From Defense to Resistance: Justification of Violence During the French Wars of Religion, Transactions, American Philosophical Society (vol. 83, part 6)

This is a print on demand publication. The right to defend oneself & one’s property came into conflict with medieval rulers’ attempts to maintain public order. As the French monarchy asserted its claims to sovereignty, the concept of “lese—majeste,” or treason, grew, but so did the belief that the king ruled by popular consent for the good of the kingdom. By the late 16th cent., heresy was being seen as a kind of treason, & religious arguments began to play a vital role in the new context o...