King de France.
Magnified by the ones, disparaged by the others, the reign of Louis XIV (sometimes called Louis the Large one) is one longest of the French history: fifty four years of personal reign, 1661 to 1715.
It is identified with the apogee of the monarchical absolutism, the triumph of the classicism illustrated by Versailles, and with the radiation of French civilization, that of the “Great century”, out of its borders.
However, the “century of Louis XIV”, who started in the disorders of the Sling, unceasingly mixed splendors with the glory of the Sun king with heavy miseries of the people. And France of Louis the Large one did not show itself not always adapted to the formidable requirements for a personality whose policy aimed at obtaining obedience inside and supremacy outside.
An awaited birth Louis Dieudonné, who is born on on September 5th, 1638 with Saint-Germain-in-Bush hammer, is for a long time desired. The union of the king Louis XIII and the queen Anne of Austria, devoted in 1615, had indeed still not given of heir to the throne to France. Louis is not five years old when his/her father dies, on on May 14th, 1643, a few months only after the death of the “principal minister”, the cardinal of Richelieu. Anne of Austria, become rules over, called upon the collaboration of a close relation of the cardinal, Mazarin, the godfather of the young king, who contributes narrowly to his political education.
The period which opens into 1643 announces difficult. France has been committed for eight years in the Thirty Year old war - against the empire of Habsbourg and Spain, always threatening at the borders. If the treaties of Westphalia put an end, in 1648, with the hostilities with the Empire, the war against Spain will be still prolonged until 1659. This engagement wanted by Richelieu requires a large tax effort of the French, who are recalcitrant, and supposes acceptance, difficult, of Protestant alliance. The popular revolts against the tax always thunder when Louis becomes king - without being able to reign, because it is too young -, and the time of regency sees the tumultuous ambitions of large kingdom giving each other free course. In this climate of disorders - in particular through the tests of the Sling -, the character of the young king is forged.
The education of the king
The education of the future Louis XIV is not neglected, even if the experiment counts sometimes more for him that the books. Of his mother, Spanish, it receives the taste of a certain magnificence, the direction of a rigorous label, the practice of a devotion applied - reconciled a long time with the profane appetites and the sexual intercourse. Mazarin teaches him the European intrigues, art to buy the consciences and to control, the role, finally, of the diplomatic marriages.
Marked by the Sling (1648-1652)
The disorders of the Sling teach to him more still: driven out from Paris at ten years by the parliamentary Sling, travelling then in faithful provinces, rebels or, it withdraws these tests the conviction that one needs a monarchical authority without division, on the one hand, a universal mistrust and a marked taste of the dissimulation, on the other hand. When it can finally return to Paris, with the autumn 1652 - it is old then fourteen years -, it makes stop the cardinal schemer of Retz before even the return of Mazarin: here are which announces the style of government authoritative and given which will be it his.
Eager of the power
The desire of Louis to be “in all points the Master” is supported by his great power of work and its excellent physical resistance - which recalls to many regards the vitality of its grandfather Henri IV. The high idea that it is made its function of king expresses through its direction of the control, its cold courtesy and its art of the production. Anxious to concentrate all the power between its hands, it takes care well not to be let influence by its many mistresses - such Miss of Vallière or Mrs. de Montespan -, even if Mrs. de Maintenon, that it marries secretly in 1683, after the death of the Marie-Therese queen, plays a discrete part at the end of her life. In the same way, it takes care to refuse any load, any command likely to really distinguish the members from his family, in particular with her brother Philippe (Mister), duke of Orleans, in undoubtedly remembering his uncle, Gaston of Orleans, eternal plotter at the time of Richelieu and the Sling.
Catch in hand of the kingdom
Before really reigning, to give the full measurement of his qualities and his “Pharaonic pride” (according to the expression of E. Lavisse), Louis XIV benefits from a life from pleasures and festivals. He lets the Mazarin cardinal restore the monarchical authority and consolidate the situation external of France of 1653 to 1661. Peace with Spain - advantageous for France: it received Artois and Roussillon - is sealed by the marriage of the king and the Marie-Therese infante of Spain in 1660 with Saint-Jean-of-Luz. With the death of Mazarin, in March 1661, the bases of the power of Louis the Large one are in place.
The State of the kingdom after Mazarin
In spite of the wars and the Sling, France of 1661 seems a rich country of its men and their work.
Demography
With nearly 20 million inhabitants, France is the first European demographic power. But the life remains fragile there, and strong mortality: on two newborns, only one arrives at the adulthood. Sometimes the tribute poured with death is done heavier still. The demographic crises - that of 1661-1664, at the time of the advent, that of 1693-1694, or the tragic winter 1709-1710 -, caused by the famines, the dearness of the grain due to bad harvests and the bad weather, the epidemics, constitute the painful back of the decoration louis-quatorzien. But, after the crises, recovery is carried out quickly, and miseries always do not prevail in the same way in the provinces. The country, which satisfied the heavy tax requirements with Richelieu then with Mazarin, can still support the weight of the wars of Louis XIV.
Economy
The richness of France, mainly agricultural, benefits the shareholders more from the ground - lords and clergy - which with the farming community (85 % of the population), which practices a food, cereal agriculture essentially, deeply dependant on the natural environment and suffering of heavy handicaps (few or not manure, reduced cattle, poor exchanges). As for the foreign trade, he makes rather general great strides to the XVII E century, which accelerates in the years 1660, under the leadership of Colbert, and which contributes to stimulate a rural industry, in particular textile. Seconds compared to agriculture, foreign trade and industry are not therefore secondary. Their development prepares, in spite of the wars and the difficulties related to the general recession of the XVIIe century, the growth of the next century.
Absolutism
The shortly after the death of Mazarin (March 10th, 1661), Louis XIV joins together his Council to announce that it will only control from now on, without Prime Minister. This declaration - that it will evoke ten years later in its Memories for the instruction of the Dolphin - constitutes a major political act; she announces the complete recasting of the system of government, the “maxim of the order” that the king intends to implement.
The royal Council
Louis starts by purifying the royal Council. He does not suffer there any more but one reduced governmental personnel, of which certain “trusty servants” bequeathed by Mazarin, surrounded by some specialized clerks. One thus finds there the Séguier chancellor - whose authority is decreased -, the Secretary of State to the War, Michel Tellier, the secretary of foreign affairs, Hugues de Lionne, and the superintendent of Finances, Nicolas Fouquet. This last, too rich and too powerful, is very quickly ousted by Colbert, which is jealous of it for a long time. Its arrest, on on September 5th, 1661, is followed, a few days later, of the suppression of the load of superintendent and the creation of a council of Finances placed under the leadership of Colbert, which becomes general inspector in 1665. The triad the Tellier-Lioness-Colbert sits with the king with the Council of in top (most important) and deals with the re-establishment of the order during the eleven years of peaces - if one excludes the “military walk” of the war of Devolution, in 1667-1668 - which open the personal reign of Louis XIV. Colbert cumulates the functions - superintendence of the Building industries, Arts and Manufactures in 1664, secretariat of State to the Navy and the House of the king in 1669 -, but the diplomacy and the army remain out of its influence. The king indeed takes care to divide for better reigning.
The “reign of the cheap middle-class”
Throughout the reign of Louis XIV, the ministerial personnel will remain relatively stable, the king supporting the rise of two or three dynasties, sometimes concurrent, faithful servants who follow one another the various stations of government: Tellier-Louvois, Colbert, secondarily Phélypeaux. Tellier associates his/her Louvois son with his ministry since 1662, and its station yields to him when it is called with the chancellery in 1677; Colbert associates his/her son, the marquis de Seignelay, with the Navy. All these men, who owe their power to the king, come families from the commercial or financial middle-class ennobled recently; they incarnate with the eyes of an aristocracy which tends to scorn them the “reign of the cheap middle-class” (the expression is of Saint-Simon).
Introduction of the order
Louis XIV writing in his Memories, with some exaggeration, that “the disorder reigned everywhere” inside its kingdom at the time of its advent. The control of the intermediate bodies of the State, the monitoring of the provincial administration, the domestication of the nobility thus were essential. Very quickly, the courses sovereign are reduced to obedience, the Parliaments must record the edicts without deliberation nor vote (1665). The assembly of the clergy is narrowly controlled, the subdued nobility. The governors of province, traditionally selected in the nobility, do not occupy any more that one honorary load and must reside at the court; they are replaced on the ground by general lieutenants, of minor nobility. In the areas of turbulence, like Auvergne, the king makes send an extraordinary commission of the Parliament of Paris to judge and punish the armed robbery of the lords (Great days of Auvergne, 1665-1666). As for Paris - city with extreme seditions, of which the king is wary at the point of not to make his capital -, it is placed, in 1667, under the jurisdiction of a general lieutenant of police force in charge of, the monitoring maintenance of law and order of manners and regular provisioning. The institution of the lieutenants of police force, which proves reliable, will be generalized at the big cities of the kingdom in 1699.
Administration and repression
In this work of maintenance of law and order, the intendants of justice, police force and finances, chosen by the king in his Council and always revocable, occupy an essential place. For the needs for the great investigation of 1664, which marks the birth of statistical description in France, Colbert assigns a role of advisers to them. From the years 1680, they become permanent administrators in the general information, where they seem truly “the eye and the arm of the king”; thus reinforcement of administrative monarchy, started at the time of Richelieu, it is completed. The authoritative framing also strikes the people, of which the revolts, sudden starts despaired against misery or the tax, are done fewer. When they occur - in Bolted in 1662, in Vivarais in 1670, Brittany in 1675 -, they are pitilessly repressed.
Reform legislation
Methodical will of reorganization and administrative standardization of the kingdom led to an important reform of the legislation, illustrated by the drafting of six great codes, whose civil ordinance or Codes Louis (1667), the ordinance of National Forestry Commission (1669), bases our current forest right, the criminal ordinance (1670), the colonial ordinance or “Codes black” (1685), which regulates the draft of the Blacks in the triangular traffic. But the implementation of these texts is done slowly, and the imperfections of an administrative system complexes will remain until the end of the reign, in spite of the centralizing efforts of the State.
Court
No doubt the reign of Louis XIV carries the life of court at its point of perfection. Governed by a strict label, attended by a crowd increasingly more avid courtiers of pensions, honors and of royal recognition, the court seems an instrument of reign, the means of domesticating the nobility. The monarchical worship is celebrated there daily, of the rising to sleeping of the sovereign; all is ritualized there, so as to emphasize ostentation, the power and the character crowned of Louis the Large one. The sumptuous festivals of the first part of the personal reign, to the service of which Molière or Lully put all their talent, also contribute to this celebration.
The importance of the life of court results in the development of the services of the House of the king: the Chaplaincy, the Room of the king, the Wardrobe, the Large one and the Small Stable, the Mouth, Hunting. At their head the representatives of the nobility are placed, which, deprived of real political powers, are in a narrow moral and financial dependence with respect to the monarch: the king exempts the incomes necessary for the “behavior of the row” and the payment of the gambling debts.
Courtiers
Of this obliged attachment, there remain many testimonies. “Lord, far from you one is not only unhappy, one is ridiculous”, affirms the marquis de Vardes. The duke of Richelieu, nephew of the cardinal, makes him echo: “I like as much to die to be two or three months without seeing the king!” These declarations, for excessive and flatterers which they are, show the political direction of Louis XIV, his art of the representation of the power to cause obedience. One understands at which point a disgraced courtier his distance of the court hard - was could feel a free thinker like the count de Bussy-Rabutin, author of a History in love with Gaules which the king did not have good fortune to like. The Memories of the Palatine Princess, those of Saint-Simon, the relations of diplomats like Primi Visconti or the Spanheim Prussian testify to this political role of the life of court, but also of the exploitation of human vanity and the dictatorship of appearances which characterize it.
Versailles
Versailles of course forms the ECRIN of this life of court, though the king liked and embellished other residences, like Marly. Old the appointment of hunting of Louis XIII becomes, at the cost of long work, the new capital of the kingdom as from 1682. The architects Vau and Mansart, Ours for the gardens and the Brown one for the decorations illustrate themselves there; they are the best ambassadors of the glory and the power of the Sun king out of the borders of the kingdom. But this policy of magnificence causes reserves at least at one of the servants of the king, Colbert.
The policy according to Louis XIV
Under the feather of Louis XIV, the most frequent terms are “my dignity”, “my glory”, “my size”, “my reputation”. These concerns announce an ambitious foreign policy, which supposes finances and an economy in order; in a word: a rich king of France in a rich kingdom. Colbert will devote all its energy to give to its sovereign the means of such an ambition. It carries out the essence of its work before 1672; after, the results of its policy, followed in a secular context of crisis and monetary food shortage, will be called into question by the priority granted to the “outside” - to the war.
The role of Colbert
The primary goal of Colbert consists in restoring the balance of the budget, thanks to a reduction of the loads and with a better output of the taxation. In ten years, it carries out a saving in several million books while decreasing or by cancelling the revenues and the interests of the Government loans contracted under Richelieu and Mazarin. It removes and repurchases a certain number of offices in order to save on the payment of their pledges. After the ousting of the Fouquet superintendent and the liquidation of its clan, Colbert made be held a Room of justice (1662-1669), jurisdiction charged to seek and punish the embezzlements of people of Finances. The Treasury thus manages to be made refund a hundred million books.
Colbert methodically endeavors not to reform in-depth an unjust tax system, but to increase the receipts by them. If it decreases the personal size - which had strongly increased since 1635 -, it makes hunting for the undue privileges, in particular for the freedom from tax of the noble forgeries, and takes care to restore the incomes of the royal field. The results are not made wait: since 1662, the budget presents a surplus, situation which will be maintained until the beginning of the war of Holland, in 1672. In ten years, the public revenues make more than to double.
The threatened budget
But the policy of prestige of the king will contribute to ruin these efforts. Years 1670 see returning the budget deficit, which becomes then the rule. Permanent anticipations of the expenditure make increasingly vain the behavior of a true budget. To finance an aggressive foreign policy, as well as work of the king and the court, Colbert must again increase the direct taxes and indirect, and resort to the extraordinary expédients, or “business”, like the sales of offices, the alienation of the royal field, the loans with the private individuals, the taxes. In 1680, the creation of the general Farm makes it possible the Treasury to touch in advance, and in block, the incomes of the indirect taxes - which are leased, i.e. conceded against standard charge with sixty farmers general. But the system worsens the arbitrary one of their perception. With some bitterness, after twenty years of service and already in a semi-disgrace, Colbert is addressed to the king in 1681 thus: “With regard to the expenditure, though that looks at me of nothing, I beg only V.M. to allow myself to say to him that in war and peace she never consulted her finances to solve her expenditure.” This respectful recall sounds unpleasantly with the ears of a monarch dreaded in all Europe and then with the ridge of its glory.
Colbertism
The financial reorganization tried by Colbert does not have a direction that within the framework of an overall economic policy. Like many its contemporaries, Colbert thinks that the quantity of noble metal in circulation in the world is about constant. The richness and the power of a State being measured with the quantity of had cash, it thus acts, by an adapted policy, to attract and retain inside the kingdom the most possible noble metal: that amounts buying little outside - to import little - and exporting much. The colbertism is not as well as a misadventure of the mercenary attitude, doctrines spread since the XVI E century in many countries of Europe.
The development of manufactures to the prestigious productions - as that of the Goblins (created in 1667), which manufactures tapestries of high stringer, or manufactures it Van Robais (installed in France in 1665, at the request of Colbert), which produces fine cloths - and the will to regulate the activities of the urban corporations are to be replaced from this point of view. The importance of the foreign trade explains the attention given to the development of the fleet and the ports; it justifies the installation of companies of trade for better benefitting from the “islands with sugar” (the Antilles) and from the “grounds with spices”, and profiting from the active exchanges in the Mediterranean or in the Baltic. Contrary, to protect the French productions from British and Dutch competition, prohibitory customs tariffs are set up in 1664 and 1667. A true “money war” is thus engaged. When the conflict bursts with Holland, in 1672, the ambitions of Louis XIV thus meet the aspirations of its minister, extremely eager to lower the United Provinces, qualified “republic of cheesemongers”.
Europe with the idle
The half-failure of Colbert, illustrated after 1675 by the disappearance of several manufactures and the liquidation of certain companies of trade, is not to charge entirely to the policy of magnificence of Louis XIV. The general slump which touches Europe, the indifference of the holders of capital towards manufactures and the great maritime trade, the frightening power of the English and Dutch trade constitute powerful brakes with the French ambitions. However, the rise of the littoral areas represents a rich success of promises.
Louis XIV and the religion
The Church and the State The youth of Louis XIV - who laughs with the Sanctimonious hypocrite of Molière, when the excessively pious people disparage it violently - gives the indication of a moderately pious sovereign. In the force of the age, it will post its piety more. However, there is not a doubt that very early, Louis XIV had understood the importance of Christian glory and religious obedience for his trade of king. The absolutism is based clearly on a monarchy of divine right, strongly theorized by Bossuet in its Policy drawn from the Holy Scripture. Anxious to defend the unit of faith of his kingdom, attentive to preserve his authority on the Church of France, Louis XIV does not hesitate to be opposed to papacy, nor to fight against Jansenists and Protestants.
Against the puritanism
Narrow association enters the Church and the State made of all “heresy” a seditious dissidence. With his advent, the king is already very hostile to the Jansenists - these “calvinists rebouillis” as calls them Mazarin -, whose loyalty and “spirit of innovation” appear suspect to him. To reduce these austere and pessimistic catholics to obedience, the Council of the king requires in April 1661 the signature by the priests, the monks and the nuns of a form repudiating the doctrines Jansenist. The opposition to this form meets an echo even within the episcopate, however controlled traditionally well by the monarchy, which has habit to place its faithful there. In 1668, the peace of the Church puts temporarily fine at the public controversies, but does not regulate anything on the bottom.
Until expulsion of the nuns and with the destruction of the convent in 1709-1710, Port-Royal-of-Fields constitutes the hearth of radiation of the doctrines of the Jansénius bishop, and especially of the “second puritanism”, inspired of the theses of the father oratorien Quesnel. Anxious and always also hostile, Louis XIV obtains from the pope a judgment of the puritanism (Unigenitus bubble, 1713) which causes at once a sharp opposition in France. The quarrel, which is not extinct with the death of the king, will still agitate the spirits to the XVIII E century.
Louis XIV and papacy
In the years 1690, the growing old king will be able to discount of Rome a certain support for his religious policy. But, before, the assertion of its independence is worth sharp conflicts with the pope to him. The business of levels, in 1673, is one of most serious: for tax reasons, the king decides to extend to the whole of the kingdom his right, hitherto limited, to manage the incomes of the dioceses in the event of vacancy of the episcopal see. The intransigence of the pope Innocent XI enables him to exploit the gallicanism of the clergy of France. With the declaration known as “of the Four Articles”, the assembly of the clergy of 1682 proclaims the superiority of the council on the pope, the need for defending “freedoms gallicanes” and the absolute independence of the king towards Rome. With the death from Innocent XI, in 1689, the end of the conflict can be considered; a reconciliation, desired by Versailles, starts.
The Revocation of the Edict of Nantes
The Protestants have also to suffer from the authoritarianism of Louis the Large one. In his Memories, the king affirms to want to maintain the tolerance towards reformed in the “narrower terminals” permitted by the edict of Nantes (1598), re-examined by that of Ales (1629). In spite of the loyalty of Huguenot during the Sling, Protestantism - minority but represented in all the mediums, of the nobility to the farming community - remains indeed an anomaly with the eyes of the majority of the catholics, who believe in the unit of faith of the kingdom.
The period 1661-1679 sees the restrictive application of the edict of Nantes. However, the multiplication of the annoyances and vexations brings back to Catholicism only a few thousands of converts. From 1679 in October 1685, when the edict of Fontainebleau is signed - which revokes that of Nantes -, the policy of Louis XIV hardens. In truth, the king needs to appear as the champion of Catholicism per hour when the emperor Léopold I er has just demolished the Turks besieging Vienna (1683), which got an immense prestige in Europe to him. Moreover, since the war of Holland, Louis runs up against the coalition of the Protestant powers (England, United Provinces), traditional supports of Huguenot French. Lastly, Colbert, in favor of the tolerance, because he knows the weight of reformed in the economy of the kingdom, dies in 1683. He leaves the free field to the clan Tellier-Louvois, follower in the strong way. Gradually emptied of any substance by the interdicts, the “Protestant republic” succumbs to the dragonnades, launched in 1680 in South-west, which cause hundreds of thousands of forced conversions. Almost everyone applauds, except Vauban. Can an absolute monarch be the Master of the consciences?
The exodus of the Protestants
No matter what the flatterers of the sovereign say some, the effects of this religious despotism are eminently debatable. The Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, in 1685, makes lose with the kingdom approximately 200 ' 000 reformed: they leave to enrich Protestant Europe. The “Huguenot refuge” of Holland contributes to the diffusion of a virulent hostile propaganda with Louis XIV. Moreover, on the diplomatic level, France alienates the Protestant powers, without being certain rallying of the catholics - taking into account his expansionist policy. The passive resistance of the “new converts” and more still the revolt of the Calvinist partisans in the Cevennes (1702-1705), in full war of succession with Spain, show that the protesting fact is irreducible. It will have to be waited until 1787 so that returns the tolerance.
Louis XIV, warlike king
“I liked the war too much”, the king acknowledges on his bed of death. From 1661 to 1715, one counts only twenty-three years of peace, for thirty and one years of wars. The true motivation of the king - beyond the reinforcement of the borders of the kingdom, of the defense of Catholicism, even of the fight against the Spanish ambitions - is the will to affirm and increase French supremacy in Europe. Louis the Large one believes and wants to be the most powerful monarch of the Earth, as its currency proclaims it: Nec pluribus impar (“Nonunequal with several ”).
Reorganization of the armies
The king has the taste of the weapons: he likes to review his troops, does not hesitate to appear in charge of his armies - as at the time of the seats of the war of Devolution. He profits from the contest from ministers, military chiefs and engineers brilliant, at least in the first part of his reign. Turenne, adviser listened until his death, in 1675, and the Large Cop, who disappears in 1686, are two of the more great men of war of the time. The reorganization of the troops, under the aegis of Tellier then of his/her Louvois son, gives to Louis XIV the first European army, the average soldiers of its will of glory: manpower increase quickly, passing from 72 000 men in 1667 with more than 200 000 in 1680; the discipline is reinforced, the maintenance of the soldiers improved (quartermaster's stores to avoid plunderings; construction of military hospitals; hotel of the Invalids created in 1674), the modernized armament (generalization of rifle and the bayonet, grenades); the artillery becomes a specialized body.
In 1672, Vauban, general police chief with the fortifications, are put in charge of the Genius. In forty years, it directs about fifty seats successfully and strengthens on the circumference of the kingdom nearly 300 places. “City besieged by Vauban, city taken; city strengthened by Vauban, impregnable city”, one said then.
Lastly, even if it hardly has the marine foot, the king supports Colbert and his Seignelay son in their efforts to give to the kingdom a navy able to compete with the Dutchmen and the English. And, until in the years 1690, in the middle of the war of the league of Augsburg, the French squadrons with the offensive gain bright successes.
The time of the victories
When Louis XIV goes up on the throne, the treaties of Westphalia (1648) and the Pyrenees (1659) have just given to France, then allied in England, in Sweden and the United Provinces, supremacy on imperial and Spanish adversaries exhausted: “All was calm in all places (...). Peace was established with my neighbors probably for as a long time as I would like it myself”, notes it. Since 1661, the young king expresses his intention to make recognize in whole Europe the absolute preeminence of the crown of France. In 1661 and 1662, two quarrels of precedence, one with the ambassador of Spain about his row in an official procession vis-a-vis the ambassador of France, the other at the court of the pope, give the measurement of superb royal. Beyond these assertions symbolic systems, true supremacy will come from the weapons.
Territorial claims
Death, in 1665, of Philippe IV of Spain, which weak Charles II succeeds, is the occasion for Louis XIV to assert part of the Spanish heritage in the name of the queen of Marie-Therese France, girl of Philippe IV and grand-daughter, by her mother, of Henri IV. After having invaded without difficulty the Spanish Netherlands and having conducted a brilliant campaign, the king obtains with the treaty of Aachen (1668) eleven places of the North, of which Lille, that it hastens to make strengthen by Vauban.
France, referee of Europe
But this French advance worries the United Provinces, then first economic power of Europe and soon regarded as the adversary to cut down. Since 1667, the commercial war had burst, especially turned against Holland, with the adoption of a customs tariff striking the foreign imports heavily. After four years of diplomatic and military preparation, Louis XIV attacks then invades the United Provinces, which resist obstinately and succeed in uniting against France the Empire, Spain and Lorraine. In 1678-1679, the peace of Nimègue devotes the French victory over ground and sea: Spain must yield the Franche-Comté and several cities of Flandres, Hainaut and Artois; the kingdom of Louis has from now on a continuous border thus in the North-East. In same time, France consolidates its influence on Alsace, vis-a-vis the Empire. Louis XIV, who defends Sweden against Brandebourg, in 1679, seems the referee of Europe. However, it did not draw a revenge bright on Holland, which left the war certainly exhausted, but released from the customs tariff on 1667.
The integration of the conquered territories
After 1679, the king continues his advantage by exploiting all ambiguities of the treaties allowing fastening France of dependences of the territories acquired recently. This policy of “meetings”, illustrated in 1681 by the capitulation of Strasbourg, hitherto free city, worries the European powers, which start to tie alliances. The Turkish push on Vienna diverts one moment the attention towards the Eastern borders of threatened Christendom, but the victory of Kahlenberg (1683), acquired without participation of Louis XIV, illustrates the found power and the prestige of Habsbourg. Not very anxious to take the head of a holy league against the Turks, Louis risked the insulation of its kingdom. In 1684 however, with enough Ratisbon, Spain and the Empire recognize in France the pleasure of its meetings for one twenty years duration. It is the summit of the French expansion, “the apogee of this reign”, Saint-Simon will say.
Reverses of the war
Against the league of Augsburg
Four years after Rastibonne, the war of the league of Augsburg bursts. Louis XIV had indeed put forward as of 1685 his claims on Palatinat (the Palatine Princess, marries of Sir, was the sister of the late Voter), makes elect his candidate as archbishop of Cologne in 1687 and revoked the edict of Nantes in 1685: as many provocations with regard to the Imperial ones, and awkwardnesses with respect to the Protestant powers. The rise of the colonial and maritime trade French causes moreover, in England, the dissatisfaction with the Parliament and business world, increasingly hostile with catholic king Jacques II Stuart, combined of Louis XIV. When, with the autumn 1688, the French Armies invade Cologne and devastate Palatinat, the Sun king engages in a difficult part. He is vis-a-vis the league of Augsburg, which joins together since 1686 the emperor, of many princes d' Empire, the sovereigns of Spain and Sweden, which joined in 1688 William of Orange, the chief of the United Provinces, who will become king d' Angleterre at the conclusion of the “glorious revolution” in 1689. The balance of the forces makes last this conflict a long time, during which France passes through the demographic serious attack of 1693-1694. To save essence, Louis XIV, who was not truly defeated, returns the “meetings” to the treaties of Ryswick (1697), but preserves Strasbourg and obtains the valley of the Saar.
A Bourbon on the throne of Spain
Though exhausted, France can start a rather fast rectification during the few years of respite which follow, and this in a very poor economic situation however. But the death of Charles II of Spain, in 1700, raises once again the question of European balance and leads to the most difficult war of the reign. The declining health of Charles II, king without posterity, had sharpened covetousnesses of the various powers on immense Spanish Empire (Spain, Netherlands, America, Milanais, Naples, Sicily…). In 1698, a treaty of division of the succession of Spain had been signed between France, England and the United Provinces, where Louis showed moderation by considering the granting with the Large Dolphin of only some territories. But Charles II did not recognize these divisions and, to avoid the dismemberment of his possessions, chooses like single heir, in October 1700, the second grandson of Louis XIV, Philippe, duke of Anjou, provided that it gave up the throne of France. Was Louis XIV to accept the will of king d' Espagne, with the risk to start a new war? The dynastic considerations, the desire to see a Bourbon on the Spanish throne and to put an end to the old surrounding of Habsbourg carried it.
Coalition against France and Spain
The aspiration with the peace of the people of Europe, tested per so many conflicts, undoubtedly retains England and the United Provinces, which recognize the heir designated by Charles, Philippe V. But the provocations of Louis XIV lead very quickly to the generalized war. With the beginning of the year 1701, it makes proclaim the maintenance of the rights of Philippe V to the crown of France. More worrying for the interests of the block anglo-Dutch, then in full imperialist competition, France is made grant important privileges in the Spanish colonies. In spring of 1702, all the European, large or small powers, joined together in Large the Alliance of $the Hague, declare the war in France and Spain.
After some initial successes, French and Spanish many reverses undergo. This time, the coalition aligns military chiefs of value, like the Marlborough English or prince Eugene of Savoy, vis-a-vis Villars whose talent does not equalize that of Turenne nor that of the Large Cop. After 1704, the list of the defeats lengthens; 1708, one of the darkest years, with the fall of Lille, sees returning the spectrum of the invasion. The terrible winter of 1709 worsens the situation of a kingdom which the taxes crush and which threat the famine. Decided to treat, the king cannot however accept the too heavy requirements of united: destruction of Dunkirk, loss of the cities of North, Strasbourg and Alsace and, especially, military aid of France to drive out Philippe V of the throne of Spain.
The hour of the treaties
From now on propped up on the iron belt of Vauban, the French Armies hold about the national ground; the victory of Villaviciosa over the Anglo-Austrians, in 1710, and especially the lassitude of the English public opinion make finally possible the peace negotiations. The tergiversations of the Empire and the Netherlands leave even time in France to gain the victory of Denain (1712), thanks to what it obtains unhoped-for conditions: Louis XIV signs the treaties of Utrecht (1713) and Rastatt (1714), under the terms of which Spain loses its Italian possessions (Milanese, Naples, Sicily) and the Netherlands, but Philippe V remains king. France must restore several Flemish cities, but preserves its borders of 1697. It gives up Newfoundland, Hudson Bay, Acadie, is a prelude to with the total loss of Canada (1763). England triumphs; it obtains many economic advantages which will ensure the colonial and maritime primacy to him.
In 1661, the French preponderance was essential on Europe; in 1714 came time from European balance between England, Austria and France of a very old king.
Assessment of a contrasted reign
France of 1715 territorialement leaves increased wars Louis XIV, but its finances are bloodless. End of the reign, marked by royal mournings (of the descendants of the king, only a great-grandson born remains in 1710), dark in sadness. The Examination of conscience of a king (1711), work of the bishop Fénelon, the reports of the intendants, the memories of the priests draw the picture of a sorry kingdom and an appalling country misery. In the campaigns and the ports, of the forces however prepare the return of the expansion. Beyond the difficult life of 20 million French, who does remain of a so long reign?
The century of Louis XIV is identified with the radiation of French civilization, with the triumph of the classicism in the letters (Boileau, poetic Art, 1674), in the representational arts and architecture, even if it should be recalled that all the great minds of the time are not French (Locke, Leibniz, Spinoza), and that the baroque finds to open out elsewhere, in Austria or Spain. The politics of grandeur of the king was accompanied by a prestigious policy of patronage, in the right line of that practiced by Richelieu and Mazarin: Corneille, Molière, Root, Lully, the painters the Brown one and Mignard, Mansart, to quote only these names, illustrate the devotion for the “beautiful one” and the creative intensity of the time. Academies - of painting and sculpture, 1655; inscriptions, 1663; sciences, 1666; of architecture, 1671 -, created in imitation of the French Academy, constitute hearths of development of the traditional rules and radiation of an entire official art turned towards monarchical glory.
Towards a critic of the power
The “century of Louis XIV” - expression forged by Voltaire - indicates also a political model. When he dies, on on September 1st, 1715, the old king leaves in France a solid braces administrative, strongly centralized. Its image of military, dynastic, political size is envied by many sovereigns; however, its contempt of the financial contingencies and the blindness to which pride led it sometimes deteriorated this image towards the end of its life. In a limited aristocratic sphere, the absolutism is criticized. The aristocratic reaction, animated in particular by Fénelon (Tables of Chaulnes, 1711), will make Regency a monarchy controlled by the general states and the bodies. At the end of the reign also, the state intervention of Colbert is saved any more neither by the traders nor by the partisans of liberalism (Boisguilbert), and Vauban, disgraced, points the inequalities of the tax system hard (Project of a tithe royal, 1707). Times of absolute obedience are not completely completed, but the persistence of the religious tensions, the rise of scientific curiosity, the popularization of Cartesian rationalism (Fontenelle, Pierre Bayle) nourish the rise of a critical spirit promised with a bright future.
The French classicism
The century of Louis XIV is marked by the prevalence of the classicism, that the royal will imposes in all the fields. For the realization of the colonnade of Louvre, the Sun king will prefer with the baroque project - however relatively quietened down - of Bernin the rigor of a Claude Perrault. Versailles, whose work will continue during almost all the reign (then beyond), will be looked like a model at the same time size and of “good taste”, imitated through all Europe.
After the disgrace of Fouquet, “its” artists, who worked with Be worth-the-Viscount, but also with the castle of Saint-Mandé (destroyed since) - Vau, the Brown one, Ours, but also the Puget sculptor -, will work for the greatest glory of the king; Molière will be in charge of the royal entertainments (only the Fountain, faithful to the superintendent, will be held away from the royal favor, even if, classic author par excellence, it contributes largely to the defense of an esthetics wanted by the king). Complete patron, Fouquet had his own tapestry workshop, directed by the Brown one, in Maincy: Louis XIV seizes so much works which the craftsmen and entrusts to Brown the organization of the royal manufacture of the Goblins, which will produce, in addition to tapestries, pieces of furniture and parts of goldsmithery, and will contribute to direct the style of decorative arts in general.
Arts are in addition subjected to the standards established by the royal Academy of painting and sculpture, wanted by Mazarin the French Academy following the example of, which, it, governs the letters, since its creation by Richelieu in 1634.
Living rooms
The living rooms, in imitation of that of the marchioness of Rambouillet, develop considerably: one likes to meet between people of taste, to discuss the arguments there of the ones and others; one comments on there also the reviews and the newspapers - the Newspaper of the scientists, the Gazette or Mercury -, the plays which are played the hotel of Burgundy or Palais Royal; one discusses there the new troop of the Comédie-Française, founded around 1680 by the fusion of the various companies. And, of course, one speaks there also literature, whose traditional ideal finds its more imposing expression under Louis XIV. Boileau formulates the rules of them: it is necessary to choose its models in Antiquity, to reach with universal while being based on the reason, to contain brutal passions by a perfect self-control. Molière, who profits from royal protection, gives her noble letters to the comedy, while, in the field of the tragedy, Racine dethrones Corneille, and that Mrs. de Sévigné, Bossuet, Rochefoucauld, Mrs. of Fayette give to the French letters of the pages among most brilliant. Towards the end of the reign, the Heather and Fénelon, by their freedom of tone, their attacks against the absolutism, open one new era.
The king largely pensions writers and artists, but in the condition which they contribute to his glory. He does not hesitate to distribute pensions the abroads, whom he seeks to attract in France, where remains, for example, the Dutch physicist Huygens of 1665 to 1680. The scientific thought is incarnated then in Descartes, who lived before the personal reign of Louis XIV but whose influence will be large, and in Pascal, two scientists who ran up however against the absolutism because of their freedom of thought.
The court makes great use of music, both for the vault the royal entertainments; it is illustrated by Jean-Baptiste Lully - who, in addition to her collaboration, sometimes stormy, with Molière for comedy-ballets, will be the creator of the opera in France - by François Couperin and Michel Delalande.