On Richelieu’s return to France, his insinuating manners and agreeable conversation, combined with more solid qualities, made him very welcome at the Court of the Queen-Mother, Mary of Medicis, Regent of the kingdom. The newly-made bishop was chosen as her Grand Almoner, and afterwards made Secretary of State. But the Queen fell into disgrace both with her son and the Government, and was exiled to Blois, where Richelieu followed her. He paved the way to his own aggrandisement by effecting a reconciliation between the young King and his mother, for which he was rewarded with the red hat of a Cardinal.
Louis XIII. in these early days disliked Richelieu, who stood so high in the Regent’s favour, and warned her: ‘Il est d’une ambition démesurée.’
This was his estimate of the man in whose hands he became later but a mere puppet.
The rise of Cardinal Richelieu to the zenith of power, and his administration as Prime Minister, the manner in which he fell and rose alternately, in the confidence of the Regent and the King, forms one of the most important pages in the history of France. He always knew how to right himself in an emergency, and as far as public affairs were concerned he advanced the power of France in a most eminent degree, and in so doing gratified his own personal ambition. He was one of the many who did not scruple to throw down the ladder on which he had risen, and that in several instances. He hated the Huguenots, and worked against them, but he hated Austria still more, and, to humble her power, he assisted the Protestant leaders in Germany, during the Thirty Years’ War, with supplies. He also loved to take down the pride of the French aristocracy, and no consideration of mercy or rectitude arrested him in his course, particularly where his own personal animosity urged him forward. He showed remarkable aptitude for military affairs, and beneath his rule, as we have said before, the glory of the French arms was much advanced. He also patronised the arts of peace, founded institutions, erected many splendid edifices, and built for himself a magnificent dwelling in Paris, which he called ‘Le Palais du Cardinal,’ now the Palais Royal, which he bequeathed to Louis XIII. Richelieu loved literature, and left numerous writings.
His cruel sentence in respect to Cinq Mars, and De Thou, accused of conspiracy, is a well-known episode in the life of this Minister. He did not long survive his victims, but died, after great suffering, with courage and firmness, protesting solemnly in his last hour that his whole aim in life had been the welfare of his king and country.
He was a man of gallantry, and was said to have presumed so far as to raise his eyes to the reigning Queen, Anne of Austria, who, however, much disliked him, and opposed him whenever it was in her power to do so.
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