any wars were now
becoming exhausted by the contest, but none so much so as France.
The great despot who had so long wielded the energies of that
country with such wonderful splendor and success found that his
unbounded love of dominion was gradually sapping all the real
good of his people, in chimerical schemes of universal conquest.
England, though with much resolution voting new supplies, and in
every way upholding William in his plans for the continuance of
war, was rejoiced when Louis accepted the mediation of Charles
XI., king of Sweden, and agreed to concessions which made peace
feasible. The emperor and Charles II. of Spain, were less satisfied
with those concessions; but everything was finally arranged to meet
the general views of the parties, and negotiations were opened
at Ryswyk. The death of the king of Sweden, and the minority of
his son and successor, the celebrated Charles XII., retarded
them on points of form for some time. At length, on the 20th of
September, 1697, the articles of the treaty were subscribed by
the Dutch, English, Spanish, and French ambassadors. The treaty
consisted of seventeen articles. The French king declared he
would not disturb or disquiet the king of Great Britain, whose
title he now for the first time acknowledged. Between France
and Holland were declared a general armistice, perpetual amity,
a mutual restitution of towns, a reciprocal renunciation of all
pretensions upon each other, and a treaty of commerce which was
immediately put into execution. Thus, after this long, expensive,
and sanguinary war, things were established just on the footing they
had been by the peace of Nimeguen; and a great, though unavailable
lesson, read to the world on the futility and wickedness of those
quarrels in which the personal ambition of kings leads to the
misery of the people. Had the allies been true to each other
throughout, Louis would certainly have been reduced much lower
than he now was. His pride was humbled, and his encroachments
stopped. But the sufferings of the various countries engaged in
the war were too generally reciprocal to make its result of any
material benefit to either. The emperor held out for a while,
encouraged by the great victory gained by his general, Prince
Eugene of Savoy, over the Turks at Zenta in Hungary; but he finally
acceded to the terms offered by France; the peace, therefore,
became general, but, unfortunately for Europe, of very short
duration.

Fran