T A L 



11 



T A L 



true, even when the public shall have been put in posses- 

 sion of the contents of these papers, it will only have ac- 

 quired another statement in addition to those previously in 

 its possession, by the comparison of which it must have to 

 - at the truth. At present however, while those me- 

 moirs continue a sealed book, and scarcely any of M. de 

 Talleyrand's intimate friends have yet contributed their 

 fragments of information, no resource is left to the biogra- 

 pher but by collating his writings, his ostensible share in 

 the politics of his age, and the incidental communications 

 of himself or his acquaintances to estimate as near as he 

 can what probable foundation in reality there is for the 

 accounts of M. de Talleyrand, which have been compiled 

 from what may be called public gossip. 



Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Perigord was born on 

 the 13th of Februa r y, 17.34, the eldest of three brothers. 

 His family was antient and distinguished; but he was 

 neglected by his parents, and placed at nurse in one of the 

 faubourgs of Paris. The effects of a fall when about 

 a year old rendered him lame for life, and being on 

 this account unfit for the military career, he was oblisrcd 

 to renounce his birthright in favour of his second 

 brother, and enter the church. The contempt and aver- 

 sion for him, which his parents did not attempt to con- 

 ceal, impressed a gloomy and taciturn character on the 

 hoy. From the charge of his nurse he was transferred to 

 the College d Harcourt, and thence successively to the 

 nary of St. Sulpice and to the Sorbonne. In all of 

 institutions he maintained the character of a shy, 

 !, bookish lad. He showed in after-life a task lor 

 .'tine, and such an extensive acquaintance with and 

 .in of science as sits gracefully on the statesman; 

 and the taste and knowledge must have been acquired at 

 irly acre, for his turbulent career after he was fairly 

 launched into busy life left little leisure for that purpose. 



By the time he had attained his twentieth year his re- 

 putation for talent and his confirmed health appear to 



reconciled the vanity of his parents to the nc.- 

 of acknowledging him. They introduced him to the so- 

 , of his equals in rank for the first time at the festhitics 

 with which the coronation of Louis XVI. was celebrated 

 1774 , under the title of the Abbe de Perigord. His 

 opinions and tastes, and his temperament, combined to 

 '.T the clerical proj'e>sion an object of detestation to 

 him, but he could not escape from it. He availed himself 

 t., the full extent of the indulgence with which his ago 

 and country regarded the irregularities of the young and 

 noble among the priestly order ; but the pride and re- 

 wit h which twenty years of undeserved neglect had in- 

 spired his confident and strong character served him in part 

 moral check. He was a strict observer of the appcnr- 

 :uici-s exacted by the conventional morality of society; 

 and this good taste exerted a powerful influence over his 

 i! future career. Thrown back upon himself from the 

 beginning, he had necessarily become an egoist; vigorous 

 both in mind and body, he had a healthy relish of pleasure, 

 and he engaged with eagerness in the pursuits of pleasure; 

 but the enjoyments of the mere voluptuary were insuf- 

 ficient for one of his intellectual character and fastidious 

 tastes. 



in 1776 Voltaire visited Paris. M. de Talleyrand was 

 introduced to him, and the two interviews he had with him 

 left such a deep impression that he was accustomed to talk 

 of them with a lively pleasure till the close of his life. 

 Voltaire and Fontenelle were M. de Talleyrand's favourite 

 authors ; upon whom he formed his written and still more 

 his conversational style. Conversational talent was in great 

 demand at Paris when he entered the world, and both his 

 love of pleasure and his love of power prompted him to 

 cultivate that which he possessed. That he did so with 

 eminent success the concurrent views of the best judges of 

 his age declare. Excellence of this kind is like excellence 

 in acting : it is impossible to convey an adequate impres- 

 sion of it to postenty. The reporters of flashes of wit and 

 felicitous turns of conversation uniformly communicate to 

 tli'-iii something of their own inferiority, and vulgarise 

 them in the telling. Again, superior excellence in con- 

 ation is an art ; the artist is and ought to be judged 

 not by his materials, but by the success with which he 

 uses them. Written ban mntx are necessarily estimated by 

 their originality, the quantity and quality of thought ex- 

 |,r .1 in them: they are judged as we judge the w 

 ! a poet: whereas the person who introduces them with 



effect in conversation ought to be judged as we judge the 

 actor, of whom we do not think less because he merely 

 says what the poet has put into his mouth. 



The robust and healthy Epicurean who requires the 

 stimulus of intellectual in addition to physical pleasures, 

 is almost inevitably driven to seek the former in the pur- 

 suits of ambition. M. de Talleyrand was no exception to 

 the general rule. And the Abb6 de Perigord must have 

 displayed, even when he was apparently, when perhaps 

 he believed himself to be, living only for pleasure, qualities 

 which inspired a belief in his business capacity ; for in 

 1780, while yet only in his twenty-sixth year, he was ap- 

 pointed general agent of the clergy of France. He dis- 

 charged the functions of this important office for eight 

 years. The Gallic church was all along the most inde- 

 pendent in its relations to the Papal chair of any church 

 that remained in communion with Rome. It was also a 

 powerful church viewed in its relations to the state, of 

 which it formed an element. Its revenue derived from 

 landed property was large, that derived from other sources 

 perhaps still larger : it had regular assemblies in which it 

 legislated for itself, determined what contributions it 

 ought to pay to the state, and in what proportions its 

 members were to be assessed. Here was a wide field for 

 cultivating experimentally a talent for administration. 

 Nor was this all: the dignified clergy of France took an 

 active part in secular politics. There is a passage in the 

 eloge of M. de Heinhard already alluded to, which seems 

 an echo of the impressions received by M. de Talleyrand 

 in this period of his life : I will hazard the assertion 

 that his (M.de Keinhard's) first studies had been an excel- 

 lent preparation for the diplomatic career. The study of 

 theology in particular had endowed him with a power, 

 and at the .same time with a dexterity of ratiocination, 

 which characterise all the documents which have pro- 

 ceeded from his pen. To guard myself against the charge 

 | of indulging in paradox, I must here enumerate the 

 names of some of our most distinguished statesmen, all 

 theologians, and all distinguished in history for the success 

 with winch they conducted the most important political 

 transactions of their times.' And he follows up tha 

 remark with a very respectable list. The general agent 

 of the clergy was their minister of state: and M. de Tal- 

 ; leyrand, while he continued to fill the office, was a power- 

 ful subject, and occupied a conspicuous place in the eye 

 of the public. In 1788 he was appointed bishop of Autiui. 

 The commencement of his political career, in the strict 

 acceptation of the term, is synchronous with this promo- 

 tion. An article upon M. de Talleyrand in an early num- 

 ber of the ' Edinburgh Review ' the materials for which 

 were furnished by Dumont, asserts that he owed his 

 advancement to the see of Autun to a ' Discours sur les 

 Loteries,' which he pronounced in his capacity of agent 

 for the clergy of France, in the Assembly of Notables which 

 met at Versailles, in February, 1787. As bishop of Autun 

 he was a member of the Etats Gfti#raux convoked in ?>Iay, 

 1789, which continued to sit as an Assemblee Constituante 

 till it dissolved itself on the 30th of September, 1791. The 

 interval from the meeting of the Notables till the dissolu- 

 tion of the Assembly is an important one in any attempt 

 to solve the problem of M. de Talleyrand's real character. 

 Previously to the meeting of the States-General, M. de 

 Talleyrand indicated the course he intended to pursue, in 

 a discourse which he addressed to the assembled clergy of 

 his diocese ; and in which he advocated the equality of all 

 citizens in the eye of the law, and free discussion. When 

 the three orders, by assenting to meet as one body, had 

 enabled the Assembly to proceed to business, the pre- 

 cise directions given by many of the bailliages to 

 their deputies were found an impediment in the way 

 of practical legislation : M. de Talleyrand moved that 

 they should be entirely disregarded, and carried his 

 motion. A constituent committee was appointed im- 

 mediately after the capture of the Bastille, and he was 

 the second person nominated a member of it. In this 

 capacity he was called upon to take part in maturing 

 measures which have had a lasting influence upon the 

 progress of affairs in France : the first of these was the 

 re-distribution of the national territory into districts better 

 adapted than the old provinces for the purposes of govern- 

 ment ; the second was, the organization of a system of 

 finance. In the financial discussions which took place in 

 the committee and Assembly, M. de Talleyrand retained 



C2 



