Unfortunately, he died at the time he was beginning to organise this authority so valiantly conquered.
If France, at the time of the cardinal’s death, presented still upon her surface the distinct evidences of a complete social overthrow, the soil was at least beginning to be freed from the thousand parasitical and devouring forces which had so long exhausted her strength.
So, one might say that almost always eminent men, although of diverse genius, are born in time to achieve the great labours of governments.
To Richelieu, that resolute and indefatigable clearer of untilled ground, succeeds Mazarin, who levelled the earth so profoundly ploughed,—then Colbert, who sowed it, and made it fruitful.
The imperial will of Richelieu appeared under one of its most brilliant aspects in the long struggle he was obliged to sustain, when he was entrusted with the organisation of the navy.
Up to that time, the governor-generals of Provence had always challenged the orders of the admiralty of France, styling themselves the “born admirals” of the Levant.
As such, they pretended to the maritime authority of the province; a few of these governors, such as the Counts of Tende and of Sommerives, and, at the period of which we speak, the Duke of Guise, had received from the king special letters which conferred upon them the title of admiral. These concessions, drawn from the weakness of the monarch, far from supporting the pretentions of the governor-generals, protested, on the contrary, against their usurpation, since these titles proved clearly that the command of sea and land ought to be separate.
Thus we see how divided and antagonistic were these rival powers, that the cardinal, in performing the functions of his office as grand master of navigation, wished imperiously to unite and centralise.
It can be seen by this rapid and cursory view, and by the extracts which we have borrowed from the report of M. de Séguiran, that a frightful disorder reigned in every department of power.
This disorder was the more increased by the perpetually recurring conflicts of jurisdiction, either through the governors of the province, or through the admiralties, or through the feudal claims of many gentlemen whose estates commanded a forest or a river.