T.OUIS XIV. 



553 



These writings, besides other historical matter, con- 

 tain information respecting the system of corruption 

 practised by Louis XIV., even at German courts, e. 

 g. at Berlin. The Memoires and Pieces militaires, 

 which constitute the third and fourth volumes of the 

 work, relate to the campaigns of 1672 IGTS^and 

 that of 1692. In Grimoard's preface, they are said 

 to be not unimportant for the history of the war. 

 The letters of Louis, in the two last vols. of this 

 work, are mostly of little consequence. The polite- 

 ness and dignity with which this proud king writes 

 to his ministers and generals are remarkable. This 

 delicate tone was then general, and gave to language 

 and manners that agreeable refinement which made 

 Paris so attractive. 



Political Occurrences during this Reign. The 

 most splendid period of the reign of Louis XIV. ex- 

 tended from the peace of the Pyrenees, concluded by 

 Mazarin, in 1659, to the death of the great Colbert, 

 in 1683. That peace, however, lasted only till 1665, 

 when Louis, on the death of his father-in-law, Philip 

 IV., king of Spain, laid claim to the Spanish Nether- 

 lands, by virtue of the right of devolution, as it was 

 called (which was a private law in part of the 

 Netherlands, but could by no means be considered 

 the rule of succession to the government of these 

 states). Holland, therefore, concluded, in 1668, a 

 triple alliance with Britain and Sweden, for the 

 preservation of the Netherlands, of which alliance, 

 although Louis was victorious in two campaigns, the 

 peace of Aix-la-Chapelle was the result. Louis 

 retained, indeed, the conquered places in the Nether- 

 lands, but was compelled to abandon his intentions 

 on the country at large, and, as he attributed this to 

 the triple alliance, he resolved on a retaliatory war 

 against Holland, having previously succeeded in se- 

 parating Britain and Sweden from their connexion 

 with the republic, and uniting them with himself. 

 This war, undertaken without regard to the commerce 

 of France, to which it was very detrimental, and in 

 which Spain, the German emperor and Brandenburg 

 also engaged against France, continued from 1672 

 till the peace of Nimeguen, concluded 1678 and 

 1679, in which Holland lost nothing, while Louis 

 XIV. received from Spain, Burgundy (the Franche 

 Comte), which the king of Spain had previously held, 

 as an appurtenance to the circle of Burgundy, under 

 the sovereignty of the German empire, and sixteen 

 places in the Netherlands. Louis lost, in this war, 

 his two greatest generals, Turenne and Conde' ; the 

 former fell at Sasbach, in 1675 ; the latter retired in 

 1676, on account of his feeble health. Louis, how- 

 ever, still had Catinat, Crequi, Luxembourg, Schom- 

 burg, and Vauban. After the peace of Nimeguen, 

 it would have been politic for Louis to have ceased 

 prosecuting, for a while, his plans of aggrandizement; 

 but he renewed, immediately after, the reunions, as 

 they were called. In the three treaties of peace, a 

 number of places, with all their appurtenances, had 

 been ceded to France, though it had not been decided 

 what really did pertain to them. Louis, therefore, 

 established, in 1680, chambers of reunions at Metz 

 and Brisach, whose office it was to accord him, under 

 the form of right, every thing that could be considered 

 in any way as belonging to those places. France, in 

 this manner, acquired large districts on the borders 

 of the Netherlands and of Germany. Louis would 

 also gladly have obtained Strasburg, but, as even 

 the chambers of reunions could start no formal claim 

 to it. this important place was quietly surrounded by 

 soldiers, and compelled to surrender, in 1681, without 

 a blow. Spain and the German empire protested 

 against this act, but both found it expedient, in 1684, 

 to enter into a twenty years' truce with Louis XIV., 

 by which this monarch obtained, for that time, besides 



Strasburg, all the places reunited prior to August 1. 

 1681. Meanwhile, Colbert had died, in 1683. From 

 this time, France declined with the same rapidity 

 that it had risen under his administration. The first 

 blow it received, was the revocation of the edict of 

 Nantes, October 22, 1685, after several years' oppres- 

 sions of the Protestant party, by which measure the 

 kingdom lost 700,000 of its most valuable subjects. 

 To this measure the king was led by the united exer- 

 tions of the two parties of the court, in other respects 

 opposed to each other the parties of the minister 

 Louvois and of Maintenon, who co-operated with the 

 generally benevolent confessor of the king, Lachaise. 

 Colbert, to his death, had opposed the adoption of 

 violent measures, which might induce the Protestants 

 to emigrate. France was, soon after, involved in a 

 new war. Several circumstances gave Louis XIV. 

 and Louvois opportunity, in spite of the twenty years' 

 truce, to enter the field anew. The war which Louis 

 now waged from 1688 to 1697, against Germany, 

 Holland, Spain, Savoy, and Britain, was terminated 

 by the peace of Ryswick, in which Louis resigned all 

 the reunions, and in addition, ceded to Germany, 

 Brisach, Friburg, Kehl, and Philipsburg, besides a! 1 the 

 smaller fortresses erected by France on the German 

 side of the Rhine. Although, throughout the war, 

 Louis was conqueror rather than conquered, he was 

 bent on peace. The exhaustion of his kingdom, and 

 especially the fear that a continuance of the war 

 might frustrate his views on the Spanish succession, 

 compelled him to yield. The death of Charles II., 

 king of Spain, to which Louis had long looked forward, 

 took place at the end of 1700. Louis had already 

 concluded treaties of partition, with respect to the 

 Spanish succession, with Britain and Holland ; but 

 Charles 1 1., by a secret testament, had designated 

 the grandson of Louis, Philip of Anjou, as heir of the 

 whole monarchy, to the disadvantage of the house of 

 Austria, in which the inheritance was legitimately 

 vested. On the enforcement of this testament Louis 

 insisted, after the death of Charles, and was thus 

 involved in the Spanish war of succession, 1702 13, 

 which he precipitated by acknowledging the British 

 pretender (son of James II.,) in violation of the peace 

 of Ryswick. The finances of Louis were in great 

 disorder ; he had also lost many of his great men in 

 the cabinet and field ; while on the other hand, his 

 numerous enemies Britain, Holland, the emperor 

 and the German empire, Prussia, Portugal, and 

 Spain could oppose to him two of the greatest 

 generals Eugene and Marlborough. France suffered 

 greatly by this war, which was terminated by the 

 treaty of Utrecht, in 1713, and those of Rastadt and 

 Baden, in 1714, brought about by the concurrence 

 of severnl circumstances favourable to France, espe- 

 cially by the change that took place in the political 

 system of Britain, in 1710, after Louis had several 

 times proffered peace, without success, on account of 

 the hard terms insisted on by his enemies. Louis 

 made, indeed, some concessions to Britain, Holland, 

 and Savoy, but saw his grandson acknowledged as 

 king of Spain, under the name of Philip V. This, 

 however, was connected with the condition of a 

 renunciation, which should prevent the possibility of 

 any future union of the Spanish and French crowns. 

 The internal prosperity of the kingdom was totally 

 ruined by this war, of which the expenses, in the 

 year 1712 alone, amounted to 825,000,000 livres. 

 The great army which he kept on foot, was what 

 chiefly excited and nourished in Louis the love of 

 conquest. He maintained a larger standing army 

 than any other prince of his time. It rose from 14O 

 to 300,000 men. Respecting the policy of Louis 

 XIV. the following is the language of Flassan: 

 "The cabinet of Louis XIV., notwithstanding the 



