Henry II, who followed his father Francis on the throne, redoubled the persecution which was stained with incessant and abominable cruelties. The ordinary process of law was set aside in dealing with the Huguenots who were brought under ecclesiastical jurisdiction. An edict published in 1555, enjoined all governors and officers of justice to punish without delay, without examination and without appeal, all heretics condemned by the judges. The civil judge was no longer anything but the passive executant of the sentences of the Church. The Parliament of Paris protested, but the King turned a deaf ear to these remonstrances and summoned a general meeting of all the Parliaments, which he attended in person and where he heard some home truths. One of the most outspoken was a great nobleman, one Anne Du Bourg, who defended the Protestants, declaring that they were condemned to cruel punishment while heinous criminals altogether escaped retribution. Du Bourg and another, Dufaure, were arrested and were conveyed to the Bastile where they were soon joined by other members of the Parliament. After many delays Du Bourg was brought to trial, convicted and sentenced to be burnt to death. "It is the intention of the Court," so ran the judgment, "that the said Du Bourg shall in no wise feel the fire, and that before it be lighted and he is cast therein he shall be strangled, yet if he should wish to dogmatise and indulge in any remarks he shall be gagged so as to avoid scandal." He was executed on the Place de la Grève on the top of a high gallows under which a fire was lighted to receive the dead body when it fell.
Henry II had been a weak and self-indulgent king. Ostentatious and extravagant, he wasted large sums in the expenses of his court and lavished rich gifts on his creatures, a course which emptied the treasury and entailed burdensome taxation. He was entirely under the thumb of his mistress, Diane de Poitiers, a cold-blooded, selfish creature, who ruled him and the country with unquestioned supremacy, before whom even the lawful queen, Catherine de Medicis, humiliated herself and paid abject court. The King's ministers, the Constable Montmorency and the Duc de Guise, were at first rivals in power with Diane, but soon joined with her in riding roughshod over the country, and in bestowing all good things, places, governments and profitable charges on their friends and creatures. Foreign adventure, external wars, famine and pestilence constantly impoverished France. The people rose frequently in insurrection and were always suppressed with sanguinary cruelty. Constable Montmorency, above mentioned, dealt so severely with Bordeaux, that in a short space of time no fewer than four hundred persons were beheaded, burned, torn asunder by wild horses or broken on the wheel.