shall we delay availing ourselves of such a favourable disposition? A
people without any fixed laws, is naturally given to change. The
Canadians love war, and despise such nations as live in peace: twenty
years inactivity would give them an ill opinion of the French; whereas,
seeing us at war with a nation whom they hate, they will esteem us, and
come into a closer alliance with us than before, &c.”
These memorials made no alteration in the general system; both sides
continued to dissemble, and express a desire of cultivating the peace.
England applied itself to increase its navy, and France sent orders to
Brest and Rochfort, for building ships with the utmost dispatch.
Amidst the most earnest concern to redress the calamities of the state,
no expedients could be found for so great and good an end. The people
could not be relieved but by abolishing the taxes; and the expences of
the state could not be answered but by new imposts: every branch of the
government was embarrassed; so that the King often said to me, with a
painful sense of such a situation, _I know not where to begin_.
The advantages of the encouragement of tillage, the improvement of
arts, the increase of trade, the discharge of the national debt, were
only in perspective; whereas the people stood in need of present relief.
Observing that the public affairs greatly affected the King’s temper and
constitution, I contrasted them with diversions. I may say, the most gay
and striking conceits of imagination, for pleasing the senses, were now
exhibited at Versailles. In all the entertainments which I gave to the
Monarch, there was little of my own; I had people of taste at Paris who
furnished me with original materials, to which I only gave a few
retouches.
Amidst all my inventions to draw the court from that mournful state
which the perplexity of affairs shed on it, I perceived that the King
was not so chearful as I could have desired. He had a cloudiness in his
looks, which were naturally sprightly; he was, likewise, more thoughtful
than usual. Alarmed at this lugubrious scene, I took the liberty to ask
his Majesty the cause of so unhappy an alteration. He vaguely answered,
“that he was not sensible of any alteration, and that my company still
was his chief delight:” the revolution, however, was but too certain.
My enemies having miscarried in their design of inducing the King to
remove me from court, by political motives, set religion to work; and no
less a person than his Majesty’s confessor was put at the head of this
cabal. He was a Jesuit with only morality for his instrument; but as
that, with a Prince, seldom gets the better of pleasure, he contrived a
way which struck my Monarch.
This reverend father employed one of the best hands in Paris, in a
picture representing the torments of hell. Several crowned heads seemed
chained down in dreadful sufferings; there was no beholding their
contortions without shuddering. This infernal master-piece he made a
present of to Lewis XV. The King having viewed it for some time with a
frown, asked the meaning of the picture, the very thing the son of
Loyola wanted.
“Sire, said he, the Prince you see there suffering eternal torments, was
an ambitious Monarch, who sacrificed his people to his vain delight in
glory and power. He next to him, whom the devils are insulting, was an
avaricious monarch, who laid up in his coffers immense treasures,
squeezed from his oppressed subjects. This third wretch was an indolent
sovereign, who minded nothing, and instead of governing by himself, left
every thing to his ministers, whose incapacity produced infinite
mischiefs. This fourth, whose sufferings exceed those of the others, his
crime being greater, was a voluptuous King, openly keeping a concubine
at his court; and by this scandalous example had filled his kingdom with
debauchery, &c.”
The allegory was coarse, and becoming a monk, who, in the want of the
means to attain his ends in this world, has recourse to things of the
other life. Lewis XV. who saw into the drift of the picture, ordered the
moralist to withdraw, but the impression remained.
This was not the first time that the churchmen had presumed on their
office, and abused the King’s goodness. A prelate had made him perform
an ignominious act of penitence when sick at Metz.
I used fresh endeavours to relieve the King from this return of languor,
and had in a great measure succeeded, when a family concern brought on a
severe relapse.
The Dauphin was now in his twenty-second year, which, by the custom of
France, intitled him to be intrusted with the affairs of the crown. This
Prince had always shewn the most submissive deference to the King his
father, but of late had put himself at the head of a party, most of whom
were my enemies: they exposed me with all the venom of scurrility, and
even brought in the King. Lewis XV. knew it, and this was what
occasioned that inward conflict which gave him so much trouble. After
communicating his situation to me, he said, _And what would you do,
Madam, in such a case?_ “Sire, answered I, I would admit his Royal
Highness the Dauphin into every council, and allow him all the honours
due to his rank and birth.” _Well_, said the King, _I will follow your
advice_; and soon after the Dauphin saw himself sent for on every
important deliberation.
M. de Machault, then at the head of the finances, left no stone unturned
to put them in a good condition: he was urged on every side. M. Rouillé
asked very large sums to form a navy; the payers of annuities were
perpetually at his elbow, and his apartment was never clear of those who
had advanced money in the late war. He one day said to the King, in my
hearing, _Sire, I know not how in the world, I shall answer your
engagements; every body is making demands on me, and no body will give
me any credit_.
Marshal Belleisle, to whom that laborious minister often used to pour
forth his lamentations, told him, “Sir, I see but one way for you, which
is to make the state a bankrupt. When a machine is out of order, the
only remedy is to stop its motion, and to set it to rights again.”
This advice, however, was not followed; and instead of stopping the
machine of the finances, in order to set it to rights again, it
remained in all its former disorder. I have somewhere, among my papers,
a scheme for discharging the national debt, in which the author, who was
accounted a very skilful economist, advanced, that, for the settlement
of an invariable order in the finances, the state, every twenty-five
years, should declare itself insolvent; and the creditors compound with
the King, as with a private insolvent.
“France, said this paper, will not hear of making itself a bankrupt, but
the way it takes to avoid it, is still more burthensome; for when the
King’s debts grow troublesome, does he not lay very onerous imposts on
the people for the payment of them? Now this is a remedy worse than the
disease, because the collecting of a tax, it is known, falls little
short of doubling it. He extorts from one to pay another; a bankruptcy
would ruin only a part of his subjects, whereas the means of payment
impoverishes every body.”
I am not sufficiently acquainted with finances, to determine whether a
wise King, in order to make his people easy, should begin by forfeiting
the confidence of the wealthy part of his subjects. There are always
some exceptionable things in these kinds of memorials. A person of a
great genius has often told me, “that should all the fine projects, for
making France the most opulent state in Europe, be carried into
execution, it would perhaps make it the very poorest in the universe.”
The particular favour with which Lewis XV. continued to honour me, drew
great numbers to my apartment, so that I had every morning a full court:
some persons of eminence appeared there purely to please the King; but
the business of the multitude was interest. I had brought the latter to
give me memorials, as otherwise, I could never have recollected so many
different objects. It is impossible for those who live at a distance
from court, to conceive the various classes of askers, and what a number
of favours the throne has the pleasure of bestowing.
I have read, in an original paper, that Lewis XIV. allowed all his
subjects, who had any demand to make at court, to apply directly to
himself. Had such an indulgence been continued under the present reign,
Lewis XV’s whole life would have been taken up only in giving audiences.
These memorials I had read to me, and afterwards talked them over to the
King.
Besides those who asked favours, I was likewise teazed with complainers,
and indeed these were usually more in number than the others.
In so large a kingdom as France, it is scarce possible to prevent all
abuses; some necessarily arise from the very constitution, and the
maintenance of political order. But one complaint so particularly struck
me, that I thought it deserved to be laid before the King. This was the
disregard of the children of officers dying in the service of their
country.
A general officer, if no gentleman by birth, though, by his courage, he
had secured the privileges both of the throne and nobility, leaving
issue, they were excluded from nobility; and soon coming to intermix
with the commonalty, no trace remained of the families which had
performed the greatest services to the state: a hero’s atchievements
died with him, his posterity were never the better for his exploits.
This I mentioned to the King with a sensible concern, and some time
after his Majesty, ever inclined to what was good and proper, issued an
edict, ennobling military officers and their posterity. The different
degrees of this nobility were specified in the edict, according to the
different ranks of the officers.
No body in the kingdom apprehended that I had any share in this
resolution; so that, unless my papers should be looked over, posterity
will never know that this establishment, which gave so much
satisfaction, was owing to me.
The courtiers were in as great a ferment as ever. They who found there
was no pushing their fortune by my means, endeavoured to hurt me. Herein
they often made use of indecent, and even insolent talk, besides the
baseness of calumny. Several cabals had been formed, and these produced
clashing and competitions, which affected the crown, as stirring up
discontent in those who held the principal posts of the state.
The chancellor de Aguesseau pleaded his great age, and laid down
business, as no longer able to bear the weight of it. A courtier, who
was present when the King received his resignation, said to him,
_Certainly, Sire, M. de Aguesseau must be above a century old, for at a
hundred years one is still young enough to be chancellor of France_.
Several other placemen quitted, alledging that they could not live in a
court where every thing was ruled by a woman: but this philosophy was of
the latest; they never had any thoughts of retirement, till their
endeavours to raise themselves to the very highest pitch of fortune, had
miscarried; and some, in their voluntary exile, had set instruments to
work, for making their appearance again on the theatre of power, which
they had so lately quitted.
M. de Machault had the seals. This circulation of posts, diametrically
opposite in practice, and requiring different talents, has been the
subject of much complaint: but the fault lies in ambition. In France
subaltern posts are looked on only as introductory to the more
honourable and lucrative employments. On the vacancy of any great
office, my apartment was crowded with competitors, who all had a genteel
competency; but they wanted profitable posts, to make a show in the
world.
The round of diversions which I had settled at Versailles, to recover
the King from that lethargic heaviness which was growing constitutional,
did not break in on general affairs. Lewis XV. daily devoted six hours
to business. In the morning he employed himself about the foreign and
domestic affairs.
The death of Marshal count Saxe now cast a damp on the festivity of the
court. I remember a man of wit, being in my apartment when the news
came, said to me, _Now, Madam, we shall soon have a war, for he was the
only one of all his Majesty’s generals whom the King of Prussia in the
least feared_.
The frequent conferences between Lewis XV. and this hero gave me an
opportunity of studying his temper; for there is a pleasure in knowing
great men; and his mind was of a singular cast: all his private
behaviour savoured of the common man, great only in the day of action;
then his soul, if I may be allowed the expression, assumed a new form;
it became piercing, noble, and exalted: a new light beaming on his mind,
he had an instantaneous perception of every thing. His imagination had
nothing to do, the military genius which inspired him at those times was
all-sufficient; yet after the battle, all this flame and magnanimity
sunk again into littleness and vulgarity, nothing great remained in him
but the fame of his actions.
In private life, he addicted himself to sensuality in its most brutish
excesses; he was a stranger to that refined love which distinguishes
noble from vulgar souls, delighting in the company of women only for
debauchery; for all his mistresses were common prostitutes. Whilst he
was disturbing all Europe by his victories, the gallantries of La
Favart, an actress, allowed him no ease.
They who were often with him say, that he had scarce any tincture of
learning; war was all he knew; and that he knew without learning it.
Some politicians have thought, that his death wrought a change in the
systems of Europe, and particularly, that the King of Prussia would
never have renewed the war, had Maurice been living: it is certain that
one man may change the whole scene of our political world.
I have read, in original memoirs of Lewis XIV. of surprising
revolutions, brought about only by the ascendency of one mortal. Count
Saxe had long laboured with indefatigable ardour in pursuit of a repose
which he never enjoyed; for scarce had he seen himself in that summit of
grandeur to which his military talents had raised him, than death laid
him in the grave. Besides the royal seat given him by the King, in
reward of his services, with suitable incomes, he was invested with the
highest dignities and honours.
This general left behind him an incontestable reputation; his very
enemies allow him to have been a consummate warrior; but if he did a
great deal for France, France still did more for him; he never wanted
for any thing. The King’s commissaries constantly furnished him with
plenty of all necessaries; he had large armies, and fought in a country
which has almost ever been the theatre of French victories, and where
the glory of the French name has shone in its greatest lustre. Farther,
Maurice had with him the King’s best troops, impatiently longing to
signalize themselves. I heard one of the trade, and reckoned to
understand it thoroughly, say, that to be a hero, a man should have
passed through all the military paths leading to glory; whereas Maurice,
in the service of France, trod only one, and that smoothed for him; he
was never put to those trials where a commander, being forced to exert
all his abilities, approves himself a general.
I have read in the manuscript memoirs of Lewis XV. that the great
Condé’s enemies put the Queen-mother on sending him into Catalonia only
with a small body of troops, and those of the very worst. Conde, who
knew his enemies views, wrote thus to his friend Gourville: _I have been
sent here to attack the gods and men, with only shadows to fight them. I
shall miscarry; how can it be otherwise, when the means of beating the
enemy have been all taken away from me?_ Yet this hero, under the
disadvantages both of numbers and the climate, baffled all the efforts
of Spain.
The death of Marshal Saxe occasioned a revolution in the minds of the
military courtiers. They who hitherto had hid themselves behind his
merit, made their appearance: all put in for this hero’s post, and not
one of them was qualified for it.
The King, on the first notice of count Maurice’s death, said, _I am now
without any general, I have only some captains remaining_. Lowendahl,
however, was still living; but it is said, the genius of those two men
was formed to be together, and that the heroic virtues of the latter
derived their splendor from the superior qualities of the other. A
courtier said, on this head, _Lowendahl’s exploits are over; his
counsellor is dead_.
Whilst Versailles was full of this event, the Pope’s nuncio came to
acquaint Lewis XV. that the King of Prussia had granted the free
exercise of the Roman Catholic religion at Berlin; and that even the
religious were allowed to settle, and wear the habit of their respective
orders. A courtier hereupon said to the King, _Sire, that Prince is for
having a little of every thing. Once nothing would go down with him but
soldiers, now he must have some monks_. Another courtier replied, _Since
he begins to fancy gowns, let me advise your Majesty to make him a
present of all the Jesuits in France_. A third added, _That article
should be kept for the next treaty of peace, and let six Loyolites be
exchanged for one soldier_. The systematical people, however, attributed
this indulgence to policy; for when a Prince is looked on to be full of
schemes and designs, every step of his is nicely canvassed, and various
constructions put on it. Some said that the King of Prussia thereby
intended to ingratiate himself with the court of Rome, as, by its
intrigues with weak and superstitious princes, it can amply make up its
want of temporal strength. Some thought it to arise from a new system of
population, to draw Catholics thither from other parts; but the monks
and priests of our faith do not increase population, &c. &c.
For my part, I attributed it to the humour for new foundations, which
prevails with all the princes of our days. On examining the constitution
of the Prussian government, which is an absolute monarchy, the plurality
of religions will by no means appear suitable to it; at least I have
heard from a very intelligent person, that it is only in republics
where a freedom of religion can be properly allowed.
For some time the King had been more chearful than usual: after so many
vexations and fatigues, he now began to breathe a little; he was at
leisure to be often with me, and to hunt as much as he could. Never was
a Prince so fond of this exercise. His eagerness in it often fatigued
him beyond all bounds. I one day represented to him, that he made a toil
of that pleasure, and that it would be better for him to be more
moderate in it; that excess in any thing was hurtful: but he answered,
that the more he hunted, the better he found himself. This is a new
medical system; the court-physicians, who are all for motion and
agitation, will have kings to spend half their life on horse-back.
But a great satisfaction, which that justly beloved Prince now
felt, was the having given some relief to his burthened subjects. He
had remitted three millions of the land-tax, abolished the hundredth
denier, and the pence per livres levied on this impost. Though this was
no great good, it presaged the end of a great evil.
At the same time, Lewis XV. ordered an inquiry into the nature of the
taxes; of all imposts, the land-tax was found to be the most
burthensome, as not proportioned to the real income. The old tax was
still levied, without considering any decays, or damages of estates and
lands; many a market-town, or village, which had formerly been able to
pay large sums, was now no longer so; yet the same duty was required.
The government deliberated on ways for abolishing such an unequal tax,
and substitute another of a more proportionate assessment. This had, for
some time past, been often proposed, but always rejected. It was now
again taken into consideration, and after the most minute discussions,
it was found best to leave things as they were, lest worse
inconveniences might ensue. It is said, there are abuses in government,
the reformation of which would do more harm than the very abuse itself.
This was the opinion of the ministers, and of the King himself; but it
was not mine, having always thought that no good can come from evil. We
had often little debates about government, for Lewis XV. as I have said
in the beginning of these Memoirs, has a great deal of wit and
good-sense, and especially a very ready penetration. “You, Madam, would
he say to me, look on the political community as a private family,
whereas it is to be considered as an universal society, consisting of
different bodies, the conjunction of which constitutes the state. Amidst
this immensity of objects, conducted by men of opposite views and
interests; the security and well-being of the state is upheld by those
very things which seem to undermine it. In a private family, there is
only one single plan of administration, the abuses are few, easily
animadverted on, and the reformation of them restores that unity of
government which is the perfection of such a society: but in the general
community, good is to be continually ballanced by evil, and in this
equipoize lies the political order of the state.”
“If so, Sir, said I to him, how is it that those states, where the most
abuses are reformed, are the best governed. The Muscovites, of all the
European nations, were the least civilized, and consequently the most
unhappy, till Peter the Great appeared, who vigorously suppressing
abuses of all kinds, from his reformation has sprung a powerful nation,
a rich and happy people.
“Brandenburgh had neither force nor power; the art of war was scarce
known there; it lay in obscurity; it was of no account among the states
of Europe; and this contemptible condition was, in a great measure,
owing to many abuses which its sovereigns either could not or would not
reform. But in our times, one of its sovereigns has suppressed abuses,
introduced political order and military discipline, and this reformation
has enabled him to act a capital part on the theatre of Europe.”
“England is said once to have been nothing, till the parliament took in
hand to form its power. It has since been continually retouching the
political system, and correcting a number of abuses, which, for several
centuries, hindered this state from emerging into power and reputation;
and now its _bills_ shew the continued system of its greatness.
“France, Sir, is a home instance of this. Lewis XIII. a weak Prince, and
wholly governed by his ministers, concerned not himself about abuses; he
left the state as he found it, full of mismanagement and disorder. Your
great grand-father changed the whole, and by the reformation he brought
about in all the branches of government, imparted, as it were, a new
genius to his people.
“France, during the first years of Lewis XIV. rose to a pitch of glory
and grandeur beyond any thing ever seen in the Roman empire.”
Here the King smiled, and very obligingly said to me, “I own, Madam, I
did not think you had been so well acquainted with these points; it
gives me infinite pleasure that, besides the graces of wit and vivacity,
you are possessed of that knowledge which enlarges and revives the
judgment. The world is often deceived in those matters, continued the
King, and the greatness of Princes is almost ever confounded with the
happiness of the people. A Sovereign may make reformations in his
kingdom, and his subjects be never the better for them; he is the only
gainer by the change.
“Peter I. made considerable alterations in Muscovy, but did not thereby
make the Russians a whit the happier. The revolution was felt only by
the state. The Monarch became great and powerful, but the people still
continued little and mean; for to have brought them from the abject
state in which they then were, required the suppression of a multitude
of civil abuses and vices, which continued after his time, and still
subsist. The present Muscovites are sordid slaves, with all the
ignorance and superstition of their fore-fathers, who lived before the
reign of that great reformer Peter. And if the empire, once without a
soldier, has now a numerous army; yet this adventitious power depends on
the chance of a battle or two.