The personal history of the monarchs of Europe is, almost without exception, a melancholy history. By their ambition and their wars they whelmed the cottages in misery, and by a righteous retribution misery also inundated the palace. Philip V. became the victim of the most insupportable melancholy. Earth had no joy which could lift the cloud of gloom from his soul. For months he was never known to smile. Imprisoning himself in his palace he refused to see any company, and left all the cares of government in the hands of his wife, Elizabeth Farnese.
Germany was still agitated by the great religious contest between the Catholics and the Protestants, which divided the empire into two nearly equal parties, bitterly hostile to each other. Various fruitless attempts had been made to bring the parties together, into unity of faith, by compromise. Neither party were reconciled to cordial toleration, free and full, in which alone harmony can be obtained. In all the States of the empire the Catholics and the Protestants were coming continually into collision. Charles, though a very decided Catholic, was not disposed to persecute the Protestants, as most of his predecessors had done, for he feared to rouse them to despair.
England, France, Austria and Spain, were now involved in an inextricable maze of diplomacy. Congresses were assembled and dissolved; treaties made and violated; alliances formed and broken. Weary of the conflict of arms, they were engaged in the more harmless squabbles of intrigue, each seeking its own aggrandizement. Philip V., who had fought so many bloody battles to acquire the crown of Spain, now, disgusted with the cares which that crown involved, overwhelmed with melancholy, and trembling in view of the final judgment of God, suddenly abdicated the throne in favor of his son Louis, and took a solemn oath that he would never resume it again. This event, which surprised Europe, took place on the 10th of February, 1724. Philip retired to St. Ildefonso.
The celebrated palace of St. Ildefonso, which became the retreat of the monarch, was about forty miles north of Madrid, in an elevated ravine among the mountains of Gaudarruma. It was an enormous pile, nearly four thousand feet above the level of the sea, and reared by the Spanish monarchs at an expense exceeding thirty millions of dollars. The palace, two stories high, and occupying three sides of a square, presents a front five hundred and thirty feet in length. In this front alone there are, upon each story, twelve gorgeous apartments in a suite. The interior is decorated in the richest style of art, with frescoed ceilings, and splendid mirrors, and tesselated floors of variegated marble. The furniture was embellishcd with gorgeous carvings, and enriched with marble, jasper and verd-antique. The galleries were filled with the most costly productions of the chisel and the pencil. The spacious garden, spread out before the palace, was cultivated with the utmost care, and ornamented with fountains surpassing even those of Versailles.
To this magnificent retreat Philip V. retired with his imperious, ambitious wife. She was the step-mother of his son who had succeeded to the throne. For a long time, by the vigor of her mind, she had dominated over her husband, and had in reality been the sovereign of Spain. In the magnificent palace of St. Ildefonso, she was by no means inclined to relinquish her power. Gathering a brilliant court around her, she still issued her decrees, and exerted a powerful influence over the kingdom. The young Louis, who was but a boy, was not disposed to engage in a quarrel with his mother, and for a time submitted to this interference; but gradually he was roused by his adherents, to emancipate himself from these shackles, and to assume the authority of a sovereign. This led to very serious trouble. The abdicated king, in his moping melancholy, was entirely in subjection to his wife. There were now two rival courts. Parties were organizing. Some were for deposing the son; others for imprisoning the father. The kingdom was on the eve of a civil war, when death kindly came to settle the difficulty.
The young King Louis, but eighteen years of age, after a nominal reign of but eight months, was seized with that awful scourge the small-pox, and, after a few days of suffering and delirium, was consigned to the tomb. Philip, notwithstanding his vow, was constrained by his wife to resume the crown, she probably promising to relieve him of all care. Such are the vicissitudes of a hereditary government. Elizabeth, with woman's spirit, now commanded the emperor to renounce the title of King of Spain, which he still claimed. Charles, with the spirit of an emperor, declared that he would do no such thing.
There was another serious source of difficulty between the two monarchs, which has descended, generation after generation, to our own time, and to this day is only settled by each party quietly persisting in his own claim.
In the year 1430 Philip III., Duke of Burgundy, instituted a new order of knighthood for the protection of the Catholic church, to be called the order of the Golden Fleece. But twenty-four members were to be admitted, and Philip himself was the grand master. Annual meetings were held to fill vacancies. Charles V., as grand master, increased the number of knights to fifty-one. After his death, as the Burgundian provinces and the Netherlands passed under the dominion of Spain, the Spanish monarchs exercised the office of grand master, and conferred the dignity, which was now regarded the highest order of knighthood in Europe, according to their pleasure. But Charles VI., now in admitted possession of the Netherlands, by virtue of that possession claimed the office of grand master of the Golden Fleece. Philip also claimed it as the inheritance of the kings of Spain. The dispute has never been settled. Both parties still claim it, and the order is still conferred both at Vienna and Madrid.
Other powers interfered, in the endeavor to promote reconciliation between the hostile courts, but, as usual, only increased the acrimony of the two parties. The young Spanish princess Mary Anne, who was affianced to the Dauphin of France, was sent to Paris for her education, and that she might become familiar with the etiquette of a court over which she was to preside as queen. For a time she was treated with great attention, and child as she was, received all the homage which the courtiers were accustomed to pay to the Queen of France. But amidst the intrigues of the times a change arose, and it was deemed a matter of state policy to marry the boy-king to another princess. The French court consequently rejected Maria Anne and sent her back to Spain, and married Louis, then but fifteen years of age, to Maria Lebrinsky, daughter of the King of Poland. The rejected child was too young fully to appreciate the mortification. Her parents, however, felt the insult most keenly. The whole Spanish court was roused to resent it as a national outrage. The queen was so indignant that she tore from her arm a bracelet which she wore, containing a portrait of Louis XV., and dashing it upon the floor, trampled it beneath her feet. Even the king was roused from his gloom by the humiliation of his child, and declared that no amount of blood could atone for such an indignity.
Under the influence of this exasperation, the queen resolved to seek reconciliation with Austria, that all friendly relations might be abandoned with France, and that Spain and Austria might be brought into intimate alliance to operate against their common foe. A renowned Spanish diplomatist, the Baron of Ripperda, had been for some time a secret agent of the queen at the court of Vienna, watching the progress of events there. He resided in the suburbs under a fictitious name, and eluding the vigilance of the ministry, had held by night several secret interviews with the emperor, proposing to him, in the name of the queen, plans of reconciliation. Letters were immediately dispatched to Ripperda urging him to come to an accommodation with the emperor upon almost any terms.