AT THE STATES-GENERAL

Talleyrand was consecrated in the seminary-chapel at Issy, a house of retreat belonging to Saint-Sulpice, on January 16th, 1788. He had observed, in that age of forms, the form of making a preliminary retreat at Issy. His delighted friends from Paris took care that the “solitude,” as the place was called, should not depress him. The ceremony was performed by the Bishop-Count of Noyon, Mgr. de Grimaldi, a Voltairean prelate. There are two legendary versions of Talleyrand’s bearing during the service. Renan was told by an aged priest who had been present that he was so scandalised at the jauntiness of the new prelate as to feel compelled to charge himself with disrespectful thoughts at his next confession. Another version affirms that Talleyrand fainted from some emotion or other during the morning. It is more likely that Talleyrand bore himself with perfect propriety and indifference. Liberal nobles and prelates rarely ridiculed religion even in private conversation. “I have always moved in good society,” said one at a later date, when asked if he had ever scoffed at sacred things. Talleyrand would regard his share in the ceremony as a regrettable necessity of his political career. It deceived nobody. In the evening he returned to Paris, and received the pallium (a privilege of the Autun bishopric) from the archbishop.

With the sonorous title of “Bishop of Autun, First Suffragan of the Archbishop of Lyons, Administrator of of the Temporalities and Spiritualities of the said Archbishopric, sede vacante, Perpetual President of the States of Burgundy, Count of Sanlien, Baron of Issy-l’EvÉque, Lucenay, Grosme, Touillon, &c.,” he was now somewhat better equipped for political work. The See of Autun was one of the most ancient in France, though its income was relatively very small—22,000 livres a year. It was, however, regarded as having next claim to the Archbishopric of Lyons, and the King had already bestowed a second abbey (of Celles, with 9,500 livres a year) on Talleyrand, and I find assigned to him in a list published at Paris in 1790, the rich Abbey of Bec. He was able to resume his pleasant ways at Paris, with an income of about 100,000 livres, and the credit of a rising prelate. It is probably to this period that the story of his adventure with the coach builder belongs. Receiving no answer to his applications for payment for the new episcopal carriage, the maker presented himself, hat in hand, at Talleyrand’s door when Monseigneur come out. After a few days of this Talleyrand blandly asked him what he wanted. “Oh, you will be paid,” he affably replied to the man. “But when, Monseigneur?” “Oh, you are very inquisitive,” said the prelate with an appearance of astonishment, as he drove away. It was the golden age of debtors. The King once ventured to tell Archbishop Dillon that he had heard he was greatly in debt. “I will consult my steward and report to your Majesty,” said the prelate.

On the other hand Talleyrand found that he must at length resort to actual duplicity to strengthen his position at Autun. The diocese of Mgr. Marboeuf was likely to hear of the new appointment with some misgiving. But already there were rumours of States-General, and it was necessary to secure real influence at Autun. Within a fortnight Talleyrand issued—let us hope he did not write—a letter to his flock, which closed the mouths of the pious grumblers. It was full of Scripture and redolent of a quiet, unmistakeable fervour and simplicity. “God is my witness,” it says, in the words of St. Paul, “that I am mindful of you without interruption.” He praises the zeal of his clergy, alludes to those unhappy people who “only seek in offices the miserable gratification of their vanity,” and urgently asks their prayers for his comfort. It was read to tearful congregations in all the churches of his diocese the next Sunday—Talleyrand being detained in Paris. A few weeks later his useful secretary, the AbbÉ des Renandes, was offered the Vicar-Generalship by the canons. He would not fail to follow up the effect of the letter he had (probably) written. On January 27th Talleyrand took possession of his cathedral, by representative. Important events were preparing at Paris and Versailles. A great arena for political adventure was being opened. About the middle of March he was free to follow the impulse of his heart and visit his beloved sheep; he had in his pocket the order to convoke the preliminary assembly of the clergy which was to send him to the States-General at Versailles.

This is really the most unpleasant page in Talleyrand’s life. I am glad the writing of it is over. But there is—perhaps unhappily—no mystery about it. He was carrying to logical conclusions the cynical estimate of the ecclesiastical order which his experiences had forced on him.

On Sunday, March 15th, he took solemn possession of his cathedral, and was honoured with a great fÊte. He took the oath, so often recalled by his enemies afterwards, to defend all the rights and privileges and the property of his church. He remained a month at Autun and captivated everybody. Were there rumours of Voltairean opinions and loose practices? He said his breviary daily in the garden—as anyone could see—attended to every function of his office, presided at the episcopal council, was a model bishop. Meantime his young abbÉ-assistants from Paris were circulating in the diocese, their conversation always ending with politics. There was open table at the episcopal palace for the poor curÉs, and the reputation of some of his Lenten dishes flew from parish to parish. The townspeople were badly supplied with fish, and a word to friends at Versailles got the post to stop at Autun and drop a load of fresh fish daily for the public market. The religious congregations were amiably cultivated, and became zealous for Monseigneur’s candidature. Soon there are 209 ecclesiastical electors assembled at Autun, many of them rough, hard-working curÉs, who distrust this descendant of all the PÉrigords. Monseigneur is tactful, candid, democratic; quietly leads their meetings as honorary president. He finds that the only serious rivals are Radical curÉs, with cries of “Down with the aristocrats in Church and State,” and better salaries for the “working clergy.” Then he issues his manifesto.

Sainte-Beuve was forced to say after reading it that Talleyrand “showed from the first day that he was one of the most enlightened and most penetrating minds of the time.” It met every serious grievance on which his rivals depended, and it was perfectly sincere. Talleyrand was not embittered against his order, like Mirabeau, by his experiences, nor did he lean to democratic principles on the lines of the Duc d’OrlÉans. He formed a sober and consistent judgment on the social and political situation, and it does no less credit to his humanity than his sagacity. He would claim at the States-General that that body should not be arbitrarily interfered with or prematurely dispersed. He would press for the making of a constitution as its first achievement; and, for all Carlyle’s raillery, this was the first political need of France. In this new constitution the rights of the people must be recognised as well as those of the king. The new political structure must have its first elements in the parish, and so up through Provincial Assemblies to a permanent States-General. All elections shall be free. The sanctity of private or corporate property shall be respected, but only after claims have been judicially examined and unsound claims rejected; in this he is clearly foreshadowing his attitude towards Church property. The administration of justice shall be simplified and purified; the criminal law reformed, lotteries suppressed, privileges abolished. The press shall be free, and the post shall not be interfered with. Feudal servitude shall be abolished. There shall be a strict inquiry into the financial situation, a reduction of expenditure, and the abolition of pecuniary privileges.

I repeat that this was not a rhetorical and insincere document, written for the purpose of catching votes. There is, in the first place, no rhetoric about it. It is a plain and sober statement of remedies for the national malady. Then, it is quite in accord with the few previous expressions of Talleyrand’s mind; and it is a faithful presentment of the measures he proposed or supported unequivocally afterwards at the National Assembly. To appreciate it fully, we must, as Mr. Belloc strongly pleads, beware of reading the ideas of ’91 and ’92 into ’89. Camille Desmoulins said there were not ten Republicans in France at that time. There were demands for reform on every point that Talleyrand takes up. I do not claim originality in the details, but the manifesto, as a whole, is an unanswerable refutation of those who would see nothing but frivolity, selfishness and cynicism in its author. His experiences had made him almost incapable of a zeal for an abstract ideal of justice, but his sympathy and humanity, as well as his political sagacity, gave a serious strain to his work. He was elected deputy by a large majority, and his address, with a few additions, was adopted by his clergy as their cahier or book of instructions to their representative.

But from the moment of his election he ceased to be an ecclesiastic, as far as possible. He left for Paris on Easter Sunday, not waiting to officiate at the services or to follow the retreat of the clergy which was commencing. His parishioners never saw him again; except that, thirteen years afterwards, his carriage broke down at Autun, as he passed through on the way to Lyons, and he is said to have been rather roughly noticed.

The next fortnight was spent in feverish debate at Paris on the forthcoming meeting. At the Thirty Club, where cultured Radicals foregathered, and where Talleyrand and Mirabeau had met the boldest politicians of their class during the last year or two, the interest was deep. Lafayette, Roederer, the Dukes de Luynes and Larochefoucauld, Sabatier, and other Liberals belonged to it, as well as some of Talleyrand’s earlier friends. A new salon that he frequented, and that rang with political controversy, was that of Mme. de StaËl. Necker’s daughter had married the Swedish Minister in 1786, and she succeeded in drawing Talleyrand into her social circle. In such a circle the dangers and possibilities of the coming meeting were properly appreciated. These men, resolutely bent on anticipating instead of waiting for events, like the bulk of the nobles and the King’s party, saw clearly enough that the great question was: Will the voting be by orders separately or in common? The country had been agitated over the question what proportion of delegates should be allowed to the Third Estate. The King had granted them a representation equal to that of the first two orders together, or 600 members. But the effect of this was inappreciable until the procedure of voting had been settled; and this had been left undecided. No one, indeed, approached the date with the feeling of solemnity with which we now look back on it through the smoke of the revolutionary fires. But the situation was serious for men who, like Talleyrand, were bent on making the national parliament a reality. If the orders were to vote separately, the machine would produce nothing; if together, the Third Estate would be supported by the democratic curÉs and would rule the Assembly.

And were the people prepared for this power? Talleyrand must have stopped many a time in the gardens of the Palais Royal, now the agora of Paris, and listened to the barrel-oratory before the cafÉs. Men who had been seen washing their only shirt in the Seine a few months ago are leading crowds. Pamphlets are poured out by the thousand. The Duc d’OrlÉans is fanning the flames that break out here and there. Mirabeau is thundering. SieyÈs is giving substance to the quips of Chamfort. Grim, gaunt, ragged crowds flood the street at the slightest provocation, sack merchants’ houses, and attack the troops. Talleyrand goes to Versailles in thoughtful mood. Popular representation on the English plan, with a second house, is the only hope.

Arnault describes in his Souvenirs how he saw Talleyrand at Versailles at that time. He would have us believe that he did not know the bishop, but was struck by this “angel’s face through which broke the spirit of a devil.” He would have thought it the face of a fast-living officer, but for the cassock and pectoral cross. The portrait given in the Galerie des États-GÉnÉraux, of Choderlos de Laclos, is of greater value, because it was drawn at the time. It gives the estimate in which he was held by his shrewder contemporaries. Intelligence, it is said, is his distinctive gift. Moderation, tact, and restraint are well cultivated. He is mild to a possible fault. He “yields to circumstances, to reason, and thinks he can make concessions for the sake of peace, without deserting the principles which he has made the ground of his morality and conduct.” His future depends on himself. If he is influenced by esprit de corps he will do nothing; if he acts independently he may do anything. We are justified in thinking that Talleyrand had made up his mind to act independently, though he had no dream of leading. He was for a limited monarchy and a second chamber representing culture and wealth.14 Beyond this he was for Talleyrand, for France, and for humanity.

On the very eve of the opening of the States-General he received another proof of the foolishness of the order to which he now belonged. A few days before the 4th the leaders of the clergy met at the Cardinal de la Rochefoucauld’s house at Versailles to discuss the situation. All were agreed, to Talleyrand’s disgust, that this was a favourable opportunity for asking the nation to extinguish their debt. One of their number was deputed to introduce the proposal, and for a long time they clung to it. Clearly, one must not sacrifice much for clerical esprit-de-corps.

Then the 4th of May arrives. Chaos settles into order at Versailles. Talleyrand notes the petty devices by which royalism mitigates its concession of popular representation. On the previous day the King had received the deputies: first the Clergy and Nobles, then, with less ceremony, the Commons. He notes, too, how the leaders of the Commons are beginning to emphasize the distinction. “Three orders? No: three nations,” says SieyÈs, constitution-maker for the next ten years. Now they march to the Salle des menus, all Paris lining the route or hanging out of the windows. Talleyrand sees the 550 popular deputies greeted with a roar of applause; mostly lawyers, with set faces under their “slouch-hats.” He sees the plumed and embroidered nobles, “the illustrious obscure,” tread daintily between silent hedges of soldiers and people. He marks the same silence as he and his forty colleagues in violet cassock and lace surplice step out, followed, with a convenient band between, by 260 curÉs. He hears the shouts of Vive le Roi in the rear: the Queen is ignored. Even in the intoxication of the spectacle and its symbolism the people discriminate conspicuously. The next day he is interested to hear the King express his pleasure that the privileged “are going to renounce their privileges” and Necker rub in the lesson. And he notices that first innovation in the history of France, when commoners put their hats on before the King has got out of the room. It is the first shot. On the third day the Third Estate finds itself alone in the great hall. The clergy and the nobility are meeting separately, as of old, to verify their papers. The commoners see that this means separate votes and impotence, and the historic battle begins.

History has described the fortunes of the Commons. I must follow Talleyrand into the obscurer meeting-place of the First Estate. The Nobles, pampered and encouraged by the unfortunate Queen, were violently opposed to union with the Commons. The Clergy knew they were fatally divided, being themselves composed of two orders, and their leaders were for a policy of drifting or compromise. Cardinal de la Rochefoucauld was president, and he contrived to bring the Clergy together for three hours a day for six weeks without doing anything. Some of the curÉs spoke at once in favour of joining the Commons, but they were silenced by an agreement to verify their papers “provisionally” where they were: the delegates from Paris, and several others, had not yet arrived. The Commons break in on their provisional action the next day by inviting them to come into the large hall—into which their own hall opens—and the struggle begins. The prelates name commissioners to discuss the matter with their colleagues of the other orders. The Commons, after a grumble, assent: the Nobles assent, but practically say their decision is taken. The cardinal suspends sittings, but there is mutiny amongst the curÉs, who are going to appoint a new president, and he hastily retracts. A week is taken up in “provisional” verification, voting commissioners, being polite to each other (except when a deputation comes from DauphinÉ to disown the Archbishop of Vienne as improperly elected), and hair-splitting. On the 13th they send deputies to inform the Commons they have appointed commissioners: the deputies announce on their return that they were “not so well received as they had expected.” Fourteen days more are spent in discussing their cahiers (instructions), disputes about titles and costumes, abandonment of privileges (which is carried in general form, but disputed in detail), homage to the King, and indignation that pamphlets are in circulation accusing them of slowness. On the 27th they are “examining their cahiers” when “a numerous deputation” of grim, business-like lawyers from the Third break in, and implore them “in the name of the God of Peace and the interest of the nation” to stop quibbling and join the Commons. The deputies are bowed out, and a discussion follows, which is interrupted by M. Target and his companions once more with the same message. They are assured that the Clergy are going to “occupy themselves seriously” with the matter.

Talleyrand knew (as all his colleagues did) that these men of business had been sitting in the next room day after day in the most painful idleness. They would not open a letter or do a single act that could be construed as an admission that they were a separate body. They were “a meeting of citizens,” waiting to be joined by other citizens to do the business of the State. It was now clear that their resolution was unshakeable, and Talleyrand and the moderates cursed Necker very freely. The situation was becoming serious. Citizens from Paris (who had now sent their deputies) keep running down to see how business is proceeding. The curÉs are getting restless. One of them is interrupted by a Vicar-General, and he says: “Hold your tongue, monsieur.” Prelates leap to their feet in horror. Then some of the curÉs induce a secretary to begin at the bottom of his list when he is calling the names. One of the bishops rushes at him and snatches the list from his hand. That night (the 27th) 60 or 70 curÉs meet and decide to press matters. The next day there is a warm debate, when the cardinal produces a letter from the King, who is painfully surprised to hear there is some hitch or other; the commissioners will meet to-morrow in presence of his keeper of the seals. Another fortnight goes in meetings of commissioners, &c. The Nobles have sent to say they are determined to remain a separate order, and the shifty cardinal has betrayed himself: “Your fathers built and defended our churches: you will be to-day the saviours of your country.” They have tried, too, to tempt the Commons into action by inviting them to discuss the pitiful condition of the country; just what we are waiting for you to come and discuss, reply the Commons. Now (the 10th) SieyÈs, the cool, hard-headed ex-theologian, is urging the Commons to “cut the cable.” On the 12th a deputation of ten offers a dignified but unmistakeable invitation to the clergy; they get a promise of “serious consideration.” The next morning it appears that three curÉs have joined the Third; three more go during the discussion: five the next day. On the 17th they hear that the Commons have constituted themselves the National Assembly. On the 19th they put the question of union to a formal vote. The cardinal says that separation is maintained by 135 votes against 127. The archbishops of Vienne and Bordeaux, the leaders of the unionists, cry that the list has been manipulated, and keep their party in the hall; they turn out to number 149 (against 115). Talleyrand marches out with the separatists, who are hooted by the great crowd at the door; the Archbishop of Vienne and his colleagues are carried in triumph. Cardinal de la Rochefoucauld and the Archbishop of Paris fly to the King.

The rest of this story of the disruption of the First Order and the consequent recognition of the National Assembly (the Revolution) is well known. Talleyrand was opposed to union. He looked with anxiety to the formation, in a totally uneducated country with a wide franchise, of a single elective chamber. We know now how just his concern was. He and the moderate reformers pressed the King (through M. d’Artois) to dissolve the States-General at whatever cost, and make a fresh appeal on a stricter franchise. He was told that it was too late (and in this the King was probably right), and had then to witness the miserable devices by which the royal party insinuated a power they dare not assert. The halls were closed to prepare for a royal sitting, and the famous oath in the tennis-court was the result. That night (June 20-21st) or the following Talleyrand probably made his last effort to stem the tide of the Revolution. He has told us in the memoirs how he and one or two other Liberal nobles went to Marly by night to see and advise the King.15 The King would not see them, and his brother told them that their proposals—namely, that the King should disperse the present Assembly and proclaim a fresh election—could not be considered. Talleyrand then said that the Prince could not hold them responsible if in the course of events they felt compelled to throw in their lot with the popular party, and M. d’Artois replied that he could not blame them. Talleyrand thereupon returned to Versailles with a deep resentment of the folly of the King’s advisers and a feeling of independence. “Under pain of folly,” he writes, “it was time to think of oneself.” He, of course, held to his ideal of a limited monarchy, but it was clear that this might have to be attained in spite of the Court party. He proposed to watch the development closely and act as circumstances would direct.

On the Monday the tennis-court was closed—reserved for the Princes to play—and the deputies, after wandering about Versailles in sight of an angry crowd, met in the church of St. Louis. There 151 clerical deputies, with two archbishops at their head, join them amidst the wildest excitement. The royal sitting takes place on the Tuesday. The King promises considerable reforms and then affects authority, and orders them to separate into their respective rooms. Talleyrand saw, on the one hand, the delighted nobles crowding about the Queen, in the belief that all danger was over; and, on the other, the sullen Commons send BrÉzÉ to tell the King they will only yield to bayonets, and King Louis abdicate, as he says, “Let them stay”; and 6,000 people invade the chateau with cries for Necker. The Archbishop of Paris has to fly for his life. Soldiers refuse to fire on the crowd. On the next day (24th) the clergy find the door walled up that leads to the Assembly, and the minority continues its separate sitting, but its members melt away. On the 26th Talleyrand and the Bishop of Orange quietly take seats in the National Assembly; they are presently followed by the Archbishop of Paris. On the 27th the King enjoins the rest of the Clergy and the Nobles to unite with the National Assembly. Talleyrand sees the crowds frantically cheer the King and Queen, but he knows it is the royal submission, not the royal authority, they are greeting.

It is from this date, and during the next three years, that Talleyrand is especially found enigmatic, and I must trace his course with care, avoiding the temptation to linger over the stirring scenes of the time. Talleyrand’s opposition to the union of the three orders is clear enough; he wanted a second chamber as a check on undisciplined passion. When it became imperative he went into the Assembly to do what good he should find possible. He was becoming seriously concerned for the nation. He knew well the leaders of the democratic party. Desmoulins was living with his friend Mirabeau at Versailles, and SieyÈs was often there. SieyÈs ridiculed the English model. Desmoulins was a Republican.

CAMILLE DESMOULINS.