The Court of Philip IV.: Spain in Decadence

by Martin A. S. Hume

The nun of Agreda

Thenceforward until death snapped the spiritual link that joined them, the heart of Philip was bared in all its sorrow, its weakness, and its sin to Sor Maria alone. The haughty face with the pathetic eyes and great projecting jaw remained unmoved before the world, only the deepening furrows in it showing the storm that raged within. Men thought that he was callous and cold; for he suffered silently behind his mask. But Sor Maria knew, and none but she under heaven, the true secret of the King's gilded misery. His cry of agony, of remorse, of pity thenceforward came to the cloistered nun as a surer way to reach the throne of grace than to all the cardinals, confessors, and bishops who waited upon his smile, and gently hinted disapproval of kingly vice.

At the end of July 1643, Philip entered his city of Saragossa, this time, to the delight of the jealous Aragonese, unattended by the crowd of dissolute nobles and courtiers who made love to their wives and threatened their political liberty.[[4]] No time was lost now in moving against the French, who were threatening the centre of Aragon, and the new commander, Felipe de Silva, whom Olivares' jealousy had consigned to a prison, showed great energy, and soon changed the appearance of affairs. It will be useful for our purpose to reproduce the principal paragraphs of Philip's first letter to the nun on the 4th October 1643, five weeks after his arrival at Saragossa, the precursor of so long and important a correspondence.[[5]]

Philip and Sor Maria

"SOR MARIA,—I write to you leaving a half margin, so that your reply may come on the same paper, and I enjoin and command you not to allow the contents of this to be communicated to anybody. Since the day that I was with you I have felt much encouraged by your promise to pray to God for me, and for success to my realm; for the earnest attachment towards my well being that I then recognised in you gave me great confidence and encouragement. As I told you, I left Madrid lacking all human resources, and trusting only to divine help, which is the sole way to obtain what we desire. Our Lord has already begun to work in my favour, bringing in the silver fleet, and relieving Oran[[6]] when we least expected it; whereby I have been able, though with infinite trouble and tardiness for want of money, to dispose my forces here so that we shall, I hope, start work with them this week. Although I beseech God and His most holy Mother to succour and aid us, I trust very little in myself; for I have offended, and still offend very much, and I justly deserve the punishments and afflictions which I suffer. And so I appeal to you to fulfil your promise to me, to clamour to God to guide my actions and my arms, to the end that the quietude of these realms may be secured, and peace reign throughout Christendom. The Portuguese rebels still raid the frontiers of Portugal, acting against God and their natural sovereign. Affairs in Flanders are in great extremity, and there is risk of a rising unless God will intervene in my favour; and though affairs in Aragon have somewhat improved with my presence, I fear that unless we can gain some successes to encourage people here they are liable to lose heart and to take a course very injurious to the monarchy. The necessities, of course, are numerous and great; but I must confess that it is not that which distresses me most, but the certain conviction that they all arise from my having offended our Lord. As He knows, I earnestly wish to please Him and to fulfil my duty in all things; and I desire that, if by any means you arrive at a knowledge of what it is His holy will that I should do to placate Him, write to me here, for I am very anxious to do right, and I do not know in what I err. Some religious people give me to understand that they have revelations; and that God commands that I should punish certain persons, and that I should dismiss others from my service. But you know full well that in this matter of revelations one must be very careful, and particularly when these religious persons speak against those who are not really bad, and against whom I have never discovered anything injurious to me; whilst others are approved whose proceedings are not usually thought well of. The general opinion about these persons is that they love turning things over, and that their truth cannot be depended upon. I do hope that you will keep your word to me, and will speak with all frankness as to a confessor, for we kings have much of the confessor in us. Do not let yourself be influenced by what the world says, for that is little to be depended upon, seeing the aims of those who move such discourse; but be guided solely by the inspiration of God, before whom I protest (and I have just partaken of Him, in the Sacrament) that I desire in all things, and for all things, to fulfil His sacred law and the obligation which He has laid upon me as a King. And I hope in His mercy that He will take pity on our pains and help us out of those afflictions. The greatest favour that I can receive from His holy hands is that the punishment He lays upon these realms may be laid upon me; for it is I, and not they, who really deserve the punishment, for they have always been true and firm Catholics. I do hope you will console me with your reply, and that I may have in you a true intercessor with our Lord, that He may guide and enlighten me, and extricate me from the troubles in which I am now immersed.—I, THE KING. Saragossa, 4th October 1644."

Philip's inner self

In addition to the invaluable and unquestionable glimpse which this letter affords of public affairs, it gives us the key, more entirely perhaps than any of the six hundred letters that followed it, to the real character of the King. He was weak; he confesses to have no confidence in himself, although in his heart of hearts he is striving to live well and do his duty. He is unable to struggle successfully against the worldly pleasures that have captured him, and which he pursues still, whilst hating himself for doing so. Conscience-haunted, he is the only sinner, and the terrible conviction forces itself upon him that his personal sins of omission and commission are to be visited in awful punishment upon whole nations of innocent people. His natural justice and his knowledge of men cause him to rebel against the suggestions that come to him, even under the cloak of religion, to punish those who in his eyes have done no ill; and behind the regal purple and the stately port of his great office we see the poor soul, so remorseful in the knowledge of its sin and insignificance as to feel unworthy even to pray without a poor nun's intercession to the appalling deity he thinks he has incensed. And yet, with all this humility, how the true Spaniard peeps out in the conviction that God has His eyes specially on him; how God's designs for the universe revolve around his fortunes, his acts, and his transgressions. Only by the light of these self-revelatory letters can we see how penetrating was the genius of Velazquez. The tragic, haunted face of Philip, when age had palled his pleasures, only told its tale to the painter; and its pride, its weakness, its mercy and despair, an enigma until now, are explained to us when, after looking upon his portrait, we read the King's own words, meant for the eyes of the cloistered nun alone.

Whilst Philip was, for the first time for twenty years, manfully struggling against his indolence, and facing his enemies in Aragon, the Queen, as regent of Castile, was straining every nerve to provide money for the campaigns; and during the autumn (1643) an army of 16,000 men was mustered in the various provinces, and sent to the King. Queen Isabel too put her hand to the Augean stable of Madrid. Murders in the streets and armed affrays upon trifling pretexts were as numerous as ever, one Newsletter (25th August) enumerating four or five of such fatal scandals during the previous few days;[[7]] one of which—although that was in Valencia and is given as an instance—is curious: one Iñigo Velasco, an actor, we are told, having been beheaded "because, forgetting the humility of his calling, he courted ladies as impudently as any gentleman could have done." But it was noticed in Madrid that the punishment now followed the crime more surely and more promptly:[[8]] that immorality was attacked more earnestly than before, and that the large public houses of ill-fame were being rapidly cleared out by the new President of the Council of Castile.

The financial officers and others were also having rather a ruthless time, for secret commissions descended upon them and their papers without notice one after the other, and scores of thousands of ducats of ill-gotten plunder had to be disgorged; whilst the friends of Olivares who had survived his fall, and kept their places, were gradually made to understand that things had altered for them.[[9]] The Countess of Olivares thus far had held firmly to her footing as Mistress of the Robes, notwithstanding the frowns of the Queen; but the Duchess of Mantua brought matters to a head with her. As the Countess aspired to sit upon a seat in the royal carriage instead of in the doorway, the Duchess rose and said that that was not her place, and she would leave the carriage. The Queen placated her, but a few days afterwards the Queen's coach was surrounded in Madrid by a crowd that cried, "Long live the Queen, and down with the Duchess of Olivares"; and soon orders came from the King in Aragon that the lady was to follow her husband into retirement.