Chapter VII: My Opposition (2)

Another miscellany, commenced in 1824, and more popular than the 'Revue'--the 'Globe'--bore the same features in a polemic of greater animation and variety. Some young doctrinarians, associated with other writers of the same class, and animated by the same spirit, although with primary ideas and ultimate tendencies of a very different character, were the ordinary editors. Their distinguishing symbols were, in philosophy, spiritualism; in history, intelligent inquiry, impartial and even sympathetic as regarded ancient times and the progressive conditions of human society; in literature, a taste for novelty, variety, liberty, and truth, even under the strangest forms and the most incongruous associations. They defended, or rather advanced their banner with the ardour and pride of youth; enjoying, in their attempts at philosophical, historical, poetical, and critical reform, the satisfaction, at once personal and disinterested, which forms the sweetest reward of intellectual activity; and promising themselves, as always happens, a too extensive and too easy success. Two faults were mingled with these generous aspirations: the ideas developed in the 'Globe' were deficient in a fixed basis and a defined limit; their form was more decided than their foundation; they exhibited minds animated by a noble impulse, but not directed to any single or certain end; and open to an easy, unrestricted course, which excited apprehension that they might themselves drift towards the rocks they cautioned others to avoid. At the same time the spirit of partisanship, inclining men to be wrapped up and isolated in the narrow circle of their immediate associates, without remembering the general public for whom they labour and to whom they speak, exercised too much influence in the pages of the 'Globe.' Turgot intended to write several articles for the 'Encyclopaedia.' D'Alembert came one day to ask him for them. Turgot declined: "You incessantly say _we_," he replied; "the public will soon say _you_; I do not wish to be so enrolled and classed." But these faults of the 'Globe,' apparent today, were concealed, thirty years ago, by the merit of its opposition; for political opposition was at the bottom of this miscellany, and obtained favour for it with many in the party opposed to the Restoration, to whom its philosophical and literary opinions were far from acceptable. In February, 1830, under the ministry of M. de Polignac, the 'Globe,' yielding to its inclination, became decidedly a great political journal; and from his retirement at Carquerannes, near Hyeres, where he had gone to reconcile his labour with his health, M. Augustine Thierry wrote to me as follows:--"What think you of the 'Globe' since it has changed its character? I know not why I am vexed to find in it all those trifling points of news and daily discussion. Formerly we concentrated our thoughts to read it, but now that is no longer possible; the attention is distracted and divided. There are still the same spirit and the same articles, but it is disagreeable to encounter by their side these commonplace and every-day matters." M. Augustine Thierry was right. The 'Globe' sank materially by becoming a political journal, like so many others; but it had not been the less essentially political from its commencement, in tendency and inspiration. Such was the general spirit of the time; and, far from avoiding this, the 'Globe' was deeply impregnated with it.

Even under the controlling influence of the right-hand party, the Restoration made no attempt to stifle this actual but indirect opposition, which they felt to be troublesome though not openly hostile: justice requires that we should remember this to the credit of that epoch. In the midst of the constant alarms excited by political liberty and the efforts of power to restrain it, intellectual freedom maintained itself and commanded respect. This freedom does not supply all the rest; but it prepares them, and, while their accomplishment is suspended, preserves the honour of nations who have not yet learned to conquer or preserve their rights.

While this movement of the mind developed itself and gained strength from day to day, the Government of M. de Villele pursued its course, more and more perplexed by the pretensions and quarrels of the party which its leader vainly endeavoured to restrain. One of my friends, endowed with penetrating and impartial judgment, thus wrote to me in December, 1826, from the interior of his department:--"Men who are at the head of a faction are really destined to tremble before their own shadow. I cannot recollect any time when this nullity of the ruling party was more complete. They do not propound a single doctrine or conviction, or a hope for the future. Even declamation itself seems to be exhausted and futile. Surely M. de Villele must be allowed the merit of being well acquainted with their helplessness; his success springs from that cause; but this I look upon as an instinctive knowledge: he represents without correctly estimating these people. Otherwise he would discover that he might refuse them everything except places and appointments; provided also that he lends himself to no connection with opposite opinions." When the party, proceeding from exigence to exigence, and the Cabinet from weakness to weakness, found themselves unable to act longer together,--when M. de Villele, in November 1827, appealed to an election for defence against his rivals in the Chamber and at Court,--we resolutely encountered our share in the contest. Every opposition combined. Under the motto, _Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera_, "Help thyself, and Heaven will help thee," a public association was formed, in which was comprised men of very different general ideas and definitive intentions, who acted in concert with the sole design of bringing about, by legal measures, a change of the majority in the Chamber of Deputies, and the fall of the Cabinet. I as readily joined them, with my friends, as in 1815 I had repaired alone to Ghent to convey to the King, Louis XVIII., the wishes of the constitutional Royalists. Long revolutions engender two opposite vices, rashness and pusillanimity; men learn from them either to plunge blindly into mad enterprises, or to abstain timidly from the most legitimate and necessary actions. We had openly opposed the policy of the Cabinet; it now challenged us to the electoral field to decide the quarrel: we entered it with the same frankness, resolved to look for nothing beyond fair elections, and to accept the difficulties and chances, at first of the combat, and afterwards of the success, if success should attend our efforts.

In the 'Biography' which Beranger has written of himself, I find this paragraph:--"At all times I have relied too much on the people, to approve of secret associations, in reality permanent conspiracies, which uselessly compromise many persons, create a host of inferior rival ambitions, and render questions of principle subordinate to private passions. They rapidly produce suspicion, an infallible cause of defection and even of treachery, and end, when the labouring classes are called in to co-operate, by corrupting instead of enlightening them.... The society, _Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera_, which acted openly, has alone rendered true service to our cause." The cause of M. Beranger and ours were totally distinct. Which of the two would profit most by the electoral services derived from the society of _Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera_? The question was to be speedily solved by the King, Charles X.

The results of the election of 1827 were enormous; they greatly exceeded the fears of the Cabinet and the hopes of the Opposition. I was still in the country when these events became known. One of my friends wrote to me from Paris, "The consternation of the Ministers, the nervous attack of M. de Villele, who sent for his physician at three o'clock in the morning, the agony of M. de Corbieres,[18] the retreat of M. de Polignac to the country, from whence he has no intention to return, although he may be vehemently requested to do so, the terror at the palace, the ever brilliant shooting-parties of the King, the elections so completely unexpected, surprising, and astounding,--here are more than subjects enough to call for prophecies, and to give rise to false predictions on every consequence that may be anticipated." The Duke de Broglie, absent, like myself, from Paris, looked towards the future with more confident moderation. "It will be difficult," he wrote to me, "for the general sound sense which has presided at these elections not to react, to a certain extent, on the parties elected. The Ministry which will be formed during the first conflict, will be poor enough; but we must support it, and endeavour to suppress all alarm. It has already reached me here, that the elections have produced great apprehensions; if I am not deceived, this terror is nothing more than a danger of the moment. If, after the fall of the present Ministry, we are able to get through the year quietly, we shall have won the victory."

When the Ministry of M. de Villele fell, and the Cabinet of M. de Martignac was installed, a new attempt at a Government of the Centre commenced, but with much less force, and inferior chances of success, than that which in 1816 and 1821, under the combined and separate directions of the Duke de Richelieu and M. Decazes, had defended France and the crown against the supremacy of the right and left-hand parties. The party of the centre, formed at that time under a pressing danger of the country, had drawn much strength from that very circumstance, and either from the right or the left had encountered nothing but animated opposition, but still raw and badly organized, and such as in public estimation was incapable of government. In 1828, on the contrary, the right hand-party, only just ejected from power, after having held it for six years, believed that they were as near recovering as they were capable of exercising office, and attacked with exuberant hope the suddenly created successors who had stepped into their places. In other quarters, the left and the left centre, brought into contact and almost confounded by six years of common opposition, reciprocated mutual understanding in their relations with a Cabinet which they were called on to support, although not emanating from their ranks. As it happens in similar cases, the violent and extravagant members of the party, paralyzed or committed the more moderate and rational to a much greater extent than the latter were able to restrain and guide their troublesome associates. Thus assailed in the Chambers by ambitious and influential rivals, the rising power found there only lukewarm or restrained allies. While from 1816 to 1821 the King, Louis XVIII., gave his sincere and active co-operation to the Government of the Centre, in 1828 the King, Charles X., looked upon the Cabinet which replaced immediately round him the leaders of the right-hand party as an unpleasant trial he was doomed to undergo; but to which he submitted with uneasy reluctance, not believing in its success, and fully determined to endure it no longer than strict necessity compelled.

In this weak position, two individuals, M. de Martignac, as actual head of the Cabinet, without being president, and M. Royer-Collard, as president of the Chamber of Deputies, alone contributed a small degree of strength and reputation to the new Ministry; but they were far from being equal to its difficulties or dangers.

M. de Martignac has left on the minds of all who were acquainted with him, either in public or private life, whether friends or adversaries, a strong impression of esteem and goodwill. His disposition was easy, amiable, and generous; his mind just, quick, and refined, at once calm and liberal; he was endowed with natural, persuasive, clear, and graceful eloquence; he pleased even those from whom he differed. I have heard M. Dupont de l'Eure whisper gently from his place, while listening to him, "Be silent, Siren!" In ordinary times, and under a well-settled constitutional system, he would have been an effective and popular minister; but either in word or act he had more seduction than authority, more charm than power. Faithful to his cause and his friends, he was unable to carry either into government or political debate that simple, fervent, and persevering energy, that insatiable desire and determination to succeed, which rises before obstacles and under defeats, and often controls wills without absolutely converting opinions. On his own account, more honest and epicurean than ambitious, he held more to duty and pleasure than to power. Thus, although well received by the King and the Chambers, he neither exercised at the Tuileries nor at the Palais Bourbon the authority, nor even the influence, which his sound mind and extraordinary talent ought to have given to him.

M. Royer-Collard, on the contrary, had reached and occupied the chair of the Chamber of Deputies through the importance derived from twelve years of parliamentary contest, recently confirmed by seven simultaneous elections, and by the distinguished mark of esteem which the Chamber and the King had conferred on him. But this importance, real in moral consideration, was politically of little weight. Since the failure of the system of government he had supported, and his own dismissal from the State Council by M. de Serre in 1820, M. Royer-Collard had, I will not say fallen, but entered into a state of profound despondency. Some sentences in letters written to me from his estate at Chateau-vieux, where he had passed the summer, will more readily explain the condition of his mind at that time. I select the shortest:--

"_Aug. 1, 1823._--There is no trace of man here, and I am ignorant of what can be found in the papers; but I do not believe there is anything more to hear. At all events, I am careless on the subject. I have no longer any curiosity, and I well know the reason. I have lost my cause, and I much fear you will lose yours also; for you assuredly will as soon as it becomes a bad one. In these sad reflections the heart closes itself up, but without resignation."

"_Aug. 27, 1826._--There cannot be a more perfect or innocent solitude than that in which I have lived until this last week, which has brought M. de Talleyrand to Valencay. It is only through your letter and his conversation, that I am again connected with the world. I have never before so thoroughly enjoyed this kind of life,--some hours devoted to study, the meditations they occasion, a family walk, and the care of a small, domestic administration. Nevertheless, in the midst of this profound tranquillity, on observing what passes, and what we have to expect, the fatigue of a long life entirely wasted in wishes unaccomplished and hopes deceived, makes itself sensibly felt. I hope I shall not give way under it; in the place of illusions, there are still duties which assert their claims."

"_Oct. 22, 1826._--After having thoroughly enjoyed this year of the country and of solitude, I shall return with pleasure to the society of living minds. At this moment that society is extremely calm; but without firing cannon, it gains ground, and insensibly establishes its power. I have formed no idea of the coming session. I believe it to be merely through habit and remembrance, that any attention is yet paid to the Chamber of Deputies. It belongs to another world; our time is still distant, fortune has thrown you into the only course of life which has now either dignity or utility. It has done well for you and for us."

M. Royer-Collard was too ambitious and too speedily cast down. Human affairs do not permit so many expectations, and supply greater resources. We should expect less, and not so soon give way to despair. The elections of 1827, the advent of the Martignac Ministry, and his own situation in the chair of the Chamber of Deputies, drew M. Royer-Collard a little from his despondency, but without much restoring his confidence. Satisfied with his personal position, he supported and seconded the Cabinet in the Chamber, but without warmly adopting its policy; preserving carefully the attitude of a gracious ally who wishes to avoid responsibility. In his intercourse with the King he held the same reserve, speaking the truth, and offering sage advice, but without in the slightest degree conveying the idea that he was ready to put in practice the energetic and consistent policy he recommended. Charles X. listened to him with courtesy and surprise, confiding in his loyalty, but scarcely understanding his words, and regarding him as an honest man tainted with inapplicable or even dangerous ideas. Sincerely devoted to the King, and friendly to the Cabinet, M. Royer-Collard served them advantageously in their daily affairs and perils, but held himself always apart from their destiny as from their acts, and without bringing to them, through his co-operation, the strength which ought to have attached to the superiority of his mind and the influence of his name.

I did not at that time return to public office. The Cabinet made no such proposition to me, and I refrained from suggesting it; on either side we were right. M. de Martignac came from the ranks of M. de Villele's party, and was obliged to keep measures with them; it would not have been consistent in him to hold intimate relations with their adversaries. For my own part, even though I should consider it necessary, I am badly adapted to serve a floating system of policy, which resorts to uncertain measures and expedients instead of acting on fixed and declared ideas. At a distance, I was both able and willing to support the new Ministry. In a close position I should have compromised them. I had, however, my share in the triumph. Without calling me back to exercise the functions of State-Councillor, the title was restored to me; and the Minister of Public Instruction, M. de Vatimesnil, authorized the reopening of my course.

I retain a deep impression of the Sorbonne which I then entered, and of the lectures I delivered there during two years. This was an important epoch in my life, and perhaps I may be permitted to add, a moment of influence on my country. With more care even than in 1821, I kept my lectures free of politics. Not only did I abstain from opposition to the Martignac Ministry, but I scrupulously avoided embarrassing them in the slightest degree. In other respects, I proposed an object to myself sufficiently important, as I thought, to occupy my entire attention. I was anxious to study and describe, in their parallel development and reciprocal action, the various elements of our French society, the Roman world, the Barbarians, the Christian Church, the Feudal System, the Papacy, Chivalry, Monarchy, the Commonalty, the Third Estate, and Reform. I desired not only to satisfy the scientific or philosophic curiosity of the public, but to accomplish a double end, real and practical. I proposed to demonstrate that the efforts of our time to establish a system of equal and legal justice in society, and also of political guarantees and liberties in the State, were neither new nor extraordinary,--that in the course of her history, more or less obscurely or unfortunately, France had at several intervals embraced this design, and that the generation of 1789, grasping it with enthusiasm, had committed both good and evil,--good, in resuming the glorious attempt of their ancestors,--evil in attributing to themselves the invention and the honour, and in believing that they were called upon to create, through their own ideas and wishes, a world entirely new. Thus, while promoting the interests of existing society, I was desirous of bringing back amongst us a sentiment of justice and sympathy for our early recollections and ancient customs; for that old French social system which had lived actively and gloriously for fifteen centuries, to accumulate the inheritance of civilization which we have gathered. It is a lamentable mistake, and a great indication of weakness, in a nation, to forget and despise the past. It may in a revolutionary crisis rise up against old and defective institutions; but when this work of destruction is accomplished, if it still continues to treat its history with contempt, if it persuades itself that it has completely broken with the secular elements of its civilization, it is not a new state of society which it can then form, it is the disorder of revolution that it perpetuates. When the generation who possess their country for a moment, indulge in the absurd arrogance of believing that it belongs to them, and them alone; and that the past, in face of the present, is death opposed to life; when they reject thus the sovereignty of tradition and the ties which mutually connect successive races, they deny the distinction and pre-eminent characteristic of human nature, its honour and elevated destiny; and the people who resign themselves to this flagrant error, also fall speedily into anarchy and decline; for God does not permit that nature and the laws of His works should be forgotten and outraged to such an extent with impunity.

During my course of lectures from 1828 to 1830, it was my prevailing idea to contend against this injurious tendency of the public mind, to bring it back to an intelligent and impartial appreciation of our old social system, to inspire an affectionate respect for the early history of France; and thus to contribute, as far as I could, to establish between the different elements of our ancient and modern society, whether monarchical, aristocratic, or popular, that mutual esteem and harmony which an attack of revolutionary fever may suspend, but which soon becomes once more indispensable to the liberty as well as to the prosperity of the citizens, to the strength and tranquillity of the State.

I had some reason to think that I succeeded to a great extent in my design. My audience, numerous and diversified, youths and experienced men, natives and foreigners, appeared to take a lively interest in the ideas I expounded. These notions assimilated with the general impressions of their minds, without demanding complete subservience, so as to combine the charms of sympathy and novelty. My listeners found themselves, not thrown back into retrograding systems, but urged forward in the path of just and liberal reflection. By the side of my historical lessons, but without concert, and in spite of wide differences of opinion between us, literary and philosophic instruction received from my two friends, MM. Villemain and Cousin, a corresponding character and impulse. Opposite breezes produced the same movement; we bestowed no thought on the events and questions of the day, and we felt no desire to bring them to the attention of the public by whom we were surrounded. We were openly and freely devoted to great general interests, great recollections, and great hopes for man and human associations; caring only to propagate our ideas, not indifferent as to their possible results, but not impatient to attain them; gratified by the intellectual advance in the midst of which we lived, and confident in the ultimate ascendency of the truth which we flattered ourselves we should possess and in the liberty we hoped to enjoy.

It would certainly have been profitable for us, and as I also believe for the country, if this intention could have been prolonged, and if our minds could have fortified themselves in their calm meditations before being once more engaged in the passions and trials of active life. But, as it happens almost invariably, the errors of men stepped in to interrupt the progress of ideas by precipitating the course of events. The Martignac Ministry adopted a moderate and constitutional policy. Two bills, honestly intended and ably discussed, had given effectual guarantees, the one, to the independence of elections, and the other, to the liberty of the press. A third, introduced at the opening of the session of 1829, secured to the elective principle a share in the administration of the departments and townships, and imposed on the central Government new rules and limitations for local affairs. These concessions might be considered too extensive or too narrow; but in either case they were real, and the advocates of public liberty could do nothing better than accept and establish them. But in the Liberal party who had hitherto supported the Cabinet, two feelings, little politic in their character, the spirit of impatience and the love of system, the desire for popularity and the severity of reason, were indisposed to be satisfied with those slow and imperfect conquests. The right-hand party, by refusing to vote, left the Ministry in contest with the wants of their allies. Despite the efforts of M. de Martignac, an amendment, more formidable in appearance than in reality, attacked in some measure the plan of the bill upon departmental administration. With the King, and also with the Chambers, the Ministry had reached the term of its credit; unable to obtain from the King what would give confidence to the Chambers, or from the Chambers what would satisfy the King, it voluntarily declared its impotence by hastily withdrawing the two bills, and still remained standing, although struck by a mortal wound.

How could it be replaced? The question remained in suspense for three months. Three men alone, M. Royer-Collard, M. de Villele, and M. de Chateaubriand seemed capable of forming a new Cabinet that might last, although compounded of very different shades. The two first were entirely out of the question. Neither the King nor the Chambers contemplated the idea of making a Prime Minister of M. Royer-Collard. He perhaps had thought of it himself, more than once, for nothing was too bold to cross his mind in his solitary reveries; but these were merely inward lucubrations, not actually ambitious designs; if power had been offered to him he would assuredly have refused it; he had too little confidence in the future, and too much personal pride, to encounter such a risk of failure.

M. de Villele, still suffering from the accusations first whispered against him in 1828, and which had remained in abeyance in the Chamber of Deputies, had formally refused to attend the session of 1829, and held himself in retirement at his estate near Toulouse; it was evident that he could not return to power, and act with the Chamber that had thrown him out. Neither the King nor himself would have consented, as I think, to encounter at that time the hazard of a new dissolution.

M. de Chateaubriand was at Rome. On the formation of the Cabinet of M. de Martignac he had accepted that embassy, and from thence, with a mixture of ambition and contempt he watched the uncertain policy and wavering position of the Ministers at Paris. When he learned that they were beaten, and would in all probability be compelled to retire, he immediately commenced an active agitation. "You estimate correctly my surprise," he wrote to Madame Recamier, "at the news of the _withdrawal_ of the two bills. Wounded self-love makes men children, and gives them very bad advice. What will be the end of all this? Will the Ministers endeavour to hold place? Will they retire partially or all together? Who will succeed them? How is a Cabinet to be composed? I assure you that, were it not for the pain of losing your society, I should rejoice at being here, out of the way, and at not being mixed up in all these enmities and follies, for I find that all are equally in the wrong.... Attend well to this; here is something more explicit: if by chance the portfolio of Foreign Affairs should be offered to me (and I have no reason to expect it), I should not refuse. I should come to Paris, I should speak to the King, I should arrange a Ministry without being included in it; for myself, I should propose, to attach me to my own work, a suitable position. I think, as you know, that it belongs to my ministerial reputation, as well as to revenge me for the injury I sustained from Villele, that the portfolio of Foreign Affairs should be given to me for the moment. This is the only honourable mode in which I could rejoin the Administration. But that done, I should immediately retire, to the great satisfaction of all new aspirants, and pass the remainder of my life near you in perfect repose."[19]

M. de Chateaubriand was not called to enjoy this haughty vengeance, or to exhibit such a demonstration of generosity. While he still dreamed of it in the Pyrenees, whither he had repaired to rest from the labours of the Conclave which gave Pius VIII. as successor to Leo X., the Prince de Polignac, brought over from London by the King, arrived in Paris on the 27th of July; and on the 9th of August, eight days after the closing of the session, his Cabinet was officially announced in the 'Moniteur.' What course would he propose to himself? What measures would he adopt? No one could tell; not even M. de Polignac and the King themselves any more than the public. But Charles X. had hoisted upon the Tuileries the flag of the Counter-Revolution.

Politics soon became the absorbing consideration of every mind. From all quarters a fierce struggle was foreseen in the approaching session; all parties hastened to congregate beforehand round the scene of action, seeking to draw some anticipation as to what would occur, and how to secure a place. On the 19th of October, 1829, the death of the learned chemist, M. Vauquelin, left open a seat in the Chamber of Deputies, in which he had represented the division of Lisieux and Pont-l'Eveque, which formed the fourth electoral district in the department of Calvados. Several influential persons of the country proposed to substitute me in his place. I had never inhabited or even visited that province. I had no property there of any kind. But since 1820, my political writings and lectures had given popularity to my name. The young portions of the community were everywhere favourably disposed towards me. The Moderates and active Liberals mutually looked to me to defend them, and their cause, should occasion arrive. As soon as the proposition became known at Lisieux and Pont-l'Eveque, it was cordially received. All the different shades of the Opposition, M. de La Fayette and M. de Chateaubriand, M. Dupont de l'Eure and the Duke de Broglie, M. Odillon Barrot and M. Bertin de Veaux, seconded my candidateship. Absent, but supported by a strong display of opinion in the district, I was elected on the 23rd of February, 1830, by a large majority.

At the same moment M. Berryer, whose age, as in my own case, had until then excluded him from the Chamber of Deputies, was elected by the department of the Higher Loire, where a seat had also become vacant.

On the day following that on which my election was known in Paris, I had to deliver my lecture at the Sorbonne. As I entered the hall, the entire audience rose and received me with a burst of applause. I immediately checked them, and said: "I thank you for your kind reception, by which I am sensibly affected. I request two favours of you; the first is to preserve always the same feelings towards me; the second is, never to evince them again in this manner. Nothing that passes without should resound within these walls. We come here to treat of pure, unmingled science, which is essentially impartial, disinterested, and estranged from all external occurrences, important or insignificant. Let us always maintain for learning this exclusive character. I hope that your sympathy will accompany me in the new career to which I am called; I will even presume to say that I reckon upon it. Your silent attention here is the most convincing proof I can receive."

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 18: He was, in fact, extremely ill at the moment of this crisis.]

[Footnote 19: February 23rd, and April 20th, 1829.]