Court Memoirs of France Series — Complete

by Various

The good reception I found at Court gave my relatives some grounds to hope that I might have the coadjutorship of Paris. At first they found a great deal of difficulty in my uncle's narrowness of spirit, which is always attended with fears and jealousies; but at length they prevailed upon him, and would have then carried our point, if my friends had not given it out, much against my judgment, that it was done by the consent of the Archbishop of Paris, and if they had not suffered the Sorbonne, the cures, and chapter to return him their thanks. This affair made too much noise in the world for my interest. For Cardinal Mazarin, De Noyers, and De Chavigni thwarted me, and told his Majesty that the chapter should not be entrusted with the power of nominating their own archbishop. And the King was heard to say that I was yet too young.

But we met with a worse obstacle than all from M. de Noyers, Secretary of State, one of the three favourite ministers, who passed for a religious man, and was suspected by some to be a Jesuit in disguise. He had a secret longing for the archbishopric of Paris, which would shortly be vacant, and therefore thought it expedient to remove me from that city, where he saw I was extremely beloved, and provide me with some post suitable to my years. He proposed to the King by his confessor to nominate me Bishop of Agde. The King readily granted the request, which confounded me beyond all expression. I had no mind to go to Languedoc, and yet so great are the inconveniences of a refusal that not a man had courage to advise me to it. I became, therefore, my own counsellor, and having resolved with myself what course to take, I waited upon his Majesty, and thanked him for his gracious offer, but said I dreaded the weight of so remote a see, and that my years wanted advice, which it is difficult to obtain in provinces so distant. I added to this other arguments, which you may guess at. I was in this adventure also more happy than wise. The King continued to treat me very kindly. This circumstance, and the retreat of M. de Noyers, who fell into the snare that Chavigni had laid for him, renewed my hopes of the coadjutorship of Paris. The King died about this time, in 1643. M. de Beaufort, who had been always devoted to the Queen's interest, and even passed for her gallant, pretended now to govern the kingdom, of which he was not so capable as his valet de chambre. The Bishop of Beauvais, the greatest idiot you ever knew, took upon himself the character of Prime Minister, and on the first day of his administration required the Dutch to embrace the Roman Catholic religion if they desired to continue in alliance with France. The Queen was ashamed of this ridiculous minister, and sent for me to offer my father—[Philippe Emmanuel de Gondi, Comte de Joigni; he retired to the: Fathers of the Oratory, and became priest; died 1662, aged eighty-one.]—the place of Prime Minister; but he refusing peremptorily to leave his cell and the Fathers of the Oratory, the place was conferred upon Cardinal Mazarin.

You may now imagine that it was no great task for me to obtain what I desired at a time that nothing was refused, which made Feuillade say that the only words in the French tongue were "La Reine est si bonne."

Madame de Maignelai and the Bishop of Lisieux desired the Queen to grant me the coadjutorship of Paris, but they were repulsed, the Queen assuring them that none should have it but my father, who kept from Court; and would never be seen at the Louvre, except once, when the Queen told him publicly that the King, the very night before he died, had ordered her expressly to have it solicited for me, and that he said in the presence of the Bishop of Lisieux that he had me always in his thoughts since the adventures of the pinmaker and Captain Coutenau. What relation had these trifling stories to the archbishopric of Paris? Thus we see that affairs of the greatest moment often owe their rise and success to insignificant trifles and accidents. All the companies went to thank the Queen. I sent 16,000 crowns to Rome for my bull, with orders not to desire any favour, lest it should delay the despatch and give the ministers time to oppose it. I received my bull accordingly; and now you will see me ascending the theatre of action, where you will find scenes not indeed worthy of yourself, but not altogether unworthy of your attention.

BOOK II.

MADAME:—I lay it down as a maxim, that men who enter the service of the State should make it their chief study to set out in the world with some notable act which may strike the imagination of the people, and cause themselves to be discussed. Thus I preached first upon All Saints' Day, before an audience which could not but be numerous in a populous city, where it is a wonder to see the Archbishop in the pulpit. I began now to think seriously upon my future conduct. I found the archbishopric sunk both in its temporals and spirituals by the sordidness, negligence, and incapacity of my uncle. I foresaw infinite obstacles to its reestablishment, but perceived that the greatest and most insuperable difficulty lay in myself. I considered that the strictest morals are necessarily required in a bishop. I felt myself the more obliged to be strictly circumspect as my uncle had been very disorderly and scandalous. I knew likewise that my own corrupt inclinations would bear down all before them, and that all the considerations drawn from honour and conscience would prove very weak defences. At last I came to a resolution to go on in my sins, and that designedly, which without doubt is the more sinful in the eyes of God, but with regard to the world is certainly the best policy, because he that acts thus always takes care beforehand to cover part of his failings, and thereby to avoid the jumbling together of sin and devotion, than which nothing can be more dangerous and ridiculous in a clergyman. This was my disposition, which was not the most pious in the world nor yet the wickedest, for I was fully determined to discharge all the duties of my profession faithfully, and exert my utmost to save other souls, though I took no care of my own.

The Archbishop, who was the weakest of mortals, was, nevertheless, by a common fatality attending such men, the most vainglorious; he yielded precedence to every petty officer of the Crown, and yet in his own house would not give the right-hand to any person of quality that came to him about business. My behaviour was the reverse of his in almost everything; I gave the right-hand to all strangers in my own house, and attended them even to their coach, for which I was commended by some for my civility and by others for my humility. I avoided appearing in public assemblies among people of quality till I had established a reputation. When I thought I had done so, I took the opportunity of the sealing of a marriage contract to dispute my rank with M. de Guise. I had carefully studied the laws of my diocese and got others to do it for me, and my right was indisputable in my own province. The precedence was adjudged in my favour by a decree of the Council, and I found, by the great number of gentlemen who then appeared for me, that to condescend to men of low degree is the surest way to equal those of the highest.

I dined almost every day with Cardinal Mazarin, who liked me the better because I refused to engage myself in the cabal called "The Importants," though many of the members were my dearest friends. M. de Beaufort, a man of very mean parts, was so much out of temper because the Queen had put her confidence in Cardinal Mazarin, that, though her Majesty offered him favours with profusion, he would accept none, and affected to give himself the airs of an angry lover. He held aloof from the Duc d'Orleans, insulted the late Prince, and, in order to support himself against the Queen-regent, the chief minister, and all the Princes of the blood, formed a cabal of men who all died mad, and whom I never took for conjurers from the first time I knew them. Such were Beaupre, Fontrailles, Fiesque, Montresor, who had the austerity of Cato, but not his sagacity, and M. de Bethune, who obliged M. de Beaufort to make me great overtures, which I received very respectfully, but entered into none. I told Montresor that I was indebted to the Queen for the coadjutorship of Paris, and that that was enough to keep me from entering into any engagement that might be disagreeable to her Majesty. Montresor said I was not obliged for it to the Queen, it having been ordered before by the late King, and given me at a crisis when she was not in a condition to refuse it. I replied, "Permit me, monsieur, to forget everything that may diminish my gratitude, and to remember that only which may increase it." These words were afterwards repeated to Cardinal Mazarin, who was so pleased with me that he repeated them to the Queen.

The families of Orleans and Conde, being united by interest, made a jest of that surly look from which Beaufort's cabal were termed "The Importants," and at the same time artfully made use of the grand appearance which Beaufort (like those who carry more sail than ballast) never failed to assume upon the most trifling occasions. His counsels were unseasonable, his meetings to no purpose, and even his hunting matches became mysterious. In short, Beaufort was arrested at the Louvre by a captain of the Queen's Guards, and carried on the 2d of September, 1643, to Vincennes. The cabal of "The Importants" was put to flight and dispersed, and it was reported over all the kingdom that they had made an attempt against the Cardinal's life, which I do not believe, because I never saw anything in confirmation of it, though many of the domestics of the family of Vendome were a long time in prison upon this account.

The Marquis de Nangis, who was enraged both against the Queen and Cardinal, for reasons which I shall tell you afterwards, was strongly tempted to come into this cabal a few days before Beaufort was arrested, but I dissuaded him by telling him that fashion is powerful in all the affairs of life, but more remarkably so as to a man's being in favour or disgrace at Court. There are certain junctures when disgrace, like fire, purifies all the bad qualities, and sets a lustre on all the good ones, and also there are times when it does not become an honest man to be out of favour at Court. I applied this to the gentlemen of the aforesaid cabal.