Home |
Texts |
Next Chapter |
|---|
|
Typos — p. 115: déliverance [= délivrance]; p. 116: treament [= treatment]; p. 117: of the old block [= off the old block]; p. 118: dèliverance [= délivrance]
- p. 115 - XVIII Louis XIV An impressive number of French historians now reject the legendary version of the Sun-King's reign. But, to the general reader, especially in England, it still means an Age of glory and good government. Even Lord Acton does not hesitate to declare this third Bourbon sovereign as "by far the ablest man who was born in modern times on the steps of a throne." (The Cambridge Modern History, 1907–31 edtn., Vol. V. Chap. I). Yet no one who has made even a cursory study of the state of France and particularly of the conditions among the common people during his reign, or has merely read de Tocqueville's L'Ancien Régime et la Révolution (particularly Livre II, Chap. X. vi) can fail to agree with Thomas Henry Buckle who in Chap. IV and V of The History of Civilisation in England, declares that Louis XIV's reign "was an age of decay . . . an age of misery, of intolerable oppression . . . an age of bondage, of ignominy, of incompetence." The most convincing proof of Buckle's accuracy is the public's sense of relief, its joy and jubilation, when at last the Grand Monarque was laid to rest. Even Voltaire, the greatest encomiast of the reign, concedes that Louis XIV "was not regretted as he deserved to be" (Le Siècle de Louis XIV, Chap. I XXVIII) whilst St. Simon says that "Le peuple ruiné, accablé désespére, rendit grâce à Dieu, avec un éclat scandaleux, d'une déliverance donc les plus ardents désirs ne doutaient plus." (Mémoires: "The people, ruined, oppressed, and desperate, thanked God with unbecoming enthusiasm for a deliverance which their most passionate longing could now cease to doubt."). How had this rapid decline in the ability of the dynasty come about? We can only infer that, in addition to the ravages wrought by the miscegenation following Antoine de Bourbon and Jeanne d'Albret, the strains introduced by that
Trustworthy Boulenger describes Louis XIV as neither highly intelligent nor at all brilliant (Le Grand Siècle. Chap. VII); whilst St. Simon, admittedly less reliable, speaks of him as "né avec un esprit au-dessous du médiocre" (Mémoires: "born with a mind less than mediocre.") Nor were his defects mitigated by a good education. His shrewd and intelligent sister-in-law (Liselotte) who was fond of him, acknowledges that neither he nor her husband (the Duc d'Orléans) "had been taught anything; they scarcely knew how to read and write." (E. F. Henderson: A Lady of the Old Régime, Chap. II). St. Simon concurs; for he says of the King, "A peine lui apprit on à lire et à écrire, et il demeura tellement ignorant que les choses les plus connues d'histoire etc. et des lois, il n'en sut jamais un mot. Il tombait, par ce défaut, et quelquefois en public, dans les absurdités les plus grossières." (Mémoires: "He had hardly been taught to read or write, and he remained so ignorant that the most notable facts of history etc. and law were unknown to him. On account of these defects he was sometimes guilty of the most absurd howlers, even in public.") A. de Montgon (Louis XIV, Chap. III), denies this and maintains that Louis XIV had had a much better education than the majority of his contemporaries; but against this we have the scrupulous historian, Boulenger, who says "His education was of the scantiest." (Le Grand Siècle, Chap. VII). Like his mother, he adored flattery "even of the grossest kind" says St. Simon; and although we know that he wept easily, he was singularly heartless, as is shown, not merely by his treament of his country's peasantry, but also by his repeated acts of brutality to La Vallière and his callous indifference to the Duchess of Burgundy's plight in 1708. I have already mentioned his sitomania, as also his unpleasant body odour. But, concerning the latter, we are told that is was so overpowering that, when he took one of his rare baths, an attendant had the duty of burning some kind of aromatic on a red hot shovel to sweeten the air. St. Simon maintains that even "the youngest and most second rate of the King's lieutenants in the government ruled
His wife, Marie Thérèse, the daughter of Philip IV of Spain and Elizabeth of France (sister of Louis XIII), besides adding more foreign blood, also contributed a further dose of the Medici strain to the dynasty, and the decline, already pronounced, was thus accelerated. It is true that she also restored some of Henry IV's blood to the line, because she was Louis XIV's cousin; but her character gave little evidence of her relationship to the great founder of the dynasty. For Boulenger describes her as "a pattern of the greatest stupidity" (Le Grand Siècle, Chap. VII); Julia Cartwright calls her "dull, ignorant and bigoted" (Madame, 1903, Chap. VII); whilst W. H. Lewis, in The Sunset of the Splendid Century, (Chap. 4), says, "she had been a stupid girl and grew up into a stupid woman" — in short, she was a chip of the old Medici block. Grant describes her as "neither intellectual nor attractive". (The Cambridge Modern History, Vol. V. Chap I). All we know about heredity and the effects of cross- and inbreeding would be invalidated if the offspring of Louis XIV and Marie Thérèse had been desirable specimens of humanity and possessed of a trace of their great ancestor's quality. But no such deviation from the established laws of heredity actually occurred; for the Grand Dauphin, one of the most abject nonentities ever born in a royal household, abundantly fulfilled all that might have been expected from the mating of his forebears. And, strange as it may seem, there was in his entourage at least one person who, despite the ignorance of biology prevalent at the time, divined the truth about this vital matter. I refer to clever Mme de Maintenon who, addressing the young Duc de Maine, Louis XIV's bastard son by Mme de Montespan, once said: "It is well that you should realise that you are happily saved from the mixed blood that is ordinarily
The Grand Dauphin (1661–1711) was certainly no example of the success of the practice. Henri Carré, who declares him feeble-minded, says, "Of less than average intelligence and of more than average indolence, his lack of energy and his lack of wit made his influence at court negligible". (La Duchesse de Bourgogne, Chaps. III and XVI). To judge from his behaviour even in his father's presence, it seemed doubtful whether he could be quite sane. Bloated and coarse in his tastes, he was "incapable of acquiring knowledge, phenomenally ignorant, and incapable of talking about anything except hunting and cooking." (C. C. Dyson: Mme de Maintenon — Her Life and Times, Chaps. V and XIII). St. Simon speaks of him as "encased in fat and benightedness" and confesses that when the Prince was supposed to be dying of smallpox, he and Mme de Simon prayed that he might not recover. When there were for a while faint hopes of his cure, they were panic stricken, and when at last he succumbed they leapt for joy. "Ma dèlivrance particulière" he says, "me semblait si grande et si inespérée qu'il me semblait . . . que l'Etat gagnait tout en une telle perte . . . il eut été un roi pernicieux." (Mémoires: "My own relief seemed so great and unhoped for, because I believed his death to be in every respect a gain for the State. He would have made a pernicious sovereign."). Louis XIV himself was perhaps of all French people the most gratified by his son's death. The Grand Dauphin's wife, Marie Anne, Victoria, Christine de Bavière, is said to have been an ugly, "insignificant and not very healthy German woman." (J. Boulenger: Le Grand Siècle, Chap. VII). She was suspected of being a hypochondriac, and from 1685, when only 25 years old, until her death, she "was always complaining about her health." After a year of "extreme suffering" she died in 1690 at the early age of thirty. What could be expected of such a couple? Besides importing fresh alien blood into the dynasty, Marie Anne failed even to
The eldest, the Duc de Bourgogne, who became Dauphin on his father's death, is described as "of small stature and sickly appearance, with an ill looking mouth, and a humpback" (C. C. Dyson: Mme de Maintenon — Her Life and Times, Chap. XVI). The Duchess of Orleans (Liselotte) tells us " he had a shocking mouth, an unhealthy skin and was deformed" (H. Carré: La Duchesse de Bourgogne, Chap. XII). Carré also suggests that these shortcomings not unnaturally made him repugnant to his wife. St. Simon hints at homosexual tendencies and says "it devint bossu" ("he became a hunchback") in spite of wearing steel supports, and adds that he finally went lame. Nevertheless, doubtless because of the memorialist's loathing of the Montespan brood of bastards, he deplored the Prince's early death, and observes, "The world was unworthy of him and he was all too ready to enter eternal happiness." (Mémoires). But the Duke of Burgundy was by no means the paragon St. Simon would have us believe. He was certainly sexually abnormal and probably alienated his wife on that account. Intellectually weak, he also failed to shine as a soldier; for Carré declares his behaviour at the siege of Lille was disgraceful. (La Duchesse de Bourgogne, Chap. XVII). The same author tells us that his young and attractive wife often raised a laugh in court by imitating his limping gait. Although the old monarch's favourite at court, Marie Adélaide de Savoie, could not have been a very estimable person. The grand-daughter of the despicable Philippe d'Orléans and of Henrietta (Charles I's daughter), her health was never good; she was always delicate and her nerves were unsteady. (F. Hamel: The Dauphines of France, Chap. VIII). Liselotte, her step-grandmother, thought her "delicate and even sickly" and St. Simon describes her as "ugly with few teeth, and those decayed, a long neck betraying signs of goitre, and pendant cheeks." (Mémoires). According to F. Hamel, she was not intelligent and to the end of her days wrote and spelt with great difficulty. Carré declares her "heartless, careless and frivolous", and the judgment, probably true, is important because it seems likely that her repulsive son inherited these failings from her. Carré also
She imported a Savoyan and English strain into the dynasty without enriching it with either stamina, health, beauty or intelligence; and she died in 1712 at the age of 27. Such were the parents of the monster, Louis XV, who consummated the havoc wrought in the State by his great grandfather; and of whom it may fairly be said that, together with Louis XIV, he was probably responsible for most of the disasters that have overtaken Europe from the time of his accession to the present day. |
Home |
Texts |
Next Chapter |
|---|