LOUIS XIV. AND WILLIAM III.
1672–1698
The war between France and the Dutch--The campaign of 1672--Refusal
of reasonable terms--Coalition against France--The campaigns of
1674–1675--Exhaustion of France--The peace of Nimwegen--Virtual
defeat of Louis’s policy--The character and influence of William
III.--The quarrel of Louis with the Papacy--The four
resolutions of 1682--Analogy to the English Reformation--Settlement
of the dispute--Policy of religious uniformity--Influence of Madame
de Maintenon--Persecution of the Huguenots--Revocation of the
Edict of Nantes--Aggressions of Louis--Formation of the league of
Augsburg--Quarrel between Louis and James II.--The war of the
league of Augsburg--Importance of the naval operations--Exhaustion of
France--Peace of Ryswick.
[Sidenote: =Grandeur of Louis XIV., 1672.=]
The year 1672 saw Louis XIV. at the height of his glory,
and France at the summit of the prosperity to which she attained
under his guidance. He was in the prime of life, his court was the
most magnificent and distinguished in Europe, his palace the most
splendid, his throne the most assured. As yet no breath of domestic
or national misfortune had visited the complexion of his fortunes too
roughly. Alone among the monarchs of Europe, thanks to the thrifty
administration of Colbert, he enjoyed the supreme satisfaction of a
well-filled treasury; and if since the war of devolution occasional
grumblings made themselves heard about the reimposition of taxes
once remitted, yet few of the tax-payers would not be constrained
on examination to admit that if the taxes had risen, their power
of paying them had doubled. Through the willing service of able
negotiators his diplomacy was triumphant in all quarters of Europe.
There was not a state which did not dread his displeasure, which was
not prepared to sacrifice something for his friendship. The watchful
diligence of Louvois had given to him as the champion of his honour,
and the instrument of his ambition, a professional army, superior in
discipline, in organisation, in leadership to all the other armies
of Europe put together. His navy, already more powerful than that of
Spain, threatened soon to rival the English and the Dutch on their own
element. England was already his vassal, Sweden Poland and half the
petty sovereigns of Germany his subsidised allies, Spain his defeated
enemy. Only the upstart merchants of Amsterdam ventured to assert
their independence of him and to dispute his authority. He had but to
stretch forth his hand and seize the fruit of supremacy over Europe
thus temptingly lying open to his grasp. He had but to ‘travel’ in the
United Provinces to reduce them to due submission.
[Sidenote: =The Dutch war, 1672.=]
Nevertheless he was wise enough to neglect no precaution to ensure the
safety of his travelling tour. It was in no empty, braggart spirit that
he made war upon so tough an enemy in so difficult a country. Charles
II., in pursuance of the treaty of Dover, declared war upon
the Dutch in March, and Louis trusted to him with the assistance of one
hundred and twenty French vessels to keep the formidable Ruyter quiet
in port, while the great effort was being made by land. Charleroi was
chosen as the basis of operations, and large stores of every warlike
necessity were collected there by Louvois with the utmost diligence.
Further magazines were established at the advanced post of Neuss near
Dusseldorf in the electorate of Köln. No longer, as in the days of
Wallenstein, was war to support war, but for the first time in modern
warfare the army was to be regularly provisioned from its base by
means of magazines established along the line of route. In the early
spring 176,000 men were massed at Charleroi under the orders of Condé
and Turenne. On the 5th of May Louis joined the army and the storm
burst upon the devoted Dutch.[4] [Sidenote: =Campaign of 1672.=]
Marching down the Meuse valley past Liége and Maestricht, masking the
latter fortress as he went, an operation hitherto unconceived of, he
turned sharply to the right at Ruremonde and reached his magazines at
Neuss on the Rhine safely on the 31st. Having thus gained the Rhine
valley he pushed Condé over the river at Kaiserwerth to sweep the right
bank and capture Wesel, while Turenne marched down the left bank and
made himself master of the smaller fortresses of Orsoy Rhynberg and
Bürick. On the 6th of June Turenne rejoined Condé at Wesel, and the
whole army poured down the right bank unchecked across the frontier of
Guelderland, until it was brought to a stop on the 11th by the little
stream of the Yssel, behind which William was posted at the head of all
the available Dutch troops. The hesitation was but momentary. Instead
of forcing the line of the Yssel in the face of the enemy, always a
most hazardous operation, Turenne determined to turn it. On his left
flank as he faced William on the Yssel ran the broad but fordable
stream of the old Rhine, which, leaving the main branch of the river,
called the Waal, in a northerly direction, receives the water of the
Yssel a few miles farther down at Arnheim, where, turning again to
the west, it flows on to the sea. Half-way between Arnheim and the
junction of the Waal and the Rhine is the ford of the Tolhuys. There,
on the 12th of June, Condé crossed the old Rhine with his cavalry
almost without opposition. On the next day a bridge was thrown across
the stream, and the king and the whole army followed. After securing
Nimwegen in his rear, Louis marched down the left bank of the old Rhine
and crossed it again a little below Arnheim without difficulty. He had
thus completely turned William’s position on the Yssel and conquered
the far more formidable difficulties of the country. When he left
Charleroi, only six weeks before, he had, between him and the heart of
his enemies’ country, the deep difficult and treacherous streams of the
Meuse, the Waal, and the Rhine, defended at the most critical points
of their course by the formidable fortresses of Maestricht, Wesel,
Nimwegen and Arnheim. Well might de Witt and the Dutch have calculated
that, according to the usual movements of war in those days, there was
material there for two campaigns at least. By the brilliant strategy
of Turenne--for to him the plan was due--all these difficulties had
been surmounted, and Louis was within striking distance of Amsterdam
itself, without having fought a battle, almost without the loss of
a man. The crossing of the Rhine at Tolhuys was indeed in itself a
military operation of the fourth order, as Napoleon called it. So was
the blockade of Ulm in 1805, but both marked the successful conclusion
of an offensive campaign which evinced the highest qualities of
strategical skill.
[Sidenote: =The cutting of the dykes.=]
Just in the very crisis of success Louis drew back. Condé urged him to
make the most of his opportunity, push on to Amsterdam and end the war
at a blow. There was no one to resist him. He might have ‘travelled
as safely’ to Amsterdam as he had hitherto ‘travelled safely’ to
Arnheim. But with inconceivable folly he refused, sent Turenne towards
Rotterdam, and sat down himself before the petty forts on the Yssel.
Rochefort, acting on his own initiative, rushed forward with some
cavalry to seize Muyden, and so prevent the cutting of the dykes
outside Amsterdam, but he was too late. A Dutch garrison was thrown in
just in time. De Witt had ordered all to be in readiness to let in the
water directly the peasantry had moved from the doomed fields. For a
few days the anxiety was intense lest the French should appear before
all was prepared, but on the 18th the signal was given. The sea resumed
her ancient mastery and Amsterdam was safe on her island throne.
A breathing space was all that was required. If the Dutch could save
their independence until the winter was passed, it was pretty certain
that a coalition against France could be formed. [Sidenote: =Refusal
of reasonable terms of peace by Louis.=] On the 7th of June the
victory of Ruyter over the combined fleets of France and England
removed all danger from the sea. Holland was safe, and stood firm
against all suggestion of submission, but the other provinces either
in the hands of Louis or exposed to his irresistible power desired
peace. For the time they prevailed, and an embassy reached Louis at
the end of June offering him 6,000,000 of livres and the fortress and
district of Maestricht. This would have made him absolute master of
the Spanish Netherlands whenever he chose to occupy them, yet at the
advice of Louvois he deliberately threw away the solid results of his
success merely to gratify his pride. He demanded that the Dutch should
acknowledge their dependence on him, maintain Catholicism with public
money, suppress all commercial edicts unfavourable to France, and pay
24,000,000 of livres. This was in fact to demand the surrender of their
independence, and was only another way of saying that the war was to
be a duel to death. [Sidenote: =Coalition against France.=]They
accepted the position, elected William III. stadtholder and
captain and admiral general, and began to organise a coalition against
the tyrant of Europe. In October 1672 the Emperor Leopold and the Great
Elector made common cause with the Dutch and the war became European.
[Sidenote: =Campaign of 1673.=]
The difference was at once noticeable. Turenne was sent across the
Rhine into Westphalia to prevent the imperial troops under Montecuculli
and the Brandenburgers from crossing to the assistance of William
from Germany, while Condé was told off to guard Alsace from invasion.
The French army thus divided into three parts lost its decisive
superiority. Yet, thanks to its superior organisation and the genius
of Turenne, it emerged victoriously from the campaign of 1673. William
was kept quiet by Luxembourg, while Turenne, by brilliant manœuvring,
checked Montecuculli’s advance on the Rhine, separated him from the
Great Elector, and driving the latter back to Halberstadt, forced
him to make peace on June 6th. But at sea the Dutch maintained their
superiority. On August 21st the intrepid Ruyter inflicted a final
defeat upon Rupert and the English fleet off the coast of Zealand. He
remained at the close of the day master of the channel, and as long as
the water-way was open Holland was safe.
[Sidenote: =Defection of Louis’s allies.=]
In spite of Louis’s success in the field, the coalition continued to
grow. In August 1673 it was joined by Spain and the duke of Lorraine,
in January 1674 by Denmark, in March by the Elector Palatine, in May by
the diet of the Empire, and in July the Great Elector ventured again
to draw the sword. By the middle of the year 1674 nearly all Europe
was engaged against France. Meanwhile her own allies were falling off.
In the autumn of 1673 Montecuculli succeeded in outwitting Turenne.
Slipping past him he joined William on the Rhine and captured Bonn on
November 12th. Frightened by this success the electors of Trier and
Köln and the bishop of Münster hastened to make peace. But that was not
the worst. In February 1674 news came to Versailles that England had
separated her interests from those of France, and Louis found himself
with Sweden as his only ally alone against the world.
[Illustration: MAP TO ILLUSTRATE THE CAMPAIGNS
OF 1674 and 1704.]
[Sidenote: =France and Sweden alone against Europe, 1674.=]
The history of the four remaining years of the war is the history of a
noble struggle against impossible odds. However great the superiority
of French leadership and of French organisation, it was out of the
question that France could for long maintain so unequal a struggle. The
allies simply had to tire her out. In the end they must be victorious.
Yet for some time victory was rendered doubtful by the skill and
resource shown by the French commanders. They saw at once the necessity
of acting on the defensive behind the protection of the fortresses of
the Spanish Netherlands and the Rhine. In 1674 Condé retiring at once
from the United Provinces, out-manœuvred William on the line of the
Meuse and the Sambre, driving him back and capturing his baggage train
at Seneff on August 11th. Louis overran Franche Comté, while Turenne
assumed the offensive on the Rhine to divert the attention of the
imperialists. Crossing the river he advanced to Sinzheim and defeating
the enemy there drove him behind the Neckar. The troops at his disposal
were, however, not sufficient for him to maintain his ground and defend
so large a tract of country as the upper Rhineland. In his difficulty
he took a course justifiable only by extreme necessity. Devastating
the palatinate with fire and sword he turned all the rich smiling
country on both sides of the Rhine into a desert, so that the enemy
could not maintain himself there. Having thus limited the area of the
campaign he retired behind the Rhine, and prepared to keep his opponent
at bay on the other side. For some months he was successful, but late
in October the imperialist army, having effected a junction with the
Brandenburgers, managed to elude his vigilance, crossed the river at
Mainz, and marching up the left bank established themselves securely
in lower Alsace. The Rhine barrier was lost. Unless Turenne could
recover it before the campaigning season of 1675 began, the tide of
war must roll back to the Vosges and the plain of Châlons. [Sidenote:
=Winter campaign of Turenne, 1674–75.=] Turenne’s spirit rose
to the crisis. Under his orders was an army of veterans capable of
endurance and devoted to himself. He determined on a masterly piece of
strategy. The Vosges mountains run parallel to the Rhine, fringing the
rich river valley at a distance of some twenty miles from the stream,
and ever increasing in height and ruggedness as they trend southwards,
until from the mountainous, and in winter snow-covered, group of the
Belchen they suddenly sweep down to the plain at the famous Gap of
Belfort, which divides them from the Jura. While the imperialists were
slowly dispersing themselves among the comfortable towns in the river
valley between Strasburg and Mühlhausen, Turenne at the end of November
retired behind the chain of the Vosges, as if to go into winter
quarters in Lorraine. Having put the mountains as a screen between him
and his enemy, he suddenly turned south from Lixheim, marched behind
the Vosges until he reached the rugged group at the southern end where
rise the head-waters of the Moselle. Then dividing his veterans into
four divisions he sent them over the mountain passes through the snow
in the dead of winter to their rendezvous at Belfort. On the 27th
of December the operation was complete. Forty thousand of the best
soldiers of Europe were gathered at the top of the rich Rhine valley of
Alsace, where the enemy was quietly enjoying himself in unsuspecting
security. On the 28th Turenne swept down upon them through the Gap of
Belfort, occupied Mühlhausen, defeated the Great Elector at Colmar, and
bundled the whole army neck and crop out of Alsace across the river at
Strasburg. The Rhine frontier was regained at a blow. Montecuculli was
sent for in haste as the only general fit to cope with so terrible an
antagonist, but fortune seemed to have deserted his standards. In the
spring of 1675 Turenne crossed the Rhine below Strasburg. By a series
of skilful manœuvres he forced Montecuculli from the Rhine to the
Neckar, from the Neckar back to the Black Forest. [Sidenote: =Death
of Turenne, 1675.=]There at Sasbach he obliged him to accept battle
in a position in which success was impossible. ‘I have him now,’ said
Turenne as he reconnoitred the enemy on July 26th. Almost as he spoke a
chance shot struck him on the breast and killed him on the spot.
[Sidenote: =Exhaustion of France.=]
With Turenne fell the last hope of France in the field. Montecuculli
drove the dismayed French over the river into Alsace, and was only
checked by the skill of Condé, who arrived with reinforcements in
time to save Hagenau and Philipsburg. Créqui, who succeeded Condé
on the Moselle, lost Trier in September. The Swedes, who had made a
diversion in favour of France by attacking the Great Elector, were
soundly beaten by him on land at Fehrbellin, and by the Danish and
Dutch fleets at sea in the Baltic. At the end of the year Condé tired
of warfare retired from the command. France was growing exhausted.
Murmurs were heard on all sides. Already the reforms of Colbert were
being undone, and corruption, the sure handmaid of financial distress,
was again raising her head. Still, however, the superiority of the
French soldier showed itself in battle, and both the Dutch and the
imperialists became as tired of fighting battles which they never won,
as the French were of winning victories which they could not utilise.
[Sidenote: =Negotiations for peace.=] Negotiations were set on
foot between the Dutch and Charles and Louis which followed the usual
tortuous course. William did his best to prevent a treaty, and even
wantonly fought a pitched battle with Luxemburg on August 14th, 1678,
near Mons, in which thousands of men were killed, in the last desperate
hope of breaking off negotiations, although he knew that the peace was
almost certainly signed, but it was happily too late. On August 10th,
1678, a treaty was concluded between Louis and the Dutch, on September
17th Spain and France came to terms, and on February 2d, 1679, peace
was made between France and the Emperor. Soon afterwards the minor
combatants followed suit.
[Sidenote: =The peace of Nimwegen, 1678.=]
By these treaties, generally known as the peace of Nimwegen the
United Provinces were not called upon to surrender one acre of their
territory, while they gained the removal of the hostile restrictions
on their trade with France. The barrier of the Spanish Netherlands was
not materially interfered with, and Spain even recovered Charleroi and
some other towns which she had surrendered at Aix-la-Chapelle, and
the frontier was fixed on a fairly straight line, from Dunkirk to the
Sambre at Maubeuge. The Emperor recovered Philipsburg, but surrendered
Freiburg with the passage of the river at Breisach. The only
substantial gain to France was the actual annexation of Franche Comté,
and the virtual annexation of Lorraine. True to his one faithful ally
Louis insisted on the restoration to Sweden of the territories in
Germany taken from her by the Great Elector.
[Sidenote: =Virtual defeat of Louis’s policy.=]
The treaty of Nimwegen is often looked upon as the summit of the
success of Louis XIV., the pinnacle of his glory. It is rather the
first step in his decline, for it marks the limits of his power. He had
made deliberately a bid for supremacy over Europe, and he had failed.
He had determined on an act of signal vengeance upon the petty nation
which had dared to thwart his will, and he had been baffled. But this
was not all. Not only was his failure one of fact, but it was one of
policy. He had failed in a way which made it certain that he would
fail again, if he made a similar attempt. However carefully laid his
plans, however skilfully conceived his campaigns, however brilliantly
led his armies, he could not fight single-handed against Europe; and
Europe was as certain to combine sooner or later against him, if he
continued his policy of universal dominion, as the tides were certain
to ebb and to flow. The selfishness of a Charles II., the ambition of a
bishop of Münster, the greediness of a Swedish oligarchy, the poverty
of a Polish nobility, the cunning inertness of a Leopold might enable
him to purchase alliance and secure neutrality until the storm-cloud
actually burst, until the danger of a French tyranny became instant and
menacing. But in the end the web of diplomacy, however deftly woven,
was certain to be torn into fragments before the rude shock of the
spirit of nationality and the love of independence. De Witt with his
policy of the Triple Alliance had shown Europe how the monster might be
bridled, and Europe did not forget the lesson. Interests rival to those
of France were too numerous, too varied, too deep-seated in national
character, to be for long obscured by the arts of diplomacy, or quieted
by the alliance of governments. The principle of the balance of power
was certain to assert itself sooner or later, and as long as Louis
persisted in an attempt to make himself dictator of Europe, whether
by the conquest of the maritime powers, or by the annexation of the
dominions of Spain, or by the disintegration of Germany and Austria,
so long would Europe combine against him and prevent that dictatorship
from becoming an accomplished fact. Unfortunately, like Napoleon after
him, Louis could not bring himself to acknowledge the permanent limits
of his power. He could not understand that he had embarked on a policy
impossible in the very nature of things. He looked upon Nimwegen as he
had looked upon Aix-la-Chapelle, merely as a check in the game which
he was playing. He knew he had made some mistakes in his play. A fresh
combination of pieces directed by a riper experience could not fail to
succeed. So, like the gambler, who, convinced of the infallibility of
his system, attributes his losses to mere errors of calculation which
experience and care must detect, Louis, in no wise disconcerted by the
failure of Nimwegen, began with increased assiduity to weave his plots
and repair his errors, so that he might again be ready to assert his
claims, when the turn of the cards seemed once more favourable to his
fortune.
[Sidenote: =Character of William III.=]
In reality while Louis was persuading himself that he was marching by
steady and statesmanlike steps to a sure goal, his chances of ultimate
success were dwindling daily. The opposition to him in Europe had
acquired both a policy and a leader. Never had a hero of a great cause
less of the heroic about him than had William of Orange. Taught in
the school of adversity, he had become a man before ever he knew what
it was to be a boy. Implicated from his birth in a web of intrigue,
nurtured in an atmosphere of suspicion, surrounded by foes of his
race and cause, his earliest lessons were those of deceit and fraud.
Generous instincts withered away in a heart in which affection had
ever to give place to policy. At the age of twenty he was heartless
as a Talleyrand, unscrupulous as a Walpole, cold, pitiless, and
self-concentrated as Macchiavelli himself. Strange indeed was the
contrast between this puny, dyspeptic, selfish, taciturn stripling
of twenty, untouched by sentiment, and inaccessible to love, and the
open-hearted, magnificent Louis in the prime of life and of glory,
the prince of gallants and the pattern of chivalry. Yet deep down in
the cold breast of William there burned a fire more enduring and more
intense than any of the fitful flashes which illumined from time to
time the soul of the splendid king. [Sidenote: =Ennobling influence
of his enmity to Louis.=] Love for his country, which, under the
peculiar circumstances of the time, translated itself into an undying
and unconquerable hatred of the aggression and tyranny of France,
slowly through long years of suffering and of patience, fused the
selfish heartlessness of William into metal of heroic stamp. To him
was not given the power of witching the world with noble deeds. He
could not plan campaigns like Turenne, or win battles like Condé or
Luxemburg. He could not enmesh two hemispheres in the bonds of his
policy like Chatham, he could not dazzle Europe with the glow of his
fame like Charles XII., or entrance it with the richness of
personal gifts like Henry IV. He could not command admiration
like Gustavus Adolphus, or extort obedience like Richelieu. The depths
of mind and of character which move nations and sway the world had no
place within the narrow limits of his mean and pedantic nature. But in
their stead were developed to an almost abnormal extent the unyielding
and tenacious qualities of his stubborn ancestry. Endurance, fortitude,
perseverance, inspiring and inspired by unconquerable hate and enlisted
in the noble cause of patriotism and liberty, made him a hero in spite
of himself. He would not recognise failure, he would not accept defeat.
He knew not the meaning of despair. Never for an instant was he tempted
to put personal ambition before public duty, for to him the public duty
of resistance to France summed up his personal ambition.
He valued the crown of England only because it enlisted the power
of England on his side against the great enemy. He was prepared to
abdicate the moment he found that England was but half-hearted and
insular in her views about the war. To die in the last ditch was in
his mouth no empty or braggart boast. He would no more have dreamed
of surrendering the religion and liberty of his country to Louis
XIV. than would Leonidas of submitting to the Persians at
Thermopylæ. He waged the military and diplomatic struggle of thirty
years in the spirit of that declaration. He fought throughout not as a
conqueror but as a defender, till he won for himself the position of
the saviour of his country, and the champion of the liberty of Europe.
Concentrating all his faculties on the personal duel in which he was
engaged, he never fully realised the magnitude of the issues at stake,
and the far-reaching effects of the policy which he had undertaken. To
his successors fell the task of reaping the harvest prepared by his
patient and painful husbandry, to resettle the map of Europe after the
overthrow of the tyrant, and to lay down at Utrecht a new balance of
power. Naturally he could not know that Steinkirk was but the prelude
to Blenheim, and that la Hogue alone made possible the glories alike
of Plassey and Quebec; yet if his spirit was permitted to follow the
Maison du Roi in their flight from Ramillies, or a century later to
brood over the shattered hulks amid the storms of Trafalgar, well might
he proudly have claimed for himself his share in the wreaths of laurel
which encircled the brows of Marlborough and of Nelson.
[Sidenote: =Quarrel of Louis with the Papacy.=]
For ten years Europe was at peace, but it was a peace which was in
reality little more than a breathing space, devoted by both parties
to preparations for the next round in the struggle. While William
was plotting and scheming for his father-in-law’s crown, Louis was
strengthening his frontier by diplomacy as well as by arms. Both
realised that the duel was still undecided, both hesitated to be the
first to loose again the dogs of war. Meanwhile other difficulties
of a serious nature came up for settlement in France herself. The
Church of France had always maintained a much greater independence
of the authority of the Pope than had been the case in Spain or in
Italy or in Germany since the Reformation. The long continued presence
of Mohammedanism in Spain, and the pressure of heresy in Germany,
had naturally tended to augment the personal authority of the Pope
over those countries. In France the tendency had been the other way.
National spirit and national pride called out by the liberation of the
country from the English yoke, and employed in the task of conquest
in Italy, emphasised national rights and distinctions. As in England
the feeling of the people was strongly anti-papal, and it was the
Crown not the Church which found it to its interest to make surrender
to the claims of the Roman Curia, in order to gain a useful ally in
its struggle with the nobles. [Sidenote: =The independence of the
Gallican Church.=] As however the royal power in France gradually
made itself supreme over all departments of the national life, the
kings began in their turn to take up the cudgels against the Pope in
a quarrel, which could not fail in the end to minister to their own
greatness. Francis I. was within an ace of declaring France
independent of the Holy See, the Valois kings refused for many years to
take any part whatever in the council of Trent, and when the cardinal
of Lorraine did appear with the French bishops, it was rather to
present an ultimatum than to take part in a discussion. The doctrinal
decisions of the council were never formally accepted by France at all.
Heresy, in the form of Huguenotism, was suppressed in France much more
by the Crown than by the efforts of the Pope, and the Jesuits were only
admitted into France under strict limitations. Richelieu and Mazarin,
though cardinals of the Roman Church, did not hesitate to pursue a
policy in strong opposition to the wishes of the Pope, and Louis
XIV. himself had not scrupled in the earlier years of his
reign to put a public indignity upon the Pontiff. The very orthodoxy of
the kings themselves and of their government made them the more jealous
of all exercise of authority in their dominions by another sovereign,
even though he was the Pope.
[Sidenote: =Claim of the regale over the whole of France.=]
Among the acknowledged rights of the Crown of France was that of
receiving the emoluments of all benefices during vacancy, which was
known as the _regale_, but it was a right which depended solely
upon custom, and obtained only in the ancient dominions of the
Crown of France. In spite of this, in 1673, Louis XIV., pursuing
his usual policy of royal aggrandisement, issued an edict asserting
that according to law and to custom the _regale_ applied to all the
bishoprics of the kingdom. [Sidenote: =Denied by the Pope.=] On this
the bishops of Pamiers and Alais, who were theologically opposed to the
Jesuit influence dominant in the court, protested and appealed to the
Pope, Innocent XI. who at once gave his decision in their favour. This
action on the part of the bishops and the Pope raised the question out
of the category of a money dispute between the Crown and some of the
clergy, into that of a grave constitutional question between the Church
of France and the Pope. Men asked themselves in France what right the
Pope had to interfere with the emoluments of the Crown, just as in
England one hundred and fifty years before they had asked themselves by
what right the Pope claimed the first-fruits of English benefices. But
Louis XIV. was fortunate enough to find ready to his hand a champion of
his cause far more noble than a Cranmer or a Cromwell. To the orthodoxy
of Sir Thomas More, Bossuet, bishop of Meaux, added the fervid
eloquence of S. Bernard and the learning and taste of Erasmus. In him
the flame of patriotism burned at fever heat. Deeply imbued with the
principles of his age loyalty was to him the first of virtues, and the
king dilated before his dazzled eyes, not as the grasping tyrant that
he really was, but as the God-given champion of an oppressed Church.
[Sidenote: =The four Resolutions, 1682.=] Bossuet felt that the mantle
of Gerson and d’Ailly had descended upon him, and at the bidding of the
king, under his leadership, the French clergy set themselves to follow
up the work of the council of Constance and put limits to the autocracy
of the Roman Pontiff. Constitutionalism once more raised its head for
a brief period within the bounds of the Roman obedience. In 1682 the
king summoned an assembly of clergy to meet at S. Germain and consider
the difficulty. Bossuet at once took the lead, and at his instigation
the assembly recognised the right of the king to the _regale_ all over
France, and passed four resolutions on the limits of the power of the
Pope.
(1) That sovereigns are not subject to the Pope in things
temporal, neither can they be deposed by him nor their subjects
freed from their oaths of allegiance by him.
(2) That a general council is superior to the Pope.
(3) That the power of the Pope is subject to the regulations and
canons of councils, and he cannot decide anything contrary to the
rules and constitutions of the Gallican Church.
(4) That the decisions of the Pope are not irreformable, except by the
consent of the universal Church.
These resolutions thus passed by the clergy were registered by the
Parlements, and accepted by the Sorbonne, and became law of the land
which all loyal subjects were bound to obey.
[Sidenote: =Constitutional question between the Crown and the
Pope.=]
Thus was raised once more the old constitutional question between
the Church and the Pope. The decisions of the Assembly of S. Germain
had behind them a weight of authority and practice, unquestioned in
the primitive Church, repeatedly asserted in the medieval Church,
formulated at the council of Constance, lately vindicated at serious
risk by the English Church, but clean contrary to the pretensions of
the Hildebrandine Papacy and the decisions of the council of Trent.
It was absurd to expect that a Pope however weak could at a moment’s
notice turn his back upon a theory on which the Papacy had continuously
acted for six hundred years. Innocent felt that he had no choice in
the matter. He at once condemned the decrees, and refused to issue the
usual bulls sanctioning the consecration of priests who had accepted
them to the episcopate. Before many years had passed there were no less
than thirty sees in France without a bishop, and hundreds of cures
without canonically instituted priests. The condition of affairs
was singularly like that in England when the statute in restraint
of the payment of Annates was passed. [Sidenote: =Analogy to the
English Reformation.=] Each country had solemnly asserted a view of
the constitutional rights of the Church within its borders, which
was diametrically opposed to that of the Papacy, and was denounced
by the Curia as schismatical. In support of the national theory the
majority of the clergy in each country was prepared to enter at the
bidding of the Crown into a contest with the Pope, which could but
result in the increase of the royal authority over them. In the
mouth of Louis XIV. as in that of Henry VIII. the liberties of the
national Church meant in reality the power of the national king. But
unlike Henry VIII. Louis XIV. was too wary to be pushed to extremes.
He carefully avoided any overt act which could be construed into an
undue assertion of independence. He contented himself with a purely
negative position. Where bulls were refused the sees remained vacant,
and the Crown enjoyed the profits of the vacancy. There was no divorce
question to complicate matters. Henry VIII. could not wait, Louis XIV.
could. Consequently, in spite of much talk about a patriarchate of
France, no definite steps had been taken to increase the difficulties
of a settlement, when it became the obvious interest of both sides to
restore peace. [Sidenote: =Settlement of the quarrel, 1693.=] In 1693,
when Louis was involved in the war of the League of Augsburg, and the
influence of Madame de Maintenon had become paramount at court, he
found the continuance of his quarrel with the Pope both undignified and
prejudicial. Innocent XII. the new Pope was willing to meet him half
way. The articles of S. Germain were repudiated, the Pope recognised
and sanctioned all the royal nominations, and ecclesiastical affairs
resumed their wonted channel. Ten years of warfare had done nothing
more for Louis than to enrich the literature of France by some valuable
works on church-government, and to assist his rival William of Orange
to the throne of England.
[Sidenote: =Policy of Louis toward the Huguenots.=]
Indirectly, however, there is little doubt that this memorable quarrel
with the Pope did much to urge Louis to the committal of the greatest
blunder and crime of his reign--the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes.
Since the suppression of their political power by Richelieu the
Huguenots had given up all political ambition. Satisfied with the free
exercise of their worship permitted by the edict, the Huguenots of the
middle class had devoted themselves with great success to industrial
employments of various kinds, while numbers of the nobles, who had only
embraced Huguenotism from political motives, came back to the Church
now that their interest and associations led them in that direction.
Even in the troublous days of the _Fronde_ the Huguenots remained
strictly and significantly quiet, and when Colbert took up the reins
of administration he found among them the most skilful the most
industrious and the most loyal of French artisans. Unfortunately in
the eyes of Louis XIV. and of Louvois their very loyalty and
their wealth proved reasons for their persecution. The time had come,
as it seemed to them, when the work of Richelieu might be safely pushed
to completion. All that he had been able to do was to draw the poison
fangs of the serpent, the time had now come when the monster itself
might be scotched and killed. The very existence of a special law in
favour of one class recognised an imperfection in the uniformity of the
body politic. France would not be herself till she was one in religious
as in political allegiance.
[Sidenote: =Desire for uniformity.=]
In the seventeenth century to a mind like that of Louis XIV.,
small in scope but concentrated in grip, there was much that
was attractive in such an argument. Those were days when social
distinctions, trade interests, local independence were all being
ruthlessly sacrificed to the solidarity of the monarchy. Why should
not religious distinctions be subject to the same law? However
contented and loyal the Huguenots might be, their very existence was an
imperfection in an absolute monarchy, which ought only to be tolerated
as long as the necessities of state required it. But that was not all.
Louis himself was somewhat altering in character as he grew older. The
cup of pleasure had begun to pall. The artificiality of court life was
becoming a restraint to him. The atmosphere of gross adulation by which
he was surrounded proved more distasteful every day. Religion, always
a strong influence over him, reasserted her claims more imperiously as
the pleasures and vanities of life were turning to ashes in his hands.
Louis had always been decorously orthodox. He now became fervently
devout. His court became more strict in life, more healthy in tone.
Simplicity of manners, strong sense of duty, sobriety of conversation
reigned in the place of luxury and frivolity. Courtiers complained that
Versailles was no better than a monastery. [Sidenote: =Influence
of Madame de Maintenon.=] The genius of the change was a woman.
Louis as long ago as 1669 had chosen as the governess of his children
by Madame de Montespan, the young widow of the deformed burlesque
poet Scarron, known to history as Madame de Maintenon. At first he
was piqued by the primness and self-restraint of her demeanour, but
gradually the beauty of her character, the wit and grace of her
conversation, the soundness of her judgment, the force and vigour of
her nature, illuminated and sanctified by the purest flame of religious
devotion, called out a response from his better qualities, and in the
end established a complete mastery over him. In 1683, two years after
the death of Maria Theresa, he married her secretly, and although at
her own wish she never assumed the dignity of queen, her position was
thoroughly well understood both in France and in the courts of Europe,
and she received at all hands the respect due both to her rank and her
virtues. Her political influence has been much exaggerated, for it was
of a quality very difficult to appraise. She rarely if ever interfered
directly except in those matters of personal patronage in which her sex
is always so deeply interested, but her indirect influence was very
strong, not only because Louis had a great opinion of her good sense
and frequently consulted her, but more especially because of the power
which she wielded invisibly over the character and mind of the king
himself. As under her influence he became more devout, he naturally
allowed his increased affection for the interests of religion to mould
his policy. As his conscience became more sensitive to the claims of
the Church, he felt more than he had done before the scandal of his
quarrel with the Holy See, he realised more than before the duties of
his position as the first Catholic power of Europe. Probably had Madame
de Maintenon lived out the rest of her life in poverty as the widow
of Scarron, Louis would still have revoked the Edict of Nantes, have
made up his quarrel with the Pope, and have persecuted the community
of Port Royal. Still, it is none the less true that he was impelled to
that policy by the knowledge that it was approved of by her mind, and
strengthened in it by the sense of duty which he had imbibed from her
society.
[Sidenote: =Disabilities placed upon the Huguenots. Encouragement of
conversions, 1681.=]
Impelled then by his fondness for uniformity, anxious to prove his
orthodoxy in spite of his difficulties with Rome, and believing that
the Huguenots themselves were ripe for conversion, Louis began his
repressive policy in 1681 by excluding all Huguenots from public
employment. They were to be marked by the law, as Roman Catholics
were marked in England, as people who were unfitted by their religion
to hold positions of trust. But repression was only one side of his
policy. While those who obstinately adhered to their independence and
their religion were stamped as persons unworthy of trust, those who
would listen to reason, and be obedient to the wishes of their lord
and father, were covered with benefits and rewarded with pensions. In
1682 missions were held throughout France to convert the heretics.
Bossuet devoted himself to the work with incredible zeal and success.
An office was established in Paris under a convert named Pelisson to
organise the work of conversion. Converts received their rewards in
the best of government posts, and the receipt of government pensions.
So numerous were they that Louis thought that he might safely proceed
to the next step and destroy heresy at its root. Edicts were issued
closing the Huguenot churches and schools and making it a penal offence
for a Huguenot pastor to preach. It soon appeared that he was wrong.
Among the middle classes in the south and centre of France there were
thousands to whom their religion was of far more moment to them than
their property or even their lives. [Sidenote: =Emigration of the
Huguenots and popular risings, 1682–1683.=] In 1682 numbers of the
best and most industrious of the artisans of France began to leave
their country rather than abandon their religion. Louis at once forbade
emigration under pain of the galleys. There was but one resource left
to the poor Huguenots, deprived of all honourable employment in their
own country and prevented from seeking it in another. In desperation
the mountaineers in the Cevennes rose in tumult rather than revolt
in 1683. Stifled almost in its birth by the royal troops it was made
the excuse of inhuman barbarities. [Sidenote: =The ‘Dragonades,’
1684.=] Dragoons were quartered upon the miserable inhabitants until
they renounced their religion. Many a Huguenot who would willingly die
for his religion could not bear to see his family and home at the mercy
of a brutal soldiery. During the year 1684 this vile system was in
force throughout the south of France. Conversions were announced by the
thousand. In Languedoc it was said that as many as 60,000 took place
in three days. At last in October 1685 the coping stone was put to
this edifice of blood and crime. [Sidenote: =Revocation of the Edict
of Nantes, 1685.=] An edict was issued by which all the privileges
accorded to the Huguenots by the Edict of Nantes were withdrawn,
the reformed worship was suppressed, and the ministers expelled.
Huguenotism became from that moment in France, like Episcopacy a few
years later in Scotland, an illegal religion outside the pale of the
law and proscribed by it.
[Sidenote: =Results of the measure.=]
The results of the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes were very
different from what Louis and his ministers expected. So far from
crushing the Huguenots into submission it goaded them into madness.
They realised that now there was no chance of peace for them in their
own country. One by one, family by family, they fled from their homes
leaving behind them their property, taking their lives in their hands.
Numbers were caught and sent to the galleys, numbers more escaped, and
carried to the enemies of France in England and Brandenburg and Holland
the thrift and the skill which under Colbert’s enlightened patronage
had done so much to make France the wealthiest of European states.
Holland dates its industrial revival and Brandenburg its industrial
life from the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes. Huguenot soldiers,
like Ruvigny and Schomberg, brought the discipline and training of
the French armies to bear fruit in the English and Dutch service. It
is said that fifty thousand families escaped in this way to fertilise
with their industry the soil of the enemies of France. Those who were
left behind, who were too poor or too ignorant to escape, continued in
the mountains of the Cevennes a desultory and fanatical struggle with
their oppressor. In the days of Louis’s greatest need, in the War of
the Spanish Succession, they kept the ablest of French generals and
an army of veterans from the theatre of war. Eventually in the next
reign they obtained and have since enjoyed a grudging toleration.
Even the uniformity of religion so dear to the heart of Louis was not
attained. Large numbers of Protestants and of Protestant children, it
is true, were added to the ranks of Catholicism, but Huguenotism lived
on in France, socially and politically insignificant, but still alive.
France soon found that persecution had bereft her of her children and
her wealth, without even giving her in return that complete national
solidarity which formed the excuse for the crime.
[Sidenote: =Aggressive policy of Louis, 1678–1688.=]
The interest of ecclesiastical questions, however intense, however
absorbing, never diverted the jealous eye of Louis XIV. for
one moment from his own aggrandisement. He did not become the less
ambitious because he had grown devout, or the less far-reaching in his
plans because they were now largely affected by his determination
to play the part of champion of the Church. No sooner was the peace
of Nimwegen signed than Louis began to cast about for pretexts for
evading it. By the words of the treaty the towns ceded to France were
expressed to be surrendered ‘with their dependencies.’ The ambiguity
of this phrase, possibly intentional, gave a great opportunity to
that kind of masterful diplomacy which Louis loved. [Sidenote: =The
Chambres des Réunions, 1679.=] In 1679 he appointed tribunals,
called Chambres des Réunions, consisting of members of the parlements
of Metz, Beisach, and Besançon to adjudge the territories in Alsace,
Franche Comté, and the three bishoprics which were included in this
phrase, and accordingly appertained to France. The Chambres well
understood their duty. Without hesitation they pronounced all Alsace,
Zweibrücken, Saarbrück and other smaller districts to be included in
the treaty. No sooner was the decision pronounced than French troops
occupied the territories in question, and their annexation to France
became an accomplished fact. In vain the diet and the princes whose
lands were thus unceremoniously seized protested. Force and possession
were on the side of Louis and he knew it. While they were protesting he
was cynically preparing for a stroke more audacious still. [Sidenote:
=Occupation of Strasburg, 1681.=] The great city of Strasburg was
included in the decision which gave all Alsace to Louis, but Strasburg
could not be occupied in a moment like Saarbrück or Montbéliard. French
gold and diplomacy were set to work, the magistrates were bribed or
intimidated, and at the end of September 1681 all Europe rang with the
news that Louis XIV. was master of the key of the upper Rhine.
The skill of Vauban was at once enlisted in its defence, and before
the war broke out again Strasburg had been added to the impregnable
circle of fortresses, which guarded France and threatened her enemies
from Lille to Pignerol. Like his apt pupil Napoleon in after times
Louis XIV. thoroughly understood the policy of employing brute
force in the time of peace against unwilling enemies, in order to
obtain advantageous positions either in diplomacy or war as the basis
of future effort. The Emperor threatened by the Turks was unable,
Germany was unwilling, to renew the war for the sake of Strasburg, and
Louis proceeded calmly and steadily on his way. By an arrangement with
Charles of Mantua he occupied Casale in Piedmont the same day that
Strasburg fell into his hands. By the truce of Regensburg concluded
after a short war with Spain in 1684, and approved by the diet, he
secured possession for twenty years of his ill-gotten gains.
[Sidenote: =Improvement of the army and navy, 1678–1688.=]
Meanwhile no pains were spared by the vigilant and careful mind of
Louvois to bring the army to a pitch of perfection hitherto unknown.
Camps of instruction were formed, the precursors of the modern Châlons
and Aldershot, where 150,000 men were kept constantly at drill.
Regiments, no longer farmed as it were by their colonel, were paid,
clothed, armed, and victualled by the war office. Stores were collected
along the frontier. All France resounded with the clash of arms and
preparation for war. Through the zeal of Seignelay, the son of Colbert,
similar energy was expended upon the navy. Arsenals were formed at
Brest and Toulon. Ships of war were built to the number of one hundred
and eighty and fitted with all the appliances of naval warfare as it
was then understood. Since the decay of the navy of Spain the command
of the Mediterranean had been shared between the Venetians, the Turks,
and the Corsairs of Algiers. [Sidenote: =Naval supremacy in the
Mediterranean.=]Now under Duquesne and de Tourville France stretched
forth her hand to win an easy supremacy over the Mediterranean, and
to claim partnership with England in the rule of the ocean. In 1683
Duquesne destroyed the pirates of Algiers and Tripoli, and liberated
their Christian slaves. In 1685 he forced the republic of Genoa to
renounce its traditional alliance with Spain and to become the humble
vassal of France.
A policy of aggrandisement so open and so unmistakable could not
fail to arouse at length the slumbering jealousy of Europe, but it
was long before the enemies of France were in a position to take any
active steps. [Sidenote: =Blunders of Louis.=] From 1678 to 1685
the danger from the Turks was too pressing to permit the Emperor
to involve himself in responsibilities on the Rhine. In 1685 the
accession of James II. to the English throne opened out prospects
of ambition to William of Orange, which made him unwilling to have
his hands tied by the necessity of defending the Low Countries. But
gradually as the months passed the blunders of Louis himself gave the
opportunity to his enemies which they desired. [Sidenote: =Alienation
of Europe.=] His continued quarrel with the Pope and his alliance with
the Turks alienated the more zealous Catholic opinion in Europe, and
deprived him of the support of a sentiment, which at that very time
he was most anxious to obtain. How could he claim the allegiance of
zealous Catholics, when he was the enemy of the Pope and the friend
of the Turk? Yet with what face could he apply to the supporters of
Protestantism or the friends of religious liberty, when he was stained
with the cruelties of the ‘dragonades,’ and had just revoked the Edict
of Nantes? His intrigues with the Turks had lost him the assistance
of John Sobieski and Poland. His seizure of the duchy of Zweibrücken
had alienated his old ally of Sweden to whom it belonged. His attack
upon Algiers and Tripoli had forfeited the friendship of the Turks.
The system of tributary states beyond the frontiers of Germany had
completely broken down. [Sidenote: =The league of Augsburg, 1686.=]
The result of this was seen in the secret formation of the League of
Augsburg in 1686, between the Emperor, Spain, Sweden, the princes of
north Germany, and the United Provinces to oppose the domination of
France threatened by the truce of Regensburg. In the next year it was
joined by Bavaria and the princes of Italy, and the Pope, Innocent XI.,
even gave it his secret support.
For the moment the accustomed political skill of Louis deserted him.
Though he knew of the League he hesitated to strike the first blow
while his enemies were unprepared. He even allowed them to deprive him
by a sudden stroke of his most important ally. [Sidenote: =Quarrel
between Louis and James II., 1688.=] James II. of England
was a very different person from his brother Charles. Gifted with much
greater energy and independence of spirit, he was wholly destitute of
political tact and discrimination. Louis quickly found that he was
unable to bend him to his will, and make England humbly attend upon
his chariot wheels as heretofore. All that Charles had cared about
was a quiet life and plenty of money. James on the contrary had high
political ambitions. He wished to make England Roman Catholic, and
the English monarchy absolute, and in comparison with these objects
he cared not a fig for the aggrandisement of France or the glory of
Louis XIV. It was all-important to Louis that James should
not embroil himself with his Parliament and people, when France
wanted the assistance of the English fleet in the Channel and English
soldiers on the Rhine. James on the contrary cared only for his own
home policy, and in spite of the urgent remonstrances of Louis, and
even of the Pope, was busied in schemes for weakening the English
Church, removing the disabilities of Roman Catholics and altering
the English constitution. Louis determined to read him a lesson. He
remembered how years before he had had to teach Charles II.
that he must obey French orders if he wanted French gold. He thought
that a somewhat sharper lesson was needed by James II. now.
He knew that the malcontent politicians in England were in close
communication with William of Orange. He knew that William was fully
prepared to attack his father-in-law’s throne directly he was sure that
his departure for England would not be the signal for French troops to
overrun the Low Countries and march upon Amsterdam. He held the fate
of James II. at his disposal. William could not move without
his permission. At that very moment, in 1688, a disputed election to
the archbishopric of Köln gave Louis the opportunity of declaring war
upon the Rhine. Persuaded that the invasion of England by William
of Orange must bring about a struggle, which would force James to
humble himself and beg for French assistance to crush the rebellion,
he deliberately allowed William to sail. The French army was moved
from the frontiers of the Low Countries to the Rhine, and occupied the
Palatinate. [Sidenote: =James driven out of England by William III.,
1688.=] In the midst of his triumph came the astounding news that
James II. was a fugitive at Versailles, and the strength of
England was added to the formidable coalition which threatened France
from all sides.
[Sidenote: =The war of the League of Augsburg, 1688–1698.=]
The war of the League of Augsburg, which lasted from 1688 to 1698, is
one of the most exhausting and most uninteresting wars of which history
makes mention. Louis found himself alone against the world. Literally
he had not a single ally. By the force of circumstances the war on his
side was largely defensive. Thanks to his prevision and Vauban’s skill,
his frontier was defended by a string of fortresses, which in those
days of bad roads and worse artillery were only conquerable by the
wearisome method of blockade, a method which often, owing to disease
and exposure, was more fatal to the besiegers than the besieged. Using
these fortresses as a base of operations his generals could advance to
deal a blow at the enemy or retire behind them to recruit as occasion
demanded. The allies, seeing the immense defensive strength which
this gave to the French operations, in their turn fortified fortress
against fortress, and Namur and Mons became under the hands of Coëhorn
the equals of Lille and Charleroi. The generals too on both sides
were well fitted for playing the game of war on such conditions. No
strategist worth the name appeared in Europe between the days of
Turenne and Marlborough. Luxemburg was a brilliant tactician. On the
field of battle he had not an equal. But no one knew less how to win
a campaign or utilise a victory. William III. was an excellent war
minister, indefatigable in preparation, indomitable under reverses, but
his commonplace leadership was never relieved by one spark of genius
or even brilliance. In the Low Countries the tide of battle ebbed and
flowed about the fortresses of Mons and Namur. The capture of them by
the French in 1691 and 1692 and the defeats inflicted by Luxemburg upon
William at Steinkirk and Neerwinden, after his efforts to save Namur in
1692, mark the highest point of French military success. The recapture
of Namur by William in 1695 is his chief title to military renown, and
the evidence of the increasing exhaustion of France. On the Rhine there
was no great event which calls for notice, while in Italy the French,
though much weakened by constant drafts for the Netherlands, managed
to hold their own through the fine fighting qualities of Catinat, who
completely defeated the duke Victor Amadeus at Staffarda in 1689, and
drove prince Eugene out of Piedmont after the bayonet fight of Civita
in 1693.
[Sidenote: =Importance of the naval operations.=]
The real interest of the war centres round the struggle at sea between
the fleets of England and France. It was the first tilt in the dread
tourney, which occupies the whole of the eighteenth century, which
extends from Beachy Head to Trafalgar, and has given England her vast
imperial position. The conquest of England and Scotland gave to William
III. the navy of England to use against Louis XIV. The continued
loyalty of Ireland to James II. made the command of the sea necessary
to Louis, for without it he could not hope to maintain James in Ireland
for a moment against the whole power of England. The issue of the
struggle in Ireland depended therefore wholly upon the issue of the
naval war. The great victory of Tourville over the English fleet off
Beachy Head in July 1690 made the French for nearly two years masters
of the Channel, and more than counteracted the effect of the battle
of the Boyne, by enabling Louis to pour French troops and stores into
Ireland, and even threaten the invasion of England itself. The defeat
of Tourville by Russell off La Hogue put a final end of this dream of
French ambition. All thought of invasion had to be laid aside, and
Ireland left to the tender mercies of the cruel conqueror. France had
to acknowledge the superiority of the English at sea, to acquiesce in
the capture and annexation of its colonies in the East and West Indies,
to submit to the absorption of its trade by its dominant rival, and to
content itself with the impotent but lucrative revenge of the legalised
piracy of privateering.
[Sidenote: =Exhaustion of France, 1698.=]
After eight years of war all sides were anxious for peace. To France,
exhausted by maintaining year after year four armies at least in the
field, peace was a necessity. Already the burden had become almost
intolerable. The coinage was debased, the _taille_ had been
doubled, offices were openly sold, and indeed created in order to be
sold, one tenth of the population was without means of subsistence. The
government too had fallen into very inferior hands. Colbert, Louvois,
and Seignelay were all dead. Pontchartrain who took charge of the
finances was incapable, Barbesieux, the son of Louvois, who succeeded
to his father at the war office, was young and without experience. When
he pleaded his inexperience to Louis, the infatuated king replied,
‘Do not disturb yourself, I formed your father and will form you.’ He
seemed to think human nature was a blank sheet of paper on which he
could write what he liked. England too was tired of a struggle which
brought her neither glory nor profit. William himself, worn out by
disease, hated by his subjects, thwarted by his Parliaments, plotted
against by his courtiers, was willing if not anxious to sheathe the
sword. In 1696 Victor Amadeus of Savoy left the League and made a
treaty with France, and negotiations for a general peace were set on
foot, which eventually were brought to a successful issue at Ryswick in
1698 chiefly through the efforts of Bouffiers and Portland.
[Sidenote: =The treaty of Ryswick, 1698.=]
By the treaty of Ryswick France surrendered all the towns which she had
captured since the treaty of Nimwegen except Strasburg, and agreed that
the chief frontier fortresses of the Netherlands should be garrisoned
by the Dutch in order to secure their ‘barrier.’ Clement of Bavaria
was acknowledged as the lawful archbishop of Köln, and the right of
William III. to the throne of England, with the succession to
his sister-in-law Anne, recognised. The peace of Ryswick was a serious
blow, not merely to the pride of Louis XIV., but to his power.
France never had time to recover from the strain of that terrible
and heroic struggle before she was again involved in the war of the
Spanish Succession. Her finances were ruined, her navy was crushed. And
the heir to her greatness was her hated rival. William III.
by ousting the Stuarts from the English throne, by forcing France
to acknowledge his own right, had changed the personal duel between
himself and Louis into a national duel between England and France, a
duel in which England had scored the first pass by wresting from France
the command of the ocean, and compelling Louis to renounce his claim
to be the dictator of Europe and the champion of the cause of Roman
Catholicism in England.