Michel de l’HÔpital was born at Aigueperse in Auvergne. The date of his birth he himself declares, in his testament, to be uncertain, but at the same time he refers it to the year 1505. His father was the domestic physician, the faithful friend, and trusted counsellor of the Constable of Bourbon, and still followed his patron’s fortunes, when that ill-used and misguided prince took up arms against France in 1523. Michel de l’HÔpital, then a student at the University of Toulouse, was arrested as the son of one of Bourbon’s partizans; but after a short time he was set at liberty by the express order of Francis I., and after the lapse of two or three years was permitted to rejoin his father in Italy. He completed his education during a residence of six years at the celebrated University of Padua. Quitting that University with high credit for his acquirements both in polite literature and legal knowledge, he took up his abode at Rome with his father, and soon obtained the favourable notice both of the Emperor Charles V. and the French ambassador, Cardinal de Grammont. But preferring the hope of re-establishment in his native country to the prospects of advancement held out in a foreign land, he returned to France in the train of the Cardinal; was present at the espousal of Catherine de Medici with the Dauphin, afterwards Henry II., in 1583; and laid a stepping-stone towards his fortunes by attracting the notice of his future queen. The death of the Cardinal however in the following year overclouded his prospects. His father was unable to procure a reversal of the sentence of exile and confiscation passed on him for his adherence to Bourbon; and Michel de l’HÔpital, without means or friends, betook himself to the practice of the law in the courts of Paris. Fortunately, his merits procured a discerning friend in Jean Morin, a high legal functionary, who gave him his daughter in marriage in 1537, with the judicial office of Conseiller for her dowry.

L’HÔpital filled this office during nine years. It was one in which he found no pleasure; for though attached to the philosophical study of the law (and he mentions it as one of the evils of his situation that he had been obliged to abandon a project for collecting into one body the laws of France, both written and resting on judicial decisions), he found the daily routine of trying causes extremely irksome. His letters are full of complaints of this drudgery, as he esteemed it, and express in lively terms the pleasure which he felt in escaping during the vacations into the country, and renewing his literary pursuits. He numbered the most intellectual and learned men of France among his friends, nor was he backward in seeking to conciliate the great and powerful. It is worth noting, as indicative of the manners of the age, that his favourite method of addressing such persons was in Latin hexameters. Accounts of his way of life, statements of his wishes, petitions, &c., are conveyed in that form; and he composed with fluency, and with a competent share of elegance, without great attention to correctness. One of his frequent correspondents, to whose favour he owed in great measure his future rise, was Cardinal Lorraine. The Chancellor Olivier, a man of no common virtue, was another of his best friends, and to him L’HÔpital was indebted for being withdrawn from the hated bustle of the law, by his appointment as envoy to the Council of Bologna. This proved a sinecure; and he employed his time in wandering about the neighbourhood of that city, and writing letters to the Chancellor, full of poetical descriptions, and requests for a more permanent provision away from the tumult of the law courts.

Early in 1549 L’HÔpital was recalled, after remaining upwards of a year in Italy. He found the Chancellor in disgrace; but his acknowledged merit obtained the notice of Margaret of Valois, daughter of Francis I., a steady patroness of learning, herself devoted to literary as well as religious study. Being created Duchess of Berri, she appointed him her Chancellor, to manage the affairs of the province; and one of his first steps in that capacity was the establishment of a new law-school at Bourges, to which he endeavoured to attract the most eminent teachers. Her influence, added to that of Cardinal Lorraine, procured for him the high financial appointment of Superintendent of the Chamber of Accounts, in 1554. His conduct in that station was firm and honest. He laboured to put a stop to numberless abuses, which had prevailed both in the collection and disposition of the revenue; and his zeal is testified by the ill-will which it brought upon him, and which twice endangered the loss of his place. His independence in this respect is ill contrasted by his obsequiousness in supporting the edict known in French history by the name of the Semestre. This requires a few words of explanation. No legislative body was recognised by the French constitution. Even the States-General could not enact: the power of making laws resided solely in the sovereign. But by the practice of the land, the edicts of the monarch required to be registered by the body of lawyers called the Parliament of Paris, before they could possess validity as law: a wholesome practice, which often served as a check upon the court. It was probably with the intention of rendering that body more subject to control, that Henry II., or his ministers, introduced the above-mentioned edict, by which it was proposed to divide the Parliament into two bodies, to relieve each other every six months. Under this arrangement it would have been easy to collect the refractory spirits into one body, and then to bring measures forward for registration in whichever half year might best suit the views of the crown. L’HÔpital’s accession to this measure has been palliated by alleging, that, as the price of it, he stipulated for the abolition of a custom which prevailed, for suitors to offer fees to the judges before whom their causes were to be tried, under the name of spices (Épices),—a ready means of corruption, for yielding to which, or something not much worse, Bacon, about half a century later, was removed with disgrace from the chancellorship of England. The whole tenor of L’HÔpital’s policy in after times tended to depress the Parliament; and this furnishes a presumption that his conduct in this particular instance was honest. But it is strange that he should not have perceived any inroad on the independence of the judicial body to be a still greater evil than even that from which he endeavoured to free it. After all, the scheme failed, and he was deeply mortified at the obloquy which his accession to it incurred.

The accession of Francis II., by bringing the house of Guise into power, proved the means of L’HÔpital’s advancement. One of the first acts of the new government was to restore to the office of chancellor Olivier, a man of tried integrity, and a friend to toleration. But while the princes of Guise availed themselves of his high character to court popularity, they had no thought of acting by his advice; and Olivier, compelled to be the unwilling instrument of a policy which he detested, and afraid or unable to resign, was hastened by vexation to his grave. L’HÔpital was selected to be his successor in June, 1560. The Guises and the Queen Mother are said to have been actuated by different views in agreeing upon this appointment. The former thought that from an old adherent and petitioner of Cardinal Lorraine they had no opposition to fear: the latter is said to have been influenced by the hope that L’HÔpital’s patriotism would lead him to be a check on the over-powerful house of Lorraine.

The circumstances under which he became Chancellor were such as might fairly breed suspicion of his honesty. None but a bold man could have hoped to do good after the example of Olivier; none but a dexterous man could have succeeded. And such dexterity is seldom joined with that sincerity and purity of purpose, which is one of the most valuable qualities of a statesman, or any man. There are sometimes seasons in which an honest man may take office, with the certainty not only that he will not be permitted to do much that he would wish, but also that he will be obliged to do a good deal that he disapproves. But such compromises are of bad example and evil influence, and can only be excused by the necessity of the times, and by the good results which ensue. By this test, L’HÔpital’s conduct is vindicated. He conferred a signal benefit on France at his first entrance upon office, by dexterously contriving to prevent the establishment of the Inquisition, which had been resolved on. He obtained the convocation of an Assembly of Notables at Fontainebleau, in which, through his influence, conciliatory measures were adopted towards the Protestants, and it was resolved to summon a meeting of the States-General. But the Guises, by working on the young king’s fears, turned that measure to their own advantage. CondÉ no sooner appeared than he was arrested, tried, and condemned to death. The King of Navarre was threatened with a similar fate; and but for the opportune death of Francis II., the kingdom probably would have been plunged at once into the utmost fury of a religious war. But the succession of Charles IX., a minor, in December 1560, threw the regency into the hands of Catherine; and she, encouraged by L’HÔpital, asserted her independence of the Guises, and, to conciliate the support of a powerful party, released CondÉ, and allied herself with the King of Navarre.

At first, the Chancellor’s liberal measures seemed to prosper. As if in compliance with the demands of the States, he published the celebrated Ordonnance of Orleans, which embodied most of his views for the reformation of the state, and introduced a variety of bold and important changes into the church, the courts of justice, and the financial system. One portion of it is expressly directed against the oppressive rights claimed and exercised by the nobility. But the spirit of the age was not ripe for such extensive reforms: they were too far in advance to produce a lasting influence. And in attempting to overcome an interested and prejudiced opposition, the Chancellor was led to an act unworthy of his real zeal for the welfare of his country. His legal improvements had not conciliated the good will of the lawyers; and, foreseeing that the Parliament of Paris might probably refuse to register his edicts, he took it on himself to dispatch them to the provinces, without ever having submitted them to that body. To justify such a step, it is not enough to say that his views were enlarged and noble, theirs bigoted and illiberal; for it is seldom or never that any object can be of importance enough to justify a constitutional statesman in breaking down a constitutional security. Nor had he even the bad excuse of success. The Parliament were justly incensed, and probably became still more hostile to the measures adopted in defiance of its authority; and the high Catholic party prevailed in obtaining a new Assembly of Notables, at which all was undone which the Chancellor had been labouring to do, and the persecuting edicts against the Protestants were re-established in full force.

This blow to his system of toleration the Chancellor contrived to obviate. He had no assembly, no body of recognised authority on which to lean for support. The Parliament of Paris was against him; the Assembly of Notables, composed of lawyers and nobility, was against him; the States-General were tedious to convoke, and were paralysed by their division into three orders. In this difficulty he bethought himself of calling an assembly of deputies from the provincial Parliaments of the kingdom; and fortified by their recommendation, he promulgated and obtained registration of the celebrated edict of January, 1562, which, under certain restrictions, permitted the open profession of the Protestant faith. Upon this the furious bigotry of the Duke of Guise broke into open violence, and kindled the first of those religious wars which long desolated France. Strengthened by the adhesion of the Constable Montmorenci, and by possession of the persons of the King, and Queen Regent, the brothers of Lorraine usurped the conduct of affairs, and excluded L’HÔpital from the council. It is remarkable, considering his resolute opposition to their policy, that they did not deprive him of his office; and this may be taken as an evidence either of the consummate prudence with which, without betraying his own principles, he avoided giving personal offence to his opponents; or that his character stood so high as to render his opponents unwilling to incur the odium of displacing him.

The assassination of the Duke of Guise, in February, 1563, restored to Catherine her own free-will, and L’HÔpital to power; and he immediately availed himself of it to lay the basis of peace by fresh edicts in favour of toleration, which as usual were opposed by the Parliament. In the following year, Charles IX. having reached the age of fourteen, the Chancellor revived an old law which fixed the majority of Kings of France at that age, and declared the King’s majority before the Parliament of Rouen. Soon after, he was engaged in a quarrel with his old patron, Cardinal Lorraine, relative to the privileges of the Gallican Church. The question was, whether or not the decrees of the Council of Trent should be admitted as authority in France. The Chancellor opposed this, and he carried his point.

To amuse Charles, and to avoid some of the evils which usually beset a court, the Chancellor conducted his young sovereign on a tour to the southern provinces of France. This was attended with unforeseen and evil consequences. At Bayonne Charles was met by his sister, the Queen of Spain, attended by the Duke of Alva and other Spanish noblemen. Alva acquired the confidence of Catherine, whom he persuaded that in the hands of L’HÔpital she really had no more freedom of action than under the control of the Guises; and as in her opposition to them she had been actuated by no love of toleration, she had little to unlearn under the tuition of that bigoted and able partizan of the papacy. L’HÔpital soon perceived that his power was shaken. He laboured to make up for the lost confidence of Catherine, by attaching himself more and more to Charles IX.; and for a time he succeeded in retaining influence over that prince, who, during the years 1565 and 1566, was kept in a state of vacillation between those who pleaded for peace and toleration, and those who would have exterminated Protestantism at all hazards and by all means. The religious war was renewed in 1567. Peace was concluded in 1568; but L’HÔpital was not employed to manage it. His only hold upon power was now in the reverence of the King; and this was shaken by the artful representations of Catherine. It shows, however, in a strong light, the ascendancy which L’HÔpital had acquired over Charles’s mind, that the joint influence of Catherine and the House of Guise could not induce him absolutely to dismiss his faithful minister. In 1568 he sent to request the Chancellor to give up the seals for a time, with a promise of returning them. L’HÔpital says in his Testament, that “he judged it better to yield to the necessity of the state, and to its new governors, than to contend with them.” He retired to his estate at Vignay, near Etampes, where he returned with avidity to his literary pursuits, and to the amusements and occupations of the country, to which his letters represent him as devotedly attached.

The Chancellor had not amassed wealth in his various high employments; but his pensions were continued by the King; and Catherine herself did not forget his former services. Even in the dreadful massacre of St. Bartholomew’s they interfered to protect him; though his family were Protestants, and he himself, though a Catholic by profession and in observances, was so suspected by the bigot party, who did not understand how sincerity and tolerance could go together, that it passed into a sort of proverb, ‘Lord deliver us from the Chancellor’s mass.’ A troop of horse was sent from court to preserve his mansion from insult. His domestics were alarmed, and proposed to shut the gates. “No,” said the Chancellor; “but if the small gate is not enough, open the great one.” His daughter, then in Paris, was in imminent danger, and escaped only through the intervention of the Duchess of Guise.

The Chancellor did not long survive this signal proof that his labours had been in vain. “I have lived too long,” he said, “since I have seen what has occurred in my last days,—a youth changed from a mild king into a merciless tyrant.” He died, March 13, 1573; and was buried in his parish church of Champmoteux. His monument is among those which have been collected at Paris, in the MusÉe des Petits-Augustins.

BrantÔme has described the person of L’HÔpital. He wore a long white beard; his face was pale, his demeanor grave, and he resembled the pictures of St. Jerome, by which name he was known at court. He and the Constable Montmorenci were famous as rabroueurs, or reprimanders, and were joint terrors to the idle courtiers; and this harshness, if we may trust his own representations, was not natural, but assumed as a necessary qualification for his office. His private habits were very simple and frugal, and he regarded the increase of luxury as the bane of France. BrantÔme says that once, when he paid the Chancellor a visit with MarÉchal Strozzi, their host gave them for dinner a single dish of bouillie, and that his whole stock of plate consisted of one silver saltcellar. He adds an amusing account of the way in which the Chancellor rated two newly appointed functionaries, who came to present themselves, and who could not pass satisfactorily through a legal examination, which he bestowed upon them.

The leading objects of L’HÔpital’s political life were to obtain the reformation of abuses, to establish the independence of the Gallican church against the usurpations of Rome, and to procure toleration for the Protestants. He is, we believe, the first minister who laid down the principle of toleration, and proclaimed the impossibility and absurdity of making force the rule of reason; and he has thus gained an indefeasible title to the reverence, not only of his countrymen, but of mankind. “What laws,” he said, in his inaugurative speech to the Parliament of Paris, “have not been promulgated on this point of religion? What judgments and punishments, of which even the magistrates of the Parliament have been victims? To what purpose have served such continued armaments and combats in Germany, in England, and in Scotland? The ancient religion has been shaken by these combats, and the new confirmed. The mistake lies in treating the maladies of the mind as if they were those of the body. Experience teaches us that it is the force of reason, the gentle persuasion of words alone, which can win hearts, and cure diseased spirits.”

This great man has another claim to notice, as one of the most distinguished jurists and reformers of France. He has been classed with Charlemagne and St. Louis, as one of the three principal legislators of that country; and his eminent successor D’Aguesseau bore testimony to the merits of his edicts, as the foundation of the most useful laws which were afterwards enacted. His constitutional views were directed towards raising the royal authority, at the expense of the nobility and the Parliament. We have expressed our belief that in the latter instance his conduct was wrong. His views of reform are embodied in the Ordonnance of Orleans (January, 1561), and that of Moulins (February, 1566), which De Thou describes as being the complement of the former. Of the contents of the Ordonnance of Orleans we have already given such notice as our space allows; that of Moulins pertains rather to legal and judicial reforms; it limits and defines the powers of judicial officers, and determines the law on various points, relative to entails, arrests for debt, sales, &c. In short, these two edicts provide for the removal of most of those evils which, unredressed, produced the first Revolution.

It is much to be regretted that L’HÔpital’s essay towards a work on French law is lost. There is a volume extant of his Poetical Epistles, of which the best edition is that of Amsterdam, 1732. To these, and to his Testament, which is printed in the BibliothÈque Choisie of ColomiÈs, and in BrantÔme (article of the Constable Montmorenci), we may refer for authentic details of his life; of which numerous particulars will be found in the history of De Thou, the Memoirs of BrantÔme, the Letters of Pasquier, the Eloges of Thevet, and other contemporary writers. His speeches before the States of Orleans have been published; and a Collection of Memoirs, consisting of various State Papers, printed at Cologne, 1672, has been ascribed to him. The Eloge of L’HÔpital was proposed as a prize by the French Academy in 1777. Slight accounts of him will be found in the various biographical dictionaries; but no publication, so far as we know, has appeared either in French or English, which can dispense with the necessity of consulting the original authorities, on the part of those who wish to obtain more than a superficial acquaintance with the history of this illustrious statesman.