En su búsqueda de fundamentos firmes para la paz y seguridad en Francia, los politiques defendían la separación de los ámbitos religioso y lo político, así como la supremacía de la soberanía del rey sobre cualquier otra potestad interna o externa (particularismos locales y estamentales o poderes universales). Cierta relación guardan estos principios con la evolución posterior de la monarquía francesa hacia el absolutismo y la interpretación galicana de las relaciones Iglesia-Estado, que culminó a finales del siglo XVII con Luis XIV; aunque mucho más se identifican con el reinado de Enrique IV, el candidato protestante al trono que optó por convertirse al catolicismo para lograr el consenso más amplio (París bien vale una misa),[2] y promulgó el Edicto de Nantes que garantizaba a los hugonotes la libertad de culto en determinados lugares (1598, revocado precisamente por su nieto Luis XIV con el Edicto de Fontainebleau, 1685).[3]
Maximilien de Béthune, duque de Sully (Mémoires des sages et royales Œconomies d’Estat, domestiques, politiques et militaires de Henri le Grand, 1638)[8]
Pierre de Beloy o Pierre de Belloy (Apologie catholique contre les libelles, déclarations, advis et consultations faictes, escrites et publiées par les liguez perturbateurs du repos du royaume de France, 1585, De l'autorité du roi, 1587, Conférence des édicts de pacification des troubles esmeus au royaume de France, pour le faict de la religion, 1600)[11]
Le devoir de révolte. La noblesse française et la gestation de l'État moderne, 1559-1661, Paris, Fayard, 1989.
entrée Malcontents, in Arlette Jouanna, Jacqueline Boucher, Dominique Biloghi et Guy Le Thiec, Histoire et dictionnaire des guerres de Religion, Paris, Robert Laffont, collection « Bouquins », 1998, pp. 1068-1069.
Bodino ha sido objeto de mil interpretaciones, a lo que ha contribuido haberse anticipado a su tiempo en la defensa atrevida de la tolerancia religiosa. (...) lejos de las posiciones disolventes de los monarcómacos, que proclamaban el derecho de resistencia, y de los maquiavelistas, que libraban a las actuaciones del poder de los límites racionales de la moralidad. (...) La soberanía necesitaba de la tolerancia religiosa para hacerse aceptable para todos los franceses, extenuados por las guerras de religión; la tolerancia necesitaba de la soberanía para hacerse respetar (...) Por esta razón (...) fue uno de los portavoces del denominado partido de los politiques, que entre católicos y hugonotes, entre los Guisa y los Borbones, intentaban la vía intermedia para llevar la paz definitiva a Francia.
Bodin never said that he was a “politique.” Briefly addressing the heart of the matter, historians have sought to make Bodin a convinced partisan of religious tolerance. During Bodin's lifetime however, religious tolerance, defined as civil tolerance and a legal admission of confessional diversity within a country or city, was not the ideal it would later become after the eighteenth century. In the sixteenth century, it was men like Sébastian Castellion who extolled the co-existence of many religions, with which the reformed camp disagreed. The struggle of the Huguenots from the beginning of the civil wars, was to convert the king and realm to the true religion. Tolerance was not an ideal since one cannot tolerate what one cannot possibly accept. For example how could one allow Christ to coexist with Belial, or a false religion to coexist with the one and only true religion? No further proof of this conviction is needed than the fierce struggle both Calvin and Beza waged against Castellion. This example causes one to ask the question: if Castellion supported freedom of religion, why did the leaders of the Reformation, who professed the same desire, denounce him so fervently? Because, in the reality, the French Reformers did not want freedom of religion which could have “opened the door to all manner of sects and heresies,” as Calvin said. At the beginning of the wars of religion, they wanted to obtain the recognition of the reformed religion as the sole religion in the realm. Yet, after thirty-six years of war, and after the conversion of Henry of Navarre, they understood that their project was too ambitious and had to be limited. Only through true religious tolerance could they convert the remainder of the kingdom at a later time. The unity of faith, and Calvinist religious concord were the ideal of Reformers too. Concerning the “politiques,” we only have descriptions of them from their adversaries who considered them atheists and heathens. For instance they were accused of having no religion because they were inclined to admit the definitive coexistence of different forms of worship in the interest of civil peace. Nevertheless, why have modern historians, placed men, who they considered the “most liberal and sympathetic,” such as Bodin, Etienne Pasquier, Duplessis-Mornay, Pierre de Beloy and many others in the party of the “politiques.” These historians have projected their modern ideals of tolerance, religious freedom, pluralism, and diversity on to the period of the Wars of Religion. Thus these scholars believed they had done a great service to the men of the past by presenting them as forerunners of the later values. But, as we have seen, Bodin viewed confessional concord as the means capable of returning religious, civil and political unity to the kingdom. It should be recalled however that the problem was not that of “liberty of conscience,” which the French government had already guaranteed by edicts in 1563, but the liberty to worship. The freedom to worship is also at the heart of the question of tolerance. When Bodin and many of his contemporaries thought about tolerance, it was only as provisional tolerance with the hope of achieving civil peace and religious reunification in the future. For Bodin, concord was essential since it formed the foundation of sovereignty and was necessary for the full exercise of power.
(...)
The Maréchaux of France, the main officers of the crown, the second estate of the nobility all of the Huguenots, “politiques” and atheists and nearly all of the princes of the blood belonged to the party of the King of Navarre. Thus, In Bodin's view, the “politiques and atheists” were linked to the reformed, which he considered the enemy.
Joachim Ambert, Duplessis Mornay, au, Études historique et politiques sur la situation de la France de 1549 à 1623. Genève : Slatkine reprints, 1970
Hugues Daussy, Les huguenots et le roi : le combat politique de Philippe Duplessis-Mornay, 1572-1600. Genève: Librairie Droz, 2002
J. A. Lalot, Essai historique sur la conférence tenue à Fontainebleau entre Duplessis-Mornay et Duperron le 4 mai 1600. Genève: Slatkine reprints, 1969
The tendency to remain neutral in religious questions and to subordinate religion to reasons of state, the recourse to a strong state which would be the guarantor of the security of commerce and exchange, corresponds to the conditions of existence of the parvenue bourgeoisie and its alliance with absolute monarchie.