chaos,--in times when a nation is by no means ripe for
revolution, but only stung by desperate revolt: these are they who are
quick enough and firm enough to bind all the good forces of the State
into one cosmic force, therewith to compress or crush all chaotic
forces: these are they who throttle treason and stab rebellion,--who
fear not, when defeat must send down misery through ages, to insure
victory by using weapons of the hottest and sharpest. Theirs, then, is a
statesmanship which it may be well for the leading men of this land and
time to be looking at and thinking of, and its representative man shall
be Richelieu.

Never, perhaps, did a nation plunge more suddenly from the height of
prosperity into the depth of misery than did France on that fourteenth
of May, 1610, when Henry IV. fell dead by the dagger of Ravaillac.
All earnest men, in a moment, saw the abyss yawning,--felt the State
sinking,--felt themselves sinking with it. And they did what, in such a
time, men always do: first all shrieked, then every man clutched at the
means of safety nearest him. Sully rode through the streets of Paris
with big tears streaming down his face,--strong men whose hearts had
been toughened and crusted in the dreadful religious wars sobbed
like children,--all the populace swarmed abroad bewildered,--many
swooned,--some went mad. This was the first phase of feeling.

Then came a second phase yet more terrible. For now burst forth that old
whirlwind of anarchy and bigotry and selfishness and terror which Henry
had curbed during twenty years. All earnest men felt bound to protect
themselves, and seized the nearest means of defence. Sully shut himself
up in the Bastille, and sent orders to his son-in-law, the Duke of
Rohan, to bring in six thousand soldiers to protect the Protestants.
All un-earnest men, especially the great nobles, rushed to the Court,
determined, now that the only guardians of the State were a weak-minded
woman and a weak-bodied child, to dip deep into the treasury which Henry
had filled to develop the nation, and to wrench away the power which he
had built to guard the nation.

In order to make ready for this grasp at the State treasure and power by
the nobles, the Duke of Epernon, from the corpse of the King, by
whose side he was sitting when Ravaillac struck him, strides into the
Parliament of Paris, and orders it to declare the late Queen, Mary of
Medici, Regent; and when this Parisian court, knowing ful