Thus stimulated in suspicions to which he naturally inclined, Saint-Mars was not slow to conceive that his means of surveillance were insufficient. To see one’s prisoner often, to assure oneself with one’s own eyes that he communicates with nobody, to examine with care his furniture and effects, to multiply the difficulties of an escape, seem to constitute all the duties of a conscientious and vigilant gaoler. But the suspicious Saint-Mars was in no-wise satisfied with these precautions. Forgetting that the prisoner’s body alone was under his care, he wished to extend his surveillance even to Fouquet’s thoughts. To attain this end he had recourse both to his confessor and to the servant who waited upon him. Having, however, soon discerned the interest which the unfortunate prisoner inspired in his servant, Saint-Mars felt that he could not rely upon the sincerity of his reports, and he attached to the person of Fouquet a second valet, who was instructed to watch the first, and was himself the object of a secret surveillance on the part of the latter.[399] As for the confessor, to control him was impossible, and in fact would have been unnecessary. We read in the correspondence of Louvois and Saint-Mars that “he was a good man,”[400] which is another proof how differently the conduct of men may be appreciated. In the eyes of Louvois and of Saint-Mars Fouquet’s confessor was a good man, because he consented to act as a spy; because, as Fouquet wrote later to his wife, “instead of having God in view, he acted the cowardly part of making his fortune at the expense of one in trouble.” He succeeded; for Saint-Mars obtained a promise from Louvois “that he should receive a living when he should cease to fulfil his office.”[401] The first instructions given to Saint-Mars authorised him to change the priest each time that Fouquet desired to confess. But when they had discovered this “good man,” they abandoned henceforth this useless precaution, and Fouquet in vain requested to be allowed to make a general confession to the Superior of the Jesuits, then to the Superiors of the Récollets and Capucines of Pignerol.[402]
These proceedings, and the non-success of an attempt made in 1669 by an old servant of Fouquet’s,[403] who endeavoured, by corrupting some soldiers, to place himself in communication with his master, induced the latter to give himself up entirely to study and religious meditations. He renounced the project of communicating with his relations and friends. The salvation of his soul and the care of his body alone occupied his thoughts. Deprived long since of all physical exercise, and having suddenly exchanged an existence, excited by travel, and adorned by everything that could make life attractive and sweet, for the solitude and inactivity of a prison, Fouquet had seen his health rapidly decay, and innumerable disorders seize on him.[404] “There is not a disease to which the body is liable,” he wrote to his wife, “of which mine has not experienced some symptom. I am no sooner quit of one than it is succeeded by another, and I can but suppose that these will only cease with my life. I should require a large volume to describe my sufferings in detail, but the principal one is that my stomach does not act in concert with my liver; what suits one is injurious to the other, and, what is more, my legs are always swollen.”... “The best thing to be done,” he says afterwards, “is to give up all care of the body, and to think of one’s soul. This is important to us, and yet we show more concern for the body.” In truth, he gave as much attention to one as to the other. Distrustful of the surgeon of the citadel, he compounded himself the remedies which suited him best; and in order, no doubt, that he might avail himself of his servant as an auxiliary, he instructed him in the art of dispensing.[405] The first books which Saint-Mars consented to give him after having received authority to do so, were the Bible and a history of France. Later, the works of Clavius and St. Bonaventura were added; and then, by desire of the prisoner, a dictionary of rhymes.[406] Poetry to him was nothing more than a relaxation, and he devoted himself above all to reading religious works and to the production of several lengthy treatises on morals. The remembrance of his former grandeur clashed in them with the impressions of his profound fall. The Christian preoccupied with his salvation, the philosopher enlightened by adversity, the recluse giving himself up to the contemplation of divine things, hold in their turn a language of sublime and unchangeable serenity. One finds in almost every page proof of this resignation in disgrace, and of this contentment in affliction which Christianity can alone inspire. He whose haughty motto, for a long time justified by events, had been Quo non ascendam, now humbly submissive to his lot, adopted the touching emblem of the silkworm in his cocoon with these words: Inclusum labor illustrat!
However, Fouquet was not so detached from things terrestrial as not to interest himself in them at all. His mother, wife and several children, being still alive, his thoughts often turned towards these dearly beloved beings, and also, but without bitterness, towards Louis XIV. and his conquests, towards the Court and the Ministers. He often questioned Saint-Mars. The latter’s replies were brief, and so unprecise that he considered himself obliged to write to Louvois and inquire in what sense he ought to answer.[407] Entirely master of his prisoner, sure of those who surrounded him, he believed that the barrier which he had erected around him was insuperable, and thought that he would be able to keep him apprised of contemporary events as he pleased, or else leave him in the most complete ignorance. Useless efforts and vain confidence in his power! The enterprising audacity and industrious perseverance of a prisoner recently brought to Pignerol, triumphed over even the innumerable precautions of the most suspicious of gaolers.
FOOTNOTES:
[384] Mémoires de Choisy, p. 590.
[385] M. Feuillet de Conches, Causeries d’un Curieux, vol. ii. p. 529. “M. d’Artagnan told me,” says Olivier d’Ormesson in his Journal, “that M. Fouquet, during the first three weeks, was very unquiet and amazed, but that his mind grew calmer, and that he became very self-possessed afterwards, giving himself up largely to devotion; that he fasted every week on Wednesday and Friday, and besides this, lived on Saturday on bread and water; that he rose before seven o’clock, said his prayers, and after that worked till nine o’clock; that he subsequently heard mass.”—Journal d’Olivier d’Ormesson, vol. ii. p. 52.
[386] Letters from Louvois to Saint-Mars, June 29, 1665, and from Colbert to the same, on the same day. People at Paris as well as at Pignerol did not fail to say that heaven had judged him innocent whom men had condemned. See Lettres de Madame de Sévigné et de Guy Patin; Journal d’Olivier d’Ormesson, vol. ii. p. 372; Œuvres de Fouquet, vol. xvi.
[387] Order of Louis XIV., countersigned by Le Tellier, and dated from Saint-Germain, June 29, 1665. It was Saint-Mars who, with his free company as escort, took Fouquet to La Pérouse, and continued to guard him there till the month of August, 1666, at which period he brought him back to Pignerol.
[388] Delort, Histoire de la Détention des Philosophes, vol. i. p. 103.
[389] Letters from Louvois to Saint-Mars, July 26 and December 18, 1665.