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XII.

1823.

Aug. 26.

quiesce in silence in the temporary restraint. Soon after, CHAP. the influence which now gained possession of the Government appeared in another ordonnance, which created a new ministry, that of "Ecclesiastical Affairs," which was bestowed on Count Frayssenous, Bishop of Hermopolis, Grand-master of the University. As he was a 1Ann. Hist. man of ability, and the acknowledged representative of 301; Lam. the Parti Prêtre, this appointment was of sinister augury 312. for the tranquillity of the succeeding reign.1

vii. 300,

vii. 308,

121.

conversa

The declining days of this monarch were chiefly spent in conversation, an exercise of the mind in which he took His great the greatest delight, as is generally the case with those powers of whose intellectual faculties in advanced years remain tion. entire, but who are debarred by increasing infirmities from continuing the active duties of life. “His natural talent,” says Lamartine, “cultivated, reflective, and quick, full of recollections, rich in anecdotes, nourished by philosophy, enriched by quotations, never deformed by pedantry, rendered him equal in conversation to the most. renowned literary characters of his age. M. de Chateaubriand had not more elegance, M. de Talleyrand more wit, Madame de Staël more brilliancy. Never inferior, always equal, often superior to those with whom he conversed on every subject, yet with more tact and address than they, he changed his tone and the subject of conversation with those he addressed, and yet was never exhausted by any one. History, contemporary events, things, men, theatres, books, poetry, the arts, the incidents of the day, formed the varied text of his conversations. Since the suppers of Potsdam, where the genius of Voltaire met the capacity of Frederick the Great, never had the cabinet of a prince been the sanctuary of more philo- 310, 311. sophy, literature, talent, and taste." 2

Though abundantly sensible of the necessity of the support of religion to the maintenance of his throne, and at once careful and respectful in its outward observances, Louis was far from being a bigot, and in no way the

2 Lam. vii.

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1823. 122. His religious impressions in his last

days.

CHAP. slave of the Jesuits, who in his declining days had got possession of his palace. In secret, his opinions on religious subjects, though far from sceptical, were still farther from devout: he had never surmounted the influence of the philosophers who, when he began life, ruled general opinion in Paris. He listened to the suggestions of the priests, when they were presented to him from the charming lips of Madame Du Cayla; but he never permitted themselves any nearer approach to his person. As his end was visibly approaching, this circumstance gave great distress to the Count d'Artois and Duchess d'Angoulême, and the other members of the royal family, who were deeply impressed with religious feelings, and dreaded the king's departing this life without having received the last benediction of the church. They could not, however, for long induce him to send for his confessor; and to attain the object, they were at last obliged to recall to court Madame Du Cayla, who had found her situation so uncomfortable, from the cold reception she experienced from the royal family, that she had retired from the palace. She came back accordingly, and by her influence Louis was persuaded to send for the priest, and after confessing received supreme unction. "You alone," said he, taking her hand and addressing Madame Du Cayla, "could venture to address me on this subject. I will do as you desire: Adieu! We will meet in another world. I have now no longer any concern with this." 1

1 Lam. vii. 314, 394.

123.

Sept. 16.

At length the last hour approached. The extreHis death. mities of the king became cold, and symptoms of mortification began to appear; but his mind continued as distinct, his courage as great as ever. He was careful to conceal his most dangerous symptoms from his attendants. "A king of France," said he, "may die, but he is never ill;" and around his deathbed he received the foreign diplomatists and officers of the national guard, with whom he cheerfully conversed upon the affairs of the day. "Love each other," said the dying monarch

XII.

to his family, "and console yourselves by that affection CHAP. for the disasters of our house. Providence has replaced 1823. us upon the throne; and I have succeeded in maintaining you on it by concessions which, without weakening the real strength of the Crown, have secured for it the support of the people. The Charter is your best inheritance; preserve it entire, my brothers, for me, for our subjects, for yourselves;" then stretching out his hand to the Duke de Bordeaux, who was brought to his bedside, he added, "and also for this dear child, to whom you should transmit the throne after my children are gone. May you be more wise than your parents." He then received supreme unction, thanked the priests and his attendants, and bade adieu to all, and especially M. Decazes, who stood at a little distance, but whose sobs attracted his notice. He then composed himself to sleep, and rested peaceably during the night. At daybreak Lam. vii. on the following morning the chief physician opened the Ann. Hist. curtains to feel his pulse; it was just ceasing to beat. 303; Cap. "The king is dead," said he, bowing to the Count d' Ar- 383. tois," Long live the king!" 1

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1

394, 397;

vii. 302,

viii. 375,

of Louis

Louis XVIII., who thus paid the debt of nature, after 124. having sat for ten years on the throne of France, during Character the most difficult and stormy period in its whole annals, XVIII. was undoubtedly a very remarkable man. Alone of all the sovereigns who have ruled its destinies since the Revolution, he succeeded in conducting the Government without either serious foreign war or domestic overthrow. In this respect he was more fortunate, or rather more wise, than either Napoleon, Charles X., or Louis Philippe; for the first kept his seat on the throne only by keeping the nation constantly in a state of hostility, and the two last lost their crowns mainly by having attempted to do without it. He was no common man who at such a time, and with such a people, could succeed in effecting such a prodigy. Louis Philippe aimed at being the Napoleon of peace; but Louis XVIII. really was so,

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1823.

CHAP. and succeeded so far that he died king of France. The secret of his success was, that he entirely accommodated himself to the temper of the times. He was the man of the age-neither before it, like great, nor behind it, like little men. Thus he succeeded in steering the vessel of the state successfully through shoals which would have in all probability stranded a man of greater or less capacity. The career of Napoleon illustrated the danger of the first, that of Charles X. the peril of the last.

125.

qualities

nesses.

In addition to this tact and judgment which enabled His private him to scan with so much correctness the signs of the and weak times, and choose his ministers and shape his measures accordingly, he had many qualities of essential value in a constitutional monarch, who must always be more or less guided by others. His intellect was clear, his memory great, his observation piercing. Though he formed strong opinions from his own judgment, he was ready to listen to considerations on the opposite side; often yielded to superior weight in argument, and even, when unconvinced, knew how to yield when circumstances rendered it expedient to do so. He was humane and benevolent; few monarchs surmounted so many rebellions with so little effusion of blood; and the rare deeds of severity which did occur during his reign were forced upon him, much against his will, by the strength of the public voice, or the violence of an overwhelming parliamentary majority. He had his weaknesses, but they were of a harmless kind, and did not interfere with his public conduct. Though oppressed in later years with the corpulence hereditary in his family, and the victim of gout and other painful diseases, he was abstemious in the pleasures of the table, and generally dined amidst the sumptuous repasts of the Tuileries on two eggs and a few glasses of wine. A constitutional coldness, and the infirmities to which he was latterly a victim, preserved him from the well-known weaknesses to which his ancestors had so often been the slaves; but he yielded to none of them

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1823.

in appreciation of the society of elegant and cultivated CHAP. women, and devoted all his leisure hours, perhaps to a blamable extent, to their society, or the daily correspondence he kept up with them. But he did not permit their influence to warp his judgment in affairs of state, and never yielded to it so readily as when employed in pleading on behalf of the unfortunate.

126.

inferences

result of the

The final issue of the Spanish revolution affords the clearest illustration of the extreme danger and inevitable Political tendency of the military treachery and revolt in which from the it took its rise. No one can doubt that the cause of Spanish refreedom in the Peninsula, and in Europe, was essentially volution. and deeply injured by the revolt of Riego and Quiroga in the Isle of Leon in 1820, which at the time was hailed with such enthusiasm by the whole friends of freedom in the Old and New World. It was not merely from the strong and general reaction to which it of necessity gave rise that this effect took place; the result was equally certain, and would have been still more swift, had the triumph of the revolutionists continued uninterrupted. Military treason, Prætorian revolt, even when supported at the time by the voice of a vast majority of the people, can never in the end terminate in anything but destruction to the cause for which it is undertaken, for this plain reason, that, being carried into effect by the strongest, it leaves society without any safeguard against their excesses. This accordingly was what took place in Spain; it was the triumph of the revolutionists which, by destroying liberty, rendered inevitable their fall. The Royalist reaction, and desolating civil war to which it gave rise, preceded, not followed, the invasion of the French. It arose from the oppressive measures of the Government appointed by the military chiefs, who had been the leaders of the revolt. It was Riego, not the Duke d'Angoulême, who was the real murderer of liberty in Spain. It was the same in England. No one supposes that either the Long Parliament or Cromwell were

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