|
THE MEMOIRS OF MARIE ANTOINETTE - V1
THE MEMOIRS OF MARIE ANTOINETTE - V1 MADAME CAMPAN [NOTE: There is a short list of bookmarks or pointers at the end of the
file for those who may wish to sample the author's ideas before making an
entire meal of them. D.W.]
MEMOIRS OF THE COURT OF MARIE ANTOINETTE QUEEN OF FRANCE
Being the Historic Memoirs of Madam Campan
First Lady in Waiting to the Queen
BOOK 1.
PREFACE BY THE AUTHOR.
Louis XVI. possessed an immense crowd of confidants advisers and
guides; he selected them even from among the factions which attacked him.
Never perhaps did he make a full disclosure to any one of them and
certainly he spoke with sincerity to but very few. He invariably kept
the reins of all secret intrigues in his own hand; and thence doubtless
arose the want of cooperation and the weakness which were so conspicuous
in his measures. From these causes considerable chasms will be found in
the detailed history of the Revolution.
In order to become thoroughly acquainted with the latter years of the
reign of Louis XV. memoirs written by the Duc de Choiseul the Duc
d'Aiguillon the Marechal de Richelieu
[I heard Le Marechal de Richelieu desire M. Campan who was
librarian to the Queen not to buy the Memoirs which would certainly
be attributed to him after his death declaring them false by
anticipation; and adding that he was ignorant of orthography and
had never amused himself with writing. Shortly after the death of
the Marshal one Soulavie put forth Memoirs of the Marechal de
Richelieu.]
and the Duc de La Vauguyon should be before us. To give us a faithful
portrait of the unfortunate reign of Louis XVI. the Marechal du Muy
M. de Maurepas M. de Vergennes M. de Malesherbes the Duc d'Orleans
M. de La Fayette the Abby de Vermond the Abbe Montesquiou Mirabeau
the Duchesse de Polignac and the Duchesse de Luynes should have noted
faithfully in writing all the transactions in which they took decided
parts. The secret political history of a later period has been
disseminated among a much greater number of persons; there are Ministers
who have published memoirs but only when they had their own measures to
justify and then they confined themselves to the vindication of their
own characters without which powerful motive they probably would have
written nothing. In general those nearest to the Sovereign either by
birth or by office have left no memoirs; and in absolute monarchies the
mainsprings of great events will be found in particulars which the most
exalted persons alone could know. Those who have had but little under
their charge find no subject in it for a book; and those who have long
borne the burden of public business conceive themselves to be forbidden
by duty or by respect for authority to disclose all they know. Others
again preserve notes with the intention of reducing them to order when
they shall have reached the period of a happy leisure; vain illusion of
the ambitious which they cherish for the most part but as a veil to
conceal from their sight the hateful image of their inevitable downfall!
and when it does at length take place despair or chagrin deprives them
of fortitude to dwell upon the dazzling period which they never cease to
regret.
Louis XVI. meant to write his own memoirs; the manner in which his
private papers were arranged indicated this design. The Queen also had
the same intention; she long preserved a large correspondence and a
great number of minute reports made in the spirit and upon the event of
the moment. But after the 20th of June 1792 she was obliged to burn
the larger portion of what she had so collected and the remainder were
conveyed out of France.
Considering the rank and situations of the persons I have named as
capable of elucidating by their writings the history of our political
storms it will not be imagined that I aim at placing myself on a level
with them; but I have spent half my life either with the daughters of
Louis XV. or with Marie Antoinette. I knew the characters of those
Princesses; I became privy to some extraordinary facts the publication
of which may be interesting and the truth of the details will form the
merit of my work.
I was very young when I was placed about the Princesses the daughters of
Louis XV. in the capacity of reader. I was acquainted with the Court of
Versailles before the time of the marriage of Louis XVI. with the
Archduchess Marie Antoinette.
My father who was employed in the department of Foreign Affairs enjoyed
the reputation due to his talents and to his useful labours. He had
travelled much. Frenchmen on their return home from foreign countries
bring with them a love for their own increased in warmth; and no man was
more penetrated with this feeling which ought to be the first virtue of
every placeman than my father. Men of high title academicians and
learned men both natives and foreigners sought my father's
acquaintance and were gratified by being admitted into his house.
Twenty years before the Revolution I often heard it remarked that the
imposing character of the power of Louis XIV. was no longer to be found
in the Palace of Versailles; that the institutions of the ancient
monarchy were rapidly sinking; and that the people crushed beneath the
weight of taxes were miserable though silent; but that they began to
give ear to the bold speeches of the philosophers who loudly proclaimed
their sufferings and their rights; and in short that the age would not
pass away without the occurrence of some great outburst which would
unsettle France and change the course of its progress.
Those who thus spoke were almost all partisans of M. Turgot's system of
administration: they were Mirabeau the father Doctor Quesnay Abbe
Bandeau and Abbe Nicoli charge d'affaires to Leopold Grand Duke of
Tuscany and as enthusiastic an admirer of the maxims of the innovators
as his Sovereign.
My father sincerely respected the purity of intention of these
politicians. With them he acknowledged many abuses in the Government;
but he did not give these political sectarians credit for the talent
necessary for conducting a judicious reform. He told them frankly that
in the art of moving the great machine of Government the wisest of them
was inferior to a good magistrate; and that if ever the helm of affairs
should be put into their hands they would be speedily checked in the
...
|
