THE FRENCH CHURCH IN BOSTON 167 



of a new Congregational society, with the proviso that 

 the building was to be preserved for the sole use of a 

 Protestant sanctuary forever. How little human pro- 

 visions can control is shown by the fact that, in spite of 

 the condition of sale, forty years later the Huguenot 

 "temple" was sold to the Roman Catholics, and mass 

 was said within its walls by a Romish priest November 

 2, 1788. As for Le Mercier, he lived for sixteen years 

 after the dissolution of the church, spending his last days 

 upon an estate which he had purchased in Dorchester, 

 Massachusetts, where he died March 31, 1764. 



During Daille's pastorate the church received a present Queen Anne 

 of a Bible from Queen Anne for pulpit use. This Bible 

 was highly esteemed and continued in use until the 

 church dissolved, when it passed into possession of Rev. 

 Mather Byles, first pastor of the Hollis Street Congrega- 

 tional Church, whose library was subsequently sold, the 

 Bible going to Mr. E. Cobb, by whose widow it was pre- 

 sented in 1831 to the Divinity Library of Harvard Uni- 

 versity, where it is now carefully preserved. The book 

 is in a very good state of preservation ; contains a few 

 illustrations and maps, and the Apocrypha ; and was 

 printed in Amsterdam by the Elzeviers in 1669. 



Bible 



