A Popular History of France from the Earliest Times

A Popular History of France
From The
by Francois Pierre
Guillaume Guizot

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The
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Title: A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times Volume
VI. of VI.
Author: Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
Release Date: April 8, 2004 [EBook #11956]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HISTORY
OF FRANCE, V6 ***

Produced by David Widger

A POPULAR HISTORY OF FRANCE FROM THE EARLIEST
TIMES.
By M. Guizot
TABLE OF CONTENTS.
VOLUME VI.
XLIX. LOUIS XIV. AND HIS COURT
L. LOUIS XIV. AND DEATH. (1711-1715.)
LI. LOUIS XV., THE REGENCY, AND CARDINAL DUBOIS.
(1715-1723.)
LII. LOUIS XV., THE MINISTRY OF CARDINAL FLEURY.
(1723-1748.)
LIII. LOUIS XV., FRANCE IN THE COLONIES. (1745 -1763.)
LIV. LOUIS XV., THE SEVEN YEARS' WAR. --MINISTRY OF
THE DUKE OF CHOISEUL. (1748-1774.)
LV. LOUIS XV., THE PHILOSOPHERS
LVI. LOUIS XVI., MINISTRY OF M. TURGOT. (1774-1776.)
LVII. LOUIS XVI., FRANCE ABROAD.--THE UNITED STATES'
WAR OF INDEPENDENCE. (17751783.)
LVIII. LOUIS XVI., FRANCE AT HOME.--MINISTRY OF M.
NECKER. (1776-1781.)
LIX. LOUIS XVI., M. DE CALONNE, AND THE ASSEMBLY OF
NOTABLES. (1781- 1787.) LX. LOUIS XVI., CONVOCATION OF
THE STATESGENERAL. (1787-1789.)

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS:
HOTEL DE VILLE, PARIS FRONTISPIECE.
YPRES 151
BRUSSELS 159
NAMUR 161
ANTWERP 233
LOUIS XVI. 347
MARIE ANTOINETTE 456

LIST OF WOOD-CUT ILLUSTRATIONS.
The Grand Monarch in his State Robes 9
Madame de la Valliere 10
Madame de Montespan 12
The Iron Mask 14
Bed-chamber Etiquette 15
Madame de Maintenon and the Duchess of Burgundy. 27
Death of Madame de Maintenon. 34
The King leaving the Death-bed of Monseigneur 36
Louis XIV. in Old Age 47
The Death-bed of Louis XIV 50

Versailles at Night 52
The Regent Orleans 54
The Bed of Justice 57
John Law 62
La Rue Quincampoix 68
The Duke of Maine 71
The Duchess of Maine 72
Cardinal Dubois 78
Peter the Great and Little Louis XV 82
Belzunce amid the Plague-stricken 96
The Boy King and his People 104
Death of the Regent 107
Louis XV 110
Cardinal Fleury 110
Mary Leczinska 121
Death of Plelo 130
"Moriamur pro rege nostro." 142
Louis XV. and his Councillors 148
Louis XV. and the Ambassador of Holland 151
Marshal Saxe 154

Battle of Fontenoy 157
Arrest of Charles Edward 166
Dupleix 168
La Bourdonnais 170
Dupleix meeting the Soudhabar of the Deccan 174
Death of the Nabob of the Carnatic 174
Lally at Pondicherry 184
Champlain 190
Death of General Braddock 203
Death of Wolfe 209
Madame de Pompadour 215
Attack on Fort St. Philip. 218
Assassination of Louis XV. by Damiens 221
Death of Chevalier D'Assas 233
"France, thy Parliament will cut off thy Head too!" 249
Defeat of the Corsicans at Golo 256
Montesquieu 269
Fontenelle 274
Voltaire 277
The Rescue of "La Henriade." 283

Arrest of Voltaire 298
Diderot 314
Alembert 317
Diderot and Catherine II 321
Buffon 323
Rousseau and Madame D'Epinay 338
Turgot's Dismissal 367
Destruction of the Tea 378
Suffren 413
The Reading of "Paul and Virginia." 427
Necker Hospital 432
"There are my Sledges, Sirs." 458
Lavoisier 465
Cardinal Rohan's Discomfiture 470
Arrest of the Members 502

A POPULAR HISTORY OF FRANCE FROM THE EARLIEST
TIMES.
CHAPTER XLIX.
----LOUIS XIV. AND HIS COURT.
Louia XIV. reigned everywhere, over his people, over his age, often

over Europe; but nowhere did he reign so completely as over his court.
Never were the wishes, the defects, and the vices of a man so
completely a law to other men as at the court of Louis XIV. during the
whole period of his long life. When near to him, in the palace of
Versailles, men lived, and hoped, and trembled; everywhere else in
France, even at Paris, men vegetated. The existence of the great lords
was concentrated in the court, about the person of the king. Scarcely
could the most important duties bring them to absent themselves for
any time. They returned quickly, with alacrity, with ardor; only poverty
or a certain rustic pride kept gentlemen in their provinces. "The court
does not make one happy," says La Bruyere, "it prevents one from
being so anywhere else."
At the outset of his reign, and when, on the death of Cardinal Mazarin,
he took the reins of power in hand, Louis XIV. had resolved to
establish about him, in his dominions and at his court, "that humble
obedience on the part of subjects to those who are set over them,"
which he regarded as "one of