Political Women, Vol. 1

BOOK II.. Chap. I.--Anne of Austria's Prime Minister and His Policy 43

CHAP. I.--Anne of Austria's Prime Minister and his policy 43

II.--The Duchess de Montbazon--Affair of the dropped letters--The Quarrel of the rival Duchesses 66

III.--The Importants 77

IV.--Conspiracy of the Duchess de Chevreuse and the Duke de Beaufort to get rid of Mazarin 82

V.--Failure of the plot to assassinate Mazarin--Arrest of Beaufort--Banishment of Madame de Chevreuse and dispersion of the Importants 99

VI.--Results of the quarrel between the Duchesses--Fatal duel between the Duke de Guise and Count Maurice de Coligny 110

BOOK III.. Chap. I.--the Duchess De Longueville and the Duke De La

CHAP. I.--The Duchess de Longueville and the Duke de la Rochefoucauld 121

II.--La Rochefoucauld draws Madame de Longueville into the vortex of politics and civil war 131

III.--The Duchess de Chevreuse driven into exile for the third time 143

IV.--Fatal influence of Madame de Longueville's passion for La Rochefoucauld--The Fronde 149

V.--Madame de Longueville wins over her brother Condé to the Fronde 161

VI.--The causes which led to the coup d'état--The arrest of the Princes 168

VII.--Madame de Longueville's adventures in Normandy--The Women's War 178

BOOK IV.. Chap. I.--the Princess Palatine 187

CHAP. I.--The Princess Palatine 187

II.--The young Princess de Condé conducts the war in the south 203

III.--State of Parties on the liberation of the Princes 214

IV.--The Duchesses de Longueville and de Chevreuse and the Princess Palatine in the last Fronde--Results of the rupture of the marriage projected between the Prince de Conti and Mademoiselle de Chevreuse 221

V.--Condé, urged by his sister, goes unwillingly into rebellion 257

VI.--Madame de Longueville coquets with the Duke de Nemours 262

BOOK V.. Chap. I.--Condé's Adventurous Expedition 275

CHAP. I.--Condé's adventurous expedition 275

II.--Political and gallant intrigues--The Duchess de Châtillon's sway over Condé--Shameful conspiracy against Madame de Longueville 290

INTRODUCTION.

IN selecting the careers of certain celebrated women who have flung themselves with ardour into the vortex of politics, the author's choice has not been so much an arbitrary one as it might seem, but rather guided by instances in which the adventurous game has not been restricted to the commonplace contentions of the public platform, or the private salon, but played on the grandest scale and on the most conspicuous arena; when Peace and War, crowns and dynasties, have trembled in the balance, and even the fate of a nation has been at stake.

The untoward results of the lives thus devoted--dazzling and heroic as some passages in their dramatic vicissitudes may appear--point the moral of the futility of such pursuit on the part of the gentler sex, and indicate the certainty of the penalty to be paid by those who by venturing into the fervid, exhausting struggle, and rashly courting exposure to the rough blows of the battle of political life, with its coarse and noisy passions, have discovered too late that the strife has done them irreparable injury. In the cases of those selected it will be seen that the fierce contention has commonly involved the sacrifice of conjugal happiness, the welfare of children, domestic peace, reputation, and all the amenities of the gentle life.

That clever women abound in the present day we have undeniable proof--many as clever, no doubt, as that famous philosopheress Madame du Chatelet, who managed at one and the same moment the thread of an intrigue, her cards at piquet, and a calculation in algebra, but who may still lack the qualifications indispensably necessary to make clever politicians. Perhaps, therefore, we might be allowed to suggest that it would be well for ladies who are ambitious of figuring in either or both spheres that politics and diplomacy are special and laborious pursuits, involving a great deal of knowledge as difficult, and in the first instance as repulsive, to acquire as Greek or chemistry. Yet, fully admitting their capacity to qualify themselves intellectually, and supposing them to attain the summit of their ambition of figuring successfully in public life, a grave question still arises--would they thereby increase or diminish their present great social influence? They have now more influence of a certain kind than men have; but if they obtain the influence of men, they cannot expect to retain the influence of women. Nature, it may be thought, has established a fair distribution of power between the two sexes. Women are potent in one sphere, and men in another; and, if they are conscious of the domestic sway they already exercise, they will not imperil it by challenging dominion in a field in which they would be less secure.

Root and bond of the family, woman is no less a stranger by her natural aptitudes than by her domestic ministrations to the general interests of society; the conduct of the latter demands, in fact, a disengagement of heart and mind to which she can only attain by transforming herself, to the detriment of her duties and of her true influence. Ever to subordinate persons to things, never to overstep in her efforts the strict measure of the possible--those two conditions of the political life are repugnant to her ardent and devoted nature. Even amongst women in whom those gifts are met with in the highest degree, clearness of perception has been almost always obscured by the ardour of pursuit or that of patronage--by the irresistible desire of pushing to the extremity of success her own ideas, and especially those of her friends.

Again, let us imagine political life to resemble a great game at cards, the rules of which have been settled beforehand, and the winnings devoted to the use of the greatest number; well, a woman ought never to take a hand in it. Her place should be at the player's elbow, to warn and advise him, to point out an unperceived chance, to share in his success, more than all to console him, should luck run against him. Thus, whilst all her better qualities would be brought into play, all her weaker would not in any wise be at stake.

We would put it, therefore, to the womanly conscience--Is it not a hundred times more honourable to exercise, so to speak, rights that are legitimately recognised, though wisely limited, than to suffer in consideration, and often in reputation, from an usurpation always certain of being disputed?

It has been the author's endeavour to show the truth of these conclusions by tracing the political career of certain well-born and singularly-gifted women--women whose lofty courage, strength of mind, keen introspection, political zeal, and genius for intrigue enabled them to baffle and make head against some of the greatest political male celebrities of modern history, without, however, winning us over to their opinions or their cause; women who, in some instances, after passing the best period of their lives in political strife, in fostering civil war, in hatching perilous plots, and who, having cast fortune and all the "gentle life" to the winds, preferred exile to submission, or to wage a struggle as fruitless as it was unceasing; until having arrived at the tardy conviction of its futility, and that they had devoted their existence to the pursuit of the illusory and the chimerical, they found at length repose and tranquillity only in solitude and repentance.

In the stirring careers of certain among these remarkable personages, it will be seen that the mainspring of their political zeal was either the fierce excitement of an overmastering passion, an irresistible proclivity to gallantry, or an absorbing ambition, rather than any patriotic motive. This may go far to explain the singular sagacity, finesse, and energy displayed in their devotion to what otherwise appears alike mischievous and chimerical by those three high-born and splendidly-gifted women who figured so conspicuously in the civil war of the Fronde; and, though so much self-abnegation, courage, constancy, and heroism, well or ill displayed, may obtain some share of pardon for errors it would be wrong to palliate or condone, their example, it is to be hoped, will prove deterrent rather than contagious. La Rochefoucauld--a moralist, though by no means a moral man--who well knew the sex, had seen at work these political women of the time of the Fronde. That opportunity does not appear to have inspired him with an unbounded admiration for them from that point of view.

Of the peril and mischief that fair trio inflicted upon Anne of Austria's great Prime Minister and the State he governed we have an interesting personal record. When, in 1660, Mazarin's policy, triumphant on every side, had added the treaty of the Pyrenees to that of Westphalia, the honour of the conclusion of the protracted conference held at the Isle of Pheasants was reserved for the chief Ministers of the two Crowns--the Cardinal and Don Louis de Haro. The latter congratulated his brother premier on the well-earned repose he was about to enjoy, after such a long and arduous struggle. The Cardinal replied that he could not promise himself any repose in France, for there, he said, the female politicians were more to be dreaded than the male; and he complained bitterly of the torments he had undergone at the hands of certain political women of the Fronde--notably the Duchess de Longueville, the Duchess de Chevreuse, and the Princess Palatine, each of whom, he asserted, was capable of upsetting three kingdoms.

Continue reading Political Women, Vol. 1 free in the Wunder reader →