Flaminia.
By Alexandre De Bar.
Concluded.
"You will not be surprised to see that Flaminia was ignorant of the veritable nature of the affection that she felt for Albert; but you will be astonished to learn that he shared entirely her ignorance, although he had seen much of life. Yet think that it is to know nothing of the most impetuous passion of our soul if we have only learnt the theory; for as to know the world we must have lived in the world, so to know the heart one must have lived by the heart; if such has not been one's experience, all is obscurity and one takes a false route. Now, Albert had lived out of the world, and had not yet loved aught but a glorious renown. Besides all this, if you will look back upon that fair time of youth which has now fled from us, you will remember that the descent which allures us is often so gentle that we follow it without attention; until the day when an unforeseen event, and often even an unimportant circumstance, arouses us, and permits us by a glance to see the road that we have already glided down. Albert, too, descended that charming declivity, gathering the perfumed flowers which hung on the shrubs, and intoxicating himself with perfumes, with light and songs. His soul happy, his heart pure, dazzled by the celestial gleams which irradiated him, how could he see where all this was conducting him? This is how he first became aware of his position: There was at the bottom of the gardens of the palace Balbo a long alley, that was covered by the thick foliage of the vines, whose stems, black and distorted, clung to and spread up the stone pillars on each side. Here and there the jasmines displayed the silver stars of their flowers, which shone out of the deep shade of their leaves. From that alley the eye gazed upon a vast horizon, bounded by two large sheets of azure, the sea and sky, between which the mountains lifted their imposing masses, gilded by the rays of the setting sun. It was in this perfumed gallery that, each evening, Albert was conducted by his hosts, as soon as the refreshing breeze of evening blew across the sea. Often it was the arm of Flaminia that aided his yet feeble steps in this exercise. How many charming hours thus passed for them during the calm of those evenings, when the noises of the day ceased one by one, until the ear brought but the sound of the whispering breeze, pure and sweet as the breath of a sleeping child, to the touched and softened soul! One day, the fever seemed struggling to regain its power over the form of Albert; his wounds were scarcely closed, and the emotions that he experienced reacted most powerfully upon his health. Sir, man is born for suffering, and not for joy. His body can support an immense weight of sorrow and pain without giving way; but it is worn out by pleasure, and joy kills it. Giovanni, uneasy about his friend, strictly forbade his leaving his room, and that evening the family went alone to their walk. Albert returned sadly to the saloon, become more desert for him than the sands of Sahara, in company with Giovanni, who, in the hope of distracting his loneliness, talked to him of battles and of victories; although had he known how far the mind of his friend was from all such subjects, he might have given himself far less trouble with an equally good result. Little caring then for glory, Albert's heart was with Flaminia under the perfumed shade of the vines and jasmines. At their return, Flaminia held out to Albert a spray of jasmine covered with flowers, saying to him: 'You like these flowers, so I bring you them.' When Albert had retired to his own room, he took this bouquet and covered it with kisses: he listened with delight to the voice that issued from those flowers and that told him such sweet words. A flame seemed to mingle with their perfumes that carried a new life to his heart; but it carried there also the light. Another voice made itself heard and showed him the truth, and he fell from the regions of happiness where his dream had carried him, into the implacable reality; for he then discovered with what sort of an affection they were both animated. And he a knight of the Order of Malta! If absence could have given the repose of forgetfulness to Flaminia, Albert would not have hesitated to have left her at once. But if there exist attachments so slight that the simple absence of their object is sufficient to cure them, so there are others which may be likened to those long-lived plants that extend their roots in all directions and all depths; so that one cannot tear them from the soil in which they have once gained a hold. Such affections as these resist all human efforts, and absence but serves to render their wounds more poignant and more lively. Albert understood too well the character of Flaminia not to know that their destiny was irrevocably fixed. Divine Providence seemed to have drawn them together in this world but to make them merit, by a sacrifice of their affections, the happiness that was destined for them in the next. The ordinary remedy of absence would have been useless in their case. Albert understood this, and the idea of getting himself absolved from his vows of knighthood came to him. This thought he repelled. It was not that he believed the success of such a measure impossible, but that he saw in it a desertion of his duty; he felt that his conscience would not be in tranquillity, and that it would perpetually remind him that one cannot thus break his engagements with God. He knelt down piously, and that which passed in his soul during that cruel night, and that which he suffered during that struggle, ever rested a secret between him and God. For you, scholar of the eighteenth century, it is an unpardonable weakness that of placing one's self humbly on one's knees before the Divine Majesty. Yet, thanks only to this weakness, Albert, in all the force of youth, resisted without failing before the most impetuous, the most irresistible of all our passions, and came forth victorious out of the rudest combat that he had ever given. He loved, passionately, Flaminia: Flaminia, beautiful, rich in heart and soul, full of all the merits, of all the virtues, that can entrance at the same time the heart, the soul, and the senses; Flaminia, who loved him with an equal ardor, and who confided herself to him absolutely and without reserve. He had over her an absolute power, and, far from using it, he subdued his passion, and, directing by a determined will the tumultuous waves of his heart, he traversed without shipwreck those tempests that are more ungovernable than the rage of the ocean. The strength with which he aided himself was that same weakness which makes you smile. Had he trusted only in himself, he would have fallen, because he was but a man; he implored the aid of him who is strength itself, and he vanquished. Faith was for him what the fortifying oil was with which the athletes rubbed their bodies before the struggle; and, not content with aiding him to overcome himself, she knew also how to dry his tears by the blessed aid of hope. For, at the same time that she showed him in all their barrenness the painful paths of duty, she let him see at the end of the journey, and as the price of his victory, that eternal union of souls which time itself is powerless to break. I know you to be prejudiced, my dear Frederick, on all that which touches religious questions; but, at the same time, I know you to be of too good faith not to acknowledge that there is truly something superhuman in a doctrine which gives such victories; neither shall I insist on the detail of the events which occurred during the six months that Albert yet passed by the side of Flaminia, for they would have no value in my recital. It would not, perhaps, be without a certain interest to follow the developments of that affection, so completely purified from all earthly thoughts; but, as there are certain situations where a look, a smile, takes the proportions of a veritable event, it would be necessary for me to enter into the very slightest points of its psychology. On learning the gravity of the wounds of his brother, Adolph Shraun had come in all haste to the palace Balbo. Antonia failed not to produce in his heart an impression as profound, but more decisive, than that which Flaminia had already aroused in his brother. As he knew that the project of an alliance would be joyfully received in the two families, Antonia was not long without knowing the sentiments which she had enkindled. The frank, impetuous, and lively character of Adolph had already predisposed her in his favor, so that she quickly shared the same sentiments and hopes as himself. Joy renders us much more disposed to confidence than does sorrow, and Antonia did not fail to feel the need of confiding to some one both her secret and her love. This need caused her to seek in Flaminia for sympathy, and the reciprocal confidence which was due between these two young hearts, so well formed to love and sustain each other, was then established for ever. The naïve confidences of her sister enlightened Flaminia on her own sentiments, and carried into her soul the light that she had but caught glimpses of before. She then understood the nature of her destiny, and, like Albert, she accepted it without a murmur. She took refuge in the consoling thought that their union would be accomplished in those celestial regions where only reign the eternal laws of love; and thus placing her hopes upon a sure basis, she resigned herself to her cross, prayed, and awaited God's will. I think that I have quite sufficiently instructed you upon the state of these noble hearts; so that I can arrive at that which is the object of my story—namely, to tell you how it was that my great-grandfather, Adolph, saw, one day, two souls." The Baron Frederick could not here repress a deep sigh of satisfaction, and the count, who noticed nothing, continued: "The hours, which their separation was soon to render so long, passed away with a cruel rapidity; the moment approached when Albert ought to leave Flaminia, that he might report himself to the Grand-Master Coroner, who was then preparing an expedition directed against Napoli of Roumania, and the few days they had yet to pass together made them feel still more strongly the happiness that they were about to lose. Giovanni had announced his intention of following his friend, and their approaching departure had cast a shade of sadness on that household, lately so joyous that it had seemed a nest hidden from the world, where alone happiness dwelt. One evening, when, according to their usual custom, they were all grouped together under the shadow of the vines, the conversation took a melancholy form, and the fear that reigned in all their hearts expressed itself by words: they were talking of death. 'Come, come,' said the Prince Balbo, after a few minutes of discussion on the subject, 'what is the use of these fears? When duty calls, we must obey, not only by action, but in heart, and without regret. Besides,' he added, 'the hour of our death is not in our own choice; and none are protected from his stroke when God calls the angel of death and says, "Strike!" I have, like you, my children, incurred many perils in my life, and yet sixty winters have whitened my head; and how many have I not seen of those whose life was peaceable—of flourishing youth—sheltered from all harm, who have been struck down before their time! Let us confide in God, my children; let us resign ourselves beforehand to his will, which is always just, always good—since he is eternally just and good.'
"Flaminia, crushed by the grief of a separation that snatched away from her for ever the half of her soul, had, until these last words of her father, remained silent; but then, lifting her head and leaning slightly toward Albert, said to him in a tone that was audible only to him, 'Yes, happily, one dies at every age.'
"Albert understood her thought.
"'Do you not, then, think on the grief of those who are left?' answered he, in a voice of low reproach.
"'Oh!' replied she quickly, 'if I die first, I will come to seek you.'
"Before that cry, uttered from the heart, before that affection that felt itself sufficiently strong to vanquish the laws of death, sufficiently holy that God should grant it a miracle, silence could be the only answer; but a glance of Albert replaced with all the eloquence of the heart the powerless word. On the morrow of that evening, Albert left Flaminia. I will not paint to you their affliction. It was immense. But a hope that is too ill known in this, our century, sustained their courage and energy. At the moment of an adieu so cruel to both, not a tear fell from their eyes. That they did flow, and most abundantly and bitterly, there is no doubt, since grief never loses its rights, and human force, even the best sustained, has its bounds; but they flowed in silence and in secret, and he who was their only witness treasured them up. The days, the months, the seasons passed on; three times the trees had lost their foliage and renewed their leaves; three times had the alley of vines seen the winter's sun pass unobstructed through their naked branches. All had changed around them; their hearts alone changed not. The renown of Albert grew each day, with his valor, more brilliant; but it was no longer renown that he sought, it was a death that would have opened before him that wide field where impatience dies away before the eternity that then commences; death that he desired because it would have brought him near to Flaminia; and death would not listen to him. In vain did he fling himself into the thickest of the danger; in vain did he accomplish prodigies that had caused the bravest to turn pale; he passed through all these without even a wound. Although he had but very rare occasion of knowing what passed in that cherished spot where ever rested his heart and thoughts, still he doubted not but that the tenderness of Flaminia was as lively and as deep as his own; nor did he deceive himself. Flaminia had refused under different pretexts the offers that had been made to her; and notwithstanding all the desire they felt to establish their daughter, I would dare to affirm that it was not without a certain secret joy that the Prince and Princess Balbo looked upon the prospect before them, the hope of keeping her always by their side. Do not blame them too quickly, my friend; for it is a painful thought that during twenty years a child should have been the object of your affection and of your solicitude; that she should have taken the best and largest portion of your life and heart, in order that, one day, a stranger, under the title of a new-born love, should carry away from you all your joy; leaving you to see your much-loved child place herself under another protection than thine, and quit without regret the house where she leaves a blank that nothing else can fill.
"I had almost forgotten to tell you that Antonia had married Adolphus, and lived happy and peaceful in this same castle where we now are finishing our career. Albert, tired of war, and freed from all further illusions of glory, had come, after having refused the highest distinctions of the order, to seek some repose by his brother's side. Ambition was dead in him; his soul, that had been so severely proved, had need of recollection and calm; and he found this by the side of him whom, after Flaminia, he loved the best in the world. Moreover, although he himself scarcely ever spoke of her who filled all his thoughts, still he felt a lively pleasure in hearing her spoken of so frequently by his brother and his wife. Albert was then calm and composed; he marched courageously forward in life as does the traveller who climbs with difficulty the bare paths of a desolate and arid mountain, sure to find in the evening the joys of the fireside and the shelter of his friends' roof.
"Three years, day by day, had passed away since the moment when Albert had quitted the palace Balbo. It was the evening; Adolphus and Antonia were by his side, in this same saloon where we now are. Contrary to his custom, Albert, for whom that anniversary was a day of mourning, felt his soul full of a penetrating and serene joy, when ten o'clock sounded from that same clock that—"
Here the recital of the count was interrupted by the sound of the clock which resounded in the vast apartment. One would have said that it affirmed the words of the count, by repeating the ten strokes which it had caused to be heard at the moment of which he was speaking. That metallic sound seemed to have in it an unusual power; there was something solemn in its grave slowness; in the deep noise of the wheel drawn round by the falling lead, which accompanied with its heavy base the more piercing sound that traversed the thick oaken case. Both the count and his friends were seized by an impression which they did not seek to dispel or resist. Both instinctively uncovered their heads, and while the count waited almost respectfully until its last vibrations were lost in silence, the baron, more moved than perhaps he was willing to show, placed on the table his pipe, yet fully charged with tobacco, and, an event that certainly had not occurred with him once in ten years, he left that inseparable companion of his leisure hours, without touching the tankard that in vain offered to his gaze its brown and golden tints.
"Ten o'clock had then sounded," continued the count, "and that being the moment when each was accustomed to separate for their bedrooms, Adolphus had got up and looked at his brother, who had been for some time previous motionless and in an attitude of profound attention, resembling a man who follows with his ear the scarcely perceptible sounds of some distant harmony.
"All is finished,' murmured Albert at the moment when the clock had finished striking; and, placing his hand on his brother's arm, 'Remain here,' said he, and turning toward Antonia: 'Pardon me, my sister, if I thus detain Adolphus; but I have need of him to-night, and to-morrow it will be too late.'
"'You frighten me,' answered Antonia; 'what then is going to happen?'
"'You will know very soon,' replied Albert. 'Poor sister! your eyes will shed many a tear; but they will be dried by the thought that the motive which causes them to flow assures for ever the happiness of those who are dear to you.'
"He then kissed her forehead, and, followed by Adolphus, went to his own room, the same which is now yours, dear Frederick.
"'What is the matter with you?' asked Adolphus of his brother, as soon as they were alone.
"'I am sad and happy at the same time; sad because I am going to leave you alone for a short time; but very happy because I go at last to rejoin her, and for this time not again to leave her!'
"'Explain yourself; why do you leave us?'
"'Listen: for that you may understand what is going to happen here this night, it is necessary that you should know what I have felt and suffered during the past three years.'
"Albert then told him of all that which I have just described to you; of his love for Flaminia, of his struggles, and of his victory, over himself; and Adolphus, who already knew through his wife of what Flaminia had suffered, saw with astonishment that all which had been felt by the one had also been by the other, in the same degree and at the same moment. Never had the most profound sympathy established between two beings a more complete identity of sensations and thoughts; near or separated, their two existences had formed but a single life, as their two souls seemed to form but a single soul. When Albert had finished his recital, he added:
"'"If I die first, I shall come to seek you!" Flaminia had told me, and now Flaminia has just died. Do not ask me how I know it, for I am ignorant myself of the reason; but I do know it. I have followed, moment by moment, the progress of her death; at the end I have felt her die, and now I await her coming. In a few instants more she will be here, and we shall depart together for that blessed home where nothing can again oppose itself to our eternal union. It seems to me that already I feel my soul disengaging itself from its bonds; I no longer regard the sufferings that I have endured, except with that sentiment of thankfulness and joy which one feels at the recollection of perils that have been overcome; my past sufferings have no longer their sting, my tears no longer their bitterness! At the solemn moment when I am about to quit a life that has been most painful in its trials for the happy life of triumph, I have wished to have you by my side, that I might say to you my last farewell in this world, and press for a last time your hand before going to await you in eternity.' I leave you to think, my dear Frederick, what must have been the astonishment of Adolphus at receiving this strange confidence.
"'I have too much confidence in the firmness of your reason,' he answered to his brother after a short silence, 'to believe that it has become weakened, were it only for a moment; but do you not fear to have been the victim of some mental illusion, and to have taken for a reality that which was in reality only the dream of your heart exalted by sadness and solitude?'
"'I understand your incredulity,' answered Albert, 'for I have myself shared in it. Each time that the recollection of that promise presented itself to my memory, my reason revolted against such an evident impossibility; the soul cannot again appear in this world once that it has quitted it, thought I, and yet I counted on the premise even while I disbelieved its possibility. Only an hour ago, I yet doubted, but now that doubt has passed away, since the moment when her dying voice sounded in my ears uttering her last words: "You have waited for me; I am here!" Then I understood that it was not merely the strong desire of a soul overexcited by the desire to be reunited to the second half of itself that I felt, but that it was really a mysterious warning; and the accomplishment of a promise that God himself had blessed, and that he permitted to be fulfilled.'
"'But how to explain this miracle?'
"'I am unable to explain it; I tell you what is about to happen, that is all that I can do. In a few minutes Flaminia will be present, and in seeing her you will believe me. For the rest,' added he, after a moment's pause, 'all is a mystery in this world, but the grand end of all is sufficient to enlighten our paths. Do you think that it would be more easy for me to tell you how it is that, notwithstanding we have never said anything to each other that could divulge the mutual state of our hearts, we have yet, in spite of our separation, lived by the same life and the same love? That you cannot believe me, I know, but only wait a little time, and you shall see.'
"In truth, Adolphus did not believe, although the evidently profound conviction of Albert shook his mind and caused in him an impression that he would gladly have shaken off, so contrary to reason did it seem to him. 'Let us make haste, the time presses,' said Albert. He then arranged in order, with rapidity and calm, several important affairs with which he was charged, relating to the principal commanderies of Germany; then, kneeling down, he offered up a short prayer; scarcely had he finished, than, rising up quickly, he seized the hand of his brother, and cried: 'Look! she is come.' Adolphus turned round, and saw Flaminia standing by the side of Albert. You who have lost some one who was dear to you, Frederick, you have remarked that, at the moment when the last sigh escapes and before the work of decay begins, the face is possessed of a calm beauty, supernatural and indefinable in its expression, that inspires an awed respect for that now lifeless form which just a moment before contained a soul. Such looked Flaminia; her figure, surrounded by a luminous atmosphere, had received from immortality an august expression. It was perfectly the form of Flaminia, such as Adolphus had known her, but it was no longer the creature that is imperfect, and subject to the attacks of time and life. It was the being imperishable who, coming forth victorious from her many trials, bore in her all the splendors of her glory. Her beauty was not that which charms by the uniformity, more or less complete, of its lineaments; no, it was the celestial beauty whose type is graven in ourselves; the beauty a single ray of which suffices to illuminate the face that hides a pure soul: this was the beauty sublime that enveloped her with its divine wings, and transfigured her face while changing its lineaments. Adolphus bent his knee before the vision. 'Had I not told you that she would come?' said Albert to his brother. 'Yes!' replied a harmonious voice, which issued from the then incorruptible lips of Flaminia. 'Yes! our love was too pure not to merit its recompense. God has permitted it; you waited for me, and I am come.' She bent slightly toward him to whom she at length was about to be united, and, surrounding him with her arms, she drew his face closer to her own, that gleamed with a celestial joy. Behind them, and contemplating them, stood Death, not under the form of fleshless skeleton, but as a radiant angel who changes bitterness into joy, and tears into smiles. His beautiful face bore the impress of grave majesty rather than of severity, softened by that infinite mercy which gives hope to repentance. The mercy and goodness of the Master who sends him shone in his look, which is so sweet to the contemplation of the soul wearied by the painful journey of life. The hour was come! At the moment when Flaminia, in a manner, took possession of Albert, the angel of Death drew near him, and while with one hand he touched his shoulder, with the other he pointed toward heaven. Albert's body fell back into the arm-chair, which, living, he had just occupied; and when Adolphus, drawn forward by an instinctive motion, ran to support him, he saw by the side of Flaminia the form of his brother, that shone forth surrounded by the same glory and the same joy. He passed the rest of the night by the side of his brother's body, and wept, though not over him whom he had just seen pass away to heaven. The man whom faith sustains with its sweet consolation weeps not the loss of his friend, but his absence. He wept because every separation, even the shortest, is a grief, and his tears were dried by the certainty that Albert was in the possession of a happiness that could neither diminish nor fade, and which he hoped one day to share with him."
The count here left off his story. The baron had listened to him with a sustained attention, and although he preserved his imperturbable calm, yet the recital had so much moved him, that he remained silent; and the count, after waiting a few minutes, continued: "Such is the history of my great-uncle Albert, as it has been transmitted to us by him who was the witness. Do you find it, then, surprising that the faith should be hereditary in a family where such facts happen? What can you reply to this history?"
"Nothing," answered the baron, "except that, to draw the consolations which it contains, one must have the faith; and besides, in supposing that God, if he exists, interferes with the affairs of this world, he is unjust, since he refuses to me the consolation that he gives to others."
"Have you ever asked him for it?" answered the count with a friendly severity. "Have you not, on the contrary, repulsed by a determined obstinacy the solicitations of divine Providence? Pardon me, my friend, if I awaken a painful recollection for you, but have you not even resisted the awful voice of Death?"
"What is the good of my asking?" replied the baron, eluding the second part of his friend's demand. "If faith be necessary, God owes it to me without asking him."
"Food is also necessary," answered the count, "and does man find it ready for him, unless he works? No, no, my friend; labor and prayer, such is the destiny of man upon the earth. His material life is bought by the sweat of his brow, as his spiritual life is the price of his efforts. 'Seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you,' has said the divine Master. Ah! if you had ever knelt before that God whom you blaspheme; if you had with perseverance exposed to him your doubts, your miseries, you would have known that he never leaves without help the soul that sincerely implores him; you would have known that he never hides himself from him who seeks him with a humble and contrite spirit and a pure heart. Pray, my dear Frederick, pray, I tell you, and you will feel that he is near to you; that his arms are open to receive you, and his hands ready to shed on you all the sweet consolations and hopes with which they are filled!"
It was now late; the two friends then separated, and, without doubt, the count that night in his prayers demanded with more than usual fervor the conversion of the man he so warmly loved. Ordinarily, on gaining his room, the baron was accustomed to install himself as comfortably as possible in an immense old leathern arm-chair, whose age dated back for two or three centuries, which he placed in front of the wood fire that burnt noisily on the hearth; and after having again lit his pipe, that inseparable friend, he used to take a book, and, stretching out his feet upon the copper fire-dogs, wait until he felt sleepy, which invariably occurred as soon as there remained no more tobacco in the sculptured wooden bowl of his pipe.
But on that night he cast around him many a curious look, and examined with as great an attention, one after the other, the several pieces of antique furniture with which his room was furnished, as though it had been the first time that he had seen them; then, in place of sitting down in that ancient arm-chair, which he preferred to all the others on account of its large dimensions, he placed it in front of him, and, sitting down on the most modern of his chairs, he regarded with a questioning curiosity and certain respect that mute witness of an adventure, the mere recital of which had caused so great a trouble in his mind; seeming to ask of it a solution to his doubts and fears. After a long and silent contemplation, he let fall his forehead on his hands, and, plunging his fingers among his hair, whitened rather by sorrow than by age, began to meditate profoundly. The agitation of his mind was so great, and the flow of his thoughts so rapid, that, without knowing it, he began to think aloud. "If what he said were true, if there were something within us that outlived our bodies, I could see thee again, my dearest and best-beloved Gertrude; and I could again find the joys of our too short union, and this time for always, unchanging and eternal! And ought I to repulse that thought through the childish fear of abandoning myself to a false hope? Of these two ideas were it not better to follow that which gives us consolation and causes us to live, rather than that which thickens around us the already too profound shades of life, and changes our grief into despair? What consolation have I ever found in the reason of which I am so proud? None! If pride has withheld my tears before men, yet since twenty years they have flowed on in silence without their source being yet dry. If I have blushed to let my weakness be seen by men, have I not felt it a thousand times within me, implacable, and terrible, before my vain revolts against a destiny that broke my heart and that I was forced to submit to? When beside her death-bed I felt but a sterile despair, when my will, my love, were powerless to retain for a single moment the last sigh of that life that I would have been willing to prolong at the expense of my own days, what have I been able to do? Nothing! not even to die! Since twenty years I implore the oblivion which flies before me! Since twenty years, I recoil before the thought to precipitate myself therein! Is it fear that hinders me? No! I have faced the peril when my duty demanded it, and I would do it again: I have too often seen Death to fear him. The reason is that a secret voice speaks within me higher than all the sophisms of my grief, and tells me that I have not the right to destroy the life which I did not give myself. Yet if there is nothing beyond the tomb, why should I fear it, and what have I to dread from oblivion? Have I not the most absolute right on myself, since all ends but in a dreamless sleep? Is it really a sleep? Ah! there is the truth, both for me and for all others; it is that in secret I doubt as often of that oblivion that I so loudly affirm, as I do whether that God does not exist whose existence I so deny. Yet again, if God is but an imaginary being, and if immortality is but a dream, what does one risk to have thought the contrary? One would have lived fortified against the ills and crosses of this life by a thought that sweetens, even the terrors of death. One would not even feel the loss of that hope, since the hour of our disenchantment would be the one which should plunge us into the deep repose of oblivion! The lie, then, would have done that which the truth could not do; it would have given us happiness. If, on the contrary, immortality is not a vain chimera, but a reality, is it not a terrible responsibility to have shut one's heart to its evidence and to have misunderstood the sublime Author of all things? Yes! in truth terrible; for in that momentous question, doubt is not to be permitted. On all human questions indifference follows uncertainty, but here indifference is itself a fault—one must deny or believe. But how am I to believe? When from earliest childhood you have had your aspirations broken or wounded under the repeated blows of contempt, and when you have been taught but to laugh at in others that faith whose absence you shall one day so bitterly deplore, how then to believe? Pray, he told me. Pray! Can I pray? Oh! happy are they who, arrived like me at that sad epoch in life when one drags painfully along the burden of one's worn-out days, have not to curse those who held them away from that source of strength and consolation! Yes, they are happy whom a pious mother taught from their cradle to bend the knees and join the hands in prayer! Gertrude also, she too prayed; and many a time have I felt myself touched in seeing her bend her head before the God of whom she asked for me the light of the faith. How many times have I not felt the desire to share her belief, and to kneel down like her and say: 'My dear Gertrude, there exists no place on this earth where we ought to be separated; there is not a thought, a belief, an affection, that ought not to be shared by us. Whatever may be the destiny that awaits us after the destruction of our being, whether it be oblivion or immortality, I wish to share it with you. Let your convictions be mine also, even as your life is mine. After having given me happiness in this world, show me the road that leads to that eternity I wish to believe in because you believe; make me to know that God whom I wish to love because you love him!' But alas! held by a false shame, I resisted that voice which spoke in the depth of my heart, and which, perhaps, was the voice of God: for is it not possible that such feelings as these are those by which Providence calls us to the truth? And I, how have I responded to that voice? Why, by rallying her on her belief. I caused her tears to flow, the only ones most certainly, but today they fall heavily upon my heart. And now friendship speaks to me this day the very same language that did of old her love. Shall I yet remain deaf? Ought I to cede to or resist the voice which now speaks to me? O Albert! you on whom was accomplished, in the room where I am, and in that arm-chair that I now look on, so incomprehensible a mystery, cannot you come in aid of the most faithful friend that your family ever had!" And the excellent baron, letting himself be carried away by his emotion, found himself, without knowing how, on his knees before that chair in whose arms Albert had died; and the head covered by his hands, and the heart filled with the thirst for truth, he prayed: "O my God!" prayed he, "if it is true that you are not a vain creation of the weakness or of the pride of man; if it is true that you continue to watch with solicitude over the creature who has issued from your hands, you will not see without pity the heart full of trouble that I lift up toward you. Led astray by the habits begun in childhood, I have perhaps followed error thinking to follow the truth; but I have done it in all sincerity and through love of the truth. If I am deceived, O God! enlighten my trembling soul, dissipate the doubt which is crushing me, and draw toward you the soul that seeks you and desires you! And you, Gertrude, dear companion too soon lost to me, if you see my regrets that time cannot extinguish; and the tears that your memory costs me, ask of your God that he make himself known to me; ask him that I may adore him as you adored him, and, above all, ask him that I may again be united to you."
His voice died away then, and yet his prayer continued. His soul, overexcited with the emotions of that night, poured itself out before God without following any line of thought. It was an immense lifting up of his whole being toward the truth—an ardent thirst for hope; it was the twenty years of a mute despair that resumed itself into a supreme cry; it was the heart, so pure and so good, of that worthy man, that opened itself completely and mounted full of desires and tears, carrying with it the most fervent prayer that had ever reached the immovable throne of the Eternal. At last the baron arose, but in place of at once laying himself down to sleep on the bed, whose soft pillows vainly invited him to repose, he retook his former position and began to reflect. The thoughts pressed so tumultuously in his brain, ordinarily so calm, and succeeded each other with so great a rapidity, that he could but vaguely seize them. His eyes, fixed upon the light flame that yet burned on the hearth, saw not that they expired one by one. The last played yet some time on the log covered with white ashes, disappearing for a moment to again reappear in another spot; at length it died out. The lamp burned with a reddened glare through its lack of oil, and yet the baron did not move. How long he had rested in that state of semi-sleep is what he never knew himself, when to the dying gleam of the lamp succeeded so brilliant a light that the baron always maintained that one so intense had never before shone on mortal eyes; at the same time brilliant and soft, it penetrated all objects without causing them to cast any shadow, and, as it were, drowned them in a sea of light. The baron lifted up his head at this unexpected brilliancy; he wished to speak, and his voice expired on his opened lips; but he distinctly heard these words: "Frederick, the prayers of your beloved Gertrude have been at length heard; the straight-forwardness and simplicity of your heart have found grace before the throne of the Eternal Master; he smiles on those who imitate him. He loves those who, like him, bear their cross with courage, and drink without feebleness the chalice of bitterness that is offered to all, without exception, in this life of probation. If it has been that, until now, you have rested deaf to the warnings that divine Providence sent you, at least you have listened with docility to that which was contained in the recital of your friend, and it was not without a reason that he was inspired to tell the true legend of the loves of Flaminia and Albert to you this night. The faith that strengthens the soul in the midst of the calamities of life descended into your heart and penetrated it with its salutary ardors at the moment when, breaking your pride before your will, you have knelt down before the Lord and asked of him the light; you could not remain always out of the truth; you, the devoted friend, the faithful husband; you whose entire life has been but a long research for the rarest virtues, and who feel, beating in your breast as noble and loving a heart as ever animated a human form." Here the brilliant light faded slowly away. The lamp was extinguished, and the blackened, logs gave forth no glimmer of light. The baron gained, by feeling his way, his bed, and laid himself on it, feeling himself full of an unknown joy, understanding the duties of a Christian, and resolved to perform them. He fell asleep in thinking of that happy day when should be restored to him that wife whom he had never ceased to love. The next morning, when he descended to the saloon where all the family were united, he embraced his friend's wife, and kissed, one after another, her children and grandchildren, who were all there that day at the castle; and all this with a demonstration of joy so contrary to his usual phlegmatic manner that it for the moment gave cause to fear for his reason; and then, approaching the count, who regarded him with stupefaction, he embraced him vigorously, and said to him, while wiping his eyes, humid with tears of joy: "Ah! you are right, my dear friend; I shall see again my Gertrude!"
Talleyrand,
by Lytton Bulwer.
[Footnote 18]
[Footnote 18: Historical Characters. By Sir Henry Lytton Bulwer, G.C.B. Two vols., 8vo. Richard Bentley, New Burlington street, London. 1868.]
Sir Henry Lytton Bulwer has presented the public with sketches of some eminent men, and has done his work well. It is not a series of biographies, but rather a finished outline of their prominent characteristics and of their achievements. In advance of the memoirs of Talleyrand, written by himself, and now in course of publication, this illustrious Frenchman is placed among the number, and in a new light. He is no longer the inscrutable being he appeared to his contemporaries, and as he has appeared since to their children. His name has been intimately associated with the great men and events of the last years of the unfortunate reign of Louis XVI. of France, near the close of the last century. Still more prominently is the memory of him associated with the convocation of the States-General and the National Assembly. By accident, he had the good fortune to be free from the odium attached to the Legislative Assembly and the atrocities of the National Convention, with the attendant horrors of the Committee of Public Safety in the Reign of Terror.
He fled from France in all haste as an émigré, and yet was lucky to avoid being classed with the aristocrats and so-called enemies of his country. He was prominent in the Revolution, without the stain of a regicide; he was a fugitive with the loyal crowd, without being stigmatized as a royalist. No amount of human foresight could have served him as a safe guide to shun the dangers which beset his fame and security on either side. His success was altogether fortuitous; but his friends attribute all to his superior sagacity and wisdom, while his enemies ascribe it to his remarkable cunning and prudence. When the days of danger and of blood passed by, Talleyrand returned to Paris with prestige, and was immediately employed by the Directory. When that went down, he floated to the surface with Bonaparte in the consulate and empire. Upon the fall of the empire, with the entrance of the allied armies into the capital he was their trusted counsellor. The restoration of the Bourbons was at once accompanied with the restoration of Talleyrand to the foreign office and to the head of affairs. When the Bourbons were expelled, in 1830, he was again reinstated by Louis Philippe, under whose reign he died in 1838, with that sovereign an attendant at his death-bed.
In truth, the same good fortune set in his favor when he was a boy: but it came in the guise of a calamity. Neglect on the part of a nurse resulted in a slight lameness for life in his legs, and in consequence a family council was convened wherein it was decided he should be deprived of his rights of primogeniture, of his high station as a nobleman, and of the wealth which went with them. His younger brother was substituted, while Talleyrand was destined for the priesthood. But such is the waywardness of fate that in a few years nobility was abolished, its privileges destroyed, and the nobles themselves were in exile, with his impoverished brother among the number. On the other hand, Talleyrand entered the church; he became a bishop, and in turn he deserted the church and his diocese when the road to greater worldly success and distinction led through desertion. He was excommunicated by the pope when papal censure and condemnation could only, for the time being, add to his popularity. Subsequently these were removed by the pontiff, when a brief to that end, with the turning tide of events, was all that was wanting to increase his prestige.
To what peculiar talent, quality, or skill he was indebted for his happy career has always been an open question; nor is it yet completely solved. Sir Henry does not undertake to discuss the problem, although he must entertain an opinion on the subject. But it is much better that he declined to propound any theory of his own; for in doing so the readers of his book would have misgivings that he tampered with some facts, or suppressed others altogether, in order to maintain it. His work in its present shape invites confidence, imports greater accuracy, and imparts additional satisfaction. No one can distrust his historical integrity, or doubt the extent of his inquiries and research in an honest endeavor to enlighten the public, or fail to appreciate the information obtained. It is a decided accession to biographical literature.
Nor are the opinions of the author, interspersed through the pages, the least interesting part of his performance; for these opinions on the mighty men and events of the period to which he refers may be taken as a reflex of the sentiments now current in the continental diplomatic corps, of which Sir Henry is an old and constant member of high standing. In his expositions, it is entertaining to compare the slow, lagging judgment of Europe on those times with American impressions, which are far more correct, enlightened, and advanced. The great idol which the foreign diplomatic community adores is success: Paris is its peculiar shrine; and Parisian society are fellow-worshippers. But, until success is attained and established, their fetich image is only one in the rough, to be hewed and hacked as cheap lumber. Napoleon and Talleyrand, during the long wars of the consulate and empire, were not deemed by neighboring states as much better than misshapen monsters of the human species: while the brilliancy of their achievements was dazzling the sight, bewildering the imagination, and extorting applause or admiration on this side of the Atlantic.
When the sanguinary contest closed in Europe, the exhibition of its continuous blaze of glory had lost much of its novelty in America; the ardor of our people commenced to cool down; they began to make a more dispassionate, and, consequently, a more rational estimate of their late heroes. This examination in some of its aspects was not favorable to the character of the republicans and of Napoleon. His genius, indeed, could not be denied; his deeds were marvellous; the splendor of his course had never been surpassed in ancient or modern ages; his individual or personal popularity was not in the least impaired. But on the whole, had his life been a blessing or otherwise to mankind? Had it been beneficial or injurious to progress? Had he or the preceding government of the Convention in the Reign of Terror promoted the welfare of France? Reluctantly but surely the American mind came to the conviction that the wars of the emperor had been as useless as they were prodigal of life, more desolating than the bloody guillotine worked by Robespierre. That decision will not soon be reversed; in all probability it will be confirmed and strengthened by time. On the eastern continent, however, this stage of enlightenment has not been reached by the mass of the intelligent population; but they are coming up to it. Napoleon as the scourge had there to be withdrawn, before he could reappear transformed into a hero, and from a hero into a great beneficent political being. His wars were there pronounced productive of good, as a destructive fire that had consumed the vermin of class abuses; that had extirpated the noxious weeds strangling civilization, which could not be eradicated by peaceful means; that the Reign of Terror had been a terrible tempest, to be sure, but a tempest, nevertheless, which, in the oratorical figure of Lord Erskine, had driven away pestilence and purified the atmosphere. At this point European sentiment now stands.
In republican America, the next stride will be still in the advance to the further conclusion, that Napoleon, in his martial policy, evinced only the cold-blooded, inordinately selfish despot, whose love of country was centred in self-love, whose patriotism for the State was unbounded when he was the State, for which he would sacrifice as much as Louis XIV. in a dazzling reign equally disastrous to the happiness of his subjects. But in Europe, to condemn the warlike propensities of Napoleon, is at the same time to condemn the hostile coalitions that promoted or provoked them. The measures adopted by inimical and rival powers to overthrow the French empire originated in passions and for a purpose fully as absurd and damaging to their own people. Both sides wanted war, without counting the cost, and now both are counting the loss, when war is no longer wanted. The losing figures present the longest columns to contemplative countenances the most elongated. In this showing, the picture is not inviting to monarchical perceptions; they are unwilling to acknowledge the fidelity of the portrait. England was always first in heart and soul in these conspiracies against the peace of Christendom, and England ever since has felt also, both first and last, the evil effects from the heaviest debts to be borne in consequence. Hence the dispiriting consciousness in the best of British circles, that France under Robespierre and Napoleon was matched in its foolishness by England under Pitt and Castlereagh. Something like even-handed retributive justice was meted out to all four: Robespierre attempted self-destruction when the executioner at the guillotine awaited him; Castlereagh cut his own throat; Pitt pined away and died as he closed the map of Europe with his finger pointing to the fatal field of Austerlitz; Napoleon lingered out a miserable life on a barren rock. The administrations of these men are now understood in the American republic, and have received the American condemnation. Talleyrand was an inferior personage to them in power, but only one degree less; he was the greatest in importance, and in position of the second grade. He is not so well comprehended. They did not know, until now, he had said to Montalvert:
"You have a prejudice against me, because your father was an imperialist, and you think I deserted the emperor. I have never kept fealty to any one longer than he has been obedient to common sense. But if you judge all my actions by this rule, you will find that I have been eminently consistent." (P. 408.)
The cause of his success was generally found in his strict adherence to the maxim that
"The thoughts of the greatest number of intelligent persons in any time or country are sure, with a few more or less fluctuations, to become in the end the public opinion of their age or community." (P. 442.)
He profited by this experience and knowledge; he understood men; he consulted public opinion, and followed it.
For these revelations and for these reasons, every line in the volume of Sir Henry Lytton Bulwer attracts attention and invites scrutiny. Sir Henry's style, turn of thought, opinions, even his words, must be weighed and studied, not only to gather the import of their meaning, but the exact shade of meaning. In this critical examination, it will be discovered Sir Henry adheres to no fixed method or standard of composition. Sometimes he is easy, smooth, and flowing as Joseph Addison; again he is terse as Dean Swift; sometimes he is turgid and rambling as a plenipotentiary who has particular instructions to communicate nothing in very verbose sentences long drawn out, wherein he is neither choice in his language nor correct in the common rules of grammar. Now, diplomacy admits of all these varieties of writing, and Sir Henry tries them all. No pent-up uniformity contracts the powers of his rhetoric or vocabulary. In one paragraph he exercises the precision of an algebraic formula; in another he wanders astray in the collocation of phrases with unguarded looseness. For him to write in his vernacular idiom must be something of an effort, although he can write well when on his good behavior; but it is evident he thinks in French. His ideas, thoughts, and some of his opinions and principles have consequently a Gallic tinge, and read like a translation; while others, if more cosmopolitan, are limited to the tone pervading the diplomatic circle; and diplomatists have among themselves a professional cant or set of political dogmas, which in a class less polished and select would be mistaken for a species of slang.
It is interesting and instructive to be made familiar with their proverbial philosophy, but it does not follow the infallibility of their proverbs must be recognized. Many of Sir Henry's opinions, therefore, may meet with dissent on this side of the water; much of his free and easy continental code he himself would abhor if made applicable to British interests, British politics, or British domestic ethics. In the cultivated opinion of the United States, the continental standard of justifiable policy is even more detestable, and ought to be in all climes and countries, in every latitude and longitude on the face of the earth.
Charles Maurice Talleyrand de Périgord was born in 1754, of one of the most noble and ancient families in France. He was sent to the Collége d'Harcout, where he gained the first prizes; transferred to the Seminary of St. Sulpice, his talents for disputation and composition were long remembered; and when, at last, sent to the Sorbonne, he was equally remarkable, although destined for the church, as a very clever and a very profligate young gentleman. He made no secret of his dislike to the profession chosen for him, but it was not doubted among those who knew him that he would reach its highest honors. In 1773, he entered the Gallican priesthood. When twenty years of age, his countenance was peculiarly attractive. It was indicative of softness, yet of boldness; of imperturbability, yet of humor and wit. When somewhat older, his features wore a long, oval appearance; his eyes were blue, deep, and variable; his lips usually compressed with an ironical smile, but not of ill nature; his nose, with clear-chiselled nostril, was delicate and slightly turned up; his voice deep toned, almost sepulchral. In five years he was chosen to the distinguished post of agent-general of the French clergy, where he administered with great success the ecclesiastical revenues of immense amount, and where he first exhibited his financial abilities in the clearness and neatness of his statements and reports. He became Bishop of Autun in 1789.
"'He dressed,' says one of his many biographers, 'like a coxcomb, he thought like a deist, he preached like a saint. At once active and irregular, he found time for everything: the church, the court, the opera. In bed one day from indolence or debauch, up the whole of the following night to prepare a memoir or a speech. Gentle with the humble, haughty with the high; not very exact in paying his debts, but very scrupulous with respect to giving and breaking promises to pay them.'" (P. 31.)
Early in life introduced into the salons of Paris, he readily caught their spirit, and soon obtained the friendship of the leading encyclopaedists and philosophers of scientific and historical fame; he was on intimate terms with many well known in letters and in the arts. The celebrated wits of both sexes, the beauties, the belles, courted his society; the charm of their brilliant conversation, their versatile accomplishments, and their winning manners were fascinating and irresistible. These divinities imagined they moved and had their being in a sublimated atmosphere far above and beyond the aspiration of common mortals; their sentiments breathed of perfect philanthropy, expressed in terms and in tenderness befitting persons divinely inspired. Every allurement that could inspire the imagination, every blandishment entrancing the senses, every grace, talent, every ornament which could enhance the form or ennoble the intellect, was cultivated and appreciated. Luxury in dress, in gems, in furniture, in equipage, in banquets, in music, in flowers, in painting, in frescoes, in sculpture, was displayed with excess of prodigality which vied with the purest taste. An ambrosial flavor of expression abounded in a common salutation; a delicate oriental perfume seemed to permeate every compliment, nor was any remark deemed appropriate unless it contained a compliment; eloquence was discarded because it was tinctured with too much external exhibition of feeling; it, moreover, took up too much precious time. But a higher art was attained in its stead—the art of epigrammatical brevity, to communicate in a half-line what an oration could not teach in a half-hour; nor was an epigram deemed perfect when its wit was rare and its sense profound, unless it tended to a sneer at religion or goodness in mankind, or told a scandalous lie.
The pervading object, the avowed purpose in this society, was to seek pleasure, to declaim against abuses in institutions, moral, political, and Christian, in the public at large, in domestic habits and manners, in the state, and in the church. But these refined creatures were not good, nor moral, nor pure, nor Christians themselves; they made no pretensions to any of these virtues; they were not proselyting reformers; they were in no sense radicals; they made no active exertions to pull down, neither did they aim to build up, nor to improve the world, but were content to deplore human evils and to rail at everybody. If a choice had been given to them to abolish institutions, or only to remove their abuses incident to all things of human creation, they would have preferred to abolish the institutions, provided the abuses were permitted to remain intact. But as they could not be rid of the beneficial advantages of the substance without the banishment of the evil shadow, they were content to tolerate the nuisance of what was a blessing to the nation, in order to possess for themselves the parts pernicious which were of sinful, comfortable consideration in their sight. They supposed their mission fulfilled when they talked and did nothing. If one of the coterie had turned patriot and aspired to usefulness, he would have been deemed a harmless traitor, and commiserated for the folly of his desertion. His efforts would have subjected him to their lamenting sympathy, their smiling mockery, their laconic brevities, which, although seemingly soothing, would be as scorching as they were short. Because he had accomplished something commendable or attempted its accomplishment, they would decide he had fallen from grace, had rendered himself liable to their biting condolence, and laid himself open to the piercing shafts of their pity. Voltaire, still lingering in his senility as head and chief priest of this highly refined and deeply depraved community, had sent forth a parting rescript to the faithful in their infidelity, that "one who has done nothing is possessed of a terrible advantage; but he must not abuse it."
Talleyrand, at the age of thirty-six, was fast rising to great prominence, if not pre-eminence in this unholy set. When Voltaire should be called to his last account in another world, and his mortal remains repose in the Père-la-Chaise or Parthenon, it was generally supposed the young Bishop of Autun would by common consent be raised to the place of the old philosopher of Ferney. But had it been thus, had the reign of the Bourbons been prolonged, Talleyrand would have betrayed and mocked the irreligious of the Palais Royal and St. Germain, as he bartered away the pious interests of his diocese. In some respects he resembled Voltaire, but in many more they widely differed. In general he was in mind unlike to him, as he was in morals dissimilar to the late bishop. Voltaire was always in search of flattery; Talleyrand despised it. Voltaire was pleased with petty scheming and petty intrigues; Talleyrand pushed them aside. Voltaire betrayed and lampooned his friends; Talleyrand did not deceive his, nor slander. Voltaire was much feared for his malicious sarcasm; Talleyrand was well liked for his bounteous humor. The one was a judge of books, as the other was a judge of men; the one was always grumbling from his failures, the other always content with his success; the one injecting a telling point into a falsehood, the other imparting force to a truth. Both were great in epigrammatic hits in their own way; with this difference, however, that Voltaire, being soured with the world, exposed his asperity in his jests; while Talleyrand, pleased with it, concealed all vexation and rounded his remarks with an easy smile. Voltaire was a spoiled child of society; society was a plaything for Talleyrand. In a word, the graceless bishop, intellectually, morally, socially, was the superior, and far outshone the snarling philosopher. Voltaire could never, in playing long whist and counting his points, if informed that an old lady had married her footman, have drawled out, "At nine honors don't count;" nor could he in pleasantry have said to Frederick of Prussia what Talleyrand remarked to Louis XVIII.: "There is something inexplicable about me which brings ill luck on the government that neglects me."
Before the death of Voltaire, the young Bishop of Autun had discovered, with his preternatural clearness of mental vision, that the scoffers who were the embodiment of science, philanthropy, and refinement, joined to profligate professors and shameless women, formed an institution, with its abominations also, like all others; just as the holy church had its sacred virtues scandalized by some glaring abuses among a portion of the clergy. The bishop must have felt that he constituted in himself a type of what was good and of what was bad in each: he ardently loved science, art, and whatever was refining and progressive, as he conscientiously revered the revealed truths of the Catholic faith. But he could not resist the enticements and adulations of society; nor refuse the temptation to raise himself to political power by laying sacrilegious hands on the property of the church. Not for one moment, however, was he deceived by the sophistries or jargon of the infidel school that reigned supreme in polite circles, and only once was his sound judgment found wanting in fidelity to his religious order, of which he was a most unworthy representative. He confounded the abuses in the state, the depravity of the aristocracy, the irregularities among the clergy, as one common class of grievances to the nation which ought to be ended; but he did not desire to witness the sovereign beheaded, the mob supreme, nor the idol of Reason enthroned in the house of God.
His aim in life seems to have been the possession of unrivalled prestige in Parisian society. To reach that pinnacle for his ease, comfort, and earthly happiness, he did or was willing to do whatever would promote his purpose: he left undone whatever would militate against it. He understood the requisites for its attainment, but would not sacrifice present tranquillity, the absolute satisfaction now, for the shadowy anticipation in the future. Intellectual exertion was a pleasure to him at all times. He desired wealth, rank, power, fame, as passports into the magic circle of his ambition; but he held himself on a level with the great, while he treated the unfortunate, the weak, the unsuccessful, with undiminished attention. He was keenly sensitive to censure, for censure impaired his prestige. Pozzo de Borgo, a celebrated and rival diplomatist, once said of him: "This man has made himself great by placing himself always by the side of the little and among those who most need him." In truth, he was willing to aid any one, powerful or weak, who could now or hereafter aid him. But he never deceived those whom he was serving, nor cringed, nor intrigued, nor betrayed them; he was always true to his country, and always sound in his judgment in deciding by what line of conduct the interests of his country could be best promoted.
In one instance only did he make a mistake, but that mistake was terrible; it was, moreover, unfortunate for France as for himself; it produced the only bad luck that befell him in his very long life and invariably prosperous career. It was in not discriminating between the clergy, as trustees of the church property, and the property itself entrusted to their keeping. He viewed the temporalities as absolutely their own, their inheritance, instead of perceiving that these possessions were only a charge delivered to them for safe keeping and transmission, which could not descend to their heirs but must go to their successors. He confounded their duties as administrators of the estate with the rights of the persons for whom the estate was formed. If the clergy were willing, therefore, to take a bribe to betray their trust, Talleyrand supposed the nefarious bargain amounted to a fair and honest purchase of the trust property. The estate was not created for them, but they were created for the estate.
A few months after Talleyrand was installed Bishop of Autun, he was elected a representative to the States-General. Of his peculiar fitness for the place, Sir Henry Bulwer brings forward some striking and convincing testimony.
When the States-General met, they formed themselves into the National Assembly; they resolved to legislate in one and the same hall, the nobles and the clergy, mixed with the commonalty, and all three merged into one body. The Three Estates were no more; it was only the Third Estate that remained. The impending danger from immediate bankruptcy of the nation being the vital as it was the first subject for discussion, the high reputation possessed by the Bishop of Autun for financial abilities and practical skill easily gained for him the first place as a man of business, as the first rank in social position was already accorded to him. He spoke well, sensibly, to the point. Mirabeau was the greater orator, it is true, but Mirabeau was the orator for the commons; Talleyrand was no orator at all; he was a fluent speaker, never indulging in meretricious or ornamental embellishments, never appealing to the vulgar passions: he was the pride and glory, the great favorite of the nobles and clergy. His sphere had been more select, more exalted, more refined, where the declamation, passionate appeals, rounded periods, startling antitheses of Mirabeau would have been deemed low and voted down. Mirabeau was unable to shine in the Parisian salons frequented by the choice aristocracy, while Talleyrand despised making a figure of himself for the applause of the bourgeoisie of the Third Estate. But what the Third Estate was wanting in elegance of manners, in wit and cultivation, they supplied in the strength of their numbers, and in the corresponding determination to absorb all political power. It was evident the nobles and the clergy would be compelled to succumb. At last they gave way, and not only yielded up whatever political rights or immunities were their own, but whatever also was confided by others to their keeping. To quote from Sir Henry:
"On the 4th of August … almost all the institutions and peculiarities which constituted the framework of government and society throughout France were unhesitatingly swept away, at the instigation and demand of the first magistrates and nobles of the land, who did not sufficiently consider that they who destroy at once all existing laws (whatever those laws may be) destroy, at the same time, all established habits of thought; that is, all customs of obedience, all spontaneous feelings of respect and affection, without which a form of government is merely an idea on paper. In after times, M. de Talleyrand, when speaking of this period, said, in one of his characteristic phrases: 'La Révolution a désossé la France,' 'The Revolution has disboned France.' … The Bishop of Autun was undoubtedly among the foremost in destroying the traditions which constitute a community, and proclaiming the theories which captivate a mob." (P. 55.)
This extract is a fair specimen of the false statement of facts, and of the fallacious reasoning in the diplomatic body, on popular events. It is as destitute of truth as it is of logic, or a correct understanding of the principles upon which civil government is constituted. In all that was done so far, only antiquated, effete, feudal, or petty provincial privileges were surrendered; privileges which properly belonged to the state for the benefit of the nation whenever the state might deem it proper to demand them or to destroy them; for, long before, they ought to have been abolished. The aristocracy now chose voluntarily to relinquish them gracefully. They removed thereby great grievances from the public, and many intolerable burdens from the peasants. The laws which were repealed at the same time were only customs or statutes which had protected the privileges given up, and became obsolete when nothing was left for them to protect. Instead of dissolving society, the relinquishment of petty political rights was the removal of pernicious, detestable rubbish. All laws were not abrogated; nor was one destroyed, altered, or amended which protected the person or preserved property.
The next step of progress in the right direction was a vigorous effort to induce the king to be equally generous and patriotic in relinquishing some of his odious antiquated prerogatives. But Louis XVI. was unwilling to conform to the public wishes; he refused, because compliance would trench upon the sovereignty which he had received untouched from his royal ancestors, and which he resolved to transmit untarnished to his posterity. But when the pressure for a written constitution began to threaten his personal safety, he yielded with a mental reservation that he had given way to superior force; he conscientiously, but erroneously and fatally, believed his consent was not binding on him or his heirs. The representatives of the nation now maintained, that ministers having the national confidence should be called into the royal cabinet. To this reasonable request, the king refused his consent; but he temporized by reluctantly giving audience to Mirabeau, Talleyrand, and some others of the liberal party, leaving them under the mistaken impression that he would listen to their advice. But the king did not adopt their counsels; he did not intend that any of them should become his counsellors.
Louis granted them a hearing in order to conceal his intentions. It was only a blind to cover his purpose, which was to resume, at the first opportunity, what he had relinquished, and to send Mirabeau and Talleyrand, with their friends the sans-culottes, adrift. These liberals were consequently deceived; in truth, they aided in their own deception; they could not imagine the king would prove a traitor to his own interests. The king, however, was only playing over again the losing game practised by Charles I., and by his son, James II., of England. The stake in both countries was the same: it was, whether sovereignty should repose in the crown, as in ancient times, or in the people, in accordance with modern ideas. The prize cannot be divided, as some supposed; it can never be divided; in its very nature it is indivisible; it would be as impossible as to place one crown on two separate heads at the same time. Sir Henry Bulwer, as a true Briton, thinks, no doubt, the Stuart sovereigns were perjured knaves, because they deceived the House of Commons, and broke solemn promises made to their ministers; but he views the Bourbon king as foolish only in doing the same things, and pursuing the same line of policy. Now, in verity, the moral code applies alike to both dynasties, in both countries, in both centuries. Whatever royal promise is made should be royally and religiously fulfilled; but its violation does not justify a resort to the block at Whitehall or to the guillotine at the Carrousel. The execution of a monarch for defending his prerogatives by fair means or false promises, is no less a crime against civilization than it is a political error. No good can come of it; no good ever has.
But the duplicity and falsehood of Louis, in its incidents, brought on the first blow against property; and with the attack on property, all the crimes and calamities, all the misery, poverty, and long list of woes of the Revolution commenced. Then society began to disintegrate; then France began to disbone; it never ended until morality, Christianity, civilization, were crushed to a jelly. Talleyrand was the leader in this raid, and on his head rests the responsibility. He was the great oracle on financial topics in the National Assembly; he was the member looked up to for the solution of the financial problem to save the nation from ruin; he had accepted the position almost thrust upon him; and his reputation was at stake in surmounting the crisis. With success he could compel the king to invite him into the ministry. Mirabeau admitted this in a letter to a friend, and a portfolio in the ministry was the goal of Talleyrand's ambition. All eyes were, therefore, turned to the Bishop of Autun, and the eyes of the bishop turned to the landed property of the church, from whence the wants of the treasury could be immediately and with facility supplied. He was willing to propose the double sacrilege on religion and on society; for it was no less an outrage on civilization or civil government than it was on Christianity, which is the foundation of good government.
The coolness with which Sir Henry Bulwer states this desecration can only be compared with the absurdity in the line of argument with which Talleyrand advocated the measure. If some Bishop Colenso in the House of Lords should propose the seizure and confiscation of the wealth of the Anglican Establishment, the question would appear in a different aspect to the British diplomatist. He would view it with horror. In either case, however, the measure would be infamous. Governments are instituted to protect property, not to squander it; and the only difference between that which is held by an individual for himself and that which is held in trust for the benefit of others, is in the circumstance that whatever is in trust is, in the public estimation, more sacred, because it is preserved for the welfare of the poor, the weak, the ignorant or infirm of mind, who cannot provide for themselves; just as the state extends a more paternal care over the property of infants, idiots, or orphans, than over the interests of men and women of full growth and sound mind. If a call must be made in a sudden exigency for funds, what government, not demented, would spare the mercantile houses of the rich, to sequestrate and spoliate the hospitals for the helpless?
Talleyrand considered the church property as public property; but this view, plausible at first sight, is found on reflection to be fallacious. It was not derived from the nation, nor from the public, but from individuals, and from its own accumulations; it was not designed for the benefit of the public, but for a specific class of the people—the needy—to which class the mass of the community did not belong, and, furthermore, hoped they never would. So much for the bishop's premises and argument. But a stronger objection remains: it is the broad principle of the invasion of private rights, of common justice; and when that principle is once rendered unstable by common consent, the stability of all public opinion, of all civil institutions, of all organized government, is shaken; the state is liable to be overturned. When the National Assembly deemed it proper for the public good to confiscate the church property, the Legislative Assembly followed the example set to deprive persons of their liberty, and the National Convention next voted away lives by the hecatomb daily; under the same plea, the king himself was decapitated. When the public morality was once vitiated, who could foretell where the national criminality would terminate, who or how many would not be its victims?
It has been the same with European ethics. When the great Frederick of Prussia violated the Pragmatic Sanction, to which Prussia had assented, and seized upon Silesia, neighboring nations were not slow to forget and forgive his audacity and to follow his unrighteous example. The partition of Poland grew out of it, from the contempt entertained for international opinion. Next came the French Revolution, when nations had no faith in the integrity of rival governments, nor had governments much confidence in their people. The world went backward in civilization, and the long wars of the republic, of the consulate, of the empire, ensued; not only the French, but every foreign soil on the Continent, was drenched in blood. At last, the moral atmosphere became so foul that the idea of assassination was entertained and talked about in every court at war with Napoleon. It was deemed feasible, it was favored by a silent assent; it floated in the air.
Sir Henry, in echo to diplomatic opinion and to the sentiment of the belligerent nations, treats the murder in cold blood of the Bourbon Duke d'Enghien, by order of Napoleon, as an atrocity. The act certainly was atrocious; but, at the bar of history, who are all the criminals that may be arraigned as accomplices in conspiring to efface the stain of turpitude in assassination from the Christian code of morals? How many were smiling at the prospect of doing unto the French emperor that which he did unto the duke? Not one statesman, or legislator, or diplomatist, or writer, could in his conscience cast the first stone. Public opinion was debauched on the subject; moral integrity was disboned. Napoleon justified his conduct in the only way left open to modify the enormity of the offence—to extenuate the nefarious deed. He excused himself as he excused his first attacks in war; it was to defend himself by becoming the assailant. He undertook to teach his enemies the efficacy of retaliation, and the lesson did teach them. Nothing more was ever whispered in secret, or again talked openly, of taking him off by poison or the dagger.
Talleyrand, although imperial prime minister at the time, does not appear to have been consulted. From all that is known, he certainly did not advise or countenance the act; he did not approve or condemn when it was done. What he communicated officially, he wrote, as secretary of the emperor, that which was dictated to him to write. But, on the other hand, no one is aware that he counselled against the murder; in all probability, in his laxity of morals, his sensibilities were not much shocked by the event. He was never known to have considered the transaction an impolitic measure; the common story that he spoke of it as worse than a crime—as a political blunder—has no authentic foundation.
Such was the course of affairs growing out of the first invasion of rights to property at the suggestion of the Bishop of Autun. But the immediate effects upon his fortunes are curious. He was erroneously associated in the foreign mind with the revolutionary acts that followed; and when, on the contrary, for self-preservation, he fled to London to escape the stigma of those very acts and the malice of the very men who perpetrated them, he was ordered out of England as a Jacobin or regicide and found a refuge in America. But in our republic no countenance was given to him, no cordial greeting extended. By the Federalists, he was, contemned as a traitor to his king, an apostate to his religion, an enemy to social order. By the anti-Federalists he was viewed as an aristocrat, an émigré, an obstacle to social progress. The ex-bishop, therefore, in 1794, like the expatriated M. Blot in 1864, had leisure to turn his attention to the culinary art. Talleyrand, and the other involuntary emigrants, observed upon the vines near the kitchens a beautiful round red production growing, which was cultivated as a vegetable ornament, whose botanical name was the lycopersicum, but which Americans called the love-apple. The French gentlemen recognized in it their tomate, and forthwith taught our great-grandmothers how to render it a more palatable esculent for their tables than it was a pleasing embellishment to their gardens.
But the Reign of Terror soon terminated; like the reign of Louis, it ended also at the guillotine. He now returned to Paris. His friend Barras was in the Directory, and Barras was of the aristocracy, who, however, "had been forgiven the crime of being a noble, in consideration of the virtue of being a regicide." From that date began the new lease to Talleyrand of power, prestige, influence, and prosperity, which was never again broken during his long life. He was willing to serve any administration under any form of government, providing it was the best under the circumstances, and when he could be, as he for the first time expressed it, the right man in the right place. But never for a day did he remain when he could not be useful to France, nor serviceable to the executive by whom he was retained. He knew how long it was beneficial to adhere to the Directory, and when the time had come to drop off. The first consul was treated in the same manner, and the emperor, and the allies, and Louis XVIII., and Louis Philippe. None of them could fascinate him by their condescension or consideration; yet he served them all honorably, honestly; but it was requisite he should be called and retained on his own terms. When he was dismissed, it was not before he already knew it was better for his own interests to go.
When Alexander of Russia entered Paris, in 1814, with the allied armies, the czar took up his imperial residence at Talleyrand's mansion, and expected to use the late prime minister for his own purpose by the high honor conferred. But Talleyrand was insensible to such delicate attentions; he was fully conscious he was himself a prince, and of the proud family of Périgord, a family that were sovereign in provinces of France in the middle ages, long before the Romanoffs, surrounded by a wild horde of half-naked Tartars, had ever held court on horse-back, or crossed the Ural, or been heard of in Europe. Talleyrand was not made a tool by the czar, but the czar was moulded like wax under the manipulations of Talleyrand; to him Louis XVIII. was indebted for his throne; and afterward, at the Congress of Vienna, when Alexander discovered Talleyrand could not be induced to betray French interests for the benefit of Russia, the czar compelled Louis to dismiss him from office.
Napoleon was estimated in a similar manner, but with even less respect, for he had been a plebeian, and perhaps, if anything, worse; he was not a Frenchman, he was a Corsican. After the battle of Leipsic, Napoleon offered the portfolio of foreign ministry to his former minister, but on the condition he should lay down the rank and emoluments of vice-grand elector. The object of the emperor was to make him dependent on imperial favor. But Talleyrand, who would have accepted the office, refused the condition, saying: "If the emperor trusts me, he should not degrade me; and if he does not trust me, he should not employ me; the times are too critical for half-measures." No circumlocution was resorted to on either side; it was plain dealing; for the parties knew with whom they were treating, and no compliments were requisite. M. Thiers remarks that "two superior Frenchmen, until they have an opportunity to flatter one another, are natural enemies." However much Talleyrand's wish might have been to assist the emperor, he would not show it: his invariable maxim was point de zèle—never evince ardor in anything.
But while he had no abasement in the presence of the great, he had no assumption toward equals or inferiors in mind and in position. Thoroughly self-reliant, he was never found disconcerted nor off his guard; in the widest sense he was a man; he held all others as no more and no less. He had no confidants. Perhaps Montrond was an exception, for Montrond was a specialty, Sir Henry tells us, of the age, a type of the French roué. He was one of Talleyrand's pets, as Talleyrand was one of his admirations. Each spoke ill of the other; for each said he loved the other for his vices. But no one could speak to Talleyrand with so much intimacy, nor obtain from him so clear an answer; for they trusted one another, though Montrond would never have told any one else to trust Talleyrand, nor Talleyrand have told any one else to trust M. de Montrond.
Here we must, with reluctance, lay down Sir Henry's book; space will not permit dwelling longer upon it.