Source:
Memoirs of Christina, Queen of Sweden, volume 1, pages 230 to 233, by Henry Woodhead, 1863; original at the University of Michigan
The account:
The two French Envoys, D'Avaux and Servien, were as quarrelsome as the Swedes. Their disputes were more violent, as might be expected from the more vehement character of their nation; and it required the presence of the Duke de Longueville to restore even common decorum between the rival ministers. Each of them had proved his abilities in former negotiations, and D'Avaux in particular had displayed both patience and judgment in some delicate affairs which had been entrusted to him. His first mission was to Venice in 1627, when he pacified the disputes between that Republic and Urban the Eighth.
Venice had for some time been uncertain in her allegiance to Rome, and had even threatened the total defection of her Church. A very little fanning of the flame would have raised a Protestant State south of the Alps, for several minor powers of Italy sent offers of assistance to the Queen of the Adriatic. The Dutch were ready to take advantage of the opportunity; the Turks also tendered their aid to their old enemies, and prayed and fasted for the continuance of the disunion among Christians. The Pope was reminded by his refractory children that St. Peter founded the Bishopric of Antioch before that of Rome, and that Christ himself had neither exercised nor transmitted any temporal power.
This was not the only occasion on which D'Avaux appeared as a pacificator; it was owing to him in a great measure, that the differences were made up between Sweden and Poland, and he negotiated the truce for twenty-six years between them.
If men of ability, ministers of the same State, who were working for the same objects, disputed in this way, it was not likely they would agree easily with other ministers who represented opposite interests.
The time of the Congress was occupied for two years by quarrels about precedence, before the real negotiations began. The miseries which the people of Germany suffered were almost unexampled; but Christina was the only person in authority who showed any earnest desire for peace.
Sweden had never altogether abandoned the cause of the German Protestants, although religion had long ceased to be her principal object. Religion was also a secondary consideration with France, especially under the government of Richelieu. He supported an heretical State for the avowed purpose of humbling Austria, and had no more sympathy with religious liberty than his antagonists. It was often made a matter of reproach to him that a Cardinal should support heretics against the Church. "This war must cause you great embarrassment", once said the Papal Nuncio to him. "Not at all", replied the Cardinal, "when I was made Secretary of State, his Holiness gave me a dispensation to do anything necessary for the good of France." "But if it concerned giving aid to heretics?" "I think the dispensation even provides for that", said Richelieu.
After his death, in 1642, his enemies complained loudly of the injury done to the Catholic religion by the alliance with Sweden. The French Court wished to depress rather than increase the power of the Protestants, and was very unwilling to sacrifice the Bishoprics of Pomerania to Sweden.
Above: Kristina.
Above: Claude de Mesmes, Count d'Avaux.
Above: Abel Servien.
No comments:
Post a Comment