ey had previously said in the case of
Henry, "If I had done for God what I have done for that man, I had been
saved twice over; and now I know not what will become of me." He expired
on the 6th of September, 1683; and on the 10th, Madame de Maintenon wrote
to Madame de St. Geran, "The king is very well; he feels no more now than
a slight sorrow. The death of M. de Colbert afflicted him, and a great
many people rejoiced at that affliction. It is all stuff about the
pernicious designs he had; and the king very cordially forgave him for
having determined to die without reading his letter, in order to be
better able to give his thoughts to God. M. de Seignelay was anxious to
step into all his posts, and has not obtained a single one; he has plenty
of cleverness, but little moral conduct. His pleasures always have
precedence of his duties. He has so exaggerated his father's talents and
services, that he has convinced everybody how unworthy and incapable he
is of succeeding him." The influence of Louvois and the king's ill humor
against the Colberts peep out in the injustice of Madame de Maintenon.
Seignelay had received from Louis XIV. the reversion of the navy; his
father had prepared him for it with anxious strictness, and he had
exercised the functions since 1676. Well informed, clever, magnificent,
Seignelay drove business and pleasure as a pair. In 1685 he gave the
king a splendid entertainment in his castle of Sceaux; in 1686 he set off
for Genoa, bombarded by Duquesne; in 1689 he, in person, organized the
fleet of Tourville at Brest. "He was general in everything," says Madame
de la Fayette; "even when he did not give the word, he had the exterior
and air of it." "He is devoured by ambition," Madame de Maintenon had
lately said: in 1689 she writes, "_Anxious (L'Inquiet, i. e., Louvois_)
hangs but by a thread; he is very much shocked at having the direction of
the affairs of Ireland taken from him; he blames me for it. He counted
on making immense profits; M. de Seignelay counts on nothing but perils
and labors. He will succeed if he do not carry things with too high a
hand. The king would have no better servant, if he could rid himself a
little of his temperament. He admits as much himself; and yet he does
not mend." Seignelay died on the 3d of November, 1690, at the age of
thirty-nine. "He had all the parts of a great minister of state," says
St. Simon, "and he was the despair of M. de Louvois, whom he