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Volume 1 (of 6)
Volume 1 (of 6)
CONTENTS EXTRACT FROM LETTER TO THE PUBLISHERS. A POPULAR HISTORY OF FRANCE CHAPTER I. GAUL. CHAPTER II. THE GAULS OUT OF GAUL. CHAPTER III. THE ROMANS IN GAUL. CHAPTER IV. GAUL CONQUERED BY JULIUS CAESAR. CHAPTER V. GAUL UNDER ROMAN DOMINION. CHAPTER VI. ESTABLISHMENT OF CHRISTIANITY IN GAUL. CHAPTER VII. THE GERMANS IN GAUL.—THE FRANKS AND CLOVIS. CHAPTER VIII. THE MEROVINGIANS. CHAPTER IX. THE MAYORS OF THE PALACE. THE PEPINS. CHAPTER X. CHARLEMAGNE AND HIS WARS. CHAPTER
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VOLUME II.
VOLUME II.
CONTENTS CHAPTER XVII. THE CRUSADES, THEIR DECLINE AND END. CHAPTER XVIII. THE KINGSHIP IN FRANCE. CHAPTER XIX. THE COMMUNES AND THE THIRD ESTATE. CHAPTER XX. THE HUNDRED YEARS’ WAR.—PHILIP VI. AND JOHN II. CHAPTER XXI. THE STATES—GENERAL OF THE FOURTEENTH CENTURY. CHAPTER XXII. THE HUNDRED YEARS’ WAR.—CHARLES V. ILLUSTRATIONS Richard’s Farewell to the Holy Land——10 Preaching the Second Crusade——13 Defeat of the Turks——16 The Christians of the Holy City Defiling Before Saladin.——
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CHAPTER XVII.THE CRUSADES, THEIR DECLINE AND END.
CHAPTER XVII.THE CRUSADES, THEIR DECLINE AND END.
In the month of August, 1099, the Crusade, to judge by appearances, had attained its object. Jerusalem was in the hands of the Christians, and they had set up in it a king, the most pious and most disinterested of the crusaders. Close to this ancient kingdom were growing up likewise, in the two chief cities of Syria and Mesopotamia, Antioch and Edessa, two Christian principalities, in the possession of two crusader-chiefs, Bohemond and Baldwin. A third Christian principality was on the point of
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EXTRACT FROM LETTER TO THE PUBLISHERS.
EXTRACT FROM LETTER TO THE PUBLISHERS.
Every history, and especially that of France, is one vast, long drama, in which events are linked together according to defined laws, and in which the actors play parts not ready made and learned by heart, parts depending, in fact, not only upon the accidents of their birth, but also upon their own ideas and their own will. There are, in the history of peoples, two sets of causes essentially different, and, at the same time, closely connected; the natural causes which are set over the general co
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CHAPTER I.GAUL.
CHAPTER I.GAUL.
The Frenchman of to-day inhabits a country, long ago civilized and Christianized, where, despite of much imperfection and much social misery, thirty-eight millions of men live in security and peace, under laws equal for all and efficiently upheld. There is every reason to nourish great hopes of such a country, and to wish for it more and more of freedom, glory, and prosperity; but one must be just towards one’s own times, and estimate at their true value advantages already acquired and progress
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CHAPTER XVIII.THE KINGSHIP IN FRANCE.
CHAPTER XVIII.THE KINGSHIP IN FRANCE.
That the kingship occupied an important place and played an important part in the history of France is an evident and universally recognized fact. But to what causes this fact was due, and what particular characteristics gave the kingship in France that preponderating influence which, in weal and in woe, it exercised over the fortunes of the country, is a question which has been less closely examined, and which still remains vague and obscure. This question it is which we would now shed light up
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CHAPTER II.THE GAULS OUT OF GAUL.
CHAPTER II.THE GAULS OUT OF GAUL.
About three centuries B.C. numerous hordes of Gauls crossed the Alps and penetrated to the centre of Etruria, which is nowadays Tuscany. The Etruscans, being then at war with Rome, proposed to take them, armed and equipped as they had come, into their own pay. “If you want our hands,” answered the Gauls, “against your enemies, the Romans, here they are at your service—but on one condition: give us lands.” A century afterwards other Gallic hordes, descending in like manner upon Italy, had commenc
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CHAPTER XIX.THE COMMUNES AND THE THIRD ESTATE.
CHAPTER XIX.THE COMMUNES AND THE THIRD ESTATE.
The history of the Merovingians is that of barbarians invading Gaul and settling upon the ruins of the Roman empire. The history of the Carlovingians is that of the greatest of the barbarians taking upon himself to resuscitate the Roman empire, and of Charlemagne’s descendants disputing amongst themselves for the fragments of his fabric, as fragile as it was grand. Amidst this vast chaos and upon this double ruin was formed the feudal system, which by transformation after transformation became u
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CHAPTER III.THE ROMANS IN GAUL.
CHAPTER III.THE ROMANS IN GAUL.
It was Rome herself that soon crossed that barrier of the Alps which she had pronounced fixed by nature and insurmountable. Scarcely was she mistress of Cisalpine Gaul when she entered upon a quarrel with the tribes which occupied the mountain-passes. With an unsettled frontier, and between neighbors of whom one is ambitious and the other barbarian, pretexts and even causes are never wanting. It is likely that the Gallic mountaineers were not careful to abstain, they and their flocks, from desce
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CHAPTER XX.THE HUNDRED YEARS’ WAR.—PHILIP VI. AND JOHN II.
CHAPTER XX.THE HUNDRED YEARS’ WAR.—PHILIP VI. AND JOHN II.
We have just been spectators at the labor of formation of the French kingship and the French nation. We have seen monarchical unity and national unity rising, little by little, out of and above the feudal system, which had been the first result of barbarians settling upon the ruins of the Roman empire. In the fourteenth century, a new and a vital question arose: Will the French dominion preserve its nationality? Will the kingship remain French, or pass to the foreigner? This question brought rav
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CHAPTER IV.GAUL CONQUERED BY JULIUS CAESAR.
CHAPTER IV.GAUL CONQUERED BY JULIUS CAESAR.
Historians, ancient and modern, have attributed to the Roman Senate, from the time of the establishment of the Roman province in Gaul, a long-premeditated design of conquering Gaul altogether. Others have said that when Julius Caesar, in the year of Rome 696, (58 B C.) got himself appointed proconsul in Gaul, his single aim was to form for himself there an army devoted to his person, of which he might avail himself to satisfy his ambition and make himself master of Rome. We should not be too rea
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CHAPTER XXI.THE STATES GENERAL OF THE FOURTEENTH CENTURY.
CHAPTER XXI.THE STATES GENERAL OF THE FOURTEENTH CENTURY.
Let us turn back a little, in order to understand the government and position of King John before he engaged in the war which, so far as he was concerned, ended with the battle of Poitiers and imprisonment in England. A valiant and loyal knight, but a frivolous, hare-brained, thoughtless, prodigal, and obstinate as well as impetuous prince, and even more incapable than Philip of Valois in the practice of government, John, after having summoned at his accession, in 1351, a states-assembly concern
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CHAPTER V.GAUL UNDER ROMAN DOMINION.
CHAPTER V.GAUL UNDER ROMAN DOMINION.
From the conquest of Gaul by Caesar, to the establishment there of the Franks under Clovis, she remained for more than five centuries under Roman dominion; first under the pagan, afterwards under the Christian empire. In her primitive state of independence she had struggled for ten years against the best armies and the greatest man of Rome; after five centuries of Roman dominion she opposed no resistance to the invasion of the barbarians, Germans, Goths, Alans, Burgundians, and Franks, who destr
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CHAPTER XXII.THE HUNDRED YEARS’ WAR.—CHARLES V.
CHAPTER XXII.THE HUNDRED YEARS’ WAR.—CHARLES V.
So soon as Marcel and three of his chief confidants had been put to death at the St. Anthony gate, at the very moment when they were about to open it to the English, John Maillart had information sent to the regent, at that time at Charenton, with an urgent entreaty that he would come back to Paris without delay. “The news, at once spread abroad through the city, was received with noisy joy there, and the red caps, which had been worn so proudly the night before, were everywhere taken off and hi
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Volume III.
Volume III.
CONTENTS CHAPTER XXIII. THE HUNDRED YEARS’ WAR—CHARLES VI. AND THE DUKES OF BURGUNDY CHAPTER XXIV. THE HUNDRED YEARS’ WAR.—CHARLES VII. AND JOAN OF ARC (1422-1461) CHAPTER XXV. LOUIS XI. (1461-1483.) CHAPTER XXVI. THE WARS OF ITALY.— CHARLES VIII. (1483-1498.) CHAPTER XXVII. THE WARS IN ITALY.—LOUIS XII. (1498-1515.) ILLUSTRATIONS Hotel de Ville Bourges——frontispiece The Procession Went over the Gates——16 “Thou Art Betrayed.”——26 Charles Vi. And Odette——71 Murder of the Duke Of Orle
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CHAPTER VI.ESTABLISHMENT OF CHRISTIANITY IN GAUL.
CHAPTER VI.ESTABLISHMENT OF CHRISTIANITY IN GAUL.
When Christianity began to penetrate into Gaul, it encountered there two religions very different one from the other, and infinitely more different from the Christian religion; these were Druidism and Paganism— hostile one to the other, but with a hostility political only, and unconnected with those really religious questions that Christianity was coming to raise. Druidism, considered as a religion, was a mass of confusion, wherein the instinctive notions of the human race concerning the origin
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CHAPTER XXIII.——THE HUNDRED YEARS’ WAR—CHARLES VI. AND THE DUKES OF BURGUNDY.
CHAPTER XXIII.——THE HUNDRED YEARS’ WAR—CHARLES VI. AND THE DUKES OF BURGUNDY.
Sully, in his Memoirs, characterizes the reign of Charles VI. as “that reign so pregnant of sinister events, the grave of good laws and good morals in France.” There is no exaggeration in these words; the sixteenth century with its St. Bartholomew and The League, the eighteenth with its reign of terror, and the nineteenth with its Commune of Paris, contain scarcely any events so sinister as those of which France was, in the reign of Charles VI., from 1380 to 1422, the theatre and the victim. Sca
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CHAPTER VII.THE GERMANS IN GAUL.THE FRANKS AND CLOVIS.
CHAPTER VII.THE GERMANS IN GAUL.THE FRANKS AND CLOVIS.
About A.D. 241 or 242 the sixth Roman legion, commanded by Aurelian, at that time military tribune, and thirty years later, emperor, had just finished a campaign on the Rhine, undertaken for the purpose of driving the Germans from Gaul, and was preparing for Eastern service, to make war on the Persians. The soldiers sang,— That was, apparently, a popular burden at the time, for on the days of military festivals, at Rome and in Gaul, the children sang, as they danced,— Aurelian, the hero of these
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CHAPTER XXIV.——THE HUNDRED YEARS’ WAR.—CHARLES VII. AND JOAN OF ARC. 1422-1461.
CHAPTER XXIV.——THE HUNDRED YEARS’ WAR.—CHARLES VII. AND JOAN OF ARC. 1422-1461.
Whilst Charles VI. was dying at Paris, his son Charles, the dauphin , was on his way back from Saintonge to Berry, where he usually resided. On the 24th of October, 1422, at Mehun-sur-Yevre, he heard of his father’s death. For six days longer, from the 24th to the 29th of October, he took no style but that of regent, as if he were waiting to see what was going to happen elsewhere in respect of the succession to the throne. It was only when he knew that, on the 27th of October, the parliament of
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CHAPTER VIII.THE MEROVINGIANS.
CHAPTER VIII.THE MEROVINGIANS.
In its beginning and in its end the line of the Merovingians is mediocre and obscure. Its earliest ancestors, Meroveus, from whom it got its name, and Clodion, the first, it is said, of the long-haired kings, a characteristic title of the Frankish kings, are scarcely historical personages; and it is under the qualification of sluggard kings that the last Merovingians have a place in history. Clovis alone, amidst his vices and his crimes, was sufficiently great and did sufficiently great deeds to
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CHAPTER XXV.——LOUIS XI. (1461-1483.)
CHAPTER XXV.——LOUIS XI. (1461-1483.)
Louis XI. was thirty-eight years old, and had been living for five years in voluntary exile at the castle of Genappe, in Hainault, beyond the dominions of the king his father, and within those of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, when, on the 23d of July, 1461, the day after Charles VII.‘s death, he learned that he was King of France. He started at once to return to his own country, and take possession of his kingdom. He arrived at Rheims on the 14th of August, was solemnly crowned there on the
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CHAPTER IX.THE MAYORS OF THE PALACE.THE PEPINS AND THE CHANGE OF DYNASTY.
CHAPTER IX.THE MAYORS OF THE PALACE.THE PEPINS AND THE CHANGE OF DYNASTY.
There is a certain amount of sound sense, of intelligent activity and practical efficiency, which even the least civilized and least exacting communities absolutely must look for in their governing body. When this necessary share of ability and influence of a political kind are decidedly wanting in the men who have the titles and the official posts of power, communities seek elsewhere the qualities (and their consequences) which they cannot do without. The sluggard Merovingians drove the Franks,
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CHAPTER XCHARLEMAGNE AND HIS WARS.
CHAPTER XCHARLEMAGNE AND HIS WARS.
The most judicious minds are sometimes led blindly by tradition and habit, rather than enlightened by reflection and experience. Pepin the Short committed at his death the same mistake that his father, Charles Martel, had committed: he divided his dominions between his two sons, Charles and Carloman, thus destroying again that unity of the Gallo- Frankish monarchy which his father and he had been at so much pains to establish. But, just as had already happened in 746 through the abdication of Pe
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CHAPTER XXVI.——THE WARS OF ITALY.— CHARLES VIII.— 1483-1498.
CHAPTER XXVI.——THE WARS OF ITALY.— CHARLES VIII.— 1483-1498.
Ferdinand II., the new King of Naples, who had no lack of energy or courage, was looking everywhere, at home and abroad, for forces and allies to oppose the imminent invasion. To the Duke of Milan he wrote, “Remember that we two are of the same blood. It is much to be desired that a league should at once be formed between the pope, the kings of the Romans and Spain, you, and Venice. If these powers are united, Italy would have nought to fear from any. Give me your support; I have the greatest ne
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CHAPTER XXVII.——THE WARS IN ITALY.—LOUIS XII. 1498-1515.
CHAPTER XXVII.——THE WARS IN ITALY.—LOUIS XII. 1498-1515.
On ascending the throne Louis XII. reduced the public taxes and confirmed in their posts his predecessor’s chief advisers, using to Louis de la Tremoille, who had been one of his most energetic foes, that celebrated expression, “The King of France avenges not the wrongs of the Duke of Orleans.” At the same time, on the day of his coronation at Rheims [May 27, 1492], he assumed, besides his title of King of France, the titles of King of Naples and of Jerusalem and Duke of Milan. This was as much
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CHAPTER XI.CHARLEMAGNE AND HIS GOVERNMENT.
CHAPTER XI.CHARLEMAGNE AND HIS GOVERNMENT.
What, then, was the government of this empire of which Charlemagne was proud to assume the old title? How did this German warrior govern that vast dominion which, thanks to his conquests, extended from the Elbe to the Ebro, from the North Sea to the Mediterranean; which comprised nearly all Germany, Belgium, France, Switzerland, and the north of Italy and of Spain, and which, sooth to say, was still, when Charlemagne caused himself to be made emperor, scarce more than the hunting-ground and the
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VOLUME IV.
VOLUME IV.
CONTENTS CHAPTER XXVIII. FRANCIS I. AND CHARLES V. CHAPTER XXIX. FRANCIS I. AND THE RENAISSANCE. CHAPTER XXX. FRANCIS I. AND THE REFORMATION. CHAPTER XXXI. HENRY II. (1547-1559.) CHAPTER XXXII. FRANCIS II., JULY 10, 1559—DECEMBER 5, 1560. CHAPTER XXXIII. CHARLES IX. AND THE RELIGIOUS WARS. (1560-1574.) CHAPTER XXXIV. HENRY III. AND THE RELIGIOUS WARS. (1574-1589.) ILLUSTRATIONS Cardinal Ximenes——14 All Night A-horseback——19 Bayard Knighting Francis I——19 Leo X.——21 Anthony Dupr
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CHAPTER XII.DECAY AND FALL OF THE CARLOVINGIANS.
CHAPTER XII.DECAY AND FALL OF THE CARLOVINGIANS.
From the death of Charlemagne to the accession of Hugh Capet,—that is, from 814 to 987,—thirteen kings sat upon the throne of France. What then became, under their reign and in the course of those hundred and seventy-three years, of the two great facts which swayed the mind and occupied the life of Charlemagne? What became, that is, of the solid territorial foundation of the kingdom of Christian France, through efficient repression of foreign invasion, and of the unity of that vast empire wherei
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CHAPTER XIII.FEUDAL FRANCE AND HUGH CAPET.
CHAPTER XIII.FEUDAL FRANCE AND HUGH CAPET.
The reader has just seen that, twenty-nine years after the death of Charlemagne, that is, in 843, when, by the treaty of Verdun, the sons of Louis the Debonnair had divided amongst them his dominions, the great empire split up into three distinct and independent kingdoms—the kingdoms of Italy, Germany, and France. The split did not stop there. Forty-five years later, at the end of the ninth century, shortly after the death of Charles the Fat, the last of the Carlovingians who appears to have re-
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CHAPTER XXVIII.FRANCIS I. AND CHARLES V.
CHAPTER XXVIII.FRANCIS I. AND CHARLES V.
The closer the study and the wider the contemplation a Frenchman bestows upon his country’s history, the deeper will be his feelings of patriotic pride, dashed with a tinge of sadness. France, in respect of her national unity, is the most ancient amongst the states of Christian Europe. During her long existence she has passed through very different regimens, the chaos of barbarism, the feudal system, absolute monarchy, constitutional monarchy, and republicanism. Under all these regimens she has
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CHAPTER XXIX.FRANCIS I. AND THE RENAISSANCE.
CHAPTER XXIX.FRANCIS I. AND THE RENAISSANCE.
Francis I., in his life as a king and a soldier, had two rare pieces of good fortune: two great victories, Melegnano and Ceresole, stand out at the beginning and the end of his reign; and in his direst defeat, at Pavia, he was personally a hero. In all else, as regards his government, his policy was neither an able nor a successful one; for two and thirty years he was engaged in plans, attempts, wars, and negotiations; he failed in all his designs; he undertook innumerable campaigns or expeditio
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CHAPTER XIV.THE CAPETIANS TO THE TIME OF THE CRUSADES.
CHAPTER XIV.THE CAPETIANS TO THE TIME OF THE CRUSADES.
From 996 to 1108, the first three successors of Hugh Capet, his son Robert, his grandson Henry I., and his great-grandson Philip I., sat upon the throne of France; and during this long space of one hundred and twelve years the kingdom of France had not, sooth to say, any history. Parcelled out, by virtue of the feudal system, between a multitude of princes, independent, isolated, and scarcely sovereigns in their own dominions, keeping up anything like frequent intercourse only with their neighbo
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CHAPTER XV.CONQUEST OF ENGLAND BY THE NORMANS.
CHAPTER XV.CONQUEST OF ENGLAND BY THE NORMANS.
At the beginning of the eleventh century, Robert, called “The Magnificent,” the fifth in succession from the great chieftain Rollo who had established the Northmen in France, was duke of Normandy. To the nickname he earned by his nobleness and liberality some chronicles have added another, and call him “Robert the Devil,” by reason of his reckless and violent deeds of audacity, whether in private life or in warlike expeditions. Hence a lively controversy amongst the learned upon the question of
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CHAPTER XXX.FRANCIS I. AND THE REFORMATION.
CHAPTER XXX.FRANCIS I. AND THE REFORMATION.
Nearly half a century before the Reformation made any noise in France it had burst out with great force and had established its footing in Germany, Switzerland, and England. John Huss and Jerome of Prague, both born in Bohemia, one in 1373 and the other in 1378, had been condemned as heretics and burned at Constance, one in 1415 and the other in 1416, by decree and in the presence of the council which had been there assembled. But, at the commencement of the sixteenth century, Luther in Germany
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CHAPTER XXXI.HENRY II. (1547-1559.)
CHAPTER XXXI.HENRY II. (1547-1559.)
Henry II. had all the defects, and, with the exception of personal bravery, not one amongst the brilliant and amiable qualities of the king his father. Like Francis I., he was rash and reckless in his resolves and enterprises, but without having the promptness, the fertility, and the suppleness of mind which Francis I. displayed in getting out of the awkward positions in which he had placed himself, and in stalling off or mitigating the consequences of them. Henry was as cold and ungenial as Fra
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CHAPTER XVI.THE CRUSADES, THEIR ORIGIN AND THEIR SUCCESS.
CHAPTER XVI.THE CRUSADES, THEIR ORIGIN AND THEIR SUCCESS.
Amongst the great events of European history, none was for a longer time in preparation or more naturally brought about than the Crusades. Christianity, from her earliest days, had seen in Jerusalem her sacred cradle; it had been, in past times, the home of her ancestors, the Jews, and the centre of their history; and, afterwards, the scene of the life, death, and resurrection of her Divine Founder. Jerusalem became, more and more, the Holy City. To go to Jerusalem, to visit the Mount of Olives,
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CHAPTER XXXII.FRANCIS II., JULY 10, 1559—DECEMBER 5, 1560.
CHAPTER XXXII.FRANCIS II., JULY 10, 1559—DECEMBER 5, 1560.
During the course, and especially at the close of Henry II.‘s reign, two rival matters, on the one hand the numbers, the quality, and the zeal of the Reformers, and on the other, the anxiety, prejudice, and power of the Catholics, had been simultaneously advancing in development and growth. Between the 16th of May, 1558, and the 10th of July, 1559, fifteen capital sentences had been executed in Dauphiny, in Normandy, in Poitou, and at Paris. Two royal edicts, one dated July 24, 1558, and the oth
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CHAPTER XXXIII.CHARLES IX. AND THE RELIGIOUS WARS. (1560-1574.)
CHAPTER XXXIII.CHARLES IX. AND THE RELIGIOUS WARS. (1560-1574.)
We now enter upon the era of the civil wars, massacres, and assassinations caused by religious fanaticism or committed on religious pretexts. The latter half of the sixteenth century is the time at which the human race saw the opening of that great drama, of which religious liberty is the beginning and the end; and France was then the chief scene of it. At the close of the fifteenth and at the commencement of the sixteenth centuries, religious questions had profoundly agitated Christian Europe;
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CHAPTER XXXIV.HENRY III. AND THE RELIGIOUS WARS. (1574-1589.)
CHAPTER XXXIV.HENRY III. AND THE RELIGIOUS WARS. (1574-1589.)
Though elected King of Poland on the 9th of May, 1573, Henry, Duke of Anjou, had not yet left Paris at the end of the summer. Impatient at his slowness to depart, Charles IX. said, with his usual oath, “By God’s death! my brother or I must at once leave the kingdom: my mother shall not succeed in preventing it.” “Go,” said Catherine to Henry; “you will not be away long.” She foresaw, with no great sorrow one would say, the death of Charles IX., and her favorite son’s accession to the throne of F
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VOLUME V.
VOLUME V.
CONTENTS CHAPTER XXXV. HENRY IV., PROTESTANT KING. (1589-1593.) CHAPTER XXXVI. HENRY IV., CATHOLIC KING. (1593-1610.) CHAPTER XXXVII. REGENCY OF MARY DE’ MEDICI. (1610-1617.) CHAPTER XXXVIII. LOUIS XIII., CARDINAL RICHELIEU, AND THE COURT. CHAPTER XXXIX. LOUIS XIII., CARDINAL RICHELIEU, AND THE PROVINCES. CHAPTER XL. LOUIS XIII., RICHELIEU--CATHOLICS AND PROTESTANTS. CHAPTER XLI. LOUIS XIII., CARDINAL RICHELIEU, AND FOREIGN AFFAIRS. CHAPTER XII. LOUIS XIII., RICHELIEU, AND LIT
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CHAPTER XXXV.HENRY IV., PROTESTANT KING. (1589-1593.)
CHAPTER XXXV.HENRY IV., PROTESTANT KING. (1589-1593.)
On the 2d of August, 1589, in the morning, upon his arrival in his quarters at Meudon, Henry of Navarre was saluted by the Protestants King of France. They were about five thousand in an army of forty thousand men. When, at ten o’clock, he entered the camp of the Catholics at St. Cloud, three of their principal leaders, Marshal d’Aumont, and Sires d’Humieres and de Givry, immediately acknowledged him unconditionally, as they had done the day before at the death-bed of Henry III., and they at onc
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CHAPTER XXXVI.HENRY IV., CATHOLIC KING. (1593-1610.)
CHAPTER XXXVI.HENRY IV., CATHOLIC KING. (1593-1610.)
During the months, weeks, nay, it might be said, days immediately mediately following Henry IV.‘s abjuration, a great number of notable persons and important towns, and almost whole provinces, submitted to the Catholic king. Henry was reaping the fruits of his decision; France was flocking to him. But the general sentiments of a people are far from satisfying and subduing the selfish passions of the parties which have taken form and root in its midst. Religious and political peace responded to a
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CHAPTER XXXVII.REGENCY OF MARY DE’ MEDICI. (1610-1617.)
CHAPTER XXXVII.REGENCY OF MARY DE’ MEDICI. (1610-1617.)
On the death of Henry IV. there was extreme disquietude as well as grief in France. To judge by appearances, however, there was nothing to justify excessive alarm. The edict of Nantes (April 13, 1598) had put an end, so far as the French were concerned, to religious wars. The treaty of Vervins (May 2, 1598) between France and Spain, the twelve years’ truce between Spain and the United Provinces (April 9, 1609), the death of Philip II. (September 13, 1598), and the alliance between France and Eng
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CHAPTER XXXVIII.LOUIS XIII., CARDINAL RICHELIEU, AND THE COURT. (1622-1642.)
CHAPTER XXXVIII.LOUIS XIII., CARDINAL RICHELIEU, AND THE COURT. (1622-1642.)
The characteristic of Louis XIV.‘s reign is the uncontested empire of the sovereign over the nation, the authority of the court throughout the country. All intellectual movement proceeded from the court or radiated about it; the whole government, whether for war or peace, was concentrated in its hands. Conde, Turenne, Catinat, Luxembourg, Villars, Vendome belonged, as well as Louvois or Colbert, to the court; from the court went the governors and administrators of provinces; there was no longer
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CHAPTER XXXIX.LOUIS XIII., CARDINAL RICHELIEU, AND THE PROVINCES.
CHAPTER XXXIX.LOUIS XIII., CARDINAL RICHELIEU, AND THE PROVINCES.
The story has been told of the conspiracies at court and the repeated checks suffered by the great lords in their attempts against Cardinal Richelieu. With the exception of Languedoc, under the influence of its governor the Duke of Montmorency, the provinces took no part in these enterprises; their opposition was of another sort; and it is amongst the parliaments chiefly that we must look for it. “The king’s cabinet and his bed-time business ( petit coucher ) cause me more embarrassment than the
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CHAPTER XL.LOUIS XIII., CARDINAL RICHELIEU, THE CATHOLICS AND THE PROTESTANTS.
CHAPTER XL.LOUIS XIII., CARDINAL RICHELIEU, THE CATHOLICS AND THE PROTESTANTS.
Cardinal Richelieu has often been accused of indifference towards the Catholic church; the ultramontanes called him the Huguenots’ cardinal; in so speaking there was either a mistake or a desire to mislead; Richelieu was all his life profoundly and sincerely Catholic; not only did no doubt as to the fundamental doctrines of his church trouble his mind, but he also gave his mind to her security and her aggrandizement. He was a believer on conviction, without religious emotions and without the mys
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CHAPTER XLI.LOUIS XIII., CARDINAL RICHELIEU, AND FOREIGN AFFAIRS.
CHAPTER XLI.LOUIS XIII., CARDINAL RICHELIEU, AND FOREIGN AFFAIRS.
France was reduced to submission; six years of power had sufficed for Richelieu to obtain the mastery; from that moment he directed his ceaseless energy towards Europe. “He feared the repose of peace,” said the ambassador Nani in his letters to Venice; “and thinking himself more safe amidst the bustle of arms, he was the originator of so many wars, and of such long-continued and heavy calamities, he caused so much blood and so many tears to flow within and without the kingdom, that there is noth
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CHAPTER XIII.LOUIS XIII., RICHELIEU, AND LITERATURE.
CHAPTER XIII.LOUIS XIII., RICHELIEU, AND LITERATURE.
Cardinal Richelieu was dead, and “his works followed him,” to use the words of Holy Writ. At home and abroad, in France and in Europe, he had to a great extent continued the reign of Henry IV., and had completely cleared the way for that of Louis XIV. “Such was the strength and superiority of his genius that he knew all the depths and all the mysteries of government,” said La Bruyere in his admission-speech before the French Academy; “he was regardful of foreign countries, he kept in hand crowne
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CHAPTER XLIII.LOUIS XIV., THE FRONDE, AND THE GOVERNMENT OF CARDINAL MAZARIN. (1643-1661.)
CHAPTER XLIII.LOUIS XIV., THE FRONDE, AND THE GOVERNMENT OF CARDINAL MAZARIN. (1643-1661.)
Louis XIII. had never felt confidence in the queen his wife; and Cardinal Richelieu had fostered that sentiment which promoted his views. When M. de Chavigny came, on Anne of Austria’s behalf, to assure the dying king that she had never had any part in the conspiracy of Chalais, or dreamt of espousing Monsieur in case she was left a widow, Louis XIII. answered, “Considering the state I am in, I am bound to forgive her, but not to believe her.” He did not believe her, he never had believed her, a
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CHAPTER XLIV.LOUIS XIV., HIS WARS AND HIS CONQUESTS. 1661-1697.
CHAPTER XLIV.LOUIS XIV., HIS WARS AND HIS CONQUESTS. 1661-1697.
Cardinal Mazarin on his death-bed had given the young king this advice: “Manage your affairs yourself, sir, and raise no more premier ministers to where your bounties have placed me; I have discovered, by what I might have done against your service, how dangerous it is for a king to put his servants in such a position.” Mazarin knew thoroughly the king whose birth he had seen. “He has in him the making of four kings and one honest man,” he used to say. Scarcely was the minister dead, when Louis
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CHAPTER XLV.LOUIS XIV., HIS WARS AND HIS REVERSES. (1697-1713.)
CHAPTER XLV.LOUIS XIV., HIS WARS AND HIS REVERSES. (1697-1713.)
France was breathing again after nine years of a desperate war, but she was breathing uneasily, and as it were in expectation of fresh efforts. Everywhere the memorials of the superintendents repeated the same complaints. “War, the mortality of 1693, the, constant quarterings and movements of soldiery, military service, the heavy dues, and the withdrawal of the Huguenots have ruined the country.” “The people,” said the superintendent of Rouen, “are reduced to a state of want which moves compassi
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CHAPTER XLVI.LOUIS XIV. AND HOME ADMINISTRATION.
CHAPTER XLVI.LOUIS XIV. AND HOME ADMINISTRATION.
It is King Louis XIV.‘s distinction and heavy, burden in the eyes of history that it is, impossible to tell of anything in his reign without constantly recurring to himself. He had two ministers of the higher order, Colbert and Louvois; several of good capacity, such as Seignelay and Torcy; others incompetent, like Chamillard; he remained as much master of the administrators of the first rank as if they had been insignificant clerks; the home government of France, from 1661 to 1715, is summed up
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CHAPTER XLVII.LOUIS XIV. AND RELIGION.
CHAPTER XLVII.LOUIS XIV. AND RELIGION.
Independently of simple submission to the Catholic church, there were three great tendencies which divided serious minds amongst them during the reign of Louis XIV.; three noble passions held possession of pious souls; liberty, faith, and love were, respectively, the groundwork as well as the banner of Protestantism, Jansenism, and Quietism. It was in the name of the fundamental and innate liberty of the soul, its personal responsibility and its direct relations with God, that the Reformation ha
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CHAPTER XLVIII.LOUIS XIV., LITERATURE AND ART.
CHAPTER XLVIII.LOUIS XIV., LITERATURE AND ART.
It has been said in this History that Louis XIV. had the fortune to find himself at the culminating point of absolute monarchy, and to profit by the labors of his predecessors, reaping a portion of their glory; he had likewise the honor of enriching himself with the labors of his contemporaries, and attracting to himself a share of their lustre; the honor, be it said, not the fortune, for he managed to remain the centre of intellectual movement as well as of the court, of literature and art as w
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A POPULAR HISTORY OF FRANCE FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES
A POPULAR HISTORY OF FRANCE FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES
ENLARGE CONTENTS CHAPTER XLIX. LOUIS XIV. AND HIS COURT. CHAPTER L. LOUIS XIV. AND DEATH. 1711-1715. CHAPTER LI. LOUIS XV., THE REGENCY, AND CARDINAL DUBOIS. 1715-1723. CHAPTER LII. LOUIS XV., THE MINISTRY OF CARDINAL FLEURY., 1723-1748. CHAPTER LIII. LOUIS XV., FRANCE IN THE COLONIES. 1745-1763. CHAPTER LIV. LOUIS XV., THE SEVEN YEARS’ WAR. CHAPTER LV. LOUIS XV., THE PHILOSOPHERS. CHAPTER LVI. LOUIS XVI., MINISTRY OF M. TURGOT. 1774-1776. CHAPTER LVII. LOUIS XVI., FRANCE ABROA
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CHAPTER XLIX.LOUIS XIV. AND HIS COURT.
CHAPTER XLIX.LOUIS XIV. AND HIS COURT.
Louis XIV. reigned everywhere, over his people, over his age, often over Europe; but nowhere did he reign so completely as over his court. Never were the wishes, the defects, and the vices of a man so completely a law to other men as at the court of Louis XIV. during the whole period of his long life. When near to him, in the palace of Versailles, men lived, and hoped, and trembled; everywhere else in France, even at Paris, men vegetated. The existence of the great lords was concentrated in the
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CHAPTER L.LOUIS XIV. AND DEATH. 1711-1715.
CHAPTER L.LOUIS XIV. AND DEATH. 1711-1715.
“One has no more luck at our age,” Louis XIV. had said to his old friend Marshal Villars, returning from his most disastrous campaign. It was a bitter reflection upon himself which had put these words into the king’s mouth. After the most brilliant, the most continually and invariably triumphant of reigns, he began to see Fortune slipping away from him, and the grievous consequences of his errors successively overwhelming the state. “God is punishing me; I have richly deserved it,” he said to Ma
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CHAPTER LI.LOUIS XV., THE REGENCY, AND CARDINAL DUBOIS. 1715-1723.
CHAPTER LI.LOUIS XV., THE REGENCY, AND CARDINAL DUBOIS. 1715-1723.
At the very moment when the master’s hand is missed from his work, the narrative makes a sudden bound out of the simple times of history. Under Henry IV., under Richelieu, under Louis XIV., events found quite naturally their guiding hand and their centre; men as well as circumstances formed a group around the head of the nation, whether king or minister, to thence unfold themselves quite clearly before the eyes of posterity. Starting from the reign of Louis XV. the nation has no longer a head, h
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CHAPTER LII.LOUIS XV., THE MINISTRY OF CARDINAL FLEURY., 1723-1748.
CHAPTER LII.LOUIS XV., THE MINISTRY OF CARDINAL FLEURY., 1723-1748.
The riotous and frivolous splendor of the Regency had suffered eclipse; before their time, in all their vigor, through disgrace or by death, Law, Dubois, and the Regent, had suddenly disappeared from the stage of the world. To these men, a striking group for different reasons, notwithstanding their faults and their vices, was about to succeed a discreet but dull and limp government, the reign of an old man, and, moreover, a priest. The Bishop of Frejus, who had but lately been the modest precept
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CHAPTER LIII.LOUIS XV., FRANCE IN THE COLONIES. 1745-1763.
CHAPTER LIII.LOUIS XV., FRANCE IN THE COLONIES. 1745-1763.
France was already beginning to perceive her sudden abasement in Europe; the defaults of her generals as well as of her government sometimes struck the king himself; he threw the blame of it on the barrenness of his times. “This age is not fruitful in great men,” he wrote to Marshal Noailles: “you know that we miss subjects for all objects, and you have one before your eyes in the case of the army which certainly impresses me more than any other.” Thus spoke Louis XV. on the eve of the battle of
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CHAPTER LIV.LOUIS XV.—THE SEVEN YEARS’ WAR.MINISTRY OF THE DUKE OF CHOISEUL. 1748-1774.
CHAPTER LIV.LOUIS XV.—THE SEVEN YEARS’ WAR.MINISTRY OF THE DUKE OF CHOISEUL. 1748-1774.
It was not only in the colonies and on the seas that the peace of Aix-la-Chapelle had seemed merely a truce destined to be soon broken; hostilities had never ceased in India or Canada; English vessels scoured the world, capturing, in spite of treaties, French merchant-ships; in Europe and on the continent, all the sovereigns were silently preparing for new efforts; only the government of King Louis XV., intrenched behind its disinterestedness in the negotiations, and ignoring the fatal influence
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CHAPTER LV.LOUIS XV., THE PHILOSOPHERS.
CHAPTER LV.LOUIS XV., THE PHILOSOPHERS.
Nowhere and at no epoch had literature shone with so vivid a lustre as in the reign of Louis XIV.; never has it been in a greater degree the occupation and charm of mankind, never has it left nobler and rarer models behind it for the admiration and imitation of the coming race; the writers of Louis XV.‘s age, for all their brilliancy and all their fertility, themselves felt their inferiority in respect of their predecessors. Voltaire confessed as much with a modesty which was by no means familia
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CHAPTER LVI.LOUIS XVI.—MINISTRY OF M. TURGOT. 1774-1776.
CHAPTER LVI.LOUIS XVI.—MINISTRY OF M. TURGOT. 1774-1776.
Louis XV. was dead; France breathed once more; she was weary of the weakness as well as of the irregularities of the king who had untaught her her respect for him, and she turned with joyous hope towards his successor, barely twenty years of age, but already loved and impatiently awaited by his people. “He must be called Louis le Desire,” was the saying in the streets before the death-rattle of Louis XV. had summoned his grandson to the throne. The feeling of dread which had seized the young kin
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CHAPTER LVII.LOUIS XVI.—FRANCE ABROAD.UNITED STATES’ WAR OF INDEPENDENCE. 1775-1783.
CHAPTER LVII.LOUIS XVI.—FRANCE ABROAD.UNITED STATES’ WAR OF INDEPENDENCE. 1775-1783.
“Two things, great and difficult as they may be, are a man’s duty and may establish his fame. To support misfortune and be sturdily resigned to it; to believe in the good and trust in it perseveringly. [M. Guizot, Washington ]. “There is a sight as fine and not less salutary than that of a virtuous man at grips with adversity; it is the sight of a virtuous man at the head of a good cause and securing its triumph. “If ever cause were just and had a right to success, it was that of the English col
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CHAPTER LVIII.LOUIS XVI.—FRANCE AT HOME.MINISTRY OF M. NECKER. 1776-1781.
CHAPTER LVIII.LOUIS XVI.—FRANCE AT HOME.MINISTRY OF M. NECKER. 1776-1781.
We have followed the course of good and bad fortune; we have exhibited France engaged abroad in a policy at the same time bold and generous, proceeding from rancor as well as from the sympathetic enthusiasm of the nation; we have seen the war, at first feebly waged, soon extending over every sea and into the most distant colonies of the belligerents, though the European continent was not attacked at any point save the barren rock of Gibraltar; we have seen the just cause of the United States tri
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CHAPTER LIX.LOUIS XVI.M. DE CALONNE AND THE ASSEMBLY OF NOTABLES. 1781-1787.
CHAPTER LIX.LOUIS XVI.M. DE CALONNE AND THE ASSEMBLY OF NOTABLES. 1781-1787.
We leave behind us the great and serious attempts at reform. The vast projects of M. Turgot, seriously meant and founded on reason, for all their somewhat imaginative range, had become, in M. Necker’s hands, financial expedients or necessary remedies, honorably applied to the most salient evils; the future, however, occupied the mind of the minister just fallen; he did not content himself with the facile gratifications of a temporary and disputed power, he had wanted to reform, he had hoped to f
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CHAPTER LX.LOUIS XVI.—CONVOCATION OF THE STATES-GENERAL. 1787-1789.
CHAPTER LX.LOUIS XVI.—CONVOCATION OF THE STATES-GENERAL. 1787-1789.
“Thirteen years had rolled by since King Louis XV. had descended to a dishonored grave, and on the mighty current which was bearing France towards reform, whilst dragging her into the Revolution, King Louis XVI., honest and sincere, was still blindly seeking to clutch the helm which was slipping from his feeble hands. Every day his efforts were becoming weaker and more inconsistent, every day the pilot placed at the tiller was less and less deserving of public confidence. From M. Turgot to M. Ne
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