THE GROWTH OF ABSOLUTISM IN FRANCE AND THE STRUGGLE BETWEEN BOURBONS
AND HABSBURGS, 1661-1743
THE AGE OF LOUIS XIV
Upon the death of Cardinal Mazarin in 1661, the young king Louis XIV
declared that he would assume personal charge of the domestic and
foreign affairs of the French monarchy. From that date, throughout a
long reign, Louis was in fact as well as in name ruler of the nation,
and his rule, like that of Napoleon, stands out as a distinct epoch in
French history.
[Sidenote: Louis XIV the Heir to Absolutist Tendencies]
Louis XIV profited by the earlier work of Henry IV, Sully, Richelieu,
and Mazarin. He inherited a fairly compact state, the population of
which was patriotic and loyal to the crown. Insurrections of
Protestants or rebellions of the nobles were now things of the past.
The Estates-General, the ancient form of representative government, had
fallen into disuse and oblivion. Local administration was conducted by
faithful middle-class officials, the intendants; and all powers of
taxation, war, public improvements, police, and justice were centered
in the hands of the king. Abroad, the rival Habsburgs had been humbled
and French boundaries had been extended and French prestige heightened.
Everything was in readiness for a great king to practice absolutism on
a scale never before realized.
[Sidenote: Absolutism. Monarchy by Divine Right]
The theories of government upon which the absolutism of Louis XIV was
based received a classic expression in a celebrated book written by
Bossuet (1627-1704), a learned and upright bishop of the time.
Government, according to Bossuet, [Footnote: The statements of the
arguments in favor of monarchy by divine right are taken from Bossuet's
famous book, _La politique tirée des propres paroles de l'Ecriture
Sainte_.] is divinely ordained in order to enable mankind to satisfy
the natural instincts of living together in organized society. Under
God, monarchy is, of all forms of government, the most usual and the
most ancient, and therefore the most natural: it is likewise the
strongest and most efficient, therefore the best. It is analogous to
the rule of a family by the father, and, like that rule, should be
hereditary. Four qualities are referred by the eloquent bishop to such
an hereditary monarch: (1) That he is sacred is attested by his
anointing at the time of coronation by the priests of the Church--it is
accordingly blasphemy and sacrilege to assail the person of the king or
to conspire against him; (2) That he is to provide for the welfare of
his people and watch over their every activity may be gathered from the
fact that he is, in a very real sense, the father of his people, the
paternal king; (3) His power is absolute and autocratic, and for its
exercise he is accountable to God alone--no man on earth may rightfully
resist the royal commands, and the only recourse for subjects against
an evil king is to pray God that his heart be changed; (4) Greater
reason is given to a king than to any one else--the king is an earthly
image of God's majesty, and it is wrong, therefore, to look upon him as
a mere man. The king is a public person and in him the whole nation is
embodied. "As in God are united all perfection and every virtue, so all
the power of all the individuals in a community is united in the person
of the king."
[Sidenote: Louis XIV]
Such was the theory of what is called divine-right monarchy or
absolutism. It must be remembered that it had been gaining ground
during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, until it was accepted
practically by all the French people as well as by most of their
Continental neighbors. Even in England, as we shall presently
see,[Footnote: See below, pp. 263 ff.] the Stuart kings attempted, for
a time with success, to assert and maintain the doctrine. It was a
political idea as popular in the seventeenth century as that of
democracy is to-day. And Louis XIV was its foremost personification.
Suave, dignified, elegant in manners and speech, the French king played
his part well; he appeared to have been born and divinely appointed to
the kingly calling.
For a king, Louis worked hard. He was conscientious and painstaking.
Day after day he reviewed the details of administration. Over all
things he had a watchful eye. Systematically he practiced what he
termed the "trade of a king." "One reigns by work and for work," he
wrote his grandson.
No prince was more fortunate than Louis XIV in his personal advisers
and lieutenants. Not only were his praises proclaimed by the silver-
tongued Bossuet, but he was served by such men as Colbert, the
financier and reformer; Louvois, the military organizer; Vauban, the
master builder of fortifications; Condé and Turenne, unconquerable
generals; and by a host of literary lights, whom he patronized and
pensioned, and who cast about his person a glamour of renown. Louis was
hailed as the "Grand Monarch," and his age was appropriately designated
the Age of Louis the Fourteenth.
[Sidenote: Versailles and the Court of Louis XIV]
At Versailles, some twelve miles from Paris, in the midst of what had
been a sandy waste, the Grand Monarch erected those stately palaces,
with their lavish furnishings, and broad parks and great groves and
myriads of delightful fountains, which became Europe's pleasure center.
Thither were drawn the French nobility, who, if shorn of all political
power, were now exempted from disagreeable taxes and exalted as
essential parts of a magnificent social pageant. The king must have
noblemen as _valets-de-chambre_, as masters of the wardrobe or of
the chase or of the revels. Only a nobleman was fit to comb the royal
hair or to dry off the king after a bath. The nobles became, like so
many chandeliers, mere decorations for the palace. Thus, about
Versailles gathered the court of France, and the leaders of fashion met
those of brains.
[Sidenote: "The Age of Louis XIV"]
It was a time when French manners, dress, speech, art, literature, and
science were adopted as the models and property of civilized Europe.
Corneille (1606-1684), the father of the French stage; Molière (1622-
1673), the greatest of French dramatists; Racine (1639-1699), the
polished, formal playwright; Madame de Sévigné (1626-1696), the
brilliant and witty authoress of memoirs; La Fontaine (1621-1695), the
popular rhymer of whimsical fables and teller of scandalous tales; and
many another graced the court of Versailles and tasted the royal
bounty. French became the language of fashion as well as of diplomacy--
a position it has ever since maintained.
[Sidenote: "Rule of the Robe"]
While the court of Louis XIV was thus the focal point of French--almost
of European--life, the professional and mercantile classes, who
constituted the Third Estate, enjoyed comparative security and
prosperity and under the king held all of the important offices of
actual administration. Because of the judicial offices which the middle
class filled, the government was popularly styled the "rule of the
robe."
[Sidenote: "Colbert"]
Colbert (1619-1683), one of Louis's greatest ministers, was the son of
a merchant, and was intensely interested in the welfare of the class to
which he belonged. Installed in office through the favor of Mazarin, he
was successively named, after the cardinal's death, superintendent of
public works, controller-general of finances, minister of marine, of
commerce and agriculture, and of the colonies. In short, until his
death in 1683, he exerted power in every department of government
except that of war. Although he never possessed the absolute personal
authority which marked the ministries of Richelieu and Mazarin, being
plainly subservient to the king's commands, nevertheless he enjoyed for
many years the royal favor and by incessant toil succeeded in
accomplishing a good deal for the material prosperity of France. In
many respects his policies and achievements resembled Sully's.
[Sidenote: Attempted Financial Reform]
First, financial reform claimed all the energies of Colbert. Under the
government of Richelieu, and more particularly under that of Mazarin,
the hard savings of Sully had been squandered, enormous sums had been
granted to favorites, and the ever-increasing noble class had been
exempted from taxation, an evil system of tax-gathering, called
"farming the taxes," [Footnote: "Farming the taxes," that is,
intrusting the collection of taxes to individuals or corporations that
squeezed as much money as they could from the taxpayers and kept for
themselves what they collected over and above the lump sum due the
government.] had grown up, and the weight of the financial burden had
fallen almost exclusively upon the wretched peasantry. Colbert sternly
and fearlessly set about his task. He appointed agents whose honesty he
could trust and reformed many of the abuses in tax-collecting. While he
was unable to impose the direct land tax--the _taille_--upon the
privileged nobility, he stoutly resisted every attempt further to
augment the number of exemptions, and actually lowered this direct tax
upon the peasantry by substituting indirect taxes, or customs duties,
which would in some degree affect all the people. To lighten the burden
of the country-folk, he sought to promote agriculture. He provided that
no farmers' tools might be seized for debt. He encouraged the breeding
of horses and cattle. He improved the roads and other means of interior
communication. The great canal of Languedoc, joining the Mediterranean
with the Garonne River and thence with the Atlantic, was planned and
constructed under his patronage. As far as possible, the duties on the
passage of agricultural produce from province to province were
equalized.
[Sidenote: Colbert and French Merchantilism]
In forwarding what he believed to be his own class interests, Colbert
was especially zealous. Manufactures and commerce were fostered in
every way he could devise. New industries were established, inventors
protected, workmen invited from foreign countries, native workmen
prohibited to leave France. A heavy tariff was placed upon foreign
imports in order to protect "infant industries" and increase the gain
of French manufacturers and traders. Liberal bounties were allowed to
French ships engaged in commerce, and foreign ships were compelled to
pay heavy tonnage duties for using French ports. And along with the
protective tariff and subsidizing of the merchant marine, went other
pet policies of mercantilism, [Footnote: See above, pp. 63 f.] such as
measures to prevent the exportation of precious metals from France, to
encourage corporations and monopolies, and to extend minute
governmental supervision over the manufacture, quality, quantity, and
sale of all commodities. What advantages accrued from Colbert's efforts
in this direction were more than offset by the unfortunate fact that
the mercantile class was unduly enriched at the expense of other and
numerically larger classes in the community, and that the centralized
monarchy, in which the people had no part, proved itself unfit, in the
long run, to oversee the details of business with wisdom or honesty.
[Sidenote: Colbert's "World Policy"]
Stimulation of industry and commerce has usually necessitated the
creation of a protecting navy. Colbert appreciated the requirement and
hastened to fulfill it. He reconstructed the docks and arsenal of
Toulon and established great ship-yards at Rochefort, Calais, Brest,
and Havre. He fitted out a large royal navy that could compare
favorably with that of England or Spain or Holland. To supply it with
recruits he drafted seamen from the maritime provinces and resorted to
the use of criminals, who were often chained to the galleys like so
many slaves of the new industry.
Likewise, the adoption of the mercantile policy seemed to demand the
acquisition of a colonial empire, in which the mother-country should
enjoy a trade monopoly. So Colbert became a vigorous colonial minister.
He purchased Martinique and Guadeloupe in the West Indies, encouraged
settlements in San Domingo, in Canada, and in Louisiana, and set up
important posts in India, in Senegal, and in Madagascar. France, under
Colbert, became a serious colonial competitor with her older European
rivals.
Colbert was essentially a financier and economist. But to the arts of
peace, which adorned the reign of Louis XIV, he was a potent
contributor. He strengthened the French Academy, which had been founded
by Richelieu, and himself established the Academy of Sciences, now
called the Institute of France, and the great astronomical observatory
at Paris. He pensioned many writers, and attracted foreign artists and
scientists to France. Many buildings and triumphal arches were erected
under his patronage.
[Sidenote: Louvois and French Militarism under Louis XIV]
In the arts of war, Louis XIV possessed an equally able and hard-
working assistant. Louvois (1641-1691) was one of the greatest war
ministers that the world has ever seen. He recruited and supported the
largest and finest standing army of his day. He introduced severe
regulations and discipline. He prescribed, for the first time in
history, a distinctive military uniform and introduced the custom of
marching in step. Under his supervision, camp life was placed upon a
sanitary basis. And under his influence, promotion in the service no
longer depended primarily on social position but upon merit as well. In
Vauban (1633-1707), Louvois had the greatest military engineer in
history--for it was Vauban who built those rows of superb
fortifications on the northern and eastern frontiers of France. In
Condé and Turenne, moreover, Louvois had first-class generals who could
give immediate effect to his reforms and policies.
[Sidenote: Deceptive Character of the Glamour of the Age of Louis XIV]
Thus was the Grand Monarch well and faithfully served. Yet the outward
show and glamour of his reign were very deceptive of the true internal
conditions. Colbert tried to do too many things, with the result that
his plans repeatedly miscarried. The nobles became more indolent,
wasteful, and pleasure-loving, and the middle class more selfish and
more devoted to their own class interests, while the lot of the
peasantry,--the bulk of the nation,--despite the spasmodic efforts of
the paternal government, steadily grew worse under the unrelieved
burden of taxation. Then, too, the king was extravagant in maintaining
his mistresses, his court, and his favorites. His excessive vanity had
to be appeased by expensive entertainment and show. He preferred the
spectacular but woeful feats of arms to the less pretentious but more
solid triumphs of peace. Indeed, in course of time, Colbert found his
influence with the king waning before that of Louvois, and when he died
it was with the bitter thought that his financial retrenchment had been
in vain, that his husbanded resources were being rapidly dissipated in
foreign war. It was Louis's wars that deprived his reign of true
grandeur and paved the way for future disaster.
[Sidenote: Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, 1685]
Before turning our attention to the foreign wars of Louis XIV, mention
must be made of another blot on his reign. It was Louis XIV who renewed
the persecution of the Protestants. He was moved alike by the
absolutist's desire to secure complete uniformity throughout France and
by the penitent's religious fervor to make amends for earlier scandals
of his private life. For a time he contented himself with so-called
dragonnades--quartering licentious soldiers upon the Huguenots--but at
length in 1685 he formally revoked the Edict of Nantes. France, which
for almost a century had led Europe in the principle and practice of
religious toleration, was henceforth reactionary. Huguenots were still
granted liberty of conscience, but were denied freedom of worship and
deprived of all civil rights in the kingdom. The immediate effect of
this arbitrary and mistaken action was the emigration of large numbers
of industrious and valuable citizens, who added materially to the
political and economic life of England, Holland, and Prussia, the chief
Protestant foes of France.
EXTENSION OF FRENCH FRONTIERS
Louis XIV was not a soldier himself. He never appeared in military
uniform or rode at the head of his troops. What he lacked, however, in
personal genius as a great military commander, he compensated for in a
genuine fondness for war and in remarkable personal gifts of diplomacy.
He was one of the greatest diplomats of his age, and, as we have seen,
he possessed large loyal armies and able generals that he could employ
in prosecuting the traditional foreign policy of France.
[Sidenote: Traditional Foreign Policy of France]
This foreign policy, which had been pursued by Francis I, Henry II,
Henry IV, Richelieu, and Mazarin, had for its goal the humiliation of
the powerful Habsburgs, whether of Austria or of Spain. Although France
had gained materially at their expense in the treaties of Westphalia
and of the Pyrenees, much remained to be done by Louis XIV. When the
Grand Monarch assumed direct control of affairs in 1661, the Spanish
Habsburgs still ruled not only the peninsular kingdom south of France,
but the Belgian Netherlands to the north, Franche Comte to the east,
and Milan in northern Italy, while their kinsmen of Austria maintained
shadowy imperial government over the rich Rhenish provinces on the
northeastern boundary of France. France was still almost completely
encircled by Habsburg holdings.
[Sidebar: Doctrine of "Natural Boundaries"]
To justify his subsequent aggressions, Louis XIV propounded the
doctrine of "natural boundaries." Every country, he maintained, should
secure such frontiers as nature had obviously provided--mountains,
lakes, or rivers; and France was naturally provided with the frontiers
of ancient Gaul--the Pyrenees, the Alps, the Rhine River, and the
Ocean. Any foreign monarch or state that claimed power within such
frontiers was an interloper and should be expelled.
[Sidenote: The Wars of Louis XIV]
For many years, and in three great wars, Louis XIV endeavored, with
some success, to reach the Rhine. These three wars--the War of
Devolution, the Dutch War, and the War of the League of Augsburg--we
shall now discuss. A fourth great war, directed toward the acquisition
of the Spanish throne by the Bourbon family, will be treated separately
on account of the wide and varied interests involved.
[Sidenote: The "War of Devolution"]
The War of Devolution was an attempt of Louis to gain the Spanish or
Belgian Netherlands. It will be remembered that in accordance with the
peace of the Pyrenees, Louis had married Maria Theresa, the eldest
daughter of Philip IV of Spain. Now by a subsequent marriage Philip IV
had had a son, a weak-bodied, half-witted prince, who came to the
throne in 1665 as Charles II. Louis XIV at once took advantage of this
turn of affairs to assert in behalf of his wife a claim to a portion of
the Spanish inheritance. The claim was based on a curious custom which
had prevailed in the inheritance of private property in the
Netherlands, to the effect that children of a first marriage should
inherit to the exclusion of those of a subsequent marriage. Louis
insisted that this custom, called "devolution," should be applied not
only to private property but also to sovereignty and that his wife
should be recognized, therefore, as sovereign of the Belgian
Netherlands. In reality the claim was a pure invention, but the French
king thought it would be a sufficient apology for the robbery of a weak
brother-in-law.
Before opening hostilities, Louis XIV made use of his diplomatic wiles
in order to guard himself against assistance which other states might
render to Spain. In the first place, he obtained promises of friendly
neutrality from Holland, Sweden, and the Protestant states of Germany
which had been allied with France during the Thirty Years' War. In the
second place, he threatened to stir up another civil war in the Holy
Roman Empire if the Austrian Habsburgs should help their Spanish
kinsman. Finally, he had no fear of England because that country was in
the midst of a peculiarly bitter trade war with the Dutch. [Footnote:
It was on the eve of this second trade war between England and Holland
(1665-1667) that the English took New Amsterdam from the Dutch (1664)
and rechristened it New York, and during this struggle that the
remarkable Dutch admiral, De Ruyter, burned the English fleet and
shipping on the Thames (June, 1667).]
[Sidenote: The "Balance of Power"]
The War of Devolution lasted from 1667 to 1668. The well-disciplined
and splendidly generaled armies of Louis XIV had no difficulty in
occupying the border fortresses in the Spanish Netherlands. The whole
territory would undoubtedly have fallen to France, had not a change
unexpectedly occurred in international affairs. The trade war between
England and Holland came to a speedy end, and the two former rivals now
joined with Sweden in forming the Triple Alliance to arrest the war and
to put a stop to the French advance. The "balance of power" demanded,
said the allies, that the other European states should combine in order
to prevent any one state from becoming too powerful. This plea for the
"balance of power" was the reply to the French king's plea for "natural
boundaries."
[Sidenote: Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle, 1668]
The threats of the Triple Alliance caused Louis XIV to negotiate the
treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle, by which Spain surrendered to France an
important section of territory in Flanders, including the fortified
cities of Charleroi, Tournai, and Lille, but still retained the greater
part of the Belgian Netherlands. The taste of the Grand Monarch was
thereby whetted, but his appetite hardly appeased.
[Sidenote: Franco-Dutch Rivalry]
Louis blamed the Dutch for his rebuff. He was thoroughly alive to the
fact that Holland would never take kindly to having powerful France as
a near neighbor, and that French acquisition of the Belgian
Netherlands, therefore, would always be opposed by the Dutch. Nor were
wounded vanity and political considerations the only motives for the
Grand Monarch's second war, that against the Dutch. France, as well as
England, was now becoming a commercial and colonial rival of Holland,
and it seemed both to Louis XIV and to Colbert that the French middle
class would be greatly benefited by breaking the trade monopolies of
the Dutch. Louis's second war was quite as much a trade war as a
political conflict.
[Sidenote: Civil Strife in Holland]
First, Louis bent his energies to breaking up the Triple Alliance and
isolating Holland. He took advantage of the political situation in
England to arrange (1670) the secret treaty of Dover with Charles II,
the king of that country: in return for a large pension, which should
free him from reliance upon Parliament, the English king undertook to
declare himself a Roman Catholic and to withdraw from the Triple
Alliance. Liberal pensions likewise bought off the Swedish government.
It seemed now as if Holland, alone and friendless, would have to endure
a war with her powerful enemy. Nor was Holland in shape for a
successful resistance. Ever since she had gained formal recognition of
her independence (1648), she had been torn by civil strife. On one
side, the head of the Orange family, who bore the title of stadholder,
supported by the country districts, the nobles, the Calvinistic clergy,
and the peasantry, hoped to consolidate the state and to establish an
hereditary monarchy. On the other side, the aristocratic burghers and
religious liberals, the townsfolk generally, found an able leader in
the celebrated Grand Pensionary, John DeWitt (1625-1672), who sought to
preserve the republic and the rights of the several provinces. For over
twenty years, the latter party was in power, but as the young prince of
Orange, William III, grew to maturity, signs were not lacking of a
reaction in favor of his party.
[Sidenote: The Dutch War]
Under these circumstances, Louis XIV declared war against Holland in
1672. French troops at once occupied Lorraine on the pretext that its
duke was plotting with the Dutch, and thence, proceeding down the
Rhine, past Cologne, invaded Holland and threatened the prosperous city
of Amsterdam. The Dutch people, in a frenzy of despair, murdered John
DeWitt, whom they unjustly blamed for their reverses; and, at the order
of the young William III, who now assumed supreme command, they cut the
dykes and flooded a large part of northern Holland. The same expedient
which had enabled them to expel the Spaniards in the War of
Independence now stayed the victorious advance of the French.
The refusal of Louis XIV to accept the advantageous terms of peace
offered by the Dutch aroused general apprehension throughout Europe.
The Emperor Leopold and the Great Elector of Brandenburg made an
offensive alliance with Holland, which subsequently was joined by Spain
and several German states. The general struggle, thus precipitated,
continued indeed with success for France. Turenne, by a brilliant
victory, compelled the Great Elector to make peace. The emperor was
defeated. The war was carried into the Spanish Netherlands and Franche
Comté.
[Sidenote: Treaty of Nijmwegen, 1678]
But when at length the English Parliament compelled Charles II to
adhere to the general anti-French alliance, Louis XIV thought it was
time to make peace. As events proved, it was not Holland but Spain that
had to pay the penalties of Louis's second war. By the treaty of
Nijmwegen, the former lost nothing, while the latter ceded to France
the long-coveted province of Franche Comté and several strong
fortresses in the Belgian Netherlands. France, moreover, continued to
occupy the duchy of Lorraine.
[Sidenote: Effects of the Dutch War on France]
Thus, if Louis XIV had failed to punish the insolence of the Dutch, he
had at least succeeded in extending the French frontiers one stage
nearer the Rhine. He had become the greatest and most-feared monarch in
Europe. Yet for these gains France paid heavily. The border provinces
had been wasted by war. The treasury was empty, and the necessity of
negotiating loans and increasing taxes put Colbert in despair. Turenne,
the best general, had been killed late in the contest, and Condé, on
account of ill health, was obliged to withdraw from active service.
Yet at the darker side of the picture, the Grand Monarch refused to
look. He was puffed up with pride by his successes in war and
diplomacy. Like many another vain, ambitious ruler, he felt that what
economic grievances or social discontent might exist within his country
could readily be forgotten or obscured in a blaze of foreign glory--in
the splendor of ambassadors, the glint and din of arms, the grim
shedding of human blood. Having picked the sanguinary path, and at
first found pleasure therein, the Grand Monarch pursued it to an end
bitter for his family and tragic for his people.
[Sidenote: The "Chambers of Reunion" and Further French Annexations]
No sooner was the Dutch War concluded than Louis XIV set out by a
policy of trickery and diplomacy further to augment the French
territories. The cessions, which the treaties of Westphalia and
Nijmwegen guaranteed to France, had been made "with their
dependencies." It now occurred to Louis that doubtless in the old
feudal days of the middle ages or early modern times some, if not all,
of his new acquisitions had possessed feudal suzerainty over other
towns or territories not yet incorporated into France. Although in most
cases such ancient feudal ties had practically lapsed by the close of
the seventeenth century, nevertheless the French king decided to
reinvoke them in order, if possible, to add to his holdings. He
accordingly constituted special courts, called "Chambers of Reunion,"
composed of his own obedient judges, who were to decide what districts
by right of ancient feudal usage should be annexed. So painstaking and
minute were the investigations of these Chambers of Reunion that they
adjudged to their own country, France, no less than twenty important
towns of the Holy Roman Empire, including Luxemburg and Strassburg.
Nothing seemed to prevent the prompt execution of these judgments by
the French king. He had kept his army on a war footing. The king of
England was again in his pay and his alliance. The emperor was hard
pressed by an invasion of the Ottoman Turks. Armed imperial resistance
at Strassburg was quickly overcome (1681), and Vauban, the great
engineer, proceeded to make that city the chief French fortress upon
the Rhine. A weak effort of the Spanish monarch to protect Luxemburg
from French aggression was doomed to dismal failure (1684).
[Sidenote: War of the League of Augsburg or of the Palatinate]
Alarmed by the steady advance of French power, the Emperor Leopold in
1686 succeeded in forming the League of Augsburg with Spain, Sweden,
and several German princes, in order to preserve the territorial
integrity of the Holy Roman Empire. Nor was it long before the League
of Augsburg was called upon to resist further encroachments of the
French king. In 1688 Louis dispatched a large army into the Rhenish
Palatinate to enforce a preposterous claim which he had advanced to
that valuable district. The war which resulted was Louis's third
struggle, and has been variously styled the War of the League of
Augsburg or the War of the Palatinate. In America, where it was to be
paralleled by an opening conflict between French and English colonists,
it has been known as King William's War.
[Sidenote: William III, Stadholder of Holland and King of England]
In his first two wars, Louis XIV could count upon the neutrality, if
not the friendly aid, of the English. Their king was dependent upon him
for financial support in maintaining an absolutist government. Their
influential commercial and trading classes, who still suffered more
from Dutch than from French rivalry, displayed no anxiety to mix unduly
in the dynastic conflicts on the Continent. Louis had an idea that he
could count upon the continuation of the same English policy; he was
certainly on good terms with the English king, James II (1685-1688).
But the deciding factor in England and in the war was destined to be
not the subservient James II but the implacable William III. This
William III, [Footnote: William III (1650-1702), Dutch stadholder in
1672 and British king in 1689.] as stadholder of Holland, had long been
a stubborn opponent of Louis XIV on the Continent; he had repeatedly
displayed his ability as a warrior and as a cool, crafty schemer.
Through his marriage with the princess Mary, elder daughter of James
II, he now managed adroitly to ingratiate himself with the Protestant,
parliamentary, and commercial parties in England that were opposing the
Catholic, absolutist, and tyrannical policies of James.
We shall presently see that the English Revolution of 1688, which drove
James II into exile, was a decisive step in the establishment of
constitutional government in England. It was likewise of supreme
importance in its effects upon the foreign policy of Louis XIV, for it
called to the English throne the son-in-law of James, William III, the
stadholder of Holland and arch enemy of the French king.
[Sidenote: Beginning of a new Hundred Years' War between France and
England]
England, under the guidance of her new sovereign, promptly joined the
League of Augsburg, and declared war against France. Trade rivalries
between Holland and England were in large part composed, and the
colonial empires of the two states, now united under a joint ruler,
naturally came into conflict with the colonial empire of France. Thus,
in addition to the difficulties which the Bourbons encountered in
promoting their dynastic interests on the continent of Europe, they
were henceforth confronted by a vast colonial and commercial struggle
with England. It was the beginning of a Hundred Years' War that was to
be fought for the mastery of India and America.
Louis XIV never seemed to appreciate the importance of the colonial
side of the contest. He was too much engrossed in his ambition of
stretching French boundaries to the Rhine. So in discussing the War of
the League of Augsburg as well as the subsequent War of the Spanish
Succession, we shall devote our attention in this chapter primarily to
the European and dynastic elements, reserving the account of the
parallel colonial struggle to a later chapter on the "World Conflict of
France and Great Britain."
The War of the League of Augsburg, Louis' third war, lasted from 1689
to 1697. Notwithstanding the loss of Turenne and Condé, the splendidly
organized French armies were able to hold the allies at bay and to save
their country from invasion. They even won several victories on the
frontier. But on the sea, the struggle was less successful for Louis,
and a French expedition to Ireland in favor of James II proved
disastrous. After many years of strife, ruinous to all the combatants,
the Grand Monarch sued for peace.
[Sidenote: The Treaty of Ryswick, 1697]
By the treaty of Ryswick, which concluded the War of the League of
Augsburg, Louis XIV (1) surrendered nearly all the places adjudged to
him by the Chambers of Reunion, except Strassburg; (2) allowed the
Dutch to garrison the chief fortresses in the Spanish Netherlands as a
"barrier" against French aggression; (3) granted the Dutch a favorable
commercial treaty; (4) restored Lorraine to its duke; (5) abandoned his
claim to the Palatinate; (6) acknowledged William III as king of
England and promised to support no attempt against his throne. Thus,
the French king lost no territory,--in fact, he obtained full
recognition of his ownership of the whole province of Alsace,--but his
reputation and vanity had been uncomfortably wounded.
THE WAR OF THE SPANISH SUCCESSION
One of the main reasons that prompted Louis XIV to sue for peace and to
abandon his claims on Lorraine and the Palatinate was the rapid
physical decline of the inglorious Spanish monarch, Charles II, of
whose enormous possessions the French king hoped by diplomacy and
intrigue to secure valuable portions.
[Sidenote: The Spanish Inheritance]
Spain was still a great power. Under its crown were gathered not only
the ancient kingdoms of Castile, Aragon, and Navarre in the Spanish
peninsula, but the greater part of the Belgian Netherlands, and in
Italy the kingdom of the Two Sicilies, the duchy of Milan, and the
control of Tuscany, as well as the huge colonial empire in America and
the Philippines. At the time when kings were absolute rulers and
reckoned their territories as personal possessions, much depended upon
the royal succession.
[Sidenote: The Spanish Succession]
Now it happened that the Spanish Habsburgs were dying out in the male
line. Charles II was himself without children or brothers. Of his
sisters, the elder was the wife of Louis XIV and the younger was
married to the Emperor Leopold, the heir of the Austrian Habsburgs.
Louis XIV had renounced by the peace of the Pyrenees (1659) all claims
to the Spanish throne on condition that a large dowry be paid him, but
the impoverished state of the Spanish exchequer had prevented the
payment of the dowry. Louis, therefore, might lay claim to the whole
inheritance of Charles II and entertain the hope of seeing the Bourbons
supplant the Habsburgs in some of the fairest lands of Christendom. In
opposition to the French contention, the emperor was properly moved by
family pride to put forth the claim of his wife and that of himself as
the nearest male relative of the Spanish king. If the contention of
Leopold were sustained, a single Habsburg ruler might once more unite
an empire as vast as that which the Emperor Charles V had once ruled.
On the other side, if the ambition of Louis XIV were realized, a new
and formidable Bourbon empire would be erected. In either case the
European "balance of power" would be destroyed.
[Sidenote: Commercial and Colonial Complications]
Bound up with the political problem in Europe were grave commercial and
colonial questions. According to the mercantilist theories that
flourished throughout the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, every
country which possessed colonies should reserve trade privileges with
them exclusively to its own citizens. So long as France and Spain were
separate and each was only moderately powerful, their commercial
rivals, notably England and Holland, might hope to gain special trade-
concessions from time to time in French or Spanish colonies. But once
the colonial empires of France and Spain were united under a joint
ruler, such a vast monopoly would be created as would effectually
prevent the expansion of English or Dutch commerce while it heightened
the economic prosperity of the Bourbon subjects.
[Sidenote: Attempts to Partition the Spanish Inheritance]
It was natural, therefore, that William III, as stadholder of Holland
and king of England, should hold the balance of power between the
Austrian Habsburgs and the French Bourbons. Both the claimants
appreciated this fact and understood that neither would be allowed
peacefully to appropriate the entire Spanish inheritance. In fact,
several "partition treaties" were patched up between Louis and William
III, with a view to maintaining the balance of power and preventing
either France or Austria from unduly increasing its power. But flaws
were repeatedly found in the treaties, and, as time went on, the
problem grew more vexatious. After the conclusion of the peace of
Ryswick, Louis XIV was absorbed in the game of dividing the property of
the dying Spanish king. One of the very greatest triumphs of Louis'
diplomatic art was the way in which he ingratiated himself in Spanish
favor. It must be remembered that it was Spain which the Grand Monarch
had attacked and despoiled in his earlier wars of aggrandizement, and
neither the Spanish court nor the Spanish people could have many
patriotic motives for loving him. Yet such was his tact and his finesse
that within three years after the treaty of Ryswick he had secured the
respect of the feeble Charles II and the gratitude of the Spanish
people.
[Sidenote: Will of Charles II of Spain in Favor of the French Bourbons]
A month before his pitiful death (1700), Charles II, the last of the
Spanish Habsburgs, summoned all his strength and dictated a will that
awarded his whole inheritance to Philip of Anjou, the grandson of Louis
XIV, with the resolute proviso that under no circumstances should the
Spanish possessions be dismembered. When the news reached Versailles,
the Grand Monarch hesitated. He knew that acceptance meant war at least
with Austria, probably with England. Perhaps he thought of the wretched
condition into which his other wars had plunged his people.
[Sidenote: Acceptance of the Will by Louis XIV]
Hesitation was but an interlude. Ambition triumphed over fear, and the
glory of the royal family over the welfare of France. In the great hall
of mirrors at Versailles, the Grand Monarch heralded his grandson as
Philip V, the first Bourbon king of Spain. And when Philip, left for
Madrid, his now aged grandfather kissed him, and the Spanish ambassador
exultantly declared that "the Pyrenees no longer exist."
Anticipating the inevitable outbreak of hostilities, Louis proceeded to
violate the treaty of Ryswick by seizing the "barrier" fortresses from
the Dutch and by recognizing the son of James II as king of England. He
then made hasty alliances with Bavaria and Savoy, and called out the
combined armies of France and Spain.
[Sidenote: The Grand Alliance against the Bourbons]
Meanwhile, William III and the Emperor Leopold formed the Grand
Alliance, to which at first England, Holland, Austria, and the German
electors of Brandenburg-Prussia, Hanover, and the Palatinate adhered.
Subsequently, Portugal, by means of a favorable commercial treaty with
England,[Footnote: The "Methuen Treaty" (1703).] was induced to join
the alliance, and the duke of Savoy abandoned France in favor of
Austria with the understanding that his country should be recognized as
a kingdom. The allies demanded that the Spanish crown should pass to
the Archduke Charles, the grandson of the emperor, that Spanish trade
monopolies should be broken, and that the power of the French king
should be curtailed.
[Sidenote: The War of the Spanish Succession]
The War of the Spanish Succession--the fourth and final war of Louis
XIV--lasted from 1702 to 1713. Although William III died at its very
commencement, he was certain that it would be vigorously pushed by the
English government of his sister-in-law, Queen Anne (1702-1714). The
bitter struggle on the high seas and in the colonies, where it was
known as Queen Anne's War, will be treated in another place. [Footnote:
See below, p. 308.] The military campaigns in Europe were on a larger
scale than had hitherto been known. Fighting was carried on in the
Netherlands, in the southern Germanies, in Italy, and in Spain.
The tide of war turned steadily for several years against the Bourbons.
The allies possessed the ablest generals of the time in the duke of
Marlborough (1650-1722), the conscientious self-possessed English
commander, and in the skillful and daring Prince Eugene of Savoy (1663-
1736). The great battle of Blenheim (1704) drove the French from the
Holy Roman Empire, and the capture of Gibraltar (1704) gave England a
foothold in Spain and a naval base for the Mediterranean. Prince Eugene
crowded the French out of Italy (1706); and by the victories of
Ramillies (1706), Oudenarde (1708), and Malplaquet (1709), Marlborough
cleared the Netherlands. On land and sea one reverse followed another.
The allies at length were advancing on French soil. It appeared
inevitable that they would settle peace at Paris on their own terms.
Then it was that Louis XIV displayed an energy and devotion worthy of a
better cause. He appealed straight to the patriotism of his people. He
set an example of untiring application to toil. Nor was he disappointed
in his expectations. New recruits hurried to the front; rich and poor
poured in their contributions; a supreme effort was made to stay the
advancing enemy.
The fact that Louis XIV was not worse punished was due to this
remarkable uprising of the French and Spanish nations and likewise to
dissensions among the allies. A change of ministry in England led to
the disgrace and retirement of the duke of Marlborough and made that
country lukewarm in prosecuting the war. Then, too, the unexpected
accession of the Archduke Charles to the imperial and Austrian thrones
(1711) now rendered the claims of the allies' candidate for the Spanish
throne as menacing to the European balance of power as would be the
recognition of the French claimant, Philip of Bourbon.
These circumstances made possible the conclusion of the peace of
Utrecht, with the following major provisions:
[Sidenote: The Peace of Utrecht 1713-1714]
(1) Philip V, grandson of Louis XIV, was acknowledged king of Spain and
the Indies, on condition that the crowns of France and Spain should
never be united. (2) The Austrian Habsburgs were indemnified by
securing Naples, Sardinia, [Footnote: By the treaty of London (1720),
Austria exchanged Sardinia for Sicily.] Milan, and the Belgian
Netherlands. The last-named, which had been called the Spanish
Netherlands since the days of Philip II, were henceforth for a century
styled the Austrian Netherlands.
(3) England received the lion's share of the spoils. She obtained
Newfoundland, Acadia (Nova Scotia), and Hudson Bay from France, and
Gibraltar and Minorca from Spain. She also secured a preferential
tariff for her imports into the great port of Cadiz, the monopoly of
the slave trade, and the right of sending one ship of merchandise a
year to the Spanish colonies. France promised not to assist the Stuarts
in their attempts to regain the English throne.
(4) The Dutch recovered the "barrier" fortresses and for garrisoning
them were promised financial aid by Austria. The Dutch were also
allowed to establish a trade monopoly on the River Scheldt.
(5) The elector of Brandenburg was acknowledged king of Prussia, an
important step In the fortunes of the Hohenzollern family which at the
present time reigns in Germany.
(6) The duchy of Savoy was recognized similarly as a kingdom and was
given the island of Sicily. [Footnote: The title of king was recognized
by the emperor only in 1720, when Savoy exchanged Sicily for Sardinia.
Henceforth the kingdom of Savoy was usually referred to as the kingdom
of Sardinia.] From the house of Savoy has descended the reigning
sovereign of present-day Italy.
[Sidenote: Significance of the Settlement of Utrecht]
The peace of Utrecht marked the cessation of a long conflict between
Spanish Habsburgs and French Bourbons. For nearly a century thereafter
both France and Spain pursued similar foreign policies for the common
interests of the Bourbon family. Bourbon sovereigns have continued,
with few interruptions, to reign in Spain to the present moment.
The Habsburg influence, however, remained paramount in Austria, in the
Holy Roman Empire, in Italy, and in the Belgian Netherlands. It was
against this predominance that the Bourbons were to direct their
dynastic policies throughout the greater part of the eighteenth
century.
The peace of Utrecht likewise marked the rise of English power upon the
seas and the gradual elimination of France as a successful competitor
in the race for colonial mastery. Two states also came into prominence
upon the continent of Europe--Prussia and Savoy--about which the new
German Empire and the unified Italian Kingdom were respectively to be
builded.
[Sidenote: Last Years of the Grand Monarch]
While France was shorn of none of her European conquests, nevertheless
the War of the Spanish Succession was exceedingly disastrous for that
country. In its wake came famine and pestilence, excessive imposts and
taxes, official debasement of the currency, and bankruptcy--a long line
of social and economic disorders. Louis XIV survived the treaty of
Utrecht but two years, and to such depths had his prestige and glory
fallen among his own people, that his corpse, as it passed along the
royal road to the stately tombs of the French kings at St. Denis, "was
saluted by the curses of a noisy crowd sitting in the wine-rooms,
celebrating his death by drinking more than their fill as a
compensation for having suffered too much from hunger during his
lifetime. Such was the coarse but true epitaph which popular opinion
accorded to the Grand Monarch."
[Sidenote: Misgovernment of France during Minority of Louis XV]
Nor had the immediate future much better things in store for exhausted
France. The successor upon the absolutist throne was Louis XV, great-
grandson of Louis XIV and a boy of five years of age, who did not
undertake to exercise personal power until near the middle of the
eighteenth century. In the meantime the country was governed for about
eight years by the king's uncle, the duke of Orleans, and then for
twenty years by Cardinal Fleury.
[Sidenote: John Law]
Orleans loved pleasure and gave himself to a life of debauchery; he
cared little for the boy-king, whose education and training he
grievously neglected. His foreign policy was weak and vacillating, and
his several efforts to reform abuses in the political and economic
institutions of Louis XIV invariably ended in failure. It was while
experimenting with the disorganized finances that he was duped by a
Scotch adventurer and promoter, a certain John Law (1671-1729). Law had
an idea that a gigantic corporation might be formed for French colonial
trade, [Footnote: Law's corporation was actually important in the
development of Louisiana.] shares might be widely sold throughout the
country, and the proceeds therefrom utilized to wipe out the public
debt. Orleans accepted the scheme and for a while the country went mad
with the fever of speculation. In due time, however, the stock was
discovered to be worthless, the bubble burst, and a terrible panic
ensued. The net result was increased misery for the nation.
[Sidenote: Fleury and the War of the Polish Election]
The little sense which Orleans possessed was sufficient to keep him out
of foreign war [Footnote: France was at peace throughout his regency,
except for a brief time (1719-1720) when Orleans joined the British
government in preventing his Spanish cousin, Philip V, from upsetting
the treaty of Utrecht.] but even that was lacking to his successor,
Cardinal Fleury. Fleury was dragged into a war (1733-1738) with Austria
and Russia over the election of a Polish king. The allies supported the
elector of Saxony; France supported a Pole, the father-in-law of Louis
XV, Stanislaus Leszczinski. France was defeated and Louis XV had to
content himself with securing the duchy of Lorraine for his father-in-
law. Thus, family ambition merely added to the economic distress of the
French people.
It was during the War of the Polish Election, however, that the Bourbon
king of Spain, perceiving his rivals engaged elsewhere, seized the
kingdom of the Two Sicilies from Austria and put a member of his own
family on its throne. Thus, in the eighteenth century, the Bourbons
dominated France, Spain, and southern Italy.
[Illustration: THE SPANISH SUCCESSION]
[Illustration: THE BOURBON FAMILY, 1589-1915 KINGS OF FRANCE, SPAIN,
AND NAPLES]
ADDITIONAL READING
GENERAL. Brief accounts: J. H. Robinson and C. A. Beard, _The
Development of Modern Europe_, Vol. I (1907), ch. i-iii; H. O. Wakeman,
_The Ascendancy of France, 1598-1715_ (1894), ch. ix-xi, xiv, xv; A. H.
Johnson, _The Age of the Enlightened Despot, 1660-1789_ (1910), ch i-
iii, vi; J. H. Sacret, _Bourbon and Vasa, 1610-1715_ (1914), ch. viii-
xii; Arthur Hassall, _Louis XIV and the Zenith of the French Monarchy_
(1897) in the "Heroes of the Nations" Series; H. T. Dyer, _A History of
Modern Europe from the Fall of Constantinople_, 3d ed. rev. by Arthur
Hassall (1901), ch. xxxvii, xxxix-xl, xlii-xliv; A. J. Grant, _The
French Monarchy, 1483-1789_, Vol. II (1900), ch. x-xvi; G. W. Kitchin,
_A History of France_, Vol. III (1899), Books V and VI, ch. i, ii;
Victor Duruy, _History of Modern Times_, trans. and rev. by E. A.
Grosvenor (1894), ch. xxi-xxiii. More detailed treatments: _Cambridge
Modern History_, Vol. V (1908), ch. i-iii, vii-ix, xiii, xiv, Vol. VI
(1909), ch. iv-vi; _Histoire générale_, Vol. VI, ch. iii-v, vii-ix,
xii-xvi, xx, Vol. VII, ch. i-iii; _Histoire de France_, ed. by Ernest
Lavisse, Vols. VII and VIII (1906-1909); _History of All Nations_, Vol.
XIII, _The Age of Louis XIV_, by Martin Philippson.
DOMESTIC AFFAIRS OF FRANCE. Cécile Hugon, _Social France in the
Seventeenth Century_ (1911), popular, suggestive, and well-
illustrated. On Colbert: A. J. Sargent, _Economic Policy of Colbert_
(1899); S. L. Mims, _Colbert's West India Policy_ (1912); Émile
Levasseur, _Histoire des classes ouvrières et de l'industrie en France
avant 1789_, Vol. II (1901), Book VI; Pierre Clément (editor),
_Lettres, Instructions et Mémoires de Colbert_, 7 vols. in 9 (1861-
1873). H. M. Baird, _The Huguenots and the Revocation of the Edict of
Nantes_, 2 vols. (1895), a detailed study by a warm partisan of the
French Protestants. Among the numerous important sources for the reign
of Louis XIV should be mentioned especially F. A. Isambert (editor),
_Recueil général des anciennes lois_, Vols. XVIII-XX, containing
significant statutes of the reign; G. B. Depping (editor),
_Correspondance administrative sous le règne de Louis XIV_, 4 vols.
(1850-1855), for the system of government; Arthur de Boislisle
(editor), _Correspondance des contrôleurs généraux_, 2 vols., for the
fiscal system. Voltaire's brilliant _Age of Louis the Fourteenth_ has
been translated into English; an authoritative history of French
literature in the Age of Louis XIV is Louis Petit de Julleville
(editor), _Histoire de la langue et de la littérature française_, Vol.
V (1898). The best account of the minority of Louis XV is that of J. B.
Perkins, _France under the Regency_ (1892); a brief summary is Arthur
Hassall, _The Balance of Power, 1715-1789_ (1896), ch. i-iv.
FOREIGN WARS OF LOUIS XIV. On Louis XIV's relations with the Dutch: P.
J. Blok, _History of the People of the Netherlands_, Part IV,
_Frederick Henry, John DeWitt, William III_, abridged Eng. trans.
by O. A. Bierstadt (1907). On his relations with the empire: Ruth
Putnam, _Alsace and Lorraine from Cæsar to Kaiser, 58 B.C.-1871
A.D._ (1914), a popular narrative; Franz Krones, _Handbuch der
Geschichte Oesterreichs_, Vol. III, Book XVI, Vol. IV, Book XVII
(1878), a standard German work. On his relations with Spain: M. A. S.
Hume, _Spain, its Greatness and Decay, 1479-1788_ (1898), ch. ix-
xiii. On Louis XIV's relations with England: Osmund Airy, _The
English Restoration and Louis XIV_ (1895), in the "Epochs of Modern
History" Series; Sir J. R. Seeley, _The Growth of British Policy_,
2 vols. (1895), especially Vol. II, Parts IV and V; Earl Stanhope,
_History of England, Comprising the Reign of Queen Anne until the
Peace of Utrecht_ (1870), a rather dry account of the War of the
Spanish Succession; G. J. (Viscount) Wolseley, _Life of John
Churchill, Duke of Marlborough, to the Accession of Queen Anne_, 4th
ed., 2 vols. (1894), an apology for Marlborough; J. S. Corbett,
_England in the Mediterranean, 1603-1713_, Vol. II (1904), for
English naval operations; J. W. Gerard, _The Peace of Utrecht_
(1885). On the diplomacy of the whole period: D. T. Hill, _History of
Diplomacy in the International Development of Europe,_ Vol. III
(1914), ch. i-iv, a clear outline; Emile Bourgeois, _Manuel
historique de politique étrangère_, 4th ed., Vol. I (1906), ch. iii,
iv, vii, ix, xiv; Arsène Legrelle, _La diplomatie française et la
succession d'Espagne, 1659-1725_, 4 vols. (1888-1892), a minute
study of an important phase of Louis XIV's diplomacy; the text of the
principal diplomatic documents is in course of publication at Paris (20
vols., 1884-1913) as the _Recueil des instructions données aux
ambassadeurs et ministres de France depuis les traités de Westphalie
jusqu'à la révolution française_.
MEMOIRS OF THE AGE OF LOUIS XIV. Among the multitudinous memoirs of the
period, the most significant, from the standpoint of the general
historian, are: Marquise de Sévigné, _Lettres_, delightful
epistles relating mainly to the years 1670-1696, edited in fullest form
for "Les grands écrivains de la France" by Monmerqué, 14 vols. (1862-
1868), selections of which have been translated into English by C. Syms
(1898); Duc de Saint-Simon, _Mémoires_, the most celebrated of
memoirs, dealing with many events of the years 1692-1723, gossipy and
racily written but occasionally inaccurate and frequently partisan,
edited many times--most recently and best for "Les grands écrivains de
la France" by Arthur de Boislisle, 30 vols. (1879-1916), of which a
much-abridged translation has been published in English, 4 vols.;
Marquis de Dangeau, _Journal_, 19 vols. (1854-1882), written day
by day, throughout the years 1684-1720, by a conscientious and well-
informed member of the royal entourage; _Life and Letters of
Charlotte Elizabeth_ (1889), select letters, trans. into English, of
a German princess who married Louis XIV's brother, of which the most
complete French edition is that of Jaeglé, 3 vols. (1890). See also
Comtesse de Puliga, _Madame de Sévigné, her Correspondents and
Contemporaries_, 2 vols. (1873), and, for important collections of
miscellaneous memoirs of the period, J. F. Michaud and J. J. F.
Poujoulat, _Nouvelle collection des mémoires relatifs à l'histoire de
France depuis le 13e siècle jusqu'à la fin du 18e siècle_, 34 vols.
(1854), and Louis Lafaist and L. F. Danjou, _Archives curieuses de
l'histoire de France_, 27 vols. (1834-1840).