Mazarin attributed much of his fortune, most of which had been amassed since his return from exile after the Fronde, to the king’s largesse. Unfortunately, Louis had been unaware of his own generosity, and Mazarin had become very rich, very quickly, by diverting funds destined for the royal treasury into his own reserves.
Now, as he lay on his deathbed, his confessor warned him that he would be damned if he did not make restitution on his ill-gotten wealth.6 Standing nearby was Jean-Baptiste Colbert, Mazarin’s intendant de la maison7 since 1651, who knew not only Mazarin’s material worth but also how it had been acquired and where it was hidden.8 He suggested that Mazarin should offer his fortune to Louis, not doubting that the king would refuse it or else return it immediately. This Mazarin did, and on March 3, he presented everything to Louis. In the agonizing days that followed, Mazarin considered his “poor family,” who “would have no bread”; but after three days, just as the cardinal had hoped, and exactly as Colbert had predicted, Louis returned the fortune.9 Mazarin made his will, while insisting that no inventory was to be made of his assets.
Ready now to die, Mazarin offered one last piece of advice to Louis: preserve the rights of the church; nominate to church benefices only those worthy to hold them; treat the nobility with respect and liberality; ensure judges stayed within the remit of their offices; relieve the people from the taille10 and other financial burdens; and select his ministers according to their talents.11 However, the cardinal did not advise Louis to govern alone; that decision was made by Louis himself. As he had once said, “his greatest desire was to manage his affairs for himself,”12 and now he was more than ready.
Mazarin died just after two o’clock on the morning of March 9, 1661, at the age of fifty-nine. Louis remained with him almost to the end, but a strictly enforced tradition insisted that a king of France must never linger in the face of death, so Louis was led out of the cardinal’s chamber before the end came. When he received the news that the cardinal was dead, he burst into tears, deeply mourning the loss of the man who had been his godfather, mentor, faithful minister, and close friend. The king shut himself away in his rooms, the only time in his life he would be entirely alone, and when he emerged, he was a different man. No longer the inexperienced youth who needed someone to run his affairs for him, Louis was now master, king in name and in fact. The personal reign of Louis XIV had begun.
Louis immediately summoned his first council. It was attended by two of the three ministers of state: Michel Le Tellier, the secretary for war, and Hughes de Lionne, acting secretary for foreign affairs and, for the past twenty years, Mazarin’s right-hand man. The third minister, Nicolas Foucquet, procureur-général and superintendent of finances, was not yet aware of the cardinal’s death, and even though he lived next to the château de Vincennes, he had not been called to the meeting. This first council of Louis’s personal reign transacted urgent business, which included drafting the letters to be sent to foreign heads of state to inform them of Mazarin’s death. The meeting lasted three hours, and before Louis left, he issued orders for a second council to meet in Paris early the following day.
At seven the next morning, March 10, Louis’s former boyhood friend, Loménie de Brienne, entered the king’s cabinet and announced that the chancellor, the ministers, and the council had arrived. Louis, who was already hard at work, handed Brienne an order before telling him to send the gentlemen in. All three ministers of state—Le Tellier, Lionne, and Foucquet—attended this council, as did Chancellor Séguier, the comte de Brienne, secretary of state for foreign affairs; the young Brienne, who would inherit his father’s post; Phélypeaux de la Vrillière, secretary for the Pretended Reformed Religion,13 and Henri de Guénégaud, seigneur du Plessis, secretary of state.
In a typical gesture of politeness, Louis raised his hat to his councillors before taking his seat. He then directly addressed Chancellor Séguier: “Monsieur, I have assembled you with my ministers and my secretaries of state to tell you that, up to the present, I have been willing to leave the government of my affairs to the late M. le Cardinal; it is time that I govern them myself.” He ordered them to assist him when he asked for their counsel, but they were forbidden to seal any agreements except on his orders. They were to sign not even so much as a safe-conduct or a passport except on Louis’s command, and they were to render account every day to the king. Turning to Foucquet, he ordered him to “make use of Colbert, whom the late M. le Cardinal had recommended to me.” Louis then assured Lionne of his affection, pronouncing himself pleased with the minister’s service before assigning the young Brienne to work with Lionne in the ministry of foreign affairs. Then the king added:
The face of the theater is changing. In the government of my State, in the management of my finances and in the foreign negotiations, I have other principles than those of the late M. le Cardinal. You know my wishes; it is for you now, messieurs, to execute them.14
The meeting was at an end. Louis rose, leaving his ministers to absorb what had just happened. It was an unprecedented move. Had Louis followed tradition, the royal council would have included Anne of Austria, Philippe, Condé, Conti, and Beaufort, and members of the nobility, but Louis denied them all this privilege. The nobility, no matter how high, would have no place in Louis’s new scheme of government.
That Louis had intended to rule alone came as no surprise to Michel Le Tellier; four days before Mazarin’s death, Louis confided to him that he planned to abolish the ministériat, the office of first minister.15 Queen Anne too was aware of Louis’s decision. As she told her ladies, “Le Tellier, Foucquet, and Lionne were destined not to govern but to serve the king.”16
Nicolas Foucquet, who had not been forewarned, was shocked and dismayed. It was widely known that he expected Louis to leave the government of the country to his council, with Foucquet stepping into Mazarin’s shoes. Louis, however, was firm in his resolve to exercise what he called his métier de roi, his job of being king, for which his years of training under Mazarin’s supervision had amply prepared him. Later, when the archbishop of Rouen, president of the Assembly of the Clergy, asked Louis to whom he should address himself now that the cardinal was dead, Louis’s reply was succinct: “To me, M. l’archevêque.”17
The France that Louis inherited was populated by some eighteen million people, half a million of whom lived in Paris.18 However, many of the people were illiterate, while the more than one hundred regional dialects spoken in France meant that French was effectively a foreign language to many. Thanks largely to Mazarin’s diplomacy and Turenne’s military genius, France’s borders were reasonably secure. Louis also enjoyed the loyalty of those who had previously opposed him: Turenne and Condé.
The economy gave cause for concern. During Louis’s minority, the years of foreign and civil war had left farmland unable to provide food, leaving the peasantry to starve. When Louis had toured parts of the realm during the Fronde, he had witnessed the hardship faced by his people but had been powerless to help. Disorder among the civilian population had been matched by lack of discipline in the army. Without new workshops, industry came to a standstill. The Fronde had generated a flood of lawsuits, so that the only people making a living were the lawyers. Now, in 1661, national debt amounted to 143 million livres, twice the amount held in the royal treasury. With revenues for that year, 1662, and 1663 having already been spent, France was almost bankrupt.
In his memoirs, Louis wrote, “Even from childhood, the name alone of idle kings and mayors of the palace displeased me when it was pronounced in my presence.”19 Determined not to be one of those idle kings, Louis established a rigid working timetable in which he would spend two or three hours each morning and again in the afternoon working with various ministers or councillors. At other times he worked alone, taking care of various affairs as they arose. Only when work was finished for the day would he allow himself time for amusements.20
The king quickly identified those areas that were most in need of attention. He noted
that the finances were almost entirely exhausted and even the most necessary expenses of his household and his own personal needs were either delayed or supported by credit. Meanwhile, the financiers were wealthy and had concealed their irregularities or else flaunted their insolent and audacious luxury, “as though they dreaded leaving me unaware of them.”21
Other areas to be addressed were the church, with particular attention to be made to schism, especially Jansenism;22 and the nobility, chiefly those claiming nobility but who were not titled or who had purchased their titles and were now abusing their status to tyrannize their vassals.23 Duelling was less of a problem because Louis enforced already existing edicts against the practice.24 Justice required urgent attention, since it was required in order to reform the others. Nevertheless, Louis found it to be the greatest challenge, because offices were filled with people without merit, judges often lacked experience and learning, while laws governing the judiciary were routinely flouted. The trial system was abused, and the royal council caused confusion with contradictory decisions made in Louis’s name, as though they came from him.
Superintendent Foucquet, equally concerned about the irregularities in the finances, requested a private audience with Louis. Speaking candidly, he declared that if there were abuses in the management of the finances and if correct form had not been observed, it was due to the urgent necessity of the times, namely war on two fronts as well as the Fronde. He noted that nothing had been done except by Mazarin’s order and promised that, henceforth, there would be no more expenditure without Louis’s directive. Louis was satisfied with Foucquet’s assurances for the future; as for the past, he did not insist upon learning the details.25 His words were, said Foucquet, “noble and worthy of a great king.”26
It is often thought that the dying Mazarin had warned Louis about Foucquet. Mme de Motteville, for instance, believed that Mazarin “had given the King some advice, so it was said, against the Superintendent Foucquet.”27 This is not true. The superintendent had been loyal to the cardinal and the king during the Fronde, and his knowledge of state affairs made him indispensable. Furthermore, Foucquet’s expertise in financial matters, which was underpinned by a powerful client network, had been of enormous use to the cardinal and the state. Nevertheless, Louis ordered Foucquet to record every financial transaction in a register, complete with an abstract so Louis could see instantly the state of expenses made or impending.28 As an added precaution, he appointed Colbert as intendant of finances; Colbert was a man in whom Louis had the greatest confidence because, as he said, of Colbert’s diligence, intelligence, and integrity.29
Louis now turned his attention to one of the first acts of his personal reign: to establish the Académie Royale de Danse. Based in Paris, the academy would professionalize ballet. One effect of this was that the steps would become too difficult to be accomplished by the amateur dancers at court.30 There was a political as well as artistic dimension to this approach, which would confer power upon a small group of carefully chosen individuals and provide Louis with a means of diminishing the nobility without destroying them.31 The academy would be run by the comte de Saint-Aignan, soon to be made a duke. At the same time, Jean-Baptiste Lully was appointed superintendent of the king’s music.
Louis’s next priority was to attend to the late cardinal’s estate. When Colbert advised Mazarin to offer his fortune to Louis, his motive was to prevent an inventory of the cardinal’s fortune; for the same reason, Mazarin willed that no inventory of his assets should be made. Both men feared that an audit would reveal the true extent of the cardinal’s wealth and raise questions about how he had acquired it. Colbert feared that such revelations would threaten those who had become rich in Mazarin’s service, chief among whom was Colbert himself.
Mazarin and Colbert took advantage of the disordered financial system to enrich themselves at the state’s expense. As superintendent of finances, it was Foucquet’s job to raise funds by supervising tax collecting and by working with a network of financiers willing to lend money to the crown. He did not personally handle the cash, which went directly into the treasury, where royal treasurers disposed of it upon receiving authorization from Foucquet. Should the crown default on its loans, however, Foucquet was subject to suit.32
In addition to raising revenue for the crown, Foucquet was responsible for providing Mazarin with large sums of money each month. This was supposed to finance the continuing military expenses and support the royal household,33 the money being delivered in gold or silver coin. Mazarin spent the cash but gave no account of his outlay to Foucquet. The cardinal, therefore, was free to direct monies destined for royal or military expenses to his own use.34
In order to fulfill Mazarin’s demands, Foucquet was often forced to borrow, usually at a rate higher than the legal rate of 5.5 percent, on his personal account. Each time he raised funds, he retained a discount, which was used to reimburse the creditor. As a lender, his own loans were refunded this way, but the method meant that the line between Foucquet’s personal account and that of the state was often indistinct.
Louis, who had pointedly not been taught about state finances, was unaware of these complex processes. He did, however, insist upon an inventory of the cardinal’s estate, if only to make it easier to settle the inheritance on his heirs. To accommodate Mazarin’s wishes, Louis divided the cardinal’s personal accounts, which he had been particularly desirous to conceal, into three parts. The first would go to the duc and duchesse de Mazarin35 after inventory. The second would be entrusted to Colbert’s safekeeping, again after inventory. The third was left in Colbert’s possession and would not be inventoried. In this way, much that Mazarin wished to be hidden remained hidden.36
Even so, Colbert worried that he would be asked to account for the fortune he had amassed in Mazarin’s service. Afraid of the consequences should Louis find out how he had come by it, he decided that a scapegoat was needed, someone who could be blamed for the disorder in the finances and would be made to pay for the crippling bankruptcy that left Louis with empty coffers and the people without food. That scapegoat was not hard to find: who better than Superintendent Foucquet?
Colbert and Foucquet came from similar backgrounds. Both of their families had emerged from the merchant classes and climbed the social ladder to public office by means of hard work and judicious marriages. However, while the Colberts rose to prominence in the provinces, the Foucquets, originally a Breton family, achieved success in Paris. Foucquet attended a more prestigious school, the Collège de Clermont in Paris.37 His family was in royal service, and the young Foucquet’s rise was facilitated by none other than Cardinal Richelieu, who employed him as an intendant. From there, he went into law, becoming procureur-général and, finally, superintendent of finances. Colbert studied in his native Reims before being apprenticed to a banker based in Lyons. He then went to Paris to study under a notary and an attorney before entering the ministry for war as a clerk. This brought him into the sphere of the minister for war, Michel Le Tellier, who introduced him to Mazarin.38
In temperament, Colbert and Foucquet were poles apart. Colbert was austere and haughty, and although he enjoyed dancing, he was otherwise unsociable. Mme de Sévigné named him “The North” because of his frosty demeanor. Foucquet too was arrogant, but he had a wide circle of friends and loved nothing better than to attend salons, write poetry, and assemble a magnificent library. He was a patron of artists, writers, and scientists, and he kept an open table. While both men worked diligently, Colbert rarely left his desk and was always to be seen with papers in his hand. Foucquet, on the other hand, often worked from home and mixed business with pleasure, which piqued Colbert.
At first, relations between the two men were friendly, but gradually Colbert came to look upon the superintendent with jealous eyes. While both men had risen to prestigious offices in the state, Foucquet held the higher position. Colbert now took every opportunity to blacken Foucquet’s name, disparage his work, and arouse suspicion against h
im, suggesting that Foucquet’s extensive building projects and his business ventures were not above board. Colbert’s motive, which had become more urgent since the death of his master, was to take Foucquet’s place.39
Colbert set about making himself indispensable to Louis. He suggested ways to reform the finances and, in a masterstroke, “found” millions of livres in cash that Mazarin had hidden in the cellars at Vincennes. His new post as intendant of finances afforded him the perfect opportunity to sow the seeds of doubt in Louis’s mind about the honesty of the superintendent. Entrusted with the register of accounts, he used it to prove Foucquet’s alleged dishonesty while earning Louis’s confidence.
At present, however, Louis was preoccupied with weddings. The spring of 1661 saw the marriage of Marie Mancini to the Italian connétable Colonna, who was not a little surprised to find his wife was still a virgin. However, it was the marriage of Louis’s brother, Philippe, that caused the most excitement at court.
Philippe’s prospective bride was Henriette d’Angleterre. Born on June 16, 1644, in Exeter, Henriette was parted from her mother at only two weeks old when the queen of England took refuge in her native France. At the age of two years, Henriette joined her mother at the French court, where she lived in an apartment at the Louvre. Far from participating in court life, Henriette and her mother lived like poor refugees, and the child was often forced to stay in bed all day during the harsh winters in order to keep warm.
Following the execution of Henriette’s father, Charles I, her brother became king, but Charles II was exiled from his own kingdom. At the age of eight, Henriette was sent to the convent of the Visitation at Chaillot to be educated.
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