ment. Suppose an amateur of pictures had decided upon making a complete collection of all the images by which the old masters have given expression to their ideas of one of those personages who so often are represented in the masterpieces of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. As the originals are not to be had, he would send an artist to the various picture galleries of Europe with the order to procure him copies. But what would we say if he enjoined the artist to copy only the one figure in question out of the groups of which it forms a part? Would not the expression, the gestures, in fine, all the better part of the picture, remain unintelligible, because the surrounding and explaining figures are wanting? In science as in art the real significance of one special point becomes intelligible only when all the other points are understood with which it stands in connection.

tory wants is, therefore, not the correspondence of this or that statesman, nor that of one single government, but the whole correspondence of, at least, the leading powers of the period in which he is concerned. Any attempt to select such state papers as relate to any special transaction, or to any special country, must be a failure. The whole foreign policy of any one government forms, as it were, but one body, of which its relations with special other governments are the members. We will try to make this clear by an example. Suppose that Charles V. had to decide whether it was wise or unwise to go to war with England. The relative strength of the Emperor and of Henry VIII. would, in such a case, be only a secondary consideration. The first and most vital question would be what the relations of Charles with the other powers were. Would Italy remain quiet, or attack his Italian possessions We do not conceal from ourselves the while he was occupied in a war with difficulties of such a work as that of which England? Would France be in a posi- we are speaking. The documents, it will tion to assist England effectually? The be objected by many, would perhaps fill answer to this latter question depended more than a hundred large volumes. again on the state of public affairs in Certainly they would. But if the volTurkey. Could the King of France count umes amounted not only to more than upon the support of the Turks? But the one hundred, but to more than five hunconcatenation of facts which were to be dred, would that be a misfortune? The taken into consideration did not even stop student would rather surround himself here. The question whether Turkey was with any number of volumes, than unable to undertake a war in Europe de- dergo the humiliating idea, when compended on her relations with the Sophi posing a history, that he is constantly of Persia. Many of our readers will be exposed to the danger of falling into preinclined to suppose that, drawing upon posterous mistakes in consequence of the our imagination, we are exaggerating fragmentary state of the sources of inforthe case. They are mistaken, if they mation which are at his disposal. We do so.. Charles V. was more than once repeat, therefore, once more, that nothing waiting for the news from Constantinople less than a complete publication of the or from Persia before he decided on a whole political correspondence of the measure which regarded France or Eng-leading governments can satisfy the leland. Had we ten times as much space gitimate demands of the historian; but at our disposal as we have, we could we hasten to add that any instalment transcribe any number of passages from made in the right direction would be official dispatches and protocols of sit- accepted by us with gratitude. tings of the Privy Council which would remove all doubts.

Thus the whole foreign policy of any given government forming but one body, it is a mutilation to tear out from it single state papers relating to a certain subject or to a certain country, the real meaning of which can only be understood if they are read in connection with the rest of the correspondence of the same govern

The consequence of the comparatively small amount of genuine historical information which is now at our disposal, especially with regard to the policy of Charles V., is visible in the very title which Mignet has chosen for his work. He has called it Rivalité, because, according to his opinion, Charles and Francis were rivals down to the middle of the sixteenth century-that is to say, until the

and Francis? Had it not taken place if Charles, or Francis, or both of them, had been less ambitious? We think the struggle was inevitable, whatever the personal character of Charles or of Francis might have been.

In the middle of the fifteenth century there was no really powerful State in Europe. England was ruined by her intestine wars. France was weakened by the opposition of her great feudatories to her central government. It was almost dismembered. Spain was divided into Granada, Castile, Aragon, and Navarre: each of these kingdoms continually waging wars with its neighbors, and raising up civil discord in them. Italy was broken up into a great number of States; and Germany counted the princes, cities, and noblemen by thousands. who virtually were more or less petty sovereigns. The Emperor Frederic III. was so much reduced that he had been obliged to go in a cart, drawn by oxen, from one place to another, half beggar, half Cæsar, yet never giving up the aspirations after supremacy which the princes of Austria cherished with unswerving constancy. When Louis XI. founded a strong government and reduced the all but sovereign vassals to obedience, France was the only great power in Christendom. One powerful

death of the King of France. Rivalry is a state of things in which two, or more than two, persons compete for the same objects. Such rivalry existed between the two princes, but it existed only during the earlier years of their reigns. It ceased perhaps immediately after the battle of Pavia, and did certainly not outlive the interview of the Pope and Francis I. at Marseilles. During the election of the Emperor in the year 1519, and during the first Italian wars, both Charles and Francis aspired to the dominion of the whole Christian world. They were then rivals. When, however, King Francis reduced his ambition to schemes of conquering portions of Italy, when he offered the Emperor to divide England between them, and even when he proposed a division of the whole of Europe, he was an opponent, but not a rival, of Charles. For Charles never abandoned his plan of rendering himself master of the whole of Christendom, France included. He strove after universal empire, while Francis, during the second half of his reign, endeavored only to aggrandize France by partial conquests. The object which the Emperor had in view was very different from that at which the King of France aimed; not only in quantity but also in quality. The empire which Charles V. imagined he was destined to realize was a safe-king among any number of mean States guard of the universal peace of Christendom, purchased by the sacrifice of national independence; the division of Europe which Francis aimed at professed to be the independence of nations at the price of continual strife and war.

threatens the independence of all of them. This danger naturally provoked opposition; and the desire to found another power, strong enough to resist France, was quite legitimate. The union of Castile and Aragon with Burgundy and Mignet explains the origin of the rival- Austria was the consequence of it. The ry between Charles V. and Francis I. in new Hispano-Austrian power, however, too narrow a manner. Both princes, he grew, from circumstances which we caninforms us, possessed powerful kingdoms, not explain in this place, stronger than had great qualities of mind, and an extreme originally been intended. Before Charles ambition. When, therefore the imperial V. was born, it was clear that the States throne had become vacant, they both of which the first-born son of the Archthem competed for it, and the competition duchess Juanna was to inherit, would once begun was continued afterwards. form so mighty an empire that not only That Charles V. and Francis I. were mon- would the influence of France be counarchs of powerful kingdoms is certain, terpoised, but also its existence as an and that they possessed great qualities independent kingdom would be threatand inordinate ambition may also be true.ened. When the mother of Charles was But does that explain the case, or exhaust about to bring forth, statesmen in all it? Did the competition between the parts of Christendom were speculating house of Valois and Hapsburg spring whether the child would be a male or a from the personal qualities of Charles female. As soon as he was born, letters

were dispatched from Ghent to all parts | earliest years of his childhood in the idea of Europe, announcing the birth of the that the empire of the world belonged to future lord of the world. When Charles him by right. He entered upon it with was quite a child, and it could hardly be the concentrated energy of his passionate known whether he would be ambitious mind, and had not entirely given up his or not, both his grandfathers, Maximil- aspirations when he was concluding his ian and Ferdinand the Catholic, did not life in Yuste. All his various measures content themselves with entertaining of war or peace with special countries vague hopes or impotent wishes for his were regarded by him as so many steps future greatness. They actually con- towards the attainment of his ultimate tracted formal treaties with other poten- plans. For instance, his first Italian tates, in which the right of the future wars were in appearance carried on for representative of the houses of Spain and nothing else than in order to expel the Austria to be the emperor of the world French from Milan and from Genoa. was recognized. In the treaty, for in- As soon, however, as we enter into the stance, which Pope Julius II. concluded intimacy of the Emperor and his most on the 19th of November, 1512, with the confidential advisers, we see that they Cardinal of Gurk, who acted in the name wanted to expel Francis from Italy in of Maximilian, it was stipulated in clauses order that they might render themselves 4 and 5 that France was to be subjugated masters of Milan and Genoa. They and dismembered; while clause 14 of wished to render themselves masters of the same treaty contains the conditions Milan and Genoa in order to gain doon which the Turkish empire was to be minion over the whole of Italy. They conquered, and the two crowns of the Ro- wanted to be lords of Italy because, once man "Imperators," that of the Occident masters of that rich country, they thought and that of the Orient, were to be placed they would soon be able to subject the on the same head. Similar stipulations rest of Christendom. That is not a mere are to be found in other treaties of that guess of ours. To show the realer how period. We will, however, mention only the Emperor and his advisers thought one more of them. In the month of on this subject, we may be permitted to September, 1515, Pope Leo X., the Em-transcribe a short passage from a protocol peror Maximilian, King Ferdinand the Catholic, the Duke of Milan, and the Swiss Confederacy concluded a treaty in which it was stipulated in as many words that "Jerusalem and the whole of Syria, the Constantinopolitan empire, and the other kingdoms, provinces, districts, etc., of the Turks" were to be conquered, and that "the old Roman empires, that of the Occident and that of the Orient, were to be revived and to beunited" in the house of Austria. This is not the place to enter into the question whether it was possible or not to carry out plans of such vastness. It is sufficient to show that the idea of a universal Christian empire was already entertained by both the grandfathers of Charles. Mignet is, therefore, wrong in ascribing a very small portion of that plan with which alone he is acquainted-to the immoderate ambition of Charles. Charles was not a political adventurer who, encouraged by success, conceived the plan to try whether fortune would favor him in greater undertakings. He was brought up from the

of a sitting of the Privy Council in which the war in Italy was taken into consideration:

"La première considéracion est que les duchez de Milan et Gennes sont les clefs et la porte pour povoir garder et dominer toute l'Italie, et l'Italie establie et bien reduite est le vrai siège et sceptre pour dominer tout le monde, et pour ce que les François vos enemies le cognoissent très-bien et qu'ilz tiennent leur propre roiaulme comme ilz ont bien monce point en plus dextime que la deffence de stré à présent par effet, fault considérer,” etc.

A considerable number of similar instances could be adduced. In fact, the idea of universal empire is either clearly stated or implicitly admitted in all state papers of Charles V. which were destined to be seen only by the initiated. Sometimes, but rarely, a confidential councillor of the crown let out the secret by a blunder. For instance, Fray Garcia Laoysa, who was confessor and privy councillor of the Emperor, and a cardinal besides, had a very high opinion of his oratorical and persuasive powers. He

was strong enough to offer resistance to Charles V. Francis too often neglected, his duties, not only towards France, but also towards the other States of Europe, the independence of which depended on him more than on any other prince.

The Rivalité de Charles Quint et de François Ier, by Mignet, opens with a detailed description of the contest of the two rival kings for the imperial crown in 1519. Mignet leads us over the same ground on which another historian of high reputation, Leopold Ranke, has more than once taken us. The difference between the two historians is as great as it can be between two men of eminence. Leopold Ranke relates to us the facts of history in a more or less general form, adding to them superabundant detail, which bears testimony to his great industry, but which we could wish to receive in a more palatable form. In the works of Ranke we do not see the persons who were the actors; and even in the rare instances where they become visible to us, we can scarcely distinguish their features. They are hazy phantoms; rather shadowy embodiments of general ideas, than living men with warm heart-blood flowing through their veins, and originating passions and aspirations. Mignet, on the other hand, introduces us directly to the living men. We meet in his book, princes, ministers, generals, and ambassadors, who are, in substance, not very different from persons we occasionally meet in the real world in which we live. Through them, and only through them, we learn the affairs of state and the policy of their days. Another difference between the French and the German historian consists in the circumstance that Mignet is always perfectly clear, even where he errs from imperfect knowledge; while Ranke is not seldom almost unintelligible, even when he is well informed. Mignet groups his history with a simplicity and an artistic feeling which exercise a great charm on our mind: Ranke is confused, and wearies us. We read Mignet for information and for pleasure; we undergo the tiresome task of unriddling Ranke only because we hope to learn from him. As for uncouth words of eight, and sometimes of more syllables,* into which Ranke oc

casionally twists the German language, we do not think that Mignet is capable of coining anything similar.

Mignet's narrative of the intrigues of the election of 1519 is excellent, if regarded as a work of art. We do not believe that this dirty affair has ever before been nearly so well related. The princes electors were seven in number-the King of Bohemia, the Archbishop of Mentz, the Archbishop of Cologne, the Archbish op of Treves, the Prince Elector of Saxony, the Markgrave of Brandenburg, and the Count Palatine. The King of Bohemia was a minor, and, besides, a brother-in-law of Charles. He could be relied upon. Frederic, Prince Elector of Saxony, was inaccessible to corruption. But the other five electors vied with one another as to which of them would commit the most contemptible acts in order to obtain a higher price for his vote. As early as in the year 1516, Francis had gained the Archbishop of Treves. In the year 1517, the Markgrave of Brandenburg sold his vote to the King of France. The price was a marriage of the Princess Renée of France with the eldest son of the Markgrave, a dower of 150,000 écus d'or (8,300,000 francs), a pension of 4000 livres a year, and another pension of 8000 livres. The brother of the Markgrave was Archbishop of Mentz. He was also bought by Francis. Soon afterwards the Count Palatine was won. Francis thus commanded four votes-that is to say, he had assured the majority of votes for his election. But Maximilian and Charles did not remain idle. Offering higher bribes than Francis, they bought back the votes of the princes electors, so that they commanded five votes. Only the vote of the Archbishop of Treves remained to the King of France, the Prince Elector of Saxony declaring himself neither for the one nor for the other candidate. After the death of Maximilian the intrigues increased, and buying and selling votes was carried on with even greater shamelessness than before. Agents of Charles and agents of Francis travelled without interruption from one of the electors to the other, with beasts of burden behind them laden with gold. The Pope

setzen." Deutsche Geschichte im Zeitalter der Ref

*For instance, "diess nur-nicht-sich-entgegen- ormation, 3d edition, vol. iv., p. 181.