THE BREACH WITH THE CHURCH
When, in later years, Talleyrand looked back on the many oaths of
allegiance he had successively sworn, he affirmed that he had never
deserted any cause until it had abandoned itself. This is most
certainly true of his desertion of the Royalist cause. His political
ideal essentially and to the end included the element of limited
monarchy; and his whole temper and taste would make him reluctant to
turn from Versailles to the Paris of the end of 1789. A chaos, of which
the issue was quite inconceivable, had succeeded to the older order.
But the King and Queen had surrounded themselves with evil councillors
from the first, and the throne was tottering. Talleyrand took no part
in the long debates on the King’s Veto. The fact that the Assembly
was discussing it at all meant, as he must have seen clearly, that a
greater power than the King now ruled in France. He only can give or
withhold an authority who possesses it.
Moreover, the royal party seemed to learn nothing from experience
to the end. The King, indeed, was recognizing the permanence of the
Revolution to some extent; nor was he without humane consciousness
that it had been merited. With a wistful glance back at the golden
days that were gone, he was clumsily learning his part as “Restorer of
French Liberty” and loser of French autocracy. But “the Austrian” was
far from reconciled, and what was left of the light-headed Court was
frenzied with mortification. The debates on the Veto were answered by
the military banquet in the Chateau on October 1st, by the huge white
cockades at Versailles and black cockades at Paris. In the afternoon of
the 5th the sitting of the Assembly is disturbed by whispers of Paris
marching on Versailles. Presently the trickling stream of oratory is
stopped by the sound of an approaching army, irregular and noisy. A
deputation from Paris is announced, and fifteen indescribable females
enter. With an implied disdain of constitution-making, they have come
for mere vulgar bread. Talleyrand and his colleagues pour out and gaze
with bewilderment on one more unique scene in the human drama—five
thousand muddy, draggled, hungry, dangerous women of every type and
complexion. The rest is familiar. Talleyrand saw the strange army surge
and beat and roar about the gates of the Chateau, until the inevitable
shot was fired, and the tide poured in and for a moment seemed likely
to settle a good deal of the Constitution. Then it was rolled back upon
Paris—but taking the King, now sunk to office of “chief baker” with it.
Monarchy was over in France. There was no question of deserting it.
But what shall we say of his desertion of the Church, whose rights,
privileges and properties he had sworn to defend on that gala-day
at Autun seven months ago? When we go back to his election address,
endorsed by the electors as their _cahier_ of instructions, we are
reminded that Talleyrand hinted long ago that titles to property must
be scrutinised. It is almost certain that he was thinking of Church
property. However that may be, the country had in October to face an
appalling scarcity of bread and money. The loans could not be raised:
the silver of the churches had been melted down: patriotic gifts had
poured fruitlessly into the insatiable caisse: respectable ladies had
sent their jewellery and other ladies had offered their earnings: monks
had tendered their monasteries. The whole nation had caught the fever
of August 4th. But the deficit remained, and very many eyes were turned
towards the property of the Church, estimated to be worth 2,100,000,000
livres. The idea of appropriating this to national purposes had been
broached in the Assembly early in August, and had been supported by
several speakers. In the national emergency the proposal was certain
to be voted sooner or later—probably sooner. Talleyrand put his name
down for a speech on the subject, and it was delivered on October 10th.
In it he urged the nation to assume the ownership of all the Church
property in France.
It is impossible to read his speech without feeling that a sincere
national interest inspires it. He points out that, in its distress,
the nation has hitherto left one class of property untouched, and
that, nevertheless, the clergy are probably expecting some change in
their position, now that tithe has been suppressed. The clergy are
not proprietors in the ordinary sense of the word. Estates are not so
much left _to them_, as left for the performance of certain functions.
A nation which has felt justified in dealing with tithe may go on
to appropriate estates. In this a great saving can be made without
injustice. The actual revenue of the Church is (to strike the average
of estimates) 150,000,000. But religion can be fully provided for by
the State out of a revenue of 100,000,000, and this may be gradually
reduced to 80 or 85 millions. Sinecures will be abolished. Useless
religious communities will be dispersed and compensated. At the same
time the income of the curé will be raised to 1,200 livres a year and
a house; and the clergy must have the first claim on the national
revenue, and be paid in advance. He then shows how the sale of Church
property may be made to yield 2,100,000,000 livres, and concludes with
an attractive sketch of the expenditure of the profit.
The style of the speech is plain, except in the peroration, but
it is solid and convincing. We can well believe that the speaker
was interrupted over and over again with loud applause. Here was a
financial expert, and a bishop, putting in impressive form the vague
dream of so many of them. From the Right, naturally, came a flood of
rhetoric. The Abbé Maury bitterly assailed Talleyrand, while Mirabeau
vigorously defended the proposal.[17] But Talleyrand took no further
share in the debate. He wished to speak again on November 2nd, the
day the law was passed, but the closure had to be voted, and he was
content to publish his speech (which was written, as was customary in
the Assembly). The second speech adds little to the first, which had
now, by order of the Assembly, been printed and distributed throughout
the country. That he strengthened his position with the Radicals need
not be stated. The _Moniteur_ spoke of him as “the youngest, most
intrepid, and most enlightened prelate in the ecclesiastical college.”
The pamphleteers of the Right denounced him as “the limping devil,”
“Judas,” “the disgrace and scandal of the Clergy, the shame of the
nobility, the basest and vilest of gamblers.” The last phrase was
suggested by the Abbé Maury’s declaration that Talleyrand was acting in
concert with Jewish speculators. We may remember that, as Castellane
points out, Talleyrand’s proposal would have the effect of reducing
his own income to the most slender proportions. We must admit, too,
that the appropriation of Church property was only a matter of time;
and we must allow the probability of M. de Lacombe’s suggestion that
Talleyrand feared the confiscation would be carried with the rough
injustice and ignorance now so often exhibited in the Assembly, and
he resolved to secure a just and rational settlement by his action.
When we have admitted all this, there is little reason for us to seek
further and dishonourable motives. We shall find him later boldly
reminding the Assembly of their engagement to stoop to no injustice in
the matter.
Not so leniently can we pass over a letter to his diocese, bearing
the date of October 12th, which must have been written while he was
preparing his speech. It enjoins the prayers of the Quarant Ore in
accordance with the King’s instructions, but it is painfully religious.
“The religion of Our Lord,” it begins, “is the firmest support of
thrones, the most solid ground for the prosperity of States. In vain
does the pride of man spend itself in brilliant speculations on the
alleged force of reason and nature in systems of government that are
independent of religion.” The work was most probably entrusted to Des
Renaudes. Talleyrand’s clergy had been somewhat shaken when they heard
of his voting for the abolition of tithe. After his speech of October
10th they wrote a strong letter of protest. Talleyrand replied with
vague and mild excuses, and they retorted with some warmth; but he took
no further notice, and the quarrel was suspended.
Meantime the Assembly had followed the King to Paris, and was meeting
temporarily at the Archbishop’s palace, now deserted by the emigrant
prelate. It would be difficult to imagine the feelings of even the
staid Talleyrand after this transfer into the very crater of the
national volcano. A glance at the Minutes of the Assembly shows a
kind of panic amongst the Deputies. On October 9th the President was
asked to grant 200 passports to members of the Assembly. Disease
spread amongst them with appalling effect as the date approached for
going to Paris. Even presidents complained of “extinction of the
voice” when awkward debates came on; and one needed some voice in an
Assembly where three orators would occupy the tribune at once, to the
accompaniment of a hundred others and several hundred spectators. It
must have been hopelessly bewildering to moderate politicians and
refined people like Talleyrand. Moreover, one beacon that had more or
less guided him so far was extinguished. He had looked forward to a
place in the Ministry. Mirabeau had included him in his scheme of a
Ministry, when the patriots got wind of it, and, at the beginning of
November, passed a law that no member of the Assembly should accept
any office or commission for two years after leaving it. The pay of an
ordinary Deputy was 18 francs a day. Calculation was now of little use.
Talleyrand must either emigrate, and leave France to the violent and
ignorant, or remain an observant member of the Assembly, and cultivate
faith and hope.
One better feature of the time was that the powerful Mirabeau was
becoming alarmed. When he had whispered to the President of the
Assembly on October 5th that “Paris is marching on us,” he had
been told that it was “so much the better; we shall get a Republic
all the sooner.” Talleyrand and he and other constitutionalists
met at the “Society of Friends of the Constitution,” the successor
of the Breton Club, meeting now in the library of the Jacobin
convent in the Rue Saint-Honoré. Its debates were then quiet
and orderly, the general public not being admitted. Most of the
abler moderates met there—Duport, Barnave, Lameth (the well-known
triumvirate—“triumscroundrelate,” Mirabeau said later), Sieyès,
Chapelier, the Duc d’Aiguillon, &c. Many non-deputies, especially
writers, were admitted after the transfer to Paris, and the club became
a lively centre of journalism and pamphleteering. Gradually it became
infected with the general violence of the time, and Talleyrand and the
moderates left it in May to found the more respectable club of the
Feuillants, with La Fayette, Bailly, Sieyès, Chamfort, and Marmontel.
But Paris was being rapidly denuded of all that appealed to Talleyrand.
By the middle of October there were 60,000 émigrés in Switzerland
alone. The society that replaced them must have tried Talleyrand’s
infinite restraint. One of Napoleon’s rough marshals said of him that
“you could attack him thirty times in the rear (_coups de derrière_)
before any indication appeared on his face.” He needed that quality
most of all in the days of the Revolution.
During the remainder of 1789 he confined himself to practical work and
moderation. On November 7th he appeared in the tribune to appeal for
the proper protection of the confiscated estates. Towards the close
of the month he was appointed on the bank committee, and he delivered
its report on December 4th—a very able, technical discourse on the bank
question, directed to be published by the Assembly. In December he
helped to carry the abolition of the royal lottery, and in January he
still further embittered his former friends of the Right by securing
the enfranchisement of the Jews in the south. We have also speeches
of his pleading for a uniform standard of weights and measures in the
country (of which he afterwards sent a copy to Sir J. R. Miller, who
was urging the cause in England), and on registration fees and the
coinage of small money.
But his most important achievement about this time was the eloquent
defence of the Assembly which he delivered on February 10th. Carlyle’s
disparagement of that body’s labours is a faithful, if not very
judicious, reproduction of what the crowds and the pamphleteers
were saying. The plague of pamphlets was now at its height. E. de
Goncourt says that 6,000 men were engaged in distributing them daily.
The Cordeliers district had taken under its august protection any
scribblers in its area, because the liberty of the press followed from
the liberty of man. As a result the Assembly was constantly attacked,
in the “theory-of-irregular-verbs” spirit. It was still too full of
“aristocrocs” or “aristocranes”: it was a mere talking-shop. “Dames
of the market” had been in it themselves, and knew. The Assembly
directed its constitution-committee to inform France what it had
done. The committee entrusted the work to Talleyrand, and he gave
them a pyrotechnic display which brought on again that “species of
intoxication” which was growing familiar to chroniclers. The _Moniteur_
reporter (Is there a parallel to this in the history of reporting?)
was too overcome with emotion even to remember its chief points; but
he excuses himself with the plea that no patriot could have done
otherwise. It evoked, he said, “applause without example.” But it was
read again the next day and published, and then scattered lovingly over
France at the expense of the Assembly. It is certainly a fine piece
of rhetoric, with some notable phrases. “The King desires to guard
his people from the flatterers he has driven away from his throne.”
“Patience! It is for liberty. You have given so many centuries to
despotism!” Talleyrand won a great deal of popularity by the speech.
Ten days afterwards he was elected President of the Assembly (for the
customary fortnight), in opposition to Sieyès, by 323 votes to 125. He
was often cheered in the street, and once Mirabeau and he were called
to the window by an admiring crowd during a banquet at the Palais Royal.
His diocese, as we can imagine, did not regard this new kind of
distinction with satisfaction. At the beginning of the year he had
sent them his greeting, and they had responded. But during the stormy
debates of February, on the suppression of the monastic orders and
the civil constitution of the clergy, they looked in vain for the
name of their Bishop. Talleyrand took no part in the struggle. He saw
the suppression of monasteries decreed on February 13th—and Capuchin
monks rush to be shaved as soon as the report came, while others
rushed to less respectable establishments without waiting to cast off
their habits. He gave no assistance to the religious speakers of April
12-13th who tried to induce the Assembly to make a formal declaration
that the Catholic Church was the Church of the nation, and he refused
to sign their subsequent protest. Then his clergy reminded him of his
office. No doubt, they said, with some irony, he had only abstained in
the idea of making a more solemn protest at the head of his clergy.
They had signed a protest and forwarded it to him to head the list
of signatures and present to the Assembly. He sent a conciliatory
reply, pointing out that it was unwise to ask a political body to
meddle with religion: the Catholic faith _was_ the religion of the
nation. His people were divided on the receipt of this letter, but one
of his Vicars-General made a vehement attack on him, and the local
pamphleteers entertained each other for a time. Talleyrand’s policy was
really clear enough. He believed that religion was wholly necessary for
the people, and had no thought of impairing its action. But he knew
that there were grave abuses to be suppressed, and he was content to
watch, in the interest of the nation and of justice, while the State
took over control of the Church. Twice he intervened with dignity and
courage for justice to the clergy; once on June 13th, when he reminded
the Assembly of its promise to treat the despoiled clergy as the first
creditors of the State, and again on September 24th. Dillon afterwards
claimed that he and the majority of his colleagues acted “as true
gentlemen,” but would hardly claim religious motives. Talleyrand could
say as much.
His popularity with the Left and the bitterness of the Right were
doubled when he said Mass for the last time on July 14th—the famous
Mass of the Champ de Mars. Much has been written, in the way of sneers,
on that famous ceremony, and Talleyrand’s share in it; much of it
is clearly unjust. It must be remembered that the demonstration in
the Champ de Mars was not a piece of ritual arbitrarily devised to
satisfy the sooty citizens who had taken the Bastille. Before the end
of the preceding year this collective demonstration and oath-taking
had started in provincial towns. As the months of 1790 advanced
Paris was piqued to hear that town after town was solemnly swearing
loyalty to King and constitution—or constitution and King—without
any lead from itself. In May Lyons sent word that it had conducted
a most enthusiastic ceremony of the kind. Paris _must_ conclude and
crown the series. The anniversary of the taking of the Bastille
was divinely appointed for it, and the Champ de Mars provided. The
municipality decreed it, and invited delegations from all parts of
France. Clearly there were great moral possibilities in such an event.
A banner could be raised there under which all parties could gather,
except the extreme Right; and that banner might be—with embroideries
and fringes—the banner of constitutionalism. As July 14th drew near
everything pointed to the realisation of these hopes. Talleyrand was
nominated by the King to preside episcopally at the function. He
saw the theatre of the demonstration growing into shape during that
marvellous fortnight: saw boys and girls, and university professors and
curés, and prostitutes and countesses (among them his old friend, Mme.
de Genlis, with a “mahogany barrow,” and a little model of the Bastille
at her neck), and butchers and brigands and lawyers, decked with
tricolours and cockades, digging and singing and wheeling barrows. It
was a new “species of intoxication,” but most certainly it might mean a
rally to a constitutional ideal, burned in by a blazing pageantry.
I believe myself it was with these thoughts that Talleyrand faced
his great audience from the high altar on July 14th. Imagine oneself
looking out on that living amphitheatre of 300,000 incandescent souls,
all, or nearly all, in transfigured earnest, swearing loyalty to
King and law and nation; and think what type of man would be like to
mock at it. Surely not one who felt, if ever he felt anything, that
a serious rally to a national idea was the pressing need of France.
The statement that Talleyrand whispered mocking words to Lafayette as
he mounted the steps rests on the thinnest of rumours, too eagerly
welcomed by Sainte-Beuve. Lafayette does not confirm it; he would,
in fact, be the last man to whom Talleyrand would say them, if he
had them on his lips, for _he_ would surely see the symbolic power
of the moment. And the supposed letter to Mme. de Flahaut, in which
Talleyrand is made to sneer at the ceremony, is not worth considering.
For most of Talleyrand’s actions during these two years we have to
construct ourselves the inner mood. The memoirs are almost silent. In
this case it is difficult to believe that Talleyrand missed the real
potency of the occasion, and we have no evidence to make us think so.
The suspicion arises from a twofold mistake. It is too readily assumed
that Talleyrand had no serious interests, but was ever in the mood of
Goethe’s Mephistopheles. This is false. His affection began at home,
if you will, but his public and political action constantly shows that
it did not end there. In the second place, the theological element of
the demonstration is taken too literally and too narrowly. The fact
that Talleyrand and his deacon and sub-deacon (Louis and des Renaudes)
were rationalists is no impediment whatever to their being thoroughly
serious. Like many priests before and since they took their service
symbolically, and looked to the effect on the audience. The ceremony
was religious on quite other grounds from those on which the theologian
examines it. I respect his technical objection, but the religion
remains.
For my part I cannot conceive a man so sensible as Talleyrand was of
the needs of France, and the possibilities of such a ceremony, looking
with even indifference from those altar-steps. Would the fire of their
enthusiasm burn on? Would this idea of allegiance to law and an orderly
constitution work deeper into them? If so, it were well for France;
but even if not, it was worth attempting. It was a great political
experiment.
Talleyrand’s diocesans would be represented on the benches of
provincial delegates, but we do not find them quarrelling with him
again until he accepts the civil constitution of the clergy. In the
discussions of religious and ecclesiastical affairs that continued
through the whole year he took no part, except, as I said, to intervene
twice when there seemed danger of injustice to the clergy. On the
financial side of the proceedings he spoke several times. In their
ignorance of the elements of political economy, the majority wished
to treat the confiscated estates as so much wealth actually added to
the country’s resources, or to dispose of them at a ruinous loss.
Talleyrand firmly pointed out the fallacies of their view, and pleaded
for a wise and business-like procedure in turning the estates into
available money. The flooding of the country with paper-money—“robbery
by violence” Mirabeau called it—was a serious addition to the financial
confusion of the times. But in spite of Talleyrand’s clear and earnest
warning, supported by all the financiers, the temptation to issue the
paper-currency on the strength of the new estates was too great, and
Talleyrand had again to bemoan in private the immature democracy
that had assumed power. He retained his popularity, however, and was
mentioned for the Archbishopric of Paris in September. He wrote a
curious letter to the _Moniteur_ on the 8th of September, disclaiming
any ambition for the post, but at the same time replying to the
personal charges which the rumour had caused the Right to circulate.
He denied that he was addicted to _heavy_ gambling, but admitted that
he had won 30,000 francs at the Chess Club. With a rather hollow show
of penitence, he allowed that he had no excuse to make for his gaming,
and said that the State ought to interfere and protect citizens from
themselves in the matter.
But the determination of the Constituent Assembly to control the Church
and force it into the political unity of the State was gradually
nearing its climax, and was to close Talleyrand’s clerical career. It
is hardly surprising that he did not take part in the debates. The
issue was never really doubtful, and on the whole would not displease
Talleyrand. His abstinence should be construed in his favour; no one
could seriously expect him to stand for the autonomy of the Church.
The priest was, in his opinion, a moral functionary (for the masses)
or nothing, and his work was part of the nation’s life. His experience
and his knowledge of history would tell him the danger of leaving the
clergy “a State within a State.” He would regard with satisfaction the
suppression (on the just conditions he had himself laid down) of the
monastic orders and the redistribution of income. He would hardly
resent the rearrangement of ecclesiastical divisions, the exclusion of
the Pope, and the elective character of the new hierarchy. Certainly
he must have foreseen the disturbances that interference in these
matters would cause, but that was a concern of the executive. With the
Archbishop of Sens (de Brienne), the Bishop of Orleans, the Bishop
of Vivières, three bishops _in partibus_, and 66 curés, he took the
oath and accepted the civil constitution of the clergy. Archbishop
Dillon and 130 prelates refused to submit—the majority of them doing
so, Dillon said, as gentlemen, not as theologians. The distinction is
unfortunate, though necessary. They had plunged the country in a civil
war which only a strict regard for their theology could have justified.
Talleyrand had no more respect for theology than Dillon (and “most of
his colleagues,” to use Dillon’s words), but he professed to regard
the new State control as purely disciplinary, and wrote to invite his
clergy to follow his example. They sent him a fiery reply, promising
him “infamy in this world and eternal reprobation in the next,” and
declining to “follow him into the abyss.” After the passing of the
civil constitution the municipal authorities of Autun had notified
Talleyrand’s chapter of the cessation of their functions, and sealed
the door of the chapter-house. They continued to meet, however, in
private and discuss the morals of their bishop. In the rearrangement of
ecclesiastical areas the authorities had contrived to leave Autun an
episcopal centre, but on January 21st Talleyrand resigned his See. He
had, he politely explained, been elected a member of the Department of
Paris, and must in future reside constantly in the capital! Lytton’s
statement that Talleyrand remained throughout life very sensitive to
any reference to his bishopric, and that a lady once greatly disturbed
him by dropping the word “lawn,” is not to be taken seriously. His
friends continued to call him “the bishop” for years after (witness
the correspondence in 1792 of Narbonne and Lauzun). There is as little
plausibility in the story of the Prince of Condé once asking him “what
had become of some precious relative of his who used to be Bishop of
Autun.” No one not gifted with the skin of an elephant would venture
to say such things to Talleyrand. I may add that Talleyrand, under the
Directorate, more than once sent help to emigrant members of his old
clergy who had censured him.
One more episcopal act must be mentioned before Monseigneur becomes
plain Citizen Talleyrand. The administration appointed two new bishops,
but had retained sufficient respect for the apostolic succession to
require their proper consecration. Several of the rallied prelates
refused, and Talleyrand promised to officiate, with the assistance
of two of the bishops _in partibus_, Gobel and Mirondot. The latter
withdrew at the last moment. Talleyrand saw him, and is said to have
worked on his feelings by toying with the handle of a pistol and
talking of suicide. The three bishops and the candidates conducted
this ceremony on the following day in a curious environment. The chapel
was strongly guarded by soldiers, and a military band supplied the
music. Saint-Sulpice sent its master of ceremonies to keep the eye of a
ritualist expert on Talleyrand, but was disappointed in its search for
an essential flaw. The American envoy, Morris, tells that Talleyrand’s
dread of violence from the orthodox occasioned a good deal of grief to
his friend, Mme. de Flahaut. The night before the ceremony she received
an envelope containing his will, and sent in search of him. He did
not return to his house that night, and she feared a catastrophe. The
truth was that, conceiving an attack to be possible, he had slept away
from home, and had directed his will to be sent to her only in case of
anything happening.
Lytton, a very careful if not generous judge of Talleyrand’s career,
looks upon this ordination as one of his “unpardonable” acts. It is one
of those acts as to which one’s judgment is almost inevitably swayed
by one’s religious views. Talleyrand explains in his memoirs that he
did it to save the Gallican Church from falling into Presbyterianism
from sheer lack of bishops. The paragraph is ingenious, but not very
convincing. Nearer to the point seems to be an answer he gave in later
years, according to a letter of the Duchess de Dino to Dupanloup.
When asked to explain some action or other, he answered that it was
impossible to explain many things done at the time of the Revolution;
the disorder was so great that people hardly knew what they were doing.
If we could succeed in putting ourselves in the frame of mind of a
man who had lived through the bewilderingly rapid changes of 1789 and
1790, we should be in a position to pass moral judgment on him. To do
it in the light of our calm standards, in our placid days, is absurd.
However, my purpose is only to have Talleyrand understood, and there is
in this ordination nothing inconsistent with the ideas and policy he
has hitherto followed.
But Rome now found itself obliged to interfere and clip the wings of
this dangerous bishop at large. On May 1st the _Moniteur_ published
the announcement from the Vatican that Talleyrand was suspended, and
would incur excommunication if he “did not return to penance within
the space of forty days.” The romantic biographers say that the only
notice Talleyrand took of it was to invite Lauzun to supper to console
him, adding that “as he was now denied fire and water they would have
to be content with wine and iced foods.” Unfortunately, the story had
been told before, and Talleyrand did not plagiarise. The censure would
not distress him. We can, in fact, imagine that he would close his
clerical career with some relief. It had imposed not a little duplicity
on him. In justice to him we must remember that he had been forced
into the clerical estate, had been unchecked in his irregular ideas
and habits, had been promoted from order to order by those who were
fully acquainted with them, and, in fine, found a position like his
sanctioned by almost his whole social class. Yet this chapter alone of
his career will prevent one from ever calling him “great,” except in
the qualified sense of a great diplomatist.