from deliberate
choice, and who continued during many years to enjoy the tranquillity of
retirement without fetching one penitent sigh, or casting back one look
of desire toward the power or dignity which he had abandoned.

No wonder, then, that Charles' resignation should fill all Europe with
astonishment, and give rise, both among his contemporaries and among the
historians of that period, to various conjectures concerning the motives
which determined a prince, whose ruling passion had been uniformly the
love of power, at the age of fifty-six, when objects of ambition
continue to operate with full force on the mind, and are pursued with
the greatest ardor, to take a resolution so singular and unexpected.
But, while many authors have imputed it to motives so frivolous and
fantastical as can hardly be supposed to influence any reasonable mind;
while others have imagined it to be the result of some profound scheme
of policy, historians more intelligent and better informed neither
ascribe it to caprice, nor search for mysterious secrets of state, where
simple and obvious causes will fully account for the Emperor's conduct.
Charles had been attacked early in life with the gout; and,
notwithstanding all the precautions of the most skilful physicians, the
violence of the distemper increased as he advanced in age, and the fits
became every year more frequent as well as more severe. Not only was the
vigor of his constitution broken, but the faculties of his mind were
impaired by the excruciating torments which he endured. During the
continuance of the fits, he was altogether incapable of applying to
business; and even when they began to abate, as it was only at intervals
that he could attend to what was serious, he gave up a great part of his
time to trifling and even childish occupations, which served to relieve
or amuse his mind, enfeebled and worn out with excess of pain. Under
these circumstances, the conduct of such affairs as occurred of course
in governing so many kingdoms was a burden more than sufficient; but to
push forward and complete the vast schemes which the ambition of his
more active years had formed, or to keep in view and carry on the same
great system of policy, extending to every nation in Europe, and
connected with the operations of every different court, were functions
which so far exceeded his strength that they oppressed and overwhelmed
his mind. As he had been long accustomed to view the business of e