In studying attentively the aim, the progress, the methods, and results of the government of Richelieu,--in comparing, in a word, the point of departure of his administration with the imperious conclusion of absolute centralisation toward which it always tended, and which he attained so victoriously,--one is especially impressed by the character of the navy, by the incredible confusion and multiplicity of powers or rival rights which covered the seashore of the kingdom with their inextricable network. When the cardinal was entrusted with the maritime interests of France, he could count but little upon the support of a weak, timid, restless, and capricious king; besides, he felt that France was secretly agitated by profound political and religious discords. Alone, opposing the exorbitant pretensions represented by the most powerful houses of France,--haughty and jealous guardians of the last traditions of feudal independence,--it was essential that the will of Richelieu should be indomitable, even obstinate, in order to crush beneath the level of administrative unity interests so numerous, so tenacious, and so rebellious! Such was, however, the work of this great minister. There is no doubt that the ardent and sacred love of the general good, the noble, instinctive perception of the needs and progress of humanity,--those pure and serene aspirations of a DeWitt or a Franklin,--would not have sufficed the cardinal in undertaking and sustaining so fierce a struggle; perhaps, too, it was essential that he should feel himself animated by an unbridled, insatiable ambition, in order to cope with so many formidable antagonisms, to despise so many outcries, to prevent or punish so many dangerous revolts by prison, exile, or the scaffold, and at last achieve the end of gathering in his dying and sovereign hand all the resources of the state. It was by this means--we think so, at least--that the genius of Richelieu, exalted by an unconquerable personality, succeeded in consummating this admirable centralisation of conflicting powers,--the constant aim and glorious end of his administration. Unfortunately, he died at the time he was beginning to organise this authority so valiantly conquered. If France, at the time of the cardinal’s death, presented still upon her surface the distinct evidences of a complete social overthrow, the soil was at least beginning to be freed from the thousand parasitical and devouring forces which had so long exhausted her strength. So, one might say that almost always eminent men, although of diverse genius, are born in time to achieve the great labours of governments. To Richelieu, that resolute and indefatigable clearer of untilled ground, succeeds Mazarin, who levelled the earth so profoundly ploughed,--then Colbert, who sowed it, and made it fruitful.