History of the United Netherlands, 1607b | Page 6

know that by now throwing down the mask he
would be for ever baffled of his purpose.
The history of France, during the last three-quarters of a century, had
made almost every Frenchman, old enough to bear arms, an
accomplished soldier. Henry boasted that the kingdom could put three
hundred thousand veterans into the field--a high figure, when it is
recollected that its population certainly did not exceed fifteen millions.

No man however was better aware than he, that in spite, of the apparent
pacification of parties, the three hundred thousand would not be all on
one side, even in case of a foreign war. There were at least four
thousand great feudal lords as faithful to the Huguenot faith and cause
as he had been false to both; many of them still wealthy,
notwithstanding the general ruin which had swept over the high
nobility, and all of them with vast influence and a splendid following,
both among the lesser gentry and the men of lower rank.
Although he kept a Jesuit priest ever at his elbow, and did his best to
persuade the world and perhaps himself that he had become a devout
Catholic, in consequence of those memorable five hours' instruction
from the Bishop of Bourges, and that there was no hope for France save
in its return to the bosom of the Church, he was yet too politic and too
farseeing to doubt that for him to oppress the Protestants would be not
only suicidal, but, what was worse in his eyes, ridiculous.
He knew, too, that with thirty or forty thousand fighting-men in the
field, with seven hundred and forty churches in the various provinces
for their places of worship, with all the best fortresses in France in their
possession, with leaders like Rohan, Lesdiguieres, Bouillon, and many
others, and with the most virtuous, self-denying, Christian government,
established and maintained by themselves, it would be madness for him
and his dynasty to deny the Protestants their political and religious
liberty, or to attempt a crusade against their brethren in the Netherlands.
France was far more powerful than Spain, although the world had not
yet recognised the fact. Yet it would have been difficult for both united
to crush the new commonwealth, however paradoxical such a
proposition seemed to contemporaries.
Sully was conscientiously in favour of peace, and Sully was the one
great minister of France. Not a Lerma, certainly; for France was not
Spain, nor was Henry IV. a Philip III. The Huguenot duke was an
inferior financier to his Spanish contemporary, if it were the height of
financial skill for a minister to exhaust the resources of a great kingdom
in order to fill his own pocket. Sully certainly did not neglect his own
interests, for be had accumulated a fortune of at least seventy thousand
dollars a year, besides a cash capital estimated at a million and a half.
But while enriching himself, he had wonderfully improved the
condition of the royal treasury. He had reformed many abuses and

opened many new sources of income. He had, of course, not
accomplished the whole Augean task of purification. He was a vigorous
Huguenot, but no Hercules, and demigods might have shrunk appalled
at the filthy mass of corruption which great European kingdoms
everywhere presented to the reformer's eye. Compared to the Spanish
Government, that of France might almost have been considered
virtuous, yet even there everything was venal.
To negotiate was to bribe right and left, and at every step. All the
ministers and great functionaries received presents, as a matter of
course, and it was necessary to pave the pathway even of their ante-
chambers with gold.
The king was fully aware of the practice, but winked at it, because his
servants, thus paid enormous sums by the public and by foreign
Governments, were less importunate for rewards and salaries from
himself.
One man in the kingdom was said to have clean hands, the venerable
and sagacious chancellor, Pomponne de Bellievre. His wife, however,
was less scrupulous, and readily disposed of influence and court-favour
for a price, without the knowledge, so it was thought, of the great
judge.
Jeannin, too, was esteemed a man of personal integrity, ancient Leaguer
and tricky politician though he were.
Highest offices of magistracy and judicature, Church and State, were
objects of a traffic almost as shameless as in Spain. The ermine was
sold at auction, mitres were objects of public barter, Church
preferments were bestowed upon female children in their cradles. Yet
there was hope in France, notwithstanding that the Pragmatic Sanction
of St. Louis, the foundation of the liberties of the Gallican Church, had
been annulled by Francis, who had divided the seamless garment of
Church patronage with Leo.
Those four thousand great Huguenot lords, those thirty thousand hard-