The
Ranums'
Panat Times
Volume 1, redone Dec. 2014
Counseling Assassination in 1636: A Study of Montrésor's and Goulas's Political-Ethical Vocabularies
Coda
by Orest Ranum
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Though in no way definitive, my research on the sources about the affairs of state during the reigns of Henry IV and Louis XIII, from Bourgeois and André, suggests that these sources were available in sufficient quantity and variety as to make it possible to work out an analysis of every major aspect of the high politics for those years, nearly a half century. In graduate school I was taught to characterize these documents as "record sources," that is, as the administrative and routine materials produced by everyday political action. Memoirs were characterized as "literary sources," which they indeed are, since they were drawn up for the purpose of remembering, perhaps for oneself but perhaps for other readers. I do not know at what point those who sought to write the history of high politics began to believe that they had to have every surviving source from all the archives of Europe, before they could put pen to paper.
The sample of memoirs dating from the 1650s that I read might, on closer reading, yield allusions to some edition of "record sources" ― for example, Richelieu's correspondence; but I did not find any mention of them. Indeed, what becomes evident is that memoir-writers completely lacked a pyrrhonist perspective on what they wrote! None seemed to feel the need to verify something by consulting a printed source or a personal journal, prior to tuning into their memories, pen in hand. As Kristen Neuschel(1) has already discerned for aristocratic society, oral narratives that were written down in the form of mémoires not only recreated political engagements, they also settled accounts.
The histories of plots, conjurations, trials, and executions were, of course, part of the great historical narratives that survived from Antiquity, and they would find their place in the grande histoire of the realm. But the differences in voice of the memoir writers, and the excited attitude so characteristic of these memoirs, gave them the authenticity, the higher truth, that would, and still does, nourish suspicion and doubt about the intentions and the legality of those empowered to conduct affairs of state. And rightly so. Under Louis XIII ― as in England during the century of the Tudors ― the harsh, arbitrary justice manifested in the King's name laid the foundations for a slow, barely articulated public questioning of justice under absolute monarchical power.
* * *
Without referring to what we have done as a method or an approach, the precise attention given to the meanings of "intention," "honor," and "interest" suggests that a general contextual frame is insufficient for interpreting nuances of meaning. For example, saying "honor or interest" places a negative meaning on the latter concept, whereas when the words are not paired, interest can be seen as a general term that infers personal or individual aims and characteristics. Also, an adverb might give something generally positive an ironic or a distinctly negative meaning: for example, action solely out of interest.
Apart from turning to religious terms in his final assessment of Montrésor, Goulas generally expresses himself by Stoic references to nature and to individual autonomy. A plot to assassinate Richelieu evidently did not bring up arguments about murdering a cleric, nor general arguments about tyrannicide. On the other hand, the use of terms such as "fortune," "Providence," and "virtue" might yield some interesting results.(2)
Historians who resort to dictionaries in order to establish the historical meaning of a word, or its semantic field, usually do so at the beginning of an essay. With quotations from Furetière, Littré, and Corneille, I am ending this exploration of how Goulas and Montrésor interpreted the intentions of Gaston d'Orléans. The aim is to confirm my discovery, early on, that the meaning of the word intention has been very stable for a long time. Thus, beginning with a definition would not have provided a non-current meaning with which to interpret the word as it was used in Montrésor's and Goulas's Mémoires, and in the latter's Deffense.
Furetière defines intention in this way: "Fin qu'on se propose en quelque action, détermination de la volonté à certain dessein."
Littré writes: "Fig., action de tendre l'esprit, et, par suite, mouvement de l'âme par lequel on tend à quelque fin."
The Latin root, intentionem, which yields tendre, and so forth, is more explicit in Littré.
The legal meanings are also very stable. Thus, to act with intent, if the action is criminal, has consequences not applicable to the unintentional. And as usual, Corneille offers exemplary precision, after Cinna has shared with Maxime his terrifying dilemma provoked by Emilie's possible actions:
Des deux côtés j'offense et ma gloire et les Dieux,
Je deviens sacrilège, ou je suis parricide,
Et vers l'un ou vers l'autre il faut être perfide.
Maxime then comments:
Vous n'aviez point tantôt ces agitations;
Vous paraissiez plus ferme en vos intentions;
Vous ne sentiez au coeur ni remords ni reprobe. (III, 2)
I leave it to younger scholars to work out the techniques for analyzing the conspiratorial atmosphere that Corneille creates in Cinna, and that Montrésor recounts in his Mémoires. Where did I read that Emilie, in ancient Greek, connotes a woman driven by furies? Claude de Bourdeille, comte de Montrésor, writes as if he is ready to lose his life for the cause, that is, bringing an end to Richelieu's tyranny.
But the very
idea of high politics may certainly have been offensive in aristocratic
circles, where notions of friendship, service, and shared power were a
shield against really understanding that the state constituted a special
sphere of authority, information, and, of course, secrecy.
Though
written long after the fact (July 1675-April 1676), and not published
for the first time until 1717, the Mémoires of that conspiring,
too-intelligent Cardinal de Retz must be given the last word here, about
Montrésor:
[1643:] Montrésor, qui avait la mine de Caton, mais qui n'avait pas le jeu...(3)
[Montrésor] ... avait été toute sa vie nourri dans les factions de Monsieur, et il était d'autant plus dangereux pour conseiller les grandes choses, qu'il les avait beaucoup plus dans l'esprit que dans le coeur.(4)
If courage in battle and bravery in carrying out plots are characteristic of the heroic, Retz's judgment must be considered brutally frank, and not that of a généreux. And finally:
Montrésor, qui était de ces gens qui veulent toujours avoir tout deviné, s'écria qu'il n'en doutait point et qu'il l'avait prédit.(5)
It is possible to imagine a wan smile coming across Cardinal Retz's face as he wrote that phrase, prompted by the reflection he saw in his own most imprudent mirror.
Goulas's emotions strengthen as he writes the Deffense, but then a serene mood takes over, for he has written everything possible that was harshly critical of Montrésor's conduct, his errors of fact and judgment, and his grammatical mistakes. Almost at the beginning he had noted that he had been a friend of Montrésor's, and that the latter had gone over the edge as a result of the pernicious atmosphere in Gaston's household. Or was it Saint-Ibar's influence on him?
... que [Montrésor] le pauvre gentilhomme s'est perdu à la fin, et jusques à blesser cet honneur qu'il avoit tousjours dans la bouche. Néan moins je m'en rapporte, j'en parle aprez tout le monde, et avec desplaisir, puisque j'ay encore de la reverence pour nostre ancienne amitié. ... Dieu resiste aux superbes et releve les humbles.(6)
Having recognized that Richelieu has carried out many "grandes actions," in a peroration that no longer mentions Montrésor yet has him clearly in mind, Goulas writes:
enfin, celui qui croyoit d'exceller à bien penser, bien parler, bien escrire, n'a plus que de pensées folles, des propos extravagans, des parolles confuses ou pour mieux dire, ne jette qu'un son vain et inarticulé, qui n'exprime que sa misere et sa disgrace ....(7)
His last thoughts about Montrésor concern divine judgments, by addressing God directly; after which he quotes two passages from Psalms. The second reads:
Domine, libera animam meam a labiis iniquis et a lingua dolosa.
* * *
In sum, we have learned that Goulas's understanding of Gaston's intentions was social and environmental in origin; it was not grounded on a idea of Nature. Princes learn at an early age to manipulate their householders to foster rivalries and jealousies. As someone who remained light-hearted and gay, the prince could listen to intense and well-reasoned (or far-fetched) but provocative advice, without allowing it to alter his intentions --- this, despite what he said to the contrary. He would let his householders dig themselves into rebellion, as he followed behind, often quite disengagingly.
Gaston did little to advance the status and income of his householders. When the latter got caught in the engrenage of royal justice that could potentially lead to imprisonment or even to execution, he did not intervene frequently or effectively on their behalf. They used the term service to describe their relationship with the prince.
Giselle Mathieu-Castellani distinguishes mémoires from autobiography, by observing that the judicial, as an extended and elaborate metaphor, is found far more frequently in the latter.(8) The mémoires penned by Gaston's householders confirm this finding. True, Montrésor remarks briefly that the King tends to be severe when accused subjects are brought before his justice. In addition, he condemns the legal procedure of trial by commission (hand-picked judges)(9) to which Richelieu resorted in the trial of Montrésor's first cousin, de Thou. Criticisms of justice by commission were a venerable and strong plank in the constitutional thought about the state.(10)
In Richelieu's Mémoires, the accounts of the clashes with the Duc de Guise and the Duc de Montmorency, as well as the discussions of Gaston's rebellious "sorties" from the realm, are very parti-pris and grounded on the principle that it is the king's sovereign duty, before God, to be just and to punish the wicked.
In the Succinct Narration of the same events (addressed to Louis XIII) in the Political Testament, the Cardinal recounts all the benefits in the form of offices, duchies, and pensions that were bestowed on those who had conspired or betrayed. His conclusion is that "grâces" do not engender gratitude! He does not mention Seneca, but he implicitly rejects Seneca's advice to Nero, that one builds trust through magnanimity and through distributing benefits, that is, benefits truly and sincerely given, and without arrière-pensées. Louis XIII and Richelieu expected to be thanked, and to have the recipient beholden to them.
On the subject of nobles' service, remarks Richelieu:
L'honneur leur devant estre plus cher que la vie, il vaudroit beaucoup mieux les châtier par la privation de l'un que de l'autre.
Oster la vie à des personnes qui l'exposent tous les jours par une pure imagination d'honneur est beaucoup moins que leur oster l'honneur et leur laisser la vie qui leur est, en cest estat, un suplice perpétuel.(11)
Much more could be said about Richelieu's views on nobility, but it has sufficed here to point out how the views of the Cardinal and of Montrésor are similar about honor. But Montrésor lacked, or rejected, what could be anachronistically referred to as Richelieu's sens de l'Etat.
Historians often assert that Richelieu had spies everywhere. In fact, in so many instances little-known householders or servants would go to an authority and transmit information about plotting. They no doubt hoped for a reward, and received one. And if someone knew of a plot and did not reveal it, he remained forever suspect to the Cardinal. Tréville, Tilladet, La Salle, and des Essarts were Cinq-Mars's friends and continued to have access to the King, and Richelieu threatened to resign if Louis did not send them away.(12)
Surprise, almost wonder, and incomprehension were Richelieu's reactions to the news of plots against his life in 1636, and again in 1642. what did Corneille know, or not know, about these plots when he wrote Cinna? Thanks to historical imagination, the works of the greatest writers and artists may transcend historical facts. Cinna is an authentic hero who acts with magnanimity and out of friendship, as he pardons and bestows benefits.
Augustus's "Soyons amis," addressed to Cinna, could be interpreted as feigned emotion, in other words, as insincere; but that interpretation would not conform to the overall ethical-political structure proposed by Seneca. In his last line, Corneille excludes a cynical interpretation of the play. Augustus speaks in the third person: "Qu'Auguste a tout appris, et veut tout oublier." A tyrant would not express the commitment implicit in this wish to forget. Plato says somewhere that the tyrant's brains are rotted by the memories that empower him over others.
Louis and Richelieu, Gaston and Montrésor, may never have known the joys of true friendship. Goulas's friendship for Montrésor prevailed over any and all betrayals and abuse, and for no benefit whatsoever.
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Notes
1. Kristen Neuschel, Word of Honor (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1989), pp. 103-114.
2. Orest Ranum, "Imposing Discordant Harmony on the Quarrel over Le Cid," in Concordia Discors, Choix des communications...., ed. Benoît Bolduc and Henriette Goldwyn, Biblio 17 (Tübingen: Narr Verlag, 2011), pp. 19-42.
3. Jean-Paul Gondi, cardinal de Retz, Mémoires. ed. S. Bertière (Paris: Garnier, 1987), p. 278.
4. Retz, Mémoires, p. 322.
5. Retz, Mémoires, p. 336.
6. N. Goulas, Deffense, p. 256.
7. N. Goulas, Deffense, p. 257.
8. Giselle Mathieu-Castellani, La Scène judiciaire de l'autobiographie (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1996), p. 40.
9. Montrésor, Mémoires, pp. 196, 222.
10. Church, Richelieu and Reason of State, pp. 328-334.
11. Testament Politique, ed. Françoise Hildesheimer (Paris: Société de l'Histoire de France, 1995), pp. 66-74. For an old but still useful context, see my "Richelieu and the Great Nobility," French Historical Studies, 3 (1963), p. 184-204; my "Clemency in Corneille and Richelieu in 1642," Cahiers d'Histoire, 16 (Montréal, 1996), pp. 80-100; and F. Hildesheimer, Richelieu (Paris: Flammarion, 2004), pp. 448-461.
12. Hildesheimer, Richelieu, (Paris: Flammarion, 2004), p. 469.