The Life of the Truly Eminent and Learned Hugo Grotius: Containing a Copious and Circumstantial History of the Several Important and Honourable Negotiations in Which He Was Employed; together with a Critical Account of His WorksBurigny, M. de (Jean Lévesque)
History
The Life of the Truly Eminent and Learned Hugo Grotius: Containing a Copious and Circumstantial History of the Several Important and Honourable Negotiations in Which He Was Employed; together with a Critical Account of His Works
Burigny, M. de (Jean Lévesque)
Grotius, Hugo, 1583-1645
Hugo Grotius had also three daughters, Frances, Mary, and Cornelia;
Frances, the youngest, was born in October, 1626, before her time, her
mother being delivered of her in the eighth month: accordingly this
young person was short-lived, for she died in the beginning of the year
1628. Mary, his second daughter, died at Paris in the month of March,
1635, of the fatigue and cold she received in her journey to that city.
Grotius informed his father of her death by a letter[772] dated March
23, 1635, in which he tells him she died almost without pain, and with a
deep sense of religion. "My wife and I, says he, bear this misfortune
like people accustomed to adversity: besides, why should we call her
death a misfortune? has not God a right to take back what he gave? and
ought not we to flatter ourselves that she is arrived at that happy
state, which the young ought to long after as much as the old? We are
delivered from the care of procuring a husband for her: perhaps we
should have had much difficulty to find one that would have been
agreeable to her and to all her family: and even if we should have found
one that pleased us all at first, would there not have been room to
apprehend that he had concealed his true character for a time, and that
he would afterwards make her unhappy? She is now delivered from the
pains of bearing children, and bringing them up. More happy than her
mother, she will not see judges incensed against her husband, because he
is innocent: she will not be obliged to shut herself up in prison for
her husband; nor to lead a wandering life to accompany him. Let us
congratulate her that God has taken her out of the world before she knew
too much of the evil or what are called the good things of it. Let us
congratulate ourselves on her having lived with us as long as life was
agreeable to her, and free from any mixture of bitterness. What is there
at present in Christendom to make us desire life? Divisions in the
Church, bloody wars, men slaughtered, women violated, cruel murders, and
multitudes reduced to beggary; Bohemia, Moravia, and Silesia pillaged;
the heirs of the most noble families reduced to the necessity of living
on alms, if it can be called living to drag out their days in misery,
wishing for death, which alone can put an end to it."
Cornelia, the eldest of Grotius's daughters, who survived her father,
married John Barthon, Viscount of Mombas, a Gentleman of Poitou, who was
obliged to quit France for having displeased Lewis XIV. He went to
Holland, from whence he was also forced to fly, having been involved in
the misfortunes wherein the De Wits perished, and which gave Peter
Grotius, his brother-in-law, so much uneasiness.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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