeared before Solomon to claim her child. Like Ulysses against Ajax I shall fight the procurator for the bestioles, who 
has produced before you many arguments as bedizened as Jezebel. 
In the first place, he contends that this court has no power and jurisdiction to try the bestial felonies that have taken place at 
Mamirolle, and towards this end argues that we are no better in God's eye than the woodworm, no higher and no lower, 
therefore we do not have the right to sit in judgement on them like Jupiter whose temple was on the Tarpeian rock from 
whence were traitors flung. But I shall refute this as Our Lord turned the moneylenders out of the Temple at Jerusalem, and in 
this way. Is man not higher than the animals? Is it not clear from the holy book of Genesis that the animals which were created 
before man, were so created in order to be subservient to his use? Did not the Lord give unto Adam dominion over the fish of 
the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that 

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J
ULIAN 
B
ARNES
: A History of the World in 10 ½
 
Chapters 
23
[p. 70]
moveth upon the earth? Did not Adam give the names to all the cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field? 
Was not the dominion of man over the animals asserted by the Psalmist and reiterated by the apostle Paul? And how may man 
have dominion over the animals and such dominion not include the right to punish them for their misdeeds? Furthermore, this 
right to sit in judgment over the animals, which the procurator for the bestioles so actively denies, is specifically given to man 
by God himself, as appears in the sacred book of Exodus. Did not the Lord lay down unto Moses the sacred law of an eye for 
an eye and a tooth for a tooth? And did he not continue thus, if an ox gore a man or a woman, that they die, then the ox shall be 
surely stoned, and his flesh shall not be eaten. Does the holy book of Exodus not thus make clear the law? And does it not go 
on further, that if one man's ox hurt another's, that he die, then they shall sell the live ox, and divide the money of it, and the 
dead ox also they shall divide? Has not the Lord laid it down thus, and given man the judgment over the animals? 
In the second place, that the woodworm are to be excused trial because of their failure to attend court. But they have been 
correctly summoned in accordance with all due process. They have been summoned as the Jews were summoned to be taxed 
by Augustus Caesar. And did not the Israelites obey? Which among those present here would prevent the bestioles from 
coming to court? My humble petitioners might have wished to do so, and to this end they might have sought to burn in the 
flames the leg of the throne that cast Hugo, Bishop of Besançon into a state of imbecility by striking his head on the altar step, 
but like Christians stayed their hand, preferring instead to submit the matter to your solemn judgment. What enemy, therefore, 
might the accused bestioles encounter? The distinguished procurator has made reference to cats eating rats. I was not aware, 
Gentlemen, that cats had taken to devouring woodworm on their way to court, yet no doubt I shall be corrected if I am in error. 
No, there is only one explanation of the refusal of the accused to appear before you, and that is a blind and most wilful 
disobedience, a hateful silence, a guilt 
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that blazes as the burning bush which did appear unto Moses, a bush which blazed but was not consumed, even as their guilt 
continues to blaze with every hour that they obstinately refuse to appear. 
In the third place, it is argued that God created the woodworm even as he created Man, and that he gave him the seeds and 
the fruit and the trees as meat, and that whatever they might choose to eat therefore has the blessing of God. Which is indeed 
the main and essential pleading of the procurator for the bestioles, and I hereby refute it thus. The sacred book of Genesis tells 
us that God in his infinite mercy and generosity gave unto the beasts of the field and unto the creeping things all the seeds and 
the fruit and the trees as meat. He gave the trees unto those creatures which have the instinct to devour trees, even though this 
might be a hindrance and a discomfort to Man. But He did not give them the cut wood. Where in the Holy Book of Genesis is 
it allowed that the creeping things of the earth may inhabit the cut wood? Did the Lord intend when He permitted a creature to 
burrow within the oak tree that the same creature had the right to burrow within the House of the Lord? Where in the Holy 
Scripture does the Lord give unto the animals the right to devour His temples? And does the Lord instruct His servants to pass 
by on the other side while His temples are devoured and His Bishops reduced to a state of imbecility? The pig that eats the 
holy sacramental wafer is hanged for its blasphemy, and the bestiole that makes his own habitation in the habitation of the 
Lord is no less blasphemous. 
Furthermore, and without prejudice to the foregoing, it has been argued that the Lord created the woodworm even as He 
created Man, and that therefore everything the Lord might do has the Lord's blessing, however pestilential and maleficent it 
might be. But did the Almighty Lord, in His matchless wisdom and beneficence, create the weevil in order that it destroy our 
crops, and the woodworm in order that it destroy the Lord's house? The wisest doctors of our Church for many centuries have 
examined every verse of the Holy Scripture just as Herod's soldiers searched for innocent children, and they have found no 
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chapter, no line, no phrase wherein there is mention of the woodworm. Therefore the question which I lay before the court as 
the essential question in this case is the following: was the woodworm ever upon Noah's Ark? Holy writ makes no mention of 
the woodworm embarking upon or disembarking from the mighty vessel of Noah. And indeed how could it have been so, for 
was not the Ark constructed of wood? How can the Lord in his eternal wisdom have allowed on board a creature whose daily 
habits might cause the shipwreck and disastrous death of Man and all the beasts of the Creation? How could such a thing be 
so? Therefore, it follows that the woodworm was not upon the Ark, but is an unnatural and imperfect creature which did not 
exist at the time of the great bane and ruin of the Deluge. Whence its generation came, whether from some foul spontaneity or 
some malevolent hand, we know not, yet its hateful malice is evident. This vile creature has given over its body to the Devil 
and thereby put itself beyond the protection and shelter of the Lord. What greater proof could there be but the manner of its 
desecrations, the cunning odiousness with which it hurled Hugo, Bishop of Besançon, into imbecility? Was this not the work 
of the Devil, to proceed thus in darkness and secrecy for many years, and then make triumph of his foul purpose? Yet the 
procurator for the bestioles argues that the woodworm have the blessing of the Lord in all that they do and all that they eat. He 
contends, therefore, that what they did in devouring the leg of the Bishop's throne had the blessing of the Lord. He contends 
further that the Lord by his own hand smote down one of the Bishops of his own Holy Church just as He smote down 
Belshazzar, as He smote down Amalek, as He smote down the Midianites, as He smote down the Canaanites, as He smote 
down Sihon the Amorite. Is this not a vile blasphemy which the court must extirpate even as Hercules did cleanse the stables 
of Augeas? 
And in the fourth place, it is contended that the court does not have the power and the right to pronounce the decree of 
excommunication. But this is to deny the very authority conferred by God upon his dear spouse, the Church, whom He 
[p. 73] 

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J
ULIAN 
B
ARNES
: A History of the World in 10 ½