Henry Bulwer - Historical Characters

Thus poets and princes, ministers of state, and members of learned academies – men of wit, and men of the world – met on a footing of apparent equality, and real familiarity, on a stage where Beauty, ambitious of universal admiration, cultivated her mind as much as her person, and established one presiding theory – “that all had to make themselves agreeable.”

The evening parties of Madame de Brignole, and of Madame du Deffand, the little suppers of Madame Geoffrin, the dinners of Baron Holbach and Helvetius, the musical receptions of the Abbé Morelet, and the breakfasts of Madame Necker, were only specimens of the sort of assemblies which existed amongst different classes, and throughout every street and corner of Paris and Versailles.

Here, all orders mingled with suitable deference towards each other. But beneath this brilliant show of actual gaiety and apparent unity there lay brooding a spirit of dissatisfaction and expectation, which a variety of peculiar circumstances tended, at that time, to exaggerate in France, but which is in fact the usual characteristic of every intellectual community, when neither over-enervated by luxury and peace, nor over-wearied by war and civil commotion. Its natural consequence was a desire for change, which diffused its influence over all things – great and small. Léonard revolutionized the head-dress of the French lady: Diderot and Beaumarchais, the principles of the French stage: Turgot and Necker, the political economy and financial system of the French state: and just at this moment, when the imagination was on the stretch for novelty, as if Providence designed for some mysterious end to encourage the aspiring genius of the epoch, the balloon of Montgolfier took its flight from the Tuileries, and the most romantic dreams were surpassed by a reality.

It was not, however, a mere discontent with the present, a mere hope in the future, a mere passion after things new, however violent that passion might be, which constituted the peril, nor, indeed, the peculiarity of the hour.

In other seasons of this kind, the wishes and views of men have frequently taken some fixed form – have had some fixed tendency – and in this way their progress has been regulated, and their result, even from a distance, foreseen.

But at the period to which I am referring, there was no general conception or aim which cast a decisive shadow over coming events, and promised any specific future in exchange for the present, evidently passing away.

There still lived, though on the verge of the tomb, an individual to whom this distinguishing misfortune of the eighteenth century was in no small degree attributable. The keen sagacity of Voltaire, his piercing raillery, his brilliant and epigrammatic eloquence, had ridiculed and destroyed all faith in old abuses, but had never attempted to give even a sketch of what was to come in their room. “ Magis habuit quod fugeret quam quod sequeretur. ” The effect of his genius, therefore, had been to create around him a sort of luminous mist, produced by the blending of curiosity and doubt; an atmosphere favourable to scepticism, favourable to credulity; and, above all things, generative of enthusiasts and empirics. St. Germain the alchymist, Cagliostro the conjurer, Condorcet the publicist, Marat the politician, were the successive produce of this marvellous and singular epoch. And thus it was, – amidst a general possession of privileges, and a general equality of customs and ideas – amidst a great generosity of sentiment, and an almost entire absence of principle in a society unequalled in its charms, unbounded in its hopes, and altogether ignorant of its destiny, – that the flower of M. de Talleyrand’s manhood was passed.

I have dwelt at some length upon the characteristics —

I have dwelt, I say, at some length upon the characteristics of those times; because it is never to be forgotten that the personage I have to speak of was their child. To the latest hour of his existence he fondly cherished their memory; to them he owed many of those graces which his friends still delight to recall: to them, most of those faults which his enemies have so frequently portrayed.

The great test of his understanding was that he totally escaped all their grosser delusions. Of this I am able to give a striking proof. It has been said that M. de Talleyrand was raised to the episcopal dignity in January, 1789, four months previous to the assembling of the States-General. To that great Assembly he was immediately named by the baillage of his own diocese; and perhaps there is hardly to be found on record a more remarkable example of human sagacity and foresight than in the new bishop’s address to the body which had chosen him its representative.

In this address, which I have now before me, he separates all the reforms which were practicable and expedient, from all the schemes which were visionary and dangerous – the one and the other being at that time confused and jumbled together in the half-frenzied brains of his countrymen: he omits none of those advantages in government, legislation, finance – for he embraces all these – which fifty years have gradually given to France: he mentions none of those projects of which time, experience, and reason have shown the absurdity and futility.

A charter giving to all equal rights: a great code embodying and simplifying all existing and necessary laws: a due provision for prompt justice: the abolition of arbitrary arrest: the mitigation of the laws between debtor and creditor: the institution of trial by jury: the liberty of the press, and the inviolability of private correspondence: the destruction of those interior imposts which cut up France into provinces, and of those restrictions by which all but members of guilds were excluded from particular trades: the introduction of order into the finances under a well-regulated system of public accounts: the suppression of all feudal privileges: and the organization of a well-considered general plan of taxation: such were the changes which the Bishop of Autun suggested in the year 1789. He said nothing of the perfectibility of the human race: of a total reorganization of society under a new system of capital and labour: he did not promise an eternal peace, nor preach a general fraternity amongst all races and creeds. The ameliorations he proposed were plain and simple; they affiliated with ideas already received, and could be grafted on the roots of a society already existing. They have stood the test of eighty years – now advanced by fortunate events, now retarded by adverse ones – some of them have been disdained by demagogues, others denounced by despots; – they have passed through the ordeal of successive revolutions; and they furnish at this instant the foundations on which all wise and enlightened Frenchmen desire to establish the condition of government and society in their great and noble country. Let us do honour to an intelligence that could trace these limits for a rising generation; to a discretion that resisted the temptation to stray beyond them!

About the time of the assembling of the States-General, there appeared a work which it is now curious to refer to – it was by the pen of Laclos – entitled Galerie des États-Généraux . This work gave a sketch under assumed names of the principal personages likely to figure in the States-General. Amongst a variety of portraits, are to be found those of General Lafayette and the Bishop of Autun; the first under the name of Philarète, the second under that of Amène; and, assuredly, the author startles us by his nice perception of the character and by his prophetic sagacity as to the career of these two men. It is well, however, to remember that Laclos frequented the Palais Royal, which the moral and punctilious soldier of Washington scrupulously avoided. The criticism I give, therefore, is not an impartial one. For, if General Lafayette was neither a hero nor a statesman, he was, take him all in all, one of the most eminent personages of his time, and occupied, at two or three periods, one of the most prominent positions in his country.