were far from
diminishing their lustre.

[Louis of Bourbon, Duke d'Enghien, afterwards, by the death of his
father in 1656, Prince de Conde. Of this great man Cardinal de Retz
says, "He was born a general, which never happened but to Caesar, to
Spinola, and to himself. He has equalled the first: he has
surpassed the second. Intrepidity is one of the least shining
strokes in his character. Nature had formed him with a mind as
great as his courage. Fortune, in setting him out in a time of
wars, has given this last a full extent to work in: his birth, or
rather his education, in a family devoted and enslaved to the court,
has kept the first within too straight bounds. He was not taught
time enough the great and general maxims which alone are able to
form men to think always consistently. He never had time to learn
them of himself, because he was prevented from his youth, by the
great affairs that fell unexpectedly to his share, and by the
continual success he met with. This defect in him was the cause,
that with the soul in the world the least inclined to evil, he has
committed injuries; that with the heart of an Alexander, he has,
like him, had his failings; that with a wonderful understanding, he
has acted imprudently; that having all the qualities which the Duke
Francis of Guise had, he has not served the state in some occasions
so well as he ought; and that having likewise having all the
qualities of the Duke Henry of Guise, he has not carried faction so
far as he might. He could not come up to the height of his merit;
which, though it be a defect, must yet be owned to be very uncommon,
and only to be found in persons of the greatest abilities."]

So long as he had only some scruples of conscience, and a thousand
interests to sacrifice, he quitted all to follow a man, whom strong
motives and resentments, which in some manner appeared excusable, had
withdrawn from the paths of rectitude: he adhered to him in his first
disgrace, with a constancy of which there are few examples; but he could
not submit to the injuries which he afterwards received, and which such
an inviolable attachment so little merited. Therefore, without fearing
any reproach for a conduct which sufficiently justified itself, as he had
formerly deviated from his duty by entering into the service of the
Prince de Conde, he thought he had a right to leave him to return again
to