The Memoirs of Cardinal de Retz | Page 2

not be satisfied without his resignation of the
archbishopric of Paris, to which he at last submitted upon advantageous
terms for himself and an amnesty for all his adherents. But still the
Court carried it so severely to the Cardinal that they would not let him
go and pay his last devoirs to his father when on his dying bed. At
length, however, after abundance of solicitation, he had leave to go and
wait upon the King and Queen, who, on the death of Pope Alexander
VII., sent him to Rome to assist at the election of his successor.
No wonder that King Charles II. of England promised to intercede for
the Cardinal's reestablishment; for when the royal family were starving,
as it were, in their exile at Paris, De Retz did more for them than all the

French Court put together; and, upon the King's promise to take the
Roman Catholics of England under his protection after his restoration,
he sent an abbot to Rome to solicit the Pope to lend him money, and to
dispose the English Catholics in his favour.
He would fain have returned his hat to the new Pope, but his Holiness,
at the solicitation of Louis XIV., ordered him to keep it. After this he
chose a total retirement, lived with exemplary piety, considerably
retrenched his expenses, and hardly allowed himself common
necessaries, in order to save money to pay off a debt of three millions,
which he had the happiness to discharge, and to balance all accounts
with the world before his death, which happened at Paris on the 24th of
August, 1679, in the 65th year of his age.

HISTORIC COURT MEMOIRS.
CARDINAL DE RETZ.

BOOK I.
MADAME:--Though I have a natural aversion to give you the history
of my own life, which has been chequered with such a variety of
different adventures, yet I had rather sacrifice my reputation to the
commands of a lady for whom I have so peculiar a regard than not
disclose the most secret springs of my actions and the inmost recesses
of my soul.
By the caprice of fortune many mistakes of mine have turned to my
credit, and I very much doubt whether it would be prudent in me to
remove the veil with which some of them are covered. But as I am
resolved to give you a naked, impartial account of even the most
minute passages of my life ever since I have been capable of reflection,
so I most humbly beg you not to be surprised at the little art, or, rather,
great disorder, with which I write my narrative, but to consider that,
though the diversity of incidents may sometimes break the thread of the

history, yet I will tell you nothing but with all that sincerity which the
regard I have for you demands. And to convince you further that I will
neither add to nor diminish from the plain truth, I shall set my name in
the front of the work.
False glory and false modesty are the two rocks on which men who
have written their own lives have generally split, but which Thuanus
among the moderns and Caesar among the ancients happily escaped. I
doubt not you will do me the justice to believe that I do not pretend to
compare myself with those great writers in any respect but sincerity,--a
virtue in which we are not only permitted, but commanded, to rival the
greatest heroes.
I am descended from a family illustrious in France and ancient in Italy,
and born upon a day remarkable for the taking of a monstrous sturgeon
in a small river that runs through the country of Montmirail, in Brie, the
place of my nativity.
I am not so vain as to be proud of having it thought that I was ushered
into the world with a prodigy or a miracle, and I should never have
mentioned this trifling circumstance had it not been for some libels
since published by my enemies, wherein they affect to make the said
sturgeon a presage of the future commotions in this kingdom, and me
the chief author of them.
I beg leave to make a short reflection on the nature of the mind of man.
I believe there never was a more honest soul in the world than my
father's; I might say his temper was the very essence of virtue. For
though he saw I was too much inclined to duels and gallantry ever to
make a figure as an ecclesiastic, yet his great love for his eldest
son--not the view of the archbishopric of Paris, which was then in his
family--made him resolve to devote me to the service of the Church.
For he was so conscious of his reasons, that I