The Project Gutenberg EBook of Memoirs Of Jean Francois Paul De Gondi,
Cardinal De Retz, Volume II., by Jean Francois Paul de Gondi, Cardinal de Retz

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Title: Memoirs Of Jean Francois Paul De Gondi, Cardinal De Retz, Volume II.
Being Historic Court Memoirs of the Great Events during the Minority
of Louis XIV. and the Administration of Cardinal Mazarin

Author: Jean Francois Paul de Gondi, Cardinal de Retz

Release Date: September 29, 2006 [EBook #3843]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CARDINAL DE RETZ ***

Produced by David Widger

MEMOIRS OF JEAN FRANCOIS PAUL de GONDI,
CARDINAL DE RETZ

Written by Himself

Being Historic Court Memoirs of the Great Events
during the Minority of Louis XIV.
and the Administration of Cardinal Mazarin.

BOOK II.

MADAME:--I lay it down as a maxim, that men who enter the service of the
State should make it their chief study to set out in the world with some
notable act which may strike the imagination of the people, and cause
themselves to be discussed. Thus I preached first upon All Saints' Day,
before an audience which could not but be numerous in a populous city,
where it is a wonder to see the Archbishop in the pulpit. I began now to
think seriously upon my future conduct. I found the archbishopric sunk
both in its temporals and spirituals by the sordidness, negligence, and
incapacity of my uncle. I foresaw infinite obstacles to its
reestablishment, but perceived that the greatest and most insuperable
difficulty lay in myself. I considered that the strictest morals are
necessarily required in a bishop. I felt myself the more obliged to be
strictly circumspect as my uncle had been very disorderly and scandalous.
I knew likewise that my own corrupt inclinations would bear down all
before them, and that all the considerations drawn from honour and
conscience would prove very weak defences. At last I came to a
resolution to go on in my sins, and that designedly, which without doubt
is the more sinful in the eyes of God, but with regard to the world is
certainly the best policy, because he that acts thus always takes ca