Part 12 (1/2)
”IV. Ought to tell him all things.
”V. To give him free access to his person.
”VI. To give him sovereign authority over his people.
”VII. Great honors and large possessions.
”VIII. A prince has no treasure more precious than his prime minister.
”IX. A prince should not put faith in what people say against his prime minister, nor listen to any such slanders.
”X. A prince should reveal to his prime minister all that is said against him, even though he has been bound to keep it secret.
”XI. A prince should prefer not only the well-being of the State, but also his prime minister, to all his relations.”
Such were the commandments of the G.o.d of France, less astonis.h.i.+ng in themselves than the terrible naivete which made him bequeath them to posterity, as if posterity also must believe in him.
While he dictated his instructions, reading them from a small piece of paper, written with his own hand, a deep melancholy seemed to possess him more and more at each word; and when he had ended, he fell back in his chair, his arms crossed, and his head sunk on his breast.
Father Joseph, dropping his pen, arose and was inquiring whether he were ill, when he heard issue from the depths of his chest these mournful and memorable words:
”What utter weariness! what endless trouble! If the ambitious man could see me, he would flee to a desert. What is my power? A miserable reflection of the royal power; and what labors to fix upon my star that incessantly wavering ray! For twenty years I have been in vain attempting it. I can not comprehend that man. He dare not flee me; but they take him from me--he glides through my fingers. What things could I not have done with his hereditary rights, had I possessed them? But, employing such infinite calculation in merely keeping one's balance, what of genius remains for high enterprises? I hold Europe in my hand, yet I myself am suspended by a trembling hair. What is it to me that I can cast my eyes confidently over the map of Europe, when all my interests are concentrated in his narrow cabinet, and its few feet of s.p.a.ce give me more trouble to govern than the whole country besides?
See, then, what it is to be a prime minister! Envy me, my guards, if you can.”
His features were so distorted as to give reason to fear some accident; and at the same moment he was seized with a long and violent fit of coughing, which ended in a slight hemorrhage. He saw that Father Joseph, alarmed, was about to seize a gold bell that stood on the table, and, suddenly rising with all the vivacity of a young man, he stopped him, saying:
”'Tis nothing, Joseph; I sometimes yield to these fits of depression; but they do not last long, and I leave them stronger than before. As for my health, I know my condition perfectly; but that is not the business in hand. What have you done at Paris? I am glad to know the King has arrived in Bearn, as I wished; we shall be able to keep a closer watch upon him. How did you induce him to come away?”
”A battle at Perpignan.”
”That is not bad. Well, we can arrange it for him; that occupation will do as well as another just now. But the young Queen, what says she?”
”She is still furious against you; her correspondence discovered, the questioning to which you had subjected her--”
”Bah! a madrigal and a momentary submission on my part will make her forget that I have separated her from her house of Austria and from the country of her Buckingham. But how does she occupy herself?”
”In machinations with Monsieur. But as we have his entire confidence, here are the daily accounts of their interviews.”
”I shall not trouble myself to read them; while the Duc de Bouillon remains in Italy I have nothing to fear in that quarter. She may have as many petty plots with Gaston in the chimney-corner as she pleases; he never got beyond his excellent intentions, forsooth! He carries nothing into effect but his withdrawal from the kingdom. He has had his third dismissal; I will manage a fourth for him whenever he pleases; he is not worth the pistol-shot you had the Comte de Soissons settled with, and yet the poor Comte had scarce more energy than he.”
And the Cardinal, reseating himself in his chair, began to laugh gayly enough for a statesman.
”I always laugh when I think of their expedition to Amiens. They had me between them, Each had fully five hundred gentlemen with him, armed to the teeth, and all going to despatch me, like Concini; but the great Vitry was not there. They very quietly let me talk for an hour with them about the hunt and the Fete Dieu, and neither of them dared make a sign to their cut-throats. I have since learned from Chavigny that for two long months they had been waiting that happy moment. For myself, indeed, I observed nothing, except that little villain, the Abbe de Gondi,--[Afterward Cardinal de Retz.]--who prowled near me, and seemed to have something hidden under his sleeve; it was he that made me get into the coach.”
”Apropos of the Abbe, my lord, the Queen insists upon making him coadjutor.”
”She is mad! he will ruin her if she connects herself with him; he's a musketeer in canonicals, the devil in a ca.s.sock. Read his 'Histoire de Fiesque'; you may see himself in it. He will be nothing while I live.”
”How is it that with a judgment like yours you bring another ambitious man of his age to court?”
”That is an entirely different matter. This young Cinq-Mars, my friend, will be a mere puppet. He will think of nothing but his ruff and his shoulder-knots; his handsome figure a.s.sures me of this. I know that he is gentle and weak; it was for this reason I preferred him to his elder brother. He will do whatever we wish.”
”Ah, my lord,” said the monk, with an expression of doubt, ”I never place much reliance on people whose exterior is so calm; the hidden flame is often all the more dangerous. Recollect the Marechal d'Effiat, his father.”