The Memoirs of Cardinal de Retz, Complete
by
Jean Francois Paul de Gondi, Cardinal de Retz
Part 2 out of 5
the practice of virtue if his self-interest did not bias him to evil,
which, whenever he committed it, he did so knowingly. He extended his
concern for the State no further than his own life, though no minister
ever did more than he to make the world believe he had the same regard
for the future. In a word, all his vices were such that they received a
lustre from his great fortune, because they were such as could have no
other instruments to work with but great virtues. You will easily
conceive that a man who possessed such excellent qualities, and appeared
to have as many more,--which he had not,--found it no hard task to
preserve that respect among mankind which freed him from contempt, though
not from hatred.
Cardinal Mazarin's character was the reverse of the former; his birth was
mean, and his youth scandalous. He was thrashed by one Moretto, a
goldsmith of Rome, as he was going out of the amphitheatre, for having
played the sharper. He was a captain in a foot regiment, and Bagni, his
general, told me that while he was under his command, which was but three
months, he was only looked upon as a cheat. By the interest of Cardinal
Antonio Barberini, he was sent as Nuncio Extraordinary to France, which
office was not obtained in those days by fair means. He so tickled
Chavigni by his loose Italian stories that he was shortly after
introduced to Cardinal de Richelieu, who made him Cardinal with the same
view which, it is thought, determined the Emperor Augustus to leave the
succession of the Empire to Tiberius. He was still Richelieu's
obsequious, humble servant, notwithstanding the purple. The Queen making
choice of him, for want of another, his pedigree was immediately derived
from a princely family. The rays of fortune having dazzled him and
everybody about him, he rose, and they glorified him for a second
Richelieu, whom he had the impudence to ape, though he had nothing of
him; for what his predecessor counted honourable he esteemed scandalous.
He made a mere jest of religion. He promised everything without scruple;
at the same time he intended to perform nothing. He was neither
good-natured nor cruel, for he never remembered either good offices or
bad ones. He loved himself too well, which is natural to a sordid soul;
and feared himself too little, the true characteristic of those that have
no regard for their reputation. He foresaw an evil well enough, because
he was usually timid, but never applied a suitable remedy, because he had
more fear than wisdom. He had wit, indeed, together with a most
insinuating address and a gay, courtly behaviour; but a villainous heart
appeared constantly through all, to such a degree as betrayed him to be a
fool in adversity and a knave in prosperity. In short, he was the first
minister that could be called a complete trickster, for which reason his
administration, though successful and absolute, never sat well upon him,
for contempt--the most dangerous disease of any State--crept insensibly
into the Ministry and easily diffused its poison from the head to the
members.
You will not wonder, therefore, that there were so many unlucky cross
rubs in an administration which so soon followed that of Cardinal de
Richelieu and was so different from it. It is certain that the
imprisonment of M. de Beaufort impressed the people with a respect for
Mazarin, which the lustre of his purple would never have procured from
private men. Ondedei (since Bishop of Frejus) told me that the Cardinal
jested with him upon the levity of the French nation on this point, and
that at the end of four months the Cardinal had set himself up in his own
opinion for a Richelieu, and even thought he had greater abilities. It
would take up volumes to record all his faults, the least of which were
very important in one respect which deserves a particular remark. As he
trod in the steps of Cardinal de Richelieu, who had completely abolished
all the ancient maxims of government, he went in a path surrounded with
precipices, which Richelieu was aware of and took care to avoid. But
Cardinal Mazarin made no use of those props by which Richelieu kept his
footing. For instance, though Cardinal de Richelieu affected to humble
whole bodies and societies, yet he studied to oblige individuals, which
is sufficient to give you an idea of all the rest. He had indeed some
unaccountable illusions, which he pushed to the utmost extremity. The
most dangerous kind of illusion in State affairs is a sort of lethargy
that never happens without showing pronounced symptoms. The abolishing
of ancient laws, the destruction of that golden medium which was
established between the Prince and the people, and the setting up a power
purely and absolutely despotic, were the original causes of those
political convulsions which shook France in the days of our forefathers.
Cardinal de Richelieu managed the kingdom as mountebanks do their
patients, with violent remedies which put strength into it; but it was
only a convulsive strength, which exhausted its vital organs. Cardinal
Mazarin, like a very unskilful physician, did not observe that the vital
organs were decayed, nor had he the skill to support them by the chemical
preparations of his predecessor; his only remedy was to let blood, which
he drew so plentifully that the patient fell into a lethargy, and our
medicaster was yet so stupid as to mistake this lethargy for a real state
of health. The provinces, abandoned to the rapine of the
superintendents, were stifled, as it were, under the pressure of their
heavy misfortunes, and the efforts they made to shake them off in the
time of Richelieu added only to their weight and bitterness. The
Parliaments, which had so lately groaned under tyranny, were in a manner
insensible to present miseries by a too fresh and lively remembrance of
their past troubles. The grandees, who had for the most part been
banished from the kingdom, were glad to have returned, and therefore took
their fill of ease and pleasure. If our quack had but humoured this
universal indolence with soporifics, the general drowsiness might have
continued much longer, but thinking it to be nothing but natural sleep,
he applied no remedy at all. The disease gained strength, grew worse and
worse, the patient awakened, Paris became sensible of her condition; she
groaned, but nobody minded it, so that she fell into a frenzy, whereupon
the patient became raving mad.
But now to come to particulars. Emeri, Superintendent of the Finances,
and in my opinion the most corrupt man of the age, multiplied edicts as
fast as he could find names to call them by. I cannot give you a better
idea of the man than by repeating what I heard him say in full
Council,--that faith was for tradesmen only, and that the Masters of
Requests who urged faith to be observed in the King's affairs deserved to
be punished. This man, who had in his youth been condemned to be hanged
at Lyons, absolutely governed Mazarin in all the domestic affairs of the
kingdom. I mention this, among many other instances which I could produce
of the same nature, to let you see that a nation does not feel the
extremity of misery till its governors have lost all shame, because that
is the instant when the subjects throw off all respect and awake
convulsively out of their lethargy.
The Swiss seemed, as it were, crushed under the weight of their chains,
when three of their powerful cantons revolted and formed themselves into
a league. The Dutch thought of nothing but an entire subjection to the
tyrant Duke of Alva, when the Prince of Orange, by the peculiar destiny
of great geniuses, who see further into the future than all the world
besides, conceived a plan and restored their liberty. The reason of all
this is plain: that which causes a supineness in suffering States is the
duration of the evil, which inclines the sufferers to believe it will
never have an end; as soon as they have hopes of getting out of it, which
never fails when the evil has arrived at a certain pitch, they are so
surprised, so glad, and so transported, that they run all of a sudden
into the other extreme, and are so far from thinking revolutions
impossible that they suppose them easy, and such a disposition alone is
sometimes able to bring them about; witness the late revolution in
France. Who could have imagined, three months before the critical period
of our disorders, that such a revolution could have happened in a kingdom
where all the branches of the royal family were strictly united, where
the Court was a slave to the Prime Minister, where the capital city and
all the provinces were in subjection to him, where the armies were
victorious, and where the corporations and societies seemed to have no
power?--whoever, I say, had said this would have been thought a madman,
not only in the judgment of the vulgar, but in the opinion of a D'Estrees
or a Senneterre.
In August, 1647, there was a mighty clamour against the tariff edict
imposing a general tax upon all provisions that came into Paris, which
the people were resolved to bear no longer. But the gentlemen of the
Council being determined to support it, the Queen consulted the members
deputed from Parliament, when Cardinal Mazarin, a mere ignoramus in these
affairs, said he wondered that so considerable a body as they were should
mind such trifles,--an expression truly worthy of Mazarin. However, the
Council at length imagining the Parliament would do it, thought fit to
suppress the tariff themselves by a declaration, in order to save the
King's credit. Nevertheless, a few days after, they presented five
edicts even more oppressive than the tariff, not with any hopes of having
them received, but to force the Parliament to restore the tariff. Rather
than admit the new ones, the Parliament consented to restore the old one,
but with so many qualifications that the Court, despairing to find their
account in it, published a decree of the Supreme Council annulling that
of the Parliament with all its modifications. But the Chamber of
Vacations answered it by another, enjoining the decree of Parliament to
be put in execution. The Council, seeing they could get no money by this
method, acquainted the Parliament that, since they would receive no new
edicts, they could do no less than encourage the execution of such edicts
as they had formerly ratified; and thereupon they trumped up a
declaration which had been registered two years before for the
establishment of the Chamber of Domain, which was a terrible charge upon
the people, had very pernicious consequences, and which the Parliament
had passed, either through a surprise or want of better judgment. The
people mutinied, went in crowds to the Palace, and used very abusive
language to the President de Thore, Emeri's son. The Parliament was
obliged to pass a decree against the mutineers.
The Court, overjoyed to see the Parliament and the people together by the
ears, supported the decree by a regiment of French and Swiss Guards. The
Parisians were alarmed, and got into the belfries of three churches in
the street of Saint Denis, where the guards were posted. The Provost ran
to acquaint the Court that the city was just taking arms. Upon which
they ordered the troops to retire, and pretended they were posted there
for no other end than to attend the King as he went to the Church of
Notre Dame; and the better to cover their design, the King went next day
in great pomp to the said church, and the day after he went to
Parliament, without giving notice of his coming till very late the night
before, and carried with him five or six edicts more destructive than the
former. The First President spoke very boldly against bringing the King
into the House after this manner, to surprise the members and infringe
upon their liberty of voting. Next day the Masters of Requests, to whom
one of these edicts, confirmed in the King's presence, had added twelve
colleagues, met and took a firm resolution not to admit of this new
creation. The Queen sent for them, told them they were very pretty
gentlemen to oppose the King's will, and forbade them to come to Council.
Instead of being frightened, they were the more provoked, and, going into
the Great Hall, demanded that they might have leave to enter their
protest against the edict for creating new members, which was granted.
The Chambers being assembled the same day to examine the edicts which the
King had caused to be ratified in his presence, the Queen commanded them
to attend her by their deputies in the Palais Royal, and told them she
was surprised that they pretended to meddle with what had been
consecrated by the presence of the King. These were the very words of
the Chancellor. The First President answered that it was the custom of
Parliament, and showed the necessity of it for preserving the liberty of
voting. The Queen seemed to be satisfied; but, finding some days after
that the Parliament was consulting as to qualifying those edicts, and so
render them of little or no use, she ordered the King's Council to forbid
the Parliament meddling with the King's edicts till they had declared
formally whether they intended to limit the King's authority. Those
members that were in the Court interest artfully took advantage of the
dilemma the Parliament was in to answer the question, and, in order to
mollify them, tacked a clause to the decrees which specified the
restrictions, namely, that all should be executed according to the good
pleasure of the King. This clause pleased the Queen for a while, but
when she perceived that it did not prevent the rejecting of almost any
other edict by the common suffrage of the Parliament, she flew into a
passion, and told them plainly that she would have all the edicts,
without exception, fully executed, without any modifications whatsoever.
Not long after this, the Court of Aids, the Chamber of Accounts, the
Grand Council, and the Parliament formed a union which was pretended to
be for the reformation of the State, but was more probably calculated for
the private interest of the officers, whose salaries were lessened by one
of the said edicts. And the Court, being alarmed and utterly perplexed
by the decree for the said union, endeavoured, as much as in them lay, to
give it this turn, to make the people have a mean opinion of it. The
Queen acquainted the Parliament by some of the King's Council that,
seeing this union was entered into for the particular interest of the
companies, and not for the reformation of the State, as they endeavoured
to persuade her, she had nothing to say to it, as everybody is at liberty
to represent his case to the King, but never to intermeddle with the
government of the State.
The Parliament did not relish this ensnaring discourse, and because they
were exasperated by the Court's apprehending some of the members of the
Grand Council, they thought of nothing but justifying and supporting
their decree of union by finding out precedents, which they accordingly
met with in the registers, and were going to consider how to put it in
execution when one of the Secretaries of State came to the bar of the
house, and put into the hands of the King's Council a decree of the
Supreme Council which, in very truculent terms, annulled that of the
union. Upon this the Parliament desired a meeting with the deputies of
the other three bodies, at which the Court was enraged, and had recourse
to the mean expedient of getting the very original decree of union out of
the hands of the chief registrar; for that end they sent the Secretary of
State and a lieutenant of the Guards, who put him into a coach to drive
him to the office, but the people perceiving it, were up in arms
immediately, and both the secretary and lieutenant were glad to get off.
After this there was a great division in the Council, and some said the
Queen was disposed to arrest the Parliament; but none but herself was of
that opinion, which, indeed, was not likely to be acted upon, considering
how the people then stood affected. Therefore a more moderate course was
taken. The Chancellor reprimanded the Parliament in the presence of the
King and Court, and ordered a second decree of Council to be read and
registered instead of the union decree, forbidding them to assemble under
pain of being treated as rebels. They met, nevertheless, in defiance of
the said decree, and had several days' consultation, upon which the Duc
d'Orleans, who was very sensible they would never comply, proposed an
accommodation. Accordingly Cardinal Mazarin and the Chancellor made some
proposals, which were rejected with indignation. The Parliament affected
to be altogether concerned for the good of the public, and issued a
decree obliging themselves to continue their session and to make humble
remonstrances to the King for annulling the decrees of the Council.
The King's Council having obtained audience of the Queen for the
Parliament, the First President strenuously urged the great necessity of
inviolably preferring that golden mean between the King and the subject;
proved that the Parliament had been for many ages in possession of full
authority to unite and assemble; complained against the annulling of
their decree of union, and concluded with a very earnest motion for
suppressing decrees of the Supreme Council made in opposition to theirs.
The Court, being moved more by the disposition of the people than by the
remonstrances of the Parliament, complied immediately, and ordered the
King's Council to acquaint the Parliament that the King would permit the
act of union to be executed, and that they might assemble and act in
concert with the other bodies for the good of the State.
You may judge how the Cabinet was mortified, but the vulgar were much
mistaken in thinking that the weakness of Mazarin upon this occasion gave
the least blow to the royal authority. In that conjuncture it was
impossible for him to act otherwise, for if he had continued inflexible
on this occasion he would certainly have been reckoned a madman and
surrounded with barricades. He only yielded to the torrent, and yet most
people accused him of weakness. It is certain this affair brought him
into great contempt, and though he endeavoured to appease the people by
the banishment of Emeri, yet the Parliament, perceiving what ascendancy
they had over the Court, left no stone unturned to demolish the power of
this overgrown favourite.
The Cardinal, made desperate by the failure of his stratagems to create
jealousy among the four bodies, and alarmed at a proposition which they
were going to make for cancelling all the loans made to the King upon
excessive interest,--the Cardinal, I say, being quite mad with rage and
grief at these disappointments, and set on by courtiers who had most of
their stocks in these loans, made the King go on horseback to the
Parliament House in great pomp, and carry a wheedling declaration with
him, which contained some articles very advantageous to the public, and a
great many others very ambiguous. But the people were so jealous of the
Court that he went without the usual acclamations. The declaration was
soon after censured by the Parliament and the other bodies, though the
Duc d'Orleans exhorted and prayed that they would not meddle with it, and
threatened them if they did.
The Parliament also passed a decree declaring that no money should be
raised without verified declarations, which so provoked the Court that
they resolved to proceed to extremities, and to make use of the signal
victory which was obtained at Lens on the 24th of August, 1648, to dazzle
the eyes of the people and gain their consent to oppressing the
Parliament.
All the humours of the State were so disturbed by the great troubles at
Paris, the fountainhead, that I foresaw a fever would be the certain
consequence, because the physician had not the skill to prevent it. As I
owed the coadjutorship of the archbishopric to the Queen, I thought it my
duty in every circumstance to sacrifice my resentment, and even the
probability of glory, to gratitude; and notwithstanding all the
solicitations of Montresor and Laigues, I made a firm resolution to stick
close to my own business and not to engage in anything that was either
said or done against the Court at that time. Montresor had been brought
up from his youth in the faction of the Duc d'Orleans, and, having more
wit than courage, was so much the more dangerous an adviser in great
affairs; men of this cast only suggest measures and leave them to be
executed by others. Laigues, on the other hand, who was entirely
governed by Montresor, had not much brains, but was all bravery and
feared nothing; men of this character dare do anything they are set upon
by those who confide in them.
Finding that my innocence and integrity gained me no friends at Court,
and that I had nothing to expect from the Minister, who mortally hated
me, I resolved to be upon my guard, by acting in respect to the Court
with as much freedom as zeal and sincerity; and in respect to the city,
by carefully preserving my friends, and doing everything necessary to
get, or, rather, to keep, the love of the people. To maintain my
interest in the city, I laid out 36,000 crowns in alms and other
bounties, from the 26th of March to the 25th of August, 1648; and to
please the Court I told the Queen and Cardinal how the Parisians then
stood affected, which they never knew before, through flattery and
prejudice. I also complained to the Queen of the Cardinal's cunning and
dissimulation, and made use of the same intimations which I had given to
the Court to show the Parliament that I had done all in my power to
clearly inform the Ministry of everything and to disperse the clouds
always cast over their understandings by the interest of inferior
officers and the flattery of courtiers. This made the Cardinal break
with me and thwart me openly at every opportunity, insomuch that when I
was telling the Queen in his presence that the people in general were so
soured that nothing but lenitives could abate their rancour, he answered
me with the Italian fable of the wolf who swore to a flock of sheep that
he would protect them against all his comrades provided one of them would
come every morning and lick a wound he had received from a dog. He
entertained me with the like witticisms three or four months together, of
which this was one of the most favourable, whereupon I made these
reflections that it was more unbecoming a Minister of State to say silly
things than to do them, and that any advice given him was criminal.
The Cardinal pretended that the success of the King's arms at Lens had so
mortified the Court that the Parliament and the other bodies, who
expected they would take a sharp revenge on them for their late conduct,
would have the great satisfaction of being disappointed. I own I was
fool enough to believe him, and was perfectly transported at the thought;
but with what sincerity the Cardinal spoke will appear by and by.
On the 26th of August, 1648, the worthy Broussel, councillor of the Grand
Chamber, and Rene Potier, Sieur de Blancmenil, President of the Inquests,
were both arrested by the Queen's officers. It is impossible to express
the sudden consternation of all men, women, and children in Paris at this
proceeding. The people stared at one another for awhile without saying a
word. But this profound silence was suddenly attended with a confused
noise of running, crying, and shutting up of shops, upon which I thought
it my duty to go and wait upon the Queen, though I was sorely vexed to
see how my credulity had been abused but the night before at Court, when
I was desired to tell all my friends in Parliament that the victory of
Lens had only disposed the Court more and more to leniency and
moderation. When I came to the New Market, on my way to Court, I was
surrounded with swarms of people making a frightful outcry, and had great
difficulty in getting through the crowd till I had told them the Queen
would certainly do them justice. The very boys hissed the soldiers of
the Guard and pelted them with stones. Their commander, the Marechal de
La Meilleraye, perceiving the clouds began to thicken on all sides, was
overjoyed to see me, and would go with me to Court and tell the whole
truth of the matter to the Queen. The people followed us in vast
numbers, calling out, "Broussel, Broussel!"
The Queen, whom we found in her Cabinet Council with Mazarin and others,
received me neither well nor ill, was too proud and too much out of
temper to confess any shame for what she had told me the night before,
and the Cardinal had not modesty enough to blush. Nevertheless he seemed
very much confused, and gave some obscure hints by which I could perceive
he would have me to believe that there were very sudden and extraordinary
reasons which had obliged the Queen to take such measures. I simulated
approval of what he said, but all the answer I returned was that I had
come thither, as in duty bound, to receive the Queen's orders and to
contribute all in my power to restore the public peace and tranquillity.
The Queen gave a gracious nod, but I understood afterwards that she put a
sinister interpretation upon my last speech, which was nevertheless very
inoffensive and perfectly consonant to my character as Coadjutor of
Paris; but it is a true saying that in the Courts of princes a capacity
of doing good is as dangerous and almost as criminal as a will to do
mischief.
The Marechal de La Meilleraye, finding that the Abbe de la Riviere and
others made mere jest and banter of the insurrection, fell into a great
passion, spoke very sharply, and appealed to me. I freely gave my
testimony, confirmed his account of the insurrection, and seconded him in
his reflections upon the future consequences. We had no other return
from the Cardinal than a malicious sneer, but the Queen lifted up her
shrill voice to the highest note of indignation, and expressed herself to
this effect: "It is a sign of disaffection to imagine that the people are
capable of revolting. These are ridiculous stories that come from
persons who talk as they would have it; the King's authority will set
matters right."
The Cardinal, perceiving that I was a little nettled, endeavoured to
soothe me by this address to the Queen: "Would to God, madame, that all
men did but talk with the same sincerity as the Coadjutor of Paris. He
is greatly concerned for his flock, for the city, and for your Majesty's
authority, and though I am persuaded that the danger is not so great as
he imagines, yet his scruples in this case are to be commended in him as
laudable and religious." The Queen understood the meaning of this cant,
recovered herself all of a sudden, and spoke to me very civilly; to which
I answered with profound respect and so innocent a countenance that La
Riviere said, whispering to Beautru, "See what it is not to be always at
Court! The Coadjutor knows the world and is a man of sense, yet takes
all the Queen has said to be in earnest."
The truth is, the Cabinet seemed to consist of persons acting the several
parts of a comedy. I played the innocent, but was not so, at least in
that affair. The Cardinal acted the part of one who thought himself
secure, but was much less confident than he appeared. The Queen affected
to be good-humoured, and yet was never more ill-tempered. M. de
Longueville put on the marks of sorrow and sadness while his heart leaped
for joy, for no man living took a greater pleasure than he to promote all
broils. The Duc d'Orleans personated hurry and, passion in speaking to
the Queen, yet would whistle half an hour together with the utmost
indolence. The Marechal de Villeroy put on gaiety, the better to make
his court to the Prime Minister, though he privately owned to me, with
tears in his eyes, that he saw the State was upon the brink of ruin.
Beautru and Nogent acted the part of buffoons, and to please the Queen,
personated old Broussel's nurse (for he was eighty years of age),
stirring up the people to sedition, though both of them knew well enough
that their farce might perhaps soon end in a real tragedy.
The Abby de la Riviere was the only man who pretended to be fully
persuaded that the insurrection of the people was but vapour, and he
maintained it to the Queen, who was willing to believe him, though she
had been satisfied to the contrary; and the conduct of the Queen, who had
the courage of a heroine, and the temper of La Riviere, who was the most
notorious poltroon of his time, furnished me with this remark: That a
blind rashness and an extravagant fear produce the same effects while the
danger is unknown.
The Marechal de La Meilleraye assumed the style and bravado of a captain
when a lieutenant-colonel of the Guards suddenly came to tell the Queen
that the citizens threatened to force the Guards, and, being naturally
hasty and choleric, was transported even with fury and madness. He cried
out that he would perish rather than suffer such insolence, and asked
leave to take the Guards, the officers of the Household, and even all the
courtiers he could find in the antechambers, with whom he would engage to
rout the whole mob. The Queen was greatly in favour of it, but nobody
else, and events proved that it was well they did not come into it. At
the same time entered the Chancellor, a man who had never spoken a word
of truth in his whole life; but now, his complaisance yielding to his
fear, he spoke directly according to what he had seen in the streets. I
observed that the Cardinal was startled at the boldness of a man in whom
he had never seen anything like it before. But Senneterre, coming in
just after him, removed all their apprehensions in a trice by assuring
them that the fury of the people began to cool, that they did not take
arms, and that with a little patience all would be well again.
There is nothing so dangerous as flattery at a juncture where he that is
flattered is in fear, because the desire he has not to be terrified
inclines him to believe anything that hinders him from applying any
remedy to what he is afraid of. The news that was brought every moment
made them trifle away that time which should have been employed for the
preservation of the State. Old Guitaut, a man of no great sense, but
heartily well affected, was more impatient than all the rest, and said
that he did not conceive how it was possible for people to be asleep in
the present state of affairs; he muttered something more which I could
not well hear, but it seemed to bear very hard upon the Cardinal, who
owed him no goodwill.
The Cardinal answered, "Well, M. Guitaut, what would you have us do?"
Guitaut said, very bluntly, "Let the old rogue Broussel be restored to
the people, either dead or alive."
I said that to restore him dead was inconsistent with the Queen's piety
and prudence, but to restore him alive would probably put a stop to the
tumult.
At these words the Queen reddened, and cried aloud, "I understand you, M.
le Coadjutor. You would have me set Broussel at liberty; but I will
strangle him sooner with these hands,"--throwing her head as it were into
my face at the last word, "and those who--"
The Cardinal, believing that she was going to say all to me that rage
could inspire, advanced and whispered in her ear, upon which she became
composed to such a degree that, had I not known her too well, I should
have thought her at her ease. The lieutenant de police came that instant
into the Cabinet with a deadly pale aspect. I never saw fear so well and
ridiculously represented in any Italian comedy as the fright which he
appeared in before the Queen. How admirable is the sympathy of fearful
souls! Neither the Cardinal nor the Queen were much moved at what M. de
La Meilleraye had strongly urged on them, but the fears of the lieutenant
seized them like an infection, so that they were all on a sudden
metamorphosed. They ridiculed me no longer, and suffered it to be
debated whether or no it was expedient to restore Broussel to the people
before they took arms, as they had threatened to do. Here I reflected
that it is more natural to the passion of fear to consult than to
determine.
The Cardinal proposed that I, as the fittest person, should go and assure
the people that the Queen would consent to the restoration of Broussel,
provided they would disperse. I saw the snare, but could not get away
from it, the rather because Meilleraye dragged me, as it were, to go
along with him,--telling her Majesty that he would dare to appear in the
streets in my company, and that he did not question but we should do
wonders. I said that I did not doubt it either, provided the Queen would
order a promise to be drawn in due form for restoring the prisoners,
because I had not credit enough with the people to be believed upon my
bare word. They praised my modesty, Meilleraye was assured of success,
and they said the Queen's word was better than all writings whatsoever.
In a word, I was made the catspaw, and found myself under the necessity
of acting the most ridiculous part that perhaps ever fell to any man's
share. I endeavoured to reply; but the Duc d'Orleans pushed me out
gently with both hands, saying, "Go and restore peace to the State;" and
the Marshal hurried me away, the Life-guards carrying me along in their
arms, and telling me that none but myself could remedy this evil. I went
out in my rochet and camail, dealing out benedictions to the people on my
right and left, preaching obedience, exerting all my endeavours to
appease the tumult, and telling them the Queen had assured me that,
provided they would disperse, she would restore Broussel.
The violence of the Marshal hardly gave me time to express myself, for he
instantly put himself at the head of the Horse-guards, and, advancing
sword in hand, cried aloud, "God bless the King, and liberty to
Broussel!" but being seen more than he was heard, his drawn sword did
more harm than his proclaiming liberty to Broussel did good. The people
took to their arms and had an encounter with the Marshal, upon which I
threw myself into the crowd, and expecting that both sides would have
some regard to my robes and dignity, the Marshal ordered the Light-horse
to fire no more, and the citizens with whom he was engaged held their
hands; but others of them continued firing and throwing stones, by one of
which I was knocked down, and had no sooner got up than a citizen was
going to knock me down with a musket. Though I did not know his name,
yet I had the presence of mind to cry out, "Forbear, wretch; if thy
father did but see thee--" He thereupon concluded I knew his father very
well, though I had never seen him; and I believe that made him the more
curious to survey me, when, taking particular notice of my robes, he
asked me if I was the Coadjutor. Upon which I was presently made known
to the whole body, followed by the multitude which way soever I went, and
met with a body of ruffians all in arms, whom, with abundance of
flattery, caresses, entreaties, and menaces, I prevailed on to lay down
their weapons; and it was this which saved the city, for had they
continued in arms till night, the city had certainly been plundered.
I went accompanied by 30,000 or 40,000 men without arms, and met the
Marechal de La Meilleraye, who I thought would have stifled me with
embraces, and who said these very words: "I am foolhardy and brutal; I
had like to have ruined the State, and you have saved it; come, let us go
to the Queen and talk to her like true, honest Frenchmen; and let us set
down the day of the month, that when the King comes of age our testimony
may be the means of hanging up those pests of the State, those infamous
flatterers, who pretended to the Queen that this affair was but a
trifle." To the Queen he presently hurried me, and said to her, "Here is
a man that has not only saved my life, but your Guards and the whole
Court."
The Queen gave an odd smile which I did not very well like, but I would
not seem to take any notice of it, and to stop Meilleraye in his encomium
upon me, I assumed the discourse myself, and said, "Madame, we are not
come upon my account, but to tell you that the city of Paris, disarmed
and submissive, throws herself at your Majesty's feet."
"Not so submissive as guilty," replied the Queen, with a face full of
fire; "if the people were so raging as I was made to believe, how came
they to be so soon subdued?"
The Marshal fell into a passion, and said, with an oath, "Madame, an
honest man cannot flatter you when things are come to such an extremity.
If you do not set Broussel at liberty this very day, there will not be
left one stone upon another in Paris by tomorrow morning."
I was going to support what the Marshal had said, but the Queen stopped
my mouth by telling me, with an air of banter, "Go to rest, sir; you have
done a mighty piece of work."
When I returned home, I found an incredible number of people expecting
me, who forced me to get upon the top of my coach to give them an account
of what success I had had at Court. I told them that the Queen had
declared her satisfaction in their submission, and that she told me it
was the only method they could have taken for the deliverance of the
prisoners. I added other persuasives to pacify the commonalty, and they
dispersed the sooner because it was supper-time; for you must know that
the people of Paris, even those that are the busiest in all such
commotions, do not care to lose their meals.
I began to perceive that I had engaged my reputation too far in giving
the people any grounds to hope for the liberation of Broussel, though I
had particularly avoided giving them my word of honour, and I apprehended
that the Court would lay hold of this occasion to destroy me effectually
in the opinion of the people by making them believe that I acted in
concert with the Court only, to amuse and deceive them.
While I was making these and the like reflections, Montresor came and
told me that I was quite mistaken if I thought to be a great gainer by
the late expedition; that the Queen was not pleased with my proceedings,
and that the Court was persuaded that I did what lay in my power to
promote the insurrection. I confess I gave no credit to what Montresor
said, for though I saw they made a jest of me in the Queen's Cabinet, I
hoped that their malice did not go so far as to diminish the merit of the
service I had rendered, and never imagined that they could be capable of
turning it into a crime. Laigues, too, came from Court and told me that
I was publicly laughed at, and charged with having fomented the
insurrection instead of appeasing it; that I had been ridiculed two whole
hours and exposed to the smart raillery of Beautru, to the buffoonery of
Nogent, to the pleasantries of La Riviere, to the false compassion of the
Cardinal, and to the loud laughter of the Queen.
You may guess that I was not a little moved at this, but I rather felt a
slight annoyance than any transport of passion. All sorts of notions
came into my mind, and all as suddenly passed away. I sacrificed with
little or no scruple all the sweetest and brightest images which the
memory of past conspiracies presented in crowds to my mind as soon as the
ill-treatment I now publicly met with gave me reason to think that I
might with honour engage myself in new ones. The obligations I had to
her Majesty made me reject all these thoughts, though I must confess I
was brought up in them from my infancy, and Laigues and Montresor could
have never shaken my resolution either by insinuating motives or making
reproaches, if Argenteuil, a gentleman firmly attached to my interest,
had not come into my room that moment with a frightened countenance and
said:
"You are undone; the Marechal de La Meilleraye has charged me to tell you
that he verily thinks the devil is in the courtiers, who has put it into
their heads that you have done all in your power to stir up the sedition.
The Marechal de La Meilleraye has laboured earnestly to inform the Queen
and Cardinal of the truth of the whole matter, but both have ridiculed
him for his attempt. The Marshal said he could not excuse the injury
they did you, but could not sufficiently admire the contempt they always
had for the tumult, of which they foretold the consequence as if they had
the gift of prophecy, always affirming that it would vanish in a night,
as it really has, for he hardly met a soul in the streets."
He added that fires so quickly extinguished as this were not likely to
break out again; that he conjured me to provide for my own safety; that
the King's authority would shine out the next day with all the lustre
imaginable; that the Court seemed resolved not to let slip this fatal
conjuncture, and that I was to be made the first public example.
Argenteuil said: "Villeroy did not tell me so much, because he durst not;
but he so squeezed my hand 'en passant' that I am apt to think he knows a
great deal more, and I must tell you that they have very good reason for
their apprehensions, because there is not a soul to be seen in the
streets, and to-morrow they may take up whom they list."
Montresor, who would be thought to know all things beforehand, said that
he was assured it would be so and that he had foretold it. Laigues
bewailed my conduct, which he said had raised the compassion of all my
friends, although it had been their ruin. Upon this I desired to be left
about a quarter of an hour to myself, during which, reflecting how I had
been provoked and the public threatened, my scruples vanished; I gave
rein to all my thoughts, recollected that all the glorious ideas which
have ever entered my imagination were most concerned with vast designs,
and suffered my mind to be regaled with the pleasing hopes of being the
head of a party, a position which I had always admired in Plutarch's
"Lives." The inconsistency of my scheme with my character made me
tremble. A world of incidents may happen when the virtues in the leader
of a party may be vices in an archbishop. I had this view a thousand
times, and it always gave place to the duty I thought I owed to her
Majesty, but the remembrance of what had passed at the Queen's table, and
the resolution there taken to ruin me with the public, having banished
all scruples, I joyfully determined to abandon my destiny to all the
impulses of glory. I said to my friends that the whole Court was witness
of the harsh treatment I had met with for above a year in the King's
palace, and I added: "The public is engaged to defend my honour, but the
public being now about to be sacrificed, I am obliged to defend it
against oppression. Our circumstances are not so bad as you imagine,
gentlemen, and before twelve o'clock to-morrow I shall be master of
Paris."
My two friends thought I was mad, and began to counsel moderation,
whereas before they always incited me to action; but I did not give them
hearing. I immediately sent for Miron, Accountant-General, one of the
city colonels, a man of probity and courage, and having great interest
with the people. I consulted with him, and he executed his commission
with so much discretion and bravery that above four hundred considerable
citizens were posted up and down in platoons with no more noise and stir
than if so many Carthusian novices had been assembled for contemplation.
After having given orders for securing certain gates and bars of the
city, I went to sleep, and was told next morning that no soldiers had
appeared all night, except a few troopers, who just took a view of the
platoons of the citizens and then galloped off. Hence it was inferred
that our precautions had prevented the execution of the design formed
against particular persons, but it was believed there was some mischief
hatching at the Chancellor's against the public, because sergeants were
running backwards and forwards, and Ondedei went thither four times in
two hours.
Being informed soon after that the Chancellor was going to the Palace
with all the pomp of magistracy, and that two companies of Swiss Guards
approached the suburbs, I gave my orders in two words, which were
executed in two minutes. Miron ordered the citizens to take arms, and
Argenteuil, disguised as a mason, with a rule in his hand, charged the
Swiss in flank, killed twenty or thirty, dispersed the rest, and took one
of their colours. The Chancellor, hemmed in on every side, narrowly
escaped with his life to the Hotel d'O, which the people broke open,
rushed in with fury, and, as God would have it, fell immediately to
plundering, so that they forgot to force open a little chamber where both
the Chancellor and his brother, the Bishop of Meaux, to whom he was
confessing, lay concealed. The news of this occurrence ran like
wild-fire through the whole city. Men and women were immediately up in
arms, and mothers even put daggers into the hands of their children. In
less than two hours there were erected above two hundred barricades,
adorned with all the standards and colours that the League had left
entire. All the cry was, "God bless the King!" sometimes, "God bless
the Coadjutor!" and the echo was, "No Mazarin!"
The Queen sent her commands to me to use my interest to appease the
tumult. I answered the messenger, very coolly, that I had forfeited my
credit with the people on account of yesterday's transactions, and that I
did not dare to go abroad. The messenger had heard the cry of "God bless
the Coadjutor!" and would fain have persuaded me that I was the
favourite of the people, but I strove as much to convince him of the
contrary.
The Court minions of the two last centuries knew not what they did when
they reduced that effectual regard which kings ought to have for their
subjects into mere style and form; for there are, as you see, certain
conjunctures in which, by a necessary consequence, subjects make a mere
form also of the real obedience which they owe to their sovereigns.
The Parliament hearing the cries of the people for Broussel, after having
ordered a decree against Cominges, lieutenant of the Queen's Guards, who
had arrested him, made it death for all who took the like commissions for
the future, and decreed that an information should be drawn up against
those who had given that advice, as disturbers of the public peace. Then
the Parliament went in a body, in their robes, to the Queen, with the
First President at their head, and amid the acclamations of the people,
who opened all their barricades to let them pass. The First President
represented to the Queen, with becoming freedom, that the royal word had
been prostituted a thousand times over by scandalous and even childish
evasions, defeating resolutions most useful and necessary for the State.
He strongly exaggerated the mighty danger of the State from the city
being all in arms; but the Queen, who feared nothing because she knew
little, flew into a passion and raved like a fury, saying, "I know too
well that there is an uproar in the city, but you Parliamentarians,
together with your wives and children, shall be answerable for it all;"
and with that she retired into another chamber and shut the door after
her with violence. The members, who numbered about one hundred and
sixty, were going down-stairs; but the First President persuaded them to
go up and try the Queen once more, and meeting with the Duc d'Orleans,
he, with a great deal of persuasion, introduced twenty of them into the
presence-chamber, where the First President made another effort with the
Queen, by setting forth the terrors of the enraged metropolis up in arms,
but she would hear nothing, and went into the little gallery.
Upon this the Cardinal advanced and proposed to surrender the prisoner,
provided the Parliament would promise to hold no more assemblies. They
were going to consider this proposal upon the spot, but, thinking that
the people would be inclined to believe that the Parliament had been
forced if they gave their votes at the Palais Royal, they resolved to
adjourn to their own House.
The Parliament, returning and saying nothing about the liberation of
Broussel, were received by the people with angry murmurs instead of with
loud acclamations. They appeased those at the first two barricades by
telling them that the Queen had promised them satisfaction; but those at
the third barricade would not be paid in that coin, for a journeyman
cook, advancing with two hundred men, pressed his halberd against the
First President, saying, "Go back, traitor, and if thou hast a mind to
save thy life, bring us Broussel, or else Mazarin and the Chancellor as
hostages."
Upon this five presidents 'au mortier' and about twenty councillors fell
back into the crowd to make their escape; the First President only, the
most undaunted man of the age, continued firm and intrepid. He rallied
the members as well as he could, maintaining still the authority of a
magistrate, both in his words and behaviour, and went leisurely back to
the King's palace, through volleys of abuse, menaces, curses, and
blasphemies. He had a kind of eloquence peculiar to himself, knew
nothing of interjections, was not very exact in his speech, but the force
of it made amends for that; and being naturally bold, never spoke so well
as when he was in danger, insomuch that when he returned to the Palace he
even outdid himself, for it is certain that he moved the hearts of all
present except the Queen, who continued inflexible. The Duc d'Orleans
was going to throw himself at her feet, which four or five Princesses,
trembling with fear, actually did. The Cardinal, whom a young councillor
jestingly advised to go out into the streets and see how the people stood
affected, did at last join with the bulk of the Court, and with much ado
the Queen condescended to bid the members go and consult what was fitting
to be done, agreed to set the prisoners at liberty, restored Broussel to
the people, who carried him upon their heads with loud acclamations,
broke down their barricades, opened their shops, and in two hours Paris
was more quiet than ever I saw it upon a Good Friday.
As to the primum mobile of this revolution, it was owing to no other
cause than a deviation from the laws, which so alters the opinions of the
people that many times a faction is formed before the change is so much
as perceived.
This little reflection, with what has been said, may serve to confute
those who pretend that a faction without a head is never to be feared. It
grows up sometimes in a night. The commotion I have been speaking of,
which was so violent and lasting, did not appear to have any leader for a
whole year; but at last there rose up in one moment a much greater number
than was necessary for the party.
The morning after the barricades were removed, the Queen sent for me,
treated me with all the marks of kindness and confidence, said that if
she had hearkened to me she would not have experienced the late
disquietness; that the Cardinal was not to blame for it, but that
Chavigni had been the sole cause of her misfortunes, to whose pernicious
counsels she had paid more deference than to the Cardinal. "But; good
God!" she suddenly exclaimed, "will you not get that rogue Beautru
soundly thrashed, who has paid so little respect to your character? The
poor Cardinal was very near having it done the other night." I received
all this with more respect than credulity. She commanded me to go to the
poor Cardinal, to comfort him, and to advise him as to the best means of
quieting the populace.
I went without any scruple. He embraced me with a tenderness I am not
able to express, said there was not an honest man in France but myself,
and that all the rest were infamous flatterers, who had misled the Queen
in spite of all his and my good counsels. He protested that he would do
nothing for the future without my advice, showed me the foreign
despatches, and, in short, was so affable, that honest Broussel, who was
likewise present upon his invitation, for all his harmless simplicity,
laughed heartily as we were going out, and said that it was all mere
buffoonery.
There being a report that the King was to be removed by the Court from
Paris, the Queen assured the 'prevot des marchands' that it was false,
and yet the very next day carried him to Ruel. From there I doubted not
that she designed to surprise the city, which seemed really astonished at
the King's departure, and I found the hottest members of the Parliament
in great consternation, and the more so because news arrived at the same
time that General Erlac--[He was Governor of Brisac, and commanded the
forces of the Duke of Weimar after the Duke's death]--had passed the
Somme with 4,000 Germans. Now, as in general disturbances one piece of
bad news seldom comes singly, five or six stories of this kind were
published at the same time, which made me think I should find it as
difficult a task to raise the spirits of the people as I had before to
restrain them. I was never so nonplussed in all my life. I saw the full
extent of the danger, and everything looked terrible. Yet the greatest
perils have their charms if never so little glory is discovered in the
prospect of ill-success, while the least dangers have nothing but horror
when defeat is attended with loss of reputation.
I used all the arguments I could to dissuade the Parliament from making
the Court desperate, at least till they had thought of some expedients to
defend themselves from its insults, to which they would inevitably have
been exposed if the Court had taken time by the forelock, in which,
perhaps, they were prevented by the unexpected return of the Prince de
Conti. I hereupon formed a resolution which gave me a great deal of
uneasiness, but which was firm, because it was the only resolution I had
to take. Extremities are always disagreeable, but are the wisest means
when absolutely necessary; the best of it is that they admit of no middle
course, and if peradventure they are good, they are always decisive.
Fortune favoured my design. The Queen ordered Chavigni to be sent
prisoner to Havre-de-Grace. I embraced this opportunity to stir up the
natural fears of his dear friend Viole, by telling him that he was a
ruined man for doing what he had done at the instigation of Chavigni;
that it was plain the King left Paris with a view to attack it, and that
he saw as well as I how much the people were dejected; that if their
spirits should be quite sunk they could never be raised; that they must
be supported; that I would influence the people; and that he should do
what he could with the Parliament, who, in my opinion, ought not to be
supine, but to be awakened at a juncture when the King's departure had
perfectly drowned their senses, adding that a word in season would
infallibly produce this good effect.
Accordingly Viole struck one of the boldest strokes that has perhaps been
heard of. He told the Parliament that it was reported Paris was to be
besieged; that troops were marching for that end, and the most faithful
servants of his late Majesty, who, it was suspected, would oppose designs
so pernicious, would be put in chains; that it was necessary for them to
address the Queen to bring the King back to Paris; and forasmuch as the
author of all these mischiefs was well known, he moved further that the
Duc d'Orleans and the officers of the Crown should be desired to come to
Parliament to deliberate upon the decree issued in 1617, on account of
Marechal d'Ancre, forbidding foreigners to intermeddle in the Government.
We thought ourselves that we had touched too high a key, but a lower note
would not have awakened or kept awake men whom fear had perfectly
stupefied. I have observed that this passion of fear has seldom that
influence upon individuals that it generally has upon the mass.
Viole's proposition at first startled, then rejoiced, and afterwards
animated those that heard it. Blancmenil, who before seemed to have no
life left in him, had now the courage to point at the Cardinal by name,
who hitherto had been described only by the designation of Minister; and
the Parliament cheerfully agreed to remonstrate with the Queen, according
to Viole's proposition, not forgetting to pray her Majesty to remove the
troops further from Paris, and not to send for the magistrates to take
orders for the security of the city.
The President Coigneux whispered to me, saying, "I have no hopes but in
you; we shall be undone if you do not work underground." I sat up
accordingly all night to prepare instructions for Saint-Ibal to treat
with the Count Fuensaldagne, and oblige him to march with the Spanish
army, in case of need, to our assistance, and was just going to send him
away to Brussels when M. de Chatillon, my friend and kinsman, who
mortally hated the Cardinal, came to tell me that the Prince de Conde
would be the next day at Ruel; that the Prince was enraged against the
Cardinal, and was sure he would ruin the State if he were let alone, and
that the Cardinal held a correspondence in cipher with a fellow in the
Prince's army whom he had corrupted, to be informed of everything done
there to his prejudice. By all this I learnt that the Prince had no
great understanding with the Court, and upon his arrival at Ruel I
ventured to go thither.
Both the Queen and the Cardinal were extremely civil, and the latter took
particular notice of the Prince's behaviour to me, who embraced me 'en
passant' in the garden, and spoke very low to me, saying that he would be
at my house next day. He kept his word, and desired me to give him an
account of the state of affairs, and when I had done so we agreed that I
should continue to push the Cardinal by means of the Parliament; that I
should take his Highness by night incognito to Longueil and Broussel, to
assure them they should not want assistance; that the Prince de Conde
should give the Queen all the marks of his respect for and attachment to
her, and make all possible reparation for the dissatisfaction he had
shown with regard to the Cardinal, that he might thereby insinuate
himself into the Queen's favour, and gradually dispose her to receive and
fallow his counsels and hear truths against which she had always stopped
her ears, and that by thus letting the Cardinal drop insensibly, rather
than fall suddenly, the Prince would find himself master of the Cabinet
with the Queer's approbation, and, with the assistance of his humble
servants in Council, arbiter of the national welfare.
The Queen, who went away from Paris to give her troops an opportunity to
starve and attack the city, told the deputies sent by Parliament to
entreat her to restore the King to Paris that she was extremely surprised
and astonished; that the King used every year at that season to take the
air, and that his health was much more to be regarded than the imaginary
fears of the people. The Prince de Conde, coming in at this juncture,
told the President and councillors, who invited him to take his seat in
Parliament, that he would not come, but obey the Queen though it should
prove his ruin. The Duc d'Orleans said that he would not be there
either, because the Parliament had made such proposals as were too bold
to be endured, and the Prince de Conti spoke after the same manner.
The next day the King's Council carried an order of Council to Parliament
to put a stop to their debates against foreigners being in the Ministry.
This so excited the Parliament that they made a remonstrance in writing,
instructed the 'prevot des marchands' to provide for the safety of the
city, ordered all other governors to keep the passages free, and resolved
next day to continue the debate against foreign ministers. I laboured
all night to ward off the fatal blow, which I was afraid would hurry the
Prince, against his will, into the arms of the Court. But when next day
came, the members inflamed one another before they sat, through the
cursed spirit of formality, and the very men who two days ago were all
fear and trembling were suddenly transported, they knew not why, from a
well-grounded fear to a blind rage, so that without reflecting that the
General had arrived whose very name made them tremble, because they
suspected him to be in the interest of the Court, they issued the said
decree, which obliged the Queen to send the Duc d'Anjou,--[Philippe of
France, only brother to King Louis XIV., afterwards Duc d'Orleans, died
suddenly at St. Cloud, in 1701.]--but just recovered from the smallpox,
and the Duchesse d'Orleans, much indisposed, out of town.
This would have begun a civil war next day had not the Prince de Conde
taken the wisest measures imaginable, though he had a very bad opinion of
the Cardinal, both upon the public account and his own, and was as little
pleased with the conduct of the Parliament, with whom there was no
dealing, either as a body or as private persons. The Prince kept an even
pace between the Court and country factions, and he said these words to
me, which I can never forget:
"Mazarin does not know what he is doing, and will ruin the State if care
be not taken; the Parliament really goes on too fast, as you said they
would; if they did but manage according to our scheme, we should be able
to settle our own business and that of the public, too; they act with
precipitation, and were I to do so, it is probable I should gain more by
it than they. But I am Louis de Bourbon, and will not endanger the
State. Are those devils in square caps mad to force me either to begin a
civil war tomorrow or to ruin every man of them, and set over our heads a
Sicilian vagabond who will destroy us all at last?"
In fine, the Prince proposed to set out immediately for Ruel to divert
the Court from their project of attacking Paris, and to propose to the
Queen that the Duc d'Orleans and himself should write to the Parliament
to send deputies to confer about means to relieve the necessities of the
State. The Prince saw that I was so overcome at this proposal that he
said to me with tenderness, "How different you are from the man you are
represented to be at Court! Would to God that all those rogues in the
Ministry were but as well inclined as you!"
I told the Prince that, considering how the minds of the Parliament were
embittered, I doubted whether they would care to confer with the
Cardinal; that his Highness would gain a considerable point if he could
prevail with the Court not to insist upon the necessity of the Cardinal's
presence, because then all the honour of the arrangement, in which the
Duc d'Orleans, as usual, would only be as a cipher, would redound to him,
and that such exclusion of the Cardinal would disgrace his Ministry to
the last degree, and be a very proper preface to the blow which the
Prince designed to give him in the Cabinet.
The Prince profited by the hint, so that the Parliament returned answer
that they would send deputies to confer with the Princes only, which last
words the Prince artfully laid hold of and advised Mazarin not to expose
himself by coming to the conference against the Parliament's consent, but
rather, like a wise man, to make a virtue of the present necessity. This
was a cruel blow to the Cardinal, who ever since the decease of the late
King had been recognised as Prime Minister of France; and the
consequences were equally disastrous.
The deputies being accordingly admitted to a conference with the Duc
d'Orleans, the Princes de Conde and Conti and M. de Longueville, the
First President, Viole, who had moved in Parliament that the decree might
be renewed for excluding foreigners from the Ministry, inveighed against
the imprisonment of M. de Chavigni; who was no member, yet the President
insisted upon his being set at liberty, because, according to the laws of
the realm, no person ought to be detained in custody above twenty-four
hours without examination. This occasioned a considerable debate, and
the Duc d'Orldans, provoked at this expression, said that the President's
aim was to cramp the royal authority. Nevertheless the latter vigorously
maintained his argument, and was unanimously seconded by all the
deputies, for which they were next day applauded in Parliament. In
short, the thing was pushed so far that the Queen was obliged to consent
to a declaration that for the future no man whatever should be detained
in prison above three days without being examined. By this means
Chavigni was set at liberty. Several other conferences were held, in
which the Chancellor treated the First President of the Parliament with a
sort of contempt that was almost brutal. Nevertheless the Parliament
carried all before them.
In October, 1648, the Parliament adjourned, and the Queen soon after
returned to Paris with the King.
The Cardinal, who aimed at nothing more than to ruin my credit with the
people, sent me 4,000 crowns as a present from the Queen, for the
services which she said I intended her on the day of the barricade; and
who, think you, should be the messenger to bring it but my friend the
Marechal de La Meilleraye, the man who before warned me of the sinister
intentions of the Court, and who now was so credulous as to believe that
I was their favourite, because the Cardinal was pleased to say how much
he was concerned for the injustice he had done me; which I only mention
to remark that those people over whom the Court has once got an
ascendency cannot help believing whatever they would have them believe,
and the ministers only are to blame if they do not deceive them. But I
would not be persuaded by the Marshal as he had been by the Cardinal, and
therefore I refused the said sum very civilly, and, I am sure, with as
much sincerity as the Court offered it.
But the Cardinal laid another trap for me that I was not aware of,--by
tempting me with the proffer of the Government of Paris; and when I had
shown a willingness to accept it, he found means to break off the treaty
I was making for that purpose with the Prince de Guemende, who had the
reversion of it, and then represented me to the people as one who only
sought my own interest. Instead of profiting by this blunder, which I
might have done to my own advantage, I added another to it, and said all
that rage could prompt me against the Cardinal to one who told it to him
again.
To return now to public affairs. About the feast of Saint Martin the
people were so excited that they seemed as if they had been all
intoxicated with gathering in the vintage; and you are now going to be
entertained with scenes in comparison to which the past are but trifles.
There is no affair but has its critical minute, which a bold
statesmanship knows how to lay hold of, and which, if missed, especially
in the revolution of kingdoms, you run the great risk of losing
altogether.
Every one now found their advantage in the declaration,--that is, if they
understood their own interest. The Parliament had the honour of
reestablishing public order. The Princes, too, had their share in this
honour, and the first-fruits of it, which were respect and security. The
people had a considerable comfort in it, by being eased of a load of
above sixty millions; and if the Cardinal had had but the sense to make a
virtue of necessity, which is one of the most necessary qualifications of
a minister of State, he might, by an advantage always inseparable from
favourites, have appropriated to himself the greatest part of the merit,
even of those things he had most opposed.
But these advantages were all lost through the most trivial
considerations. The people, upon the discontinuation of the
Parliamentary assemblies, resumed their savage temper, and were scared by
the approach of a few troops at which it was ridiculous to take the least
umbrage. The Parliament was too apt to give ear to every groundless tale
of the non-execution of their declarations. The Duc d'Orleans saw all
the good he was capable of doing and part of the evil he had power to
prevent, but neither was strong enough to influence his fearful temper;
he was unconscious of the coming and fatal blow. The Prince de Conde,
who saw the evil to its full extent, was too courageous by nature to fear
the consequences; he was inclined to do good, but would do it only in his
own way. His age, his humour, and his victories hindered him from
associating patience with activity, nor was he acquainted, unfortunately,
with this maxim so necessary for princes,--"always to sacrifice the
little affairs to the greater;" and the Cardinal, being ignorant of our
ways, daily confounded the most weighty with the most trifling.
The Parliament, who met on the 2d of January, 1649, resolved to enforce
the execution of the declaration, which, they pretended, had been
infringed in all its articles; and the Queen was resolved to retire from
Paris with the King and the whole Court. The Queen was guided by the
Cardinal, and the Duc d'Orleans by La Riviere, the most sordid and
self-interested man of the age in which he lived. As for the Prince de
Conde, he began to be disgusted with the unseasonable proceedings of the
Parliament almost as soon as he had concerted measures with Broussel and
Longueil, which distaste, joined to the kindly attentions of the Queen,
the apparent submission of the Cardinal, and an hereditary inclination
received from his parents to keep well with the Court, cramped the
resolutions of his great soul. I bewailed this change in his behaviour
both for my own and the public account, but much more for his sake. I
loved him as much as I honoured him, and clearly saw the precipice.
I had divers conferences with him, in which I found that his disgust was
turned into wrath and indignation. He swore there was no bearing with
the insolence and impertinence of those citizens who struck at the royal
authority; that as long as he thought they aimed only at Mazarin he was
on their side; that I myself had often confessed that no certain measures
could be concerted with men who changed their opinions every quarter of
an hour; that he could never condescend to be General of an army of
fools, with whom no wise man would entrust himself; besides that, he was
a Prince of the blood, and would not be instrumental in giving a shock to
the Throne; and that the Parliament might thank themselves if they were
ruined through not observing the measures agreed on.
This was the substance of my answer: "No men are more bound by interest
than the Parliament to maintain the royal authority, so that they cannot
be thought to have a design to ruin the State, though their proceedings
may have a tendency that way. It must be owned, therefore, that if the
sovereign people do evil, it is only when they are not able to act as
well as they would. A skilful minister, who knows how to manage large
bodies of men as well as individuals, keeps up such a due balance between
the Prince's authority and the people's obedience as to make all things
succeed and prosper. But the present Prime Minister has neither judgment
nor strength to adjust the pendulum of this State clock, the springs of
which are out of order. His business is to make it go slower, which, I
own, he attempts to do, but very awkwardly, because he has not the brains
for it. In this lies the fault of our machine. Your Highness is in the
right to set about the mending of it, because nobody else is capable of
doing it; but in order to do this must you join with those that would
knock it in pieces?
"You are convinced of the Cardinal's extravagances, and that his only
view is to establish in France a form of government known nowhere but in
Italy. If he should succeed, will the State be a gainer by it, according
to its only true maxims? Would it be an advantage to the Princes of the
blood in any sense? But, besides, has he any likelihood of succeeding?
Is he not loaded with the odium and contempt of the public? and is not
the Parliament the idol they revere? I know you despise them because the
Court is so well armed, but let me tell you that they are so confident of
their power that they feel their importance. They are come to that pass
that they do not value your forces, and though the evil is that at
present their strength consists only in their imagination, yet a time may
come when they may be able to do whatever they now think it in their
power to do.
"Your Highness lately told me that this disposition of the people was
only smoke; but be assured that smoke so dark and thick proceeds from a
brisk fire, which the Parliament blows, and, though they mean well, may
blaze up into such a flame as may consume themselves and again hazard the
destruction of the State, which has been the case more than once. Bodies
of men, when once exasperated by a Ministry, always aggravate their
failures, and scarcely ever show them any favour, which, in some cases,
is enough to ruin a kingdom.
"If, when the proposition was formerly made to the Parliament by the
Cardinal to declare whether they intended to set bounds to the royal
authority, if, I say, they had not wisely eluded the ridiculous and
dangerous question, France would have run a great risk, in my opinion, of
being entirely ruined; for had they answered in the affirmative, as they
were on the point of doing, they would have rent the veil that covers the
mysteries of State. Every monarchy has its peculiar veil; that of France
consists in a kind of religious and sacred silence, which, by the
subjects generally paying a blind obedience to their Kings, muffles up
that right which they think they have to dispense with their obedience in
cases where a complaisance to their Kings would be a prejudice to
themselves. It is a wonder that the Parliament did not strip off this
veil by a formal decree. This has had much worse consequences since the
people have taken the liberty to look through it.
"Your Highness cannot by the force of arms prevent these dangerous
consequences, which, perhaps, are already too near at hand. You see that
even the Parliament can hardly restrain the people whom they have roused;
that the contagion is spread into the provinces, and you know that
Guienne and Provence are entirely governed by the example of Paris. Every
thing shakes and totters, and it is your Highness only that can set us
right, because of the splendour of your birth and reputation, and the
generally received opinion that none but you can do it.
"The Queen shares with the Cardinal in the common hatred, and the Duc
d'Orleans with La Riviere in the universal contempt of the people. If,
out of mere complaisance, you abet their measures, you will share in the
hatred of the public. It is true that you are above their contempt; but
then their dread of you will be so great that it will grievously embitter
the hatred they will then bear to you, and the contempt they have already
for the others, so that what is at present only a serious wound in the
State will perhaps become incurable and mortal. I am sensible you have
grounds to be diffident of the behaviour of a body consisting of above
two hundred persons, who are neither capable of governing nor being
governed. I own the thought is perplexing; but such favourable
circumstances seem to offer themselves at this juncture that matters are
much simplified.
"Supposing that manifestoes were published, and your Highness declared
General of the Parliamentary Army, would you, monseigneur, meet with
greater difficulties than your grandfather and great-grandfather did, in
accommodating themselves to the caprice of the ministers of Rochelle and
the mayors of Nimes and Montauban? And would your Highness find it a
greater task to manage the Parliament of Paris than M. de Mayenne did in
the time of the League, when there was a factious opposition made to all
the measures of the Parliament? Your birth and merit raise you as far
above M. de Mayenne as the cause in hand is above that of the League; and
the circumstances of both are no less different. The head of the League
declared war by an open and public alliance with Spain against the Crown,
and against one of the best and bravest kings that France ever had. And
this head of the League, though descended from a foreign and suspected
family, kept, notwithstanding, that same Parliament in his interest for a
considerable time.
"You have consulted but two members of the whole Parliament, and them
only upon their promise to disclose your intentions to no man living. How
then can your Highness think it possible that your sentiments, locked up
so closely in the breasts of two members, can have any influence upon the
whole body of the Parliament? I dare answer for it, monseigneur, that if
you will but declare yourself openly the protector of the public and of
the sovereign companies, you might govern them--at least, for a
considerable time--with an absolute and almost sovereign authority. But
this, it seems, is not what you have in view; you are not willing to
embroil yourself with the Court. You had rather be of the Cabinet than
of a party. Do not take it ill, then, that men who consider you only in
this light do not conduct themselves as you would like. You ought to
conform your measures to theirs, because theirs are moderate; and you may
safely do it, for the Cardinal can hardly stand under the heavy weight of
the public hatred, and is too weak to oblige you against your will to any
sudden and precipitate rupture. La Riviere, who governs the Duc
d'Orleans, is a most dangerous man. Continue, then, to introduce
moderate measures, and let them take their course, according to your
first plan. Is a little more or less heat in Parliamentary proceedings
sufficient reason to make you alter it? For whatever be the consequence,
the worst that can happen is that the Queen may believe you not zealous
enough for her interest; but are there not remedies enough for that? Are
there not excuses and appearances ready at hand, and such as cannot fail?
"And now, I pray your Highness to give me leave to add that there never
was so excellent, so innocent, so sacred, and so necessary a project as
this formed by your Highness, and, in my humble opinion, there never were
such weak reasons as those you have now urged to hinder its execution;
for I take this to be the weakest of all, which, perhaps, you think a
very strong one, namely, that if Mazarin miscarries in his designs you
may be ruined along with him; and if he does succeed he will destroy you
by the very means which you took to raise him."
It had not the intended effect on the Prince, who was already
prepossessed, and who only answered me in general terms. But heroes have
their faults as well as other men, and so had his Highness, who had one
of the finest geniuses in the world, but little or no forethought. He
did not seek to aggravate matters in order to render himself necessary at
Court, or with a view to do what he afterwards did for the Cardinal, nor
was he biassed by the mean interests of pension, government, and
establishment. He had most certainly great hopes of being arbiter of the
Cabinet. The glory of being restorer of the public peace was his first
end in view, and being the conservator of the royal authority the second.
Those who labour under such an imperfection, though they see clearly the
advantages and disadvantages of both parties, know not which to choose,
because they do not weigh them in the same balance, so that the same
thing appears lightest today which they will think heaviest to-morrow.
This was the case of the Prince, who, it must be owned, if he had carried
on his good design with prudence, certainly would have reestablished the
Government upon a lasting foundation.
He told me more than once, in an angry mood, that if the Parliament went
on at the old rate he would teach them that it would be no great task to
reduce them to reason. I perceived by his talk that the Court had
resumed the design of besieging Paris; and to be the more satisfied of it
I told him that the Cardinal might easily be disappointed in his
measures, and that he would find Paris to be a very tough morsel.
"It shall not be taken," he said, "like Dunkirk, by mines and storming;
but suppose its bread from Gonesse should be cut off for eight days
only?"
I took this statement then for granted, and replied that the stopping of
that passage would be attended with difficulties.
"What difficulties?" asked the Prince, very briskly. "The citizens? Will
they come out to give battle?"
"If it were only citizens, monseigneur," I said, "the battle would not be
very sharp."
"Who will be with them?" he replied; "will you be there yourself?"
"That would be a very bad omen," I said; "it would look too much like the
proceedings of the League."
After a little pause, he said, "But now, to be serious, would you be so
foolish as to embark with those men?"
"You know, monseigneur," I said, "that I am engaged already; and that,
moreover, as Coadjutor of Paris, I am concerned both by honour and
interest in its preservation. I shall be your Highness's humble servant
as long as I live, except in this one point."
I saw he was touched to the quick, but he kept his temper, and said these
very words: "When you engage in a bad cause I will pity you, but shall
have no reason to complain of you. Nor do you complain of me; but do me
that justice you owe me, namely, to own that all I promised to Longueil
and Broussel is since annulled by the conduct of the Parliament."
He afterwards showed me many personal favours, and offered to make my
peace with the Court. I assured him of my obedience and zeal for his
service in everything that did not interfere with the engagements I had
entered into, which, as he himself owned, I could not possibly avoid.
After we parted I paid a visit to Madame de Longueville, who seemed
enraged both against the Court and the Prince de Conde. I was pleased to
think, moreover, that she could do what she would with the Prince de
Conti, who was little better than a child; but then I considered that
this child was a Prince of the blood, and it was only a name we wanted to
give life to that which, without one, was a mere embryo. I could answer
for M. de Longueville, who loved to be the first man in any public
revolution, and I was as well assured of Marechal de La Mothe,--[Philippe
de La Mothe-Houdancourt, deceased 1657.]--who was madly opposed to the
Court, and had been inviolably attached to M. de Longueville for twenty
years together. I saw that the Duc de Bouillon, through the injustice
done him by the Court and the unfortunate state of his domestic affairs,
was very much annoyed and almost desperate. I had an eye upon all these
gentlemen at a distance, but thought neither of them fit to open the
drama. M. de Longueville was only fit for the second act; the Marechal
de La Mothe was a good soldier, but had no headpiece, and was therefore
not qualified for the first act. M. de Bouillon was my man, had not his
honesty been more problematic than his talents. You will not wonder that
I was so wavering in my choice, and that I fixed at last upon the Prince
de Conti, of the blood of France.
As soon as I gave Madame de Longueville a hint of what part she was to
act in the intended revolution, she was perfectly transported, and I took
care to make M. de Longueville as great a malcontent as herself. She had
wit and beauty, though smallpox had taken away the bloom of her pretty
face, in which there sat charms so powerful that they rendered her one of
the most amiable persons in France. I could have placed her in my heart
between Mesdames de Gudmenee and Pommereux, and it was not the despair of
succeeding that palled my passion, but the consideration that the
benefice was not yet vacant, though not well served,--M. de La
Rochefoucault was in possession, yet absent in Poitou. I sent her three
or four billets-doux every day, and received as many. I went very often
to her levee to be more at liberty to talk of affairs, got extraordinary
advantages by it, and I knew that it was the only way to be sure of the
Prince de Conti.
Having settled a regular correspondence with Madame de Longueville, she
made me better acquainted with M. de La Rochefoucault, who made the
Prince de Conti believe that he spoke a good word for him to the lady,
his sister, with whom he was in, love. And the two so blinded the Prince
that he did not suspect anything till four years after.
When I saw that the Court would act upon their own initiative, I resolved
to declare war against them and attack Mazarin in person, because
otherwise we could not escape being first attacked by him.
It is certain that he gave his enemies such an advantage over him as no
other Prime Minister ever did. Power commonly keeps above ridicule, but
everybody laughed at the Cardinal because of his silly sayings and
doings, which those in his position are seldom guilty of. It was said
that he had lately asked Bougeval, deputy of the Grand Council, whether
he did not think himself obliged to have no buttons to the collar of his
doublet, if the King should command it,--a grave argument to convince the
deputies of an important company of the obedience due to kings, for which
he was severely lampooned both in prose and verse.
The Court having attempted to legalise excessive usury,--I mean with
respect to the affair of loans,--my dignity would not permit me to
tolerate so public and scandalous an evil. Therefore I held an assembly
of the clergy, where, without so much as mentioning the Cardinal's name
in the conferences, in which I rather affected to spare him, yet in a
week's time I made him pass for one of the most obstinate Jews in Europe.
At this very time I was sent for, by a civil letter under the Queen's own
hand, to repair to Saint Germain, the messenger telling me the King was
just gone thither and that the army was commanded to advance. I made him
believe I would obey the summons, but I did not intend to do so.
I was pestered for five hours with a parcel of idle rumours of ruin and
destruction, which rather diverted than alarmed me, for though the Prince
de Conde, distrusting his brother the Prince de Conti, had surprised him
in bed and carried him off with him to Saint Germain, yet I did not
question but that, as long as Madame de Longueville stayed in Paris, we
should see him again, the rather because his brother neither feared nor
valued him sufficiently to put him under arrest, and I was assured that
M. de Longueville would be in Paris that evening by having received a
letter from himself.
The King was no sooner gone than the Parliament met, frightened out of
their senses, and I know not what they could have done if we had not
found a way to change their fears into a resolution to make a bold stand.
I have observed a thousand times that there are some kinds of fear only
to be removed by higher degrees of terror. I caused it to be signified
to the Parliament that there was in the Hotel de Ville a letter from his
Majesty to the magistrates, containing the reasons that had obliged him
to leave his good city of Paris, which were in effect that some of the
officers of the House held a correspondence with the enemies of the
Government, and had conspired to seize his person.
The Parliament, considering this letter and that the President le Feron,
'prevot des marchands', was a creature of the Court, ordered the citizens
to arms, the gates to be secured, and the 'prevot des marchands' and the
'lieutenant de police' to keep open the necessary passages for
provisions.
Having thought it good policy that the first public step of resistance
should be taken by the Parliament to justify the disobedience of private
persons, I then invented this stratagem to render me the more excusable
to the Queen for not going to Saint Germain. Having taken leave of all
friends and rejected all their entreaties for my stay in Paris, I took
coach as if I were driving to Court, but, by good luck, met with an
eminent timber-merchant, a very good friend of mine, at the end of
Notre-Dame Street, who was very much out of humour, set upon my
postilion, and threatened my coachman. The people came and overturned my
coach, and the women, shrieking, carried me back to my own house.
I wrote to the Queen and Prince, signifying how sorry I was that I had
met with such a stoppage; but the Queen treated the messenger with scorn
and contempt. The Prince, at the same time that he pitied me, could not
help showing his anger. La Riviere attacked me with railleries and
invectives, and the messenger thought they were sure of putting the rope
about all our necks on the morrow.
I was not so much alarmed at their menaces as at the news I heard the
same day that M. de Longueville, returning from Rouen, had turned off to
Saint Germain. Marechal de La Mothe told me twenty times that he would
do everything to the letter that M. de Longueville would have him do for
or against the Court. M. de Bouillon quarrelled with me for confiding in
men who acted so contrary to the repeated assurances I had given him of
their good behaviour. And besides all this, Madame de Longueville
protested to me that she had received no news from M. de La
Rochefoucault, who went soon after the King, with a design to fortify the
Prince de Conti in his resolution and to bring him back to Paris. Upon
this I sent the Marquis de Noirmoutier to Saint Germain to learn what we
had to trust to.
On the 7th of January, 1649, an order was sent from the King to the
Parliament to remove to Montargis, to the Chamber of Accounts to adjourn
to Orleans and to the Grand Council to retire to Mantes. A packet was
also sent to the Parliament, which they would not open, because they
guessed at the contents and were resolved beforehand not to obey.
Therefore they returned it sealed up as it came, and agreed to send
assurances of their obedience to the Queen, and to beg she would give
them leave to clear themselves from the aspersion thrown upon them in the
letter above mentioned sent to the chief magistrate of the city. And to
support the dignity of Parliament it was further resolved that her
Majesty should be petitioned in a most humble manner to name the
calumniators, that they might be proceeded against according to law. At
the same time Broussel, Viole, Amelot, and seven others moved that it
might be demanded in form that Cardinal Mazarin should be removed; but
they were not supported by anybody else, so that they were treated as
enthusiasts. Although this was a juncture in which it was more necessary
than ever to act with vigour, yet I do not remember the time when I have
beheld so much faintheartedness.
The Chamber of Accounts immediately set about making remonstrances; but
the Grand Council would have obeyed the King's orders, only the city
refused them passports. I think this was one of the most gloomy days I
had as yet seen. I found the Parliament had almost lost all their
spirit, and that I should be obliged to bow my neck under the most
shameful and dangerous yoke of slavery, or be reduced to the dire
necessity of setting up for tribune of the people, which is the most
uncertain and meanest of all posts when it is not vested with sufficient
power.
The weakness of the Prince de Conti, who was led like a child by his
brother, the cowardice of M. de Longueville, who had been to offer his
service to the Queen, and the declaration of MM. de Bouillon and de La
Mothe had mightily disfigured my tribuneship. But the folly of Mazarin
raised its reputation, for he made the Queen refuse audience to the
King's Council, who returned that night to Paris, fully convinced that
the Court was resolved to push things to extremity.
I was informed from Saint Germain that the Prince had assured the Queen
he would take Paris in a fortnight, and they hoped that the
discontinuance of two markets only would starve the city into a
surrender. I carried this news to my, friends, who began to see that
there was no possibility, of accommodation.
The Parliament was no sooner acquainted that the King's Council had been
denied audience than with one voice--Bernai excepted, who was fitter for
a cook than a councillor--they passed that famous decree of January 8th,
1649, whereby Cardinal Mazarin was declared an enemy to the King and
Government, a disturber of the public peace, and all the King's subjects
were enjoined to attack him without mercy.
In the afternoon there was a general council of the deputies of
Parliament, of the Chamber of Accounts, of the Court of Aids, the chief
magistrates of Paris, and the six trading companies, wherein it was
resolved that the magistrates should issue commissions for raising 4,000
horse and 10,000 foot. The same day the Chamber of Accounts, the Court
of Aids, and the city sent their deputies to the Queen, to beseech her
Majesty to bring the King back to Paris, but the Court was obdurate. The
Prince de Conde flew out against the Parliament in the Queen's presence;
and her Majesty told them all that neither the King nor herself would
ever come again within the walls of the city till the Parliament was gone
out of it.
The next day the city received a letter from the King commanding them to
oblige the Parliament to remove to Montargis. The governor, one of the
sheriffs, and four councillors of the city carried the letter to
Parliament, protesting at the same time that they would obey no other
orders than those of the Parliament, who that very morning settled the
necessary funds for raising troops. In the afternoon there was a general
council, wherein all the corporations of the city and all the colonels
and captains of the several quarters entered into an association,
confirmed by an oath, for their mutual defence. In the meantime I was
informed by the Marquis de Noirmoutier that the Prince de Conti and M. de
Longueville were very well disposed, and that they stayed at Court the
longer to have a safer opportunity of coming away. M. de La
Rochefoucault wrote to the same purpose to Madame de Longueville.
The same day I had a visit from the Duc d'Elbeuf,--[Charles de Lorraine,
the second of that name, who died 1657.]--who, as they said, having
missed a dinner at Court, came to Paris for a supper. He addressed me
with all the cajoling flattery of the House of Guise, and had three
children with him, who were not so eloquent, but seemed to be quite as
cunning as himself. He told me that he was going to offer his service to
the Hotel de Ville; but I advised him to wait upon the Parliament. He
was fixed in his first resolution, yet he came to assure me he would
follow my advice in everything. I was afraid that the Parisians, to whom
the very name of a Prince of Lorraine is dear, would have given him the
command of the troops. Therefore I ordered the clergy over whom I had
influence to insinuate to the people that he was too influential with the
Abbe de La Riviere, and I showed the Parliament what respect he had for
them by addressing himself to the Hotel de Ville in the first place, and
that he had not honour enough to be trusted. I was shown a letter which
he wrote to his friend as he came into town, in which were these words:
"I must go and do homage to the Coadjutor now, but in three days' time he
shall return it to me." And I knew from other instances that his
affection for me was of the feeblest.
While I was reflecting what to do, news was brought to me before daylight
that the Prince de Conti and M. de Longueville were at the gate of Saint
Honord and denied entrance by the people, who feared they came to betray
the city. I immediately fetched honest Broussel, and, taking some
torches to light us, we posted to the said gate through a prodigious
crowd of people; it was broad daylight before we could persuade the
people that they might safely let them in.
The great difficulty now was how to manage so as to remove the general
distrust of the Prince de Conti that existed among the people. That
which was practicable the night before was rendered impossible and even
ruinous the next day, and this same Duc d'Elbeuf, whom I thought to have
driven out of Paris on the 9th, was in a fair way to have compelled me to
leave on the 10th if he had played his game well, so suspected was the
name of Conde by the people. As there wanted a little time to reconcile
them, I thought it was our only way to keep fair with M. d'Elbeuf and to
convince him that it would be to his interest to join with the Prince de
Conti and M. de Longueville. I accordingly sent to acquaint him that I
intended him a visit, but when I arrived he was gone to the Parliament,
where the First President, who was against removing to Montargis and at
the same time very averse to a civil war, embraced him, and, without
giving the members time to consider what was urged by Broussel, Viole,
and others to the contrary, caused him to be declared General, with a
design merely to divide and weaken the party.
Upon this I made haste to the Palace of Longueville to persuade the
Prince de Conti and M. de Longueville to go that very instant to the
Parliament House. The latter was never in haste, and the Prince having
gone tired to bed, it was with much ado I prevailed on him to rise. In
short, he was so long in setting out that the Parliament was up and M.
d'Elbeuf was marching to the Hotel de Ville to be sworn and to take care
of the commissions that were to be issued. I thereupon persuaded the
Prince de Conti to go to the Parliament in the afternoon and to offer
them his service, while I stayed without in the hall to observe the
disposition of the people.
He went thither accordingly in my coach and with my grand livery, by
which he made it appear that he reposed his confidence entirely in the
people, whom there is a necessity of managing with a world of precaution
because of their natural diffidence and instability. When we came to the
House we were saluted upon the stairs with "God bless the Coadjutor!"
but, except those posted there on purpose, not a soul cried, "God bless
the Prince de Conti!" from which I concluded that the bulk of the people
were not yet cured of their diffidence, and therefore I was very glad
when I had got the Prince into the Grand Chamber. The moment after, M.
d'Elbeuf came in with the city guards, who attended him as general, and
with all the people crying out, "God bless his Highness M. d'Elbeuf!" But
as they cried at the same time "God save the Coadjutor!" I addressed
myself to him with a smile and said, "This is an echo, monsieur, which
does me a great deal of honour."--"It is very kind of you," said he, and,
turning to the guards, bade them stay at the door of the Grand Chamber. I
took the order as given to myself, and stayed there likewise, with a
great number of my friends. As soon as the House was formed, the Prince
de Conti stood up and said that, having been made acquainted at Saint
Germain with the pernicious counsels given to the Queen, he thought
himself obliged, as Prince of the blood, to oppose them. M. d'Elbeuf,
who was proud and insolent, like all weak men, because he thought he had
the strongest party, said he knew the respect due to the Prince de Conti,
but that he could not forbear telling them that it was himself who first
broke the ice and offered his service to the Parliament, who, having
conferred the General's baton upon him, he would never part with it but
with his life.
The generality of the members, who were as distrustful of the Prince de
Conti as the people, applauded this declaration, and the Parliament
passed a decree forbidding the troops on pain of high treason to advance
within twenty miles of Paris. I saw that all I could do that day was to
reconduct the Prince de Conti in safety to the palace of Longueville, for
the crowd was so great that I was fain to carry him, as it were, in my
arms out of the Grand Chamber.
M. d'Elbeuf, who thought the day was all his own, hearing my name joined
with his in the huzzas of the people, said to me by way of reprisal,
"This, monsieur, is an echo which does me a great deal of honour," to
which I replied, as he did to me before, "Monsieur, it is very kind of
you." Meantime he was not wise enough to improve the opportunity, and I
foresaw that things would soon take another turn, for reputation of long
standing among the people never fails to blast the tender blossoms of
public good-will which are forced out of due season.
I had news sent to me from Madame de Lesdiguieres at Saint Germain, that
M. d'Elbeuf, an hour after he heard of the arrival of the Prince de Conti
and M. de Longueville at Paris, wrote a letter to the Abbe de la Riviere
with these words: "Tell the Queen and the Duc d'Orleans that this
diabolical Coadjutor is the ruin of everything here, and that in two days
I shall have no power at all, but that if they will be kind to me I will
make them sensible. I am not come hither with so bad a design as they
imagine." I made a very good use of this advice, and, knowing that the
people are generally fond of everything that seems mysterious, I imparted
the secret to four or five hundred persons. I had the pleasure to hear
that the confidence which the Prince had reposed in the people by going
about all alone in my coach, without any attendance, had won their
hearts.
At midnight M. de Longueville, Marechal de La Mothe, and myself went to
M. de Bouillon, whom we found as wavering as the state of affairs, but
when we showed him our plan, and how easily it might be executed, he
joined us immediately. We concerted measures, and I gave out orders to
all the colonels and captains of my acquaintance.
The most dangerous blow that I gave to M. d'Elbeuf was by making the
people believe that he held correspondence with the King's troops, who on
the 9th, at night, surprised Charenton. I met him on the first report of
it, when he said, "Would you think there are people so wicked as to say
that I had a hand in the capture of Charenton?" I said in answer, "Would
you think there are people vile enough to report that the Prince de Conti
is come hither by concert with the Prince de Conde?"
When I saw the people pretty well cured of their diffidence, and not so
zealous as they were for M. d'Elbeuf, I was for mincing the matter no
longer, and thought that ostentation would be as proper to-day as reserve
was yesterday. The Prince de Conti took M. de Longueville to the
Parliament House, where he offered them his services, together with all
Normandy, and desired they would accept of his wife, son, and daughter,
and keep them in the Hotel de Ville as pledges of his sincerity. He was
seconded by M. de Bouillon, who said he was exceedingly glad to serve the
Parliament under the command of so great a Prince as the Prince de Conti.
M. d'Elbeuf was nettled at this expression, and repeated what he had said
before, that he would not part with the General's staff, and he showed
more warmth than judgment in the whole debate. He spoke nothing to the
purpose. It was too late to dispute, and he was obliged to yield, but I
have observed that fools yield only when they cannot help it. We tried
his patience a third time by the appearance of Marechal de La Mothe, who
passed the same compliment upon the company as De Bouillon had done. We
had concerted beforehand that these personages should make their
appearance upon the theatre one after the other, for we had remarked that
nothing so much affects the people, and even the Parliament, among whom
the people are a majority, as a variety of scenes.
I took Madame de Longueville and Madame de Bouillon in a coach by way of
triumph to the Hotel de Ville. They were both of rare beauty, and
appeared the more charming because of a careless air, the more becoming
to both because it was unaffected. Each held one of her children,
beautiful as the mother, in her arms. The place was so full of people
that the very tops of the houses were crowded; all the men shouted and
the women wept for joy and affection. I threw five hundred pistoles out
of the window of the Hotel de Ville, and went again to the Parliament
House, accompanied by a vast number of people, some with arms and others
without. M. d'Elbeuf's captain of the guards told his master that he was
ruined to all intents and purposes if he did not accommodate himself to
the present position of affairs, which was the reason that I found him
much perplexed and dejected, especially when M. de Bellievre, who had
amused him hitherto designedly, came in and asked what meant the beating
of the drums. I answered that he would hear more very soon, and that all
honest men were quite out of patience with those that sowed divisions
among the people. I saw then that wisdom in affairs of moment is nothing
without courage. M. d'Elbeuf had little courage at this juncture, made a
ridiculous explanation of what he had said before, and granted more than
he was desired to do, and it was owing to the civility and good sense of
M. de Bouillon that he retained the title of General and the precedence
of M. de Bouillon and M. de La Mothe, who were equally Generals with
himself under the Prince de Conti, who was from that instant declared
Generalissimo of the King's forces under the direction of the Parliament.
There happened at this time a comical scene in the Hotel de Ville, which
I mention more particularly because of its consequence. De Noirmoutier,
who the night before was made lieutenant-general, returning by the Hotel
de Ville from a sally which he had made into the suburbs to drive away
Mazarin's skirmishers, as they were called, entered with three officers
in armour into the chamber of Madame de Longueville, which was full of
ladies; the mixture of blue scarfs, ladies, cuirassiers, fiddlers, and
trumpeters in and about the hall was such a sight as is seldom met with
but in romances. De Noirmoutier, who was a great admirer of Astrea, said
he imagined that we were besieged in Marcilli. "Well you may," said I;
"Madame de Longueville is as fair as Galatea, but Marsillac (son of M. de
La Rochefoucault) is not a man of so much honour as Lindamore." I fancy
I was overheard by one in a neighbouring window, who might have told M.
de La Rochefoucault, for otherwise I cannot guess at the first cause of
the hatred which he afterwards bore me.
Before I proceed to give you the detail of the civil war, suffer me to
lead you into the gallery where you, who are an admirer of fine painting,
will be entertained with the figures of the chief actors, drawn all at
length in their proper colours, and you will be able to judge by the
history whether they are painted to the life. Let us begin, as it is but
just, with her Majesty.
Character of the Queen.
The Queen excelled in that kind of wit which was becoming her circle, to
the end that she might not appear silly before strangers; she was more
ill-natured than proud, had more pride than real grandeur, and more show
than substance; she loved money too well to be liberal, and her own
interest too well to be impartial; she was more constant than passionate
as a lover, more implacable than cruel, and more mindful of injuries than
of good offices. She had more of the pious intention than of real piety,
more obstinacy than well-grounded resolution, and a greater measure of
incapacity than of all the rest.
Character of the Duc d' Orleans.
The Duc d'Orleans possessed all the good qualities requisite for a man of
honour except courage, but having not one quality eminent enough to make
him notable, he had nothing in him to supply or support the weakness
which was so predominant in his heart through fear, and in his mind
through irresolution, that it tarnished the whole course of his life. He
engaged in all affairs, because he had not power to resist the
importunities of those who drew him in for their own advantage, and came
off always with shame for want of courage to go on. His suspicious
temper, even from his childhood, deadened those lively, gay colours which
would have shone out naturally with the advantages of a fine, bright
genius, an amiable gracefulness, a very honest disposition, a perfect
disinterestedness, and an incredible easiness of behaviour.
Character of the Prince de Conde.
The Prince de Conde was born a general, an honour none could ever boast
of before but Caesar and Spinola; he was equal to the first, but superior
to the second. Intrepidity was one of the least parts of his character.
Nature gave him a genius as great as his heart. It was his fortune to be
born in an age of war, which gave him an opportunity to display his
courage to its full extent; but his birth, or rather education, in a
family submissively attached to the Cabinet, restrained his noble genius
within too narrow bounds. There was no care taken betimes to inspire him
with those great and general maxims which form and improve a man of
parts. He had not time to acquire them by his own application, because
he was prevented from his youth by the unexpected revolution, and by a
constant series of successes. This one imperfection, though he had as
pure a soul as any in the world, was the reason that he did things which
were not to be justified, that though he had the heart of Alexander so he
had his infirmities, that he was guilty of unaccountable follies, that
having all the talents of Francois de Guise, he did not serve the State
upon some occasions as well as he ought, and that having the parts of
Henri de Conde, his namesake, he did not push the faction as far as he
might have done, nor did he discharge all the duties his extraordinary
merit demanded from him.
Character of the Duc de Longueville.
M. de Longueville, though he had the grand name of Orleans, together with
vivacity, an agreeable appearance, generosity, liberality, justice,
valour, and grandeur, yet never made any extraordinary figure in life,
because his ideas were infinitely above his capacity. If a man has
abilities and great designs, he is sure to be looked upon as a man of
some importance; but if he does not carry them out, he is not much
esteemed, which was the case with De Longueville.
Character of the Duc de Beaufort.
M. de Beaufort knew little of affairs of moment but by hearsay and by
what he had learned in the cabal of "The Importants," of whose jargon he
had retained some smattering, which, together with some expressions he
had perfectly acquired from Madame de Vendome, formed a language that
would have puzzled a Cato. His speech was short and stupidly dull, and
the more so because he obscured it by affectation. He thought himself
very sufficient, and pretended to a great deal more wit than came to his
share. He was brave enough in his person, and outdid the common Hectors
by being so upon all occasions, but never more 'mal a propos' than in
gallantry. And he talked and thought just as the people did whose idol
he was for some time.
Character of the Dice d'Elbeuf.
M. d'Elbeuf could not fail of courage, as he was a Prince of the house of
Lorraine. He had all the wit that a man of abundantly more cunning and
good sense could pretend to. He was a medley of incoherent flourishes.
He was the first Prince debased by poverty; and, perhaps, never man was
more at a loss than he to raise the pity of the people in misery. A
comfortable subsistence did not raise his spirits; and if he had been
master of riches he would have been envied as a leader of a party.
Poverty so well became him that it seemed as if he had been cut out for a
beggar.
Character of the Duc de Bouillon.
The Duc de Bouillon was a man of experienced valour and profound sense. I
am fully persuaded, by what I have seen of his conduct, that those who
cry it down wrong his character; and it may be that others had too
favourable notions of his merit, who thought him capable of all the great
things which he never did.
Character of M. de Turenne.
M. de Turenne had all the good qualities in his very nature, and acquired
all the great ones very early, those only excepted that he never thought
of. Though almost all the virtues were in a manner natural to him, yet
he shone out in none. He was looked upon as more proper to be at the
head of an army than of a faction, for he was not naturally enterprising.
He had in all his conduct, as well as in his way of talking, certain
obscurities which he never explained but on particular occasions, and
then only for his own honour.
Character of Marechal de La Mothe.
The Marechal de La Mothe was a captain of the second rank, full of
mettle, but not a man of much sense. He was affable and courteous in
civil life, and a very useful man in a faction because of his wonderful
complacency.
Character of the Prince de Conti.
The Prince de Conti was a second Zeno as much as he was a Prince of the
blood. That is his character with regard to the public; and as to his
private capacity, wickedness had the same effect on him as weakness had
on M. d'Elbeuf, and drowned his other qualities, which were all mean and
tinctured with folly.
Character of M. de La Rochefoucault.
M. de La Rochefoucault had something so odd in all his conduct that I
know not what name to give it. He loved to be engaged in intrigues from
a child. He was never capable of conducting any affair, for what reasons
I could not conceive; for he had endowments which, in another, would have
made amends for imperfections . . . . He had not a long view of what
was beyond his reach, nor a quick apprehension of what was within it; but
his sound sense, very good in speculation, his good-nature, his engaging
and wonderfully easy behaviour, were enough to have made amends more than
they did for his want of penetration. He was constantly wavering in his
resolution, but what to attribute it to I know not, for it could not come
from his fertile imagination, which was lively. Nor can I say it came
from his barrenness of thought, for though he did not excel as a man of
affairs, yet he had a good fund of sense. The effect of this
irresolution is very visible, though we do not know its cause. He never
was a warrior, though a true soldier. He never was a courtier, though he
had always a good mind to be one. He never was a good party man, though
his whole life was engaged in partisanship. He was very timorous and
bashful in conversation, and thought he always stood in need of
apologies, which, considering that his "Maxims" showed not great regard
for virtue, and that his practice was always to get out of affairs with
the same hurry as he got into them, makes me conclude that he would have
done much better if he had contented himself to have passed, as he might
have done, for the politest courtier and the most cultivated gentlemen of
his age.
Character of Madame de Longueville.
Madame de Longueville had naturally a great fund of wit, and was,
moreover, a woman of parts; but her indolent temper kept her from making
any use of her talents, either in gallantries or in her hatred against
the Prince de Conde. Her languishing air had more charms in it than the
most exquisite beauty. She had few or no faults besides what she
contracted in her gallantry. As her passion of love influenced her
conduct more than politics, she who was the Amazon of a great party
degenerated into the character of a fortune-hunter. But the grace of God
brought her back to her former self, which all the world was not able to
do.
Character of Madame de Chevreuse.
Madame de Chevreuse had not so much as the remains of beauty when I knew
her; she was the only person I ever saw whose vivacity supplied the want
of judgment; her wit was so brilliant and so full of wisdom that the
greatest men of the age would not have been ashamed of it, while, in
truth, it was owing to some lucky opportunity. If she had been born in
time of peace she would never have imagined there could have been such a
thing as war. If the Prior of the Carthusians had but pleased her, she
would have been a nun all her lifetime. M. de Lorraine was the first
that engaged her in State affairs. The Duke of Buckingham--[George
Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, assassinated when preparing to succour
Rochelle.]--and the Earl of Holland (an English lord, of the family of
Rich, and younger son of the Earl of Warwick, then ambassador in France)
kept her to themselves; M. de Chateauneuf continued the amusement, till
at last she abandoned herself to the pleasing of a person whom she loved,
without any choice, but purely because it was impossible for her to live
without being in love with somebody. It was no hard task to give her one
to serve the turn of the faction, but as soon as she accepted him she
loved him with all her heart and soul, and she confessed that, by the
caprice of fortune, she never loved best where she esteemed most, except
in the case of the poor Duke of Buckingham. Notwithstanding her
attachment in love, which we may, properly call her everlasting passion,
notwithstanding the frequent change of objects, she was peevish and
touchy almost to distraction, but when herself again, her transports were
very agreeable; never was anybody less fearful of real danger, and never
had woman more contempt for scruples and ceremonies.
Character of Mademoiselle de Chevreuse.
Mademoiselle de Chevreuse was more beautiful in her person than charming
in her carriage, and by nature extremely silly; her amorous passion made
her seem witty, serious, and agreeable only to him whom she was in love
with, but she soon treated him as she did her petticoat, which to-day she
took into her bed, and to-morrow cast into the fire out of pure aversion.
Character of the Princess Palatine.
The Princess Palatine' had just as much gallantry as gravity. I believe
she had as great a talent for State affairs as Elizabeth, Queen of
England. I have seen her in the faction, I have seen her in the Cabinet,
and found her everywhere equally sincere.
Character of Madame de Montbazon.
Madame de Montbazon was a very great beauty, only modesty was visibly
wanting in her air; her grand air and her way of talking sometimes
supplied her want of sense. She loved nothing more than her pleasures,
unless it was her private interest, and I never knew a vicious person
that had so little respect for virtue.
Character of the First President.
If it were not a sort of blasphemy to say that any mortal of our times
had more courage than the great Gustavus Adolphus and the Prince de
Conde, I would venture to affirm it of M. Mole, the First President, but
his wit was far inferior to his courage. It is true that his enunciation
was not agreeable, but his eloquence was such that, though it shocked the
ear, it seized the imagination. He sought the interest of the public
preferably to all things, not excepting the interest of his own family,
which yet he loved too much for a magistrate. He had not a genius to see
at times the good he was capable of doing, presumed too much upon his
authority, and imagined that he could moderate both the Court and
Parliament; but he failed in both, made himself suspected by both, and
thus, with a design to do good, he did evil. Prejudices contributed not
a little to this, for I observed he was prejudiced to such a degree that
he always judged of actions by men, and scarcely ever of men by their
actions.
To return to our history. All the companies having united and settled
the necessary funds, a complete army was raised in Paris in a week's
time. The Bastille surrendered after five or six cannon shots, and it
was a pretty sight to see the women carry their chairs into the garden,
where the guns were stationed, for the sake of seeing the siege, just as
if about to hear a sermon.
M. de Beaufort, having escaped from his confinement, arrived this very
day in Paris. I found that his imprisonment had not made him one jot the
wiser. Indeed, it had got him a reputation, because he bore it with
constancy and made his escape with courage. It was also his merit not to
have abandoned the banks of the Loire at a time when it absolutely
required abundance of skill and courage to stay there. It is an easy
matter for those who are disgraced at Court to make the best of their own
merit in the beginning of a civil war. He had a mind to form an alliance
with me, and knowing how to employ him advantageously, I prepossessed the
people in his favour, and exaggerated the conspiracy which the Cardinal
had formed against him by means of Du Hamel.
As my friendship was necessary to him, so his was necessary to me; for my
profession on many occasions being a restraint upon me, I wanted a man
sometimes to stand before me. M. de La Mothe was so dependent on M. de
Longueville that I could not rely on him; and M. de Bouillon was not a
man to be governed.
We went together to wait on the Prince de Conti; we stopped the coach in
the streets, where I proclaimed the name of M. de Beaufort, praised him
and showed him to the people; upon which the people were suddenly fired
with enthusiasm, the women kissed him, and the crowd was so great that we
had much ado to get to the Hotel de Ville. The next day he offered a
petition to the Parliament desiring he might have leave to justify
himself against the accusation of his having formed a design against the
life of the Cardinal, which was granted; and he was accordingly cleared
next day, and the Parliament issued that famous decree for seizing all
the cash of the Crown in all the public and private receipt offices of
the kingdom and employing it in the common defence.
The Prince de Conde was enraged at the declaration published by the
Prince de Conti and M. de Longueville, which cast the Court, then at
Saint Germain, into such a despair that the Cardinal was upon the point
of retiring. I was abused there without mercy, as appeared by a letter
sent to Madame de Longueville from the Princess, her mother, in which I
read this sentence: "They rail here plentifully against the Coadjutor,
whom yet I cannot forbear thanking for what he has done for the poor
Queen of England." This circumstance is very curious. You must know
that a few days before the King left Paris I visited the Queen of
England, whom I found in the apartment of her daughter, since Madame
d'Orleans. "You see, monsieur," said the Queen, "I come here to keep
Henriette company; the poor child has lain in bed all day for want of a
fire." The truth is, the Cardinal having stopped the Queen's pension six
months, tradesmen were unwilling to give her credit, and there was not a
chip of wood in the house. You may be sure I took care that a Princess
of Great Britain should not be confined to her bed next day, for want of
a fagot; and a few days after I exaggerated the scandal of this
desertion, and the Parliament sent the Queen a present of 40,000 livres.
Posterity will hardly believe that the Queen of England, granddaughter of
Henri the Great, wanted a fagot to light a fire in the month of January,
in the Louvre, and at the Court of France.
There are many passages in history less monstrous than this which make us
shudder, and this mean action of the Court made so little impression upon
the minds of the generality of the people at that time that I have
reflected a thousand times since that we are far more moved at the
hearing of old stories than of those of the present time; we are not
shocked at what we see with our own eyes, and I question whether our
surprise would be as great as we imagine at the story of Caligula's
promoting his horse to the dignity of a consul were he and his horse now
living.
To return to the war. A cornet of my regiment being taken prisoner and
carried to Saint Germain, the Queen immediately ordered his head to be
cut off, but I sent a trumpeter to acquaint the Court that I would make
reprisals upon my prisoners, so that my cornet was exchanged and a cartel
settled.
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