History of Civilization in England, Vol. 2 of 3. Henry Buckley
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Название: History of Civilization in England, Vol. 2 of 3

Автор: Henry Buckley

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СКАЧАТЬ spirit, by which, in France as well as in England, toleration was preceded. For, without entering into details which would be too long for the limits of this Introduction, it is enough to say, that French literature generally was, at this period, distinguished by a freedom and a boldness of inquiry, of which, England alone excepted, no example had then been seen in Europe. The generation which had listened to the teachings of Montaigne and of Charron, was now succeeded by another generation, the disciples, indeed, of those eminent men, but disciples who far outstripped their masters. The result was, that, during the thirty or forty years which preceded the power of Louis XIV.,245 there was not to be found a single Frenchman of note who did not share in the general feeling – not one who did not attack some ancient dogma, or sap the foundation of some old opinion. This fearless temper was the characteristic of the ablest writers of that time;246 but what is still more observable is, that the movement spread with such rapidity as to include in its action even those parts of society which are invariably the last to be affected by it. That spirit of doubt, which is the necessary precursor of all inquiry, and therefore of all solid improvement, owes its origin to the most thinking and intellectual parts of society, and is naturally opposed by the other parts: opposed by the nobles, because it is dangerous to their interests; opposed by the uneducated, because it attacks their prejudices. This is one of the reasons why neither the highest nor the lowest ranks are fit to conduct the government of a civilized country; since both of them, notwithstanding individual exceptions, are, in the aggregate, averse to those reforms which the exigencies of an advancing nation constantly require. But, in France, before the middle of the seventeenth century, even these classes began to participate in the great progress; so that, not only among thoughtful men, but likewise among the ignorant and the frivolous, there was seen that inquisitive and incredulous disposition, which, whatever may be said against it, has at least this peculiarity, that, in its absence, there is no instance to be found of the establishment of those principles of toleration and of liberty, which have only been recognized with infinite difficulty, and after many a hard-fought battle against prejudices whose inveterate tenacity might almost cause them to be deemed a part of the original constitution of the human mind.247

      It is no wonder if, under these circumstances, the speculations of Descartes and the actions of Richelieu should have met with great success. The system of Descartes exercised immense influence, and soon pervaded nearly every branch of knowledge.248 The policy of Richelieu was so firmly established, that it was continued without the slightest difficulty by his immediate successor: nor was any attempt made to reverse it until that forcible and artificial reaction which, under Louis XIV., was fatal, for a time, to every sort of civil and religious liberty. The history of that reaction, and the way in which, by a counter-reaction, the French Revolution was prepared, will be related in the subsequent chapters of this volume; at present we will resume the thread of those events which took place in France before Louis XIV. assumed the government.

      A few months after the death of Richelieu, Louis XIII. also died, and the crown was inherited by Louis XIV., who was then a child, and who for many years had no influence in public affairs. During his minority, the government was administered, avowedly by his mother, but in reality by Mazarin: a man who, though in every point inferior to Richelieu, had imbibed something of his spirit, and who, so far as he was able, adopted the policy of that great statesman, to whom he owed his promotion.249 He, influenced partly by the example of his predecessor, partly by his own character, and partly by the spirit of his age, showed no desire to persecute the Protestants, or to disturb them in any of the rights they then exercised.250 His first act was to confirm the Edict of Nantes;251 and, towards the close of his life, he even allowed the Protestants again to hold those synods which their own violence had been the means of interrupting.252 Between the death of Richelieu and the accession to power of Louis XIV., there elapsed a period of nearly twenty years, during which Mazarin, with the exception of a few intervals, was at the head of the state; and in the whole of that time, I have found no instance of any Frenchman being punished for his religion. Indeed, the new government, so far from protecting the church by repressing heresy, displayed that indifference to ecclesiastical interests which was now becoming a settled maxim of French policy. Richelieu, as we have already seen, had taken the bold step of placing Protestants at the head of the royal armies; and this he had done upon the simple principle, that one of the first duties of a statesman is to employ for the benefit of the country the ablest men he can find, without regard to their theological opinions, with which, as he well knew, no government has any concern. But Louis XIII., whose personal feelings were always opposed to the enlightened measures of his great minister, was offended by this magnanimous disregard of ancient prejudices; his piety was shocked at the idea of Catholic soldiers being commanded by heretics; and, as we are assured by a well-informed contemporary, he determined to put an end to this scandal to the church, and, for the future, allow no Protestant to receive the staff of marshal of France.253 Whether the king, if he had lived, would have carried his point, is doubtful;254 but what is certain is, that, only four months after his death, this appointment of marshal was bestowed upon Turenne, the most able of all the Protestant generals.255 And in the very next year, Gassion, another Protestant, was raised to the same dignity; thus affording the strange spectacle of the highest military power in a great Catholic country wielded by two men against whose religion the church was never weary of directing her anathemas.256 In a similar spirit, Mazarin, on mere grounds of political expediency, concluded an intimate alliance with Cromwell; an usurper who, in the opinion of the theologians, was doomed to perdition, since he was soiled by the triple crime of rebellion, of heresy, and of regicide.257 Finally, one of the last acts of this pupil of Richelieu's258 was to sign the celebrated treaty of the Pyrenees, by which ecclesiastical interests were seriously weakened, and great injury inflicted on him who was still considered to be the head of the church.259

      But, the circumstance for which the administration of Mazarin is most remarkable, is the breaking out of that great civil war called the Fronde, in which the people attempted to carry into politics the insubordinate spirit which had already displayed itself in literature and in religion. Here we cannot fail to note the similarity between this struggle and that which, at the same time, was taking place in England. It would, indeed, be far from accurate to say that the two events were the counterpart of each other; but there can be no doubt that the analogy between them is very striking. In both countries, the civil war was the first popular expression of what had hitherto been rather a speculative, and, so to say, a literary scepticism. In both countries, incredulity was followed by rebellion, and the abasement of the clergy preceded the humiliation of the crown; for Richelieu was to the French church what Elizabeth had been to the English church. In both countries there now first arose that great product of civilization, a free press, which showed its liberty by pouring forth those fearless and innumerable works which mark the activity of the age.260 In both countries, the struggle was between retrogression and progress; between those who clung to tradition, and those who longed for innovation; while, in both, the contest assumed the external form of a war between king and parliament, the king being the organ of the past, the parliament the representative of the present. And, not to mention inferior similarities, there was one other point of vast importance in which these two great events coincide. This is, that both of them were eminently secular, and arose from the desire, not of propagating religious opinions, but of securing civil liberty. The temporal character of the English rebellion I have already noticed, and, indeed, it must be obvious to whoever has studied the evidence in its original sources. In France, not only do we find the same result, but we can even mark the stages of the progress. СКАЧАТЬ

<p>245</p>

That is in 1661, when Louis XIV. first assumed the government.

<p>246</p>

M. Barante (Tableau de la Littérature Française, pp. 26, 27) notices ‘cette indépendance dans les idées, ce jugement audacieux de toutes choses, qu'on remarque dans Corneille, dans Mézéray, dans Balzac, dans Saint-Réal, dans Lamothe-Levayer.’ To these may be added Naudé, Patin, and probably Gassendi. Compare Hallam's Literat. of Europe, vol. ii. pp. 364, 365, with Mackintosh's Ethical Philos. p. 116, and Lettres de Patin, vol. i. p. 297, vol. ii. pp. 33, 186, 191, 242, 342, 498, 508, vol. iii. p. 87.

<p>247</p>

The increase of incredulity was so remarkable, as to give rise to a ridiculous assertion, ‘qu'il y avoit plus de 50,000 athées dans Paris vers l'an 1623.’ Baillet, Jugemens des Savans, Paris, 1722, 4to. vol. i. p. 185. Baillet has no difficulty in rejecting this preposterous statement (which is also noticed in Coleridge's Literary Remains, vol. i. p. 305; where, however, there is apparently a confusion between two different periods); but the spread of scepticism among the upper ranks and courtiers, during the reign of Louis XIII. and the minority of Louis XIV., is attested by a great variety of evidence. See Mém. de Madame de Motteville, vol. iii. p. 52; Mém. de Retz, vol. i. p. 266; Conrart, Mém. p. 235 note; Des Réaux, Historiettes, vol. vii. p. 143; Mém. de Brienne, vol. ii. p. 107 note.

<p>248</p>

Volumes might be written on the influence of Descartes, which was seen, not only in subjects immediately connected with his philosophy, but even in those apparently remote from it. Compare Broussais, Examen des Doctrines Médicales, vol. ii. pp. 55 seq.; Lettres de Patin, vol. iii. p. 153; Sprengel, Hist. de la Médecine, vol. iv. p. 238; Cuvier, Hist. des Sciences, part ii. pp. 327, 332, 352, 363; Stäudlin, Geschichte der theologischen Wissenschaften, vol. i. p. 263; Tennemann, Gesch. der Philos. vol. x. pp. 285 seq.; Huetius de Rebus ad eum pertinentibus, pp. 35, 295, 296, 385–389; Mosheim's Eccles. Hist. vol. ii. p. 258; Dacier, Rapport Historique, p. 334; Leslie's Nat. Philos. p. 121; Eloges, in Œuvres de Fontenelle, Paris, 1766, vol. v. pp. 94, 106, 137, 197, 234, 392, vol. vi. pp. 157, 318, 449; Thomson's Hist. of Chemistry, vol. i. p. 195; Quérard, France Lit. vol. iii. p. 273.

<p>249</p>

On the connexion between Richelieu and Mazarin, see Sismondi, Hist. des Français, vol. xxiii. pp. 400, 530; and a curious, though perhaps apocryphal anecdote in Tallemant des Réaux, Historiettes, vol. ii. pp. 231, 232. In 1636 there was noticed ‘l'étroite union’ between Richelieu and Mazarin. Le Vassor, Hist. de Louis XIII, vol. viii. part ii. p. 187.

<p>250</p>

‘Mazarin n'avoit ni fanatisme ni esprit persécuteur,’ Sismondi, Hist. des Français, vol. xxiv. p. 531. That he did not persecute the Protestants is grudgingly confessed in Felice's Hist. of the Protestants of France, p. 292. See also Smedley's Reformed Religion in France, vol. iii. p. 222.

<p>251</p>

He confirmed it in July, 1643. See Benoist, Hist. de l'Edit de Nantes, vol. iii. appendix, p. 3; and Quick's Synodicon in Gallia, vol. i. p. ciii.

<p>252</p>

In 1659, there was assembled the Synod of Loudon, the moderator of which said, ‘It is now fifteen years since we had a national synod.’ Quick's Synodicon in Gallia, vol. ii. p. 517.

<p>253</p>

Brienne records the determination of the king, ‘que cette dignité ne seroit plus accordée à des Protestans.’ Sismondi, Histoire des Français, vol. xxiv. p. 65.

<p>254</p>

He was so uneasy about the sin he had committed, that before his death he intreated the Protestant marshals to change their creed: ‘Il ne voulut pas mourir sans avoir exhorté de sa propre bouche les maréchaux de la Force et de Chatillon à se faire Catholiques.’ Benoist, Hist. de l'Edit de Nantes, vol. ii. p. 612. The same circumstance is mentioned by Le Vassor, Hist. de Louis XIII, vol. x. part ii. p. 785.

<p>255</p>

Louis XIII. died in May 1643; and Turenne was made marshal in the September following. Lavallée, Hist. des Français, vol. iii. pp. 148, 151.

<p>256</p>

Sismondi (Hist. des Français, vol. xxiv. p. 65) makes the appointment of Gassion in 1644; according to Montglat (Mémoires, vol. i. p. 437) it was at the end of 1643. There are some singular anecdotes of Gassion in Les Historiettes de Tallemant des Réaux, vol. v. pp. 167–180; and an account of his death in Mém. de Motteville, vol. ii. p. 290, from which it appears that he remained a Protestant to the last.

<p>257</p>

The Pope especially was offended by this alliance (Ranke, die Päpste, vol. iii. p. 158, compared with Vaughan's Cromwell, vol. i. p. 343, vol. ii. p. 124); and, judging from the language of Clarendon, the orthodox party in England was irritated by it. Clarendon's Hist. of the Rebellion, pp. 699, 700. Contemporary notices of this union between the cardinal and the regicide, will be found in Mém. de Retz, vol. i. p. 349; Mém. de Montglat, vol. ii. p. 478, vol. iii. p. 23; Lettres de Patin, vol. ii. pp. 183, 302, 426; Marchand, Dict. Historique, vol. ii. p. 56; Mem. of Sir Philip Warwick, p. 377; Harris's Lives of the Stuarts, vol. iii. p. 393.

<p>258</p>

De Retz (Mémoires, vol. i. p. 59), who knew Richelieu, calls Mazarin ‘son disciple.’ And at p. 65 he adds, ‘comme il marchoit sur les pas du cardinal de Richelieu, qui avoit achevé de détruire toutes les anciennes maximes de l'état.’ Compare Mém. de Motteville, vol. ii. p. 18; and Mém. de la Rochefoucauld, vol. i. p. 444.

<p>259</p>

On the open affront to the Pope by this treaty, see Ranke, die Päpste, vol. iii. p. 159: ‘An dem pyrenäischen Frieden nahm er auch nicht einmal mehr einen scheinbaren Antheil: man vermied es seine Abgeordneten zuzulassen: kaum wurde seiner noch darin gedacht.’ The consequences and the meaning of all this are well noticed by M. Ranke.

<p>260</p>

‘La presse jouissait d'une entière liberté pendant les troubles de la Fronde, et le public prenait un tel intérêt aux débats politiques, que les pamphlets se débitaient quelquefois au nombre de huit et dix mille exemplaires.’ Sainte–Aulaire, Hist. de la Fronde, vol. i. p. 299. Tallemant des Réaux, who wrote immediately after the Fronde, says (Historiettes, vol. iv. p. 74), ‘Durant la Fronde, qu'on imprimoit tout.’ And Omer Talon, with the indignation natural to a magistrate, mentions, that in 1649, ‘toutes sortes de libelles et de diffamations se publioient hautement par la ville sans permission du magistrat.’ Mém. d'Omer Talon, vol. ii. p. 466. For further evidence of the great importance of the press in France in the middle of the seventeenth century, see Mém. de Lenet, vol. i. p. 162; Mém. de Motteville, vol. iii. pp. 288, 289; Lettres de Patin, vol. i. p. 432, vol. ii. p. 517; Monteil, Hist. des divers Etats, vol. vii. p. 175.

In England, the Long Parliament succeeded to the licensing authority of the Star-chamber (Blackstone's Commentaries, vol. iv. p. 152); but it is evident from the literature of that time, that for a considerable period the power was in reality in abeyance. Both parties attacked each other freely through the press; and it is said that between the breaking out of the civil war and the restoration, there were published from 30,000 to 50,000 pamphlets. Morgan's Phœnix Britannicus, 1731, 4to. pp. iii. 557; Carlyle's Cromwell, vol. i. p. 4; Southey's Commonplace Book, third series, p. 449. See also on this great movement of the press, Bates's Account of the Late Troubles, part i. p. 78; Bulstrode's Memoirs, p. 4; Howell's Letters, p. 354; Hunt's Hist. of Newspapers, vol. i. p. 45; Clarendon's Hist. of the Rebellion, p. 81; Nichols's Lit. Anec. vol. iv. pp. 86, 102.