utmost parts of the Kingdom where he was like a banished man and led him by the hand to the fairest Theatre in France but only to make known his goodness and virtue and put him in an Estate to gain that Succession to which had he been absent he had never been called But on the other side when the multitude of his Puissant enemies which armed themselves against him are considered the small Treasure and few Forces he had the Obstacle of his Religion and a thousand other difficulties it could not be certainly judged whether the Crown was ordained for him to enjoy or fallen upon his head to crush him in Pieces and there might be reason to say that if this Conjuncture Elevated him it was upon a Throne trembling and erected on the brink of Precipices Whilst Henry the third was in his Agony our Henry held many Tumultuary Councels in the same lodgings with those whom he Esteemed his most faithful Servants So soon as he understood he was expired he retired to his quarter at Meudon and attired himself in the mourning Purple he was presently followed by a great quantity of Noblemen who accompanied him as well for Curiosity as affection The Hugonots with those Troops which he had led presently swore Allegiance to him but this number was very small Some of the Catholicks as the Marshal d' Aumâ—nt Givry and Humieres swore Service to him until death and that willingly without desiring any Condition of him but the greatest part of the others being either estranged by inclination or exasperated by some discontent or else believing now to have found the time to make their Services be bought kept at a greater distance and held several little Assemblies in divers places where they formed a number of Fantastick designs Each of these proposed to make themselves Sovereigns of some City or some Province as the Governours had done in the decadence of the house of Charlemagne The Marshal of Byron among others would have had the County of Perigord and Sancy not to reject him spoke to the King This Proposition was very dangerous for if he denied it he incensed him and if he accorded to his demand he opened the way to all others to make the like and so the Kingdome would be rent in Peices It was only his great spirit and understanding which could walk safely in so dangerous a path he therefore charged Sancy to assure him on his part of his affection of which he would willingly in time and place give him all the markes a good Subject could expect from his Sovereign but at the same time he furnished him with so many puissant reasons wherefore he could not accord to what he desired that Sancy being himself first perswaded found it not difficult to work the same effect on the spirit of Byron whom he obliged not only to renounce that pretence but likewise to protest that he would never suffer any peice of the Estate to be dismembred in favour of whomsoever We may without doubt conclude that the great Henry did reason puissantly and that he explained his reasons in the best manner since he could in occasions so important perswade such able Spirits against their proper interests Byron being thus gained went with Sancy to assure themselves of those Suisses which Sancy had brought to the deceased King but who being of the Catholick Cantons made some difficulty to bear Arms for a Hugonot Prince and that without new order from their Superiour As for the French Troops of the Defunct King it was not so easie to gain them The Lords who Commanded them or who had their Chiefs under their dependance had every one divers designs one would have one thing and the other another according to their several interests or Caprichio's There were six Princes of the house of Bourbon to wit the old Cardinal of Vendosme the Count of Soissons the Prince of Gonti the Duke of Montpensier and the Prince of Dombes his Son which in stead of being his firmest Prop gave him no little inquietude because there was none of them which had not his particular pretence which proved to him a continual Obstacle Many of the Lords which were in the Army were not very well intentionated particularly Henry Grand Prior of France Natural Son to Charles the ninth after Count of Auvergne and Duke of Angoulesme the Duke of Espernon and Termes Belle-garde who out of the fear they had formerly had lest he should deprive them of the favour of their Master had opposed him in divers Rencounters For the Courtiers as Francis d' O and Manou his brother Old-Castle and many others they knowing that our Henry detested their Villanous Debaucheries and that he would not prove a person of so ill management as to lavish out his Revenues to supply their Luxury had no great inclination for him Nevertheless hoping to find things better they resolved to declare in his favour but with such Conditions as should restrain and bridle him and in some manner oblige him to depend on them For this purpose there met an Assembly of some Noblemen at d' O's Palace a man Voluptuous Prodigal and by consequence not very scrupulous but who at present made Conscience a Cloak to render himself necessary who there resolved not to acknowledge him till he were a Catholick Francis d' O accompanied with some Noblemen had the confidence to carry to the King the Resolutions of this Assembly and added a studied discourse to perswade him to return to the Catholick Religion but the King who had already past over his greatest fears made them an answer so mixt with sweetness and gravity with spirit and reservedness that Couragiously repulsing them without too severely taunting them he testified to them that he desired to conserve them his but that after all he feared not much the loss of them Some time after the Nobility after divers little Assemblies held a great one with Francis de Luxembourg Duke of Piney There many Propositions being made at last the Dukes of Montpensier and Piney subtilly Matraged the Spirits and Steered the Opinions of the most importunate to this Resolution That they would acknowledge Henry for King upon these Conditions 1. Provided that he would cause himself to be instructed for they presupposed conversion must necessarily follow instruction 2. That he should not permit the exercise of any but the Catholick Religion 3. That he should neither give charge nor employment to the Hugonots 4. That he should permit the Assembly to depute Agents to the Pope to let him understand and agree to the Causes which Obliged the Nobility to remain in the Service of a Prince separated from the Romane Church The King had the knowledge of this Resolution from the Duke of Piney he thanked them for their zeal for the Conservation of the Estate and the affection they had for his person promising them that he would sooner
wilt punish me as my sins deserve I offer my head to thy Justice spare not the Culpable but Lord for thy holy mercies sake take pity of the poor Kingdom and smite not the flock for the offence of the shepherd It cannot be expressed of what efficacy these words were they were in a moment carried through the whole Army and it seemed as if some vertue from heaven had given courage to the French The Arch-Duke therefore finding them resolved and in good Countenance durst not pass farther Some other attempts he afterwards made which did not succeed and he retired by night into the Country of Artois where he dismissed his Army In fine Hernand Teillo being slain by a Musquet-shot the besieged capitulated and the King established Governour in the City the Seigneur de Vic a man of great order and exact discipline who by his command began to build a Citadel there At his departure from Amiens the King led his Army to the very Gates of Arras to visit the Arch-Duke he remained three days in battalia and saluted the City with some Volleys of Cannon Afterward seeing that nothing appeared he retired towards France ill satisfied said he gallantly with the courtesie of the Spaniards who would not advance so much as one pace to receive him but had with an ill grace refused the honour he did them The Marshal of Byron served him extraordinarily at this siege and the King when he was returned to Paris and that those of the City gave him a reception truly Royal he told them shewing them the Marshal Gentlemen see there the Marshal de Byron whom I do willingly present both to my friends and to my enemies There rested now no appearance of the League in France but onely the Duke of Merceur yet keeping a corner of Brittany The King had often granted him Truces and offered him great Conditions but he was so intoxicated with an ambition to make himself Duke of that Country that he found out daily new fancies to delay the concluding one imagining that time might afford him some favourable revolution and flattering himself with I know not what prophecies which assured him that the King should dye in two years In fine the King wearied with so many protractions turns his head that way resolving to chastise his obstinacy as it deserved He had been lost without remedy if he had not been advised to save himself by offering his only daughter to the eldest son of the Fair Gabriella Dutchess of Beaufort who is at this day Duke of Vendosme His Deputies could at first obtain nothing else but that he should immediately depart out of Brittany and deliver those places which he held which done his Majesty would grant him oblivion for all past and receive him into his favour But the King being of a tender heart and desiring to advance his natural son by so rich and noble a marriage granted him a very advantagious Edict which was verified in the Parliament as all those of the Chiefs of the League were This accommodation was made at Angiers the Contract of marriage passed at Chasteau and the affiances celebrated with the same Magnificence as if he had been a Legitimate son of France He was four years old and the Virgin six The King made gift to him of the Dutchy of Vendosme by the same right that other Dukes hold them which the Parliament verified not without great repugnancy and with this condition that it should be no president for the other goods of the Kings patrimony which by the Laws of the Realm were esteemed reunited to the Crown from the time of his coming to it From Angiers the King would pass into Brittany He stayed some time at Nantes from thence he went to Rennes where the Estates were held he passed about two months in this City in feasts joys and divertisements but yet ceasing not seriously to imploy himself to hasten the expedition of many affairs For it is to be observed that this great Prince employed himself all the mornings in serious things and dedicated the rest of the day to his divertisements yet not in such manner that he would not readily quit his greatest pleasures when there was any thing of importance to be acted and he still gave express order not to defer the advertizing him of such things He took away a great many superfluous Garisons in this Country suppressed many imposts which the Tyranny of many perticular persons had introduced during the War disbanded all those pilfering Troops which laid waste the plain Country sent forth the Provosts into the Campagne against the theeves which were in great number restored Justice to its authority which License had weakned and gathered four Millions of which the Estates of the Country of their own free will levyed eight hundred thousand crowns So he laboured profitably for these two ends which he ought most to intend to wit the ease of his people and the increase of his treasures Two things which are incompatible when a Prince is not Just and a good manager or lets his mony be managed by others without taking diligent care of his accounts Thus was a calme of Peace restored to France within it self after ten years Civil Wars by a particular grace of God on this Kingdom by the labour diligence goodness and valour of the best King that ever was And in the mean time a peace was seriously endeavoured between the two Crowns of France and Spain The two Kings equally wished it our Henry because he passionately desired to ease his people and to let them regain their forces after so many bloody and violent agitations and Philip because he found himself incline to the end of his days and that his Son Philip the third was not able to sustain the burthen of a War against so great a King The Deputies of one part and the other had been assembled for three months in the little City of Vervins with the Popes Nuntio Those of France were Pompone of Believre and Nicholas Bruslard both Counsellours of State and the last likewise President of the Parliament who acting agreeably and without jealousies determined on the most difficult Articles in very little time and according to the order they received from the King signed the peace on the second of May. The 12. of the same month it was published at Vervin It would be too long to insert here all the Articles of the Treaty I shall say only that it was agreed that the Spaniards should surrender all the places they had taken in Picardy and Blavet which they yet held in Brittany That the Duke of Savoy should be comprehended in this Treaty provided he delivered to the King the City of Berry which he held in Provence And for the Marquesate of Saluces which that Duke had taken from France towards the latter end of the Reign of Henry the third that it should be
Justice is denied them they may do it themselves and have recourse to force when their prayers cannot prevail This is the cause of almost all seditions and this is it which made all those beyond the Loire incensed at this imposition drive away the Factors and which is more kill some of them The Farmers on the other side sharpned the mischief by their furious threats that they would dismantle the rebellious Cities that they would build Citadels to keep them in awe And I believe that these Gentlemen did desire it should be so not out of love to the Kings Authority which they had still in their mouths but for their proper revenge and particular advantage The King having advice of these Commotions fearing left they were raised by the Emissaries of the faction of the Duke of Byron which he had then newly discovered a little after Easter departed from Fontainblean came from Blois and from thence to Poictiers There he favourably hearkned to the complaints of his people and remonstrated to the Deputies of the Cities of Guyenne That the Imposts raised were not to enrich his Ministers and Favourites as his Predecessour had done but to support the necessary charges of his Estate That if his demeans had been sufficient for it be would not have taken any thing out of his Subjects purses but since he had first employed all his own it was just they should contribute some of theirs That he passionately desired the ease of his Subjects and that none of his Predecessours had so much desired their prayers to God as he to bless the increase of his Realm That those Alarms given them that he had a designe to build Castles in the Cities were false and seditious for he desired to have no other Forts then in the hearts of his Subjects By these sweet Remonstrances he calmed all the seditions without having need of chastising them save onely that the Consuls of Limoges were deposed and the Pancarte for so it was they called the Sol pour livre established But this was onely for the honour of the Royal Authority for soon after this Prince the most just and best that ever was knowing the extream Vexations it caused revoked and utterly abolished it The second thing which gave him yet more trouble and which was capable to overthrow his Kingdome if it were not remedied was The Conspiracy of Marshal Byron It is to be understood that Laffin had been the principal Instrument of intelligence between the Marshal and the Duke of Savoy he had carried and re-carried Letters and had had some Conferences with the Duke and with the Count of Fuentes so that he understood the whole intrigue But seeing that there was no assurance in the words of the Savoyard and that Byron began to shake he resolved to discover the whole plot to the King were it that he feared lest if he should too long delay it it might be discovered other ways or that he hoped by this service to gain a great recompence and restore himself to the Kings favour with whom he stood on very ill terms Having laid this designe he employed the Vidame of Chartres his Nephew to obtain from the King his Grace and Oblivion of all passed on condition that he discovered to him the Complices of the Conspiracy and furnished him with proofs He had preserved several Letters committed to his keeping but they said not enough nor spoke so clearly as to make a Conviction But to pass an absolute one see what he did Byron had some Notes written with his own hand wherein the Conspiracy was laid down in Articles Laffin remonstrated to him that it was an imprudence to keep them and to communicate them because his writing was too well known that it would be more secure to make a Copy and burn the Original Byron approving his counsel gives them him to transcribe He indeed transcribes them whilst Byron lay on his Bed afterwards giving him the Copy and ruffling up the Original he makes shew of casting it into the fire but by a premeditated cunning he casts in some other Papers and keeps them A thing of this importance deserved well the care of Byron himself in its burning but he not taking it because God so permitted that negligence cost him his life as we shall see After this Laffin continuing still his devices to endeavour yet to gather some more particular secrets he went disguised to Milan and conferred with the Count Fuentes but this close and able Spaniard finding well that he would betray them shewed himself more reserved It hath been reported that Laffin having knowledge of this distrust was fearful lest he should make him away and therefore returned by the unusual and unfrequented ways of which the Duke of Savoy being advertized by Fuentes kept prisoner the Secretary of Laffin named Renaze for fear lest he should go serve as a witness against Byron In their Conferences they had proposed to dismember the Kingdom of France That the Duke of Savoy should have Provence and the Daulphinate Byron Bourgongne and la Bresse with the third Daughter of the Duke in marriage and fifty thousand Crowns for Dower some others should be Lords of other Provinces with the quality of Peers That all these little Soveraigns should hold their right from the King of Spain That to compass this designe the Spaniards should with a puissant Army enter the Kingdom and the Savoyard with another That they should cause the Hugonots to stir and at the same time revive many discontents in several places and animate the people already much incensed by the Pancarte or Tax of a Sol pour livre All these propositions say some were made in the time of the war against Savoy and the Marshal of Byron grown outragious at the Kings refusal to give him the Citadel of Bourg had not only lent his eare but had engaged himself very far in these damnable designs However he seemed to have repented himself for he had confessed them to the King walking with him in the Cloister of the Cordiliers at Lions and had demanded pardon of him but he had neglected to take an abolition or script of indempnity contrary to the advice of the Duke d' Espernon who was more wise and considerate then he But a little after repenting himself for having repented he was returned to his first fault and yet entertained correspondence with strangers Moreover he spoke of the King with little respect abasing the splendor of his worthy actions glorifying his own and boasting that he had put the Crown on his head and preserved France In fine all his discourses were onely Bravadoes Rhodomontadoes and Threats All this was reported to the King It was told him that he undervalued his great acts extolled the power of the King of Spain praysed the wisdome of that Princes Council his liberality in recompencing all good services and his zeal to defend
caused likewise the Registers of Parliament and of the Notaries to be taken off the File with all informations which might conserve the memory of his Crime By this see an example how time causes a mutability in all things and how it changeth the greatest hatreds into the greatest affections and on the contrary transmutes the strongest affections into mortal hatreds By searching into the plot of the Marchioness her Father to deliver her with her Children to the Spaniards the designes of the Duke of Bouillon were likewise discovered who at present was the onely person could give the King any trouble in his own Kingdom It is most certain that this Prince had conferred on him very considerable Favours having given him the Staff of Marshal of France and procured him the marriage of the Heiress of Sedan and this Lord had likewise very well served him in his greatest necessities But after he saw him converted to the Catholick Faith he diminished much of his affection and moved partly by Zeal for his false Religion and partly by Ambition he conceived vast designes of making himself Chief and Protector of the Hugonot party and under that pretext make himself Master of the Provinces beneath the Loire It was believed that for this effect he had much assisted to exasperate the spirit of the Marshal of Byron and that he had made a Treaty with the Spaniard who was to furnish him with what money he desired but not with forces for fear of rendring himself odious to the Protestants It was but too visible that after the conversion of the King he had instantly laboured to beget distrusts and discontents in the spirits of the Hugonots and to unite and Rally them together that they might make a body perswading himself that that body must necessarily have a head and that they could chuse no other but himself And for these Reasons so many Assemblies were made and so many particular and general Synods of those of this Religion held wherein nothing was heard but complaints and murmurs against the King whom they continually wearied with new Requests and Demands Moreover it was found that this Duke had Emissaries and Servants in Guyenne and particularly in Limosin and Quercy who held private Councils among the Nobility distributed money and took oath of those who promised him service and had formed designes against ten or twelve Catholick Cities The King judging that he ought to dig up the root of this mischief before it extended farther and not knowing indeed to what it might extend resolved himself to go and remedy it He departed from Fontainbleau in the month of December having sent before Jean-Jacques de Mesmes Lord of Rossy to make process against those that were culpable Immediately all this conspiracy flew into smoak The best advised came to the King to cast themselves at his feet The chief Agent of the Duke of Bouillon being advertized that there was order given to arrest him brought his head to the King and told him both all he knew before and all that he did not know The others either fled out of the Kingdom or else hid themselves Five or six unfortunate persons being taken were beheaded at Limoges and their heads planted on the tops of the Gates their bodies burnt and the ashes thrown into the Air. Three or four others suffered the same punishment at Perigord There were ten or twelve condemned for Contumacy and their Effigies hanged up amongst others Chappelle-Byron and Giversac of the house of Cugnac But in all these procedures there were found no proofs by writing nor yet by any formal deposition against the Duke of Bouillon so cautiously and subtilly had he carried his business Before these executions the King having made his entrance into Limoges returned to Paris He passionately wished that after this the Duke of Bouillon would acknowledge and humble himself For if he remained impenitent he was obliged to prosecute him to the utmost and if he did prosecute him he offended all that great body of Protestants which were his faithful Allies He employed therefore underhand all means which he could devise to induce him to have recourse to his Clemency rather then to the intercession of strangers which a Soveraign could not agree to in the case of his Officer and Subject The Duke desired as much as he to draw himself out of this trouble but he believed he could not finde security at Court because Rosny who was not his friend and who had conceived some jealousie to see him more authorized then himself in the Hugonot party had so great credit with the King So that after many Treaties and Negotiations the King resolved to go seek him at Sedan with an Army Rosny laboured with great Zeal to make preparation for this Expedition The King confided much in him and by honouring him desired to testifie to the Hugonots that if he assaulted the Duke of Bouillon it was not against their Religion but the Rebellion he made War For this purpose he erected the Land of Sully into a Dutchy and Peerage wherefore we shall henceforward call him Duke of Sully His thoughts were that the King should pursue the Duke of Bouillon to the utmost Villeroy and the rest of the Council were of a contrary judgement they would not have the Siege of Sedan hazarded because the length of that Enterprize might possibly revive divers factions in the other corners of the Kingdom give time to the Spaniard to assault the Frontiers of Picaray to the discontented Savoyard to cast himself with the Forces of the Milanois on disarmed Provence and to the Hugonots and Protestants of Germany to come to the assistance of their friends The King well foresaw all these inconveniences and therefore having advanced to Donchery during the absence of Sully who was gone to provide Artillery he treated with the Duke of Bouillon and received him into grace on condition that he humbled himself before his Majesty and received him into the City of Sedan and delivered up the Castle to him to keep it with what Garison he should think fit for foâ—h years These were the publick Conditions but by the secret Articles the King promised the Duke to stay but five days in Sedan nor to put but fifty men in the Castle which should immediately depart upon humble supplication made by the Duke All these things were faithfully executed and without the least distrust either on the one side or the other The Duke came to meet the King at Donchery where he besought his pardon The King received him as if he had never been faulty and five or six days after entred into Sedan where he stayed onely three days and then returned to Paris The Duke accompanied him as far as Mouson passing then no further but some days after when he understood that the Parliament had confirmed his pardon in which were likewise comprehended his
Authority doth not always consist in prosecuting things to the utmost extremity That the time the persons and the cause ought to be regarded That having been ten years extinguishing the fire of civil War he feared even the least sparkles That Paris had cost him too much to hazard the least danger of loosing it which seemed to him insallible if he followed their counsel because he should be obliged to make terrible examples which would in few days deprive him of the glory of his Clemency and the love of his people which he prized as much as nay above his Crown That he had in an hundred other occasions made proof the fidelity and honesty of Miron who had no ill intention but without doubt he believed himself obliged by the duty of his Charge to do what he did That if some inconsiderate words had escaped him he might well pardon them for his past services That after all if this man affected to be the Martyr of the people he would not give him that glory nor attract to himself the name of Persecutor or Tyrant And that in fine he would not prosecute a man whom he would resolve to loose in so advantagious occasions Thus this wise King knew how prudently to dissemble a little fault nor would he understand what passed for fear of being obliged to some blow of Authority which might possibly have had dangerous Consequences He received therefore very favourably the excuses and humble submissions of Miron and after prohibited the farther pursuing the inquisitions of Rents which had caused so much trouble The second means of which he served himself to raise money and which was of very dangerous consequence was the Paulete or Annual Right To understand this business well we must make some recital of things farther off The Offices of Judicature of Policy and of the Revenues had formerly been exercised in France under the first and second Race of our Kings by Gentlemen for the Nobility was obliged to study and understand the Laws of the Kingdom They were chosen for the maturity of their Age and Judgement they were changed from time to time from one seat to another nor took they any Fees from Parties but onely a Salary very moderate which the Publick paid them rather for honour then recompence Afterwards in the end of the second Race and the beginning of the third the Nobility becoming ignorant and weak together the Plebeians and Burgesses having learnt the knowledge of the Laws raised themselves by little and little to these Charges and began to make them better worth because they drew all their Honour and all their Dignity thence not having any other by their birth as the Gentlemen had Yet they had not over-much employment for the Church-men possessed almost all the Jurisdiction and had their Officers which administred Justice In the mean time the Parliament which before was as the Council of Estate of the Kingdom and an Epitomy of the general Estates taking upon them to trouble themselves with the knowledge of differences between particular persons whereas before they onely treated of great Affairs of Policy Philip the fair or according to some others Lewis Hutin his son made it sedentary at Paris Now this Company of Judges being most illustrious because the King often took seat amongst them the Dukes Peers and Prelates of the Realm made a part of them and that the most able people for Law were chosen to fill places there they made depend upon them all the power of other Judges-Royal to wit the Bayliffs and Seneschals who though before Soveraign Judges became now Subalternate to them Long time after our other Kings created likewise at divers times many other Parliaments but out of a sole intention the better to distribute Justice without any pecuniary interest for by it they charged their Coffers with new Wages to be paid these new Officers At this time the number of the Officers of Justice was very small and the order which was observed to fill the vacancies in Parliament perfectly good The custome was to keep a Register of all the able Advocates and Lawyers and when any Office came to be vacant they chose three whose Names they carried to the King who preferred him he pleased But the Favourites and the Courtiers soon corrupted this Order they perswaded the Kings not to confine themselves to those presented but to name one of their proper motion which those people did to draw some present from him who should be named by their recommendation And the abuse was so great that oftentimes the Charges were filled with ignorant People and Porters by reason of which people of merit held the condition of an Advocate much more honourable then that of a Counsellour The mischief dayly encreasing and the rich people becoming extreamly liquorish of these Charges for lucre and their Wives out of vanity those who governed began to make a Merchandize of them and to draw money from them Thus under Lewis the xii his Coffers being exhausted by the long Wars of Italy the Offices of the Revenue began to become vendible However that good King having soon foreseen the dangerous consequence resolved to re-imburse those who had bought them but dying in that good designe Francis the first of whom he had well predicted that he would spoile all sold likewise those of Judicature afterwards new ones were at several times created onely of purpose to raise money Afterward Henry the second his Son created the Presidents and Charles the ninth and Henry the third heaping ill upon ill and ruine upon ruine made a great number of other Creations of all sorts to have these Wares to sell. And moreover they sold Offices when they were vacant either by death or forfeiture Hitherto the ill was great but not incurable a part of these Offices need onely have been suppressed when they became vacant and the rest when so filled with persons of capacity and merit Thus in twenty years this Ants-nest of Officers might have been reduced to a very little number and those as honest people But the business was not in this manner made known to Henry the Great they represented it to him in another sense They let him understand that since he drew no profit from vacant Offices being almost always obliged to give them he would do well to finde the means to discharge that way his Coffers of a part of the Wages he paid his Officers which he might do by granting them their Offices for their Heirs reserving a moderate sum of money which they should yearly pay yet without constraining any person so that it should be a favour and not an oppression This was named the Annual Right otherwise the Paulete from the name of the proposer named Paulete who gave the Counsel and was the first Farmer All the Officers were not wanting to pay this Right to assure their Offices to their heirs We need
not here tell the mischiefs and inconveniencies which this wicked invention hath caused and doth daily cause The most stupid may easily know them and see well that it is a disease whose remedy at present is difficult I will not charge this History with all the Ceremonies and Rejoycings made at the Birth and Baptism of all the Children of Henry the Great nor at divers Marriages of the Princes and Grandees of the Court amongst others of the Prince of Conde and the Duke of Vendosme which were made in the Month of July 1609. The Prince of Conde Espoused Câ—anlatta Margarita of Montmorency Daughter of the Constable who was wonderfully fair and had a presence absolutely noble which the King having considered was more lively struck with her then he had ever been with any other which caused a little after the retreat of the Prince of Conde who carried her into Flanders and thence retired to Milain Not without the Kings extreme displeasure to see the first Prince of his blood cast himself into his enemies hands The Duke of Vendosme Espoused Madamoiselle de Merceur to whom he had been affianced since the year one thousand six hundred ninety seven as we have said before however the Mother of the Lady standing upon high punctilio's of honour brought many troubles to the accomplishment of this Marriage so that it had never been made had not the King highly concerned himself in it This was none of the least difficulties of his life for he had a high and obstinate spirit to bend however he employed only ways of sweetness and perswasion acting in this business only as a Father who loved his Son and not as a King who would be obeyed Now will I speak of his ordinary divertisements Hunting Building Feasts Play and Walking I will adde only That in Feasts and Merriments he would appear as good a Companion and as Jovial as another That he was of a merry humour when he had the glass in his hand though very sober That his Mirth and good Discourses were the delicatest part of the good Chear That he witnessed no less Agility and Strength in Combats at the Barriers Courses at the Ring and all sorts of Gallantries then the youngest Lords That he took delight in Balls and Danced sometimes but to speak the truth with more affection then good grace Some carped that so great a Prince should abase himself to such follies and that a Grey-beard should please to act the young man It may be said for his excuse that the great toiles of his spirit had need of these divertisements But I know not what to answer to those who reproach him with too great a love to playing at Cards and Dice little befitting a great King and that withal he was no fair Gamester but greedy of Coin fearful at great Stakes and humorous upon a loss To this I must acknowledge that it was a fault in this great King who was no more exempt from Blots then the Sun from Beams It might be wished for the honour of his memory that he had been only guilty of this but that continual weakness he had for fair Ladiesâ— was another much more blamable in a Christian Prince in a of his age who was married to whom God had shewed so many graces and who had conceived such great designs in his spirit Sometimes he had desires which were passant and only fixt for a night but when he met with beauties which struck him to the heart he loved even to folly and in these transports appeared nothing less then Henry the Great The Fable saies that Hercules took the Spindle and Spun for the love of the fair Omphale Henry did something more mean for his Mistresses He once disguised himself like a Country-man with a Wallet of straw on his back to come to the fair Gabriella And it hath been reported that the Marchioness of Verneuil hath seen him more then once at her feet weeping his disdains and injuries Twenty Romances might be made of the intrigues of his several loves with the Countess of Guiche when he was yet but King of Navarre with Jacqueline of Bueil whom he made Countess of Moret and with Charlotta d' Essards without counting many other Ladies who held it a glory to have some Charm for so great a King The high esteem and affection which the French had for him hindred them from being offended at so scandalous a liberty but the Queen his wife was extremely perplexed at it which hourly caused controversies between them and carried her to disdains and troublesom humours The King who was in fault endured it very patiently and employed his greatest Confidents and sometimes his Confessor to appease his spirit So that he had continually a reconciliation to make And these contentions were so ordinary that the Court which at first were astonished at them in the end took no more notice Conjugal duty without doubt obliged the King not to violate his faith to his Legitimate Spouse at least not to keep his Mistresses in her sight but if he in this point ought to have been a good husband so he ought to be likewise in that of Authority and in accustoming his wife to obey him with more submission and not perplex him as she did with hourly complaints reproaches and sometimes threats The trouble and displeasure of these domestick broiles certainly retarded the Execution of that great design which he had formed for the good and perpetual repose of Christendom and in fine for the destruction of the Ottoman power Many have spoken diversely but see here what I find in the Memoires or Notes of the Duke of Sully who certainly must know something being as he was so great a Confident of this Kings which makes me report it from him The King said he desiring to put in Execution those projects he had conceived after the Peace of Vervin believed that he ought first to establish in his Kingdom an unshaken Peace by reconciling all spirits both to him and among themselves and taking away all causes of bitterness And that moreover it was necessary for him to choose people capable and faithful who might see in what his Revenue or Estate might be bettered and instruct him so well in all his Affairs that he might of himself take Counsels and discern the good from the ill feasible from impossible enterprizes and such as were proportionate to his Revenues For an expence made beyond them draws the peoples curses and those are ordinarily followed by Gods He granted an Edict to the Hugonots that the two Religions might live in Peace Afterwards he made a certain and fixed Order to pay his debts and those of the Kingdom contracted by the disorders of the times the profusions of his Ancestors and by the payments and purchases of men and places which he was forced to make during the League Sully shewed him an account
all Europe by the esteem of his Vertue In effect since the first foundation of the French Monarchy the History furnisheth us not with any Reign more memorable by reason of the great Events more repleat with the wonders of Divine Assistance more glorious for the Prince and more happy for the People then his and it is without Flattery or Envy that all the Universe hath given him the surname of Great not so much for the greatness of his Victories however comparable to those of Alexander or Pompey as for the greatness of his Soul and of his Courage for he never bow'd either under the Insults of Fortune or under the Traverses of his Enemies or under the Resentments of Revenge or under the Artifices of Favorites or Ministers he remained always in the same temper always Master of himself In a word he remained always King and Soveraign without acknowledging other Superiour then God Justice and Reason Let us then proceed to write the History of his Life which we shall divide into three principal Parts The first shall contain what happened from his Birth till his coming to the Crown of France The second shall speak what he did after he came to it until the Peace of Vervin And the third shall recount his Actions after the Peace of Vervin until the unhappy day of his death But before all it is necessary we speak something briefly of his Genealogie He was Son to Anthony de Bourbon Duke of Vendosme and King of Navarre and of Jane of Albret Heiress of that Kingdome Anthony descended in a direct and Masculine Line from Robert Count of Clermont fifth Son to King St. Lewis This Robert espoused Beatrix Daughter and Heiress to John of Burgoyne Baron of Bourbon by his Wife Agnes for which cause Robert took the Name of Bourbon but not the Arms still keeping those of France This sage Pre-caution served well to his Descendants to maintain themselves in the Degree of Princes of the Blood which those of Courtnay lost for not having acted in the same manner And besides the Vertue which gave a splendour to their Actions the good management and oeconomy which they exercised to conserve and augment their Revenues the great Alliances in which they were very diligent to match themselves ever refusing to mingle their Noble among Vulgar Blood and above all their rare Piety towards God and that singular goodness wherewith they acted towards their Inferiors conserved them and elevated them above Princes of elder Branches for the People seeing them always rich puissant wise and in a word worthy to command had imprinted in their spirits as it were a prophetick perswasion that this House would one day come to the Crown and they on their side seemed to have conceived this hope though it were at great distance having taken for their Word or Device Espoir or Hope Among the younger Branches which issued from this Branch of Bourbon the most considerable and most illustrious was that of Vendosm It carried this Name because they possessed that great Country which came to them in the year 1364. by the marriage of Katharine Vendosme Sister and Heiress to Bouchard last Count of Vendosme with John of Bourbon Count of the Marches At present it was but a County but was after made a Dutchy by King Francis the first in the year 1514. in favou◠of Charles who was great grand-childe to John and father of Anthony This Charles had seven Male-Children Lewis Anthony Francis another Lewis Charles John and a third Lewis the first Lewis and the second died in their infancy Anthony remained the eldest Francis who was Count of Anguien and gained the Battel of Cerisoles died without being married Charles was a Cardinal of the title of Chrysogone and Archbishop of Rouen this is he who was named The old Cardinal of Bourbon John lost his life at the Battel of St. Quintin The third Lewis was called The Prince of Condé and by two Marriages had several Male-Children from the first descended Henry Prince of Condé Francis Prince of Conty and Charles who was Cardinal and Archbishop of Rouen after the Death of the old Cardinal of Bourbon There were eight Generations from Male in Male from St. Lewis to Anthony who was Duke of Vendosme King of Navarre and father to our Henry As for Jane d' Albret his Wife she was Daughter and Heiress to Henry of Albret King of Navarre and of Margaret du Valois Sister to King Francis the first and Widow to the Duke of Alenzon Henry d' Albret was son to John d' Albret who became King of Navarre by his Wife Katherine du Foix Sister to King Phoebus deceased without Children for that Realm had entred into the House of Foix by marriage as it 〈…〉 afterwards into that of Albret and since into that of Bourbon Ferdinand King of Arragon had invaded and taken the Higher Navarre that is that part which is beyond the Pyraenean Hills and the most considerable of that Realm from King John d' Albret so that by consequence there rested to him onely the Lower that is that beneath the Mountains towards France but with it he had the Countries of Bearn of Albrett of Foix of Armagnac of Bigorra and many other great Signories coming as well by the House of Foix as that of Albret Henry his Son had onely one Daughter Jane who was called The Minion of Kings for King Henry her Father and the great King Francis the first her Uncle with Envy to each other strove most to cherish her The Emperour Charles the fifth had cast his Eyes on her and caused her to be demanded of her Father for his Son Philip the second proposing this as a means to pacifie their Differences touching the Kingdome of Navarre but King Francis the first not thinking it fit to introduce so puissant an Enemy into France causing her to come to Chastellerault affianced her to the Duke of Cleves and after releasing her of that Contract married her to Anthony of Bourbon Duke of Vendosme and the Marriage was solemnized at Moulins in the year 1547. the same year that Francis the first died The two young Spouses had in their first three or four years two Sons both which died at Berceau by accidents very extraordinary the first because its Governess being her self cold of nature kept it so hot that she stifled it with heat and the second by the carelessness of the Nurse who playing with a Gentleman as they danced the Childe from one to another let it fall to the ground so that it died in torment Thus Heaven deprived them of these two little Princes to make way for our Henry who merited well both the Birth-right and to be an onely Son Let us now come to the History of his Life The First PART OF THE LIFE OF HENRY the Great Containing his History from his Birth until he came to the Crown of FRANCE
That force could not justly be employed against him who so far submitted himself to reason and the greatest part of the Nobility approved this generous procedure and proclaimed aloud that the Duke of Guise ought not to refuse so great an honour That Duke wanted no courage to accept the Defiance but he considered that drawing his sword against a Prince of the blood was in France accounted a kinde of Parricide that otherwise he could willingly have reduced the cause of Religion and of the Publick to a particular Quarrel He therefore prudently answered That he esteemed the person of the King of Navarre and would have no controversie with him but that he onely interested himself for the Catholick Religion which was threatned and for the tranquillity of the Kingdome which onely and absolutely depended on the unity of Religion His other Action was thus Having understood the noise of those paper-Thunder-bolts which the Pope had thrown out against him he dispatched one to the King to make his Complaints to him and to remonstrate to him That this procedure concerned his Majesty nearer then himself That he ought to judge That if the Pope took upon him to decide concerning his succession and should seize to himself a right to declare a Prince of the blood unable of the Crown he might afterwards well pass further and dethrone himself as Zachary is reported to have formerly degraded Childeric 3. Upon these Remonstrances the King hindred the publication of those Bulls in his Dominions But our Henry not contenting himself there with knowing himself to have friends at Rome proved so hardy as to fix his and the Prince of Condé his opposition at the corners of the chiefest streets of the City by which those Princes appealed from the sentence of Sixtus to the Court of Peerage of France giving the Lye to whoever accused them of the crime of Heresie offering to prove the contrary in a general Council and in the end professing that they would revenge upon him and upon all his successours the injury done their King the Royal Family and all the Courts of Parliament It could not but be supposed that this opposition would incense to the utmost the spirit of Sixtus the fifth and indeed at first he testified a very furious emotion However when his Choler was a little asswaged he admired the great Courage of that King who at such a distance had known how to revenge himself and fix the marks of his resentment even at the gates of his Palace in such manner that he conceived so great an esteem for him so true is it that Vertue makes it self be reverenced by its very enemies that he was often afterwards heard say That of all those who reigued in Christendome there was none but this Prince and Elizabeth Queen of Enland to whom he would have communicated those great things which agitated his spirit if they had not been Hereticks Nor could all the prayers of the League ever oblige him to furnish any thing towards the charges of this War which possibly overwhelmed the greatest part of their Enterprizes because their hopes in part depended on a Million which he had promised them Now as on their side the Chiefs of the League endeavoured to engage on their party all the Lords and Cities they could our Henry on his part re-united with him all his friends both of the one and the other Religion the Marshal of Damville-Montmorency Governour of Languedoc the Duke of Montpensier Prince of the blood who was Governour of Poictou with his Son the Prince of Dombes the Prince of Condé who held a part of Poictou of Xaintonge and of Angoumois the Count of Soissons and the Prince of Conty his brother Of these five Princes of the blood the three last were his Cousen-Germans the two first were removed one degree further and all professed the Catholick Religion save onely the Prince of Condé He had likewise on his part Lesdiguieres who from a plain Gentleman had by his Valour elevated himself to so high a point that he was Master of the Daulphinate and made the Duke of Savoy tremble Claudius de la Trimouille who possessed great Lands in Poictou and Brittany and was sometimes before turned Hugonot that he might have the honour to marry his Daughter to the Prince of Condé Henry de la Tour Viscount of Turenne who either out of complacency or true perswasion had espoused the new Religion Chastillon son to the Admiral of Coligny la Boulaye Lord Poitevin Rene chief of the house of Rohan George de Clermont d' Amboise Francis Count of Rochefoucaud the Lord de Aubetterre James de Caumontla-force the Seigneurs de Pons Saint Gelais-Lansac with many other Lords and Gentlemen of remark all or most of the new Religion At the same time he dispatched to Elizabeth Queen of England and to the Protestant Princes of Germany such able Agents that they joyned all together in a strong Union The One to maintain the Other so that all these being united all things arrived contrary to what the League expected and our Henry found himself fortified in such manner that he had no longer any apprehension of being oppressed without having the means to defend himself I shall not make here a particular Recital of the Actions either of the one or the other party during the years 1585. and 1586. because I have observed nothing very considerable King Henry the third was extreamly perplexed at this War which was maintained at his expence and to his great prejudice since they disputed the succession he yet living and well and already considered him as one dead He loved neither the one nor the other party but did so much cherish his Favourites strange blindness that he could have desired had it been in his power to have parted his Estate amongst them The League on their side pretended to have power enough to carry it and our Henry hoped to frustrate the designes both of the one and the other The Queen-mother having other wishes for the children of her Daughter married to the Duke of Lorrain promised the King to finde means to calm all these tempests To this purpose she procured a Truce with our Henry during which an Interview was agreed upon between him and her at the Castle of St. Brix near Coignac where both the one and the other met in the month of December There was some difficulty to finde security both for the one and the other but especially for the Queen-mother who was wonderfully distrustful Our Henry hereupon did an Action of great Generosity which he managed in this manner There had a Truce been agreed upon for the security of this Conference in such sort that if either party broke it they were in fault and might justly be arrested now some of our Henry's followers feigning to be Traytors had enticed some of the Catholick-Captains too greedy of the booty to Fontenay which they
would have let them take by this means the Catholicks would have remained convict of perfidy and he had had good pretence to arrest the Queen-mother but this generous Prince having understood the carriage of this foul play was extreamly troubled against those who contrived it and forbad them to continue it Was not this to have the true sentiments of honour founded in his Soul and not onely in his exteriour Carriage And as he testified his Generosity in that Rencounter so he made known his Constancy and the power of his Spirit in all the Discourse The Qeen demanding of him what it was he would he answered regarding those Ladies she had brought with her Madam there is nothing that I would have as if he would have said That he would not longer permit himself to be drawn away by such allurements She endeavoured above all things to disunite him with the other Chiefs of his party or to render him suspected offering all that he demanded as to his particular but he knowing well her stratagem held firmly to this point That he could not treat any thing without communicating it to his Friends After a long entertainment she once demanding him if the pains she had taken should produce no more fruit especially to her who onely wished for repose he answered her Madam I am not the cause of it nor is it I who hinder you from resting in your Bed it is you that hinder me from resting in mine That pains you take pleaseth and nourishes you for Repose is the greatest enemy of your life He made many other Replies very lively and full of spirit but above all that was observable which he made to the Duke of Nevers of the house of Gonzague who accompanied the Queen-mother This Duke advancing once to tell him that he might live much more honourably near the King then among those people who had no authority and that if he should have occasion for money at Rochel he would scarce have the credit to raise one impost he fiercely replyed Sir I do at Rochel all that I please because I shall please to do nothing but what I ought This Conference of St. Brix having produced nothing but new Exasperations and the Queen-mother being returned the Guises who endeavoured by all means possible to revenge themselves of the Favourites made offer of their service to our Henry and the Duke of Mayenne sent to tell him that there might means be found for an accommodation if he would understand them that he would come to finde him with four horse at whatever place he pleased and that he would give him his Wife and Children for Hostage This Negotiation had no success nor can I finde the cause why it was interrupted The rest of the Winter passed in the two Courts in Feasts and Dances for though among the miseries and troubles of the Kingdome Queen Katherine had introduced that custome of Dancing in all places and in all seasons which she did as it was said to amuse the great ones of the Court in those vain Divertisements there being nothing which more dissipates the powers of the spirit nor which is more capable if we may speak so to dissolve the forces of the soul then the ravishing sound of Violins the continual agitation of the body and Charms of Ladies After the Examples of the Court Dances and Maskes reigned in all the Realm Nor could the Remonstrances of the Ministers hinder these Dances among the greatest part of the Hugonot Lords though there were still some who could not suffer it In the Spring some Enterprises began both on one part and the other but they were nothing in comparison of what was done towards the end of the Summer The Protestant Princes of Germany sent an Army to the assistance of the Hugonots consisting of Five thousand Lansquenets or German Foot Sixteen thousand Switzers and Six thousand Reistres or German Horse They traversed Lorrain and Champagne afterwards passed the Seine and marched towards the Loire as if they would have passed it or coast along it in their re-advancing At the same time the King of Navarre had gathered his forces towards Rochel and endeavoured to come to meet them unto the Bankes of the Loire but he was hindred by an Army of the Kings commanded by the Duke of Joyeuse who had order diligently to pursue him The Duke of Guise having likewise gathered the forces of his party and though they were very small followed sometimes the German horse sometimes coasted them and oftentimes mixed himself amongst them without any great danger so much the rather because this too weighty body of strangers could not easily move being troubled with a great baggage not having a Chief either of any great Credit or sufficiently intelligent to Conduct and all its Captains being in discord and bad intelligence one with the other By reason of all these defaults this Army could never take any good Resolution The Loire was fordable in many places for it was about the end of September but nevertheless they would not pass it but came to spread themselves in the Champaines of Beaustre expecting News from the King of Navarre in stead of advancing amongst the Nivernois and gaining Burgongne The intention of the King of Navarre was to advance along Dordogna and from thence enter into Guyenne and after having gathered together all his Forces to meet the Protestant Army in Burgongne by the favour of those Provinces were his friends But the Duke of Joyeuse obstinately pursued him imagining he fled because in effect he avoided fighting having no other end then a Conjunction with the Germans This new Duke was much declined in his favour with the King who had received advice that he inclined much to the League not that he loved the Guises but because he had permitted it to be put into his head by his flatterers that he deserved to be Chief of that great party and he held the destruction of the Hugonots so certain that he had obtained from the Pope the Confiscation of all the Soveraign Territories of our Henry Desiring therefore to sustain his Reputation and Favour which were then tottering he pursued him so closely that he overtook him near to Coutras The Army of Joyeuse was as one may say all of Gold shining with Silver and Gold Laces with Damasked Arms with Feathers in great Plumes with Embroydered Scarfs with Velvet Coats with which every Lord according to the mode of the times had furnished his Companies but the Army of the King of Navarre was all of Iron having no other then Grizled Arms without any Ornament with great Belts of Buff and labouring Habits The first had the advantage in number having six hundred Horse and a thousand Foot more then the other the half of its Infantry Dragoons its Cavalry almost all Lances and most mounted on managed Horses it had besides for it the Name and
and attended onely by one Page passing the Bridge went to give a visit to the King They entertained one another a long time in two or three Conferences in which our Henry gave great marks of his Capacity and Judgement Their Resolution in sum was to raise a puissant Army to assault Paris which was the principal head of the Hydra and gave motion to all the rest a thing easie for them to do because the King expected great Levies from towards the Switzers whither he had sent Sancy for that purpose adding that the designe of the siege being published it would infallibly draw a great number of Souldiers and Adventurers out of hopes of so rich a pillage The two Kings having passed two days together he of Navarre went to Chinon to cause the rest of his Troops to advance who hitherto had refused to mingle themselves among the Catholicks During his absence the Duke of Mayenne who had taken the Field fell upon the Suburbs of Tours thinking to surprize the City and the King within it by means of some intelligence The Combat was very bloody and the Dukes designe wanted little of taking effect but after the first endeavours having lost the hopes to compass it he easily retired Afterwards the Kings Troops being wonderfully increased they marched conjoyntly he and the King of Navarre towards Orleans took all the little places thereabouts and from thence descended into Beauce and drew together all of a suddain towards Paris All the Posts round about it as Poissy Estampes and Meulan were either forced or obtained Capitulation in which they desired no other security then the word of the King of Navarre to which they trusted more then to all the Writings of Hen. 3. So great a profession made he of keeping his word even to the prejudice of his interests Let us consider a little the different Estate to which these two Kings were reduced by their different conduct The One for having often broken his Faith was abandoned by his Subjects and his greatest Oaths found no belief amongst them and the Other for having always exactly kept it was followed even by his greatest Enemies in all occasions he gave marks of his Valour and Experience in point of War but above all of his Prudence and of those Noble Inclinations he had to good and to oblige all the world He was always seen in the most dangerous places to accelerate Labours animate his Souldiers sustain them in Sallies comfort the wounded and cause Money to be distributed amongst them He observed all inquired into all and would himself with the Marshal of the Camp order the Lodgings of his Souldiers He observed strictly what was done in the Army of Henry 3. where though he often found faults he concealed them out of fear to offend those who had committed them by discovering their ignorance and when he believed himself oblito take notice of them he did it with so much Circumspection that they could not finde any reason to take it in ill part He was never niggardly of giving praises due to Noble Actions nor of Caresses and generous Deport to those came near him he entertained himself with them when he had time to do it or at least so obliged them with some good word that they still went away satisfied He feared not at all to make himself familiar because he was assured that the more men knew him the more they would esteem him In fine the conduct of this Prince was such that there was no heart he gained not nor no friend he had who would not willingly have become his Martyr Paris was already besieged the King lodged at St. Clou and our Henry at Meudon keeping with his Troops all that is between Vanvres to the Bridge of Charenton Sancy was already arrived with his Levies of Suisses and they laboured with Orders to give a general Assault to the end they might gain the Suburbs beneath the River The Duke of Mayenne who was in the City with his Troops expecting those Supplies the Duke of Nemours was to bring was in great apprehensions that he should not be able to sustain the furious shock was preparing when a young Jacobin of the Convent of Paris named James Clement spurred on by a Resolution as devilish and detestable as it was determinate smote King Henry the third with a blow of a knife in the Belly of which he died the morrow after If the frantick Monk had not been slain upon the place by the Kings Guards many things might have been known which are now concealed Our Henry being advertized late in the Evening of this mournful Accident and of the danger in which the King was came to his Lodging accompanied onely by five and twenty or thirty Gentlemen and being arrived a little before he expired he fell on his knees to kiss his hands and received his last Embraces The King named him many times his Good Brother and Legitimate Successour recommended the Kingdome to him exhorted the Lords there present to acknowledge him and not to disunite In fine after having conjured him to embrace the Catholick Religion he gave up the Ghost leaving all his Army in an astonishment and confusion which cannot be expressed and all the Chiefs and Captains in Irresolutions and different Agitations according to their Humours Fancies or Interests The Second PART OF THE LIFE OF Henry the Great Containing what he did from the day he came to the Crown of France until the Peace which was made in the year 1598. by the Treaty at Vervin THE Death of Henry the third caused an entire change in the face of affairs Paris the League and the Duke of Mayenne were transported from a profound Sadness to a furious Joy and the Servants of the Defunct King from a Pregnant Hope to see him Revenged to an extreme Desolation This Prince who had been the object of the peoples hatred being now no more it seemed that that hatred should cease and by consequence the heat of the League relent but on the contrary not only all those who composed that faction but likewise many others who had held it for a Crime to League themselves against Henry the third their Catholick and Legitimate King believed themselves in Conscience Obliged to oppose themselves against our Henry at least till such time as he should return into the bosome of the true Church a qualification they believed absolutely necessary for that him should succeed Charlemagne of S. Lewis So that if the League lost that heat which hatred gave it it gained one much more specious from a zeal to Religion and had likewise a most plausible pretext not to lay down Arms till Henry should Profess the Religion of his Ancestors It was very difficult to judge whether the point of time wherein this unhappy Parricide arrived were good or ill for him for on one side it seemed that Providence had not drawn him from the
pretext for raising his Siege from before Paris To put his body in a place where the resentment of the Duke of Guises creatures might not outrage it he carried it to Compeigne and laid it in the Abbey of S. Cornille where he celebrated all the funebrous Ceremonies as honourably as the confusion of the time would permit Not able to assist himself because of his Religion he committed the care to Bellegarde and Espernon the last of which accompanied him thither and then retired into Angoumois There were three advices given concerning the place to which he ought to retire when he raised his siege from Paris The first was to repass the Loire and abandon to the League all the Provinces on this side it because he could difficultly maintain them The second to re-advance along the Marne and seizing those Bridges and Cities expect an assistance from the Protestant Suisses and Germans promised to come to him And the third to march down into Normandy to assure himself of some Cities whose Governours were not yet engaged in the League to gather the mony received for Taxes and to joyne with the Assistance of England which Queen Elizabeth had promised him and which could not be long absent He concluded on the last of these advices and so many of the Nobles who accompanied him desiring some time to go and refresh themselves he gave them leave He sent a part of his Troops into Picardie under the Conduct of the Duke of Longueville another into Campaine under that of Marshal d' Aumont and with three thousand French foot two Regiments of Suisses and twelve hundred horse only which he kept with him he descended into Normandy The Duke of Montpensier who was Governour there came to joyne him with two hundred Gentlemen and fifteen hundred Foot Rolet Governour of Pont d' Arche a man of Courage and Spirit brought him the Keys of that place demanding no other recompence but the honour to serve him Emer de Chattes a Commandadoâ—e of Malta did the same with those of Diepe After which the King approached Rouen where he believed to have some intelligence This Enterprize put him in extream danger but in revenge gave him a fair occasion to acquist Glory in retiring himself from so great a peril See how it passed The Duke of Mayenne came to the succour of Rouen with all his forces and passed the Rivers at Vernon The King much astonished retires to Diepe and sends to the Duke of Longueville and d' Aumont to return to him with diligence with their forces The Duke in the mean time takes all the little places about Diepe to inviron and invest himself within In effect he shuts him up so close that if he had not amused himself by an untimely motion to go to Bins in Hainault to confer with the Duke of Parma he had in that disorder dissipated the greatest part of his little Army He had already caused a report to be spread through France and had writ with assurance to all strange Princes That he held the King of Navarre so he called him shut up in a little corner from whence he could not get but either by yeilding himself to him or leaping into the Sea The danger appeared so eminent even to his most faithful servants that the Parliament at Tours sent expresly to him a Master of Requests proposing as the onely expedient they saw to save the Estate the associating him and the Cardinal of Bourbon his Uncle in the Royalty giving to One the conduct of Civil Affairs and the Other of Martial There were likewise the greatest part of the Captains of his Army of opinion that leaving his Forces on shore well intrenched in their posts he should as soon as possible embarque for England or for Rochel for fear lest if he should longer delay it he might be shut up by Sea as well as by Land To the Proposition of the Parliament he made answer That he had taken such good order that the intrigues of the Duke of Mayenne could not deliver the Cardinal of Bourbon as they apprehended and the Marshal of Byron so stoutly opposed those who counselled him to embarque that they desisted It appeared soon after by the proof that the Forces of the League which were thrice as great as his were not to be feared in proportion to their number and that the more Commanders they had the less their power was to be doubted The King was lodged at the Castle d'Arques which is seated on a little Hill to stop the passage of the Valley which goes to Diepe The Duke had formed a Designe to take this Post by Sea by four or five Reprises and on divers days he essayed to assault the Suburbs of Polet and four or five times was driven back Our Henry dayly doing wonders and exposing himself so much that once he thought he should have been surprized and encompassed by his Enemies In fine the Duke having lost eleven days time and a thousand or twelve hundred men raised the Siege and retired into Picardy It was believed that he passed into this Province upon a fear lest the Picards a free and honest people but very simple should permit themselves to be surprized by the Artifices of the Agents of Spain who would engage them to cast themselves under the protection of the King their Master It was observed likewise that that which hindred the success of his enterprize at Diepe and which kept him two or three days without enterprizing any thing at the time he ought to have done it was the jealousie and contentions between the Chiefs that accompanied him particularly of the Marquess dâ— Pâ—ntâ—-Mousson Son to the Duke of Lorrain of the Duke of Nemours and of Cavalier d'Aumale for they believing the taking of the King infallible or at least his flight assured and disposing already of the Kingdome as of their Conquest regarded one another with an Eye of jealousie and each formed designes in his head to have the better part of it It was observed likewise that in one of these Combats of Diepe the Duke of Mayenne having at present some advantage had gained an entire Victory if he had advanced but a quarter of an hour quicker but marching too slowly he let slip that opportunity he could never redeem which made the King who well observed his faulâ— say If he act not in another manner I shall be assured always to gain the Field I have recounted these Particularities because they make known the defaults of that great Body of the League and the true causes which hindred its progress and reduced it to nothing I finde three principal ones The first was the distrust which the Duke of Mayenne had of the Spaniards for though he could not be without them yet he could not but regard them as his secret Enemies and they assisted him not for love of himself but out of the
into Paris by the Serjeants for the debts of his Father contracted in his service and when la Noue went to complain to him of this insolence he answered publickly La Noue you must pay his debts for I pay likewise those of mine But after that he took him apart and gave him some precious stones to engage to his creditors in stead of the Baggage which they had seized Was there ever a more wonderful goodness or more exact Justice The second is that the same evening he played at Cards with the Dutchess of Montpensier who was of the house of Guise and the most vehement Leaguess of the Party What could be seen of more Policy After this reduction of Paris the other Cities and their Governours hastened likewise to conclude their Treaties Villars made his for Rouen so gaining to himself the Government in chief of this City and Bailiwick and that of the Country of Caux with the charge of Admiral which he was to take out of the hands of Byron for that of Marshal of France twelve hundred thousand Livres of present money and sixty thousand Livres of pension At the same time or little after Montreuil and Abbeville in Picardy Troyes in Champagne Sens and Riom in Auvergne Agen Marmande and Villeneuve d' Agenois rendred themselves obedient and their Governours had all they could demand of the King The City of Poictiers and the Country thereabouts treated likewise by means of its principal Magistrates and the Marquis of Elbeuf Governour for the League seeing he could not hinder the Revolution permitted himself to be drawn in with them and composed with the King who left him the Government of that Province In the mean time the Count Mansfield entred into Picardy to endeavour to sustain the League which was in a very low condition and took la Capelle The King in revenge laid siege to Laon and took it by capitulation notwithstanding all the endeavours of the Duke of Mayenne to relieve it Balagny with his City of Cambray renounced likewise the League and promised service to the King He had called himself Sovereign of this City and had held it from the time that Henry the thirds brother the Duke of Alenzon had usurped it from the Baron of Inchi who in the great Rebellion of the Low-Countries had quitted the obedience of Spain to embrace his party In like manner the Cities of Beauvais and Peronne renounced the League as did likewise that of Amiens shaking off the yoak of the Duke of Aumale There resting to that party in all Picardy only Soissons la Fere and Ham. And which was much more the Duke of Guise shook off the Duke of Mayenne and brought the Cities of Reims Vitry and Mezieres under the Kings obedience who in recompence of it gave him the Government of Provence from which he was obliged to withdraw the Duke of Espernon because the People the Parliament and the Nobility had taken Arms against him The Duke of Lorrain likewise who negotiated his peace by the intermission of Bassompierre concluded it the twenty sixth of November But neither the example of this Duke chief of the house of Lorrain nor the general revolution of that party could oblige the Duke of Mayenne to withdraw himself from that danger wherein he was ready to be overwhelmed he could not abandon that fair title of Lieutenant-General of the Crown but flattered himself with the hopes that the assistance of Spain might again give his affairs the upper hand He was retired into his Government of Bourgongne because that remained yet most entire to him though to keep to himself Dijon he was forced to make use of an odious cruelty in cutting off the head of the Mayor and another who laboured to reduce it to the Kings service Now since it was the Spaniards who maintained him in his obstinacy and who made War against the King in his name it was proposed and agreed in the Councel to assault them with an open War to the end that being imployed at their own homes they might lose the desire and leasure of coming to disquiet the King in his For they not only assaulted him by force of Arms and by practices which encouraged the people in Rebellion but moreover they would have had his life and endeavoured to murther him by base and execrable waies They contrived or favoured many conspiracies against his Sacred person which were well discovered Those two which made most noise was that of one Peter Barriere and that of John Castel The first was a Souldier aged about twenty seven years who being discovered at Melun in the year one thousand five hundred ninety three as he sought the execution of his detestable blow was condemned to have his right hand burned holding the Knife with which he should have struck the King after to have his flesh torn off with burning Pinsers and to be broken on the wheel alive The second was a young Scholar aged about eighteen years son of a Merchant-Draper of Paris keeping Shop before the Palace this villain about the end of the year fifteen hundred ninety four having thrust himself with the Courtiers into the Chamber of the fair Gabriella where the King was would have struck him with a Knife into the belly but by good fortune the King then bowing to salute some one the blow chanced on his face only piercing his upper lip and breaking a Tooth It was not known for the present who had struck it but the Count of Soissons seeing this young man affrighted stopt him by the arme He impudently confessed that he had given the blow and maintained that he ought to do it The Parliament condemned him to have his right hand burned his flesh torn off with red-hot Pinsers and after to be torn in pieces by four horses This detestable Parricide not shewing any sign of pain so much had they imprinted in his spirit that he would offer a Sacrifice acceptable to God by taking out of the world a Prince relapsed and Excommunicate The Father of this miserable villain was banished his house before the Palace demolished and a Pyramide erected in its place The Jesuites under whom this Miscreant had studied were likewise accused for having instructed him with this pernicious Doctrine and they having many enemies the Parliament banished the whole Society out of the Kingdom by the same Arrest of their Scholar Yet these Fathers were not wanting notwithstanding that the times were contrary to them to labour to sustain their honour but writ many things to justifie themselves against their charge And truly those who were not their enemies did not at all believe the Society culpable so that some years after the King revoked the decree of Parliament and recalled them as we shall mention hereafter The success of the War declared against Spain was much different from that which the King maintained against the League and made
took care before his death to treat of the marriage of his Son with Margaret Daughter to the Arch-Duke of Grats and that of his dear Daughter Isabella with the Cardinal-Arch-Duke Albert of the same blood with her and gave him for Dowry the Low-Countries and County of Bourgongne on Condition of its Reversion if she died without issue He had already signed the Articles of the peace but this mortal sickness permitted him not to give Oath to it with the same solemnities as the King and Arch-Duke had done Philip the third his Son and Successour acquitted himself of this Obligation on the one and twentieth of May in the year 1601. in the City of Vallidolid and presence of the Count of Rochepot Ambassodour of France The license of the War having for many years permitted mischiefs with impunity there were yet found a great number of Vagabonds who believed it still permitted them to take the Goods of others at pleasure and others there were who thought they had right to do themselves justice by their arms not acknowledging any Laws but force This obliged our wise King to begin the Reformation of the Estate by the Re-establishment of publick Security To this effect he forbad all carrying of Fire-arms to all persons of what quality soever upon pain of the Confiscation of their Arms and Horses and a Fine of two hundred Crowns for the first fault and of Life without remission for the second permitting all the world to arrest any who carried them except his light-horsemen his Gens d' Arms and the Guards of his body which might bear them onely when they were in service To the same purpose and to ease the Country of the multitudes of his Souldiers he dismissed not onely the greatest part of his new Troops but likewise reduced the one half of his old He reduced the Companies of the Ordinance to a very little number and took off the Guards of the Governours of the Provinces and Lieutenants of the King not willing to suffer any whatsoever besides himself to have that glorious mark of Soveraignty about their persons The Wars had spoiled all Commerce reduced Cities into Villages Villages to small Cots and Lands to Deserts nevertheless the Receivers constrained the poor Husband-men to pay Taxes for those Fruits they had never gathered The Cries of these miserable people who had nothing but their Tongues to lament with touched in such manner the very Entrails of so just and so good a King that he made an Edict by which he released them of all they owed him for the time past and gave them hopes to ease them more for the future Moreover having understood that during the Troubles there were made a great quantity of false Nobles who were exempted from the Tax he commanded that they should be sought forth nor did he confirm their Usurpation for a piece of mony as hath been sometimes done to the great prejudice of other taxed people but he would that the Tax should be re-imposed upon them to the end that by this means they might assist the poor people to bear a good part of the burthen as being the richer He desired with much affection to do good to his true Nobility and repay them those Expences they had been at in his service but his Coffers were empty and moreover all the Gold in Peru had not been sufficient to satisfie the Appetite and Luxury of so many people For King Henry the third had by his example and that of his Minions raised expences so high that Lords lived like Princes and Gentlemen like Lords for which purposes they were forced to alienate the Possessions of their Ancestors and change those old Castles the illustrious marks of their Nobility into Silver-lace Gilt-coaches train and horses Afterwards when they were indebted beyond their credit they fell either upon the Kings Coffers demanding Pensions or on the backs of the people oppressing them with a thousand Thieveries The King willing to remedy this disorder declared very resolvedly to his Nobility That he would they should accustom themselves to live every man on his Estate and to this effect he should be well content that to enjoy themselves of the peace they should go see their Country houses and give order for the improvement of their Lands Thus he eased them of the great expences of the Court and made them understand that the best treasure they could have was that of good management Moreover knowing that the French Nobility would strive to imitate the King in all things he shewed them by his own example how to abridge their superfluity in Cloathing For he ordinarily wore gray Cloath with a Doublet of Sattin or Taffata without slashing Lace or Embroydery He praised those who were clad in this sort and chid the others who carried said he their Mills and their Woods and Forests on their backs About the end of the year he was seized with a suddain and violent sickness at Monceaux of which it was thought he would die All France was affrighted and the rumours which ran of it seemed to re-kindle some factions but in ten or twelve days he was on foot again as if God had onely sent him this sickness to discover to him what ill wills there were yet in the Kingdome and to give him the satisfaction to feel by the sorrows of his people the pleasures of being loved In the strength of his Disease he spoke to his friends these excellent words I do not at all fear death I have affronted it in the greatest dangers but I avow that I should unwillingly leave this Life till I have put this Kingdome into that splendour I have proposed to my self and till I have testified to my people by governing them well and easing them of their many Taxes that I love them as if they were my Children After his recovery continuing in his praise-worthy designes of putting his Affairs in order he came to St. Germain in Laya to resolve the Estates of the expence as well of his House as for the Guard of Frontiers and Garisons entertainment of Forces Artillery Sea-Affairs and many other Charges He had then in his Council as we may say we have at present very great men and most experienced in all sorts of Matters but he still shewed himself more able and more understanding then they He examined and discussed all the particulars of his expence with a judgement and with a clearness of spirit truely admirable retrenched and cut off all that was possible allowing onely what was necessary Amongst other things he abridged the superfluous expences of the Tables in his house not so much that he might spare himself as to oblige his subjects to moderate their liquorish prodigality and hinder them from ruining their whole houses by keeping too great Kitchins In sum by the example of the King which hath always more force then Laws or then Correction Luxury was
little St. Anthonies being holy Thursday as she returned to her Lodging and being walking in the Garden she felt her self struck with an Apoplexy in the brain The first fury of it being passed she would no longer stay in that house but caused her self to be carried to that of Madam de Sourdis her Aunt near St. Germain of the Auxerrois And all the rest of that day and the morrow she was perplexed with Swoondings and Convulsions of which she died on the Saturday-morning The causes of her death were diversly spoken of but however it was a happiness to France since it deprived the King of an object for which he was about to loose both himself and his Estate His grief was as great as his love had been yet he not being of those feeble souls who please themselves in perpetuating their sorrows and in bathing themselves in their tears received not onely those comforts he sought but still conserved for the Children and particularly for the Duke of Vendosm that affection he had born the Mother All good French-men passionately desired that so good a King might leave legitimate Children They durst not press him to take a Wife capable to bring him forth such so long as Gabriella lived for fear lest he should espouse her and out of the same fear Queen Margaret would not give her consent to dissolve his marriage But when Gabriella was dead she willingly lent her hand to it and her self addressed a Request to the holy Father to demand the dissolution founding it principally on two causes of nullity The first was the want of consent for she alledged she had been forced to it by King Charles the ix her Brother The second the Proximity of Kindred found between them in the third degree for which she said there had never been any valuable Dispensation In like manner the Lords of the Kingdome and the Parliament besought his Majesty by solemn Deputations that he would think of taking a Wife representing to him the inconveniencies and the danger wherein France would be found if he should die without Children These Deputations will not seem strange to those who know our ancient History where it may be seen that neither the King nor his Children married but by the advice of his Barons and this passed in that time for almost a Fundamental Law of the Estate The King touched with these just supplications of his subjects addressed his request to the Pope containing the same reasons as that of Queen Margaret and charged the Cardinal d'Ossat and Sillery his extraordinal Ambassadour whom he had sent to Rome to pursue the judgement of the Pope concerning the restitution of the Marquisate of Saluces to sollicite instantly this Affair The cause reported to the Consistory the Pope gave Commission to the Prelates to judge it on the place according to the rights of that Crown which suffers not French-men to be transported for Affairs of the like nature beyond the Mountains whither it would be almost impossible to bring the necessary proofs and witnesses These Prelates were the Cardinal of Joyeuse the Popes Nuntio and the Archbishop of Arles who having examined both Parties seen the Proofs produced on one and the other and the Request of the three Estates of the Kingdom declared this marriage null and permitted them to marry whom they should think fit Queen Margaret who for many years had deserted the King and voluntarily shut her self up in the strong Castle of Usson in Auvergne had now permission to come to Paris money given her to pay her debts great Pensions the possession of the Dutchy of Valois with some other Lands and right to bear still the Title of Queen She lived yet fifteen years and built a Palace near du Pre-aux-Clercs which was after sold to pay his debts and demolished to build other houses She loved extreamly good Musitians having a delicate Ear and knowing and eloquent Men because she was of a spirit clear and very agreeable in her discourse For the rest she was liberal even to prodigality pompous and magnificent but she knew not what it was to pay her debts Which is without doubt the greatest of all a Princes fault because there is nothing so much against Justice of which he ought to be the Protector and Defender This marriage being dissolved Bellievre and Villeroy fearing lest the King should engage himself in new loves and be taken in some of those snares which the fairest of the Court stretched out for him perswaded him by many great Reasons of State to fix his thoughts on Maria de Medicis who was daughter to Francis and Neece to Ferdinand great Dukes of Toscany The Cardinal d' Ossat and Sillery made known his intention to the great Duke Ferdinand her Uncle and Alincour son to Villeroy whom he had sent to thank the holy Father for his good and brief Justice touching the aforesaid dissolution of his marriage had order to testifie to him that the King having cast his eyes on all the Daughters of the Soveraign Houses of Christendome had found no Princess more agreeable to him The business was managed with so much activeness and vigilancy by the diligence of those which had enterprized it that the King found himself absolutely engaged The contract of the marriage was signed at Florence by his Ambassadors the fourth of April in the year one thousand six hundred And Alincour in seven days brought him the news to Fountain-bleau He assisted at present at that famous Conference or Dispute between James David du Perron Bishop of Eureux afterwards Cardinal and Philip du Plessis Mornay where truth nobly triumphed over falsehood There are particular relations of the solemnities made at Florence the Magnificences of the great Duke the Ceremonies of the Affiancing and Marriage of this Queen of her Imbarking her being convoyed by the Gallies of Malta and Florence and her reception at Marseilles at Avignon and at Lions and therefore I shall speak nothing of it Whilst the Marriage of Florence was treating the King having a heart which could for no long time keep his liberty became enslaved to a new object It is to be understood that Mary Touchet who had been Mistress to Charles the ninth from whom came Issue the Count d' Auvergne had been Married to the Lord d' Entragues and had by him many children amongst the rest a very fair daughter named Henrietta who by consequent was sister by the mothers side to the Count of Auvergne This Count was about the age of thirty years and she about eighteen It is but too well known that Flatterers and wicked Sycophants ruine all in the Courts of great Men and corrupt likewise their persons These are they which sweeten the poyson which embolden the Prince to do ill which make him familiar with vice which seek and facilitate occasions for it and who act as we may say the mystery of
this Prince He came to this effect to Milain but too late where with two Millions of Gold which were ready he begins to make great preparations After that the Duke had by divers Artifices drawn out the Negotiation almost two moneths longer the King wearied with these delays prepared himself to bind this Proteus who changed himself into all sorts of forms and to force him to give a certain answer He advanced to Lyons whither he had before sent his Council The Duke knowing that he approached had recourse to other cunnings he sent to him three Ambassadours who conjoyntly proposed an Act by which they declared that their Master was ready to accomplish the Treaty made at Paris and that he promised to restore the Marquisate but he of the three who had the secret refused to signe the Articles till first the Duke had shewed them to his Council and signed them By this trick the Duke yet gained seven or eight days time but the King resolved to press him to a conclusion still followed his trace discovered his deceits and left him no further subterfuge he was forced therefore to answer positively and he promised to surrender the Marquisate by the sixteenth of August Upon this assurance the King caused to advance le Bourg-l ' Espinasse an old Colonel of Infantry with the Troops of the Suisses to take possession of the Marquisate As he approached the Duke took off his Mask and answered clearly That according to the Conditions proposed War was less sharp to him then Peace Wherefore the King was obliged to come to that point to which he had long foreseen he should come to wit an open War he declared it therefore on the eleventh of the moneth of August but with these express terms That he did it onely for the Marquisate and without prejudice to the Treaty of Vervin which he desired to observe inviolably At the same time he gave advice of this rupture to all the neighbouring Princes and made them understand the just reasons he had This great King knew well that among Christians the breach of peace is extreamly odious and that without reasons which strongly convince our spirits we ought never to trouble the publick tranquillity He was at present at Grenoble where he had to begin this War only three or four Companies of Ordinance Some proposed to him to cause his Regiment of Guards to advance he answered that he would not send them from him that they were the tenth Legion which never fought without Caesar. But in a little time the French Nobility and the Adventurers flocked to him on all sides as as if they had come to a Marriage or a Ball. The Marshal of Byron though already disgusted having gathered some Troops spoiled the Country of Bresse in many places with his Canon he forced the City of Bourg but the Cittadel defended it self better and proved indeed the onely difficulty in this War Crequy entring into Savoy gained the City of Montmelian about midnight but not the Castle The Pope Alarm'd by the first sparkles of this fire and fearing lest it should enflame all Italy imployed himself immediately to extinguish it he dispatcht a Prelate who bore the title of Patriarch of Constantinople to remonstrate unto him the inconveniences of this rupture and to conjure him in the name of God not to pass farther The King assured him that he had no design to trouble the peace of Italy that he was a Christian and just Prince that God had given him a Kingdom sufficient to content him but that he desired to have what belonged to his Crown that if he had had other more vast designs he had made greater preparations Few days after he departed and entred himself into Savoy His presence so much astonished the City of Chamberry that they made the Garison depart by a quick Capitulation He made himself after master of Tarentaise and la Morienne by taking in two or three days the City of Conflans and that of la Charbonniere which till then had passed for impregnable Yet the Duke of Savoy moved not he was so little concerned that he Hunted and Danced whilst his Provinces were despoiling he seemed not to be the adversary but the spectator his subjects likewise seemed not much astonished at the Kings Progress they said that if he took any places in Savoy their Duke would take others in France It could not be divined from whence this great security proceeded some believed that the Duke assured himself on I know not what Prognostications of Astrologers who had foretold that in the month of August there should be no King in France that which happened to be very true for at that time he was victorious in the midst of Savoy Others believed that the Duke yet trusted to the intelligences he had with the Marshal of Biron whose fidelity much shaken by his artifices while he was in France was now near entirely debauched by those grand Subjects of discontent this Marshal had received since this War For the King testified that he put not so much trust in him nor treated him with the same freedome he had done before and he committed the principal direction of this Conquest to Lesdiguieres who indeed better knew the Country and the manner of making War in those Mountains then he This Preference furiously incensed such a high spirit who believed nothing either could or ought to be done without him Afterwards the refusals of the King to give him the Government of the City of Bourg put him quite out of his senses From this time he had none but extravagant and criminal thoughts and began as it was said to treat a League with the Savoyard for the re-kindling a new Civil War in France I cannot relate the particulars of this design because they were never well known The Duke of Savoy believed his Fortresses of Montmelian in Savoy and of Bourg in Bresse impregnable reposing the security of his Country upon them He was much surprized to understand that the Marquis of Brandis Governour of the first had capitulated to surrender it in a certain time Upon it he put himself in the field and used all his endeavours to get into an estate to relieve it He had recourse to the assistance of the Spaniards but the Count of Fuentes who desired to engage affairs farther refused him forces in his need and in the mean time the term of the capitulation being finished he lost Montmelian to the great astonishment of his Subjects and no less shame to Brandis Want of Victuals and Ammunition made him likewise in some weeks lose the Citadel of Bourg which the Governour held out to the last extremity The King passing by the side of Geneva submitted the Country of the Chablais and the Faussigni The inhabitants of Geneva took the Fort of St. Katherine which the Savoyards had built to annoy them and
steal a victory that ambuscadoes were not honest but onely during War and that it was necessary for his honour to take heeâ— that he did not in any manner contribute to that rupture the enemies had a design to make In fine the Spaniards having found that this wise Argus had too many eyes and too much vigilance to be surprized on any side resolved to employ their Arms in pious and honorable enterprizes A part of their Land-Army passed into Hungary which was at that present assaulted by the Turks The Duke of Merceur being gone to seek in that Country a juster glory then in the Civil-wars of France commanded the Emperours forces He made known to the Infidels by many gallant exploits particularly by the memorable retreat of Canise that the French valour was chosen by God to sustain the Christian Religion Nor was there any doubt made but that he would have quite chased them out of that Kingdom of which they had invaded more then one half if he had not died the year following of a burning Feavour which seized him at Nurembourg as he was about to go pay his devotions at the Shrine of the Lady of Loretto There arrived some time after an accident by which the King took occasion to let the Spaniards know that he could not suffer any thing against his honour nor against the dignity of his estate Rochepot was his Embassador in Spain Some Gentlemen of his train of which one was his Nephew washing in the River chanced to have a quarrel with some Spaniards and killing two saved themselves in the Ambassadors house The friends of the slain so much excited the people that they besieged the house and were ready to put fire to it The Magistrate to prevent the Tragick effects of this fury was constrained to do an injustice and to violate the freedom of the Ambassadors house for he seized by force and led the accused to prison The King of Spain being troubled that he had violated the right of Nations sent him to demand pardon of the Ambassador yet the French men still remained prisoners There were made many discourses and writings concerning the rights and priviledges of Ambassadors It is true said they that an Ambassador hath alone right of Soveraign Justice in his Palace but the people of his train are subject to the Justice of the estate in which they are for those faults they commit out of his Palace and so if they be taken out of it their Process may be made and though it be known that this rigour is not generally observed and that the respect born to the Ambassadors person extends to all those that follow him yet however this is a courtesie and not a right But notwithstanding it is not permitted to go seek the Criminal in the Palace of the Ambassador which is a sacred place and a certain Sanctuary for his people yet ought it not however to be abused or made a retreat for wicked persons nor give Sanctuary to the Subjects of a Prince against the Laws and Justice of his Realm for in such cases on complaint to his Master he is obliged to do reason Now the King being offended as he ought to be at the injury done to France in the person of his Ambassador and not judging the satisfaction the Magistrate had given him sufficient commands him immediately to return which he did without taking leave of the King of Spain He forbade likewise at the same time all Commerce with Spaniards and foreseeing that in these beginnings of the rupture they might enterprize somewhat on the Towns of Picardy he with great diligence departed from Paris to visit that Frontier and came to Calais The people who began to taste the sweetness of repose and to Till their lands with patience trembled for fear lest a new War should expose them once more to the License of the Souldiers But God had pity of these poor people The Pope becoming mediatour to remedy those mischiefs which threatned Christendom happily accommodated the difference The Spaniard remitted the Process and the Prisoners whom his Holiness consigned some days after into the hands of the Count of Bethune Ambassador for France at Rome and the King afterwards sent an Ambassador into Spain which was the Count of Barraut Whilst the King was at Calais whither as we have said he went the Arch-Duke who was before Ostend where he continued that Siege the most famous that ever was since that of Troy feared with some reason lest the Kings approach should retard the progress of his enterprize in which he had already lost so many men so much time spent so many Cannot shot so much money and such stores of Ammunition he sent therefore to complement him promising him on the part of Spain satisfaction for the violence done to the Lodgings of his Ambassador but intreating him that the besieged might not prevail themselves of this Conjuncture The King who never let himself be overcome by Courtesie no more then by Arms sent the Duke of Aiguillon eldest Son of the Duke of Mayenne to assure him that he desired to maintain the peace that he was not advanced on the Frontiers but to dissipate some designs which were contriving and that he hoped in the equity of the King of Spain which he doubted not would do him reason VVhilst he was at Calais Queen Elizabeth sent likewise to visit him by my Lord Edmonds her principal Confident For answer to which obliging civility he caused the Marshal of Byron to pass into England accompanied by the Count d' Auvergne and the choice of all the Nobility of the Court to represent to her the displeasure the King had finding himself so near her that he could not enjoy the sight of her This Queen endeavoured by all means possible to make known to the French her greatness and power One day holding Byron by the hand she shewed him a great number of heads planted on the Tower of London telling him that in that manner they punished Rebels in England and recounting to him the reasons she had to put to death the Earl of Essex whom she had once so tenderly loved Those who heard the discourse remembred it afterwards when they saw the Marshal Byron fallen into the same misfortune and lose his head after having lost the favour of his King VVe must not forget how that before the King made his voyage to Calais he had led the Queen with him to enjoy the Jubilee in the City of Orleans where the holy Father had ordained the Stations for France to begin His piety which was sincere and unfeigned gave a fair Example to his people who see him go to Processions with great devotion and pray to God with no less attention his heart agreeing with his lips He laid the first stone to the foundation of the Church of the holy Cross at Orleans which the Hugonots had miserably
was very good and commodious thought it best to introduce the Manufacture into France to the end the French might gain what was now gained by the strangers To this purpose he gave order for the planting of a great number of white Mulberry-trees in those Countries where they would best thrive and particularly in Touraine to nourish Silk-worms and that people should be provided who understood how to prepare the Webs and put to work the labour of these pretioâ—â— Caterpillers If care had been taken â—â—ter his death to maintain this Order and to extend it to other Provinces it might have spared France more then five Millions which it every year sends out to provide silk Stuffs besides a Million of persons useless for other labours as are old people Maids and Children might have gained a living by it and the Employers more easily have afforded to pay the Imposts and Taxes out of the profit they had made of their industry There was yet a much greater mischief which as we may say dryed up the very Intrails of the Kingdom this was the excessive Usury The ill Husbands that is to say the greatest part of the Nobility borrowed money at ten or twelve in the hundred In which there was two great inconveniences The first That the Interests undermining by little and little in seven or eight years dug up the foundations of the richest and most ancient Houses which are as we may say the Props and Pillars that uphold the State The second That the Merchants finding this conveniency of laying out their money to so great profit and without any hazard absolutely abandoned all Commerce the streams of which once dryed up there must needs follow a famine of Gold and Silver in the Kingdome for France hath no other Mines then its Traffick and the distribution of its Merchandizes These Considerations obliged the King not onely to prohibit all Usuries but lay a penalty of the Confiscation of the sum lent and great Fines beside Afterwards the Parliament deputed some Counsellours in all Provinces to make inquisition after Usurers and to reduce all Interests or Hypothecated Rents to six and a half in the hundred They were before at ten or twelve as we have said The reason of which was because when they were constituted money was much more scarce now since it was extreamly multiplyed since the discovery of the Indies it was just to abate its interests And it was for this reason that it was afterwards put at six and may possibly one day be reduced lower Out of the same designe to enrich his people and to bring abundance and plenty into his Kingdome the King continually received all Proposals which might serve to enlarge Commerce to bring Commodity to his people and to till and make fruitful the most sterile places He endeavoured as much as was possible to make Rivers Navigable He caused to be repaired all Bridges and Causways and the great Roads to be paved knowing that whilst they are not well kept Carriages find but a difficult passage and Commerce is by that means interrupted From whence happen the same disorders in the oeconomy of an Estate as doth in that of a mans body when it findes Obstructions and when the passage of the blood and spirits are not free When he passed through the Countries he curiously regarded all things took notice of the necessities and disorders and immediately remedied all with a great diligence Under his favour and protection were established in many places of the Kingdom Manufactures of Linen and Woollen Cloths Laces Iron-ware and many other things After his example the Burgesses repaired their houses which the War had ruined The Gentlemen having laid by their Arms with onely a switch in their hand dedicated themselves to manage their Estates and augment their Revenues All the people were attentive to their work and it was a wonder to see this Kingdom which five or six years before had been as we may say a Den of Serpents and venemous Beasts being filled with Thieves Robbers Vagrants Rake-hells and Beggers changed by the diligence of the King into a Hive of innocent Bees who strove as it were with envy to each other to give proofs of their industry and to gather Wax and Honey Idleness was a shame and a kinde of Crime and indeed it is as the Proverb says the Mother of all Vices That spirit which takes no care to employ it self seriously in something is unprofitable to it self and pernitious to the publick And for these Reasons did the Provosts in that time make diligent search after Loyterers Vagabonds and idle persons and sent them to serve the King in his Gallies to oblige them perforce to work There is no happiness so stable and assured but it may be easily troubled there arrived this year two things which might have overturned all France had not the King in a good hour subverted them The Assembly of the Notables or Chiefs at Rouen which was held in the year 1596. to raise money for the King to continue the War and pay his debts had granted him as we have said the imposition of a Sol pour livre on all Merchandizes carried into walled Cities The Estate says Tacitus the greatest Polititian among Historians cannot be maintained without Forces nor the Forces without Payment nor they paid without Impositions by consequence therefore they are necessary and it is just that every one should contribute to the expences of an Estate of which he makes a part as well as partake of those Conveniences and that protection it enjoys But these impositions ought to be moderate proportionate to the power of every one and every one ought to bear his part Moreover it should be easie to perceive that the expence of raising them exceed not the principal that they be not laid so as to appear odious as on Merchandizes which nourish the poor and that in fine they be blood drawn gently from the veins and not marrow forced from the bones Now the imposition of a Sol pour livre was of this nature It was very oppressive for in every City they searched the Merchants Goods opened their Bales and saw what every one brought so that liberty was quite lost in the Kingdom Moreover it was excessive for any Merchandize being ten or twelve times sold it was found that it paid as much Impost as it was worth Moreover there was great expence in the sale of it for men were forced to employ as many Factors as would have composed an Army who desiring all to make themselves rich as well as their Masters were so vexatious to the Merchants that they became desperate And that was most strange was that there were in the Kings Council Pensioners to these Farmers who supported them in their violences and upheld them against all Complaints made of their misdemeanours The people are always subject to this Criminal Errour That when
the true Religion The King answered plainly and prudently to those that made him these reports That he knew the heart of Byron that it was faithful and affectionate that in truth his tongue was intemperate but that in favour of those good actions he had done he could pardon his ill discourses Now two things compleated his loss and obliged the King to search into the very bottom of his wicked designs The first was the too great number of his friends and the affection of the Souldiery which he made boast of as if they had been absolute dependants on his Command and capable to do whatever he would The second the most particular friendship he had with the Count d' Auvergne brother by the Mothers side to Madamoiselle d' Entragues who was called the Marchioness of Verneuil For by the one he begat a jealousie in the King and made himself be feared and by the other he rendred himself odious to the Queen who imagined and possibly not without cause that he would make a party in the Kingdom to maintain that Rival and her Children to her prejudice Now the King desiring to search the farthest he could into this affair sends for Laffin who comes to Fountain-bleau more then a month before the King departed towards Poictou He had at first some very secret entertainments with him afterwards very publick ones and gave him great quantities of Papers amongst other those Memoires or Notes written by Byrons own hand of which we have before spoken That which Laffin revealed to the King begat great inquietudes in his spirit so that in all the voyage of Poictiers he was observed extremely pensive and the Court after his example was plunged in a sad astonishment though none could divine the cause of it At his return from Poictiers to Fountainbleau he sent for the Duke of Byron to come to him The Duke at first doubted to go and excused himself with many weak reasons He presses him and sends to him some of his Esquires afterwards the President Janin brought him word that he should receive no harme which was provided he put himself into an estate to receive grace and aggravated not his crime by his pride and by his impenitence Byron knew that Laffin had made a voyage to Court but he was more assured of that man then of himself Moreover the Baron of Lux his confident who was then there had told him that Laffin had without doubt kept his Counsel and not revealed any thing which might hurt him De Lux believed so because the King after having entertained Laffin had told him with a merry countenance I am glad I have seen this man he hath eased me of many distrusts and suspitions of spirit In the mean time the friends of Byron writ to him that he should not be such a fool as to bring his head to the Court that it would be more secure for him to justifie himself by Attorny then in person But notwithstanding this advice and against biting of his own conscience after having some time deliberated he took post and came to Fountain-bleau now when the King no longer expected him but prepared to go seek him The Histories of that time and many other relations recount exactly all the circumstances of the imprisonment process and death of that Marshal I shall content my self to relate onely the chief The insolence and blindness of this unhappy man cannot be sufficiently admired at nor on the contrary the goodness and clemency of the King be enough praised who endeavoured to overcome his obstinacy Confession of a fault is the first mark of repentance The King taking him in private instantly conjured him to declare all those intelligences and Treaties he had made with the Duke of Savoy engaging his faith that he would bury all in an eternal oblivion That he knew well enough all the particulars but desired to understand them from his mouth swearing to him that though his fault should be greater then the worst of crimes his confession should be followed by an absolute pardon Byron in stead of acknowledging it or at least excusing himself with modesty as speaking to his King who was offended insolently answered him that he was innocent and that he was not come to justifie himself but to understand the names of his back-biters and demand justice which otherwise he would do himself Though this too haughty answer aggravated much his offence the King ceased not sweetly to tell him that he should think farther of it and that he hoped he would take better counsel The same day after supper the Count of Soissons exhorted him likewise on the part of the King to confess the truth concluding his Remonstrance with that sentence of the Wiseman Sir know that the anger of the King is as the Messenger of Death But he answered him with more fierceness then he had done the King On the morrow morning the King walking in his Gardens conjured him the second time to confess the Conspiracy but he could draw nothing from him but protestations of innocency and threatnings of his accusers Upon this the King felt himself agitated even at the bottom of his soul with divers thoughts not knowing what he ought to do The affection he had born him and his great services withheld his just anger on the other side the blackness of his crime his pride and obstinacy gave reins to his justice and obliged him to punish the criminal Besides that the danger with which both his Estate and Person were threatned seemed impossible to be prevented but by cutting off the head of a conspiracy whose bottom was scarce visible In this trouble of spirit he retired into his Closet and falling on his knees prayed to God with all his heart to inspire him with a good resolution He was accustomed to do thus in all his great affairs esteeming God as his surest Counsellour and most faithful assistance At his coming from prayers as he said afterwards he found himself delivered from the trouble wherein he was and resolved to cast Byron into the hands of Justice if his Council found that the proofs they had by writing were so strong that there need no doubt be made of his Condemnation He chose for this purpose four persons of those which composed it to wit Bellievre Villeroy Rosny and Sillery and shewed them the proofs They all told him with one voice that they were more then sufficient Yet after this he would make a third trial on this proud heart He employed this last time Remonstrances Prayers Conjurations and assurances of pardon to oblige him to acknowledge his crime but he answered still in the same manner adding that if he knew his accusers he would break their heads In fine the King wearied with his Rhodomontadoes and obstinacy left him giving him these for his last words Well then we must learn the truth in another place Farewel Baron
several Petitions of complaint against them accusing them of a great number of Exactions and Cruelties The Duke d' Espernon who without doubt sustained these Burgesses at the Court was sent by the King to accommodate this difference The Soboles who had offended him no longer trusted him they would not permit him to enter into the strongest Citadel nor let the Garison go out to meet him so that being justly incensed he envenomed the plague instead of healing it and animated the inhabitants in such a manner that they Barricadoed themselves against them The King who knew that the least sparkles were capable to kindle a great fire was not content to send La Varenne but went himself being moreover willing to visit that Frontier Sobole gave the place into his hands and he gave it to Arquien Lieutenant-Colonel of the Regiment of Guards with the Quality of Lieutenant of the King to command in the absence of the Duke d' Espernon Governour who had no great power so long as the King lived The King passed the Feast of Easter at Mets. Whilst he was there he hearkned to the request which the Jesuites made for their re-establishment He referred the doing them Justice till he should come to Paris and gave leave to Father Ignatius Armand and Father Coton to come to sollicite their cause They were not wanting to do it and Father Coton being of a sharp and witty discourse and a very famous Preacher gained so soon the favour of all the Court and pleased the King so well that he obtained from his Majesty the recalling of the Society into the Kingdom contrary to the opinion and advice of some of his Council He then re-established them by an Act which he caused to be confirmed in Parliament and caused to be thrown down that Pyramide which had been erected before the Palace in the place of the house of John Castel where there were many writings in Verse and Prose very bloody against these Fathers Thus was their banishment gloriously repaired and after all the King kept with him Father Coton as his Chaplain in Ordinary and Confessor and Director of his Conscience This was not accomplished till the year 1604. In these two years of 1602 and 1603. we have yet three or four important things to observe The first that the King at his departure from Mets went to Nancy to visit his Sister the Dutchess of Bar who died the year following without Children The second that he renewed the Alliance with the Suisses and some months after with the Grisons notwithstanding those Obstacles by which the Count of Fuentes endeavoured to oppose it The third was that in returning to Paris he received news of the Death of Elizabeth Queen of England one of the most Illustrious and most Heroick Princesses that ever Reigned and who Governed her Estate with more Prudence and Power then any of her Predecessors had ever done She was Daughter to King Henry the eighth and to that Anne of Bullen for whose love he had left Katherine of Arragon Aunt to Charles the fifth Emperour his first wife There was nothing wanting to the happiness of her Kingdom save the Catholick Religion which she banished out of England And we might give her the name of good as well as great if she had not dealt so inhumanely as she did with her Cousin-German Mary Stuart Queen of Scotland whom she kept eighteen years prisoner and after beheaded induced to it by some conspiracies which the Servants and Friends of that poor Princess had made against her person The Son of that Mary named James the sixth King of Scotland being the nearest of the blood-Royal of England as Grandchild to Margaret of England Daughter to King Henry the seventh and Sister to Henry the eighth married to James the fourth King of Scotland succeeded Elizbeth who had put his Mother to death He caused himself to be called King of Great Britain to unite under the same title the two Crowns of England and Scotland which indeed are but one Island formerly called by the Romans Magna Britania The Alliance of so powerful a King might make the balance incline to which side soever it were turned either of France or Spain For which reason both the one and the other immediately sent Magnificent Ambassadors to salute him each endeavouring to draw him to his side It was Rosny who went on the part of Henry the Great he obtained all the favourable Audience he desired and the confirmation of the ancient Treaties between France and England The Ambassador of Spain found not such facility in his Negotiation the English appeared resolute The Spaniards were forced to yeild that the place of the Treaty should be appointed in England and to grant the English free Taffick in all their Territories even in the Indies and give them liberty of Conscience in Spain so that they should not be subject to the Inquisition nor obliged to salute the holy Sacrament in the streets but onely turn from it France was in a profound peace as well without by the renewing of the Alliances with the Suisses and with England as within by the discovery of the Conspiracies which were quite dissipated the King enjoyed a repose worthy his labours and his past travail made his pleasure more sweet However he was not idle but was seen daily employed for he endeavoured with as much diligence to conserve peace that divine daughter of heaven as he had used courage and valour in making War He was often heard say That though he could make the house of France as powerful in Europe as that of the Ottomans was in Asia and conquer in a moment all the Estates of his neighbours yet he would not do so great a dishonour to his word by which he was obliged to the keeping of the Peace His most ordinary divertisements during this time were Hunting and Building He at the same time maintained workmen at the Church of the holy Cross at Orleans at St. Germain in Laye at the Louvre and at the Place Royal. The Nobility of France during this peace could not live out of action some passed their time in Hunting others with Ladies some in Studies of Learning and the Mathematicks others in travelling into Forraign Countries and others continued the Exercise of War under Prince Maurice in Holland But the greatest part whose hands as it were itched and who sought to signalize their valour without departing from their Countries became punctilious and for the least word or for a wry look put their hands to their swords Thus that madness of Duels entred into the hearts of the Gentlemen and these Combats were so frequent that the Nobility shed as much blood in the Meadows with their own hands as their enemies had made them lose in Battails The King therefore made a second and a most severe Edict which prohibited Duels confiscating the
pleasure it causes a thousand troubles and a thousand mischiefs even in this world it self The King being now but just fifty years of age began this year to have some small feelings of the Gout which possibly were the doleful effects of his excessive voluptuousness as well as of his labours To return to the Marchioness it happened one day that the Queen being very much offended at her discourse threatned her that she should know how to bridle her wicked tongue The Marchioness upon this seemed sad and grieved shunn'd the King and let him understand that she desired that he would no more demand any thing of her because she feared that the continuation of his favours would be too prejudicial both to her and her children Her design was to inflame more his passion by shewing her self more difficult But when she saw that her cunning had not all the effect she hoped and that the Queens anger was encreased to such a point that indeed there was some danger for her and hers she advised her self of another thing D' Entragues her Father demanded permission of the King to carry her out of the Kingdom to avoid the vengeance of the Queen The King granted her demand easier then she thought he would wherewith being excessively enraged her Father and the Count d' Auvergne her Brother by the Mothers side began to Treat secretly with the Ambassador of Spain to have some retreat in the Territories of his King casting themselves absolutely they and their children into his Arms. The Ambassador believed that this business would be very advantagious to his Master and that in time and place he might serve himself of that promise of marriage which the King had given to the Marchioness he therefore easily granted them all that they demanded and added all the fair promises with which weak and feeble spirits might be entoxicated The King had granted them permission to retire themselves out of France but yet without the Children out of a belief he had that they would go into England to the Duke of Lenox and the Earl of Aubigny of the house of the Stuarts who were their near kinsmen but when he understood that they consulted of a retreat into Spain he resolved to hinder them but to employ fair means to do it He sends therefore for the Count d' Auvergne who was then at Clermont so much beloved in the Province that he believed he might securely stay there He refused to come before he had his Pardon Sealed in good form for all that he might have done This was a kind of new crime to capitulate with his King however he sends it him but with this Clause That he should make his immediate appearance His distrust permitted him not to obey on this condition he stayed still in the Province where he kept himself on his Guard with all precautions imaginable Nevertheless he was not so cunning but the King could entrap him and by an Artifice very gross He being Colonel of the French Cavalry was desired to go see a Muster made of a Company of the Duke of Vendosmes He went well mounted keeping himself at a good distance that he might not be encompassed Nevertheless d' Eâ—â—â—re Lieutenant of that Company Nerestan approaching him to salute him mounted on little Hobbies for fear of giving him suspition but with three Souldiers disguised like Lacquies cast him from his horse and made him prisoner They led him presently to the Bastille where he was seized with a great fear when he saw himself lodged in the same Chamber where the Marshal of Byron his great friend had been Immediately after the King caused d' Entragues to be Arrested who was carried to the Conciergerie and the Marchioness who was left in her lodgings under the Guard of the Cavalier de Guet After desiring to make known by publick proofs the ill intention of the Spaniards who seduced his subjects and excited and fomented conspiracies in his Estate he remitted the prisoners into the hands of the Parliament who having convicted them of having complotted with the Spaniard declared by a sentence of the first of February the Count of Auvergne d' Entragues and an English man named Morgan who had been the Agent of this fair Negotiation guilty of Treason and as such condemned them to have their heads cut off The Marchioness to be conducted with a good Guard into the Abby of Nuns at Beaumont near to Tours to be there shut up and that in the mean time there should be more ample information made against her at the request of the Attorny-General The Queen spared no sollicitations for the giving of this sentence believing that the Execution would satisfie her resentment but the goodness of the King surpassed her passion The love which he had for the Marchioness was not so far extinct that he could resolve to Sacrifice what he had adored he would not permit them to pronounce the Sentence and two months and a half afterward to wit on the fifteenth of April he by Letters under his Great Seal changed the penalty of Death on the Count of Auvergne and the Lord d' Entragues into perpetual Imprisonment Some time after he had likewise changed the prison of Entragues into a Confinement to his house of Malles-herbes in Beausse He likewise permitted the Marchioness to retire to Verneuil and seven months being passed without the Attorney-Generals procuring any proof against her he caused her to be declared absolutely innocent of the crime whereof she was accused There rested onely the Count of Auvergne who being the most to be feared was the worst treated for the King not onely kept him prisoner at the Bastille where he lay for twelve whole years but likewise deprived him of his propriety in the County of Auvergne He had bore the title and enjoyed it by vertue of the Donation of King Henry the third Queen Margaret newly come to the Court sustained that this Donation could not be valuable because the contract of the Marriage of Katherine de Medicis her Mother to whom that County appertained allowing Substitution of her goods and that Substitution said she extending to Daughters in default of Males that County was to come to her after the death of Henry the third nor could he give it to her prejudice The Parliament having hearkned to her reasons and seen her proofs annulled the Donation made by Henry the third and adjudged her this County In recompence of which obligation and many others she had received from the King she made a Donation of all her Estates after death to the Daulphin reserving to her self onely the fruits of them during life The Count of Auvergne thus despoiled remained in the Bastille untill the year one thousand six hundred and sixteen when Queen Mary de Medicis having need of him during the troubles delivered him from thence and caused him to be justified She
friends that had been condemned for the default of Limoges he came to Court where he received more Houours and Kindnesses then ever This was the custome of that great King He had a heart like a Lyon against the Proud and against Rebels but he was pleased to relieve with an unparallell'd goodness those he had overcome when by their submissions they rendred themselves worthy to receive his grace And the Duke of Bouillon who perfectly knew his Nature for they had lived and made War a long time together was not wanting in this Conjuncture to comport himself with all that Prudence and Compliancy which an understanding man as he was could be capable of Notwithstanding this great generosity and goodness of the King his Kingdome was no less turmoiled with incredible infidelities and conspiracies such were the treason of l' Oste the attempt on the City of Marseilles by Merargues and another on Narbonne and Leucate by the Luquisses L' Oste was Clerk to Villeroy and his God-son the employment he had under him was to copy out the dispatches This unfortunate man revealed all the secrets of the Kings Affairs to some of the Council of Spain who had corrupted him with twelve hundred Crowns of Pension which they promised him whilst he was in that Country with the Ambassadour Rochepot His treachery being discovered he fled and as he was pursued by the Provosts of the Marshal he drowned himself in the River of Marne near the Ferry of Fay. It may easily be judged that Villeroy whose fidelity by this means remained exposed to the Kings just suspitions and to the calumnies of his enemies was sensibly troubled He had had without doubt some difficulty to clear himself of this business if the King who saw him in an extraordinary affliction had not had the goodness to go visit him himself and by that honour brought him the comfort of justifying him against all calumnies the Envious might sow against him Merargues was a Provincial Gentleman of a very good House who having assurance that he should the following year be Viguier or Sheriff of Marseilles had promised to deliver that City to the Spaniard during his Sheriffalty He was so imprudent and so foolish as to discover his designe to a Slave of the Gallies of Marseilles who gave advice of it to the Court to the end possibly that he might gain his liberty Upon this advice Merargues who was then at Paris was watched so diligently that they found him conferring with the Secretary of the Ambassadour of Spain and speaking so loud that almost all they said was heard They searched him and found in the fold of his Garter a Note containing the model of his Enterprize He was arrested and had his head cut off by sentence of the Parliament of Paris on the nineteenth of December His body was quartered and his Quarters fixed before the City-gates his head carried to Marseilles to be planted on a Pole on a Tower of one of the principal Gates The Secretary of the Ambassadour was arrested as well as he and had been in great danger if the King had been as furious as those counselled him who desired a rupture with Spain This Rencounter gave subject to the Polititians to discourse diversly concerning the Rights of Ambassadours and their people but Henry the Great decided himself the Question in this manner The Ambassadours said he are sacred by the right of Nations now they first break them when they contrive any treason against the State or against the Prince to whom their Master sent them and therefore by consequence this right ought not secure them from being sought out and punished Moreover it is not to be presumed that they are either Ambassadours or that they represent the Soveraign who sends them when they commit those treacheries and infidelities which their Masters would neither act nor avow However there is more generosity in not using in this point the utmost rigour but reserving the advantage to chastise them without doing it And to this purpose being well read in History he alleadged that example of the Roman Senate who having discovered that the Ambassadors of the Allobroges were concerned in the Conspiracy of Catiline contented themselves with commanding them to depart the City This was his Opinion and as he always followed the most generous Maximes he forbad that any process should be made against the Secretary to whom the Judges were about to give the Question In the mean time the Ambassadour thinking to cloak this perfidy by his Exclamations came to complain to him that the rights of Nations were violated and in them the Dignity of Ambassadours and that the King his Master would have that resentment of it which became a great Prince when offended The King answering him with a wise coldness represented unto him what his Secretary had acted with Mirargues The Ambassadour not willing either to own the Man or approve his Action turned the business another way and complained that the King had made the first breach of the peace of Vervin by assisting the Hollanders both with men and money The King replyed that for the men they went not by his Orders and that there were Frenchmen in the service of the Arch-Duke as well as in the Hollanders but for his money that it was in his power to do with it what he pleased and to lend it or give it without offending any The Ambassadour was very hot and there past some high words both on one part and the other In fine the King returned him his Secretary as he had resolved to do before he spake As for the Luquisses they were two Brothers Genoways by extraction who had made agreement with the Governour of Perpignan to deliver to him Narbonne and Lucate It is certain that it was not in their power to execute this designe and that there was more ill will in them then danger that the thing should succeed Nevertheless they were taken and carried to Tholouse where the Parliament sent both the one and the other to the Gibbet It seemed that not onely the malice of men but even folly it self conspired now against France for the same day that Merargues was executed an unhappy Fool made an attempt on the sacred person of the King throwing himself upon him with a Dagger in his hand as he passed on horse-back over the Pont-Neuf returning from hunting The Foot-men of the King running in made him loose his aim and had killed him on the place if the King had not forbad it who caused him to be carried Prisoner to For-l ' Evesque He was called John de l' Isle Native of Vineux near Senlis He was presently examined by the President Janin who could get no reasonable answer from him for he was indeed quite out of his senses He believed himself-King of all the world and said that Henry the fourth having usurped and taken France
Louvre and demanding his opinion of it The Escurial is much another thing said Don Pedro. I believe it replyed the King but has it a Paris about it like my Gallery One day Don Pedro seeing at the Louvre the Kings Sword in the hands of one of his followers advanced to it and putting one knee on the ground kissed it rendring this honour said he to the most glorious Sword in Christendom During the truce of eight months of which we have spoken the President Janin incessantly laboured for a Treaty There were two great difficulties one that the King of Spain would not treat with the United Provinces but as with Subjects and they would have him acknowledge them to be free and independent the other that the Prince of Orange whose power and authority would be extremely weakned by the Peace opposed it by a thousand Artifices being sustained in it by the Province of Zealand who ever desired War and by some Cities of its faction These two obstacles were in the end surmounted The Spaniard yeilded to the first and acknowledged that he owned the States for Free States Provinces and Countries and about the second the King spoke so high to the Prince of Orange that he durst not stop the course of the Treaty It ended no longer however in a Peace but onely in a Truce of twelve years which was free and assured Commerce on one part and on the other The renown of this accommodation carried the Kings glory throughout all Europe The Duke of Venice told our Ambassador in the Senate That that Signory entred into new admiration of the prudent conduct of our King who never deceived himself in his undertaking nor never gave blow in vain that he was the true upholder of the repose and felicity of Christendom and that it had nothing of happiness to desire but that he might reign for ever An Elogie so much the more worthy and glorious because we may say with truth that Venice hath still been the Seat of Politick wisdome and that the prayses which came from that Senate are as so many Oracles The Friendship and Protection of this great King was sought on all sides all was referred to his Arbitration and all implored his assistance And as he was equally powerful as wise feared as loved there was none who durst contradict his judgement or assault those whom he protected But he was so just that he would not enterprize any thing upon the Rights of another nor maintain the Rebellions of Subjects against their Soveraign A certain proof of which he gave to the Maurisques It is known how heretofore the Moores or Sarazins invaded all Spain towards the year 725. The Christians with the aid of the French had regained it from them by little and little so that there remained no more then the Kingdom of Granada which was little in Extent but very rich and extremely populous because all the remnants of that infidel Nation were retired into that little space Ferdinand King of Arragon and Isabella Queen of Castile finished the Conquest of that Kingdom in the year 1492. and so put an end to the Government of the Moores and to the Mahumetan Religion in Spain constraining the Infidels to take Baptism or to retire into Affrica Now as those who had thus professed the Christian Religion had done it perforce they for the most part remained Mahumetans in their hearts or Jews for there were many Jews amongst them and secretly brought up their children in their incredulity To which likewise the Spanish Rigor did much contribute putting great distinction between the new Christians and the old For they received not the new ones either to Charges or Sacred Orders they allied not themselves with them and which is worse made a thousand avanies upon them and oppressed them with excessive â—mposts So that these unfortunate people seeing themselves thus trampled on and being too weak of themselves to loosen themselves from their Yoak they resolved to address themselves to some strange power but which should be Christian because that of the King of Morrocco or the other Princes of Affrica would have appeared too odious To this effect they had secret recourse by Deputies to our Henry when he was then but King of Navarre Afterwards in the year 1595. when they saw that he had overcome the League and had got the upper hand in his affairs they again implored his Protection He hearkned favourably to their propositions sent disguised Agents into Spain to see the Estate of their affairs and made them hope that he would assist them And truly he might have done it since then he was in War with the King of Spain and it is lawful to make use of all sorts of Arms to defend our selves against our enemies But now being returned this year 1608. to sollicite him instantly to accept their propositions and offers and to hear the answer from his own mouth he plainly let them know that the quality of thrice-Christian King which he bore permitted him not to undertake their defence so long as the peace of Vervin lasted but that if the Spaniard should first openly infringe it he should have just cause to receive them into his Protection Their Deputies having lost all hopes on this side addressed themselves to the King of England whom they found yet less disposed then he to lend them assistance In the mean time their plots having taken wind in the Court of Spain caused both fear and astonishment for they were near a million of souls and were possessed of almost all the Traffick particularly that of Oiles which is very great in that Country King Philip the third found no other secure way to hinder the dangerous effects of their conspiracies but banishing them quite out of his Territories which he did by an Edict of the tenth of January in the year 1610. which was executed with much cruelty Inhumanity and Treachery For in Transporting these unfortunate people into Affrica as they had demanded part were drowned in the Sea others despoiled of all they had so that those who remained to depart perceiving the ill Treatment of their Companions fled towards France one part by land to St. John de Lus to the number of one hundred and fifty thousand others in French Vessels who brought them into divers ports of the Kingdom But to speak truth those who came by land were not much better treated by the French then the others had been by the Spaniards for in crossing the Countries they were almost all robbed and stript and their Wives and Daughters ravished so that finding so little safety in a Country wherein they believed they might find refuge they embarqued by the Kings permission in the Ports of Languedoc and crossed over into Affrica where they are become implacable and most cruel enemies to all Christians There remained some families in the Maritime Cities of the Kingdom
as in Bourdeaux and Rouen where it is suspected there is yet some of their Children who privately follow the obstinacy of their Fathers Much contrary to the taking the protection of these Infidels the King was about very great designes for the glory and extent of the Christian Religion towards the Levant But he would not declare himself till he had so ordered the Affairs of Christendome that there should be no fear of any trouble or division and that it might make use of all its forces against so powerful an enemy as the Grand Signor Out of these thoughts he had sent three or four Gentlemen into the Levant who under the pretext of travelling and visiting the holy places might take notice of the Country the disposition of the people the estate of their Forces the Garisons and Government of the Turks Which having well considered he promised himself that after having composed the interests and procured the union of the Christian Princes he might in three or four years at most ruine this power esteemed so terrible and that with an Army of five and thirty thousand foot-men and twelve thousand horse onely Alexander the Great not having had more Forces to destroy the Empire of the Persians which without doubt was greater and more powerful then that of the Turks I shall declare what his great designe for the re-union of Christendome was when I shall in brief have observed some important things which passed in the three or four last years of his Life As he laboured diligently to heap up money the Nerves of War so he hearkned to all Propositions made for the gaining it so much the more willingly because his designe was to abolish all Taxes and Impositions The first could not be done without much diminishing his Revenue so it was necessary to find some other foundation in its place Now this stock or foundation was the Demains of the Crown which he would entirely disengage encrease by a great quantity of new rights and particularly by that of the Greffes which had been quite withdrawn for five or six years but had brought him fifteen Millions a year But when he was dead Queen Mary de Mediâ—is re-engaged it fâ—rther then it was before It is certainly worth our wishing that this sacred Patrimony of the Crown might be regained and that care were taken to re-gather this Mass which the Law of the Realm and the diligences of so many wise Heads have made and composed for the space of so many Ages to maintain our Kings with splendour and magnificence without being a charge to their Kingdome except in great and urgent necessities As for the Impost our Henry had a desire to buy from the particular Owners all the Salt-Marishes of Poictou and Britanny and then when he had them in his hand sell the Salt upon the place at what price he pleased to the Merchant who should again retail it through the whole Kingdom as they do Corn without any constraint or imposition In this manner there had been no need of so many Officers Overseers Controulers Factors and a hundred other people which without fallacy amounted to near twenty thousand all fed and paid at the expence of the King and Publick and against whom he had often very great complaints Thus the poor Country-people would not be burthened by them with imposed Salt constraining them will they nill they to take yearly a certain quantity and it is certain the people would have had it four times better cheap then they have and the King have raised much more money then he doth without expence without pains and without the vexation of his subjects Now the King seeking means to fill his Coffers and to finde some other way then Taxes it must be acknowledged that he made some Imposts and likewise some creation of Officers but that he removed many things which gave cause of complaint to many persons And moreover to pay his ancient Debts and acquit himself of the recompences and pensions due to those which had served him in his Wars against the League he was constrained to pass for their profit the advice of several things which they proposed so that he loaded himself with that envy and those reproaches which ought more justly have fallen upon those people then on himself But those who knew his intentions blamed him not as did the others for they called that good husbandry and wise oeconomy which some termed avarice and insatiable covetousness Moreover though the will of this Prince was very good for the ease of his people and for the grandeur of his Estate nevertheless it cannot be denied but he was sometimes deceived in the choice of the means and that all those whereby he furnished himself were not always as innocent as his intentions He had two particularly of which the one made some noise but never succeeded and the other was of very dangerous consequence The first was an inquisition of the Rents of the Hostel de Ville by which he pretended to make those loose them who had ill gained them and this in it self was very just but most part of the Rents having changed Owners or been parted he must of force trouble an infinite number of Families so that all Paris was moved at it and the Landlords had recourse to their Provost of the Merchants This was Miron who was likewise Civil Lieutenant a man very zealous for the service of the King as he had demonstrated in several occasions but withal a very honest Man and one whom no interest in the world could bribe against the peoples whose Magistrate he was In sum he sustained it stoutly he spoke in the Assemblies of the Hostel de Ville acted with the Superintendent with like vigour and made Remonstrances to the King But in these Remonstrances too much heat transported him to make some odious Comparisons not of the Kings person but of some people of his Council The Louvre stormed the people of the Court cryed out that he had blasphemed those whom he had taken notice of in his speeches And those who were interested in this inquisition after Rents used all their endeavours to incense the King and to perswade him to punish rigorously this boldness On the other side the people having understood that their Magistrate was threatned took fire sooner then it was believed the Burgesses came in troops about his house to defend it Miron instantly entreated them to retire and not to make him Criminal He remonstrated to them that he feared nothing that they had to do with a King as sweet and just as he was great and wise and who would not let himself be carried away by the perswasions of ill Counsellors Upon this those who wished him ill employed all their endeavours to engage the King to take him by force and to make valid his supreme Authority but he wisely answered these people That
sends forth enlivenings and joy into the eyes of all that behold it To continue the Metamorphosis I will yet say that so many wise Laws which he made for Justice for Policy and for his Revenues so many good and useful Establishments of all sorts of Manufactures which produced to France the yearly profit of many Millions so many proud buildings as the Galleries of the Louvre the Pont-neuf the Place Royal the Colledge Royal the Keys for Merchants of the River Seine Fontain-bleau Monceaux St. Germain so many publick works Bridges Causwaies Highwaies repaired so many Churches rebuilded in many places of the Realm should be as the Ingravements and Imbellishments Let us Crown then with a thousand prayses the immortal memory of that great King the love of the French and the terror of the Spaniards the Honour of his age and the Admiration of Posterity Let us make him live in our hearts and in our affections in despite of the rage of those wicked persons deprived him of life Let us shout forth as many Acclamations to his glory as he hath done benefits to France He was a Hereules who cut off the Head of the Hydra by overturning the League He was greater then Alexander and greater then Pompey because he was as Valiant but he was more Just he gained as many victories but he gained more hearts He conquered the Gaules as well as Julius Caesar but he conquered them to give them liberty and Caesar subjugated them to enslave them Let his Name then be raised above that of the Hercules the Alexanders the Pompeys and the Gaesars Let his Reign be the Model of good Kings and his Examples the clear Lights to illuminate the eyes of other Princes Let his Posterity be Eternally Crowned with the Flowers de Lis Let them be alwaies happy alwaies Triumphant And to compleat our wishes let Lewis the Victorious his Grand-child Resemble or if it be possible Surpass him FINIS The Life of Hen. the Great divided into three parts The first The second The third His Genealogie Who Antho. de Bourbon his father was a Peter sixth Son to Lewis le gross espoused Isabella Heiress of Courtnay and took both Name and Arms a fault very prejudicial to his posterity b The branch of Bourbon produced many among others that of Vendosme Charles Duke of Vendosme had Anthony and six other sons Who Jane d' Albret his Mother was 〈◊〉 of Bourbon Duke of Vendosme and Jane d' Albret married at Moulins 1547. 1552. Henry the Great conceived at la Fleche 1553. His mother sings at her delivery of him He cries not at his birth So soon as born his grandfather carries him into his chamber he rubs his lips with Garlick makes him taste wine The Spaniards Raillery concerning the birth of his mother Her fathers Reply to it 1554. Baptism of Hen. 4. His godfathers and godmother He was hard to bring up He had for Governess Madam de Miossens His grandfather permits him not to be nourished delicately * It hath been said that he was ordinarily nourished with coarse bread beef cheese and garlick and that oftentimes he was made to march with naked feet and brre headed The death of Henry d' Albret 1555. His daughter son-in-law succeed him and retire from the Court. 1557. 1558. 1559. Death of King Henry the second Francis 2. succeeâ—s Divisions at Court 1560. Death of Francis 2. Charles 9. succeeds Queen Katherine declared Regent and the King of Navarre Lieutenant-General of the Realm 1562. He is killed before Rouen 1562. The Queen his wife returns to Bearn and embraces Calvinism 1566. She taâ— her son from the Court and gives him a Master instructs him in ill Doctrine 1567. Henry Prince of Navarre declared chief of the Religion 1569. Louys Prince of Condé his Uncle his Lieutenant with Admiral Coligny A judicious action when yet an infant b This Duke of Anjou was King after Hen. 3 Another action very judicious at the battle of Jarnac Lewis Prince of Condé slain After his death the Admiral commands all He hazards the battle of Montcontour Our Prince impatâ—ent to engage but hindred Gives marks of his judgement 1570. He with the Admiral continues the War The peace of Arnay-le-Duc 1571. A Resolution to entrap the Hugonots and exterminate them Death of Jane d' Albret Her son takes the quality of King of Navarre He marries the King of France his sister Massacre of St. Bartholomew The grief and fear of our young King He is constrained to turn Catholick 1572. His great dangers troubles at Court His wise prudent conduct He contracts friendship with the Duke of Guise He shuns contention with Duke d' Alenzon but lets himself be overcome by the beauty of Ladies which was his greatest weakness 1572. He fell not into any other of the horrible Vices of the Court. 1573. The Duke of Anjou besieges Rochel and carries the King with him The siege raised by the election of Duke d' Anjou to the Kingdome of Poland 1574. Charles 9. falls mortally sick at Bois de Vincennes A league made at Court into which Henry enters The Queen-mother discovering it causes him the Duke Alenson c to be arrested and la Mole Coconas Tourtray to be put to death The Chancellour would examine the King of Navarre Charles 9. near his death sends for him 1574. Queen Katherine alarm'd would affright him After the death of Charles 9. she seizeth on the Regency The two Princes set at liberty The Prince of Condé was in Germany The King of Navarre cannot escape as he desires He falls in love with a Lady The Queen-mother alluminates all the factions and civil wars 1575. Conspiracy against Henry 3. who confides in our Henry Henry 3. anointed and espoused to Louis de Lorrain Familiarity between our Henry and the Duke of Guise The Queen-mother breaks this union Henry 3. falls very sick a Francis 2 died of an Aposthume in his ear which was believed to come of poyson A noble and generous action of our Henry 1575. 1576. Monsieur departs from Court and joyns with the Hugonots Our Henry could not soon follow him but at length saves himself at Alenzon Peace made with Monsieur and the Hugonots 1576. Our Henry again turns Hugonot He is received into Rochel and after goes into Guyenne The gates of Bourdeaux shut against him The birth of the League These Leagues a fair path for the ambitious to rise by The Duke of Guise makes himself chief of the League The War of Monsieur his joyning with the Hugonots the cause of the League The Cities of Picardy begin it and why Christopher de Thou hinders its procedure at Paris The Leaguers oblige the King to call the Estates They assemble at Blois War resolved against the Hugonots Henry 3. declares himself chief of the League 1577. He raises three or four Armies against the Hugonots The Queen-mother obliges him to grant them peace 1578. She makes a voyage to Guyenne
Counsels given him He rejects them and causes to be Proclaimed the old Cardinal of Bourbon The King tries in vain several Treaties with the Duke He raises his League from Paris and why He writes to the Protestant Princes to justifie himself His troubles for 4. years to content both Catholicks Hugonots He had need of infinite prudence address eloquence Hee carries the Corps of Henry the third to S. Cornille de Compeigne Three advices touching the place to which he should retire 1590. He follows the last which was to march into Normandy Rolet brings him the Keyes of Pont d' Arche and Chattes of Diepe He would besiege Rouen but the Duke of Mayenne coming to its suecour drives him to Diepe and invests him The Duke reports he cannot escape him The Parliament at Tours counsel him to associate the Cardinal of Bourbon in the Royalty Others counsel him to retire to England He derides both one and t'other The Duke of Mayenne besieges Diepe Batâ—ail of Arques The Duke raises the siege retires goes into Picardy and why What hindred the success of his enterprize He knew not how to take his advantages Thâ—eeâ— auses for 〈…〉 which the great body of the League prospered not in their designes The distrust between the Spaniards and Duke of Mayenne The jealousie among the Chiefs of the League The sloth and negligence of the Duke of Mayenne Great activity and vigilance of Henry 4. Officers servants resemble their masters This History recounts onely the chief affairs The Parisians made believe the King was taken They arâ— much astonished to understand him marching towards them He takes the Faubourgs of St. Germain c. His moderation in this rencounter The Dukes of Nemours Mayenne post thither The King retires to Montlehery He takes Estampes Vendosm le Man 's Alenzon Want of mony stops his progress In what manner he made his Troops subsist He reduces almost all Normandy and besiegeth Dreux The Duke marches to succour Dreux The King advances to fight him Two reasons oblige him to it What causes engage the Duke of Mayenne to the Battail Battail of Yvry March 14 Wonderful intelligence of Henry the fourth His prayers to God His exhortation to his Souldâ—ers The battail won by the King Great loss of the Leaguers The Duke of Mayenne escapes to Mantes and thence to Paris The King too much exposes his person which Byron freely remonstrates to him His Clemency aâ— Generosi â— after the Victory His Acknowledgements and Justice A Noble Action he did Another worthy Action What hindred the King to go directly to Paris Devilish counsel The widow of Montpensier amuses the people The King departs from Mantes takes some Cities and goes to block up Paris The Duke of Mayenne was gone to meet the Duke of Parma and had left the Duke of Nemours at Paris The death of the old Cardinal of Bourbon troubles him The Spaniards the Sixteen â—â—â—â—s him to make a King he assignes the Estates to Paris He keeps to himself the Title of Lieutenant-General Nemours takes order for the defence of Paris Number of the inhabitants of Paris It proves not so easie to take it by famine The Hugonots would have it taken by force but the King will not Useless mouths starve Paris Great Clemency of the King to let the miserable people go forth His generous words Those of the Army send victuals into Paris Which makes them subsist The King takes all the Suburbs in one night The Duke of Mayenne advances to Meaux but dares not relieve Paris The Duke of Parma comes to joyn with him with an Army from the Low-countries He had so well contrived all things that he was assured to raise the siege of Paris The King never believed he would quit the Low-Countries He renews the Negotiation with the Duke of Mayenne who feigns to entertain it to amuse him The Kings Council mech ironbled The King would take a place of battel and not raise the siege Byron advises to raise the siege and carries it The Duke of Parma takes Lagny in the sight of the King relieves Paris Abundance of Victuals carried to Paris The Army of the King constrained to separate Duke of Parma besieges Corbeil and takes it He returns to Flanders Corbeil regained by storm The Duke of Parma counsels the King of Spain to become chief Master of the League The King of Spain no longer considers the Duke of Mayenne but thinks to render himself Master of the great Cities by factions The King endeavours to re-gain the Duke He endeavours likewise to regain the people Three means by which Henry 3. lost the affection of his subjects His negligence and inapplication The wasting his Revenues His ill keeping his word Three other ways quite contrary by which Henry 4. gained the esteem and affection of his subjects His activity and greatness of soul. His care of his Revenues Francis d' O Superintendant of the Revenues a great expender The King constrained to suffer him in this charge but pares his nailes His constant keeping his word and freedom His goodness He pardoned injuries and never knew vengeance This reconquered his kingdom rather then his sword 1591. Divisions and Jealousies in the party of the League and that of the King In the party of the King three factions of Hugonots Catholicks and Servants of Henry the third The Hugonots solicite the Protestants to send Henry 4. powerful assistance to hinder him from turning Catholick An Edict granted to the Hugonots Death of Pope Sixtus 5. Election of Gregory 14. Enterprize of the League on S. Denis where the Cavalier d' Aumale is killed Enterprize of the King on Paris called the battail of the Flour Chartres besieged and taken by the King President Janin sent to Spain on the part of the League The Spaniards design to profit themselves by the ruine of France Gregory 14. sends an Army to the League And a Bull of Excommunication against those Prelates follow the King and money to the Sixteen Oâ—r Henry well served by the Count of Turenne And by the Duke Lesdiguieres He becomes passionate of the fair Gabriella The Duke of Guise escapes from prison The judicious reasoning of Hen. 4. on his escape The Duke of Mayenne becomes jealous of his nephew The Sixteen lean to the Duke of Guise and would lose Mayenne They write to the King of Spain They drive the Cardinal of Gonde many others from Paris By a horrible attempt they cause to be hanged the President of Brisson and two Counsellours * The publick place of execution in Paris Some would likewise kill the Duke of Mayenne but want heart to do it Upon this the Duke comes to Paris and hangs four which quite quells the faction of the Sixteen He makes four Presidents of Parliament 1592. The King besieges Rouen where Villars was Governour Great and memorable Sally The City pressed Parma comes to relieve it The King raises his Siege and
retires to Pont de l' Arche The Duke of Parma takes Caudebec and is wounded and the Duke of Mayenne falls sick The Army of the King increases and the pursues the two Dukes Byron beats up one quarter but will not quite defeat them He would continue the War * A French Proverb aâ— if he should say Wouldst thou have me ruine my own Fortune Wonderful retreat of the Duke of Parma which the King cannot hinder The King admires the action A noble and dangerous action of the King at Aumale where he saved his Rereguard Grave answer of the Duke of Parma's concerning the Kings action Byron killed at Espernay Conferences renewed The Duke of Mayenne calls the Estates to Paris to elect a King The election of a King would have been the ruine of Henry 4. and France Expedient which the King finds to hinder this election Confeence of Surene 1593. Estates of the League assemble at Paris Mansfield comes with a Spanish Army takes Noyon afterwards his Army dissipates Byron raises the siege of Selles to relieve Noyon but dares not aâ—tempt it which puffs up the Kings enemies Conspiracy to surpâ—ize his person The Duke of Feria brings a Letter to the States-General from the King of Spain It was time for the King to convert In fine God touches him and he is converted The Spaniards and Legat press the Estates to chuse a King Grand arrest of the Parliament at Paris for the Salique Law Advantagious testimony of Villeroy in favour of the Parliament The King takes Dreux The Spaniards propose to the Estates to elect the Duke of Guise and their Infanta The Duke of Mayenne enraged his Wife more He makes truce with the King His subtile Argument against the Minister He abjures his Errour and becomes a Catholick The Duke of Mayenne dismisses the Estates The King sends the Duke of Nevers to Rome to have absolution of the Pope The Pope shews him self very difficult 1594. The League fals in less then a year Meaux Aix Lyons Orleans Bourges surrender to the King Reduction of Paris The King anointed at Chartres It was almost a wonder how he became master of Paris He sees the Spanish Garison depart and what he saies to them Parliament at Tours recalled to Paris The City rejoyce and are peaceable Two worthy actions of the King The one of Justice The other of Policy Reduction of Rouen Abbeville Troyes Sens c. La Capelle taken by Mansfield and Laon by the King Balagny turns to the Kings party with his City of Cambray Reduction of Amiens Beauvais Peronne The Duke of Guise compounds with the King And likewise the Duke of Lorrain The Duke of Mayenne remains alone and retires into Bourgongne 1595. The King declares war against the Spaniards Two artempts on his person Of Peter Barriere and of John Castel Jesuites exiled the kingdom Reduct on of Beaune Auxerre and Dijon c. The King goes into Bourgongne against the Spanish Army Battail of Fountain-Franzoise where the King shews his valour but is in danger of his life The Spanish Army retire The Duke of Mayenne despairing would retire into Savoy The King hath pity of him and offers him an accommodation and place of retreat He grants him a truce La Fere Ham delivered to the Spaniards who are cut in pieces at Ham. Humieres killed Many Leaguers despairing cast themselves into the Spaniards arms Amongst others Rosny who causeth the taking of Dourlens Battel of Dourlens Villars slain Cambray taken by the Spaniards The Pope absolves the King The Duke of Mayenne in the end makes his Treaty with King Hath advantagious Conditions He comes to Monceaux to salute the King The Duke of Nemours reconciled likewise His elder Brother died of a strange disease 1596. The Duke of Joyeuse makes his Treaty with the King And the Lord of Boisdaufia Reduction of Marseilles The King grants a truce to the Duke of Merceur Arch-duke Albert takes Calais Taking of la Fere by the King The Archduke takes likewise Guines and Ardres The King to have mony calls an assembly of the Chiefs to Rouen The manner of their sitting His Speech The Assembly grant money for the War King of Spain desires the peace Surprizal of Amiens by the Spaniards retards the peace 1597. The King resolves to besiege Amiens Many conspiracies discovered The people contribute willingly and the Leaguers serve him well The Arch-Duke comes to relieve Amiens His arrival assaults put the Kings Army in disorder The King re-assures them Words worthy a good and Christian King The Arch-Duke retires to Flanders The King retakes Amiens The King marches to the gates of Arras and dares the Spaniards The Duke of Merceur daily delays concluding his Treaty The King goes into Brittany resolved to chastise him He gives his daughter to the Kings natural son and by this means makes his agreement By reason of this marriage the King gives his son the Dukedom of Vendosme 1598. He goes to Nantes and Rennes He puts good order in the Province Endeavours for a general peace and the two Kings wish it The Deputies met at Vervin Substance of the Treaty of Vervin The peace published 1598. The third part of the Life of Henry the great more calm and more peaceable then the others He was a Souldier by constraint but a Polititian by inclinaon It is necessary a King should know War but besides that there are other functions of Royalty What those functions are The Peace sworn by the King and Arch-Duke Albertus Byron made Duke and Peer goes to swear the peace in the Netherlands The Spaniards possess him with pride and presumption VVhat the French and what the Spaniards said of the peace VVhy the King desired peace Excellent words Strange sickness death of Philip 2. of Spain Before his death he takes care to marry his son and daughter His sickness hinders his swearing to the peace His son Philip the 2. doth it after his death The King forbids the carrying of arms He dismisses his Troops He remits the arrears of Taxes He commands the false Nobles to be sought out and taxes re-imposed on them He retrenches theluxury of the Nobility and sends them all to their houses in the Country He shews them by his example the modesty of his habits He falls dangerously sick Words of a good King He gives the Estates an account of his expences Cuts off the superfluous expences of his Tables Who were his Counsellours Ministers Chiverny Bellievre Sillery Sancy Janin Villeroy The King confers often with his Counsellours how Rosny after Duke of Sully After the death of Francis d' O he commits his Revenues to five or six who acquit themselves ill Seeing that he makes Sancy alone Superintendent And very little time after Rosny who knows perfectly the Revenues Which the King knows also so well that he could not be cheated He desires Rosny to take no Presents without advertising him He begins to establish a constant
sends likewise to complement him and he answers it by Byron To whom she shews the Earl of Essex head The King Queen enjoy the Jubilee at Orleans The Queen brought to bed of a Daulphine who is named Lewis after surnamed The Just. The King gives him his blessing and puts his sword in his hand Birth of the Infanta of Spain named Anne who after espoused King Lewis xiii The King makes divers Orders for the good of the Estate He suppresses the Triennial Officers for Revenues He establisheth a Chamber of Justice to call Treasurers and Collectors to account The onely remedy against their thefts The King prohibites the transport of gold or silver out of his Kingdome and wearing gold and silver lace or gildings Introduces the manufacture of silk into France The usury excessive in France which caused the ruine of the best families and the Merchants to abandon all traffick The King reduces interests to six in the hundred His great care to enrich his Kingdom He favours the establishment of manufactures After his example all labour for their benefit Idleness punished 1602. The King remedies two things capable to overthrow France The tax of a Sol pour livre burthensome It causes commotions in the Provinces The King to appease them goes to Poictiers His wise and just remonstance to the Deputies of Guyenne * He had sold the Lands of his Patrimony He calms the seditions and revokes the Sol pour livre Conspiracy of the Marshal Byron Laffin discovers it to the King * Vidame is a Lord who holds his Lordship in Fief of a Bishop How he got the Notes written with Byron's own hand The Duke of Savoy keeps Renaze Laffins Secretary Propositions betwixt Byron the Duke of Savoy and the Count Fuentes Byron had demanded pardon of the King but after fell again He speaks ill of the King and boasts excessively of himself Two things compleat his loss Laffin comes to Court and reveals all to the King The King sends for Byron to Court who at first excuses himself In the end Byron comes The King conjures â—im the first time to confess the truth He insolently vindicates himself The King prayes the Count of Soissons to exhort him to confess his crime But he is more obstinate The King speaks to him the second time but in vain He is troubled what to resolve on He resolves to leave him to Justice Yet tries the third time to draw truth from him He finds it in vain leaves him By on and the Count of Auvergne Arrested prisoners His kindred intercede for him The Parliament make his Process He defends himself weakly Letters of the King revoking the pardon granted him at Lyons He reproacheth not Laffin Renaze appears before him at which he is much astonished He is conducted to the Parliament and heard Sentence of death voted against him The King removes the execution to the Bastille Sentence pronounced His head cut off He was very ignorant but a great lover of predictions A reflection very necessary for great men Laffin and Renaze pardoned * That is the Rack So is the Baron of Lux and confirmed in his Charges Montbarot imprisoned and soon released Fontanelles broke on the wheel Duke of Bouillon had a hand in the conspiracy The King sends for him to Court but he presents himself to the Chamber of Castres After he retires to Geneva thence to Heidelberg to the Prince Palatine his Kinsman The favour of Rosny a pretext to the discontents of the great ones Yet the King gave him not too much power but keeps it to himself An important truth A memorable example that a King ought not to yeild too much to his Ministers Enterprizes of the Duke of Savoy on Geneva Thirteen of the Enterprizers â—anged The Duke of Savoy excuses himself to the Suisses From whom the City of Geneva was held It was an Allie of the Suisses and under protection of France The Genevans make War on Savoy But the King obliges them to peace The inhabitants of Mets rise against Sobole their Governour The Duke d' Espernon kindles the fire more The King goes in person The Jesuites present their request to the King for their reestablishment He re-establisheth them gloriously 1602 1603. He visits his sister at Nancy Renews his alliance with the Suisses and Grisons Hears of the death of Queen Elizabeth of England She beheaded Mary Queen of Scots James 6. King of Scotland and Son of Mary succeeded to the Kindom of England He was James the first of that name among the Kings of England Ambassadors go from France and Spain to desire his friendship Piety yeilds to Interest The King labours to conserve peace Excellent speeches of a good King His divertisements Employs of the Nobility Duels too frequent The King makes an Edict against this madness He makes Acts for working the Gold Silver and Copper Mines An enterprize to joyn the Seine and Loire Another design to joyn the two Seas Navigation to Canada Establishment of Religious Orders at Paris The King gives Verneuil to Madamoiselle d' Entragues She despises and offends the Queen * Alluding I suppose to the Dukes of Florence who are all Merchants The Queen on her part troublesome to the King Leonora Conchini her husband foster the Queen in ill humors 1604. The Kings debaucheries cause the Gout The Queen threatens the Marchioness Who prays the King to see her no more And her Father demands leave to retire with her out of France They treat with the Ambassador of Spain The King resolves to hinder them To this end he sends for Auvergne who is at Clermont and refuses to come He is Arrested prisoner and carried to the Bastille D' Entragues and the Marchioness likewise Arrested * The Common Goal of Paris Sentence of Parliament against them The King pardons them and justifies the Marchioness But the Count of Auvergne remained at the Bastille and is despoiled of his County Which is adjudged to Queen Margaret who gives her Estates to the Daulphin The designes of the Duke of Bouillon discovered The King had done him many favours and he had as well served the King But after the Kings conversion he excites the Hugonots against him and would make himself chief of their party His Emissaries endeavour to form a party in Guyenne The King goes to prevent them All the Conspiracy dissipated The King returns to Paris He in vain endeavours to make the Duke of Bouillon humble himself He resolves to besiege Sedan Rosny makes all necessary preparations The King makes him Duke of Sully Inconveniences in the siege of Sedan The King chuses rather to receive the Duke into favour On what conditions The Duke demands pardon of of the King who enters Sedan and thence goes to Paris A great example of generosity in our Prince Notwithstanding which there are many conspiracies Treason of l' Oste. 1605. Treason of Merargues He is surprized talking with the Spanish Ambassadours
Secretary His punishment The Ambassadours Secretary arrested Several discourses concerning Ambassadours priviledges The King forbids any process against the Secretary The Ambassadour makes a great noise and threatens his Kings resentment Treason of the Luquisses A fool makes an attempt on the Kings person Those who desire war whet the Kings spirit upon these Conspiracies Character of Philip 3. of Spair A good profitable reflection In what the courage of a Soveraign principally consists The goodness of Henry the Great But the King hastens not the War He makes himself Arbitrator of the differences of Christendom 1606. After the death of Clement 8. he causes to be chosen Leo xi who soon dies and Paul 5. succeeds A great difference between Paul 5. and the Venetians The Venetians had made a law to bound the Acquisitions of the Clergy They make other Decrees Paul 5. offended at these Decrees He sends Briefs to revoke them He Excommunicates the Senate They declare his sentence of Excommunication null and abusive 1607. Henry the great undertakes to accommodate the difference He sends to this purpose Cardinal Joyeuse who concludes an accommodation The Pope absolves the Signory There was nothing but the reestablishment of the Jesuites not obtained 1608. The King endeavours an accommodation between the Hollander and Spaniard He underhand assists the Hollander with men and money Janin sent for this accommodation They come presently to an eight months truce The King makes an offensive and defensive League with the Hollander The Spaniards Alarm'd at this League Don Pedro de Toledo makes great complaints to the King Things very curious which passed betwixt the King and Don Pedro. Their entertainments Lively and quick replies Don Pedro kisses the Kings Sword Two obstacles in the Treaty of the Hollanders surmounted by the King The Treaty ends in a twelve years Truce Great praise given by the republick of Venice to our Henry All desire his friendship and protection He will not protect Subjects against their Soveraign What the Maurisques were The Spaniards treat them ill * An avanie is when by a false accusation money is forced from any person They demand assistance of Henry the Great He refuses it The King of Spain banisheth them all They are horribly ill Treated by the Spaniards and by the French They are carried into Affrica but some stay in France The great designe of Henry 4. for the extent of the Christian Religion in the Levant He sends some to spy the Country He seeks means to raise mony without burthening his people He would disengage his demain * The Greffes is a due to the King of 63 â— 9 d. Tours upon the sale of wood in several places and take off the Impost by buying the Salt-Marishes He is constrained to acquit himself of old scores to make some new imposts creations He makes not always use of innocent means Inquisition of the rents of the City-house cause disturbance * Hostel de Ville is the same at Paris as Guild-hall at London Miron Provost of the Merchants sustains the interest of the people Some would incense the King against him The people rise to defend him The King counselled to take him by force The Kings wise answer worthy a great Polititian He will not pursue this business of the Rents Establishment of the Paulete Justice formerly administred in France by Gentlemen How it fell into the hands of the Plebeians who made profit of it The Parliament of France meddle with particular affairs and is made sedentary at Paris They make all other Judges subalternate to them The number of the Officers of Parliament small How Offices became vendible under Francis 1. * He had often said that fat Boy would spoile all and Henry 2. How this might be remedied But on the contrary is made incurable by the Paulete Which causes great abuses 1609. Marriage of the Prince of Conde And of the Duke of Vendosme What were the Kings divertisements He loved Play too much He was extremely given to women This passion made him do shameful things Three or four of his Mistresses This causes often contentions with his wife And hinders his great design What that was The means with which he served himself to put it in Execution To this purpose he grants an Edict to the Hugonots and pays his debts Which regains the reputation and credit of France He joyns to him all Christian Princes by promising his conquests He reunites them by accommodating their differences The Princes he made his friends How he would have accommodated the Protestant Princes with the Pope He treats with the Electors With the Lords of Bohemia Hungary Poland With the Pope Model of the designe of Hen. 4. He would part Christendome into fifteen equal Dominions To wit eleven Kingdoms and four Republicks What the Pope had had The Signory of Venice The Italian Common-wealth Duke of Savoy Republick of the Swisses The Low-Countries Kingdome of Hungary The Empire with free election Bohemia Hungary elective A general Council of sixty persons Three others of each twenty Order to hinder tyranny and rebellion and to assist the Provinces adjoyning to Infidels Three general Captains two by Land and one by Sea to war against the Turks What forces what train None but the house of Austria had suffered by this establishment In Italy the Pope Venetians and Savoyard would consent In Germany many Electors and had chosen the Duke of Bavaria Emperour In Bohemia and Hungary the Lords and Nobility The business of Cleves happens to give a beginning to the great designe The Cities of Flanders should revolt The Kingâ— Army should have lived in great order The King would have reserved nothing of his Conquests He had with other Princes prayed the Emperour to rerestore the Cities of the Empire to liberty Bohemia Hungary Austria had made the same request The Duke of Savoy had demanded the Dower of his wife from the Spaniard The Pope and Venetians to become mediators of the difference of Navarre Naples Savoy c. And the King had yeilded his right They had perswaded the King of Spain or else forced him The great Prudence and moderation intended by the King in the pursuit of his design The preparations he made The forces he had The Prince of Oranges Army That of the Electors German Princes That of the Venetians and Savoyard His Exchequer for defraying this great designe He would make the War powerfully that it might be short Great appearance it might have succeeded having no Princes to oppose it but the Dukes of Saxony and Florence What was the business of Cleves and Juliers Death of John Duke of Juliers without issue His succession disputed by many particularly by Brandenbourg and Newbourg The Emperour said it was devolved to the Empire He invests Leopold of Austria who whilst Brandenbourg and Newbourg dispute seizes Juliers They implore the Kings assistance who promises to march in person But tells him he intended to conserve the Catholick Religion in that Country Answer made to the Ambassador of the Empire He establishes good order in the Kingdom before his departure Leaves the Regency to the Queen but gives her a good Council He establishes little Councils in the Provinces who refer to the great one 1610. Some put it into the spirit of the Queen that she should be installed before the Kings departure He though unwillingly consents The instalment of the Queen Many Prognosticks which seemed to presage the death of Henry 4. Advice from several places that his life should be attempted He seems to believe them and fear Who Ravaillac was He is induced to kill the King but it is not known by whom The King departs the Louvre to go to the Arsenal What persons were with him His Coach stopt in the street of the Ferronnerie Ravaillac killeth him He is torn with burning pincers and drawn in pieces by four horses The Kings body opened and found that he might yet live 30 years He is buried at St. Denis The Queen made Regent The great desolation in Paris when they knew of the Kings death His age and the time of of his reign His two wives Margaret and Mary He had three Sons by Mary and three Daughters He had eight Natural children of divers Mistresses Two Sons and a Daughter of Gabriella A Son and a Daughter of the Marchioness of Verneuil Of the Countess of Moret one Son Of Madam d' Essards two daughters He loved all his children and would have them call him Papa Summary recital of the Life of Henry the Great Parallel of his adversities and prosperities * There are more then fifty conspiracies against his person His adversities whet his spirit and courage Why Princes who come young to the Crown seldome learn to govern well Those who come to a Crown at greater distance and a more ripe age are more capable and better The reasons of it A mystick Crown to the glory of Henry the Great