be de Yermond, fortified their decision with their
advice; being, in truth, greatly influenced by a reason which they forbore
to mention, namely, by their suspicion that the untiring malice of the
queen's enemies would not have failed to represent that the suppression of
the slightest particle of the truth could only have been dictated by a
guilty consciousness which felt that it could not bear the light; and that
the queen had forborne to bring the cardinal into court solely because she
knew that he was in a situation to prove facts which would deservedly
damage her reputation.

It is impossible to doubt that the resolution which was adopted was the
only one consistent with either propriety or common sense. However
plausible may be the arguments which in this or that case may be adduced
for concealment, the common instinct of mankind, which rarely errs in such
matters, always conceives a suspicion that it is dictated by secret and
discreditable motives; and that he who screens manifest guilt from
exposure and punishment makes himself an accomplice in the wrong-doing, if
he was not so before. But, though Louis judged rightly for his own and his
queen's character in bringing those who were guilty of forgery and robbery
to a public trial, the result inflicted an irremediable wound on one great
institution, furnishing an additional proof how incurably rotten the whole
system of the Government must have been, when corruption without shame or
disguise was allowed to sway the highest judicial tribunal in the country.

The Parliament of Paris, constantly endeavoring throughout its whole
history to encroach upon the royal prerogative, had always founded its
pretensions on its purity and disinterestedness. Since its
re-establishment at the beginning of the present reign, it had advanced
its claim to the possession of those virtues more loudly than ever; yet
now, in the very first case which came before it in which a noble of the
highest rank was concerned, it was made apparent not only that it was
wholly destitute of every quality which ought to belong to a judicial
bench, of a regard for truth and justice, and even of a knowledge of the
law; but that no one gave it credit for them, and that every one regarded
the decision to be given as one which would depend, not on the merits of
the case, but on the interest which the culprits might be able to make
with the judges.[8]

The trial took place in May of the following year. We ne