Historical Characters

With a firm conviction, indeed, of the necessity of this peace, he took the best and only course for maintaining it. An ordinary diplomatist is occupied with the thousand small affairs passing through his hands, and the thousand ideas of more or less importance connected with them. M. de Talleyrand’s great talent, as I have more than once said, was in selecting at once in every affair the most important question of the moment, and in sacrificing, without delay or scruple, whatever was necessary to attain his object with respect to that question.

He saw that the peaceful acceptance of the Orleans’ dynasty could be obtained, and could only be obtained, by being on good terms with England. A quarrel with us was an European war; a good understanding with us rendered such a war unlikely, almost impossible. Belgium was the especial question on which all earlier negotiations turned, and on which the amity of our government depended. That country, smarting under many real, and irritated by the thought of many fancied, grievances, had thrown off the Dutch yoke. The Dutch troops, who with a little more vigour might have been victorious, had retreated, beaten, from Brussels; the frontier fortresses were in the hands of the insurgents, and it is no use disguising the fact that there was, is, and ever will be, a considerable party in France in favour of extending the French frontier, and comprising Antwerp within the French dominions. England, however, was not then disposed, and probably will not at any time be disposed, with statesmen caring for the safety of their country, to submit to this. She had, in fact, as I have said at the peace of 1814, provided especially, as she thought, for the safety of the Netherlands, by the amalgamation of the Belgian and Dutch provinces into one kingdom, and by the fortresses which she had built or repaired for protecting that kingdom.

This policy was now overthrown, and could not be reconstructed without exciting the warlike and excited spirit of the French people. On the other hand, we could only make a limited sacrifice to French susceptibility and ambition. Much skill then was necessary on the part of all persons, but more especially on the part of the French negotiator, to avoid any serious wound to the interests of the one nation, or to the feelings of the other. There was a call, in short, for the steadiest discretion without any change of purpose; and all through the various phases of those long negotiations, by which jarring questions were finally composed, M. de Talleyrand warily persevered in his plan of planting the new government of France amongst the established governments of Europe through its alliance with Great Britain.

The establishment of conferences in London was one of the most artful of the measures adopted with this end. Here the ambassador of Louis Philippe was brought at once, and in union with the Cabinet of St. James’, into almost daily and intimate communication with the representatives of the other great powers. A variety of misrepresentations were removed, and a variety of statements made, not merely useful for the questions which were especially under discussion, but for the general position and policy of the State which the veteran diplomatist represented.

The quadruple alliance – an alliance of the western and constitutional governments of Europe – was, in fact, a mere extension of the alliance between France and England, and a great moral exhibition of the trust placed by the parties themselves in that alliance. With this remarkable and popular compact – a compact which embodied the best principles on which an Anglo-French alliance can be formed – the diplomatic career of M. de Talleyrand closed. He felt, as he himself said, that there “is a sort of space between death and life, which should be employed in dying decently.”

The retirement of Lord Grey removed from the scene of public affairs in England that generation which, long accustomed to the reputation of a man who had filled half a century with his name, treated both himself and his opinions with the flattering respect due to old remembrances. To the men of the new government he was, comparatively speaking, a stranger. The busy time of their career he had passed in seclusion from affairs. They considered him, in a certain degree, as antiquated and gone by: a sentiment which he was keen enough to detect, and sensitive enough to feel deeply.

His opinions, indeed, became somewhat embittered by certain affronts or negligences of which, during the latter part of his embassy, he thought he had to complain; and, after his retirement, it is said that he rather counselled his royal master to consider that the advantages sought for in an alliance with England were obtained, and that the future policy of France should be to conciliate other powers.

VII

At all events M. de Talleyrand, during his mission in England, not only sustained his previous reputation, but added very considerably to it. What struck the vulgar, and many, indeed, above the vulgar, who did not remember that the really crafty man disguises his craft, was the plain, open, and straightforward way in which he spoke of and dealt with all public matters, without any of those mysterious devices which distinguish the simpleton in the diplomacy from the statesman who is a diplomatist. In fact, having made up his mind to consider the English alliance at this time essential to his country, he was well aware that the best and only way of obtaining it was by such frank and fair dealing as would win the confidence of British statesmen.

Lord Palmerston told me that his manner in diplomatic conferences was remarkable for its extreme absence of pretension, without any derogation of authority. He sat, for the most part, quiet, as if approving: sometimes, however, stating his opinion, but never arguing or discussing; – a habit foreign to the natural indolence which accompanied him throughout his active career, and which he also condemned on such occasions, as fruitless and impolitic: “I argue before a public assembly,” he used to say, “not because I hope to convince any one there, but because I wish my opinions to be known to the world. But, in a room beyond which my voice is not to extend, the attempt to enforce my opinion against that which another is engaged to adopt, obliges him to be more formal and positive in expressing his hostility, and often leads him, from a desire to shine in the sense of his instructions, to go beyond them.”

Whatever M. de Talleyrand did, therefore, in the way of argument, he usually did beforehand, and alone, with the parties whom he was afterwards to encounter, and here he tried to avoid controversy. His manner was to bring out the principal point in his own opinion, and present it to the best advantage in every possible position.

Napoleon complained of this, saying, he could not conceive how people found M. de Talleyrand eloquent. “Il tournait toujours sur la même idée.”79 But this was a system with him, as with Fox, who laid it down as the great principle for an orator who wished to leave an impression.

He was apt, however, to ask to have a particular word or sentence, of which he had generally studied the bearing and calculated the effect, introduced into a paper under discussion, and from the carelessness with which he made the request it was usually complied with. There was something in this silent way of doing business, which disappointed those who expected a more frequent use of the brilliant weapons which it was well known that the great wit of the day had at his command. But in the social circle which he wished to charm, or with the single individual whom he wished to gain, the effect of his peculiar eloquence generally overran the expectation.

M. de Bacourt, who was secretary to his embassy in London, informed me “that M. de Talleyrand rarely wrote a whole despatch,” but that a variety of little notes and phrases were usually to be found in his portfolio. When the question which these notes referred to had to be treated, they were produced, and confided to him (M. de Bacourt), who was told the general sense of the document he was to write, and how such memoranda were to be introduced. Finally, a revisal took place, and the general colouring, which proved that the despatch came from the ambassador, and not from his chancery, was fused over the composition. As a general rule in business, M. de Talleyrand held to the rule, that a chief should never do anything that a subaltern could do for him.

“You should always,” he used to say, “have time to spare, and rather put off till to-morrow what you cannot do well and easily to-day, than get into that hurry and flurry which is the necessary consequence of feeling one has too much to do.”

I have painted the subject of this sketch personally in his early life. Towards the close of his existence, the likenesses of him that are common are sufficiently resembling. His head, with a superfluity of hair, looked large, and was sunk deep into an expanded chest. His countenance was pale and grave, with a mouth, the under-lip rather protruding, which formed itself instantly and almost instinctively into a smile that was sarcastic without being ill-natured. He talked little in general society, merely expressing at intervals some opinion that had the air of an epigram, and which produced its effect as much from the manner with which it was brought out, as from its intrinsic merit. He was, in fact, an actor, but an actor with such ease and nonchalance that he never seemed more natural than when he was acting.

His recorded bon mots, of which I have given some, have become hackneyed, especially the best. But I will venture to mention a few that occur to me, as I am writing, and which are remarkable as expressing an opinion concerning an individual or a situation.

When the Comte d’Artois wished to be present at the councils of Louis XVIII., M. de Talleyrand opposed the project. The Comte d’Artois was offended, and reproached the minister. “Un jour,” said M. de Talleyrand, “Votre Majesté me remerciera pour ce qui déplaît a Votre Altesse Royale.”

M. de Châteaubriand was no favourite with M. de Talleyrand. He condemned him as an affected writer, and an impossible politician. When the “Martyrs” first appeared, and was run after by the public with an appetite that the booksellers could not satisfy, M. de Fontanes, after speaking of it with an exaggerated eulogium, finished his explanation of the narrative by saying that Eudore and Cymodocée were thrown into the circus and devoured “par les bêtes.” “Comme l’ouvrage,” said M. de Talleyrand.

Some person saying that Fouché had a great contempt for mankind, “C’est vrai,” said M. de Talleyrand, “cet homme s’est beaucoup étudié.”

There is a certain instinct which most persons have as to their successor; and when some one asked M. de Talleyrand a little before the Duc de Richelieu, governor of Odessa, was appointed prime minister in his own country, whether he, M. de Talleyrand, really thought that the Duc was fit to govern France, he replied, to the surprise of the questioner, “Most assuredly;” adding, after a slight pause, “No one knows the Crimea better.”

A lady, using the privilege of her sex, was speaking with violence of the defection of the Duc de Raguse. “Mon Dieu, madame,” said M. de Talleyrand, “tout cela ne prouve qu’une chose. C’est que sa montre avançait et tout le monde était à l’heure.”

A strong supporter of the chamber of peers, when there was much question as to its merits, said, “At least you there find consciences.” “Ah, oui,” said M. de Talleyrand, “beaucoup, beaucoup de consciences. Semonville, par exemple, en a au moins deux.”

Louis XVIII., speaking of M. de Blacas before M. de Talleyrand had expressed any opinion concerning him, said, “Ce pauvre Blacas, il aime la France, il m’aime, mais on dit qu’il est suffisant.” “Ah oui, Sire, suffisant et insuffisant.”

As Madame de Staël was praising the British Constitution, M. de Talleyrand, turning round, said in a low, explanatory tone, “Elle admire surtout l’habeas corpus.”

One evening at Holland House the company had got into groups, talking over some question of the moment in the House of Commons; and thus M. de Talleyrand, left alone, got up to go away, when Lord Holland, with his usual urbanity, following him to the door, asked where he was going so early. “Je vais aux Travellers, pour entendre ce que vous dites ici.”

We could prolong almost indefinitely this record of sayings from which M. de Talleyrand, notwithstanding his many services and great abilities, derives his popular and traditional reputation: but, in reality, they belong as much to the conversational epoch at which he entered the world, as to himself.

VIII

On quitting England, he quitted not only diplomacy, as I have said, but public life, and passed the remainder of his days in the enjoyment of the highest situation, and the most agreeable and cultivated society, that his country could afford.

His fortune and ability might now, according to the Grecian sage, be estimated; for his career was closed; and, as the old sought his saloon as the hearth on which their brighter recollections could be revived, so the young were glad to test their opinions by the experience of “the politic man,” who had passed through so many vicissitudes, and walked with a careless and haughty ease over the ruins of so many governments, at the fall of which he had assisted. He himself, with that cool presence of mind for which he was so remarkable, aware that he had but a few years between the grave and himself, employed them in one of his great and constant objects, that of prepossessing the age about to succeed him in his favour, and explaining to those whom he thought likely to influence the coming generation, the darker passages of his brilliant career. To one distinguished person, M. Montalivet, who related to me the fact, he once said: “You have a prejudice against me, because your father was an Imperialist, and you think I deserted the Emperor. I have never kept fealty to any one longer than he has himself been obedient to common sense. But, if you judge all my actions by this rule, you will find that I have been eminently consistent; and where is there so degraded a human being, or so bad a citizen, as to submit his intelligence, or sacrifice his country, to any individual, however born, or however endowed?”

This, indeed, in a few words, was M. de Talleyrand’s theory; a theory which has formed the school, that without strictly adhering to the principle that common sense should be the test of obedience, bows to every authority with a smile and shrug of the shoulders, and the well-known phrase of “La France avant tout.”

Shortly previous to his last illness he appeared (evidently with the intention of bidding the world a sort of dignified adieu) in the tribune of the Institute. The subject which he chose for his essay was M. Reinhard, who had long served under him, and was just dead, and between whom and himself, even in the circumstance of their both having received an ecclesiastical education, there was some sort of resemblance. The discourse is interesting on this ground, and also as a review of the different branches of the diplomatic service, and the duties attached to each – forming a kind of legacy to that profession of which the speaker had so long been the ornament.

IX

“Gentlemen, —80

“I was in America when I was named a member of the Institute, and placed in the department of moral and political sciences, to which I have had the honour of being attached ever since it was first established.

“On my return to France, I made it my principal object to attend its meetings, and to express to my new colleagues, many of whom we now so justly regret, the pleasure it gave me to find myself one of their number. At the first sitting I attended, the bureau was being renewed, and I had the honour of being named secretary. During six months, I drew up, to the best of my ability, the minutes of the proceedings, but my labours betrayed perhaps a little too plainly my diffidence, for I had to report on a work, the subject of which was new to me. That work, which had cost one of our most learned colleagues many researches, many sleepless nights, was ‘A Dissertation on the Riparian Laws.’ It was about the same period that I read at our public meetings several papers, which were received with such indulgence as to be thought worthy of being inserted in the memoirs of the Institute. But forty years have now elapsed, during which I have been a stranger to this tribune; first, in consequence of frequent absence; then from duties, to which I felt bound to devote my whole time and attention; I must also add, from that discretion, which, in times of difficulty, is required of a man employed in public affairs; and finally, at a later period, from the infirmities, usually brought on, or at least aggravated, by age.

“At the present moment, I feel myself called upon to perform a duty, and to make a last appearance before this Assembly, in order that the memory of a man, known to the whole of Europe; – of a man whom I loved, and who, from the very foundation of the Institute, has been our colleague, should receive here a public testimony of our esteem and regret. His position with respect to my own furnishes me with the means of speaking with authority of several of his merits. His principal, but I do not say his only, claim to distinction, consists of a correspondence of forty years, necessarily unknown to the public, and likely to remain so for ever. I asked myself, ‘Who will mention this fact within these walls? who, especially, will consider himself under the obligation of directing your attention to it, if the task be not undertaken by me, to whom the greater part of this correspondence was addressed, to whom it always gave so much pleasure, and often so much assistance in those ministerial duties, which I had to perform during three reigns … so very different in character?’

“The first time I saw M. Reinhard, he was thirty, and I thirty-seven, years of age. He entered public life with the advantage of a large stock of acquired knowledge. He knew thoroughly five or six languages, and was familiar with their literature. He could have made himself remarkable as an historian, as a poet, or as a geographer; and it was in this last capacity that he became a member of the Institute, from the day it was founded.

“Already at this time he was a member of the Academy of Sciences of Göttingen. Born and educated in Germany, he had published in his youth several pieces of poetry, which had brought him under the notice of Gesner, Wieland, and Schiller. He was obliged at a later period to take the waters of Carlsbad, where he was so fortunate as to find himself frequently in the society of the celebrated Goethe, who appreciated his taste and acquirements sufficiently to request to be informed by him of everything that was creating a sensation in the French literary world. M. Reinhard promised to do so; engagements of this kind between men of a superior order are always reciprocal, and soon become ties of friendship; those formed between M. Reinhard and Goethe gave rise to a correspondence, which is now published in Germany.

“We learn from these letters that when he had arrived at that time of life, when it is necessary to select definitively the profession for which one feels most aptitude, M. Reinhard, before making his final decision, reflected seriously upon his natural disposition, his tastes, his own circumstances and those of his family; and then made a choice singular at that time, for instead of choosing a career that promised independence, he gave the preference to one in which it is impossible to secure it. The diplomatic career was selected by him, nor is it possible to blame him; qualified for all the duties of this profession, he has successively fulfilled them all, and each with distinction.

“And I would here venture to assert that he had been successfully prepared for the course he adopted by his early studies. He had been remarked as a proficient in theology at the Seminary of Denkendorf, and at that of the Protestant faculty of Tübingen, and it was to this science especially that he owed the power, and at the same time the subtlety, of reasoning, that abounds in all his writings. And to divest myself of the fear of yielding to an idea which might appear paradoxical, I feel obliged to bring before you the names of several of our greatest diplomatists, who were at once theologians and celebrated in history for having conducted the most important political negotiations of their day. There was the chancellor, Cardinal Duprat, equally skilled in canon and civil law, who established with Leo X. the basis of the Concordat, of which several articles are still retained. Cardinal d’Ossat, who, in spite of the efforts made by several great powers, succeeded in effecting a reconciliation between Henry IV. and the Court of Rome. The study of his letters is still recommended at the present day to young men who are destined for political life. Cardinal de Polignac, a theologian, poet and diplomatist, who, after so many disastrous campaigns, was able to preserve, by the treaty of Utrecht, the conquests of Louis XIV. for France.

“The names I have just mentioned appear to me sufficient to justify my opinion that M. Reinhard’s habits of thought were considerably influenced by the early studies to which his education had been directed by his father.

“On account of his solid, and, at the same time, various acquirements, he was called to Bordeaux, in order to discharge the honourable but modest duties of a tutor in a Protestant family of that city. There he naturally became acquainted with several of those men whose talents, errors, and death have given so much celebrity to our first legislative assembly. M. Reinhard was easily persuaded by them to devote himself to the service of France.

“It is not necessary to follow him step by step through all the vicissitudes of his long career. In the succession of offices confided to him, now of a higher, now of a lower order, there seems to be a sort of inconsistency and absence of regularity, which, at the present day, we should have some difficulty in conceiving. But, at that time, people were as free from prejudice with respect to places as to persons. At other periods, favour, and sometimes discernment, used to confer situations of importance. But, in the days of which I speak, every place had to be won. Such a state of things very quickly leads to confusion.

“Thus, we find M. Reinhard first secretary of legation at London; occupying the same post at Naples; minister plenipotentiary to the Hanseatic towns of Hamburg, Bremen, and Lübeck; chief clerk of the third division in the department of foreign affairs; minister plenipotentiary at Florence; minister of foreign affairs; minister plenipotentiary to the Helvetian Republic; consul-general at Milan; minister plenipotentiary to the Circle of Lower Saxony; president in the Turkish provinces beyond the Danube, and commissary-general of commercial relations in Moldavia; minister plenipotentiary to the King of Westphalia; director of the Chancellerie in the department of foreign affairs; minister plenipotentiary to the Germanic Diet and the free city of Frankfort; and, finally, minister plenipotentiary at Dresden.

“What a number of places, of charges, and of interests, all confided to one man, and this at a time when it seemed likely that his civil talents would be less justly appreciated, inasmuch as that war appeared to decide every question.

“You do not expect me, gentlemen, to give here a detailed account of all M. Reinhard’s labours in the various employments, which I have just enumerated. This would require a volume.

“I have only to call your attention to the manner in which he regarded the duties he had to perform, whether as chief clerk, minister, or consul.

“Although M. Reinhard did not possess at that time the advantage which he might have had a few years later of being able to study excellent examples, he was already perfectly aware of the numerous and various qualities that ought to distinguish a chief clerk in the foreign office. A delicate tact had made him feel that the habits of a chief clerk ought to be simple, regular, and retired; that, a stranger to the bustle of the world, he ought to live solely for his duty, and devote to it an impenetrable secrecy; that, always prepared to give an answer respecting facts or men, he must have every treaty fresh in his memory, know its historical date, appreciate its strong and weak points, its antecedents and consequences, and finally be acquainted with the names of its principal negotiators, and even with their family connections; that, in making use of this knowledge, he ought, at the same time, to be cautious not to offend a minister’s self-esteem, always so sensitive, and, even when he should have influenced the opinion of his chief, to leave his success in the shade; for he knew that he was to shine only by a reflected light. Still, he was aware that much consideration would be the reward of so pure and modest a life.