 It was still illegal, and, although the law was seldom enforced, it could be a threat or a nuisance to Protestants.Calvinists lived primarily in the Midi; about 200,000 Lutherans accompanied by some Calvinists lived in the newly acquired Alsace, where the 1648 Treaty of Westphalia effectively protected them.<ref>Nigel Aston, "Religion and Revolution in France, 1780–1804" (2000) pp 61–72</ref>

Persecution of Protestants diminished in France after 1724, finally ending with the Edict of Versailles, commonly called the Edict of Tolerance, signed by Louis XVI in 1787.Two years later, with the Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen of 1789, Protestants gained equal rights as citizens.