This it is which redeems and exalts this man. He was liberal, he loved to give, and he knew how to give, and let it not be said in the name of any morbid and morose morality that, even if he had taken the State's money without retaining it, he was only the more guilty, uniting prodigality to unscrupulousness. No, his liberality remains honourable; it showed that the principle which prompted his embezzlements was not a vile one, that, if this man was ruined, the cause of his ruin was not natural baseness, but the blind impulse of a naturally magnificent temperament. Thus Foucquet will live in history as the consoler of the aged Corneille, and the tactful patron of La Fontaine. No one will deny his faults, the crimes he committed against the State, but for a moment one may forget them, and say that what was truly noble, and even nobly foolish in his temperament, half atones for the evil which has been only too thoroughly proved. [1] Cf. _Les amateurs de l'ancienne France: Le surintendant Foucquet,_ by Edmond Bonnaffé. _Librairie de l'Art,_ 1882. The book contains particulars drawn from Peiresc's unpublished manuscript. During the course of this work we shall have frequent occasion to quote from this excellent study of an accomplished connoisseur. [2] _Mémoires de Choisy,_ Ed. Petitot et Monmerqué, p. 262. [3] _Journal d'Olivier d'Ormesson,_ Vol. II, p. 60. The unknown author of the dialogues attributed to Molière by M. Louis Auguste Ménard brings Mme. Foucquet on to the stage and makes her utter words in keeping with those pious sentiments which were well known to her contemporaries. The fictitious scene which confronts her with Anne of Austria is a paraphrase of the words I have quoted in my text from the _Mémoires de Choisy._ [4] _Histoire du Dauphiné,_ by M. le baron de Chapuys-Montlaville. Paris, Dupont, 1828, 2 vols. Vol. II, pp. 460 _et seq._ [5] Cf. _Les premiers intendants de justice,_ by S. Hanotaux, in _La Revue Historique,_ 1882 and 1883. [6] Of Fronde.--_Trans._ [7] Mazarin's note-book, XI, fol. 85, Biblioth. Nat. [8] Unpublished Diary of Dubuisson-Aubenay, cited by M. Chéruel in the _Mémoires sur N. Foucquet,_ Vol. I, p. 7. [9] _Histoire de Colbert et de son administration,_ by Pierre Clement. Paris, Didier, 1874, Vol. I, p. 15. [10] _Mémoires sur la vie publique et privée de Foucquet,_ by A. Chéruel, Inspector-General of Education. Paris, Charpentier, 1862, Vol. I, pp. 86-88. [11] Bibliothèque Nationale, MSS. collection Gaignieres. This letter is quoted by Chéruel, I, p. 183. [12] _Histoire financière de la France,_ by A. Bailly. Paris, 1830, Vol. I, p. 357. [13] In 1651, Foucquet received from Marie-Madeleine de Castille, the daughter of François de Castille, his wife, one hundred thousand livres, the house in the Rue du Temple, the abode of the Castille family, as well as the buildings adjoining, which were let at 2200 livres. (Cf. Jal, _Dictionnaire,_ article on Foucquet)