General History for Colleges and High Schools Part 56

THE WARS OF LOUIS XIV.--During the period of his personal administration of the government, Louis XIV. was engaged in four great wars: (1) A war respecting the Spanish Netherlands (1667-1668); (2) a war with Holland (1672-1678); (3) the War of the Palatinate (1689-1697); and (4) the War of the Spanish Succession (1701-1714).

All these wars were, on the part of the French monarch, wars of conquest and aggression, or were wars provoked by his ambitious and encroaching policy. The most inveterate enemy of Louis during all this period was Holland, the representative and champion of liberal, const.i.tutional government.

THE WAR CONCERNING THE SPANISH NETHERLANDS (1667-1668).--Upon the death of Philip IV. of Spain (1665), Louis immediately claimed, in the name of his wife, portions of the Spanish Netherlands (see p. 568, n.). The Hollanders were naturally alarmed, fearing that Louis would also want to annex their country to his dominions. Accordingly they effected what was called the Triple Alliance with England and Sweden, checked the French king in his career of conquest, and, by the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle, forced him to give up much of the territory he had seized.

THE WAR WITH HOLLAND (1672-1678).--The second war of the French king was against Holland, whose interference with his plans in the Spanish Netherlands, as well as some uncomplimentary remarks of the Dutch humorists on his personal appearance, had stirred his resentment. Before entering upon the undertaking which had proved too great for Philip II.

with the resources of two worlds at his command, Louis, by means of bribes and the employment of that skilful diplomacy of which he was so perfect a master, prudently drew from the side of Holland both her allies (Sweden and England), even inducing the English king, Charles II., to lend him active a.s.sistance. Money also secured the aid of several princes of Germany. Thus the little commonwealth was left alone to contend against fearful odds.

The brave Hollanders made a stout defence of their land. It was even seriously proposed in the States-General, that, rather than submit to the tyranny of this second Philip, they should open the d.y.k.es, bury the country and its invaders beneath the ocean, and taking their families and household goods in their ships, seek new homes in lands beyond the sea.

The desperate resolve was in part executed; for with the French threatening Amsterdam, the d.y.k.es were cut, and all the surrounding fields were laid under water, and the invaders thus forced to retreat.

The heroic resistance to the intruders made by the Hollanders in their half-drowned land, the havoc wrought by the stout Dutch sailors among the fleets of the allies, and the diplomacy of the Dutch statesmen, who, through skilful negotiations, detached almost all of the allies of the French from that side, and brought them into alliance with the republic,-- all these things soon put a very different face upon affairs, and Louis found himself confronted by the armies of half of Europe.

For several years the war now went on by land and sea,--in the Netherlands, all along the Rhine, upon the English Channel, in the Mediterranean, and on the coasts of the New World. At length an end was put to the struggle by the Treaty of Nimeguen (1678). Louis gave up his conquests in Holland, but kept a large number of towns and fortresses in the Spanish Netherlands, besides the province of Franche-Comte and several Imperial cities on his German frontier.

Thus Louis came out of this tremendous struggle, in which half of Europe was leagued against him, with enhanced reputation and fresh acquisitions of territory. People now began to call him the _Grand Monarch_.

THE REVOCATION OF THE EDICTS OF NANTES (1685).--Louis now committed an act the injustice of which was only equalled by its folly,--an act from which may be dated the decline of his power. This was the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, the well-known decree by which Henry IV. secured religious freedom to the French Protestants (see p. 578). By this cruel measure all the Protestant churches were closed, and every Huguenot who refused to embrace the Roman Catholic faith was outlawed. The persecution which the Huguenots had been enduring and which was now greatly increased in violence, is known as the _Dragonnades_, from the circ.u.mstance that _dragoons_ were quartered upon the Protestant families, with full permission to annoy and persecute them in every way "short of violation and death," to the end that the victims of these outrages might be constrained to recant, which mult.i.tudes did.

Under the fierce persecutions of the _Dragonnades_, probably as many as three hundred thousand of the most skilful and industrious of the subjects of Louis were driven out of the kingdom. Several of the most important and flourishing of the French industries were ruined, while the manufacturing interests of other countries, particularly those of Holland and England, were correspondingly benefited by the energy, skill, and capital which the exiles carried to them. Many of the fugitive Huguenots found ultimately a refuge in America; and no other cla.s.s of emigrants, save the Puritans of England, cast

"Such healthful leaven 'mid the elements That peopled the new world."

[Footnote: See Baird, _History of the Huguenot Emigration to America._]

THE WAR OF THE PALATINATE (1689-1697).--The indirect results of the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes were quite as calamitous to France as were the direct results. The indignation that the barbarous measure awakened among the Protestant nations of Europe enabled William of Orange to organize a formidable confederacy against Louis, known as the League of Augsburg (1686).

Louis resolved to attack the confederates. Seeking a pretext for beginning hostilities, he laid claim, in the name of his sister-in-law, to portions of the Palatinate, and hurried a large army into the country, which was quickly overrun. But being unable to hold the conquests he had made, Louis ordered that the country be turned into a desert. The Huns of an Attila could not have carried out more relentlessly the command than did the soldiers of Louis. Churches and abbeys, palaces and cottages, villas and cities, were all given to the flames.

This barbarous act of Louis almost frenzied Germany. Another and more formidable coalition, known as the "Grand Alliance," was now formed (1689). It embraced England, Holland, Sweden, Spain, the German emperor, the Elector Palatine, and the Electors of Bavaria and Saxony. For ten years almost all Europe was a great battle-field. Both sides at length becoming weary of the contest and almost exhausted in resources, the struggle was closed by the Treaty of Ryswick (1697). There was a mutual surrender of conquests made during the course of the war, and Louis had also to give up some of the places he had unjustly seized before the beginning of the conflict.

[Ill.u.s.tration: DUKE OF MARLBOROUGH. (After a painting by F. Kneller.)]

WAR OF THE SPANISH SUCCESSION (1701-1714).--Barely three years pa.s.sed after the Treaty of Ryswick before the great powers of Europe were involved in another war, known as the War of the Spanish Succession.

The circ.u.mstances out of which the war grew were these: In 1700 the king of Spain, Charles II., died, leaving his crown to Philip of Anjou, a grandson of Louis XIV. "There are no longer any Pyrenees," was Louis's exultant epigram, meaning of course that France and Spain were now practically one. England and Holland particularly were alarmed at this virtual consolidation of these two powerful kingdoms. Consequently a second Grand Alliance was soon formed against France, the object of which was to dethrone Philip of Anjou and place upon the Spanish throne Charles, Archduke of Austria. The two greatest generals of the allies were the famous Duke of Marlborough (John Churchill), the ablest commander, except Wellington perhaps, that England has ever produced, and the hardly less noted Prince Eugene of Savoy.

For thirteen years all Europe was shaken with war. During the progress of the struggle were fought some of the most memorable battles in European history,--Blenheim, Ramillies, Oudenarde, and Malplaquet,--in all of which the genius of Marlborough and the consummate skill of Prince Eugene won splendid victories for the allies.

Finally, changes wrought by death in the House of Austria brought the Archduke Charles to the imperial throne. This changed the whole aspect of the Spanish question, for now to place Charles upon the Spanish throne also would be to give him a dangerous preponderance of power, would be, in fact, to reestablish the great monarchy of Charles V. Consequently the Grand Alliance fell to pieces, and the war was ended by the treaties of Utrecht (1713) and Rastadt (1714).

By the provisions of these treaties the Bourbon prince of Anjou was left upon the Spanish throne, but his kingdom was pared away on every side.

Gibraltar and the island of Minorca were ceded to England; while Milan, Naples, Sardinia, and the Netherlands (Spanish) were given to Austria.

France was forced to surrender to England considerable portions of her possessions in the New World,--Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, and the Hudson Bay territory.

DEATH OF THE KING.--Amidst troubles, perplexities, and afflictions, Louis XIV.'s long and eventful reign was now drawing to a close. The heavy and constant taxes necessary to meet the expenses of his numerous wars, and to maintain an extravagant court, had bankrupted the country, and the cries of his wretched subjects clamoring for bread could not be shut out of the royal chamber. Death, too, had invaded the palace, striking down the dauphin, the dauphiness, and two grandsons of Louis, leaving as the nearest heir to the throne his great-grandson, a mere child. On the morning of September 1st, 1715, the Grand Monarch breathed his last, bequeathing to this boy of five years a kingdom overwhelmed with debt, and filled with misery, with threatening vices and dangerous discontent.

THE COURT OF LOUIS XIV.--The Court sustained by the Grand Monarch was the most extravagantly magnificent that Europe has ever seen. Never since Nero erected his Golden House upon the burnt district of Rome, and ensconcing himself amid its luxurious appointments, exclaimed, "Now I am housed as a man ought to be," had prince or king so ostentatiously lavished upon himself the wealth of an empire. Louis had half a dozen palaces, the most costly of which was that at Versailles. Upon this and its surroundings he spent fabulous sums. The palace itself cost what would probably be equal to more than $100,000,000 with us. Here were gathered the beauty, wit, and learning of France. The royal household numbered fifteen thousand persons, all living in costly and luxurious idleness at the expense of the people.

[Ill.u.s.tration: LOUIS XIV. IN HIS OLD AGE.]

One element of this enormous family was the great lords of the old feudal aristocracy. Dispossessed of their ancient power and wealth, they were content now to fill a place in the royal household, to be the king's pensioners and the elegant embellishment of his court.

As we might well imagine, the life of the French court at this period was shamefully corrupt. Vice, however, was gilded. The scandalous immoralities of king and courtiers were made attractive by the glitter of superficial accomplishment and by exquisite suavity and polish of manner.

But notwithstanding its immorality, the brilliancy of the Court of Louis dazzled all Europe. The neighboring courts imitated its manners and emulated its extravagances. In all matters of taste and fashion France gave laws to the continent, and the French language became the court language of the civilized world.

LITERATURE UNDER LOUIS XIV.--Louis gave a most liberal encouragement to men of letters, thereby making his reign the Augustan Age of French literature. In this patronage Louis was not unselfish. He honored and befriended poets and writers of every cla.s.s, because he thus extended the reputation of his court. These writers, pensioners of his bounty, filled all Europe with their praises of the Great King, and thus made the most ample and grateful return to Louis for his favor and liberality.

Almost every species of literature was cultivated by the French writers of this era, yet it was in the province of the Drama that the greatest number of eminent authors appeared. The three great names here are those of Corneille (1606-1684), Racine (1639-1699), and Moliere (1622-1673).

DECLINE OF THE FRENCH MONARCHY UNDER LOUIS XV.--The ascendency of the House of Bourbon pa.s.sed away forever with Louis XIV. In pa.s.sing from the reign of the Grand Monarch to that of his successor, Louis XV. (1715- 1774), we pa.s.s from the strongest and most brilliant reign in French history to the weakest and most humiliating.

France took part, but usually with injury to her military reputation, in all the wars of this period. The most important of these were the War of the Austrian Succession (see p. 644), and the Seven Years' War (see p.

631), known in America as the French and Indian War, which resulted in the loss to France of Canada in the New World and of her Indian possessions in the Old.

Though thus shorn of her colonial possessions in all quarters of the globe, France managed to hold in Europe the provinces won for her by the wars and the diplomacy of Louis XIV., and even made some fresh acquisitions of territory along the Rhenish frontier.

But taken all together, the period was one of great national humiliation: the French fleet was almost driven from the sea; the martial spirit of the nation visibly declined; and France, from the foremost place among the states of Europe, fell to the position of a third or fourth rate power.

CHAPTER LV.

ENGLAND UNDER THE STUARTS: THE ENGLISH REVOLUTION. (1603-1714.)

I. THE FIRST TWO STUARTS.

1. _Reign of James the First_ (1603-1625).

THE "DIVINE RIGHT" OF KINGS AND THE "ROYAL TOUCH."--With the end of the Tudor line (see p. 561), James VI. of Scotland, son of Mary Stuart, came to the English throne, as James I. of England. The accession of the House of Stuart brought England and Scotland under the same sovereign, though each country still retained its own Parliament.

The Stuarts were firm believers in the doctrine of the "Divine Right" of kings. They held that hereditary princes are the Lord's anointed, and that their authority can in no way be questioned or limited by people, priest, or Parliament. James I.'s own words were, "As it is atheism and blasphemy to dispute what G.o.d can do, so it is high contempt in a subject to dispute what a king can do, or to say that the king cannot do this or that."

This doctrine found much support in the popular superst.i.tion of the "Royal Touch." The king was believed to possess the power--a gift transmitted through the royal line of England from Edward the Confessor--of healing scrofulous persons by the laying on of hands. [Footnote: Consult Lecky, _A History of England in the Eighteenth Century_, Vol. I. p. 73. The French kings were also supposed to possess the same miraculous power, inherited, as most believed, from Louis the Saint.] It is simply the bearing of this strange superst.i.tion upon the doctrine of the divine right of kings that concerns us now. "The political importance of this superst.i.tion," observes Lecky, "is very manifest. Educated laymen might deride it, but in the eyes of the English poor it was a visible, palpable attestation of the indefeasible sanct.i.ty of the royal line. It placed the sovereignty entirely apart from the categories of mere human inst.i.tutions."

By bearing this superst.i.tion in mind, it will be easier for us to understand how so large a proportion of the people of England could support the Stuarts in their extravagant claims, and could sincerely maintain the doctrine of the sinfulness of resistance to the king.

THE GUNPOWDER PLOT (1605).--In the third year of James's reign was unearthed a plot to blow up with gunpowder the Parliament Building, upon the opening day of the Session, when king, lords, and commons would all be present, and thus to destroy at a single blow every branch of the English Government. This conspiracy, known as the Gunpowder Plot, was entered into by a few Roman Catholics, because they were disappointed in the course which the king had taken as regards their religion. [Footnote: Though son of the Catholic Mary Stuart, James had been educated as a Protestant.] The leader of the conspiracy, Guy Fawkes, was arrested, and after being put to the rack, was executed. His chief accomplices were also seized and punished. The alarm created by the terrible plot led Parliament to enact some very severe laws against all the Roman Catholics of the realm.

COLONIES AND TRADE SETTLEMENTS.--The reign of James I. is signalized by the commencement of that system of colonization which has resulted in the establishment of the English race in almost every quarter of the globe.

In the year 1607 Jamestown, so named in honor of the king, was founded in Virginia. This was the first permanent English settlement within the limits of the United States. In 1620 some Separatists, or Pilgrims, who had found in Holland a temporary refuge from persecution, pushed across the Atlantic, and amidst heroic sufferings and hardships established the first settlement in New England, and laid the foundations of civil liberty in the New World.

Besides planting these settlements in the New World, the English during this same reign established themselves in the ancient country of India. In 1612 the East India Company, which had been chartered by Elizabeth in 1600, established their first trading-post at Surat. This was the humble beginning of the gigantic English empire in the East.

CONTEST BETWEEN JAMES AND THE COMMONS.--We have made mention of James's idea of the divine right of kingship. Such a view of royal authority and privileges was sure to bring him into conflict with Parliament, especially with the House of Commons. He was constantly dissolving Parliament and sending the members home, because they insisted upon considering subjects which he had told them they should let alone.