



Produced by Clarity, Turgut Dincer and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
file was produced from images generously made available
by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)









  TALLEYRAND

  A BIOGRAPHICAL STUDY

[Illustration:

  _From an engraving after a painting by Gerard._
  _Allen H. London, Ltd. &c._

  Signature of Talleyrand]




  TALLEYRAND

  _A Biographical Study_

  By

  JOSEPH McCABE

  _Author of "Peter Abelard," "Saint Augustine," &c._

  WITH 25 PORTRAITS

  INCLUDING A PHOTOGRAVURE FRONTISPIECE

  London

  Hutchinson & Co.

  Paternoster Row

  1906




PREFACE


Sainte-Beuve, after an attempt that one cannot describe as successful,
declared that "it is hardly possible to write the life of M. de
Talleyrand." Frederic Masson noticed the figure of the great
diplomatist as he passed with a disdainful "ce Sphinx." Carlyle forgot
his dogmatism for a moment, and pronounced Talleyrand "one of the
strangest things ever seen or like to be seen, an enigma for future
ages." Even a woman of penetration, Mme. de Stael, who had known
him well, assures us that he was "the most impenetrable and most
inexplicable of men."

There were a few who thought that the long-sealed "Memoirs" of the
Prince, which were published only a few years ago, would reveal every
secret. They forgot that these were the work of the man who held
(improving on Voltaire) that "speech was given to man to disguise his
thoughts"--the man who conducted his exit from the world with all the
art he had used at the Congress of Vienna. Yet, if the "Memoirs" have
thrown no light, or only a deceptive light, on some of the obscurer
passages in Talleyrand's career, they have at least filled in our
picture of his personality, so that the tradition of its inscrutability
must be surrendered. There has been a prolonged and microscopic
research into the age or ages of Talleyrand,--the Old Regime, the
Revolution, the Consulate, the Restoration, and the second Revolution.
The memoirs of nearly all his contemporaries have seen the light, and
official records everywhere have been examined. I have made a careful
use of all this research up to date, and find it possible to present a
consistent and intelligible personality.

Lady Blennerhassett included the material of the "Memoirs" in the
biography of Talleyrand that she wrote ten years ago. But a good deal
of light has since been thrown on the earlier part of his career, and
in this regard I gratefully avail myself of the investigations of M.
de Lacombe. Moreover, Lady Blennerhassett is chiefly occupied with the
Prince's diplomatic action. His personality does not stand out very
clearly from her very crowded canvas. That is an inherent disadvantage
in writing the life of a great diplomatist. However, in spite of the
alluring character of the stretch of history across which the thread
of Talleyrand's life passes, I have tried to keep it in its place as a
background, and to bring out into the fullest light the elusive figure
of the man who made and unmade a dozen oaths of loyalty.

  J. M.

  LONDON, _June, 1906_.




CONTENTS


  CHAP.                                  PAGE

     I. THE TRAINING OF A DIPLOMATIST          1

    II. THE ABBE MALGRE LUI                   16

   III. PRIEST AND BISHOP                     38

    IV. AT THE STATES GENERAL                 56

     V. THE BREACH WITH THE CHURCH            80

    VI. CITIZEN TALLEYRAND                   101

   VII. EXILE                                121

  VIII. THE REGENERATED PARIS                141

    IX. ENTER NAPOLEON                       165

     X. WAR AND DIPLOMACY                    177

    XI. THE RESTORATION OF RELIGION          200

   XII. THE RENEWAL OF WAR                   223

  XIII. AWAY FROM NAPOLEON                   251

   XIV. THE RESTORATION                      281

    XV. A DIPLOMATIC ROMANCE                 303

   XVI. THE "FOREIGNERS OF THE INTERIOR"     326

  XVII. THE LAST ACT                         349




BIBLIOGRAPHY


This Study is chiefly based on the following Works:

  1. Talleyrand's "Memoires" (edit, de Broglie, 5 volumes); Official
  Correspondence from London in 1792, during the Directoire, during the
  Vienna Congress, and from London in 1830-4 (edit. Pallain); Letters
  to Napoleon, Mme. Adelaide, D'Hauterive, Choiseul-Gouffier, the
  Duchess of Courland, Bacourt, Royer-Collard, Guizot, and others; and
  his separately published Speeches and other Documents.

  2. "Proces-verbal Historique des Actes du Clerge;" "Proces-verbal de
  l'Assemblee Nationale;" "Histoire Parlementaire" (Bouchez et Roux);
  and the Memoirs or Letters of Arnault, Barante, Carnot, Consalvi,
  von Gagern, Mme. de Genlis, Guizot, Lauzun, Las Cases, Macdonald,
  Meneval, Miot de Melito, Morellet, Napoleon, Pasquier, Mme. de
  Remusat, Savary, Senfft, and Stapfer.

  3. Of Biographies or Biographical Sketches of Talleyrand the chief
  are those by Lady Blennerhassett (the first authority on his
  diplomatic career), Brougham, Castellane, Castille, Lacombe (the best
  authority on his ecclesiastical career), Sir H. Bulwer Lytton (a very
  generous but imperfectly informed study), Mignet, Montarlot, and
  Place et Florens. The following writers are too imaginative or too
  prejudiced to be of much value: Bastide, Colmache, Marcade, Michaud,
  Pichot, Sainte-Beuve, Salle, Stewartson, Touchard-Lafosse, Vars, and
  Villemarest.

  4. Subsidiary information has been derived chiefly from "Aus
  dem Eheleben eines Bischofs" (anon.); Abt's "Lebensende des
  F. Talleyrand;" Aulard's "Histoire Politique de la Revolution
  Francaise;" Caro's "La Fin du XVIII Siecle;" Cretineau-Joly's
  "Bonaparte et le Concordat;" Darcy's "L'ambassade de Talleyrand
  a Londres;" Demaria's "Benevento sotto il Principe Talleyrand;"
  Gazier's "Etude sur l'Histoire Religieuse de la Revolution
  Francaise;" Goncourt's "Histoire de la Societe Francaise Pendant
  la Revolution;" Louandre's "La Noblesse Francaise sous l'ancienne
  Monarchie;" Mongras' "La fin d'une Societe;" Michelet's "Histoire
  de la Revolution;" Rambaud et Levisse's "Histoire Generale;"
  Rose's "Life of Napoleon I.;" Sloane's "Life of Napoleon;" Taine's
  "Les Origines de la France Contemporaine;" Thier's "Revolution,"
  "Consulat," and "Empire."




ILLUSTRATIONS